Damian stepped through the newly appeared doorway within the Nevermore construct with Toby. After a disorienting flash of light, he found himself back in the white 'room' that he'd initially entered, this time standing next to the naked figure of his reluctant guide.
He turned to him, still angry.
"What the fuck is going on in this place?" he demanded. "Where are you taking me?"
Toby seemed calmer again now, although Damian could feel the pull against his mind as he tried to regenerate some clothes to cover himself. Damian staunchly resisted. After this betrayal, he deserved a bit of humiliation.
Toby shot him a sideways glance, understanding the control that Damian somehow had over him. He sighed.
"I'm taking you to the operating console." He explained. "That's where I can show you how Nevermore works".
Another subaudible click signalled a further shift in the construct, and Damian found them both standing in a non-descript office, with bare walls and devoid of furniture.
"This is where all the information is stored for the Nevermore platform." Toby explained. "From here you can access past encounters, preferences, avatars...This is the heart of the construct."
"Do you mean to tell me that anything that happens here is recorded?" Damian asked, aghast.
"That's right. We have to record it in case there are allegations of wrongdoing down the track. This is our protection." Toby explained it like it was the most normal thing in the world to have video of people's most secret encounters held for anyone to access."
"How do I know that people can't just come in and jerk off to my 'encounters' to their heart's content?" Damian was beginning to see the implications of this. Who knew who had access to his recent indiscretions?
"Well, generally no-one can access someone else's data in Nevermore. Privacy is the backbone of our organisation." He seemed to gloss over his recent voyeuristic breach of this backbone from earlier.
"Every now and then, though, someone is willing to sign over access to others in return for certain benefits. You and your friends, for example, seemed happy to sign a consent form giving ownership of all your recordings and data for Nevermore to do with as it pleased in return for a slightly longer appendage."
"What do you mean?" A heavy stone had suddenly lodged itself in the pit of Damian's gut. What exactly had he signed in that consent form?
"Well, the form you signed is an agreement that any data obtained during your time at Nevermore, and any avatars produced, is the property of the construct. It means that you've agreed to let others use your avatar for their own purposes."
Damian felt like he was going to vomit.
"So they can just come in here and pretend to be me?"
"Of course not!" Toby laughed. "No one else can inhabit your avatar. However the avatars can be run on autopilot by the construct. They act and respond based on the data collected from your visits here in Nevermore. That's why your own encounter with yourself was so realistic."
Toby went on explaining, oblivious to the roaring commotion going through Damian's mind.
"One of the problems we had at the beginning of Nevermore is that entirely synthetic avatars are never all that convincing. Even with all of our technology, it seems we can never quite mirror the exact combination of movements and responses that we need to make humans convincing.
"People enjoyed their time here, but it never seemed as real as it should. One of our biggest discoveries was that basing avatars on real people made the result so much more realistic. The data we collect from their original and follow up encounters only serves to increase that realism."
"So basically you just steal data from the people who come here?" Damian had turned from feeling sick to feeling angry now. He fought a desire to punch him in the face.
"It's not theft at all." Toby was defensive. "We give people all the information and ask them directly to confirm they've read and understood it. Frankly it surprises me that you wouldn't read such a thing more carefully.
"Also, we only harvest data from certain participants. We find that men who attend in groups, buck's parties, groups of mates, etc. tend to be much more willing to give up their data in exchange for looking good in front of their peers.
"We also find they're much more...flexible. This suits our purposes as well. That's why we offer such a discount for these groups."
"What do you mean more 'flexible'?" Damian asked.
"Well, the holy grail of avatars is to scan someone relatively innocent, and then collect data as they experience something for the first time. That means that all of the expressions, movements, sounds they make when they experience it for the 'first time' again with someone else will be all the more realistic.
"Your waiter, for example. Had he not been fucked for the first time here in Nevermore, we never would have been able to produce that look on his face as you entered him. That mix of apprehension, surrender, pleasure... These are the things that make Nevermore so unique."
Damian blushed as his cock jumped at the memory of that vulnerable look. It seemed he had no secrets from Nevermore now.
"But what does flexibility have to do with that? How does that help you get your first times?"
Toby nodded, as if expecting the question. He took a deep breath.
"Well, we find that people can be quite malleable while in Nevermore. People who never would have ventured down a particular road will often skip happily down it with the merest of pushes.
"Homosexual encounters, for example. Almost all men have had some level of fantasy or curiosity about sex with another man, but most would never even consider trying it in real life. Put them in a group where it becomes normalised, though, and they're guzzling cock like some cum-covered porn star.
"Take your group. All 'straight' blokes, none of you have ever held another cock in your hand. All it takes is some loss of inhibition to grease the wheels.
