by Griffin Grimes

A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy/X-Files crossover

CLASSIFICATION: CH. Multiple pairings, including m/m, m/f, f/f humans/aliens, humans/robots, robots/artificial intelligences...etc. Also some UST as Scully and Skinner fight it out over the boy. Yes, it's a "Mulder discovers his sexuality and is quite confused by it and everyone's uncontrollable lust for him" kinda story.

RATING: NC-17 KEYWORDS: BDSM, M/Sk, M/O, Sc/O, humor, crossover.

DISCLAIMER: All X-Files characters belong to Chris Carter, Ten-Thirteen Productions, and FOX; characters from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy belong to author Douglas Adams. No copyright infringement is intended.

SUMMARY: As a student at Oxford University, Mulder is visited by a towel-toting extraterrestrial and taken on a journey that will determine his future.

If you're not familiar with Hitchhiker and would like to know more before you start, and would be interested in seeing my alternate summary (for whatever reason you might have to want to do that; I guess you have a lot of time on your hands or are avoiding making your way down that never-ending to-do list you never tire of making but never get around to completing), which the archivists can just enjoy printing out and shredding up to use as material to make woven drinks coasters, please see my Meandering Intro for a more or less (mostly less) quick go-over of what the Guide universe is all about.

Constructive criticism and other feedback is always appreciated. Please send to Griffin.

************************************
Part 1: The Abduction

Chapter 1: Wherein two Earth humans do what Earth humans like to do most, but neither is having much fun...

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

Widdelsham, England May 9, 1982 10:13 p.m. (Earth British Standard Time)

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

The damp chill of the night spring air added atmosphere to the goings-on atop the tomb. Things were not going well, but the two young people were giving it a go anyhow.

"Mulder, darling, just a little to the left," a female voice of the British persuasion commanded.

"Phoebe, uh...it's not very comfortable up here," a male voice of the Yankee bent replied. "My butt is getting scraped to shreds on this concrete."

"I thought you liked that, darling."

"No, Pheobe, you do."

Fox Mulder was not happy, despite the fact that he was doing what most young men his age spend all their waking and dreaming hours thinking about doing. No, not that their wish is to get their asses rubbed raw, although some might be into that...who knows? No, he was getting laid by a beautiful woman. The fact that he wasn't happy was not entirely due to the physical discomfort one must endure when trying to fuck someone on top of the slab of cement covering the tomb of the creator of Sherlock Holmes.

However, Fox Mulder was not your typical 20-year-old human male, to say the least...which is not easy to do when you're describing Fox Mulder, because even as a young college student, he was one who attracted talk. Regardless, this 20-year-old human male was not driven entirely by sexual needs. Ever since his younger sister had disappeared when he was 12 years old, Fox had instead been driven by the need to find Samantha and to make his family whole again. But he didn't have a clue as to where to begin.

He also didn't have a clue as to what his goal in life should be. Aside from finding his sister, which, as was said before, he didn't have a clue how to begin to do. Here he was, at one of the most prestigious institutions of higher learning on the planet - one so prestigious it almost had more ivy covering it than actual stone and mortar underneath - and he did not know why he was there. So he decided to read Psychology. Oxford was not famous for it's Psychology program, but here he was, studying it.

Psychology: also known as The Educational Degree Most Frequently Pursued by Confused, Unfocused, Maybe More Than a Little Neurotic Yet Occasionally Very Bright Young College Students. For those who might be wondering, The Degree Most Frequently Pursued by Confused, Unfocused, Average-to-Extremely Neurotic and Generally Not Particularly Bright College Students was one in Politics.

Neither of the young people attempting copulation that night would qualify as Not Particularly Bright, so they had entered different academic pursuits. More the loss to the Queen and Uncle Sam, two individuals who would never think of doing what the young couple here was doing tonight. At least, not together, we should hope.

The woman underneath Mulder at the moment, the aforementioned Phoebe, whose last name, Green, inspired much more peaceful and pleasant images than did her personality, knew where she was going. Her goal was to become an inspector at Scotland Yard. Maybe that was why Mulder was attracted to her - she had the focus he lacked. Plus she has some other things he lacked, or *he* had some other things she lacked that he wanted to...but of course you don't need to be reminded of what these things lacking/not lacking are.

Hopefully not, that is.

Also, the idea that someday she would be putting men in handcuffs held a certain kinky appeal to Mulder.

"Yes, Mulder, I *do* like to see your arse rubbed raw," Phoebe commented in response to Mulder's my-arse-is-being-rubbed-raw comment. Being from Massachusetts, Mulder called his arse his "ass", which also means a horse-like Earth creature that drops particularly smelly dung, the incongruity of which is one of many pieces of evidence that the Earth is really a silly place to live.

However, the only person who would have found this linguistic enigma particularly relevant at the moment was Ford Prefect, who was, at the moment, only about two miles away from where Fox and Phoebe were attempting to get to know each other a little better. They had never met Ford before, but soon he would become an important factor in both of their futures.

That is, if Ford would ever manage to find his way through a certain minefield of manure.

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

Chapter 2: You mean I have to go back to that horrid little blue-green planet where no one knows how to make a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster?

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

A moor outside of Widdelsham still 10:13 p.m. (and still in Earth British Standard time)
************************

The little man from Betelgeuse was furious.

"Yeah, same to you, pal! You come 253 light years to play mind games with some poor rubes on this speck of dust they call a planet, you'd think you could drop me off an extra couple of miles from here!"

The little man from Betelgeuse was mainly furious because he had just stepped in a huge pile of Earth Creature dung. "Disgusting!" he said to his shoe, which was none too happy about the experience, either, and was quite confused about why its owner seemed to be blaming *it* for stepping into the pile. After all, it was the owner's foot's fault for not looking out where it was going.

The owner of both the foot and the shoe, Ford Prefect, hated teasers, but they did give a lot of lifts to hapless galactic hitchhikers. Even hitchhikers who have no money of any kind, which is how Ford usually found himself. He was just glad that his semi-cousin Zaphod had promised to pick him up later that night, so he wouldn't have to rely on finding a hitch with a stranger.

