Oh, the other thing I wanted to mention is, Eric seems practically unable to resist ramping up his enabling of the boys' boyish behavior in the same vein as Ken. In the early chapters, all his private thoughts are about how utterly strange it is, but gradually over the course of each night, he can't focus on the thoughts of strangeness for as long, and just defaults to acting in the same enabling, prodding, coaxing way as Ken. I really think it's inconceivable that Eric isn't being unknowingly manipulated, himself.

I was raised Aesir from age 7 and I honor the old ways. Normally I would object to an Odinic sexual fantasy but Mate; what an incredible story of embodiment, possession and transformation. I'm awed at it's potency. Good on you!!!

My tl;dr I guess is, every time *any* character but Ken ever thinks of doing anything which would interfere with Ken's supposed experiment, they start rationalizing wildly out-of-character things, and while Liam is usually shown to be aware he is making these rationalizations, Eric really, really doesn't - even though his rationalizations as to why he doesn't interfere get really wacky and deeply irrational when you take a step back from them. I think Ken pre-conditioned these characters to achieve these results, and furthermore I think that Eric is a straight-up unreliable narrator and has been hypnotized himself, which skews the very perspective of the story.

Honestly, tangential to the discussion people are having about the ethics of the story, the way it has been written up until now has consistently given me the impression that any or all of the guys involved may have been unknowingly manipulated prior to the story, or are being manipulated in additional ways which they aren't aware of; that Ken has been priming for this short period of extreme manipulation for even longer than where the story started. Especially Eric; it's felt to me like he ethically knows many times that what he wants to do, and what he should do, is intervene; but, even from night one, it just felt implicitly right to him to rationalize the behavior of acting in a caregiver role, felt implicitly right to him despite his natural discomfort the very first time Benny made stickies on him. He shows no prior inclination to this particular sexuality and yet, at every turn in the story, it seems that every time he gets pushed one step further in that direction, he compulsively rationalizes immediately why he should *not take any actions to interfere with Ken's experiment.* Eric thinks from minute one that the *whole experiment* is wrong, that neither Ben or Liam should even submit to it, and yet nobody is questioning this character's attitude on the matter going from "this is some wildly fucked-up shit what the hell" to "I need to help my little boy make stickies before pre-school" in the *exact same time-frame* as Liam going from an IQ of 142 to an IQ of 42? Eric initially wanted to recoil from Benny's first obliviously sexual advances due to the extreme inter-personal discomfort and ethical implications he *immediately* recognized - much like most sane readers - and yet he immediately snap-rationalizes that Benny doesn't know better and it would be bad to hurt his feelings, and that making a scene would make Benny upset and so he should just simply accept the sexual attention. Eric knows that Liam shouldn't go through this, but he can never bring himself to really try to convince him; he just accepts Liam's lame excuse of 'I always follow through on my word*.' Eric repeatedly, internally surmises that Liam is compulsively losing the most important things that he values in life, but every time he thinks to *actually do something* in response to those thoughts, he suddenly has another rationalization - one which would preserve the experiment. He's literally standing over Liam, having the assurance of complete confidence from Ken that Liam's brain is being fucking *melted* right now, and what does he think? He doesn't think "oh man it's so hot Liam is gonna be a little boy," he doesn't even spend long wondering whether he thinks Liam will make it or not. He immediately thinks "It's already been an hour, it's probably already too late, it would be best to just let it happen." *Non-interference with the experiment.* You see what I'm saying? In the very set-up of the story, all of the guys seem very driven, despite their other misgivings, to help Ken with whatever he needs. Nobody seems willing to interfere with Ken's experiment, even with their very ethics are at stake. I really think all 3 of them were compromised by Ken long before he enacted this culminating period of intense brainwashing, even if it was just him being a subtly manipulative psycho, and not legit drugging or hypnotizing them. When Ken is preparing to trigger Liam's ultimate regression, the very word "trigger" makes Eric strongly react; if I recall it correctly, he doesn't see Liam's reaction and feel his blood run cold; he *feels something inside himself* (which he does not question, and is immediately distracted from), and then recognizes it in Liam's face. Eric also is very sure to note *to himself* that there doesn't seem to be anything odd about the nursery rhyme trigger, as he watches it affect Liam. Is Eric a reliable narrator? Given that, immediately after the triggering, Eric falls *deeply and completely into fetishizing the brain-drained status of Liam* - who, moments before, he felt terrified for - instantly babying him as if Liam now becoming a functional toddler is not a major event, even though *neither Liam nor Eric honestly believed it would happen about thirty seconds prior.* When Eric raises his concerns about the ethics of all of this, or how much this is wrong to do to Ben and Liam, and how they would hate to be forced to be like this, Ken literally just tells him to "let [Ken] worry about it;" that's all it takes to convince Eric. I honestly think Eric is going through the same psycho-sexual compulsive arousal conditioning for sure, and Ken just made his compulsion to normalize and accept the care-giving as his new sexual outlet, either simply because it was a convenient way to make the experiment easier on him in one way or another, or because he has even darker motives. *\**(something which, I'll add, Ken would definitely be able to know about him as a higher-level psych student who has been living with these close friends for months or years, and also administered a battery of personality tests to Liam and Ben - and, possibly, secretly Eric, as well - under the guise of preparing to do a test or a study)

I cant wait to see where this goes

> but I think the mods REALLY need to look over the rules and policies of this story because the sexualisation of these characters is “acceptable” by the flimsiest of excuses “oh they’re a child in every way but they’re 6 foot so it’s not gross.” My discomfort notwithstanding, "the mods" (i.e. me) is in no way questioning that this story is well within the rules and policies of this site.

because people are in a constant search for their next nut, they will excuse some disturbing things. I know some folks are really into the adult baby scene, which while not for me, is popular in gay spaces probably for similar reasons to dumbing down. I have read the three chapters of this and I have to admit, your writing is good, it’s evocative, it highlights the cruelty of men in and the things they’ll ignore in favor of an erection. Benny is a victim here, but every other character is enjoying the loss of agency and infantilisation of the other because it makes their dick hard, and maybe that makes folks uncomfortable because they aren’t far off from there. I’m not the target audience of this story so it won’t be a story I revisit, but I think the mods REALLY need to look over the rules and policies of this story because the sexualisation of these characters is “acceptable” by the flimsiest of excuses “oh they’re a child in every way but they’re 6 foot so it’s not gross.”

Awesome story! I already love both characters: would love a sequel detailing their "exploits"!

More?...

his partner is his master ! Super interesting move! So sad it's not finished.