In Defense of a Bad Plan, an essay by Jack Edwards.
So I've gotten two comments, a PM and a Reddit message confused about Alex's plan in the most recent chapter, and what she hoped to accomplish with it.
Here's the thing, the plan is deliberately bad. And by that I don't mean Alex thinks she has a bad plan, I'm sure she thinks her plan is terrific... you know, other than outright admitting it's stupid when pressed by Sherry. But as a writer, I knew that the only way this was going to work - and I knew this months ago when I outlined this out, make no mistake - was if Alex's attempt at scheming were about on par with Cersei Lannister's. Which is to say, she fucking sucks at it. If this were an action movie, she'd be the brute of the team, whose first and really only effective solution involved the direct approach, and when she tries to go a different direction, it backfires spectacularly. In this story, it means her decisionmaking is just plain not up to par. This is an intentional decision on my part as a writer. You can tell, because Sherry is basically telling her (and the audience) that what Alex is doing is stupid, she's rolling her eyes and trying to figure it out at any turn, and the only thing that gets her on board with the plan is Alex's promise to give Sherry sexual control for a day, because Sherry is the only character more sex-obsessed than Alex is.
As a writer, I've been writing Alex with very specific character flaws, which I will now share with you so you get why I had her come up with a hare-brained scheme such as this one.
First, I've been writing Alex as though she has mild, undiagnosed ADHD. This is evident by both her constantly being distracted by things, but also by her occasional moments of laser-tight focus. On the things she wants to pay attention to, like when she first discovered how Sexworld detention works, she bored down on it like a homing missile, and didn't even notice the woman she has a massive crush on walk out of the building and up next to her. On the other hand, we've seen her get antsy when she does one thing (or one person) for too long.
Second, and I fully admit this is a character flaw that I borrowed from my cat of all places, she has a tendency to fully commit to decisions even when she realizes they're bad ones. There have been two times in the story where this flaw has gotten her in trouble; her challenging her math teacher, and when she sexually propositioned Pat between classes. She'll make a decision and go for it regardless of the consequences. So what does that mean for siccing Sherry on her brother? She came to some conclusions about her brother's presence, whether or not those conclusions are correct is immaterial here, and she decided to "do something about it," however nebulous that concept may seem. So she ropes in someone she clearly sees as a sexual role model, who instantly realizes that this is is a bad idea, but by the time Alex realizes it herself, she's already committed to it. She's put her chips in the pot so to speak, even if her hand is terrible.
And finally, as perceptive as she is, she gets stuck in her own head a LOT. We've seen her ruminate on all sorts of things and make some weird conclusions. This gives her an advantage in piecing together information when she chooses to, but it's not really an advantage when looking at people's motives. In her mind, her plan revolves around jealousy. She came to the (incorrect) conclusion that Emily was flaunting Pat to her. So the best way to handle the situation is to remove access to Pat from who she now sees as an aggressor. Obviously this is very flawed thinking, and she's clearly forgetting several precepts of Sexworld life, but in her mind, this is basically Operation: Make Emily Jealous. Again, this is a terrible plan with no real basis in Sexworld reality, for reasons which either should be evident or will become so once this story arc reaches its culmination.
And that's the crux of this whole thing. Alex is not a perfect person. She's absolutely going to come to incorrect conclusions. And those incorrect conclusions will get her in trouble. And if we're lucky, it'll be sexy trouble.
tl;dr: Alex's plan is terrible in-universe and ON PURPOSE. Chill, guys.