As soon as Mr. MacPhisto awoke in his luxurious king bed with satin-smooth bedsheets and fluffy down pillows, he heard an unmistakable sound coming from his TV set. Heart pounding, MacPhisto sat straight up in bed and, hardly daring to hope, glanced over at the TV. What he saw made his spirits soar through the roof. TRASH SMELL THE DOLCE ROSES WHILE IGNOMINY YOU STILL BOMB CAN WHORE JAPAN NOW, all accompanied by one of the lightest tracks he had ever recorded, a gentle wake-up call. It's too late tonight to drag your past out into the light…

All MacPhisto could do for a few long moments was sit and bask in the glory of his achievement. He'd done it. The old bastard at 66 had done it. He'd pitched his program to the network, and the network had gotten him on air. One hour in the morning, one hour in the afternoon, and one in the evening, with provisional footage to take over solely at night if Zoo TV proved popular enough. Joy to the world! MacPhisto knew he was old, and aging fast, but this one moment proved that he could still be relevant with the kids- that with a little bit of molding and pinching in the right places, those kids, and their families, could become his army.

He was so happy he could sing, and at once a long-forgotten yet beautiful melody sprang to his lips. MacPhisto belted the lyrics out with all his might, giving in to the grand bluster of the past. "Stars when you shine, you know how I feel. Scent of the pines, you know how I feel! Yeah, freedom is mine, and you know how I feel! It's a new day, it's a new dawn, it's a new life… for me…"

Pause, wink one achingly blue eye at the nonexistent camera, and then continue singing.

"And I'm feeling good."

In MacPhisto's cluttered head, the horns and strings crashed in, and he reveled tremendously.

Instead of reaching Bryce up at Level 13, Theora and Murray were both mildly surprised when Tina Wilson, a controller who normally worked down on their level, answered the viewphone's call. Her red lip gloss, smoothed-back blonde hair and pencil-darkened eyebrows were incongruous with the shadowy surroundings of Bryce's cluttered experimental lab. Cocking her head, Tina gazed down at Theora and Murray on the other end of the line with genuine surprise in her blue eyes. "Hello, Theora! What's going on down there?"

"Hello, Tina," Theora greeted her. "Do you know where Bryce is?"

Tina jerked her thumb in a direction over her shoulder. "He's gone to the bathroom. I came up to bring him lunch, and… apparently there's some kind of dangerous TV program he's analyzing?" Concern was heavy in her voice, and Theora realized that Tina was worried about Bryce himself being corrupted by the film. She tried to reassure her. "It's a program they're showing on Network 66, and it contains subliminal messages. It can only hurt Bryce if he's watching it at normal speed- and besides, he's paid to do this."

Tina blinked, seemingly pacified but also surprised that Theora had read through her so easily. "Well, normal speed is certainly not what he's watching it at. It looks like he's got each frame all spread out over the monitor… it's really kind of eerie."

At that came the sound of a toilet flushing, and eventually Bryce Lynch came into view from the viewphone. As always, he was in a perpetual state of disarray- his clothing looked hastily thrown on, his hair seemed to have been attacked once by a comb but then given up on, and there was a strange white substance smeared across his face. He stopped on his way to the viewphone to hug Tina and give her a kiss on the cheek, and then plopped himself down in his seat to face Theora with his usual no-nonsense brown eyes. "Hey, Theora. What can I do for you?"

"We need-" Theora began, but then stopped herself to ask a question. "Bryce, what's that on your face?"

"Zik Zak Zit Cream," he responded, running a hand through his untidy hair. "Probably not the best product, but the only relevant one I could get ahold of at the moment. Anyway…" His fingers reached up to smear some of the cream around on his face, blending it into his skin. "Is there any particular problem you'd like me to sort out for you?"

"We were wondering," Murray spoke up behind Theora, "if you'd managed to make anything of Network 66's TV program yet."

"Can't you wait just a few minutes longer?" Bryce said. "Giving me too little time to compute could lead to inaccurate results. Besides, I'm not entirely sure what I'm supposed to be looking for."

"Theora mentioned something about subliminal messages…" Tina began uncertainly.

Bryce turned his head to look up at her. "Yeah, and Cheviot said there might hexadecimals hidden in the code, like what happened to Whacketts. But I've run a scan on the raw data and there doesn't seem to be anything encrypted in the file." He moved away from the viewphone and gestured with his hand, pointing to the monitor behind him, and Theora could just barely see dozens of small squares, each one corresponding to a different frame in the program. "On the other hand, subliminal messages are very prominent, as you can tell… but there's so much text that I'm not sure what's supposed to be relevant and what isn't."

"How did you get the program on your computer?" Murray asked curiously. Bryce shrugged. "Simple- I taped it while it was running. Then I broke the tape down into bits." His gaze focused on Theora again. "Where's Edison, by the way? I'd suggest either he or you come up to Level 13 to check this out. You won't be able to see much staring at the viewphone screen."

"Edison stepped out for a bit," Theora said, feeling an unusual conflict of emotions rise within her- she still wasn't entirely sure why Edison had reacted so indifferently. "I'll see if I can find him and send him up." She thought she heard Murray sigh behind her.

Bryce blinked grateful eyes at her. "Thanks. I'll be waiting." He disconnected the line, and the faces of him and Tina disappeared. Theora got up from her chair, ready to go out into the hall and find Edison. Murray watched her as she moved, his face expressing the slightest hint of disappointment.

"While you're up there, could you get Tina to come back to her workstation?" he said, and Theora stopped her stride to look at and admonish him. "Murray. She's doing no harm lunching with Bryce, and if she's needed her producer or reporter will ask her to come back down- not you. That's not your job."

Murray pulled out a fake glower, shrugging his wide shoulders. "I just can't imagine Bryce Lynch being in love."

"For me, I approve," Theora said. "They're very fond of each other." She then turned to go, and tried to make her thoughts turn as well, from the happy couple upstairs to Edison Carter, who probably hadn't gone very far. Yet she couldn't suppress a small smile when she thought of how kind Tina had been to Bryce in the days following Alex Burgess's last trial. She had let him room with her in her apartment when staying in his studio brought back bad memories of his attack, and took care of him as if she were his de facto mother. Of course, their relationship went beyond that- the attraction they felt towards each other was undeniably romantic. Thanks to Tina's loving care, Bryce was now a whole person again, recovered enough from his trauma to get back to doing the work he loved.

All right, that's enough of that, Theora chided herself for getting distracted. She stepped outside into the hall, her mind slowly discarding the images of Tina and Bryce and replacing them with Edison's countenance. What was his problem with the story?, she wondered. It didn't matter that the story was similar to ones done in the past- that would be caring more about marketing than the impact on the lives of others, and Theora knew Edison too well to even imagine he would do that. His desire not to "play the ratings game" was a bit more likely, but again, this had more resonance than simply letting Network 23 crawl all the way back to the top.

Theora discovered that she had reached the end of the corridor, and so peered out around the corner to see if there was any sign of Edison from either direction. To her relief, an enormously familiar figure was heading her way from the left, his brow furrowed but his stride relaxed. Theora stepped out to greet Edison, murmuring a soft "Hello" as he passed her. He muttered "hi" in return, and then stopped walking, instead turning around to look at her.

"Well?" he said after a brief moment of silence had passed. "I know you were sent out here for a reason."

"I wasn't sent by anyone," Theora replied sharply. "I came to find you myself. Bryce wants us up in his lab, to help us search Network 66's program for relevant messages." Edison's eyes darkened, as if a cloud had passed over them.

"So you were sent by someone…"

"No," Theora tried to explain. "I just thought it might interest you."

Edison only shrugged and looked away down the hall, his eyes lost and scanning the scenery as if desperately waiting on some kind of call. "Look… I'm sorry I wasn't interested in the story before," he said, without looking back at Theora. "I just think Cheviot and Co. are making too big a deal out of it. We don't know that there's anything harmful in 66's program, at least not without analyzing it first. Their knee-jerk reaction…" His head slowly revolved, his eyes settling in on Theora's face. "Was to notify us because the ratings are going down. Like I could care about that." Edison shook his head once, and then looked away again as Theora searched for appropriate words.

"Edison, you…" You've got to stop being so apathetic towards the ratings? You've got to care? What was she trying to say anyway? Theora took in every detail of his face, the fiercely-defined jaw, the cool blue eyes, and suddenly remembered a moment they had shared once, during the Sky Clearance Festival. Joining in on the festivities, Edison had taken her hand and pulled her close to him, and they danced together, sharing the warmth of each other's bodies. Such contact had been as easy as breathing, and required no thinking, no dwelling on any consequences. But now, such loose touches would have filled the air with awkwardness. Though Theora wanted to put her hand on Edison's arm to draw his attention towards her, she knew that he would find the touch unwelcome.

So instead, she somewhat changed the subject by asking, "By any chance, did you see something in the program that might have affected your mood?"

Edison turned his head back to Theora, tightly shaking it no. "I don't think so. I'd like to think anything I feel comes from me."

"You'd like to think…" Theora faltered and trailed off, and Edison nodded and turned away, beginning to walk back down the hall the way Theora had come. As she followed him, he began to talk quietly, under his breath.

"I'm not sure if it was the program that did it, but I definitely felt more… restless after watching it. More irritable. More willing to pick fights." He gave a great shrug and shoved his hands into his pockets, and Theora saw that they were heading towards the nearest elevator. "If that's the show's doing, I can see how it could be a problem."

Theora waited until Edison had punched the button on the elevator and said button had lit up with red light before saying, "So you think you can find an angle?"

"I'm sure," he muttered as the elevator's doors opened and Theora stepped in, ladies first, before Edison followed her. "Just give me a few moments with Bryce, and then we'll be able to make something out of nothing."

As it happened, Tina didn't need to be told to leave- Theora and Edison met her on their way in as she went out. She chirped a "Hi!" to the pair, and Theora saw Edison's head turn as she sashayed down the hall towards the elevator. "Who would have thought such a catch would be bagged by Bryce?" he murmured, a chuckle in his voice. Theora gave him a stern look. "Now now, Edison. You don't want to steal Bryce's girl away from him."

"Hey, I respect the kid," Edison said as he went through the door, making sure Theora was close to him as he did so. "Just can't believe his luck." Theora smiled to herself as she entered and followed after Edison, feeling warmth spread through her veins. Here was a return to her old relationship with Edison, the casual relationship where they had joked and jived each other without a care in the world. She hoped that this moment wasn't a fluke, and that Edison had either spontaneously decided to forgive her or had put aside his grievances for the moment because there was work to be done.

"Hey, Bryce," Edison greeted the teen as he slowly pulled his face away from the monitor's screen, readjusting his gaze to the three-dimensional world. In a cage near the monitor, Bryce's parrot rattled its bars and gave a loud squawk.

"Oh, hey Edison," Bryce said in response, slowly peeling himself away from the monitor to sit backwards in his chair. "Hey Theora."

"You're looking well," Edison stated mildly. He came up to the space behind Bryce and gestured to his face. "What's with the stuff?"

"Apparently Zik Zak's foray into dermatological products includes anti-acne ointment," Bryce explained. "Thought I could use some." He waited for Theora to squeeze herself into place next to Edison before turning back around to face the monitor and gazing at it with interest. Theora too couldn't stop herself from staring as the small squares that she had seen previously downstairs took on meaning up close. Each one, she could now see, bore a different word on it, and all were placed in seemingly random order. BONDAGE BABY FEAR ROCK WEAR SCHOOL…

"What's this you've got to show us?" Edison asked, and Bryce responded. "It's part of the program that I taped off of Network 66, apparently called 'Zoo TV.' I've gotten all the frames in order, but I'm not sure what kind of messages they make." He turned slightly to look up at Edison and Theora inquisitively. "I hate to say this, but I think this project is out of my league."

"Well well well!" Edison exclaimed, laughter breaking in his voice. "Looks like you're no longer the big shot you thought you were, Bryce."

"It's only because none of the words seem to form a pattern," he retorted indignantly. "Normally there'd be one intact phrase hidden within the image, but this program is dense."

"It's fine," Theora reassured Bryce, and almost reached out to touch his shoulder before thinking that might make him uncomfortable and stopping herself. "We'll take a gander at it and see if we can't decipher anything."

"Be my guest," Bryce said, clicking on one of the frames to make it fill the entire screen. "You two probably know more about common phrases than I do."