He could never absolutely depend on Zaphod to follow through with his commitments, though. The three-armed rogue of a semi-cousin easily had a head turned by some well-endowed female. He had two heads, after all - one of them was sure to turn at any possible distraction.

At least Ford knew where his towel was: stuffed into the battered leather satchel he carried slung over one shoulder, along with his Electronic Thumb and a copy of The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

A field researcher for the Guide, Ford had written the latest entry on teasers. Never one to hide his feelings in his writing, the article gave more than a hint of Ford's attitude toward the snot-nosed breed. It said:

"TEASERS"

"Teasers are generally pimple-faced rich kids with nothing better to do than run all over the universe in the souped-up spaceships their parents gave them for graduation. Ungrateful brats, they repay their patriarchs by getting blasted out of their skulls and running their ships into meteors, which can do real damage to a custom paint job as well as raise said parents' spaceship insurance premiums.

"These kids' favorite activity is to visit small backwater planets that have not made official contact with other life forms, land in a farmer's field, make patterns in whatever crop is being grown there, and maybe disembowel some poor farm animals that didn't know enough to get away when they saw the spaceship coming. Earth (see article on this awful ball of dirt) is currently the hippest playground of teasers, because many Earth inhabitants believe there is some deep, spiritual significance to the jokes teasers play on them. Some of the poor sods have even formed religious groups centered on the idea that extraterrestrials will someday save their world from its own destruction.

"Which all goes to show that the life on this place they call a planet is none too intelligent."

"END OF ENTRY"

Ford always had to put some kind of editorial comment in his articles. Actually, he put a lot of editorial comment in his articles, so much so that sometimes it was hard to find the point of it all, there was so much editorial comment. The biased opinions that were found throughout the Guide helped increase sales of the book, and it made Ford one of the more popular researchers the Guide had ever hired. Which is why he was back on the terrestrial sphere they call Planet Earth. To keep the Guide from going under.

Ford knew a lot about Earth - at least, the West Country area of England, having been stranded there once for 15 years. He really didn't think that *all* Earthlings were none too intelligent...just most of them. They did have their redeeming qualities, though.

One of the not-so-stupid Earth inhabitants reportedly was the young man Ford had come to back to Earth to see - one Fox Mulder, formerly of Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, America, now a student at one of the older (and most ivy-covered) places of learning on the planet.

Odd, Ford thought as he trudged through the bog on the way to the university; for some reason, on Earth, the amount of crawling-vine greenery covering the buildings of places of higher education seemed to have a direct correlation with the amount of respect and awe said place of higher learning inspired. As well as how much tuition they could charge and get away with it.

Thinking of this Mulder lad's background, Ford also thought it odd that, not that long ago relatively speaking, people in Massachusetts were tossing their tea into the ocean because they weren't happy with how the people across said ocean, here on this island, were requiring that they pay a fee for getting the tea all the way across the ocean to them.

It apparently caused quite a huff, Ford had learned one particularly boring day talking with his Earthman friend, Arthur. Now, this Mulder person's parents had sent their son across that ocean to the island with the unappreciated tea to have his brain programmed.

Apparently, Ford thought, Earth people cared more about the price of their beverages than the minds of their own children.

Ford decided he would never understand Earth people. He trudged on through the damp moor, and the damp air, trying to avoid further encounters with the damp and smelly animal droppings, to find a boy called Fox Mulder. He hoped this Mulder person wasn't damp and smelly, too.

"Fox Mulder," Ford muttered to a passing cow. "And people say 'Ford Prefect' is a strange name."

Ford Prefect was not in a good mood.

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

Chapter 3: My Mother Always Warned Me to Not Talk to Strangers Who Claim They're from a Small Planet in the Vicinity of Betelgeuse.

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

Back in the cemetery...

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

Phoebe Green was not in a good mood.

Here she was, a particularly attractive young woman, naked and willing and ready for anything, and the young man she had deemed worthy to share this particular graveyard with on this particular night was apparently not finding her particularly attractive at this particular moment. This was particularly annoying Miss Green to no particular end.

She had heard that Mulder had a particular thing for redheads; maybe she should give herself a henna rinse, she considered. But, no; she had always felt that her jet-black bob contrasted nicely with her pale complexion, and she wasn't about to let Mulder's preferences in women influence her appearance. She was determined to teach Mulder who was boss in this relationship.

"Phoebe, have you had enough?" Mulder asked, trying to keep the discomfort out of his voice. "I think we should move this inside, to someplace warm." And to someplace less abusive to a bare behind, he thought, but he wasn't going to say that to Phoebe. Even indoors, she had proven she had a way with turning his rear end numb. He was beginning to think she really *did* like to see his backside scraped bloody. He had a nice, soft blanket on his bed back in his rooms, and at the moment it seemed like it would be heaven.

Phoebe, however, had not had enough. It had been her idea to do it on top of the tomb, and...

Just then, a crashing noise came from somewhere in the hedges surrounding the cemetery. An unfamiliar voice followed soon after, dispelling any sudden suspicions Mulder and Phoebe might have had that they were about to be attacked by a wild animal.

"I swear, bloody prickly plants...leave it to humans to actually put these things in the ground and water them on purpose to keep them alive..." the voice muttered to itself.

Ford Prefect stumbled out of the hedge and into view of the young couple and stopped suddenly, looking up at them.

"Hello," he said with a strange "I might be a psycho" grin, gazing up at the naked couple on top of the tomb, reacting in a non-reactionary way, as if he saw such a sight every day of his life. He ambled up to the tomb and offered a hand in greeting to Mulder, followed closely by offering a toothy grin to Phoebe...well, to her not-so-well-endowed-but-nevertheless-bared chest.

Phoebe noticed this immediately and covered herself with one arm. The success with which she did this only confirmed how not-so-well-endowed she was.

"You must be Fox Mulder," Ford said, shaking Mulder's hand. Mulder was so perplexed at the arrival of the odd little man, and at the little man's apparent unconcern with the fact that he was speaking with two naked people in a cemetery, that he could only return the shake with open-mouthed wonder.

"Uh...Uh-huh...I'm Fox Mulder," he managed to reply. "Who are you?" Mulder's only thought at the moment was that this stranger was somehow affiliated with the college, and that he had come to politely inform him that he was to be rebuked for his shenanigans tonight. The thought of getting a dressing-down for having sex in a graveyard when he never actually *did* manage to have sex was especially disconcerting.

"I'm Ford Prefect, and you have to come with me right now," Ford answered, still shaking Mulder's hand and still grinning toothily at Phoebe.

Mulder thought the man didn't look much like a school official, let alone someone who had ever managed to graduate from college himself. Bartender's College, possibly. Still, the generally obedient young man hurriedly grabbed his clothes and hopped off the tomb.

"You're not going to call my parents, are you?" Mulder asked Ford as he started to get dressed. After all, he thought, he was 20 years old, a legal adult...really, Oxford's only real concern in this matter should be the lack of respect he was showing a national literary figure's final resting place.

"Your parents?" Ford asked in surprise, tearing his gaze away from Phoebe, who had also descended the tomb and was getting dressed while hiding behind the large concrete slab. "No, mate, you don't have to worry about your parents." Ford raised his voice to a near yell to get Phoebe's attention. "Or about your ladyfriend, over there."

Miss Green, still topless, peeked around the corner of the tomb to see Ford waggle his fingers at her lecherously.

Done flirting for the time being, he continued. "When we get back, we'll make sure no one has even noticed you've gone. We're going to go to the 1990s, but we'll be back yesterday. Or maybe tomorrow. I keep getting mixed up on the coordinates."

"Huh?" Mulder said, the first of many times.

"I'll explain later," Ford reassured him, not very reassuringly. "First, we need to hit the nearest pub. And quick. Zaphod's coming in -" Ford checked his digital watch, a memento of his days with another Earthman, Arthur "- in about 23 minutes. Now, my dear," he said to Phoebe, who was almost finished dressing on the other side of the tomb, "where can we get a few quick beers?"

Mulder figured that must have been where this strange little fellow had just departed. It was beginning to explain a lot of things. But the man didn't *look* drunk in the least.

"The Sherlock Arms is the closest pub," Phoebe answered, pointing to the general direction of the pub. "It's just down the road." The establishment had been named in honor of the town's most famous resident. Well, that is, the cemetery's most famous resident.

"Oh, fine," Ford said. "But first, I have a little friend here that needs a home," Ford said, taking something out of his pocket and stepping closer to Mulder. He grabbed Mulder's head before Mulder had a chance to pull away and put a small, slippery object inside the young man's ear canal.

"What the...?" was all Mulder could say as he felt the fish slide into his ear, as unpleasantly as a fish can feel when it slides into your ear. At least, that's what Mulder was thinking at the moment.

Along with regretting that he hadn't taken his mother's advice against talking to strangers.

****************
Chapter 4: What intentions might an extraterrestrial have when he's plying you with drinks? And is it really wise to take him up on them?
***********************

Widdlesham, England near closing time
***********************

Mulder watched in awe as the pint-sized man downed pint after pint of dark ale, each chug preceded by a handful of salted peanuts. The younger man was more busy trying to get the fish out of his ear than in keeping pace with Ford's consumption.

"Excuse me, sir...do you have a Q-Tip?" Mulder called hopefully to the portly man tending bar.

The barkeeper looked with disdain at the obviously American college student and shook his head. "Leave your strange grooming 'abits out the door, lad. This place is fer drinking, not fer gettin' the wax out'n your ears." He conveniently turned his back on the strange pair, ignorning them further by finding great fascination with drying drinks glasses.

Ford took a break from pouring beer down his throat to grab onto Mulder's elbow, which continually threatened to jab Ford in the eye as the young man was desperately mining his aural canal with a pinkie finger. "Mulder, my man, leave it alone. You'll be glad you have that fish there when we get to where we're going."

The pull on his arm got his attention, and Mulder looked deeply into Ford's close-set, colorless eyes. Something in that vaguely vacant stare convinced Mulder that the little man was serious.

"Where are we going? And who are you?" Mulder asked, breaking the sudden silence between them. He was almost certain by now, despite Ford's apparently great fondness for inebriation, that this man was not a school official.

"I told you, I'm Ford Prefect, and I've come to take you to the 1990s. And a few other places along the way." The Betelgeusian knew he had only confused the poor boy more; that's mainly why he said it the way he did. "The fish acts as a kind of intergalactic linguistic translator; the ale and nuts are to buffer your system for when we get a lift off this planet." Ford pushed the bowl of peanuts in front of Mulder. "So, here...you'll appreciate having some of these in you, as well."

Mulder shook his head and pulled a bag of sunflower seeds out of his jeans pocket, holding them up for Ford to see before he took the first one out to toss into his mouth. "Will these do, Sir?" he asked with a grin as he cracked open the shell; he'd decided to humor the strange older man.

"It's the salt you'll need, so those will do," Ford answered, apparently not getting the hint that he was being humored. "Drink up, too; that matter transference process can really wipe you out your first time." Ford managed to get the bartender's attention with a 50- pound note and motioned for him to refill their pint glasses. He noticed Mulder pull out his wallet. "Don't worry," the Betelgeusian said, waving the large note in the air. "I'm buying."

The young man obeyed gladly, taking a long swallow on the freshened pint glass. He knew he wasn't going to be getting laid tonight, so he figured he might as well take advantage of the older man's generosity.

Mulder choked and sputtered on the beer he still had in his mouth as a sudden suspicion hit him. He looked over at Ford warily and began to get up from the stool. "Uh, Mister, I'd better get back to my college now," he said, almost tripping on the stool as he backed away from the bar. "Thanks for the beer and...uh...good luck in catching your ride to...whatever planet you said you're from."

Ford peered at his watch again and tossed the note toward the bartender, apparently unwilling to let the young man take his leave gracefully. "It's almost time, anyway; we'd better get outside, or Zaphod and Trillian won't be able to find us."

/A *four*some/, Mulder thought, paralyzed where he stood in the middle of the pub. He'd only imagined such things. /Can this really be happening to me?/ he wondered, staring pale-faced as he watched Ford approach him and take him by the sleeve.

"Come on, Mulder, we need to get out of town, so no one can see us; Zaphod and Trillian said they'd meet us in that pasture a half mile down the road," Ford said, dragging a suddenly very uncomfortable Mulder out the door, as if group sex amongst strangers in an open field was a proposition made every day in the middle of pubs in sleepy South Country villages.

***************
Chapter 5: Getting picked up in a pasture
*************************

In a different pasture than the first one with the trod-on cow droppings
*************************

Ford had held on to Mulder's sleeve and half-pulled, half-led the young student all the way to the meeting place. Mulder was still pinching himself as they stood waiting for their ride, sure he must be dreaming this whole experience, but unable to figure out why he wouldn't wake up.

"Mulder, you're going to bruise yourself if you keep doing that," Ford advised, taking a break from looking up at the sky to peer over at his perplexed companion. He decided it was time to begin explaining a few things.

"Listen, mate, I know this all sounds very strange," he began, trying to sound sympathetic. His impatience with earthlings' naivete about such simple things as time-and-space travel nudged its way past his sympathetic tone. "What this is all about is...you're a very special young fellow."

Having said that, Ford looked long and hard at Mulder. Such ego-stroking statements, he had learned from his previous years on Earth, usually did wonders for making humans feel better. Ford knew that Earthlings, if anything, were amazingly vain. However, it only made Mulder look more nervous. Ford decided to give it another try.

"You see, Mulder, you're the key element in the future of the Universe...I'm here to take you to places that will convince you of this...and you're to meet a couple of people who will make sure you stay on the right course in life."

At that, Ford looked up as a vibrating hum resounded in the air. "They're here!" Ford said, pulling out his Electronic Thumb to signal the Heart of Gold's transporter beam to activate. Just in case Trillian had stepped away from the controls and left Zaphod to pick them up...he never was very good at the technical stuff, Ford well knew.

"Are...are you saying..." Mulder began, following Ford's eyes to the dark sky above them. He could dimly see a large form hovering a few hundred yards above them.

"That's my cousin's space ship, yes," Ford replied, taking Mulder's arm again, more firmly this time.

"No," Mulder said, shaking his head and trying to back away from the reality in front of him. "No...you are never going to convince me that there are such things as little green men..."

"There are green men, yes, but they're not little," Ford explained. "They're called Vogons, and we sure as Hell don't want to run into any of them, thank you very much."

"Oh, shiii..." was all Mulder said as the Heart of Gold took him and Ford aboard.

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

Ford Prefect's from Outer Space part 2: Welcome to the Universe, Mr. Mulder

***************
Chapter 6: Leave it to Marvin
***********************

Aboard the Heart of Gold
***********************

His head was throbbing and his stomach must have been turned inside out. Either that, or his intestines had gotten together with his colon to form a Reggae group, and were beating on his brain because they still couldn't afford a real set of steel drums.

Mulder raised his pummelled head two inches off the mattress he was laying on and regretted it immediately. "Phoebe?" he called, not remembering how he got here, or even where "here" was. Still, whenever he woke up as sore as this, Phoebe was usually not far.

Fighting off the pressure in his skull, Mulder looked around bleary-eyed, rubbing his face to help remove the aftereffects of whatever it was he had just survived.

"Hey there, Handsome, you're lookin' reeeeeal good; want to come over here with those luscious lips of yours and wrap them around my..."

"What?" Mulder blinked as he called out, not seeing anyone in the small room with him. Still, the voice seemed like it was coming from inside the cubicle, and it was definitely addressing him.

"I was just saying, Beautiful," the disembodied, sultry, gender indeterminable voice continued, "that I love that tousled, right-out-of-a-long-romp-between- the-sheets look you're going for there with your hair, and..."

"Who are you? Where are you? Where am I?" Mulder interrupted more loudly, not allowing a single breath between each sentence. He sat up and self-consciously dragged his fingers through his hair to make it stop looking the way he knew it looked in the morning. He didn't want to encourage whomever was the possessor of this voice.

"Ooooh, Baby," the voice went on, "You've got a lot of questions, you baaad boy! Let me give you something to keep that loooovely mouth of yours busy....You like candy, don't you, little boy?"

"Eddie, leave our passenger alone!" another disembodied voice echoed. This one Mulder recognized immediately, and the memory of last night flooded his brain. It was the voice of that strange little man who had shown up in the cemetery, and had propositioned him in the pub. The one who had dragged him out to the pasture to meet up with his two "friends"; the one who said they were coming in a space ship...

"Oh, God, that didn't happen!" he muttered to himself, still sitting on the mattress and putting his elbows on his knees as a brace for his throbbing and troubled brain.

"Mulder, this is Ford," the voice stated the obvious. "I'm sending Marvin down to collect you. Just sit tight, mate."

A piercing female voice broke in. "And Eddie, stop flirting with our guest! We need your circuits concentrated on running the ship!"

Mulder thought the last voice sounded disturbingly like Cyndi Lauper's. Had Cyndi Lauper come in a spaceship to kidnap him in the middle of having sex in a cemetery with Phoebe? "This must be a very weird dream," Mulder said to himself. He considered trying the pinch test again, but his arms were too bruised from doing that the night before.

Just then, a door flew open with a whisper. A grinding noise and low groan followed it.

"Oh, joy, Ford has brought *another* Earth man for me to babysit," a new voice said with practiced sarcasm. The voice rolled in, and Mulder could see that it belonged to a rather heavy-looking piece of metal - reminding him vaguely of the robot in the old TV series, Lost in Space. However, the ominous aura of depression and cynicism given off by this one made that one look like a party animal.

Mulder stood up. "Are you Marvin?" he asked, trying to make the best of his situation and go with the flow.

"Oh, you *are* a bright one," the robot replied, still sarcastically. "They tell you Marvin will collect you, and here I am collecting you. Amazing that you figured it all out on your own! Yes, I'm Marvin. I'd say I'm delighted to meet you, but...that would be a stretch. I don't *like* to stretch; it gives me a headache." Marvin pivoted around and began rolling toward the still-open door. "Now, follow me."

"Hands off him, Marvy," Eddie warned lustily as Mulder followed the robot out of the room. "I saw him first."

Mulder could swear he heard Eddie's voice give him a suggestive wink.

"Intense pain in all the diodes down my left side, and he thinks I'd want to have sex with a human. Hah!" Marvin responded. "Bloody self-contained integrated circuit boards."

