The Spoofery

This thread is to store a series of humorous shorts I wrote on another forum, centering around the members there. Recently, the forum has been effectively taken over by a malicious hacker, and I really didn't want to lose these. I thought I'd store them here, if that's okay. Feel free to read them--they're not bad, I guess, although you'd be missing a lot of in-jokes. If it's not okay, please tell me and I'll move them.

((Or whatever the hell that topic was.))

"Tomatoes," said Spella, looking shifty. All around the temple, whispers circled, like vultures watching their prey. Grim stroked his beard, beady eyes peering about. Cheese? No! Pizza had cheese and tomatoes! That wouldn't fly. He sank backwards into his seat, trying to pretend he was Jack Black, but they had already spotted him. They knew it was his turn. They knew.

"Hot Chocolate!" He exclaimed suddenly, experiencing a burst of inspiration. A few people sitting at the table gasped quietly. He was daring, this one. A risky move, hot chocolate, but it could pay off.

"Oysters," said Draco, fingering the pearl necklace that gleamed around her neck, drawing attention to her plunging neckline. Her long sensuous fingers caressed the big hard balls...of mother-of-pearl. She ran her tongue over her lips, glancing at the next contestant.

Saturos was starting to sweat. What could he come up with that wouldn't go with tomatoes, hot chocolate, or oysters? Mayonnaise, obviously, but they had already agreed that using mayonnaise was cheating, since it was gross as shit and just didn't go well with anything. The table's occupants, sensing his weakness, closed in around him. They waited for his pronouncement with baited breath. You could have heard a pin drop, save for Saturos's labored breathing. The sweat ran down into his eyes, and he raised an arm to wipe it away. The tension was unbearable. He couldn't handle it. He was going to die. He had to--wait! He had it! A stroke of genius filled his mind, and a tiny invisible light bulb turned on over his head. He surged forward with confidence, thrusting his finger out dramatically.

"WHIPPED CREAM!" he shouted, the words echoing around the room. His breathing was heavy, but a triumphant smile covered his face. He had done it! He had found something that--wait. Wait, why where they all looking at him like that? Spella grinned evilly to herself. Grim looked at him like he was sizing up a guitar to use for his school of rock. Draco licked her lips again and eyed him up, the scent of bananas filling the air around her. Then Saturos realized his mistake. Whipped cream went well with hot chocolate! He sat down heavily, shock and disbelief written all over his face. It was over. He had lost.

"Don't feel bad, Satty." Draco purred into his ear, slipping one arm around his shoulders and another under his shirt collar. "I'm sure I could think of plenty of other things whipped cream could go with."

"Heeeeeeeheeheeheehee!" giggled Spella as her fingers wrapped around the bottle of dressing. Her long, clawlike fingernails dug into the paper covering. She stood before a table in her basement, the table wobbly because of a too-short fourth leg. One single light bulb was suspended by a power chord from the ceiling, turned on and off by a string with a tiny crushed metal bell on the end that dangled from the socket. A rat scurried past her and into the corner, carrying a piece of god-knew-what, but she ignored it.

It was well past midnight, and the rest of her household was asleep. They would never understand, the fools. Their puny minds were too small to even comprehend the forces she toyed with. Dangerous forces, yes, but Spella knew what she was doing. She would show them. She would show them all, and then they'd be sorry! "We're sorry, Spella!" they would shout. "We should never have doubted you!" "It's too late now," she would reply haughtily, "You had your chance." She grinned to herself, thinking about the pictures she would take. The character limit on the temple wouldn't be able to hold all of her pictures! She would have to make two posts in a row just to handle the snapshots of her triumphant grin.

She pulled the bowl of mac'n'cheese closer and leaned in. She tipped the bottle over it, and a small glob of Ranch dressing oozed out and onto the macaroni. It hissed violently, steam rising up from the point of contact. She giggled her evil giggle and set the macaroni aside. None of them knew her secret. You couldn't use any substitute for real Ranch dressing. Ranch Lite was for pussies like Necare. No weight-loss alternatives for Spella! Real Ranch dressing was the only way, the only thing strong enough for her desires. She poured the Ranch out over a bowl of chocolate pudding, watching raptly.

BOOM! The pudding exploded, leaving her covered in scorched brown-and-white goo. She rushed to the corner, toweled herself clean, and took half a dozen pictures of her face. Whew. All better. She was just starting to return to the table when she heard sirens. What? What was that? Sirens at this time of night? What could--

The sirens halted outside her house, and she heard the sound of car doors behind slammed. Fear gripped her heart. No! It was impossible! She had carefully hidden her laboratory's presence from everyone! Everyone except--shit. The temple. The police must have seen the pictures she posted on the temple and used them to work out her location. Damn! She had struggled so hard to set up that fake IP address, and all for nothing! She could have cried, but instead she grabbed her trusty Ranch dressing and, cradling it close to her chest, ran upstairs.

"Spella! This is the police!" the loudspeaker boomed. "Come out of the house! Keep your hands where we can see them!"

She burst out of the front door, brandishing the bottle of Ranch at the ten squad cars parked outside. "Come and get me!" she yelled. Instantly, the officers ducked behind the cars and aimed their guns at her.

"Spella! Put the dressing down and place your hands on your head!" the loudspeaker boomed. She frowned. She knew that voice! But no. Now was not the time.

"You'll never take me alive, coppahs!" she screamed, and squeezed the bottle of Ranch. A spurt of white, sticky fluid shot from the tip, covering one officer with Ranch. He screamed and dropped to the ground as his skin smouldered. The other officers opened fire. Spella's body was riddled with bullets in front of her house, as the neighbors watched with relief. She collapsed to the ground in a bloody heap, the bottle falling beside her. She gazed at it, her vision going dark. Oh, Ranch...she longed for it so. A trickle of the salad dressing reached her tongue.

She hissed, sitting upright. She clawed the air and grabbed the bottle, hugging it tightly to herself. She crawled back and vanished into the bushes. The last thing they heard was her faint hissing growing fainter and fainter until it faded away into silence.

"Well, chief, what now?" one officer asked, throwing a quick salute. "It appears she's gotten away, and one of our men is wounded."

"I guess we'll just wait. She's bound to make another username on the temple sometime." he replied.

"Yes, chief, but until then?"

"I dunno. Nyoro~n..." shrugged police chief Saturos.

They stared at each other over the table. Haggard eyes, deprived of sleep, were surrounded by dark circles and overshadowed by dirty, unwashed hair. Their clothing stank of sweat. Someone had farted about ten minutes ago and it still smelled of rotten eggs. They had locked eyes with each other, engaging in a fierce contest of will and the ability of their dried-out orbs not to blink. The area was completely silent. They had been at it for days, battling for the fate of the world.