They set to work, Bryce clicking through each frame one at a time and Edison and Theora peering intently at each word, trying to connect them with what they had seen before. At first nothing made sense- RADIOACTIVE THE ROAR FIRE LSD- but then Theora began to see a certain abundance of words, and halted the act at once to point them out. "Wait…" Theora murmured, and Bryce slowed his rapid clicking. "Bryce, can you go back a few frames? I think I see the pattern you were looking for."

"As you wish," Bryce replied, and dutifully clicked backwards until Theora told him to stop. He then began to very slowly click forward, and Theora read each word out loud.

"Work, guilt, guilt, guilt, blackmail… is, is, is… survival, not, not, not… fatty, of, of, of, death… candy, God." She looked over at Edison, who gaze impassively back. "'Guilt is not of God.'"

"Guilt is not of God?" Edison whistled and leaned in to the screen. "That's a pretty lofty statement to make on network TV."

"Keep going," Theora urged. "I sense a pattern coming up soon."

Bryce nodded and kept clicking, and Theora kept reading.

"Rejoice, speed, tread, softly…" She blinked. "Tread softly. Survive, solution, destiny, hype… condom…" Fortunately for her, Bryce was too sheltered to make mention of the word, and Edison kept his mouth shut. "Mock, mock, mock, tutti, the, the, the, ignorant- hang on. Devil, Devil, Devil… recycle, and, and, and… change, he, he, he, travel, will, will, will, urge, flee, flee, flee, left, from, from, from, right, thee. Mock the Devil and he will flee from thee."

There was a brief silence as the message sunk in and took effect. Guilt is not of God. Mock the Devil and he will flee from thee. Guilt is not of God… mock the Devil and he will flee…

"There seems to be a religious slant," Edison murmured. "God, Devil… these are powerful words."

Theora nodded tightly, her mind already far away, and then asked Bryce, "Can you run the tape you made, Bryce? I want to know what sort of effects these messages have on us."

Bryce nodded wordlessly, and Theora and Edison waited for him to put the tape into the player before watching as the words crawled across the screen, followed by a pounding, driving beat. Run at normal speed, the tape was like an affront to all the senses, and Theora slowly felt her brain grow unhinged as she watched the words flash past. Not even knowing what she was looking for could prevent the madness from coming on. All the while, a voice sang slyly, "A man will rise and a man will fall on the sheer face of love like a fly on a wall. It's no secret at all."

NAPALM SWELL COUNTRY HYPOCRISY INEVITABLE… The more Theora watched, the more she had the sense of being swallowed up inside the music, never to return. She felt the words and the lyrics fill her bones and puff her stomach out with pride. And suddenly… suddenly all of the energy that was directed to her solar plexus went shooting, skyrocketing up to her head. She felt herself inflate like a balloon, transforming into something much more high and mighty than she really was. She had the very real, very visceral sensation of being bound by chains made of aluminum foil, of her body vibrating beneath the deadened skin, of being able to shuck both prisons off of her and become a powerfully inhuman creature made of light. She wanted the world to fall at her feet, and she also wanted to want nothing, to not trouble herself with the minor quibbles of mortal life.

Suddenly the words WATCH MORE TV began to flash on the screen, and Theora emitted a gasp, which quickly drew her back to the real world. She turned away and hugged herself, shutting her eyes tightly, wanting to warn Edison and Bryce but not being able to. Despite none of them living a sedentary lifestyle, it was hard not to assume that it would all end in a Blipverts-esque mess.

Look, I gotta go, yeah, I'm running out of change. There's a lot of things if I could I'd rearrange. Then the song was over, after a brief musical interlude, and Theora pried her eyes open to witness Bryce staring shell-shocked at the screen of his monitor, his fingers rigid against the handles on his chair.

Theora found her voice. "You alright, Bryce?"

"…Wow," was all he said, half-whispering the word. "That was… great. I feel…" He coughed. "I felt so powerful."

"Better than Neurostim?" Edison whispered suddenly, and Theora turned to the side to see him tensed up, his eyes boring into the monitor even while his words were directed to Bryce.

"Yes," Bryce replied in a quiet voice. "Better than Neurostim… although, there's some… pain in it, too…" His tone was wondering, trying to uncover every strand of emotion.

"I don't like it," Edison muttered acridly, and smoothly turned to stalk away, towards the door. Theora followed him with her eyes, the Zoo TV-induced high starting to wear off.

"Edison, where are you going?" Every part of Theora felt new, rubbed raw, open to the world. She took a step forward, confusion overwhelming every pore. Edison made it to the door, but he hesitated, and that gave Theora enough time to make her way to his side and unthinkingly taking hold of his arm. He reacted as if a bee had stung him.

"Get your hands off me!" Edison spun around and Theora took a surprised step back, in fear of the fire in his eyes. He was positively smoldering, his body quivering with suppressed energy that was just dying to be released. Slowly, Theora began to back away, before softly murmuring, "Calm down, Edison. What's gotten into you?"

"I want you to leave me alone," Edison growled harshly, clenching his hands into fists and jamming them into his pockets. "Both of you."

Theora looked over to Bryce, who was still sitting transfixed at the monitor, and asked, "Could that program have anything to do with Edison's reaction?"

Slowly, Bryce blinked his eyes under his glasses several times, as if getting a hang of seeing properly again, and inclined his head. "It could be… Of course it all depends on what sort of messages stuck with him." He spoke professionally, but Theora could hear stress hidden beneath his voice, and when he raised a hand to push back his brown hair Theora saw it tremble a bit. Whatever Bryce had gotten out of Zoo TV was not as good as he claimed it was.

"I don't care about messages, Bryce," Edison spoke up tiredly from his distance at the corner of the room, sounding fed up with the whole day. "I just want to get this over with."

"You don't care…" Theora whispered, and frowned. This was the second time today Edison had claimed about not caring for something, and both times were after he had watched Zoo TV. Her brain sparked.

"Edison," she said, "you don't really mean that. It's just the program affecting you."

"What?" Edison scoffed. "I know what I feel, Theora. I really don't care what the messages say. This isn't a story, this is just… Network 23 sticking its noses where they shouldn't go." He once again turned towards the door, but it was Bryce who spoke up next.

"Edison, I think what Theora's saying is true. The messages affected your mood. It did the same for me too." He had regained his composure and was now flexing his fingers together, staring quizzically over at Edison. Edison had turned when his name was spoken, and stared back, but he didn't respond.

"And for me," Theora added in a small voice. "I felt like I wanted… I wanted to take over the world."

Edison's eyes moved onto Theora, and then he came forward again at last, moving over to the monitor and standing behind it to look at the faded screen.

"How long does each frame last?" he asked. "One second?"

"Yes," Bryce replied.

Edison nodded and continued to peer at the screen, deep in thought. "So each word would appear onscreen for one second, except for the ones relevant to the message, which appear in three frames… meaning they're seen for three seconds."

Bryce smacked his forehead. "I can't believe I didn't think of that!"

"And the messages are important," Theora said. "We must have gotten such strong reactions because we were standing right in front of the screen and our entire attention was focused on it."

"But what do the messages mean?" Edison wondered, trying to puzzle it out for himself. "Mock the Devil and he will flee from thee…"

"I think we'd better trace the original program," Theora said. "Find out who developed it and who sold it to Network 66. It looks like a job for you, Edison."

She fearfully wondered whether or not Edison was back to his old, deeply-caring self, but as soon as he nodded she knew that he was all right. "Okay. We need to get on this right now." He reached out to gently pat Bryce's shoulder. "It was great seeing you up here. We've got to get going."

"Feel free to visit anytime," Bryce piped up as Theora and Edison began to hustle out the door. "I'm always willing to help out."

When the elevator arrived and opened its door, Edison stepped back and gestured with his arm, meaning for Theora to get inside before him. She did, but sighed as she did so.

"What's the matter?" Edison asked, catching the look in her eye as he entered the elevator himself. "I thought you liked being treated like royalty."

"That lifestyle is not for me." Theora grinned disapprovingly. "I do appreciate you trying to be a gentleman, but I'm no delicate flower."

"Hey, I know what you're made of," Edison said. "And it's certainly not sugar and spice and everything nice." His eyebrows angled upward humorously as Theora smirked up at him. "Not all of it anyway."

"Good to know," Edison murmured, and his hand lightly rested against the small of Theora's back. Gently, she shook him off.