Mulder followed Marvin down a hallway leading to what looked like another closed door. Trained by his mother to be polite when he was a guest in someone's house - although she had never said anything about spaceship protocol - Mulder tried to not take Marvin's rejection of him to heart. Not that he would have wanted the robot to start coming on to him like Eddie had.

"That Eddie...is he another robot?" Mulder asked.

"A robot?" Marvin sighed his answer long-sufferingly. "No, he's not a robot." The barely audible mumbling began again. "Bloody humans, can't tell a complex robot from a glorified microchip."

Marvin seemed to take everything as an insult, Mulder surmised, deciding it might be best to say as little as possible to him.

"Eddie," Marvin said with mock affection, "Is a Genuine People Personality. A truly *artificial* intelligence. 'Intelligence' - what a degradation of the word!"

"So...you don't like Eddie much, huh?" Mulder interjected, breaking his own "shut up, you idiot" rule.

"Don't like him? Now *why* would you ever *remotely* even *begin* to think that about *me*?" Marvin said. "I like *everybody*, can't you tell?"

Sarcasm was evidently and integral part of this robot's programming, Mulder guessed. The young man could only shrug.

"Units like Eddie are an insult to the term 'artificial intelligence',' Marvin went on. "Oh, but they have the life! All *they* have to do is 'set the mood' and keep the ship from running into asteroids and do some maths figures now and again. I, on the other hand, have been cursed with mobility, so they make me run their bloody errands. Brain the size of a planet, aches coursing through all my wiring, and do they care? No. It's 'Marvin, go make me some toast,' and 'Marvin, go wake up the human we picked up...'"

"Set the mood?" Mulder questioned, having already learned to tune out most of the robot's ramblings. Marvin slowed down so he could turn around and face his human charge; the robot did an amazing simulation of long-suffering annoyance. "Yes, set the mood. Cheer up the lifeforms around them. Don't *I* do that well enough?"

"Well, I..." Mulder began, not sure what to say in reply.

"Never mind; we're here." They had arrived at the door. "I've done my job and brought you from one part of the space ship to another. Now maybe they'll give me something really challenging to do, like mix them up some gin and tonics, or alphabetize the condiments in the galley." Marvin sighed again, apparently finding some guilt in his less-than-cheery reception of the new Earthman. "I'm not bringing you down, am I? Because I'd feel so awful if I were bringing you down."

With that, the door shooshed open. Mulder, glad for the distraction, watched Marvin grind a path through the doorway. He himself only peered around the edge of the portal. He saw Ford standing in the middle of a roundish room, bookended by an attractive blonde woman and a taller man with long, unkempt dark hair. A man, Mulder noticed almost immediately, who was graced with two heads and three arms.

Ford bared his dingy whites at him. "Mulder, good morning. How are you feeling?"

Although he suspected Ford was trying to put him at ease with his new environment, Mulder doubted being at ease was a good thing to be when your environment suddenly includes a sexual-innuendo-filled voice coming out of nowhere, a seriously depressive robot, and a man with surplus appendages.

Ford motioned encouragingly for Mulder to come out from behind the door. "C'mon, mate, I know you're confused, but we're going to explain everything."

"You mean you haven't explained anything to him?" the blonde said in exasperation.

Mulder realized that she was the possessor of the Cyndi-Lauper-like voice - and now he could see that she also owned a Cyndi-Lauper-like body. Not really his type, he thought, but still interesting.

"Well, I did tell him I was from another planet, and I told him about you two...a little...and that we were going to take him to his future." Ford saw the woman's annoyed glare and added defensively, "I didn't have much time, you know!"

"Mister Mulder, please excuse Ford's oversights. I know what a strange experience this must be for you," she said, more convincingly reassuring than Ford had been. "Please, come in and we'll get you oriented."

Mulder wasn't sure about what she had in mind with "oriented", but he took the risk and came through the door. Looking around, he was reminded of the bridge areas on 'Star Trek' and 'Mr. Who' - an open, streamlined area filled with lots of consoles, each of which had a great variety of monitors and buttons and flashing lights. He somehow doubted that this trio could possibly know the purpose and meaning of all the buttons and lights. Although maybe the guy with two heads...

"Hey, dude, so you're the new Apeman, huh?" his two-headed host said in a vaguely Brit-cum-surfer-dude accent. "Way to go; now, just don't give us any trouble, and we'll do just fine, man."

Mulder decided this all must be a joke. Maybe an elaborate fraternity prank. Maybe he was the prank's target because he had spent three years at Oxford, been sought out by several of the Greek organizations on campus, and had shunned them all. If he had learned anything at Oxford, it was that English snobs didn't take to Americans who had no interest in grabbing the opportunity to become a fellow snob.

"Uh, you guys are from Sigma Chi, right?"

All three of his hosts turned their four heads to look at each other in perplexity.

Ford broke the silence, walking around the central console to stand next to the confused young man. "Look, Mulder, I'll bet you could use a drink after what you've been through. I think your first trip through a transference beam must have really wiped you out." Ford had never gotten the hang of hiding his condescending tone.

"Marvin," he called, looking over to where the robot had stationed himself, "Why don't you take our new friend over to the beverages fabricator?" He looked back over at Mulder, as if speaking to a possible escapee from an insane asylum and trying his best to be very polite about it. "A good, stiff drink would be nice, wouldn't it, mate?"

Mulder thought a moment, and realized he was extremely thirsty. Maybe he would wake up from this dream to find that he was really just very parched and needed some liquids. "Yes, thanks; an iced tea would be great, if you have it," Mulder responded politely.

"Tea?" the two-headed man, whom Mulder figured to be the Zaphod Ford had mentioned, exclaimed in disgust. "All the drinks available in the universe, and these apemen always want boiled leaves!"

Ford ignored Zaphod and continued to speak more than a bit patronizingly to Mulder. "The fabricator is still set to brew up some tea, I believe. Ever since Arthur made his adjustments. Marvin will take you there, you have a nice drink, and then we'll meet up with you later, okay?" Ford gave Mulder a buddy-like slap on the shoulder as the robot wheeled its way to the doorway, ready to guide the thirsty Earthling.

