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Adventures in Lap Land

It'd been a long day. Shirleen sat on the couch on the side porch listening to the aluminum trailer behind her back contract with the waning heat of early evening. She was so tired with dealing with the baby all day and wondered if Porter had remembered they were out of beer when his Trans-Am suddenly appeared in the dirt driveway, kicking up dust and other debris which hung there in the humidity long after his car shuddered to a stop.

"Got beer..?" She greeted him laconically, arms akimbo and the Metallica tank top hanging off one shoulder. God, she looked hot; he would've nailed her right there on the ratty old couch behind her on the porch if he wasn't so beat from pushing meth over at Jimbo's truck stop and video palace out on the Bypass. Uh-oh...he'd forgot the beer....

"Babe...I hadda git a full tank a gas and dincha need diapers fer Curtis?" She didn't look exactly excited enough to drop her drawers right there; in fact, she looked pissed. Damn, he hadn't actually forgotten the beer: he'd unfortunately run into Mad Dog, his bookie, who was in the mood for collections and had wiped him clean of dough. If the guy hadn't'a been a father himself, he wouldn't even left him money for the Huggies. What a guy; he'd gotten half his money from those losing bets on the NCAA games while the other half he took out in meth and the satisfaction of keying the door of his TA (hopefully Shirleen wouldn't notice the fresh slash mark through the dirt).

"Ef'n you had a job, hon, mebbe we could afford a lil' beer." She was looking nastier and nastier, still towering above him on the porch. "You know, since you quit yer waitressing job, we jest don't have the cash flow..."

"So whatcher sayin' is I gotta go out and buy mah own beer..." She jumped off the three steps, nearly taking out the yard gnome in the process. "Wahll...git outta mah way, and I'll jest go on down to Jimbo's and git me some dates."

"Hey, wait a minute, shug." He grabbed her by the arm before she could open the car door... "I gotta better idea." (Not that hooking hadn't been an option when they'd been low on funds before.) "They're hirin' over at Lap Land, and I think none of those girls kin compare to you." Uh-oh...he'd just said something really stupid 'cause she was all over him in a split second.

"You mean to tell me you been playin' me at a strip club?! You scrub!" And in a rage, she flung the car door open, knocking him in his groin, then peeled out of the driveway, taking out the deer statuette and the mini windmill at the end of the dirt road.

************************************************************

Okay, so Porter's idea wasn't a bad one...and she wouldn't have to necessarily put out, unless she wanted more than just a few crumpled bills snagged in her g-string. She sat there in the darkened club, inhaling a Coors Lite while waiting for the owner, Merle, to appear. Merle didn't look like no Merle she'd ever seen, though; the man was fine...nice, boot cut Wrangler jeans and a clean white t-shirt, with nary a beer belly or sideburn in sight.

He shook her hand, said, "Pleased ta meetcha," then promptly told her to strip. Somewhat disconcerted, she proceeded to peel off her soggy Metallica top, pitching it on the bar, and started to wiggle out of her Guess cut-offs when she felt his hand on her bare shoulder. "Stop," he said, and she looked up in surprise. "That's all I need to see. You're hired." She stood there uncertainly, her bare skin starting to cool in the air conditioning, not sure whether to put her top back on. He answered that question for her by picking up her top and throwing it at her. "Jest one thang..." He was behind the bar at this point, shooting some soda into a glass. "Your jugs are too small.... You need a lil' cosmetic he'p there, ef you know what Ah mean." Looking bewildered, she shrugged her shirt back over her head and mumbled, "Nuhh.."

"I gotta guy who does breast implants...I'd say you're a 34 A...huh?" She hopped back up onto the barstool and took a swig of beer.

"I'm a B...when I wear a bra..."

"Huh....Well, we only use girls that are a C or better, so...here...ef you want the job, go see this guy...the whole deal is on me..." He flipped her an engraved business card: "Melvin Seltzer-Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeon." She fingered the card, slipped it in her back pocket and nodded slowly. "Uh...OK...I'll talk it over with mah boyfriend." She already knew what his reaction would be: "Yessss!!"

************************************************************


The office park was set 5 miles outside of town;all by its lonesome: as if waiting for urban sprawl to catch up with it. "Fat chance," thought Porter as they pulled into the deserted parking lot.

The doctor's office was clean and kinda fancy, with big, thick glossy magazines in the waiting room and those 3-dimensional kind of paper art framed on the walls. While Shirleen filled out all the paperwork, Porter poured himself some coffee out of the sparkling clean Mr.Coffee next to the equally sanitized receptionist. She was a looker: nice perky breasts-must come with the territory. Shirleen nudged him in the ribs. "Ah'm done," she said pointedly, handing Miss Perky the clipboard. Then she was ushered into the office while he stood awkwardly at the reception desk.

"She'll just be a minute; we'll call you when she's all prepped and ready," the gal sang out as she scooted Shirleen along.

About a half hour and three Sports Illustrateds later, he was shown into the pre-op room. Shirleen lay under a paper thin sheet with her long blonde hair tucked up under a shower cap. "Hey babe," he said as she looked up at him drowsily, like she looked the last time they'd done Ecstasy together: all lovey dovey and special. "You jest have a nice rest; and when you wake up, y'all be the bitchinest hottie around." She smiled weakly, and he was about to lean over and kiss her when he felt a hand on his arm. He turned around to see a big, tall guy in blue surgical scrubs, the same shower cap thing on and a mask tied around his face.