No, they weren't playing Yu-gi-oh.

Draco gripped her fork tightly. She wasn't going down without a fight. There were people counting on her. She had a cause, and she would rather die than betray it. Across the table from her, Jack Black held his fork with both hands like a guitar and growled at her. At least, it would have seemed that way to the untrained eye. In fact, it was Jack Black's alter ego, Grim, using his leet ninja skillz to impersonate the rock star. (Six and half a dozen.)

A massive plate of scrambled eggs sat between them. Grim had a salt-and-pepper combo shaker close to his hand, designed for the maximum salt-and-pepper-shaking angle of fire. On Draco's side of the table there was a bottle of ketchup, but it was at least two feet away from her. It was the glass kind, the sort that only waitresses could get anything out of. She never used the squeezable plastic bottle kind. They ran out of ammo too quickly, and then they could only make funny fart noises. Squeezable bottles were only for pussies like Necare. No weight-loss alternatives for Draco! Er, effort-loss.

Her hand inched toward the bottle. Grim noticed the movement, and his eyes narrowed. She could tell he was trying to think of a song to quote before he made his move. She could use that to her advantage. Hopefully he would decide on something long, like the thing about "I am the very model of a modern major general." She smirked derisively. Gilbert and Sullivan was for pussies like Necare! Wait, hadn't she already snerked at Necare in the past five minutes? Well, a little more couldn't hurt. Moderation was for pussies like Necare.

Her hand continued to inch towards the ketchup bottle. Sitting to the side, Satty sighed.

"Is this going to turn out like the Ranch dressing thing?"

She moved like lightning, grabbing the bottle and whipping it around. The tomato sauce splattered across Satty's face, knocking him backwards out of the chair. He sprawled across the floor, eyes open wide in shock.

"Draco...how could you..." he gasped, his vision fading. "Nyoro...~n..."

Grim made his move. Releasing one hand's grip on the fork, he seized the salt-and-pepper shaker upended it over the scrambled eggs. He had cunningly unscrewed the lid earlier, so the salt and the pepper poured out over the entire plate until the shaker was completely emptied. Draco gasped in horror.

"No! My eggs! You--ahhhhhhATCHOO!!!"

She sneezed, losing her grip on the ketchup. Grim seized his chance and lunged across the table, stabbing her finger with the fork. Draco suffered from an allergy attack, a heart attack, blood loss, finger trauma, and a really nasty look from Jack Black all at the same time. She slumped backwards in her chair and died.

"YEEEEESSS!!" Grim screamed, loudly enough to warrant two exclamation marks. He leaped up onto the table, beating his chest. It had lasted for days on end, but finally it was over! He had shown her, he had shown the WORLD that eggs were to be eaten with salt and pepper, not ketchup! Ketchup was for pussies like Necare. He sneered down at her corpse, then bent down and took a bite of the eggs. He nibbled on them one by one. Ecstasy. Euphoria like none he had felt before. The taste was heavenly. It was sexual. Mia orgasmed.

They burst into the bare, dirty room. The sole occupant, a woman crouched over a laptop, straightened immediately. The SWAT (Solian Weapons And Tactics) team leveled their weapons at her with a series of ominous clicks. "Freeze!" the sergeant barked. The woman raised her hands slowly and placed them behind her head, staring at the wall. The sergeant unclipped a pair of handcuffs and approached her.

Outside the abandoned building, a sleek black car pulled up. Police chief Saturos, just about to take a bite out of his donut, frowned and stood up. He walked over as the car door opened, and a man in a perfect black suit stepped out. Black shades masked his eyes, and a grim expression was set permanently on his face.

"Hey, what are you doing here?" asked Saturos. "My men are bringing her down just now."

"No, captain," replied Agent Fluff, "Your men are already dead."

Floors above them, the sergeant reached out with the handcuffs. Spella spun around and poked him in the eye with a carrot. She whirled through the SWAT team effortlessly, lashing out without mercy with the two orange vegetables. The final SWAT member stood before her, raising a stick of zucchini to strike at her. She leaped into the air, her arms coming up above her head in a V-shape. Time seemed to slow, and Spella hung suspended before the SWAT officer. Then the feeling was gone, and her foot shot out to hit him in the chest. He flew backwards, hitting the wall so hard that a series of cracks branched out from the point of impact, and fell to the floor limply. Spella landed on her feet and looked around the room.

"Shit."

She ran out the door and looked down the staircase. Already there were footsteps below her as Agent Fluff and Saturos raced up after her, followed closely by more SWAT members. She turned and sprinted up the stairs. They ran upwards, ascending until they were at the very top of the building. Spella burst out of the door and dashed across the rooftop. A second later, Agent Fluff rounded the doorway, running at an incredible speed as he followed the sight of her back. Saturos and his men charged valiantly after them, but they slowly lost ground to the two runners as they went. Finally, Spella halted. She glanced over her shoulder, and saw Agent Fluff's dour face only a few seconds behind her. She turned to face the open air, crouched, and jumped. She sailed through the air over the street, hundreds of feet below, and landed safely on the adjacent building. She threw herself to the side, hiding behind an outcropping.

Agent Fluff stopped abruptly where Spella had crossed. He, too, crouched and jumped. Saturos and his men skidded to a halt behind him, jaws hanging open at the black-suited figure as he flew through the air as no human being should have been able to do.

"...Nyoro~n..." whispered Saturos in awe.

Agent Fluff landed with a puff of dust and stood, scanning the rooftop before him. There was no sign of Spella. He slowly drew a pair of salt-and-pepper shakers from inside his suit. He knew she was here. He knew.

Spella was struggling not to breathe. She was trapped, and they both knew it. She glanced to the side, towards the sound of Agent Fluff's foosteps, and a ray of light gleamed in her mind. An open window gaped twenty feet from the edge of the roof. Agent Fluff's feet drew closer and closer. Spella bit her lip, and took a deep breath. She started to run, and leaped.

She hurtled through the air like an arrow. She streamlined her body like a swimmer, blasted through the open window, and rolled down the set of stairs. She reached the bottom and spun around on her back, whipping two bottles of ranch out and leveling them at the window. No Agent Fluff flew through the window. There was silence.

"Get up, Spella," she whispered to herself. "Get up!"

She got up, ran down the flights of stairs, and outside.

In the real world, the ship S.S. Broccoli floated silently inside the gargantuan sewers. Spella sat up, rubbing the back of her head. She stood, and stretched.

"Well?" Necare was impatient as always, the dickhead. "What happened?"

Spella's face was grim. "They captured RyuKenshin. They're going to hack into his brain to discover the coordinates of Gehenna."

"What?" cried Necare. "He's not even black!"

Spella stared at him for a moment, eye twitching. She had the eerie feeling that she was caught in the midst of a gargantuan movie reference too big to even comprehend. Dammit, how many pseudo-realities are we going to have to hack out of!?

She shook off the feeling, and got back to business. "We have to pull his plug. There's no other way." She strode over to RyuKenshin's seat and gazed down at him sadly.

"No!" cried Necare. "I'm going to go after him. I can rescue him. He believes in me."

Spella looked at him for a moment, then decided to skip a WHOLE lot of stupid arguing and nodded her agreement. "Then I'm going with you."

Necare returned the favor by skipping the useless protests that every Hollywood story had to have right before the good guys went off on their epic rescue mission. "All right," said Shadow, enjoying his one sentence of dialogue in the entire story. "Let's get you guys hacked in."

They appeared on top of a building. It was as close as Shadow's leet azn hax could get them. They were alone--or so it seemed, until the door leading down into the building opened, and out strode Fluff, accompanied by a team of SWAT officers. Spella drew her Ranch bottles and started for the SWAT team. "You hold him off!" she yelled to Necare.

Fluff's amazingly handsome faced broke into a smirk. Necare looked about in a panic, trying to find some place to hide like the weiner he was. Fluff raised a bottle of ketchup and aimed it at him. Necare's eyes opened in shock as Fluff squeezed the bottle, and a series of short bursts of ketchup flew at him. His reflexes took over, pushing aside his conscious control. Time slowed, and he bent backwards, waving his arms like an idiot. Since it was in slow-motion, however, it ended up looking cool. The ketchup flew past him, passing over and around him. One single blast grazed the side of his leg, leaving a thin streak of red. Necare cried in pain and fell to the ground.

Fluff strode up to him, blazing with smexiness. He stopped just short of Necare's body and raised the bottle of ketchup.

"Only a pussy," he said, smirking handsomely.

Behind him, Spella raised a bottle of Ranch to his head. "Dodge this," she said, and squeezed the bottle. Fluff fell to the ground, dead, leaving girls throughout the world devastated. Spella held out a hand to Necare and helped him to his feet.

"How did you do that? I've never seen anyone but one of them move that fast."

"I wasn't fast enough," said Necare, pointing to his ketchup-stained pants leg. "Now let's get Ryu. We can use that conveniently-located helicopter."

They climbed inside the conveniently-located helicopter and took off, flying beside the building until they stopped outside the room in which RyuKenshin was located. Three agents, all of whom looked like Fluff except without the smexiness (which still meant they were incredibly handsome) turned their heads simultaneously. Glancing up and out the window, Ryu saw them and a spark of hope flickered to life inside him. Roaring hopefully, he snapped the handcuffs on his wrists and charged towards the window.

"He's not going to make it," said Necare. He grabbed a rope, tied it around his waist, and leaped. Spella reached out the window and shot the agents DED with her Ranch bottle. Ryu jumped for Necare's outstretched hand, sailing through the window. Their hands touched in a completely heterosexual manner, making Blissfullystoopid cry. Necare seized hold of Ryu and pulled him up, hoisting them both into the helicopter.

"Thanks," said Ryu, leaning over and panting with exertion. He glanced at Necare's leg. "Is that ketchup? What, did you accidentally sit on one of those squeezy bottles?"

"Of course not. I would never." said Necare, curling his lip disdainfully. "Squeezy bottles are for pussies like Fluff."

"Myuuuu, we've been walking for days, Nyoro!" exclaimed Saturos. They were in the middle of an urban wasteland, ruined and abandoned buildings all around them.

"Yes, Satty," Draco said as she stepped over a gaping crack in the broken sidewalk, her voice far too patient. "We know that."

"I think I'm going to strangle him soon," Necare said very calmly.

Sea Monkey gave him a suggestive wink. "You can strangle me if you like, Necare. It'll be fun, I promise."

Draco rolled her eyes. "Els, you wish you were whore enough to be strangled by Necare."

Sea Monkey snarled angrily. "I'm more of a whore than you'll ever be, you saggy old has-been!"

"Can we please stop arguing now?" asked Satty. "It's making me nervous. Myuuuu~"

"SATUROS!" yelled Necare, losing his temper at last. He waved his arms in the air for emphasis. "YOU ARE NOT A KITTEN! STOP MAKING KITTEN NOISES!"

"I can make kitten noises if--" Sea Monkey and Draco said in unison, then broke off and glared at each other.

"Hmph," said Draco.

"Hmph yourself," retorted Sea Monkey. "Did we have to walk all this way? Couldn't we have taken a bus or a plane or something?"

"Ha!" sneered Necare. "Buses are for pussies like--"

"DON'T EVEN [radio edit]ING SAY IT," the girls exclaimed together. They didn't even bother bitching at each other this time.

Necare glared at them. "--Satty. I was going to say Satty."

"That's not nice, Nyoro!" Satty protested. "I--Aaauugh!"

He screamed in agony as a gargantuan lightning bolt lanced down from the clear sky and seared through his body. He fell to the ground, smouldering. They all leaped back, a shrill squeak coming from Sea Monkey. They all stared in shock at his limp form, then Draco took a tentative step forward and poked him. There was no reaction, so she knelt and hoisted him onto her shoulder.

"I guess we'd better get rid of his body," she said grimly. There was a convenient grave-sized hole only a few feet away, so she walked over to that. "Wait...I felt something."

"I'm not dead yet!" came Saturos's feeble voice.

"What?" Draco asked, craning her neck in vain to see.

"Nothing," said Necare, waving his hand dismissively. "Drop him in"

"I'm not dead!" squeaked Satty again.

"Hey, he says he's not dead!" Draco started to set him down. Necare stopped her.

"Yes he is."

"I'm not!" Satty protested.

"He isn't?" asked Draco, growing more and more confused.

"Well, if he isn't, he will be soon. He just got roasted by a lightning bolt," said Necare.

"I'm getting better!" Satty exclaimed, swinging his arms limply. Draco was looking very confused.

"No, you're not," Necare snorted. "You'll be stone dead in a moment."

"Well, I can't bury him like that," said Draco. "I mean, I can't."

"I don't want to go in the hole!" yelled Satty, sounding like an infant again.

"Oh, don't be such a baby," Necare said, rolling his eyes.

Draco sighed. "I can't put him in like that."

"I feel fine!"

Necare ignored Satty, focusing instead on Draco. "Come on, do us ALL a favor!"

"I feel happy!" Satty sang, wriggling around on Draco's shoulder. "I feel happy!"

Sea Monkey stepped forward, wielding a big stick. WHOCK! The stick banged into the back of Draco's head and she fell forward into the hole, crushing Saturos beneath her.

"Thanks very much," said Necare.

Sea Monkey bowed. "Not at all."

They continued down the ruined street, both extremely happy with the way things had turned out. They turned at the crossroads, and saw sparks coming from around another corner.

"We found him!" whispered Sea Monkeey. "Look, he must be over there!"

"I see him," replied Necare, also whispering. "Now what do we do?"

She beckoned, and started to creep forward. Necare followed her lead. Together they snuck down the block, approaching the spark-filled corner. Sea Monkey motioned for a pause as they neared the sparks, then they leaped out and yelled in unison "Aha!"

It was a broken transformer, throwing sparks around like there was no tomorrow but doing nothing else. They stared at it in disappointment and confusion. Then a voice rang out behind them.

"AHA!" Chrono Ivan exclaimed. "You've walked right into my trap!"

They spun around, gaping at him. He was floating in midair, holding a massive squeaky hammer. On the hammer's top was engraved a name: DOGGBLADDR. Lightning arced around him in a sphere, keeping him airbound. He smirked, and pointed the hammer at them.

"Your friends fell prey to my lightning strike, and now I'll roast the two of you where you stand! Prepare to face my power!"

"Necare," whispered Sea Monkey, backing up slowly. "What does the scanner say about his power level?"

Necare pulled out the scanner and pointed it at Chrono. He looked at the reading and his eyes grew wide. His jaw tightened, and he crushed the scanner in his fist.

"IT'S OVER NINE THOUSAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAND!!!"

Through the cold, black emptiness of space, a monstrous construction floated. Powered by quadruple-linked ionized quantum spork generators and fueled by technobabble, it made its ominous way through the nothingness like a knife cutting through butter. Cold, black, nonexistent butter. The Death Muffin. It was the largest space station in the history of space stations. It packed enough power to destroy raisin fleets with a single blast. Whole planets trembled to hear its name, although that might have been because of the mega-quadruple-itis inflatable loudspeakers. It was invincibility incarnate. Its defenses were impregnable, its style was impetuous (its rap was repetitive). Nothing could stand against the power of the Death Muffin.

Except Boyd. Well, technically he wasn't standing. He was sitting. His hands gripped an oddly phallic joystick that sat between his legs, twisting it frantically in an attempt to control the P-wing fighter he was in.

"This makes no sense!" He cried frantically to the radio. "How can you have a fighter with wings shaped like an P? I don't even understand how this thing manages to fly, let alone make a run on the Death Muffin!"

"Boyd," said the exasperated Princek, piloting the D-wing on his left, "Shut up. It's obviously a dick joke."

"Tell me about it," said Squee glumly, sitting in the C-wing on his right.

SUDDENLY, RAISINS!
HUNDREDS OF THEM!!!

"They've spotted us!" yelled Squee. "Take evasive action!"

The C-wing thrust forward into space, penetrating the nothingness and jabbing towards the raisin fighters. The D-wing gave a brief spurt of speed, then a mustard blast hit it and its engine blew its load.

"I'm hit! I'm hit!" cried Princek. "I'm coming down!"

"Do a barrel roll!" Boyd yelled. Princek complied, doing a barrel roll. Boyd swooped in to cover him, his P-wing fighter's guns blazing like two pricks of light against the blackness of space. Nuts were burst, spewing fighter fluid all over the surface of the Death Muffin.

Suddenly, Princek was in trouble again. "They came from--behind!" he blurted out, then his D-fighter exploded. Sure enough, there behind him was a strangely androgynous raisin. From inside, Lachesis's voice came from within, sounding eerily asexual.

"Boyd! I--Am--Your--FATHER!"

"NO!" screamed Boyd. "That's impossible!" Ahead of them lay the Death Muffin's only weakness, the hole in its panties, the crack in its cheeks, the tear in its condom, the banana in its pudding.

"You would have to be a guy for that to work," radioed Squee. "I mean, girls can't...you know...I mean..."

"...god dammit," muttered Lach, blasting Squee into oblivion with a squirt of his/her/its "raisin juice." The P-wing was the only fighter left to finish the mission, and the raisin was closing in fast.

"Fine!" yelled Boyd defiantly. "Prove that you have the balls to do it! Hit me, baby, one more time!"

"Careful, son," growled Lach, "Or I might have to mind-rape you. Now pull out!"

He/she/it focused its "raisin juice" tube on the P-wing, locking on to Boyd''s fighter. Boyd wiped the sweat from his brow. If he stayed, he would be blown to smithereens, but he had to finish the mission. The Death Muffin's back door was unguarded, and if he could penetrate it, they would really have the space station with its pants down. It would be a huge victory for the Pickle Alliance. He wiped the sweat from his brow again.

"Hey," Draco had said. "Wait a minute, Boyd."

"What?" Boyd had said.

"Here," Draco had said, and kissed him on the cheek. "For luck."

Boyd had gaped at her. A kiss? Gross! "What if I get cooties!"

Draco waved her hand dismissively. "I'll teach you how to deal with the cooties when you get back. Now go get 'em, tiger!"

Boyd jerked out of the entirely irrelevant flashback. He had to focus. Use the fork, dude. The voice echoed in his head. He looked around, confused. That was the voice of his mentor, Obi-Wannabe. "What? Who's there?"

Use the fork, dude. Use the--OH FOR CHRIST'S SAKE BOYD YOU ASSHOLE USE THE FORK BEFORE I STUFF IT UP YOUR ASS!

Boyd shook himself out of the delusions and grabbed the fork by his side. He really needed to see a shrink soon, and not just for the effect Draco had on him. He jammed the fork into its key slot, and twisted it. A space cucumber shot out of the tip of the P-wing, and streaked out into the hole that was the AN-I_I-s unit of the Death Muffin. Lach gasped in dismay.

"Not the back door!"

Boyd grinned and angled his P-wing for outer space. "Yeeeehaaaaw!" he yelled, speeding towards the Pickle Alliance's home base. When he got home, the first thing he planned to do after the celebrations was take a long cootie bath. Ew, girls.

Lachesis, on the other hand, was not so happy. The dreaded Death Muffin's bunghole had been plugged, its pooper pooped, its laundry chute stuffed. It would explode at any moment. The sexless warrior steered his/her/its raisin fighter away from the blast radius and entered the coordinates for his/her/its home planet of Meatspin V.