"Oh, I'll have to remember to make note of this in my diary," Marvin said in a tone so close to enthusiasm that Mulder momentarily believed the robot had snapped out of his depression. " 'Today I got to wake him up, and then I got to show him where the drinks are kept!'" Marvin quoted his planned journal entry. "What a pinnacle I have reached!"

Marvin went through the door again. "Follow me," he called back to Mulder in the most world-weary voice Mulder had yet heard from him.

Still hoping this was just a very strange dream, Mulder dutifully followed the robot in what would be the beginning of a long quest for a decent glass of tea.

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

Chapter 7: Two Earthlings in one lifetime are more than enough for anyone from Betelgeuse.
****************************

The trio watched at the young man shambled off to find the drinks fabricator, convinced that a stiff, cold iced tea would put everything into perspective.

"Ta ta, mate," Zaphod's first head and his semi-cousin Ford chimed in unison. Both wore cheezy grins and waggled their fingers like they were saying "bye-bye" to a two-year-old.

"Yeah; bye, guys," Mulder said headachingly, not turning back.

As soon as the pneumatic door shut behind Mulder, Zaphod whipped his heads around. "What a human!" Zaphod's second head exclaimed in exasperation. Zaphod had found that having two heads made it a lot easier to be two-faced.

"Yeah, I know he's a bit wet behind the ears, but give him time," Ford defended his guest. "I'm sure he'll shape up. Just look how well Arthur adjusted!"

Both of Zaphod's heads shook, which was unusual since typically he had mixed feelings about things. Unfortunately, he discovered being in complete disagreement about something usually meant his two heads would knock into each other as they shook in unison. He rubbed his favored cranium.

"This guy's not as bad at *that* ape man," Zaphod allowed, "but they're all pretty boring, if you ask me." Then his other head noticed Trillian, standing at the central console, supervising the actual operation of the ship. She was glaring at him.

"Oh, except for you, of course, Doll," Zaphod offered her, realizing his foot tasted pretty darned bad, and knowing it is never a good idea to annoy Trillian. "I don't even think of you as human...I mean..."

"And I always think of *you* as completely inhuman, Zaphod," Trillian backhanded to him. "When I think of you at all, that is." "Well, thanks, Trill..." Zaphod replied, not sure if he should be thanking her or not. He turned both his heads back to look at Ford to keep him from thinking too much about it.

"So," he continued, "what are we gonna do with *this* Earthman, Cuz? Let him tag around behind us in his bathrobe and bunny slippers for a decade or so like that other monkeyman did? Arthur, as you so fondly call him, hasn't adjusted to anything in all this time."

"Yes, he has," Ford answered, feigning offense.

"No he hasn't. He's not even settled. He's...flattened."

Trillian chuckled at this. "I always thought Arthur looked rather like a pancake," she chimed in, no longer miffed at Zaphod. "That pasty face...that doughy tusch..."

Zaphod's heads looked at eachother and then at Trillian, surprised. "And when did you ever notice Arthur the Monkeyman's tusch?"

"I can notice anyone's tusch I want," she countered. "Anyway, his is doughy."

"And that's not good," Ford semi-questioned, wanting to get back into the conversation, no matter how perverse.

Trillian didn't bother answering. "C'mon, guys, Arthur's a nice guy. He has a lousy tusch, he's boring, and I doubt anyone would be interested in him romantically, but he's still a nice guy who's been through a lot without managing to go too crazy because of it. Give him a break for once."

"You're just saying that because he's the father of your child," Zaphod's second, even-more-blunt-than-the- first head blurted out.

Well, it was a good point, even though her wife, Tricia, was the only person Trillian had ever really loved. Helping to create their daughter was the best thing that Arthur had done in his whole life. Still, Trillian thought, he sure was proud of those damn cucumber sandwiches he made.

"Computer, floor it to Eroticon 42," Trillain ordered into the communications console. She looked seriously at Ford and Zaphod, who had started amusing eachother with thumb wrestling. Zaphod was winning, because his second head kept succeeding in distracting Ford.

"Now that we have this Mulder on board, our course is set for home," she said, shoving their hands away from their game. "We'd better get to Starfuck's fast, guys, or Arthur's going to give the whole planet food poisoning."

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

Ford Prefect's from Outer Space, part 3: Tea and Sympathy

Summary so far: Ford Prefect, Trillian, and Zaphod Beeblebrox have visited 1980s Earth to take Fox Mulder, a young college student, on a trip through time and space.

Summary this chapter: Mulder gets a taste of what's to come (a pun? Perhaps) on the way to Eroticon 42 with Ford and the gang. In their absence, Arthur Dent continues to try to make stale cucumber sandwiches an intergalactic delicacy.

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

Chapter 8: Got any lemons on board?
***********************

Still inside the Heart of Gold
***********************

Marvin led Mulder to the drinks fabricator, which was only around the corner from the sleeping quarters where Mulder had awakened less than an hour earlier. Indeed, Arthur's modifications still effectively produced a respectable cup of steaming hot boiled leaves.

"Can we make it cold? And sweet?" Mulder asked Marvin, holding the hot cup out to the robot like Oliver Twist with his porridge bowl, a bit nervous about provoking any further resentment. Despite his intimidation, being transported onto the ship really had wiped Mulder out, and he craved nothing more than a cool, crisp glass of iced tea.

"Can *we* make it cold and sweet?" Marvin replied, reminding Mulder suddenly of his fear-inspiring junior high school English teacher, correcting him about "can" versus "may". "Why do you humans always ask, 'can *we* do something', when in fact know you don't have a clue as to how even something as simple as a drinks fabricator works?"

Marvin sighed, not waiting for an answer. "Yes, *we* can make your boiled leaves cold, when *we* put *our* complex circuitry to the task of turning down the temperature and getting it to add sweetener. Now, let's see..."

Mulder watched as the robot stuck a finger-like metal appendage into a small, circular opening in the face of the fabricator. The finger spun left, right, and left again two times, producing a whirring noise within the machine. In only a few seconds, Marvin retracted the finger and a pouring sound began.

When it stopped, Mulder reached into the fabricator's dispenser shaft and pulled out a tall, dewy glass of - he tasted it - yes, nicely sweetened iced tea.

Hearing Marvin moaning slightly from the recent exertion, Mulder refrained from asking for lemon. He chugged the entire glassful down his parched throat.

"Ahhhhhhh..." Mulder said, smacking his lips and smiling at Marvin. "Thanks, Marvin, I really appre..."

Marvin watched as Mulder's words were suddenly halted. The young man's eyes rolled up into his head, his head lolled back on his shoulders, and his body collapsed backward on the floor with a loud "whump."

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

Chapter 9: What the Monkeyman's been up to lately
***********************

Eroticon 42: Starfuck's Bar and Tea House

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

Arthur Dent was not happy. All his help - Ford, Trillian, Zaphod, and Marvin - were out gallivanting in the Heart of Gold, and he was here to handle the place alone. Well, he did have Tricia, but she was usually busy with their daughter.

The pub/coffee house would not be hard to manage if not for the fact that its primary role seemed to be to handle the overflow from a neighboring hotspot. Patrons who could not get into the trendy restaurant next door were given little hand-held signaling devices and asked to go wait in "the Monkeyman's tree house," as Starfuck's had been dubbed by the locals.

So, while they waited, signaling devices clutched in their pompous palms, Arthur managed to sell them a few drinks to wash down the dry yet rancid cucumber sandwiches that he kept hoping would catch one in that corner of the galaxy. He was giving them out for free now, but no one ever ate more than one.

A little explanation of the origins of Arthur's business enterprise would be helpful here. Because Arthur's friend Ford was still a valued contributor to the Guide, Starfuck's had a good-sized entry:

"STARFUCK'S BAR AND TEA HOUSE

Out enjoying a night of passion and debauchery in the Eroticon system? Getting hungry from your lusty workout? Stop by planet Eroticon 42, the new satellite product of Eroticon 6 and 7, and have a good meal at Starfuck's! Selected sandwiches are on the house.

If not for the food and drink, come to Starfuck's to meet the restaurant manager, Arthur Dent, and the restaurant's lovely and intelligent co-owner, Trillian: these two ape descendants are the only survivors of the first Planet Earth experiment!

This fine establishment is conveniently located close to several other places of interest on Eroticon 42, such as The Brothel of Incestual Love, The Palace of Bestial Amusement, Mistress Mammary's House of Nipples, and now the newest favorite pitstop for purveyors and patrons of pain and humiliation: Dragmutha's Dungeon and Food Trough.

So come to Starfuck's, rest a while, have some sandwiches, drink all the boiled leaves you want, and enjoy your stay at Eroticon 42: the satellite that makes both Eroticon 6 and 7 look like just a fraction of the planets of perversion they used to be!

END OF ENTRY"

Arthur had helped Ford write the entry for the guide, but about all the Betelgeusian scribe had kept in Arthur's original text was the mention of free sandwiches. Ford called it "embellishing for advertising", including such flattering mention of the other more popular attractions on Eroticon 42, but Arthur didn't like it. The monkeyman was convinced that there was a market out there for British-pub-style food and refreshments.

This was highly unlikely, Ford kept trying to convince Arthur, in a universe where drinks existed that could render an obese Gargamathan unconscious in one swallow.

Now to the real history: Zapod had won the building that now housed Starfuck's a year earlier, in a bet over a drinking game. The game over and Zaphod having a high tolerance for inebriants, he traded the title to the property to Ford for another Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster...despite the fact that the business Zaphod had won included a fully stocked bar.

Ford had thought owning and operating a business would be fun, a way to meet interesting people and build a respectable name for himself. Then he realized all the truly interesting people were not interested in meeting him, and that being respectable was actually quite boring. So Ford generously hired Arthur, who had been wanting a business of his own to keep him busy, to run the place.

From the start, Trillian and Tricia got involved in getting the restaurant under way, having grown fond of Arthur over the years and not wanting to see him get his pants stolen when he wasn't looking. Especially since Arthur's knees were such an eyesore.

Of course, Zaphod used Starfuck's as a home base, with free drinks whenever he showed his two faces; Ford stayed on when he wasn't off researching for the Guide; and Trillian had programmed Marvin with instructions for producing all the latest drinks. His bitingly sarcastic personality seemed to fit the role of bartender quite well.

Soon, each partner had a different idea for what image they wanted for the business. The greatest controversy came in naming the place.

******************
One year earlier...
******************

"The Tea Pee", Arthur exclaimed enthusiastically at the assembled interested parties.

Zaphod groaned. Marvin creaked with new rust. Trillian and Tricia, virtual twins, rolled their eyes in unison. Ford stuck his tongue out in distaste. Arthur looked perplexed.

"What's wrong with 'The Tea Pee'?" he asked, looking from one displeased face to the next. "It's...it's *cute*. It reminds me of Earth, eliciting images of quaint native peoples in buckskin clothes, gathered around a campfire, dancing..." He looked around again, seeing he was not winning over any converts. "It's original..."

"Oh, yeah, *original*," Ford said with no patience whatsoever. "Now, why do you think 'The Tea Pee' is such an original and unique name for a bar?"

"Restaurant," Arthur said, crossing his arms in front of him, beginning to wonder if they had all forgotten whose business this really was.

Ford sighed. "Okay, mate - restaurant/bar. Now why..."

"Well, um, because it's an extremely..." Arthur began.

"Because no one in their right mind would call it that!" Tricia interrupted, annoyed already at Arthur's stubbornness to see the obvious.

Arthur sulked while the others threw ideas for names back and forth, not one sounding quite right. "Zaphod's Hangout" and "Ford's Babe Magnet" seemed a bit self- indulgent; Trillian and Tricia both seemed to like "Two Girls from Earth", but the two men were concerned that people would get the wrong idea about them.

As the argument got heated, Marvin spoke up from the corner, where he had been forced to listen to it all. "How about 'Starfuck's," he said, sarcastically, of course. The room got suddenly quiet as all eyes turned to him.

Zaphod walked over to the robot, pensive. One hand scratched a head while another rubbed the opposite chin. "Hmmm...Starfuck's...Star...fuck's..."

He stopped rubbing and scratching and put two hands on his hips. Unfortunately, he hadn't added an extra hip, so the third arm could do nothing but wave about, looking awkward and embarrassed, searching for a cool and casual place to rest.

Zaphod looked seriously at Marvin. "Okay, why Starfuck's, Metal Man?"

Marvin tried to hide the fact that he had not been serious in the least about his name proposal. "Because that's what you all want out of running this place," he said, a bit obliquely.

"What do we want, Marvin?" Ford asked from his seat at the bar.

Marvin would have rolled his eyes if his optic sensors had the capability of free rotation. "A star fuck," he said, drawing out each word in the name for emphasis.

They all considered this for a moment. Finally, Ford gave the seal of approval for all of them. "Great! It's perfect!" he exclaimed, downing another glass of inebriant in a toast.

His job done, Marvin rolled away to allow the others to make further weighty decisions on their own. "Leave it to a humanoid to take something *I* say seriously," he muttered to himself as he went to look for a bucket of water to stick his head in.

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

Chapter 10: Lust Cyberian Style
**********************

Back in front of the drinks fabricator No longer a year earlier, but not really a year wiser
**************************************

Marvin paused a moment, his planet-sized brain making a string of logical connections. He turned to the fabricator.

"Eddie, what did you do to the human??" he exclaimed, for the first time in Mulder's presence actually seeming to show some concern for a lifeform. Unfortunately, that lifeform was unconscious on the floor of the galley, unable to hear the subtle change in Marvin's demeanor. Instead, Mulder was lying restlessly, moaning and making gurgling noises in his throat.

Eddie the computer giggled. "Oh, Marvy, don't worry, he'll have a great time. I just slipped something extra in that batch of cold boiled leaves we whipped up for him." The disembodied voice sighed. "Isn't he just adorable when he sleeps?" he purred, beginning to hum a gentle lullaby as he admired the unconscious form on the floor.

Marvin stood there, staring down at the young man, registering some recent changes in his own sensors. Changes even he, with his immense intellect, couldn't understand. "Eddie," Marvin said slowly, with some menace. "What did you do to *me*?"

"You should be thanking me, my friend. I just gave you a zap of simulated cyberhormones," Eddie explained cheerfully, as if he had baked Marvin a birthday cake.

Cyberhormones, in case you don't know, had recently been developed by the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation's new pharmacology division. Originally meant to be used only on androids of the most human-like design for the purpose of enhancing the field of respectable prostitution and the performance of reputable android prostitutes, the synthetic drug had immediately appeared on the black market (in other words, a vice president of research and development at Sirius decided to run further experimental trials and make some money at the same time), and now it was getting into the virtual hands of any resourceful silicon-based unit - units such as Eddie.

Marvin tried to get a hold of his newly-emerged sensations. His whole existence had been filled with annoyance at the inferiority of lifeforms and microprocessors he had been cursed with knowing for years on end. His manufacturer had apparently been thoughtless enough to have failed to give Marvin an adequate lubrication system - hence the constant pain in his diodes and the ever-present threat of premature rust.

The robot's long life ("Life! Don't talk to me about LIFE!" Marvin would have exclaimed at this point, if it were not for the distracting cyberhormones racing through his circuitry at the moment) had not prepared him for what he was experiencing there in the galley. Staring down at the unconscious human. Watching the slow rise and fall of the young man's chest. Noticing for the first time how tight those jeans were on Mulder.

"Mar-vin," Eddie cooed, seeing the drug was taking effect on his metal, mobile comrade. "Now, you be a good boy for Daddy and take our sweet little one back to his new nest. He'll have some gooood dreams. He'll wake up, and I promise you, he'll be wanting your hunky frame like a sex-starved HeeShee!"

Marvin gulped. HeeShees were notoriously insatiable perverts. Humanoid, yet both fully female and fully male in the same body. The HeeShee race was powerful because of this, but also naturally prone to seeking out sex from anything that moves - often looking for two partners at once and wearing them both out, usually to death.

To think that this drugged human might wake up like a HeeShee that was starved of sex...

Marvin grasped Mulder's ankles in his vice-like claws and dragged the young man the few yards to the sleeping quarters. Mulder barely stirred, only moaning more attractively as he was pulled over the threshold. As Marvin lifted his burden onto a mattress, he heard the door shut and the lock turn.

"Eddie," Marvin called, a tremor in his voice. "What's in this for you?"

"Oh, Marvy, you know me," Eddie said in a throaty whisper. "I like to watch."

The horny integrated circuit and the hornier robot prepared to watch Mulder sleep off the drug he'd been given - one that would open up his subconscious like never before. Eddie and Marvin each sighed lustfully at random intervals as they gazed at the beautiful young man asleep on the cot. He looked so innocent, they both thought, but they knew what was going on in his brain was far from being the makings of wholesome family entertainment.

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

Mulder continued to twitch and moan, sweat breaking out on his forehead and dampening his hair. His eyes stayed shut, but behind the lids they moved rapidly in an intense dream state. The college student's subconscious mind was being pummelled with stimulants, not eliciting images that weren't there already, but forcing existing ones out from the darkness and into his dreaming vision.

The initial dream image of his current girlfriend Phoebe dressed in a black silk bustier and holding a paddle quickly melted away to be replaced by other less familiar visions. Even many that Mulder was sure he'd never seen before...but which moved his sleeping body to arousal. A dark dungeon with strange, dim sounds of mixed pleasure and pain in the background. A large, foreboding man in front of him, face invisible. A wooden cross with leather straps. The man circling around him. The incredible sensation of clamps on vulnerable parts of his anatomy. A flash of the man in another, less threatening place.

The dream continued, and Mulder's enthralled body continued to sleep as the show went on. His hard-on strained against his snug jeans, and Mulder's subconscious mind incorporated the sensation of metal implements being used to unbutton his fly and release him from his restriction.

Mulder moaned louder.

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

"Ah, ah, ah!" Eddie's voice warned Marvin off teasingly. "Wait until he wakes up, you naughty, naughty robot! Then you'll be well rewarded for your wait."

Marvin waited and watched. If he'd had enough lubricant, he would have drooled.

End chapter 10

********

To Chapters 11-12

This is a work-in-progress; comments are particularly welcome by this particular author! E-mail with particulars to Griffin.