"Mmmmmmm...mmmm....fffff...meee..." Porter couldn't make out a word the fellow was saying; but before he could say as much, the guy yanked his arm and, without a backward glance at Shirleen, he was wrenched out into the hall by the doc.

"Huh...what?" yelped Porter as the guy threw him up against the wall and pinned him there by his shoulders. His eyes widened as the doctor pressed on him harder until he felt the sheetrock bite into his skin. The mask suddenly split apart where the surgeon's mouth would've been if not for the large sucking worms that spewed forth and drilled into Porter's eyes, immediately churning through his brain until he crumpled into senselessness on the freshly laid linoleum.

************************************************************


It was a typical Saturday at the Lap Land if the attendance could be gauged by the parking lot filled with Ford F-150s and GMCs, sporting license plate holders with "Gas, grass or cash, nobody rides for free" or chain links. The bass beat of ACDC could be heard thud-thud-thudding through the walls out to the parking lot where a group of good ol' boys sucked in Busch and spat out Skoal, preparatory to entering Merle's establishment.

The man himself was sitting behind the bar, bemusedly nursing a Coke while the bartender, Earl, was frantically filling the pitchers before the first show. They were unveiling the new girl, Shirleen, tonight; the buzz was that she was the best looking chick in the county. And since Porter, her boyfriend, had disappeared last week (something to do with betting and/or dope), she was available afer the show with a new set of knockers (bonus). Blythedale was a small town,so this news had swept through the burg like a flu through a nursing home.

The first girl, Gale Force, came on: she was over from Arlette and not too hard on the eyes. She did a pole dance to the tune of ZZ Top's "She Got Legs," giving the front tables an eyeful before scurrying off-stage to mingle for lapdances.

The next performer was Cherry Tomato: a real cutie from Bent Willow, about 10 miles down the road. She came out as Xena, Warrior Princess, which was a little threatening to some of the rednecks who started mumbling "dyke" and "ball buster" under their breaths. One snap of her whip, though, was all it took for the audience to warm up to the fetish; the crowd grew livelier as she gradually stripped down to leather thong and coiled snake armbands. She was a crowd pleaser, that was for sure, thought Merle as he ambled up on stage after she did the splits into some guy's lap for her finale.

"Now for our final number for this set, we have a local gal, who many of y'all already know, in the Biblical sense" (big man-to-man wink). "Direct from Blythedale: Lil' Miz Shirleen...The Dream Machine!"

When Shirleen bounded onstage, the sound of collective jaws hitting the floor resounded throughout the club. Her hair was piled on top of her head in a big bouffant; but who was looking at her hair? The art of the surgeon's knife had sculpted two most incredibly perfect breasts in the world; even after childbirth, a few nips and tucks (and some added packing) had made these puppies stand up on their hind legs and bark. The little string bikini top was about to give way with each jutting movement of her hips as she flounced down the run-way.

The hoots and hollers came fast and furiously as Shirleen clambered up the pole and ever so slowly inched her body down the none too clean surface. The crowd was going postal, screaming at her to take it off. She walked over to the edge of the stage and cupped her hand over her ear as if to mime "I can't hear you," and the roars shook the building. The bartender rolled his eyes, leaning his elbows up against the bar while Merle sat smugly behind him.

She walked over to mid stage, put both hands behind her head,and instantly the bra top fell to the floor, exposing the two wonders of artificial enhancement. However,what plunged the club into pin-dropping silence were the two black holes where her nipples should have been. Anticipating this lull, Merle calmly rose off his stool and watched with interest as a stream of viscous tar shot out of each breast and rained down upon the first circle of tables. Startled,the patrons reached up to feel a slithering mass of what seemed to be acid injecting itself into their eyes, traveling around to their ears then carving a path through their brains and sinuses to meet at the now white and revealed skull. Without hesitation, more waves of gelatinous black flew out of her aerolaes like some kind of evil silly string until the entire room of human customers was reduced to a silent, white-skulled congregation.

*****************************************************

"Feed a cold, starve a fever; starve a cold, feed a fever....How the hell does that go...?" Mulder shifted around on the couch, found the remote control and debated whether to turn the idiot box on or not. His head was as stopped up as the Key Bridge on a Friday night. He hadn't eaten since noon yesterday, almost 12 hours ago, but he couldn't think the effort to make something was worth it. Perhaps he would run down to the 7-11 for a Red Bull, just as soon as the Excedrin kicked in. "Aw, what the hell." He turned on the TV then went into the other room for a box of Kleenex...and some drugs.

"And if you just joined us, we met Krystle who says that her father, Raymond, can't seem to keep his hands off her boyfriend Lorenzo." Springer was on with his mutant panel of guests and his equally mutant nest of audience members. "So, Raymond, what's going on?"

The phone began ringing, thankfully, interrupting the woeful scenario unfolding on the tube.

"Mulder, where are you? We have to be out at Quantico in 20 minutes for weapons recertification."

Oh, damn! "Heyy, Scully, I'm sorry...I just got up. I've got a head cold and can't see straight, much less shoot straight."

"Oh, nice, thanks for letting me know." Scully was normally a pretty understanding type when it came to personal problems, but she was the total misery chick today. "You're not watching Springer, are you?" He could hear noise from I-66 in the background. She was probably just bitchy because of the traffic.

"Yeah, I just turned it on. Look, Scully, just make my excuses, and I'll call in at the office later. Cool?"

"Hmm...yeah...hey, listen, Mulder, Skinner mentioned something about going down to Texas next week...heheh...something to do with a bunch of guys disappearing out of a strip club." By the sound of the traffic behind her, she was picking up speed as well as her good humor again.

"Yeah, you're kidding, right? Is it the fact that I'm watching Springer that has visions of strip clubs dancing in your head?" He would've smiled at his quip, but the Execedrin was still in timed release mode.

"No, Mulder, not even the fact that you're playing hookey and watching daytime TV would get me kidding about something as eminently appealing to you as this." She was back to her old self; she must have the car up to 75 on cruise control. "Hey, Mulder, consider Springer 'research' for this next assignment...see ya!" And she clicked off before he could hang up on her.

Damn...she could have the last word: to hell with her wit and "good humor"...which reminded him--he might actually have an ancient Klondike bar stashed away in the freezer. Unrecognizable as a chunk of ice, the ice cream trophy was brought back to the living room; and with a box of tissue, Mulder got comfy on the couch, watching the Computer Learning Center gal get that cush job installing Microsoft 2000..."in only 8 weeks!"

Springer returned: "Next we have Merle." Mmmm...slightly freezer-burned chocolate coating. Mulder was really hungry and inventorying in his head what other goodies he might've forgotten at the back of the cupboard. Jerry was walking through the audience, then the camera panned to some sadistic looking cowpoke in a suede vest and a checkered shirt. "Now, Merle, here, says he's a budding entrepreneur. Uh...what actually are you peddling, Merle?"

"Whall... Jerry." Instantly the audience began the obligatory "Jer-ree, Jer-ree, Jer-ree" litany. Milder rolled his eyes and focused on not getting ice cream on the couch.

"Ah'm heah to promote mah new business: sexy gals who got some junk in the trunk but are a li'l light in the headlights...ya know whut ah mean?" The audience reaction could only be described as stupefaction. Jerry had already been briefed and came up with the easy laugh.
"You mean, you'd supply new light bulbs, eh?" The audience gradually erupted into guffaws as Merle shifted in his seat, fluffed his mullett and drawled, "Yep, Jerry, Ah find the gals, give 'em a new set of hooters, and they come work fer me. Ah call it a Stripper Beautification Project, doncha know." Jerry nodded sagely as he approached the front of the stage.

"And you brought along your latest...er...work in progress."

"Whall...Ah call her mah masterpiece." The multitude geared up for the gratuitous tramp du jour; maybe they'd have to mosaic out her crotch for the home viewers if she forgot her foundation wear. One could only hope...Mulder was starting to feel semi-human...better living through chemicals...Monsanto had hit gold with that slogan. He threw the Klondike wrapper in the direction of the wastebasket just as the stripper came on.

She was minty-clean perfection and had not a brain cell in sight. She strode out of the wings, momentarily wrapped herself around the bald-headed security guy, Steve, then plopped herself down in her chair. Mulder suddenly felt his sinuses loosen up as an electric jolt of recognition flooded through him. He was seeing his abducted sister, all grown up, as a zombified stripper, gazing directly through the screen and into his soul. And as the announcer put up the phone number for anyone interested in getting implants and joining Merle's troupe, Mulder was desperately scrambling for the cordless.

************************************************

But, Scully, I know what I saw..."

"Mulder, you are outta your mind if you think I'm gonna go on the Springer show..." She chugged down the rest of her non-fat mocha and stomped over to the nearest trashcan lining the edges of the Mall...that so touristy hub of Washington, D.C. ...while Mulder wiped the sweat off his forehead. Now he had a damn fever: his quality of life was slipping away while Scully looked the picture of flat-chested health.

"No, you wouldn't be going on Springer: I signed you up for an audition for implants." Scully glared up at him, realized he looked too ill to be joking, then looked away off to the spires of the Old Smithsonian building.

"I never thought you pictured me as a wannabe sex object, Mulder." As if in response to her comment, he summarily began loosening his tie--more of a Rodney Dangerfield maneuver to ingest more air rather than simulating an overt comeon. Damn...he shouldn't have tried to come into work today, but that oddly familiar vision of what could've been from the past had gotten him dressed and in the office...illness be damned. "Mulder, you OK?" He was looking around for a place to sit down instead of an opportunity to make potshots at her last comment; he must really be sick, she thought warily.

"Yeah, I'll be fine." He hurriedly stumbled over to the trashcan she had just used and with Oscar-winning heaves deposited his breakfast on top of the empty coffee cup. A couple of pot-bellied joggers looked askance as Mulder continued inundating the receptacle's contents with his own. Scully fished around in her suit pocket for a tissue, trying not to look a part of the scene but feeling completely responsible all the same.

"Ok, Ok." She was in a rare, conciliatory mood; they both ended up sitting on the closest bench: Mulder with his head between his legs, and Scully gingerly touching his slightly damp hair. She caught a whiff of Pert Plus shampoo with conditioner right before the Burger King Breakfast Value Meal assaulted her nostrils.

"Poor baby, I'll do it for you..." At these words, he oh-so-coyly raised his head and gave her a slyly sheepish grin. Even with a mouthful of vomit, he could still muster up a triumphant little smirk. She'd have none of that and quickly stood up, brushing off imaginary flecks of Mulder spittle.

"Well, after all," she added, "this may be connected to the missing sleazoids in Texas that Skinner wants us to track down."