The raisin fighter touched down. Lach stepped out, swathed in his/her/its flowing gender-disguising robes and hood. He/she/it glided asexually across the landing platform, which was naturally built into the side of a mountain in the middle of a lake of lava-like ketchup.

"Well?" came a voice from the shadows as Lach stepped inside. He/she/it walked forward, coming closer to the emperor-sized bed.

"Emperor, I have failed," Lach said morosely. "The Death Muffin was stuffed up the smurfhole."

"I am disappointed in you," the voice hissed softly from the bed. "But I must say, I should not have expected any better from a sexless being such as yourself."

Lach raised an eyebrow. "Oh? And tell me, would a man--or perhaps woman--like yourself have done any better than me? I still don't know which you are."

A chuckle came from the bed, and a long-nailed finger emerged, wagging reproachfully at Lach. "Come, come, general. I'm not about to tip my hand to you. That would be telling."

"Fine, Shadow," purred Lach, reaching under the covers. "If you won't tell me what gender you are, then I'll just have to find out myself."

Deep in the wild, wild west, a rowdy little saloon sat in the middle of a tiny little town. Inside, all was as it should be: Jackal twirled his six-shooters idly, Draco hit on all the boys (and a few of the girls), Sundancer served drinks, and wee little Shadow played games in the dust.

But one day, all of that changed. The door slammed open, revealing a strange-looking man in a straight hat. The door hit Sundancer in the face, knocking her flat on her back and dazing her. The stranger strode into the saloon, showing his italian shoes and hot pink shirt under his jacket, then without warning struck a pose in the center of the room.

"Hi. My name's Bliss...But you can call me..."

Shoom! The finger shifted from his waist and shot out straight into the air. His other hand snapped to his hips, which shifted to a jaunty angle.

"Blissful Jackson, king of pop!"

Immediately, everyone mentally abbreviated the name to "BJ king of pop."

Draco stood, and lounged her way over to him. Her top was predictably low-cut. Hey, at least she was wearing a top. Sundancer, who had groggily risen to her feet, stumbled over to offer BJ a drink. In her disorientation, she stumbled and her face connected with Draco's left breast. The boob bounced back with a firmness born of lots and lots of cosmetic enhancements, sending Sundancer flying backwards to crash into a table. Ignoring her, Draco put a hand on BJ's shoulder sensually.

"Why hello there, handsome," she purred. "Can I get you something?"

BJ glanced at her and slid smoothly to the side, brushing imaginary dust off his shoulder. "No thanks," he said, and moonwalked over to wee little Shadow in the corner.

"Hi there, little boy. Want to come to my neverland farm?"

Shadow stared up at him with wide, unfocused eyes. "Lach...purring...gender...sheets..."

Sundancer stumbled over, opened her mouth to offer BJ a drink, and promptly fell face-first into the door with a loud "THONK." Shadow kept staring into empty space, rocking slightly.

"The horror! The horror!"

BJ took his hand and led Shadow towards the door. Sundancer crawled feebly towards him, cross-eyed from multiple concussions. "Sir...can I get...you..."

BJ accidentally stepped on her, crushing her spine. He tripped, skidding across the floor, although he might have just been doing a moonwalk on his tummy. Shadow stumbled across the room. Draco licked her lips with anticipation and held out her arms in a manner not unlike Freud's mother. Sundancer rolled in on a wheelchair, but unused to controlling the bulky contraption, missed BJ and knocked into Shadow. He lurched to the side, grabbing onto Jackal's trousers.

"Hey, what the hell?" Jackal looked down, distracted from his pistol-spinning, and accidentally shot Sundancer in the foot. Twice. With each pistol. "What do you want, kid?"

Shadow clung even tighter to him. "I don't...like...girls..."

Across the room, BJ struck a triumphant disco pose, imitating Elvis Presley. A disco ball descended from the ceiling, throwing sparkling colors all around the room.

"WE HAVE SUCCESSFULLY CONVERTED ANOTHER ONE!!!"

Then the disco ball fell on Sundancer's head.

"Hee hee hee," giggled Enro, hunched over his laptop, although with his accent it sounded more like "Hey, hey, hey."

"Crikey, slagging off bands is so much fun. Tomorrow, I think I'll even take it to WIKIPEDIA! Hell," he considered, tapping his chin and dislodging several spiders the size of footballs in the process, "Why wait? I've got time. This is Australia; there's nothing else to do here."

He entered the wikipedia web address into his browser and waited. Five minutes passed, then the wikipedia logo appeared, followed by the search bar. After about half an hour of waiting, which passed quickly as he read his favorite book, Twilight, Enro finally managed to load the Disturbed article. Still sighing over Edward's sparkly hair, he clicked the "edit" button and picked up the book again. Another five minutes went by, a five minutes punctuated throughout by his loud sighs and giggles as he imagined being swept off his feet by an eternally young monster with sexy hair.

Finally, he was there. The entire Disturbed article lay at his fingertips--well, the fingertips that hadn't been devoured by the GIANT [radio edit]ING SPIDERS already. He put the book down, regretfully promising Edward that he would return. He leaned forward, licking his greasy pizza-covered lips, and started to type.

"WHAT THE [radio edit]!?" yelled David Draiman, six hours later on the other side of the world. "WHAT IS GOING ON HERE? WHO THE [radio edit] HAS BEEN [radio edit]ING WITH MY WIKIPEDIA ENTRY!?!?!?"

His manager, a reedy little man called Bob, tried to calm him down. "Look man, it's wikipedia. People do stupid shit like this; it's no big deal. We'll have it fixed really soon."

Draiman still wasn't happy. "You told me we were set! You said we were [radio edit]ing indestructible! Shit, I even wrote a [radio edit]ing song about it!"

Bob threw up his hands in frustration. "I don't know, okay? Just stop! Enough of the limitless critical comments on my life!
Just drop the judgment and all of your pseudo-involvement in my life."

Draiman gazed at him, his jaw drooping slightly. "Hey, man, those would actually make really good lyrics for a song--"

He stopped, and they stared at each other in horror. "Oh no," wailed Bob, "We're turning into Grim!"

Meanwhile, Enro was having the time of his life. Wikipedia was only the first step. "Today, Wikipedia. Tomorrow, the world!" he cackled to himself, then, feeling slightly dizzy, picked up Twilight and read a few pages to steady himself. He felt his arousal growing at the thought of Edward's sensual sparkling lips. He heaved another sigh, then turned again to his computer.

"What's this? Another Disturbed fan? Crikey, we'll have to see about that, mate!" The "edit" button took another five minutes, during which he imagined touching Edward, running his hands over that beautiful vampire body, lifting up his shirt and--oh, the page had loaded. Enro set to work, reading the open book out of the corner of his eye while he sabotaged the unsuspecting internet. He switched to typing with one hand, and rummaged around behind himself for the jar of Vaseline. He found it, dipped into the slippery jar, then straightened.