The elevator door opened at that point, and as the two stepped back onto their level Theora sensed that Edison was watching her. She ignored the feel of his eyes on her skin, and it wasn't until they were halfway down the hall that he spoke up, as she wasn't going to say anything. However, what he said was not the apology she expected. "I talked with your brother last month."

"Shawn?" Theora glanced over at Edison, unable to hide her surprise. "He didn't tell me he'd spoken to you recently the last time we talked."

"There wasn't much he would have told you about," Edison said. He took a deep breath. "It was on the day of Alex Burgess's trial on You The Jury. After the show, I… I walked out. I'm sure you remember."

Theora nodded, indeed remembering painfully how she, Bryce, Tina, and Murray had gone out to a nice restaurant to celebrate wrapping up the Alex Burgess story, but though even Max had popped in a few times to partake in the revelries, his human counterpart had been noticeably missing. She had just assumed that Edison went home, though- not to a place where he had met up with her brother.

"I was at a bar downtown," Edison said, "and I saw your brother there. We got talking, and… well, he gave me some important advice. He told me not to make the same mistake that he made in regards to you. He told me not to hold anything against you that could get in the way of a good relationship."

Not sure how to react to this news, Theora blinked her long lashes and crossed her arms, realizing that she and Edison had stopped walking. They were a foot away from the door that would take them back to their workstation, but neither were eager to cross that line.

"So, I hereby end this silence now," Edison said, and gave a funny smile. "Life's too short to hold grudges. I'm sorry for the way I've behaved around you recently- I promise I'll try to be more positive." He began to lift a hand as if to offer shaking on it, before choosing a different option and letting it fall.

After a second, Theora found her voice. "Positive about what?"

He exhaled, and glanced quickly up at the ceiling before replying. "Positive about you, and… and your decisions. I mean… I mean, it did hurt me, Theora, when you lied to me about seeing someone. But I can understand why you would do that."

"After what happened last time…" Theora murmured, remembering Edison stumbling across the aftermath of her date with Ted. Now that had been a short-lived relationship, but Edison had gotten jealous enough to snoop around in Theora's personal files and then launch barbed attacks at her throughout the day.

She looked up and made eye contact with Edison, brown meeting blue. "Kent has been very good to me, and I'm perfectly happy in a relationship with him. I suppose that's what you wanted to hear."

"I would have wanted to hear that he was abusing you as long as it was the truth," Edison said. Theora arched one eyebrow, and he amended his statement- "I mean, I'd have preferred any truth to one lie."

"I understand." She wanted to sigh but couldn't, not in the middle of a conversation with Edison. "I hope you know that what I do in my personal life is none of your business, though."

"But you'll tell me anything if I inquire about it?" Edison pressed.

"That depends." She suddenly found herself smiling with mirthful humor. "I'm not, for example, going to tell you all the details about what Kent and I did after dinner last night, but as long as you don't get nosy I'm open to answering any questions."

"Good." Edison's eyes crinkled around the edges as he smiled. "And I won't ask you any more about us." With that, he walked off and entered the doorway, leaving Theora standing behind in his wake, pondering over the meaning of that last sentence.

He's still attracted to me. Of course, it had always been a known fact, but Theora had never let Edison's admiration of her get in the way of their true friendship underneath. It was only until he had started putting moves on her while she was in a relationship that she had had to tell him off. Though the pretense for telling him off was different now that Edison knew she was in a relationship, Theora's decision remained the same. She would not sleep with Edison, not because he wanted to and definitely not in order to advance her career. If their relationship ever deepened in the far-off future, she would naturally go along with it, but such things were too complicated for her to imagine, and so she preferred to stick with the present and Kent for the time being.

Expelling the sigh that she had pent up during her conversation, Theora turned and made her way back into the room, ready to face the challenge of a new story.

Ever since that moment of beautiful, swelling pride when MacPhisto had woken up and discovered Zoo TV to be launched, he had drifted about his one-story house like a feather borne on a breeze. The lovely music that he had helped create blared from the one TV set he owned, which was displayed prominently in the middle of the room, close enough for him to see it every morning in bed when he opened his eyes. The bed was technically in the main room, but it was hidden by an unusual wall structure that carved out an arch, obscuring the bedroom area from view of visitors. Usually MacPhisto would have turned on the faux glass player piano and listened to it rattle out old melodies over watching TV, but now he was too excited and spent the better part of the day floating across the floor, basking in the glow of the program that he had invented all by himself. With luck and a little bit of work, soon everyone would be watching it- everyone that mattered, anyway.