He squinted up at her. She was adjusting her hose with a deft little tug behind the knee, bending over just enough to reveal nonexistent cleavage.

"I think it'll be worth it, Scully," and Mulder stood up, enjoying the mild head rush, and grinned wryly.

------------------------------------------------------------

"Blythedale, Pop. 12,005." The wind seemed to keen through the partially opened car window, mourning the loss of 30 of its upstanding citizens to unexplained phenomena in a nudie bar. Scully absentmindedly fiddled with the car radio with one hand while downshifting the bright red Mustang with the other. The barren outskirts looked too much like a potential speedtrap, and they really didn't want to draw undue law enforcement attention to themselves, particularly the way she was dressed, thought Scully , feeling a little strange in a too tight Bongo mini skirt and a ruffled, off the shoulder midriff-baring eyelet blouse. The outfit was straight off the rack of the Alexandria Goodwill; she'd done other sleaze shopping for the actual "strip tease" get-up at Frederick's. She'd have to oil herself up to get into the leather hot pants or forgo eating dinner; they were a definite tight squeeze.

"Give it up; you're not gonna get the Chemical Brothers-- or even the Righteous Brothers on any of these stations." Mulder raised the bucket seat from the reclining position and stretched, looking a little more scruffy than usual with a full day's worth of beard and a Rammstein t-shirt on. Mulder liked the silk-screen of all four band members facially impaled with barbed wire. Scully thought it was too youthful, but then she looked like a reject from a John Hughes teen movie. "Agent Scully's Day Off." She shifted uncomfortably on the leather seat and made a mental note to shave really close for the g-string.

They had no trouble locating the Lap Land; it was all by its lonesome, shunned by the neighboring high rent strip malls to the unincorporated part of Blythedale. They were supposed to meet Merle at his home office; he'd explained that the Lap Land gave him the heebie-jeebies, and he wasn't sure if he'd be using it anymore after "a lil' ruckus we had last month." "We kin try out yer gal over to the house," he kindly offered Mulder when he called him on the cell phone en route. "Y'all check into the Tumbleweed Inn and freshen up, then c'mon over to the house around 8:oo for drinks and a show." They had a little time to kill so they decided to check out the scene of the supposed abductions.

The parking lot was decorated with oil stains from elderly trucks and other oozing vehicles, both drivers and machines vanished from the landscape. Scully pulled up to what would've been the handicapped spot and got out. "You coming, Mulder?" He fumbled for his Nikes and grabbed his service revolver under the seat.

The building wasn't much to look at, but then the clients probably weren't achitectural savants...more like idiot savants, surmised Scully as she kicked the bottom of the door which easily gave way. Dust and leftover carcinogens floated in the shaft of light that penetrated the cool interior. Mulder gently tapped her on the shoulder, "Hey," and moved to one side of the entrance, gun drawn at his side.

A jukebox stood at the back with a couple of pool tables, then the bar off to one side. The main showpiece, though, was the stage with the duty pole in the middle. In a crouch, taking no chances, Mulder scrambled over to the chest-high bar, thrust the 45 over the edge, following it with his head. Scully walked over to the stage, disdainfully flicking her fingers over the cigarette burned, water stained tabletops as she went.

"Wow! I always imagined my debut would be in a high class joint like this." She found the rickety steps to the platform and found a light to illuminate the backstage. Mulder nearly banged his head on the lip of the bar as the unlit setting was plunged into enough light so that he could see the roaches scurrying under a stack of napkins piled on the woodgrain veneer. "Oh, hey, Scully, only the best for you." The place felt harmless enough; he didn't at all sense the presence he'd felt in his own room coming across the TV. The danger wasn't here; it was in the people they'd meet later on...he was sure of it. So sure that he nonchalantly flipped out two shot glasses, filled them with Jack Daniels and brought them over to the first row of tables next to the stage, the bottle tucked in the crook of his elbow. "It looks pretty normal back here...for a strip club." Scully pushed back the set of flocked red velvet curtains and walked to the edge of the stage. "What's with the adult beverages, Mulder?" He handed her a glass then sat back, legs propped up on the stage, chair tipped back. "When in Rome..." and he downed the shot while reaching for the bottle.

"Hey, careful there, big boy; we gotta show to put on later..." Scully admonished, eyeing him suspiciously. Something about the atmosphere was bringing out the sleaze factor in Mulder. He was such a chameleon sometimes.

"So, whatta ya waiting for?" Mulder sipped his next shot, feeling the liquid burn its way down his lubricated throat. "You got the stage...and the audience...Oh, wait..." He uncrossed his ankles from off the stage, stood up and wove his way through the nest of tables. Scully stood self-consciously at the edge of the platform, the three 100- watt "floodlights" making Mulder himself disappear while his shadow continued to fill the room. It was probably a relief not to be able to see the clients from a stripper's vantage point, she considered, feeling a little buzz from the warmth of the weak lighting and the warm aftertaste of the JD inside her. She stretched langorously, then kneeling on the stage, she reached over and grabbed the bottle, swigging down a few gulps just as the flippy, bee-bop strains of a new-wave tune seeped through the room. Scully smiled; it would just figure Mulder would pick New Order's "Bizarre Love Triangle" to serenade her routine. Oh, what the hell, she thought, and as the singer crooned, "Everytime I think of you I feel shot right through with a bolt of blue" she took one last chug and handed the bottle back to Mulder, who regarded her with increasing interest. "Nice choice," she said, then arose, turning her back on him. He sat back down and waited...for what? he had no idea.


She stood midstage and sinuously put her hands through her burnished auburn hair, then slid them down to the bottom of her midriff blouse and inched it over her breasts, which sprang free. "Whoa...maybe Scully didn't need the cosmetic work after all," thought Mulder as he felt something of his own spring free and shifted uneasily in his chair. She proceeded to unzip the back of the mini skirt and slipped it down, one side of her hip then the other. She stepped out of it; and crawling like a big, beautiful baby, she reached the edge of the stage before which Mulder sat expectantly and knelt there. "Everytime I see you falling, I get down on my knees and pray," she mouthed the words, her breath reeking of JD. The intoxicating scent reached out to Mulder who in turn reached up and grabbed her behind the neck, plunging his tongue deeply into her mouth.

"Mmmm..." She threw herself into his lumpy lap mid-kiss whereupon the chair he was sitting on collapsed under the combined weight. The sound of the cracking chair and the drunken giddy laughter of the pair completely drowned out the brief creak of the front door opening...

***************************************

Scully felt like the losing contestant in a WCW grudge match as she lay sprawled across Mulder's inert form, clad only in a thong and a smile. The whole scene would've been pretty funny if she wasn't hurting so bad, thought Scully, as she pried a splinter of laminated pine out of her butt cheek. "Here, let me get that for you," and Mulder reached out to minister some aid. Scully scrambled up off his chest; her breasts brushed his cotton t-shirt, making the insignia'ed band members grin even more sinisterly in the half light peeking through the half-opened front door.

"Mulder, we're not alone," and Scully frantically clawed up at the stage, trying to grab her clothing while Mulder whipped out his gun, lurched out of the wooden ruins and took cover under a table.

"Well, what were we interrupting here: amateur night?" and the too well groomed trailer denizen, Merle, appeared out of the shadows, spritzing some soda into a glass behind the bar. "What are two, over the hill, fledging porn stars doing in a dump like this?"

Mulder stood up uncertainly, levelling his gun at the guy dressed in a sleeveless muscle shirt that said, "I Stop For Road Kill At Bubba's on the Bypass." "No need for the weaponry, my man," and Mulder felt his limbs loosen like spaghetti as Merle nodded at him. "That's right, you're feeling a little... unmanned...as it were." He smiled as Mulder crumpled to the floor then directed his gaze towards the stage. "And...my little fleshpot...what was your name again: Angelpuss? Henna-haired Hottie?" The onomapoetic implications fell on deaf ears as Scully arose from the floor, her pulchritudinous physique spotlit by the off-angled floorlights as she moved, mothlike to a candle, towards Merle. "Yess...come here, my little magenta-colored concubine," and he gently chucked her under the chin as she stopped in front of the bar, then tenderly explored each breast with a knowing hand. "They'll...I mean, you'll, do nicely," and he walked through the pass-through in the bar countertop, followed by the sparsely-clad, doe-eyed Scully.

After they left in a peal of gravel and missing transmission, Mulder lay there, paralyzed on the floor amid peanut shells and unspeakable pools of liquid. The only sound in the place was his labored breathing, joined moments later by the inexplicable strains of Bachman, Turner Overdrive's "You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet," merrily echoing through the venue.

*****************************************

Scully awoke to someone humming off-key "I Feel Pretty" from the musical Gypsy. They were humming so loudly that she could sense vibrations thrumming through her brain in a not unpleasant way. Umm...she opened her eyes then quickly shut them as she was directly underneath what seemed to be a klieg light, baking her benumbed body. The light seemed to be pulsating, raining down upon her puffs of warmth, and she sighed. She hadn't felt this warm and toasty since she'd been a teen-ager, frying the hell out of herself with coconut-scented Hawaiian Tropic during summer vacation, listening to Banarama singing "Robert Deniro's Waiting, Talking Italian."

"I think their remake of 'You're My Venus' was way better," came a disembodied voice. No, that hadn't been her intrusive thought 'cause she had never even liked Banarama, except for that one irritating song. Then she noticed that "I'm So Pretty" was no longer being hummed and turned her head to the side that the remark had come from.

A doe-eyed, top heavy blond was regarding her with a wide grin as she sat with a copy of The Star in her lap. Aside from the fact that she was wearing some kind of Kathy Ireland spandex outfit from Kmart and looked like her brains had been sucked out of her ears by an 8-pound Oreck, she was a pleasant-appearing individual.

"How y'all feelin'?" She put down the tabloid, opened to the "Would You Be Caught Dead In This Outfit?" section and leaned over Scully, blocking out the sizzling overhead lamp. Scully instantly felt chilled and shivered, causing the titian-haired automaton to cluck in a motherly fashion. "Poor sweetie, y'all don't have yer kivers pulled up." And she moved down towards Scully's feet. Scully tried following her with her eyes but couldn't get past the hillock of jutting flesh that blocked her view. It semed as if her chin was almost resting on it, and she had to refocus because all her eyes could see was hairs and pores. Then it dawned on her: the operation had been a success, and she had the rack of Mount Olympus to prove it. Her heart began to race, and she had the urge to push the mound of flesh off her. The weight was inexorably crushing the life out of her, and she began panicking to breathe in more air. Shirleen, for that's who it was, proceeded to dump more "kivers" on her, making her attack that much more acute; and Scully, in one last desperate intake of air, tried to push herself up to a sitting position, only to discover that she was held in restraints on a gurney. "Now, honey, we jest cain't do that raht now, doctor's orders." And with one precise movement, Shirleen injected her with Demerol, and Scully fell into Morpheus' arms.

******************************

Talitha stormed out of the house, screaming at her mother as she waddled in a huff down the cracked and weedy driveway. "Dumb ass," she kept repeating as she started trudging out to the Bypass, her inner thighs criss-crossing together. Ouch...damn razor burn...the friction made her waddle a little more open-legged, not unlike someone who'd been on a horse all day, or been ridden like one all night.

Talitha grinned evilly. She would go out to the bypass and head on over to Jimbo's, maybe spend some time with one of the truckers and kick it, do up some E, smoke some weed, drink some Mad Dog. Maybe she'd even go buy some pork rinds and have one helluva good time. Her mouth started watering; and after pulling her size 10 underwear out of her crack, she picked up the pace.

It was about 4 o'clock...pre-rush hour...the lull on the road between school letting out and the Hav-a-Jalapeno pickling plant ejecting its merry drones from the 9-5. Talitha had picked a good time to do her hitching; there would only be strangers out, desperately trying to get the hell away from Blythedale, and so no one would narc her out. She reached the road in record time (a mile in 25 minutes, for her, record time) and heaved her rear end onto the guardrail to wait for a ride.

Well, that didn't take long. She could hear the dull, labored roar of a car...some high performance number...obviously driven by someone unfamiliar with a stick 'cause the engine was revving for all it was worth and coming down the pike at about 15 miles an hour. "Man, that sure ain't no way to treat a nice car like that," Talitha murmured to herself as the red Mustang glinted off in the distance..drawing near, and she stood up, somewhat uncertainly but, nevertheless, good to go.

About 2 minutes later, the car swerved to the side of the road, nearly missing Talitha by a foot or two, but at the rate of speed it was going, she had plenty of time to step back. The driver took his foot off the clutch, and the engine thankfully spluttered dead. Talitha leaned in at the passenger side, only to see the man of her dreams pushing the door open for her. It bounced against her stomach and slammed back onto Mulder's fingers.

"Oh, shi..." Mulder flip-flapped his wrist like a queen really trying to call attention to himself, then stopped as quickly as he'd begun. "What just happened?" He looked across at Talitha who had stepped a few feet back from the car, not sure whether to adjust her underwear again or simply suffer. She suffered and felt his pain.

"You stopped for me, right?" Mulder looked at her then back at the steering wheel, then promptly got out of the car.

"Here...you drive; I don't know how." He walked around to where she was standing and pushed her out in the middle of the road, ostensibly in the direction of the driver's side. "Huh?" He was already in the front seat, scrabbling around under it for something. She had her hand on the door, unsure whether to get in or run like hell. "Hey, mister, I only wanted a ride..."

"Well, you're getting one." Mulder found his laptop and began examining it with interest. Talitha, surveying the situation, figured that the guy had stolen the car and the 'puter in a carjacking, and now he wanted her to be an accessory. Well, seeing as I'm only 13, she thought, they can't do nothing to me, and I bet we could have a high old time. Looks like he's already wasted..." Hey, mister, you wasted?" She leaned through the door, still on the outside looking in. "Huh?" He was alternately looking at the laptop, trying to open it then drumming his fingers against it absent-mindedly.

"I guess that answers my question..." She sighed heavily (in her endomorphic capacity, the only way she could), pulled open the door and squished into the seat. The car listed over to her side. Mulder looked at her, startled, then turned his attention back to the computer just as hurriedly.

Whoa...a tweaker...her brother was one; he'd even suggested she get addicted to meth so she'd lose weight. "Ya, and look like the crack whores you go out with," she'd responded in snappy repartee. This old burnout definitely was on some mind-bending substance 'cause he was still trying to get the 'puter open, this time by whacking it with a gun.

Talitha's family were all card-carrying NRA members, so she wasn't uncomfortable around firearms, just tweakers. "Here..." She grabbed the gun by the barrel and pointed it to the floor of the car. Mulder had lost interest in the weapon, however, and was starting to play with the car cigarette lighter. She made sure the safety was on the gun then scooted it under her seat.

"Okay...we're outta here..." and Talitha switched on the ignition, found the only decent radio station in town (after slapping Mulder's hands away from the dial) then peeled out onto the bypass.

********************************

Jimbo's Truck Stop was a veritable cultural mecca in the wasteland that comprised Blythedale's outskirts. It was just getting onto dusk when Talitha swung the dusty Mustang into a spot in front of the "restaurant" portion of the establishment. The neon sign twinkled on just as Mulder stumbled out on his side, "Nothing Finer Than Jimbo's Diner." Transfixed by the humming, glowing words, Mulder stood rooted to the spot, hands alternately clenching and unclenching in frustrated awe. "What does it all mean?" he murmured, then proceeded to get back into the car. His attempt was foiled by Talitha who'd already auto-locked the car with the keychain attachment, so he was left ineffectually pawing the door handle. "C'mon, big boy," and she dragged him up the curb by his belt loop.

Once inside, she easily lifted his wallet out of his back pocket and made herself to home at the counter. Mulder, after unsuccessfully trying to knock over the "Support the Kiwanis Club" gumball dispenser, which was cemented into the linoleum, hopped up next to her on a stool.
"Hey, Sterling," called Talitha to the cook staring at her dourly from behind the chest-high kitchen partition, scratching his bi-level through his hairnet. "You got any chicken-fried steak back there?" He continued to stare, this time focusing on Mulder who was starting to pull all the napkins out of their steel container. "Quit that!" admonished Talitha half-heartedly.