"Oh, Edward," he sighed, slipping his hand under his belt. "Oh, Edward. Oh, Edward, Oh, Edward!"

The mansion's massive double doors flew open, each twelve-foot side nearly split in half by the force that had propelled them inwards. Necare and Spella stepped through. The guards inside gaped in astonishment, then leveled enough automatic weaponry at them to cut a Kris in half. Necare smirked, and held up his hand palm-out. The guns started to fire.

The bullets flew at them, buzzing like angry hornets on helium. Then, two feet out from his hand, they stopped dead in the air. More bullets came, buzzing like more angry hornets on more helium. They kept coming, and kept stopping, until a veritable wall of bullets hovered in front of Necare. He snorted, and flicked his wrist. The bullets dropped to the floor like so many de-helium-ized marbles.

"What--" The guard who had spoken coughed, blowing out a lungful of helium, sucked in oxygen, and tried again. "What--what--you can't do this! You're just a--a--" he stammered, but Necare cut him off. "A pussy?" He smirked, grasping the neck of his shirt. "Oh, no, my friend. I am--A STUD!" He ripped his shirt off, revealing perfect pecs, bulging biceps, titillating triceps, amazing abs, and a variety of other noteworthy muscles. (Well, since they weren't actually named, they couldn't have been that noteworthy, but whatever.)

"GAH!" The guard yelped, falling back. "My eyes!" screamed another clutching at his seared sockets. "He's too awesome!" One by one, the guards fell, victims of Necare's overwhelming studliness. Soon the two of them stood in the center of a room full of charred and smoking corpses. Spella grinned at Necare and stepped across a cooked cadaver. "I think Were should be somewhere in this building." She reached out and opened the door in front of her. On the other side was Were, curled into a little ball on the floor of a broom closet.

"Holy shit! Were?" Necare asked in astonishment, jogging over to them. Were turned his tear-stained face upwards, his lower lip trembling. "Spella! N-Necare! Thank god you're here!" He crawled forward and clutched at Spella's legs, whimpering. She looked down at him in shock. "Were? Good god, what did they do to you?" Were sniffled, and wiped a line of dribble away from his nose. "Th-they made me g-give--give up b-being a-a-an asshole for Leeeeent!" His voice broke, and he started bawling into Spella's leg. "What a pussy," muttered Necare, a look of disgust crossing his face.

"WHAT DID YOU SAY!?!"

Were bounded up from the floor, bristling and snarling with rage. Hellfire surrounded him, and the smell of falling meteors filled the air. "N-nothing!" peeped Necare, jumping back and flinching a little bit. "Good," said Were, and started sniffling again. "It was a-a-awful!"

Suddenly, footsteps sounded from the balcony above them. Fluff emerged, and smirked down at them. "Well, hello there, Necare. Spella. It's been a long time." They gaped up at him. "Fluff!" cried Spella in astonishment. "I thought you were dead! Hell, I killed you!" He waved his hand dismissively. "I got better. Now, why don't you all surrender and save me the trouble of having to kick your asses?"

"I DON'T THINK SO."

Were stood, shaking with fury. Horns burst from his body, and a pair of crimson bat wings grew from his shoulder blades. Flames blazed to life over his skin, filling the room with heat. He rose into the air, floating up to Fluff's level. His mouth opened, and molten lava spewed forth. Fluff smirked, and backhanded Were across the face. "Dude, it's still Lent. You ain't got shit, bitch." Were's eyes started to water. He sank back to the floor, curled up into a ball, and began to cry.

"Aw, shit," muttered Necare. He jumped up, directing a studly blast of studliness at Fluff. Fluff leaned to the side, letting the blast hit the wall behind him. The blast rained rubble down on Spella. "Necare!" she cried out, before she was completely buried. Necare stared down at her in horror, then flew backwards as Fluff's fist connected with his stomach. He hit the wall, bounced off, and did a facegrind across the floor. Fluff jumped, and landed in front of him. He pulled back his foot, and kicked Necare's ass. Necare flew, bounced off the wall, bounced off the ceiling, bounced off the floor, bounced off the wall, bounced off the other wall, and skidded to a bruised and battered halt.

Fluff snapped his fingers, and girls flooded out to hang off his arms, curl around his feet, and massage his shoulders. He stood there, smirking handsomely. Necare tried to get up, but found he couldn't. "I knew it," he groaned. "Pussies are for squeezes like Fluff."

"Draco!" Hinoa almost screamed, gesturing frantically. "Enough of this! Just come clean! Say the words!"

"Never!" shouted Draco defiantly, waving her arms at him. "No matter what others bits of me you might have pierced, you'll never pierce my iron resolve, Hinoa! I shall not falter!"

Hinoa waved a midget zucchini at her. "I know, Draco. Oh, I know! You can't hide from my heaven-piercing--"

"Heaven-piercing?" Draco interrupted. "Ha! Look at you!" She pointed at the midget zucchini. "That zucchini could pierce my heaven better than you could!"

"Fine!" he yelled, throwing the fruit (FRUIT!!!) down furiously. Unfortunately for him, it bounced off of the ground between his legs and pierced his heaven. "OOOWWWOWWOWWWW!" he squealed, clutching the fruit (FRUIT!!!) protruding from his bum cheeks. "THIS HURTS WORSE THAN THE ONE TIME WITH ENRO!"

Elsewhere in the world, Enro sat bolt-upright in bed, his eye twitching. He could have sworn he'd experienced that "someone-is-talking-about-me" feeling. Oh, well. He lay back on his bed and picked up Twilight again.

"AND THE TIME WITH NECARE!"

Elsewhere in the world, Necare sighed and glared sullenly at nothing in particular. "Go ahead, jackass," he muttered. "I know you're going to make the joke sooner or later. Get it over with."

"AND THE TIME WITH ENRO AND NECARE!"

Elsewhere in the world, Fluff grinned smugly. That was his cue. He cleared his throat. "Threesomes are for pussies like Necare."

"And me and Els and Alex," he added as an afterthought.

Draco's eye was twitching. "How...how many guys have you slept with, Hinoa? That list there is getting ridiculous. I think you might have a Yaoi addiction."

"THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT!" chorused Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee before the time warp sucked them back in.

Hinoa ignored the interruptions. "That's not the point!" he yelled. "You're a bitch, and you just stuck a vegetable in my ass!"

"Technically, it's a fruit," said Draco patiently, but Hinoa was having none of it. "To hell with you! I'm leaving, and I'm going to run off with Satty! At least he understands my piercingly punful playtime preoccupations!"

"And your Yaoi addiction," observed Draco.

"THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT!" chorused Shadow and Lach before they were obliterated in the explosion of the Death Muffin.

"Lol buttsex," grinned Satty. "Lol star wars. Lol purrshipping. Lol nyoro~n."

Suddenly, Phoenix, Sundancer, Princek, Squee, and Bliss all jumped out of the woodwork, ready to make a meaningful contribution to the storyline (lol). Just as suddenly, rocks fell, and they all died. Sucks to be them, right?

"Wow," said Delfeir. "That looked just like as many people as possible within reason were brought into the storyline, and then ceaselessly abused. Wait, there's nothing reasonable about this! Fluff, you bast--aagh!"

He fell to the ground, bleeding feebly. Fluff wiped the blood off of his knife and walked away, whistling innocently. "What?" he asked, blinking at Draco, Hinoa, and Satty. "It's a knife. Come on, giant moon lasers and shit are for pussies like Necare."

ZAP!

"And Grim," he clarified, dodging the giant moon laser. "Hiya up there, Grim!"

Grim waved down to Fluff and went into to play more rock music with young children, because he was NOT A PEDOPHILE, DAMMIT!

"Myu, didn't we used to have a plot?" myused Satty. "Oh good heavens!" he screeched piercingly. "What happened to you, Hinny-kun?"

"My heavens got pierced by a vegetable," said Hinoa glumly. "FRUIT!!!" yelled Draco.

Satty frowned. "What do you mean, nyoro~n?" Hinoa turned around to show him the midget zucchini lodged in his backside. "It's a buttsex metaphor for the vegetable in my butt."

"FRUIT!!!" yelled Draco.

"Hmmm," Satty said ponderously. "Looks like you have a fruit up your ass."

"FRUIT!!!" yelled Draco. Then, once she realized that Satty had said fruit to begin with, the universe imploded inside her brain. Luckily, no one important was hurt, just black people and gays.

"HOLD ON A MINUTE!" yelled Delfeir, wiping off the fake blood and standing up. "This whole spoof has just been one big slur against homosexuals! This is reprehensible! Think how you'd all feel if this hatred, this malevolence was being directed towards you. Think how you'd all feel if you were being ostracized this way. Would you like it? I don't think you would!"

"Actually," Bliss said, coming back to life for the sake of convenience, "I don't really mi--"

"I SAID, I DON'T THINK YOU WOULD!" yelled Delfeir. "I--DON'T--THINK--YOU--WOULD!"

No one was paying any attention to him any more, though, because shit was getting real. "SHIT JUST GOT REAL!" declared Chrono, popping out of nowhere, where he had been having sex with your mother. Suddenly, rocks fell and Delfeir died.

"WHAT HAPPEN" said Chrono.

"SOMEBODY SET US UP THE ROCKSLIDE" said Princek, who had also conveniently come back to life.

"HELLO GENTLEMEN HOW ARE YOU" said Fluff. "ALL YOUR MEME ARE BELONG TO ME"

"Screw this," said Chrono in disgust. "This is just ridiculous and overdone. Who in their right mind would read shit like this?"

Fluff shrugged. "Sorry, dawg. I just herd u liek memes, so I put a meme in ur meme so u can laugh while u read my spoof."

"BRILLIANT!" declared Chrono, hopping on the bandwagon. "How is babby made?"

Fluff rolled his eyes. "Grim, shoot him with the giant 'laser' so we can get back to the 'story.'"

Grim complied, and they got back to the 'story.' "Ouch, nyoro," said Satty. "That looks painful. Hey, maybe you should ask Boyd for some lube. That might make it easier."

"I'M NOT GAY!" Boyd yelled, "I'M JUST TOO STUPID TO REALIZE I'M NOT STRAIGHT!" With that, he promptly started chasing Draco, who had gotten bored and was taking a kinky shower. In a scene eerily reminiscent of Psycho, he ripped aside the shower curtain. However, in a strange twist on the original plot, it was Draco who stabbed him. " " said Draco. "GTFO my showers, bitch."

Fluff smirked. "Showers are for pussies like Necare."

Elsewhere in the world, Necare threw down his eyeliner pencil and stomped on it furiously. "That's it!" yelled he, "I've had it! That's TWICE in one spoof! Fluff, you sick son of a bitch!"

"Oh, come off it," snorted Fluff, hearing him with his authorship-enhanced powers. "You're a pussy, and Enro reads twilight, and it's funny. Deal with it."

Elsewhere in the world, Enro started to cry when he learned that Edward wasn't real.

Meanwhile, Satty was driving a jackhammer in-between Hinoa's butt cheeks. Everyone was like this: 0.0

"Hey," said Bliss, "my roommate was doing that just yesterday."

"Riiiight. Whatever." Fluff rolled his eyes. "Look, wasn't it about time we got to the punchline? We've usually had it by now. Ah," he smiled. "I think I have it."

"YAOI ADDICTION IS FOR PUSSIES LIKE NECARE!!!"

"THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT!" chorused Satty and Hinoa.

It was a dark night. The kind of night where the wind blows down the alleys like it's looking for trouble. The kind of night where that cat, the black one with maybe a white spot on its right ear, skitters across the road chasing a mouse, and you feel like you're the mouse but you can't see the cat. The kind of night where there's trouble just brewing in the air, and you can smell it.

My name is Frank Fluff, Private Eye, and this is my city. I know all the gangsters, the hoodlums, the bums and the cops. They're all the same. Each guy is only looking to keep his own skin dry, and he doesn't care if you get left in the wet. The trick is to leave him wet first. This city is afraid of me. I've seen its true face.

I was sitting in the bar, like I do every night. The barman, Grim, me and him go way back. I can talk to him. He's a good guy, knows all the secrets but knows better than to stick his nose where it don't belong. Probably the only guy I can trust in this whole damn city. It was a quiet night, the kind of night where you know something has to be happening, you just don't know where. It was quiet...too quiet. And then she walked in.

As soon as she walked through the door, I knew she was trouble. She was wearing a tight red dress, so tight you could have seen the waistband of her underwear--if she'd been wearing any. She was wearing heels so high she could have worked as a second-story window wiper if she'd wanted to, but she wasn't that kind of doll. She was wearing lipstick so red it should have gone on a fire hydrant. Her hair was almost as red, and it swept back to the small of her back. That back was so smooth I could have polished my shoes on it.

"Hey," she said, sliding up to the bar. "Slow night, huh?"

"Yeah," said Grim, polishing a glass as he walked around to her. "It was till you got here. What can I get you?"

