Our young Heroine's Vanity proves decisive

The street outside was a wasteland of broken dreams and shattered commerce. Storefronts gaped like empty eye sockets. Signs hung at crazy angles, their messages incomplete. One caught Bill's attention: ADULT BOOKS & VIDEO above a door that hung open, revealing darkness within. Spilled magazines littered the sidewalk—not the normal kind, the other kind, their covers promising pleasures that Bill couldn't imagine and didn't want to.

He was so focused on the horror of pornographic comics that he almost missed it.

A shoe.

A single shoe, lying in the gutter like a discarded hope. Pointed toe. Strange construction. Not Earth-made.

"Splock's," he breathed. He picked it up. Turned it over. It was empty. No foot. No blood. Just a boot, abandoned like a shed skin.

Ham Duo looked at it. Looked at Bill. "I hope he hasn't gone crazy. Started undressing for no reason. That would be—"

"Maybe he wanted to swim?" Bill offered weakly. "Is there water nearby?"

Duo pointed at the burning buildings. The cracked asphalt. The complete absence of any body of water larger than a puddle. "Do you SEE any water?"

"I mean, he could have taken it off for a reason. Maybe his feet hurt. Long walk. Unfamiliar terrain."

"His feet don't hurt. He's a Fortinbrasian. They don't have pain receptors in their feet. It's a known fact. I think. I made it up, but it sounds right."

They ran on.

The square opened before them—a wide plaza with a fountain at its center, dry now, filled with debris. Around it, more ruined shops. Another sign caught Bill's eye: ADULT SUPERSTORE - WE NEVER CLOSE. The door was ajar. Something fluttered in the darkness within.

And there, by the fountain's edge, another discovery.

A sock.

Striped. Strange material. Definitely Splock's.

Next to it, crushed but visible, a small square plastic package. Bill picked it up. Turned it over. The wrapper had a slit in it, as if something had been removed. Words on the side: EXTRA STRONG and FOR MAXIMUM PLEASURE.

Bill squinted at it. "What's this? Some kind of gum? Extra strong gum? Must be Earth candy. Maybe he got hungry and—"

Duo looked at the package. His eyebrow rose. His lips twitched.

"Bill," he said slowly, "you are the most innocent creature I have ever met. And I've met newborn babies. Unborn babies, even. You make them look worldly."

"What? What is it?"

Duo took the package, examined it with the air of a connoisseur, and dropped it back on the ground. "Nothing. Forget it. Let's find the rest of your friend."

Bill stared at him. "What? WHAT IS IT?"

"Later. If we survive, I'll explain. If we don't... well, you'll die ignorant, which might be better."

They ran.

Fifty meters. Maybe less. The street curved, and there, spread across the pavement like a sacrifice to some perverse god, lay a pair of pants.

Splock's pants. The unmistakable one-piece jumpsuit, now in two-piece form, neatly folded and placed on a low wall. As if someone had taken them off with care. With intention.

Bill stopped. Stared. His brain refused to process.

"His pants," he whispered. "His pants are... here. On the ground. Without him."

Duo tried. He really tried. "Maybe he... got hot? Running generates heat. Fortinbrasians probably overheat easily. Taking off pants is logical in that scenario. Very logical. Classic Splock move."

Bill looked at him. "Do you believe that?"

"No."

"Neither do I."

Bill looked at the pants. And remembered the shoe. The sock. And the torn package with the mysterious promise of maximum pleasure.

"No," he whispered. "No, no, no."

The radio crackled. For just a moment, they heard something—a voice, Splock's voice, saying words they couldn't quite catch. Then static swallowed it again.

Bill ran toward the sound.

Duo followed, the empty pants fluttering behind them in the ash-choked wind.

The buildings grew seedier, the signs more suggestive, the debris more personal in nature. High heels. Broken mirrors. A velvet rope trampled into the asphalt.

Music pulsed from somewhere ahead. Low. Throbbing. Menacing.

They rounded a corner and found the source.

A strip club. Or what had been a strip club, before the apocalypse. The sign, hanging crookedly from one remaining chain, read GOLDEN PHEASANT EXOTIC DANCING. Garish posters flanked the entrance—women in impossible poses, their painted smiles faded by smoke and time. The building itself was half-crumbled, but inside, somewhere, a radio played.

From the broken windows, sound bled out into the daylight. Muffled. Distorted by distance and rubble. A voice from the radio—growling, angry—cut through the afternoon haze:

"...this twisted, tortured mess..."

And then, from the same building, closer to the windows, another voice. Human. Male. It lunged at the melody like a drunk trying to catch a moving train.

"Thish... twistted... tor-churred..." He was rushing, gulping syllables, struggling to keep up. When he hit the last word, he grabbed it and STRETCHED, voice cracking, the vowel bending and warping as saliva thickened his throat:

"...MESSSSHHH—"

He held it until he ran out of breath, the sound degenerating into a wet, rattling gasp. Heavy breathing. A cough. Then the radio again, tinny through the distance:

"...this bed of sinfulness..."

The human voice crashed in immediately, desperate not to fall behind. He grabbed the first word and pulled it apart:

"Bedda shiiiiiiinful—"

He stretched it long, the pitch wavering, losing the melody, finding it again, losing it. His voice cracked on the way up, then settled into a thick, slurred drone. Then he tore into the last word, holding it until his throat gave out:

"—NESSSSHHH—"

The sound echoed across the rubble, fading into a wet sniffle. A pause. Heavy, phlegmy breathing. Then the radio: