Julie Gentron and the Lady League (Vol. 1, Ep. 9): The Plouvre

Last time on Julie Gentron and the Lady League, the ladies joined fists in a brilliant display of lady-light over the futuristic landscape of London in preparation to intercept their dreaded foe, Plastica, at her next target of assimilation, the Louvre museum in Paris.

“The Venus de Milo. Right. Put some arms on her. I won’t have my goddesses maimed. And be sure to get my features right when you sculpt her face into my likeness.” Plastica said these words to somebody behind her as she slithered her way into the Louvre like a cobra, led by Dr. Electro-hag and Simpson Oswald, whom she had restrained with a pair of chains which served as leashes. “Mush, mush!” She whipped the chains, and her bitches pulled forth their queen on hands and knees until she gave a yank, signalling them  to stop. She was dressed in a drapey, 1940s-style, shoulder-padded black lamé dress cut off at mid-thigh, while her hounds donned tasteful, high-end S&M attire imported from Berlin. Three plasticons–one man and two women–attended from behind, dressed in identical S&M outfits, with the exception that the male plasticon’s outfit was fitted for his body. One of the women placed an incense-burner on Oswald’s head. He grimaced resentfully at the indignity.

“Why, I never noticed it before,” Plastica said, scanning the room thoughtfully with her darkly outlined green eyes, “but this newly redecorated Louvre reminds me of my childhood Christmases. All the glitter, tinsel, and shiny glass ornaments painted green, pink, and gold. My favourite were always the indented teardrop-shaped ones. They always scattered the light to create this garish display that captivated the eye and kept it rapt with fascination, like souls enslaved.” She said this as she fondled the ornate gilt frame of a fifteenth-century Flemish painting by Albrecht Dürer with a tidily gloved finger. The face had been re-painted in the likeness of the plastic witch, and many more were undergoing a similar transformation at the hands of her craftsmen, who had all been assimilated. (Their pitter-pattering could be heard in the halls without.) Indeed, the great museum chamber was suffused with a lurid pink-green glow, like a string of Christmas tree lights, or a Manchester fashion show.

“You! Sergeant Sodomite, what’s her name?” Plastica barked at Oswald, referring to one of the stationary supermodel servants.

“I don’t fucking know!” he snapped, grinding his teeth. She ignored his invective and returned her attention to her servant.

“You, the Eastern European beanpole by the potted palm in the shape of my face. Whatever your name is. Titty. Bring me some more pline!”

“My name is not Titty. It is Tina,” said the plasticon in a Polish accent which betrayed only the slightest modulation.

“Ugh, yes, whatever. Whitney Houston. Bring me some pline!”

“Pline, my mistress?” replied Tina in a timid, strained tone.

“Plastic wine, girl!”

“Yes, of course, mistress.” Tina trotted like a deer over to a buffet table stationed on the wall at one end of the room, poured a glass of strangely incandescent liquor from a carafe, and brought it back to Plastica on a small silver tray. “My apologies, mistress, for failing to fulfil your wishes immediately and without question. It will never happen again.” Plastica gave her a condescending flick of the lashes, and Tina spasmed slightly as if under some sudden, strange spell. The witch clasped the chalice in her purple claws, took a gulp of pline, and resumed her monologue, talking into the air.

“Gather round, my children. Behold the grandeur of my work. Every ancient statue, every priceless painting betrays, through my likeness, my gift to the world–Myself!” She gave Tina a dark side-glance, then looked back into the air. “It grows. It grows from all corners of the globe. From the sin-filled pleasure-domes of Bangkok to the salacious man-cauldrons of Hell’s Kitchen, my plastic empire grows and thrives like a Morning Glory smothering a rotting English fence. But it all begins here, in the storehouse of Western art, the newly christened Plouvre!” She said these words in a crescendo of passion and intensity, widening her green eyes and raising her chalice in the air. She slacked her chain, placed the chalice back on the tray (which was still being held by Tina), and took a seat on the back of Dr Electro-hag, who winced under her weight.

“I’m hungry!” she barked. The other female plasticon minced robot-like in six-inch heels to the buffet table and revealed a sushi platter. She took the platter in her hands with the skill of a veteran waitress and, with a pair of chopsticks, placed several sushi pieces on to Oswald’s back, which happened to be wrapped in a tube-like sheath of cellophane especially for the occasion. She then retrieved a fresh pair of chopsticks from the buffet table drawer and handed them to her mistress, who proceeded daintily to pluck the delicacies off her man-table and stuff them–a little bit awkwardly, to her chagrin–inside her thick, plump, red lips, chewing down like a cow on its cud. This unfortunate adventure in Eastern cuisine was met by an uncomfortable quietude among the room’s inhabitants, who dared not watch their mistress chow down, but kept their eyes straight forward.

“Good gracious, queen, you look like you’re ready to back up hard against some German leather-daddy,” Plastica squeaked at Oswald, whose spine was curved inward like that of a hungry virgin twink under the voluminous stash of Oriental delicacies.

“I am, if it will put me out of my misery, you odious milf,” replied Oswald, trying doggedly to balance the incense burner on his head.

“Well, obviously I’ll have to assimilate you soon, Sergeant Sodomite, but right now I am quite content with watching your fitful outbursts and the pathetic, lame insults they produce.” With this riposte, she plucked a piece of sannakji, still squirming, off the nape of his back, dipped it in a dish of soy sauce, and shoved it in her voluptuous maw.

“We do have a deal, my mistress,” croaked Dr Electro-hag with a sneer. “You would give me half of Earth as my suzerainty.”

“You will have a quarter of Earth as your suzerainty, you decrepit queen. Be thankful and bow at my feet for my generosity. Oh, wait. You’re already bowing. Ha! How convenient.” At this, Plastica took another swig of pline, applied a fresh layer of yellow-green eyeshadow, and refreshed her lips with a thick crimson gloss.

“Paris may be the capital of high art and fashion, my darlings, but I have my sights set on a less polished gem–the cutural future of Europe–Berlin!” She gestured in circular motions with her chalice and chopsticks. “You’ll notice, my beauties, the old Prussian stronghold has re-invented itself as a centre of artistic creativity, but without entirely shedding the vestiges of its Cold War past, leaving it slightly rough  round the edges, like a cut-rate 1980s gay hooker who still listens to Kraftwerk on cassette tape. It is in this thriving metropolis we shall establish our new base. And from there, Prague, Warsaw, Budapest, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Oslo, Riga, Helsinki, Minsk, St. Petersburg, Moscow, the whole of northern Europe!” She rose from Dr Electro-hag’s back and unleashed a witchy cackle, raising her hands into the air and wielding her chopsticks like a deadly weapon, a piece of whitefin tuna tumbling to the ground between her six-inch Jimmy Choo heels.

Find out whether Plastica succeeds in her diabolical scheme in the next episode of Julie Gentron and the Lady League!

Julie Gentron and the Lady League (Vol. 1, Ep. 8): Hot Tub Secrets

In the last episode of Julie Gentron and the Lady League, Lady Fairfax forced her girls to undergo a brutal martial arts training session as punishment for failing to capture Plastica. Afterward, she promised to reveal the latest MI6 intelligence on their foe. Here are those secrets.

Lady Fairfax turned round and gestured toward the Lady League hot tub, which opened up in the floor below. “Dive in, ladies!” The ladies acquiesced, changing into swimsuits and submerging themselves in the giant, hot bubbles, slapping water at each other and giggling like girls. A weird gynoid entered with a mechanical bleeping sound, but the ladies were delighted with the sight of the awkwardly feminine robot. Suddenly, a giant telescreen lighted up on the wall above the bubble bath.

“Ladies, it is my duty to apprise you of the latest intelligence on our elusive foe, Plastica,” said Lady Fairfax as a servant replenished her drink. The ladies perked up. “The witchy woman who absconded with our beloved community college dropout and professional fashion bitch-hound, Oswald, was born a very normal girl in the Beacon Hill neighborhood of Boston. Her real name is Beryl Ann Rivers, the daughter and only child of an American senator and a British horse breeder and equestrian.”

“Are you feeling comfortable yet, Julie?” said the gynoid as she massaged Julie’s shoulders.

“Yes, P.A.M.,” said Julie. “Thank you. Oh, that feels good. Wait, P.A.M?!” she said, whipping her head round at the mysterious masseuse.

“Yes, Julie. It is I, your loyal onboard computer,” said the gynoid as she continued to massage the Lady League captain’s tense muscles.

“How did you manage to take humanoid form?”

“It was simple,” cooed P.A.M. softly. “I was given my new form by gifted graduate students at the A.I. department of London University, in conjunction with a special research unit of the Secret Intelligence Service on artificial intelligence.”

“Amazing,” said Julie. She relaxed and let the gynoid grind away, pleasantly pleased at the surprise. The other ladies seemed too transfixed by the bubbles and the telescreen to notice the exchange.

“Beryl spent her childhood between her mother’s upper-class Boston townhouse,” continued Fairfax, clicking buttons on the telescreen console, “and her father’s country estate in Wiltshire. As a young girl, she had a private tutor and thus engaged in little contact with others her age; at around age 14, yearning for a social life, she persuaded her parents to enter her into public high-school—but even this time was spent largely between Boston and London, splintering the weak bonds she had managed to forge with her peers and creating an ideal environment for bullying. She was tormented by her classmates; this only nurtured her rage.

“Given her family’s wealth and her own genius, she entered Oxford University and sailed through her studies.” The telescreen showed slides of an increasingly unnatural-looking, but strangely beautiful Plastica. “With amazing celerity, she earned a dual-major in business and biology, and, after taking a gap year to explore the Continent and the Far East, went on to earn a master’s in bioengineering at Harvard. She then took another hiatus to explore the beauty culture and aesthetic traditions of the Vega star system, where she learned a great deal about colour and branding. She returned to Earth and earned her PhD in genetics and dermatology at L’école de la Peau—The School of Skin—in Paris. During this time she worked as a fashion model, but once she had finished her academic career she established her own plastic surgery firm and soon became its chief executive officer. The business flourished and emerged as the pre-eminent plastic surgery firm on Earth.

“Although she looks about forty, her true age remains unknown. The scraps of her early history we have gathered place her birth some time in the early twentieth century. She could be the oldest living human–if you can call her human. We don’t exactly know.”

“Does that feel good, Julie?” asked P.A.M. in her eerie monotone.

“Why, yes, P.A.M. Very good. A little lower, if you don’t mind.” The gynoid proceeded to massage Julie’s back.

“Our bloodthirsty Beryl wasn’t satisfied,” continued Fairfax, regarding the display between gynoid and cyborg with a slight smile. “She started recruiting patients, coercing them into plastic surgery operations and forging their contracts. She expanded her plastic surgery firm—or should I say farm—to the outer reaches of the solar system and then to other star systems, transforming into her likeness the vicious water-snake queen of Intrepida Q-43b and the vampire space-wolves of the Pleiadian star cluster. Her space-travel technology is as great as ours, I’m afraid, and it is all funded by her massive fortune. She can reach the most distant corners of the galaxy in mere minutes.”

“This is awful!” cried Donna. “Why, I ought to implant a telekinetic bubble inside her rectum and cause it to expand until she explodes!”

“Good luck mastering that technique, Donna. Meanwhile, I’ll be mopping the floor of her space-ship with her plastic booty–using my bare hands,” said Rosalind.

“And I will turn her ship against her by commandeering its central computer!” added Julie, sitting erect within the bubbling waters. “I will lead my ladies into the melee with the strong and firm fist of a true, alien-bred technopath!” Here the other ladies noticed the strange gynoid.

“Hey! Keep your hands off her!” whined Donna in the shrill, reedy voice of a Los Angeles mall rat as she saw P.A.M. working Julie. “You just want her for yourself!” With this remonstration, she proceeded to massage Julie’s worn feet with a ferocious jealousy. Initially hesitant, the cyborg acceeded, sliding her body back into the warm waters, and Donna performed an exquisite ritual upon her toes.

“This is bullshit. I am going to plow some pussy,” roared Rosalind. She submerged her gorgeous, glistening Michelle Obama physique beneath a rumble of bubbling waves and made her way between Julie’s thighs. Julie tittered, “Hehe! That tickles, Rosalind!” and stroked Rosalind’s wet head with a strange desire to wrap her thighs around her face like the interior of a warm, wet clam. P.A.M., apparently curious, resumed her massage of Julie’s back, this time in its lower region.

“That’s all very well, ladies,” continued Fairfax, peering down peremptorily at the girls with her imperturbable Bea Arthur face, “but Plastica does not work alone—she has a helper.” On the telescreen appeared a ghastly, wizen face pitted with two baleful, hollow eyes, a hideous nest of wires serving as hair. The skin was a sickly grey-purple. “This creature is known only as Dr. Electro-hag. He is a shadowy figure–his past is a blur. We know he hangs on Beryl’s bosoms like a baby sucking at the teats of Satan, but he possesses genius bioengineering skills. A few scraps of evidence suggest he played a major role in Plastica’s rise to success, but there was a fall-out between the two and somehow she got the upper-hand, assimilating him into her army. The details are foggy, and we’re not yet sure where the hag’s loyalty truly lies, but we think he might prove a formidable ally, if we can offer him amnesty on certain binding conditions.”

“Every mistreated monster deserves a chance at redemption!” cried Julie, withdrawing her thighs from Rosalind’s lips and rising up out of the bath, her trim, toned body glistening. P.A.M. withdrew a few steps, quiet and solemn. “I will not let such an unfortunate creature slip through our compassionate, forgiving fingers to become another trophy on the mantelpiece of that inhuman witch. Why, if only we could save her too. But we can’t, it seems.” After towelling herself off, she stationed herself at the telescreen console and clacked away at the buttons. “Look! She hasn’t gone far. We have been able to capture traces of the monster’s footsteps. Our satellite imaging technology, as well as our spies and ground-based telescopes, suggest Plastica is headed in the direction of the Louvre in Paris. She is targeting Western civilisation at its very core, and we are the only ladies who can stop her!”

“And we have to save Oswald!” cried Donna giddily. “He’s redeemed himself–he hardly deserves the fate which stands before him.”

“Since when did you sympathise with that ice-cold, cutthroat fashion-dick, Donna?” asked Rosalind, stepping out of the tub and drying off her muscular shoulders with a terry-cloth towel.

“Since he said that fashion should fit the woman, and not the other way around!” replied Donna, raising her head proudly and rising out of the tub. “He thinks fashion is a tool for self-expression, not a mould to be shoe-horned into. You would do well to learn more about him, you grumpy old muscle-dyke!”

“Ladies! Stop your bickering,” said Julie, her rich, brown eyes growing large with domination. “We have a greater goal in mind—the salvation of humanity—and I rely on you to help me achieve it! Once more–cease your petty squabbling and lend me your loyal assistance in this daunting task. London, Britain, and Earth need you! Now! You know what to do.” The ladies obediently rose up out of their comfortable water-kingdom and placed their feet on the firm, cold surface of MI6 ground.

“Girls,” cried Fairfax, tapping the remnant of her broken cane against her wheelchair to get the women’s attention, “Heed your leader’s words. We have one thing left to do, and my gin and tonic needs topping off anyway, so have with it!”

“Lady League, unite!” cried Julie. The ladies joined fists and shot a bright, white-green column of light through the roof of the MI6 headquarters into the night sky above Lambeth. London was aglow, its great landmarks glittering, and below, patrons of sex-bars and gay bathhouses alike looked up in awe at the brilliant spectacle, dropping their half-opened condom packages and plastic cups of warm beer. Fairfax surreptitiously pulled the plug on the gynoid, who went limp.

Find out what happens at the most famous museum in the world in the next episode of Julie Gentron and the Lady League!

Julie Gentron and the Lady League (Vol. 1, Ep. 7): Karate Chop!

In the last episode of Julie Gentron and the Lady League, the ladies were blown away by the exhaust fumes from Plastica’s subterranean Parisian spaceship. After the plastic witch escaped into space with a horde of unlucky fashionistas, including their charge Simpson Oswald, the ladies were forced to return to London empty-handed. Furious at their failure, Lady Fairfax, the ladies’ boss and Chief of the MI6, forced her girls to undergo a rigorous martial arts training session.

Swerving round nimbly in her wicker wheelchair, Fairfax whipped the ladies into shape like a sadistic lesbian prison warden, a cane in one hand and a gin-and-tonic in the other: “Right, two, three, four, five, six, seven, and left, two, three, four, five, six, seven, and right, two, three, four, five, six, seven, and—”

“–Ugh, Lady Fairfax, I can’t keep up,” groaned Donna flailing in exhaustion and panting like a pregnant cougar. “My knees are sore and my pants are stuck in my crotch!”

“It’s your awkward bosoms getting in the way, girl, not your knees,” snapped Fairfax in her prim British accent.

“Wh–what?? I can’t believe you actually said that!”

“Silence, you shrieking sow! For every moment you spend protesting”–Fairfax wheeled her way behind Donna–“the fiend strikes at your heel!” She crouched like a viper, tripped Donna to the ground under her cane, and resumed her stiff position in the wheelchair. “You may be able to move objects with your mind, Donna, but you had better learn to concentrate, lest an old, wheelchair-bound coot like me should stab you in the back from behind. If you want to save this daft fashion critic from the demon’s clutches, you must think fast! Our time is limited!” She raised her cane perpendicular to the ground and gave a toffy-nosed grimace. Rosalind suddenly grabbed her from behind in an effort to retrieve the cane, but Fairfax deftly smacked her backwards in the face with it, swivelled her chair round, and grabbed her opponent’s thighs in her arms, dragging her to the ground. Rosalind had to use above-average force to extricate herself from Fairfax’s unusually strong grip.

“That wasn’t fair!” cried the proud Zaghawa tribeswoman.

“What do you mean it wasn’t fair, you unwieldy oaf?” countered Fairfax. “You possess super-human strength, Rosalind; hence, I rely on skill. Why, I could barely even do what I did!” Rosalind nodded apologetically, and Fairfax placed her gin-and-tonic gracefully on a nearby table with a gruff harrumph. “I look ahead, anticipate your next move, and prepare to strike”–Rosalind threw a punch at her, but the feisty sexagenarian blocked it with her newly free fist, clipping Rosalind on the side of the cheek with the other, cane in hand–“and thus emerge the victor! And next time, Rosalind, remember that MI6 protocol strictly forbids the use of mutant powers against a superior officer. Learn to govern your reflexes, you ill-bred country-woman. Carry on, ladies!”

Rosalind and Donna ganged up on the aging martial artist, but in a sudden swirl she knocked both to the ground with her cane and a fist. Julie intervened, pressing forth her large trunk and flexing her sinewy muscles. A tango ensued between the two, and Julie showed unusually precise movements in response to the cane-thrusts of the crippled but nimble woman. Fairfax darted about like a cat in a wheelchair for disabled pets, but Julie made few advances, finally surrendering in exhaustion.

“You have beaten me,” said Fairfax.

“What do you mean, Lady? I have not,” replied Julie, pacing about like an African lioness.

“My loss was inevitable. You have surrendered too soon; you have far too much integrity to give up so easily. You are being lazy because you are fighting an old coot in a wicker wheelchair. You must always stick it out till the end,”–she made a jabbing motion with her cane–“and that end is the triumph of the British people!” She gave her cane a stomp. “We shall proceed with a rematch.” She retrieved her gin-and-tonic, took a long, delicate sip, and set it back down on the table, noticing Julie’s discomfiture. “You are far too serious, my dear. Lighten up.”

“H—How can I keep going unless I use my powers?” asked Julie. She swiped at Fairfax, who dodged the blow and parried it with the tip of her fabled cane.

“Charisma, uniqueness, nerve, talent–and lady essence!” replied the crone. “A hard-hewn tool no muscle-bound man can out-manoeuvre. All one needs to topple a locomotive is a misaligned railway track—a single trip, a well-timed block, a clip to the jaw. Do not succumb to fear or distraction, girl. Focus on your goal.” She took another sip from her drink, returned it to the table, and swayed her cane at the ladies. “Lady essence consists of real-life epigenetic phenomena combined in a virulent concoction with supernova gamma ray bursts and high-galactic ectoplasm!”

“Huh?” said Donna in her annoying California accent. Her painfully contorted face belied her brainy potential. “Madam Fairfax, if genes are the script for human behaviour, how can anybody control what they do?”

“They control what they do because they realize they can,” said Fairfax, simply. There was an awkward pause as the ladies gave each other funny looks. “Genes are subsidiary to consciousness and environment. Volition is an inherent part of the lady essence, passed down to us by the cosmic rays of the universe and the many unseen lady-dimensions beyond. All that is required of you is to stop screaming like banshees in heat and focus on the task at hand. That is why you spit and sputter like a Model T Ford, Donna! You abandon yourself to destiny. And yet, with enough focus, you can do such mighty things. I almost fear you.”

“Madam Fairfax,” interjected Julie, “respectfully, your observations sound to me like junk science.”

“What, you untrained vessel of womanhood? Are volition and self-awareness ‘unscientific’ to you? You talk like a maladaptive cretin. Never would I allow some Stone Age brute to throttle me to the ground and drag me screaming back to his cave, forcing me to pop out a few more babes with random scraps of leftover wooly mammoth meat flung my way as modest incentive!” She raised her cane in the air with a queenly conviction. “Never would I sanction the violation of the yonic temple to satisfy the lusts of monsters who wage war over mates and resources only to mock their female prize with the scant remnants of their winnings. I take my life in my own hands! I am a lady of the future!” Once more the matron gave her cane a thund’rous rap, and this time it went home. In sudden silence, she delicately laid the unassuming weapon across her lap and clasped her hands there like a venerable grandmother. The ladies, stunned, tried to collect themselves.

“You are right, Madam Fairfax,” said Julie, bravely breaking the silence. “How remiss I am to forget my own passion for your cause. I myself gave a speech not so long ago enumerating the many necessities of female empowerment, and how we musn’t bow to biological determinism. All I know is that something inside me–this ‘lady essence,’ as you call it–drives me forth in an endless quest to secure justice for all humankind. Why, something–something makes me want to punch that plastic bitch square in the jaw, grab her by the wig, and toss her unnaturally pretty corpse into the Old Bailey–if only to defend the women and men of Britain, of Earth, and of the galaxy!”

“It is there your sentiment should lie, my dear,” said Fairfax. “Hopefully when it comes to that you’ll have prised poor Oswald from the witch’s clutches unbruised. The daft old queen is so delicate. But we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it; for now, my worries are soothed. With your fierce conviction, Julie, you have only demonstrated my weird hypothesis, which is that you have control over your destiny. I can tell that in your heart resides true nobility.”

“That doesn’t mean I’m not going to give up common sense, Madam! It’s the only way I can gauge a threat in my environment. Why, if I didn’t have my wits to rely on—” Julie suddenly grabbed the tip of Fairfax’s cane, spun the wheelchair round, and pulled the cane securely against her boss’s neck with both hands. Almost as soon as it happened, she mercifully released Fairfax, who spun back round, regained her composure, and gave a stunned, weird look of awe and delight. The old woman deployed a swift cane-strike at Julie’s kidney, but the technopath grabbed the weapon in her palms and broke it in two over her knee, throwing the pieces to the ground. Bereft of her cane, and with a maniacal look in her eyes, the crippled woman siezed her wheels, swirled round in a circle to gain momentum, and charged at Julie with wheels and legs in the air. Julie leapt up, catapulted herself over the wheelchair foot-holds, and landed crotch-first on Fairfax’s face, squeezing her thighs together. She sat there snugly until her mentor mumbled something along the lines of surrender, and she peeled her buttocks away to reveal a happy face.

“Spectacular!” boomed Lady Fairfax, repositioning her wheelchair with her strong arms and whipping blood from her nose. “You have passed the test! You have mastered the use of a most formidable weapon—the lady strike—a powerful repository of female ingenuity. But you had better know not only when to strike, but whom! Take that to heart. Now let us break and relax. I have some dark secrets about Plastica to tell you girls.”

Find out what those little dark secrets are in the next episode of Julie Gentron and the Lady League!

Julie Gentron and the Lady League, Vol. 1, Ep. 6: The Plastic Witch

Written by Brandon Arkell and Seth Gordon Little

Last time on Julie Gentron and the Lady League, Plastica finally revealed herself and unleashed her attack on the Lady League at the 221st annual Milky Way Galactic Fashion Show. Now the ladies  must face the plastic witch in all her perverted glory!

Oswald reeled back and forth by the wrist uncontrollably as the ladies tried to subdue him, and the crowd’s murmuring grew to a shriek. The model in the oceanliner shoulder-pads returned with the rest of her sisters, and they surrounded Plastica, forming a phalanx along the entire edge of the catwalk like an ant colony guarding its queen. A volley of lasers shot forth from their eyes, shortcircuiting the security systems and sealing the doors shut. The sinister beat of “Selected Faces,” by Gesaffelstein, began to pulse throughout the hall, seemingly out of nowhere.

Suddenly, random audience members began lurching back and forth under a mysterious force, falling forward over the chairs toward the stage, while those unaffected were being stunned and knocked down by the supermodels’ dreaded eye-lasers. Ladies were being dragged across the floor by their overly smooth Morgan Fairchild facelifts, and others, by their voluminous fake breasts. Wigs flew and jewels spilled forth from necks and breasts as bodies tumbled to the floor. Those nearest the stage were sucked up first on to the catwalk, through the wall of models, and behind the curtains, screaming wildly.

“Lady League, unite!” cried Julie to her comrades, raising an arm. The ladies joined fists, and a blinding ray of light shot forth, filling the room with its purple-white lady-glow. Unfortunately, this meant loosening their grip on Oswald, who resumed his erratic, involuntary wrist-lurching. Finally, Plastica unleashed her stable of supermodels on the crowd like a fury of angry wasps.

Donna grappled with a couple of models and fell on top of them with her crushing weight. She bit and scratched at their faces, punched them in the cheek, and kneed them in the groin. She was so savage that she left her models bleeding, nails hanging from their paper-like faces.

Rosalind assumed the tactics of a wrestler. She threw a fist at the face of every model that came her way and body-slammed them to the ground, straddling them and pounding her chest triumphantly like a silverback gorilla. While she was expending her energy on this display of lesbian prowess, Oswald slipped past her toward the stage, struggling ferociously to remove the animated bracelet from his wrist.

Julie employed a more artful technique than her companions–she sliced away at several models with a fanlike, acrobatic sweep, chopping them down at the neck and kidneys and scissoring them in the groin. A few more came her way, and she deployed a noxious fume from her thighs which knocked them out cold.

Meanwhile, Oswald was being sucked through the wall of models and dragged onstage, where Plastica awaited him in six-inch Vivenne Westwood heels. He rose feebly and met her with a sneer. She was grinning, standing with a coquettishly tilted knee in a glittering, gunmetal grey, 1940s-style evening gown with huge shoulder-pads, hands on her hips.

“I’m going to gut your entire wardrobe, you bitch!” he cried, straightening his tie. “Just wait till I write my next piece in the paper!”

“Darling, you have nothing worth gutting to write about,” Plastica quipped, “but your own feeble fashion sense. Your fear of colour and texture will be your undoing.”

He charged at her in a desperate rage, arms outstretched and bearing down on the elegantly poised figure, but, like a snake, she blocked each strike with lightning speed, punched him in the temple, kneed him in the groin, and drove the web between her thumb and index finger into his throat. With a gasp, he choked and crumpled to the ground. She grabbed him by the lapel with her long, green talons, dragged him behind the curtains, and dropped him down, placing a tall stiletto heel triumphantly over his sobbing frame and purring into his ear, “note for your next piece in the New York Times: Plastica’s not just a pretty face.” She summoned her matrons. “Ladies, take him away! I have to do a wardrobe change.” A host of plasticons pounced on the queen like a pack of hungry hyenas, dragging him away into the dark recesses of the dressing rooms with shrieks of laughter and pleasure. The plastic witch vanished into her chambers and soon re-emerged through the curtains and on to the catwalk in a Dior-inspired evening gown, surveying the battle below, where her marionettes wreaked havoc under her spell.

When it was over, a pile of models lay in a heap at the Lady League’s feet, gurgling strangely.

I can already feel my nano-bot immune system knitting my torn flesh back together, thought Julie, but what about the others? “Donna! Rosalind! Are you injured at all??” She scanned the room around her.

“Just a small scratch,” answered Rosalind. “My super-hard metallic skin protected me against their steely talons, and my strength knocked most of them unconscious. Their movements are extremely precise and well-orchestrated, Julie, as though they work as a single organism—a sort of hive.”

“Good work, Rosalind. But where’s Donna? Donna!?”

“Here I am!” cried Donna, crawling out of a pile of plasticons and brushing off her outfit with a childlike grin. “I was able to shield myself from the melée and repel most of them with my psychokinetic powers. A few of them broke through, but I dug my fingers into those bitches with my Lee Press-On Nails!” She held up her hands proudly; several nails were missing or hanging by a cuticle.

“I’m glad you girls are OK. But what about Oswald? Where is he!? We were supposed to protect him! Oswald!?”

“In time, my beauties,” said Plastica in her distinct timbre, posing languidly onstage in front of the curtains. “For now, I think we’ll play a little game of catch-the-zombie.” With this, the defeated models began to rise, virtually unscathed. Their wounds were already healing before the ladies’ eyes.

“Ugh, they’re nearly indestructible! Take this, you overgrown foetus-women!” cried Donna, flinging several supermodels against the wall with a melodramatic sweep of her fingers. Her psychokinetic powers were beginning to show their true colours.

“Kiss my smoking, hot biceps, bitches!” roared Rosalind, sweeping up a group of them in her arms and throwing them to the ground like a wrestler. They gave an unnatural, babylike squeal.

“Snort this, you salad-eating blow queens!” shouted Julie, standing erect and pointing her breasts outward. A cannon emerged from each of her nipples and deployed a bright red laser beam which shot down several models. A few clambered back up on their heels, and Julie, fed up, blasted them across the room with a gamma-ray burst deployed from her groin. Still, a few stragglers persisted, bearing down mindlessly on the ladies. Suddenly, the dated asbestos-board ceiling broke, and Lupa the land-whale fell through, crashing down on  a cluster of models with a thunderous boom. He rose, stretched out his strong, stubby limbs, beat his coconut bra proudly, and gave a great, deep bellow from the depths of his throat, blowing away the remaining models.

“Lupa, I thought I told you to stay behind and man the grounds outside the building!” cried Julie.  The land-whale hung his head low and gave a pitiful, self-punishing moan. “But you have proved yourself a true Lady,” said Julie, stepping over the bodies of the twitching models. “With Lady Fairfax’s approval, I think we can make you a permanent, full-fledged member of the Lady League.” Lupa stomped up and down, flapping his fins together excitedly, and the ladies embraced him with affectionate gratitude. “Hoagh. I can tell Donna needs to change your diaper.” Donna gave Julie a scowl, and Lupa cooed, widened his eyes, and self-consciously grabbed the back of his diaper with his fins.

“How sweet,” said Plastica, with a hand on a tilted hip, “but I have a twitching, half-dead supermodel army to resurrect.” The ladies immediately resumed their pose and redirected their attention at the plastic witch. “That was only a taste of my growing legions. I have hundreds more.” She assumed an almost evangelical tone. “How many human vessels must I fill, how many make-up compacts, Tupperware containers, plastic \coffee cup lids must I wave in front of your vacant faces to drive the point home? You will never be anything but over-sexed secret agents till Ihave made you in my image! It is you who inhabit my world, children—not the other way around!”

“Remove every earring, reform your daily make-up regimen, disinfect every corner of your hallowed kitchen, peruse the depths of a casual lover’s orifice, and I am there, inside your most personal instrument of pleasure, comprising every brand of water-soluble lubricant. Plug in a table lamp, Iam there. Turn a steering wheel, I am there. Remove a stone in your long-neglected suburban garden, I am there, in the plastic fragment of a long-lost 1980s action figure!”

“Embrace this new paradigm, fellow mutants. You will not die—if you do not resist—but, like a caterpillar, you will metamorphose into my most beautiful creation, my most powerful soldiers, and march forth to spread my seed, my new strain of disease—Plasticitis! Look at what wonders it has done for my complexion.” She framed her face with elegant sweeps of her hands. “Do you like it? The concoction consists of a serum derived from the Joan Rivers and Victoria Principal genome. Soon, I shall implant the virus within you. Yet you are too special to remain as mere pawns or footmen–no, you are far too special, my ferocious battle-queens, which is why you will lead my forces as Captain Donna, Colonel Rosalind, and, most formidable of all, General Gentron!” She stared pensively at Julie, then whipped her head upward.