The rest of the day- the times when Zoo TV wasn't what Network 66 was airing- was spent phoning up his bandmates and everyone else who had worked with developing the program to simper down the line about how wonderful a job they all had done. Viewphones were a constant struggle in MacPhisto's life, though, and he hated pretending to be sincere. It was one thing to disguise the emotion in one's voice- it was another to change one's entire body language. But then, MacPhisto was an actor, and he had become quite adept at this sort of thing over time. What a shame that the phones of the good old days were no longer used, though- viewphones couldn't be decorated with glitter and look decent. Such a thing was nigh impossible.

The last call MacPhisto made that day was a special one, an invitation for his girl Frances to come over and celebrate Zoo TV being put on the air. Frances hadn't helped with any of the development, but she was MacPhisto's greatest inspiration and muse, and he could hardly wait to share his excitement with her. Sure enough, she arrived just as the afternoon turned to evening, as MacPhisto had told her to do. She was dressed in drag when he answered the door, a clever disguise against those who might want to violently take over MacPhisto's property. A black men's suit and binder underneath concealed her feminine attributes, and though her orange hair was short enough to pass for a man's Frances wore a fedora anyway to hide it. Her face was a bit of a giveaway- it was too angular and the lips were too full to pass as male, as well as her skin being powdered white (only a vain woman would use such cosmetics; MacPhisto himself preferred paint)- but even from her stride it wasn't immediately apparent what gender she was. Frances was androgynous, and that was the way MacPhisto liked them. He shut the door behind her and took the paper bag from her hands as she removed her hat and jacket.

"Ah, and what's this then?" he intoned, though he knew full well what it was.

"Wine," Frances answered, slipping out of her shoes as well. "Is this really Zoo TV?" She gestured to the TV set, where Zoo TV had just begun its evening block, but MacPhisto was too absorbed in removing the bottle of wine from its bag and then hastening to get a corkscrew to answer.

"Just sit back and enjoy yourself, darling," he called over his shoulder, placing the bottle of wine on his kitchen-area counter. "I'll be needing you very shortly." The cork went pop, and MacPhisto filled two glasses before coming over to Frances and handing her one, which she gulped down eagerly as if it were water. MacPhisto took dainty, cultured sips as he went over and turned the lights down low.

"Now, madam, shall we begin?" He came over and extended one long arm towards Frances, and she got up from her seat and clasped his hand tightly.

"Always," she whispered before sinking her face into the gold lame.

They danced together, moving to the slow and tantalizing beat of the song, one of MacPhisto's crowning achievements. Love is blindness, I don't want to see. Won't you wrap the night around me? Take my heart… love is blindness. The one regret MacPhisto had was that it wasn't a waltz. But then again, he and Frances had had their share of waltzes, several times over. Even the words onscreen moved slowly, placed against the backdrop of a star map, in time to the sensual dance that Frances and MacPhisto took part in. As her hands reached under his gold jacket, a shudder rippled through his body. His fingers began to rub against her smooth legs, obnoxiously hidden beneath a layer of menswear.

It wasn't until the next song started- "Even Better Than The Real Thing," right on cue- that MacPhisto and Frances got serious. Clothing was scattered, and the dance took on a grinding, bumping quality, full of plenty of yelps, laughter, and ass-smacking. All the while, a hungry guitar riff yowled. Give me one more chance, and I'm gonna make you sing… Give me half a chance to ride on the waves that you bring.

Once Frances was entirely naked, MacPhisto disentangled himself from her embrace- what a hard thing to do!- and went back over to the paper bag she had brought, rifling around inside of it until he found what he wanted. He came back to Frances and made her face the wall and slip on her gloves while he tied the black blindfold around her eyes. Then, as she braced herself, he loosened his pants and asked her the eternal words. "Are you ready?"

"Always," she whispered breathlessly. "Always, always, always."

"Good," MacPhisto murmured, smiling, and pressed ruby red lips to her bare white back before commencing the action.

You're the real thing, the song playing on Zoo TV sang. You're the real thing… even better than the real thing, child.