"Yo...what's the dude on, 'Litha?" Sterling was starting to use his spatula as a back scratcher, still not moving a culinary muscle. Talitha shrugged and smacked a butter knife across Mulder's fingers. "I said, quit it!" He looked up in consternation, rubbing his knuckles vigorously, then stood up as if to leave. "Yer not going anywhere," and she tugged him back into place by the collar of his shirt. Oh, boy: the seat twirled; this discovery was enough to keep him happy for a few minutes, and Talitha moved over one so he could rotate without knocking into her ass. "Hey, am I gonna get some service around here or what? Where's Dorcas?"

The itchy cook was doing something unspeakable with the spatula now, for it had disappeared from her view but remained in action. "She quit," he intoned, his eyes fixated on the orbiting Mulder who was having a blissful time achieving dizzy Zen. "This a relation of yers?"
"Nahh ..jest some guy I picked up hitching." She reached over the counter and grabbed a greasy menu. "So, why did Dorcas quit; she get tired of the great pay and sparkling conversation?"

"Huh...no'um." The spatula was again visible and suspiciously buffed to a shine. Perhaps Talitha would just go next door to the Stop N Rob and buy some USDA-inspected pork rinds instead, rather than pick up an incipient case of pinworms. "She jest left with a bunch of the fiiinest gals you'd've evah seen. She's going off to be a stripper and 'pear on the Jerry Springer Show."

With a loud wham, Mulder fell off his stool and landed on the institutional green floor. Talitha sighed and reached down to give him a hand up, but he was already scrambling to his feet. "Jer-ree, Jer-ree, JER-REE?" he asked in girlish squeals of glee, his voice cracking on the last "REE," crescendoing up to a scale just shy of Mariah Carey blowing out a dog's eardrums. Sterling and Talitha exchanged "whazzup" looks; both nodding "uh-huh."

Mulder jumped up and down, possessed with an enthusiasm that failed to infect the other two with anything but suspicion and disgust. "We've gotta go!" and Mulder, with a prodigious effort, hefted 230 pound Talitha off her chair and hustled her out of the door, nearly preventing her from snagging the basket of toothpicks and mints by the register on her way out.

************************

On May 2nd 2000, viewers from around the world were treated to a very special episode of the Jerry Springer show entitled "Attack of the Alien Strippers with Implants."

"Welcome, thanks for joining us." Close up of Jerry holding his hand up to staunch the flow of applause. "Thank you. Today we have a great show for you. We have Merle, here (scattered applause for Merle who's sitting in a chair dressed in leather chaps over jeans and a leather vest with fringe and no shirt) whom you may remember was on a previous show. Just to refresh our mammary, er... memory (a few chuckles from audience members who completed the eighth grade) Merle runs a strip club which generously provides its employees with cosmetic benefits..and we're not just talking a few tubes of eyeliner, eh, Merle?" Merle smiles thinly and shakes his long hair. "No, we're not, Jer'; we're talkin' implants...heheh." The audience titters in appreciation and begins the chant of "Im-plant, Im-plants, Im-plants." Jerry also forces a smile and holds up his hand. "OK, OK, so...what we did was put up a number to call for any potential...er...implantees (an abortive chant of Jer-ree) and call they did!"

The applause sign apparently came on as the cerebrally-challenged crowd clapped obediently, eyes turned upstage for the piece de resistance (and we're not talking Rice a Roni here). With a clatter of Candies, a bevy of high-heeled trollops paraded onto the stage; tube tops and side-slit pleather mini skirts de riguere.

The glassy-eyed bimbos seated themselves on either side of their benefactor, each re-enacting their own version of "Basic Instinct" while the audience, enervated by this pelvic extravaganza, erupted in a standing O. Merle beamed the smile of a proud papa, gesturing from one side of himself to the other. Jerry melted into the background, sensing that the show could continue with or without him on the strength of the charismatic Merle who began the introductions.

"Yeah, we got the most beautiful women here today, representing the best of what my club, the Lap Land, has to offer," and Merle walked the length of the stage to the first buxom babe, the red-haired, over-stuffed and vacant-eyed Scully, who took Merle's pro-offered hand, arose and walked to centerstage. Immediately, cries of "Take it off, take it off, take it off" resonated through the studio, and Merle elegantly twirled her around then let her go. Without hesitation, and against the producer's instructions, Scully began to peel off the tube top, and Jerry tried to look put upon and disappointed with the antics of his guest. (It would make a great reaction shot after editing.)

Suddenly, though, there was a high keening wail, and a guy dressed in a suit and wielding something in his hand came crashing down the aisle, knocked Jerry out of his way and clambered up onto the stage, kicking the security men as they fought to pull him down. The Neanderthal, Aryan-looking Steve quickly pulled his arm away, shouting, "Hey, that motherbleeper bit me," and rushed off to inspect the damage, leaving the other three security guys to fend for themselves against the inflamed FBI agent. Scratching, kicking and biting, Mulder moshed his way up onstage and, grabbing Scully by the waist, he threw off her tube top and, to the sound of 200 people sucking their breath in at once in horror, Mulder neatly performed an emergency breast reduction with what looked to be a Swiss Army knife. Resinous looking strings of alien goo streamed down Scully's body, puddling the stage, and overcome by the procedure, she collapsed with a slick thump. As if on cue, the other strippers bared their breasts and projected the contents out into the audience. Seemingly unaffected by the insidious macrame of alien mother's milk, Mulder agily moved from one hottie to the other, exacting the same type of surgery with the pen knife, causing the streams to diminish to trickles and the babes to fall like a phalanx of narcoleptic Rockettes. Finally, arriving at Merle whose countenance was beginning to match his black leather ensemble, Mulder weighed the knife in one hand and looked the man in black square in his green fluorescing eyes.