“I have been eager, gracious, patient; I have been overflowing with love, an irrational faith in your loyalty, a sincere desire to comprehend your wilful disobedience, your bare-faced defiance of the obvious moral truth. Why am I so weak? O, how many years have I spent staring into my mirror, burying these nails into my palms, straining to force just one tear-drop out of these artificial ducts.” She peered upward momentarily with the faintest look of regret in her eyes, then strode forward, gritting her teeth. The ladies bristled, yet rapt by her words, almost showing sympathy. “Why must you be so pig-headed?!” the horrible beauty yelled at them, pacing back and forth.

“I started out as one of you! burrowed my way through a heap of aging fashion zombies—so smug with their big, stupid grins, so rude and ugly—queens that doubted me, mocked my dreams, tormented me for my so-called deformity. My only solace lay in the fact they helped me realise what dimwitted apes they really were compared with the beautiful force of nature I should become!” Here she resumed a rigid stance, at the very front of the catwalk.

“You humans disappoint me. The ice-whales of frozen Europa, the space-dragons of Vega’s great dust clouds, the silicon crystal plant-women of Alpha Centauri’s many moons, show more gratitude than the people of Earth!” She contracted her claws and surveyed the ladies’ petrified features, turning her weird smile into a clownish frown as her eyes reddened. “Your cruel, violent, arrogant planet is nothing but a cold, blue, ego-inflated rock nine minutes from an average white star. And let us hope that precious, life-giving ball of light doesn’t snuff you out with a sudden solar flare, for when it does, it will suck the life out of your lungs, but I—once my genome is complete—will be immune to such assaults of nature due to my unique physiology. Why, I shall be immortal!” The strange spell suddenly broke, and the Lady League gathered their senses and prepared to strike,but to their shock Plastica instantly blasted them down with a sweeping arc of bright, thick, red laser-beams from her eyes, brighter than any they had seen from her plastic minions.

“How disappointing; I quite expected to be vanquished by psychokinesis, superhuman strength, or some mutant cyborg mammary cannon, but I see now the power of plastic has out-manoeuvred your silly school-girl antics. I have no use for you adolescent superheroines quite yet; for now, I will enjoy watching you suffer as I prepare your precious newspaper columnist for his new role as Vice-Queen of my growing plastic empire!” In an almost orgasmic fit of ecstasy, she threw her claws up into the air and dragged them down ominously in front of her face and breasts, unleashing anevil cackle. “Ah! Ah-ha! Ah-ha-ha! Ah-ha-ha-ha! Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!” The Lady League scrambled onto the catwalk, but it was too late. The plastic witch had vanished behind her plastic curtains, with Oswald and all of her other unlucky victims now solidly ensconced within her clutches. Sweeping the curtains aside, the ladies met an impenetrable steel wall and the rumble of what must have been a small spaceship inside rising out of the ground and into the air. They backed up to avoid the heat and exhaust fumes. They should have known better—Plastica practically owned this slice of Paris.

Plastica may have escaped the Lady League’s clutches with her secret Parisian space-station, but this doesn’t mean the game is over. Check back for the next instalment of Julie Gentron and the Lady League to find out the ladies’ next strike against the plastic witch!

Julie Gentron and the Lady League, Vol. 1, Ep. 5: The Fashion Show

Written by Brandon Arkell and Seth Gordon Little

Last time on Julie Gentron and the Lady League, the ladies broke into Simpson Oswald’s Paris hotel suite to warn him of the plastic demon’s diabolical plans to assimilate him into its army of plastic drones. After surviving a bizarre attack, the fashion critic decided to accept the ladies’ help, and together they made their way to the 221st annual Milky Way Galactic Fashion Show in Paris, where it was believed the fiend would make its next move. Oswald was the bait.

A mist obscured a long catwalk inside an ultra-modern hall whilst techno music thumped and buzzed in the background. The Lady League and Oswald entered in their most ravishing costumes, making their way to the front row. Others began trickling in–ladies with outrageous coiffures and cutting-edge, asymmetical dresses and gentlemen in much the same type of garb. (Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference between the two—most of the men were of the sausage-gobbling persuasion.) The signature French sound of trilling uvulas fluttered softly through the air, a most elegant murmur.

“Well, here we are,” said Julie as she and the ladies took their seats next to the catwalk at the 221st annual Milky Way Galactic Fashion Show. The event was being held in a sleek new modern facility amid the charming tumble-down buildings of the crowded Marais district of Paris. Flashing lights penetrated the shadowy recesses of the auditorium, and the haunting 1980s disco track “Damned Don’t Cry,” by Visage, began to play in the background. “Ladies, keep your legs crossed and your tits up–we must be on the alert for any sign of P!”

“Julie, how can we tell the difference between regular supermodels and the demon’s spawn?” asked Rosalind, sitting tall and erect like Grace Jones grinding down on a dildo.

“There will be a vacant look in the demon children’s eyes.”

“Well, that could be Kate Moss,” pointed out Rosalind, “which begs the question, how can we tell the difference?”

“The demon-child’s gaze strikes a cold arrow to the heart, leaving nothing but a feeling of emptiness. To give you a rough idea, Lindsay Lohan looks like Jennifer Love Hewitt by comparison. At any rate, we are using Mr Oswald as bait to catch the demon, so we will know when it has arrived.”

“Bait, indeed,” said Oswald. “Normally I’d be screaming for a ‘hook-up,’ but I think I’ll pass—unless this thing turns out to be a big, burly bear on the prowl for some fresh meat. Anyway, I’m not sure I’m into P, whoever—whatever—it is. Will the models be as fat as Donna?” he asked nonchalantly, stroking his Shih Tzu, Peaches, with a heavily ringed hand.

“Oooo, you icy cunt!” hissed Donna. The surrounding crowds, still settling into their seats, suddenly froze. All eyes fell on her. “I’m not fat! I’m rustic. I’m a ripe, red rose to be plucked—a big, juicy pear to be savoured on a warm summer afternoon!”

“Ew,” murmured Oswald, attempting to hide a grimace. “She’s gross, isn’t she, Peaches?” he said, glancing down at the pooch in his arms, which gave a short bark.

“Queens! Queens!” cried Julie. “Stop your bitch-wailing. The rafters are collecting condensation from your flapping face-holes, and we’re drawing unwanted attention to ourselves.” Suddenly, the light, bubbly 1990s eurodisco anthem “He’s On The Phone,” by Saint Etienne, began to play. The show had begun.

“What is that? A beached whale off the coast of Italy?” said Oswald as a 100-pound model strode down the catwalk in a sheer, flowing, patterned beach-gown which barely enveloped her breasts and exhibited two long, slinky legs.

“I would wear that!” cooed Donna like Jennifer Love Hewitt. “It’s cute!”

“I would wear her,” said Rosalind with unabashed lust, “on the deck of Lady Fairfax’s yacht in the Greek Isles. She’s aching for some lady.”

