The seduction-machine: "Subjects," the Excitement-Hope-Acquisition-Contempt cycle, the chart

pivotal · Subsidized era, → YDAU

• When: ongoing since the disfigurement/separation (~YTSDB), stated as of YDAU
• What: Orin's adult erotic life is a ritualized serial conquest of women he calls "Subjects." Per Hal (scene 122): once Orin "needed only to have sexual intercourse with them" — the era of the record of Subjects, "sort of a cross between a chart and a journal," left out "just pleading to be read"; after Joelle's disfigurement he escalated to "getting them to fall so terribly in love with him they'd never be able to want anyone else." Per the narration (scene 119): "Orin can only give, not receive, pleasure," feigning post-coital tenderness over a "contempt he belies so well with gentleness." The drive is not conquest but the propitiation of an impossible hope (event 19) laced with need, fear, and hatred.