"You'll never get away with this," Merle's thought projected into Mulder's head. Mulder regarded him cooly, smiled ever so slightly and plunged the knife into the area where, generally speaking, most men's thoughts originate. Merle doubled over and did a magnificent flip off the stage, landing a glancing blow on the host's head, who bravely made the comment before cutting to a break, "I gotta get out of this business" before passing out cold.

Mulder looked around him: what would've normally been a chaotic scene was one filled with hushed anticipation. The audience members, groggy and soggy from the alien juice, were slowly coming to, whether slumped on the floor or still seated in their metal chairs. Good, thought Mulder, the "alien-induced" stupor that he had been in for almost 12 hours seemed to reflect the crowd's usual behavior, so the damage was nearly imperceptible. Hopefully, these people don't drive, Mulder considered fleetingly before directing his attention to Scully, facedown on the stage, gagging.

"Hey, Scully, you OK?" Mulder knelt down, gently cradling her head in his crotch. She was a mess, red hair frosted with tints of alien liquer, heavy pancake make-up coursing down her face like chalk pictures on sidewalks in the rain.

"Dammit, Mulder, why'd you have to go and do that?" She coughed a lung up, and Mulder patted her on the back until the heaving stopped. "Hey, Scully, you're gonna be fine. We're gonna get you outta here and stitched up, good as new." Her head lolled backwards, and she looked up at him dizzily.

"But I was just getting used to them...they made me feel...pretty..." and she lapsed into off-key humming as Mulder picked her up and carried her offstage.

EPILOGUE


Skinner was idly studying a tasteful arrangement of birds of paradise when Mulder entered Scully's hospital room. Both of them jumped, a little startled at Mulder's entrance.

"Hey there! I see you got the flowers; like em?" Like a breath of springtime and twice as exciting, Mulder was the antithesis to the other two sickroom's glum occupants. Skinner glowered at him, said he was glad to see Scully was doing better and that he'd talk to her soon. "Mulder...in my office, nine AM."

"Sure." Fox stared after the closing door then turned to Scully. "So, how's the Stripper Formerly Known as Scully feeling?" She grunted and reached over for the plastic water pitcher. "Allow me..." and Mulder graciously poured her a Dixie cup full. She glared at him and gingerly brought it to her lips, her pectoral muscles starting to sear with pain as the meds from the operation were starting to wear off.

"Dammit, Mulder." She was never good at self-containment, especially coming out of heavy anesthesia. "Skinner just told me that they tried destroying the master copy of the Springer show, but someone smuggled one out and it's already had over 2 million hits on the Net." Mulder regarded her sympatheticaly as she spluttered on. "I did not join the FBI so I could become the most downloaded woman in America."

"Oh, tsk, tsk, Scully. That's the dream of most empty-headed redheads, present company excepted of course." Mulder walked over to the window overlooking a Chicago landscape while Scully stared daggers into his back.

"Speaking of empty-headed, how did you manage to go in there and..." she paused, choking at the thought, "do what you did, without being affected by all the alien sputum?" She shook her head, trying to will the the image out of her mind. "I mean, we were covered in it by the time you brought me out to the ambulance; even the driver got some on himself, and you had to get us to the hospital, right?" She could still see the two giggling paramedics cramming oxygen cannulas up their noses as Mulder frantically called the dispatch in search of the hospital. Perfectly nightmarish, but all to be expected in the line of duty...NOT.

"Well, Scully, I decided that I needed a little...uh...spiritual help, so after getting tickets to Springer for the day of your..uh...unveiling...I did a little e-shopping and found an auction for some underwear worn by Steve Young." Scully could've sworn he'd said "underwear," and it wasn't just the buzzing of the Demerol in her head. "Steve Young...uh...football..."

"Yeah, he's a Mormon and former QB for the San Francisco 49ers. Well, the Mormons have this thing about blessed undergarments, and I found this website, 'Thongs for the Memories.com,' that sells used celebrity undergarments." Scully shook her head back and forth repeatedly, trying to justify what Mulder was prattling on about: football and Mormon underwear. "So I bid on it and had it Fed-Exed." Scully scrabbled for the dual TV and bed remote and adjusted her position to regard him with an even more incredulous, hate-filled look. "What the hell are you..."

"No, wait..you gotta hear me: it worked." Mulder filled her Dixie cup and gulped it down. "I put on the blessed undergarments previously worn by Steve Young...and...whaddya know: they worked! I was impervious to alien slime." Scully started pressing the emergency call button and had him escorted out by a burly nurse, but not before he could add, as he was shoved out of the door," Hey, he wasn't wearing blessed undergarments when he got that career-ending concussion. I have found a way to...Oww! That's my foot, you..." and, alone again, naturally, Scully sighed, feeling her career as a stripper/agent was one for the record books as well.

THE END!!!











 
   
 

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