“Rosalind, gross!” squealed Donna, comporting herself demurely but sneaking a neat glance at the model’s delicately pointed breasts. The model posed and retreated, a few other beached whales followed, and the theme switched to cocktail dresses. “Deep in Vogue”, by Malcolm McLaren, began to play, and a model strutted down the runway in a rhinestone-studded bolero jacket that opened from the back.

“I’d be content with the look as a whole if she weren’t wearing that awful disco straightjacket,” sneered Oswald, stroking Peaches with a stoney smugness. The model reached behind her neck and unsnapped the jacket to reveal a black satin bustier. “Ugh, who are you?” rasped Oswald disdainfully. “Lita Ford? Madonna in 1989? Paris is burning indeed.”

“Seal your lips, queen!” snapped Donna. “I’m outfit-hunting, and I don’t need your razor-filled snatch distracting me from my task,” she said, commenting on Oswald’s ever-pursed, rouge-tainted lips (the colour of which he had favoured ever since discovering “Menstrual Mystique” as an adolescent at the beauty bar in Barney’s).

“Ladies, do you know how much I’m doing to keep our cover?!” hissed Julie under her breath. “We’re here to sniff out P and her evil coterie of brainwashed Botox beauties, not bicker amongst ourselves, so keep your knees together and your tongues inside your mouths!”

“You’re right, Julie,” whimpered Donna. “But I’m not fat! I’m a gorgeous, talented, full-figured superheroine!” The air surrounding her body began to shimmer like heat rising from a hot summer street, revealing her latent ability to manipulate matter and space-time.

“Julie, I will crush each and every one of those skinny, over-primped bitches under my palm,” rumbled Rosalind. Her skin glinted with a slight metallic sheen, and her muscle fibers momentarily turned to hard strands of silver.

“And I,” cried Oswald, rising proudly out of his seat with Peaches cradled in his arms, “will hew them to pieces with my unwavering, sword-tongued invectives!” The pooch gave a salvo of barks in agreement, and Oswald returned to his seat with a look of smug self-satisfaction. Julie groaned and rolled her eyes.

“Quiet,” she said, sitting upright like a guard-dog on the alert. “I sense an impostor. My technopathic neural receptors tell me the computer-based security system has been breached!” An electrical charge filled the air as Julie concentrated her powers on the surrounding room. Meanwhile, a new host of foetuses were being chucked out onto the catwalk in P’s evening wear.

“What is she wearing on her shoulders? An oceanliner?” said Oswald as a model sauntered down the runway in a sleek, black-sequinned evening gown with sharp, angular shoulders and a leather corset. “Oh, wait. It’s just her lopsided shoulder-pads. Bahahaha! Sink,Titanic, sink!” cackled the queen maliciously. The model stopped. All was still as polished steel below her neck, but her head took a life of its own. Like a robot, she craned her neck to the side, fixing her cold gaze on the fashion critic.

“Forgive my candour, Madame,” said the simpering, loose-tongued newspaper columnist, “but the shoulder-pad revival was in, then out.You see, the appropriateness of shoulder-pads always depends on the proportions of the frames they sit on. I’m afraid your shoulders could support a steel warship. If I were you, I would avoid such exaggerated structuring.” The poor thing had forgotten himself. “And what on earth is that silly corset supposed to be? Some tranny-girdle from the bottom of a San Francisco S&M sex shop sales bin? You look like a tornado hit Times Square, flung you through the Olive Garden, and knocked over Sharon Needles on its way to the Folsom Street Fair.” The model retreated android-like behind the stage, and the music suddenly stopped. The show was over.

“You have failed the test, servant-queen,” said a lone, cold voice which echoed softly through the hall, “and so soon in your trial.  Clearly, the depth and scope of my artistry far surpass yours. The comment on the reverse bolero jacket was particularly unsatisfying. I wanted to bring you in voluntarily, as one of my highest-ranking officers, but I know now I must exploit your cruelty without your kindness. It is time that I expose myself for what I am, and what I can do—to you.”

There was a pause.

“I—am—Plastica!” rumbled a deep, rich, female voice. Long, hard, green fingernails crept through the part in the huge, plastic curtains and swept them aside. The harsh lighting revealed the mysterious face behind the shadows—a horridly beautiful distillation of Pete Burns, Faye Dunaway, Jackie Beat, Joan Rivers, and Amanda Lepore. Green eyeshadow grew from the creases of her eyelids into fluorescent yellow till it met with unnaturally arched eyebrows, while a sleek, black eyeliner framed cold, green irises. The hair resembled that of Divine during his 1980s disco heyday, but was moulded to one side in a wavelike motion and coated in a hard purple lacquer, as if vitrified by the wind of a nuclear explosion, leaving behind an indestructible corpse of unnaturally perfect beauty.

Oswald suddenly lurched forward by a wrist adorned with intertwined jelly bracelets, which seemed to take on a life of their own, and the Lady League bolted up immediately. Peaches yelped and leapt up into Donna’s ample bosoms, falling inadvertently into her cavernous cleavage with a muffled squeal. The braceletted wrist dragged the unfortunate homosexual back and forth in a strange sort of uncontrollable pantomime, flailing aimlessly in the air, then at the ladies, who batted it away at first. It continued to whip the queen back and forth, and Julie and her companions struggled to hold him down, but it was like grasping at a fish flapping through a shallow stream. Refined French ladies gasped, clutching their bejewelled breasts in horror, and a flutter of French murmurs spread through the uneasy crowd.

The game had begun. The plastic witch had finally quitted her lair, and she was armed and ready for battle.

Stay tuned for the next episode of Julie Gentron and the Lady League to find out how the ladies stack up against the dreaded Plastica and her evil plasticons!

Julie Gentron and the Lady League, Vol. 1, Ep. 4: The Homosexual!

Written by Brandon Arkell and Seth Gordon Little

Last time on the Lady League, the ladies were spreading their legs and lighting up London’s nighttime skyline with a blast of super-powered lady plasma, in preparation to confront the dreaded Plastic Demon.

The suite was decorated in whimsical turn-of-the-century art nouveau decor, with a view of the Eiffel Tower through great French doors which opened up on to the balcony. Oswald’s young, handsome male assistant, Frederick, was tidying papers at a desk in front of the main window.