She looked at me sideways. "I'll have whatever he's having." Grim raised his eyebrows, but didn't say anything. He went away to fix her the strongest drink this side of a push into the river with a cement bucket on your feet, and she sat down by me.

"Hey," she said, looking at me like a hungry dog who knows you've got food. "My name's Els."

"Frank Fluff," I said. "What's a girl like you doing here?"

Girl arrived with her drink, and she smiled at him like the cat from that movie about the girl who falls down into a rabbit hole and takes drugs. I know some girls like that. She handed him a five-dollar bill, and he left. "Tell you the truth," she said, "I'm looking for some help."

I perked up. This was getting good. "I'm a P.I.," I said. "What's your trouble?"

She looked around the bar. "Well," she said slowly, "I got a problem with somebody. He won't leave me alone, and I got the feeling he's up to no good. I need somebody to work it out for me."

"Who's the guy?" I asked.

"Jake 'Barret," she said, and I almost spat out the 95% alcohol I was drinking. Jacob Werebarret was the meanest guy this side of Al Capone, and he wasn't bald either. He had a gun the size of the Statue of Liberty, that he liked to call Meteor, 'cause when he shot it it felt like a meteor hitting ground. "Big Jake," as everyone called him, was no good. You messed with him, you weren't coming out in one piece. I'd had a couple of run-ins with him, and I knew from personal experience what a rough guy he was.

"Ol' Jacob, huh," I said. "What, you owe him money?"

"Not exactly," she said. "He wants me to join a 'business venture,' as he calls it, and I don't like it. I like being on my own." She eyed me up and down. "I can pay you for your trouble...with benefits."

I knew what that meant. This was a doll with her sights set on one thing. "That's fifty bucks of work," I said, standing up. "You can pay me when I get back."

I went over to Big Jake's place. It was a club, a pretty crazy place. All sorts of broads inside, like the one that I met halfway through. She was wearing a black dress like Els's, but tighter. She was wearing underwear, though, with teddy bear print. She flipped her brown hair and smiled at me like a cat smiles at a mouse. "Hey, slugger," she said, and grabbed my arm with both of hers. "I'm Alex."

"The name's Frank Fluff, P.I.," I said. "I'm here to see Big Jake."

She raised her eyebrows. "Whoa, baby, you must be somebody if you want to see the big guy. Want to have something to drink first?"

From the smell of her breath, she'd had more than something to drink already. "No thanks," I said. "I'm here to see Big Jake."

"All right, slugger," she said. "Follow me."

It was hard not to, since she had my arm grabbed so tight I could feel it in my other elbow. Walking with her, I noticed she had a revolver stuffed in this teddy-bear panties. That was okay; I knew a few tricks with a gun myself. She walked me to a door in the back, knocked, and waited. It was opened by two thugs, each probably about as big as a killer whale. That was okay; I'd eaten killer whale once. It tasted like chicken.

They patted me down, and she pulled me through another door. Behind a desk sat Jacob "Big Jake" Werebarret, looking so big I felt like a mouse. "Hey, Mister Fluff," he said, not smiling. "What's your business here? Is he packing heat, Alex?"

"Nope, Mister Werebarret," she said. "Reid and Boyd searched him outside."

"Good, good," he said. "So, what brings you here, Eye?"

I stepped away from Alex, towards Big Jake, and she stepped back to the door. "I got a talk with a girl named Els," I said. "She said there was stuff between you and here she wanted me to deal with."

"Ah, Els," he said, cracking a grin. "What a dame. She doesn't wear underwear, did you know that?"

"I noticed," I murmured, but he wasn't paying attention. "Yeah, Els is just perfect for my joint business venture concerning Alex here." He motioned towards Alex, who was leaning against the wall and looking better than a meat joint in a butcher's shop. A nice joint. "Me and Alex, we can both see it, but Els, well..." he grinned again. "Some dames take a little convincing."

"She doesn't take too kindly to your 'convincing,'" I said, raising an eyebrow. "Maybe you should back off, Big Jake."

"Listen, buddy," he said, leaning forward and spreading his elbows on the desk. "Els is just perfect for my business, and soon she's gonna see it too. I got the lease on everything she owns, right here on my desk. Now, you stay outta my way, and everything'll be fine, see?"

He was looking at me like I was a mouse again. On my shoulders, I felt the big hands of Reid and Boyd, Jake's hired thugs. Well, this was one mouse that knew a thing or two. Turning, I punched Boyd square in the jaw, and when he let go I twisted out of Reid's grip and jumped at Alex. I reached around and grabbed the gun out of her underwear, knocking her backwards. Turning around, I saw Reid running at me. I held the revolver at my waist, and fired twice.

Reid fell like a sack of potatoes that just got shot twice with a snub-nosed revolver. I grabbed the papers from Big Jake's desk and grabbed Alex's arm while I was at it. Big Jake was pulling Meteor out of his desk, so I high-tailed it outta there as fast as I could. "You numbnuts!" I heard him yell at Boyd. "See, this is what happens when you screw up like that!"

"No, boss, no!" I heard Boyd yell, and then there was a boom. That was Meteor, all right. I had stayed too long. I dragged Alex out of there and dumped her in my car. Jumping behind the wheel, I floored the pedal and we shot off into the night.

I still had the revolver, so Alex stayed put. When we got to Grim's bar, I jumped back out and opened the door for her. I might have to get tough with some guys, but that don't mean I can't be a gentlemen when the time asks for it. She gave me a kinda surprised look, then got out and walked into the bar. I put the gun in my coat and walked in after her.

Els was still there. "I fixed your problem," I said, and tossed her the papers. "Big Jake can't bother you any more."

"Thanks," she said. "Who's this doll?"

"This is Alex," I said. "She doesn't work for Big Jake any more."

Alex was looking kinda crafty, like a cat that wants something from a dog it knows is bigger than her. That was fine by me; I was used to cats in dresses. "You know," she said, "I could sure use something to drink."

I motioned Grim over. "Grim, give Alex two shots of what I had," I said. He chuckled, and slid two shot glasses over the counter. Alex downed both of them and didn't even look dizzy. I was impressed, and Els wasn't paying attention.

"Hey," she said, looking even craftier than Alex. "Hey, I think it's time I paid you."

Grim chuckled again. "You wanna use the room upstairs, Mister Fluff? No charge for you."

"Yeah, Grim, thanks," I said. "Put the drinks on my tab, would you?"

"Sure thing," he said as I led the girls upstairs. "No problem."

Yep, Els wasn't wearing any underwear.

And Alex's was teddy bear print.

Just another day in the life of Frank Fluff, Private Eye.