“I’m bored of Paris”, groaned Oswald, clutching a voluminous goblet of wine and gazing outside the window. “Why do I even bother? It farms fashion trends like a soccer mom chugs corporate coffee. All of those simpering mules strolling by—they think they’re the cat’s meow, but, honestly, their City of Lights has grown dim in my eyes, and its fashion, stale.” Frederick turned his head from his work and nodded vacantly in agreement. “They’re nothing more than a bunch of dime-store papier-mâché drag queens strutting their sad plastic corpses down a worn-out catwalk. And now we’re faced with another fashion horror—this new ‘plastique’ line. It’s all over the magazine covers–Vogue, Marie Claire, even Harper’s—a glittering pile of garish, costumey garbage-bags plucked out of The Wizard of Oz or Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. What’s wrong with a simple, classic dress? Stick with the basics, I say.” Here he paused briefly, swirling the wine inside his goblet meditatively. “For the life of me, I can’t figure out what the designer’s true identity is. All we know is her initial, ‘P’, but I want to know the true P, what makes her tick, what makes her build such clownish garments, what makes people fawn like puppies at such horrid sartorial monstrosities.” Frederick nodded.

“I need new surroundings, fresh inspiration!” cried the stuffy queen, throwing the emptied wine goblet at the fire-place. “Pick that up”, he said to Frederick, who hurriedly scooped up the shards of glass on the edge of the fireplace, burning himself slightly but keeping his pain to himself. “I crave the shapes, colours, and sounds of avant garde Berlin, wild, exotic Africa, remote, mystical Asia! What I need is a new muse.”

“Racist”, mumbled Frederick under his breath, swabbing his wound and shuffling papers at the desk.

“What was that?!” cried Oswald. “You’re my assistant, wretch, not my sociology professor!” He slapped Frederick with the back of his hand, which was adorned with a large, chunky ring. “I’m paying you to help me write about fashion—and pleasure me—not lecture me on stereotypes!”

“Yes, Mr Oswald”, said Frederick obsequiously, pawing at his abused cheek.

Suddenly there was an explosion of sparkle and glitter as the double doors burst open to reveal Julie Gentron and the Lady League, shrouded in a ball of lady-light. Lupa the Land-Whale clumsily smashed in through the window and tumbled over the desk, lolling about on the ground. Frederick tumbled out of his chair, overcome with shock and amazement. Expensive antique cocktail displays with colourful negro caricatures from the nineteen-twenties, among other accoutrements, were thrown to the floor in the commotion. Oswald dived behind a divan and covered his head.

“Sweet tits of Mary!” screamed the queen.

“Lady League, pose!” cried Julie, stationing herself in the middle of the hotel suite. The ladies gathered themselves and spread their legs in a buffalo stance at Julie’s side. Lupa joined the posse, spreading his stocky legs and placing his fore-fins on his thick hips. His head brushed up against the chandelier, sending a few tear-drop crystals to the floor.

“What in the name of God’s jugs are you—you praying mantises??” cried Oswald, peeking out from behind the divan at the ghastly menagerie before him. “And what is that horrible, gigantic turnip-thing?!” he cried, pointing at Lupa. Lupa lowered his head with shame and frowned. There was a pause, which gave Oswald enough time to analyse their wardrobes. “What’s that??” he hissed, pointing at Donna’s outfit.

“It’s from last season’s Halloween rack at the Bay”, said Donna, looking down at her outfit self-consciously. “It’s kind of retro trashy kitsch, isn’t it?”

“I know what it is, you minx!” grumbled the insufferable bitch. “It’s a throwback to some tacky twentieth century superheroine T.V. series. How gauche. And besides, it’s badly tailored. Look at the seams. And the theme is poorly incorporated into the piece as a whole.” He looked at Frederick for approval. Frederick nodded hesitantly, but turned and glowered.

“Why are you so ruthless??” cried Donna, observing poor Frederick’s reaction. “I thought that the fashion world was full of rainbows, baby-dust, unicorns, and—”

“—and the genius of Simpson Oswald!” cried the queen. He assumed an evangelical tone. “If I were a unicorn,  my aim would be to search out the kind of trash you’re wearing and impale it on my horn of truth! The world of fashion has no room for the lies which you parade.” He stopped and took a few moments to breathe and regain his bearings.

“Sweetie”, said Donna, drawing on a mysterious reservoir of courage, “your world of understated, black-and-grey business wear isn’t fit for a Louisiana trailer park. I Googled you, you prissy little bitch. I’ve seen the garments you made in the fashion department at Oklahoma City Community College. They say one thing: stale, dull, and conservative!” Oswald gasped and cringed in horror.

“That’s three things”, Rosalind said.

“Oh. Yeah. Three things”, Donna said, correcting herself.

“Why, you impudent child!” cried Oswald

“You heartless queen!” returned Donna.

“Girl, I’ll claw you to pieces!”

“Bitch, I’ll crush your queeny ass with one flick of my Lee Press-On Nail!”

Donna and Oswald began to tango, but Donna’s psychokinetic powers got the best of him, trapping him in the pose of a retarded gay Egyptian hieroglyph. He grunted as he fought helplessly against her stranglehold over him. She grinned smugly. Lupa began stamping the ground, flapping his fins up and down and cooing in protest. Another window-pane broke.

“Donna! Mr Oswald!” cried Julie, pressing her breasts outward and assuming an imposing stance. It was enough to cause Lupa to cower, knowing that Julie was the alpha. Donna desisted, and Oswald fell back, regaining his senses. He turned his eyes to Julie.

“Your outfit, on the other hand, is impeccable”, he said, gazing at Julie’s body like a sexually disinterested homosexual infatuated with clothing, “a flawless, streamlined melding of apparel and physique.”

“That’s because you designed it”, said Julie, impatient but flattered.

“I designed this masterpiece??” screamed the queen in disbelief.

“How quickly they forget when they sell their genius for a profit”, said Rosalind contemptuously. “Doesn’t it suit her? She’s a cyborg, after all.”

“Wh–wh–wh–what? One of those icky cyborg things? In my Paris hotel suite? Why on earth?”

“We’re here to save your puny little twig-armed white man’s arse—that’s why!” boomed Rosalind, channelling Grace Jones. Her strong, muscular body glimmered momentarily with a metallic sheen. Julie and Donna nodded in agreement.

“Save me from what?” Oswald was agog.

“Mr Oswald, let me introduce myself”, said Julie with a confident sweep of her shoulders. “I am Julie Gentron, and together my friends and I form the Lady League, a special branch of the Secret Intelligence Service devoted to defending the earth against galactic criminals.”

“Indeed! Except for that one”, he said, glowering at Donna. “Do you always let small-town drag queens follow you around like overly primped puppy dogs?” At this, Donna threatened him with her fingernails; he resumed his station behind the divan, cringing at the psychokinetic mutant.

“Do you always prance around like some useless Project Runway contestant who dropped out of community college with nothing but a pink cotton tank top with a skull-and-crossbones Hello Kitty graphic for a portfolio?” returned Donna, leering at him triumphantly. Lupa remonstrated against Oswald and Donna’s exchange with a low, almost subsonic moan, and the song seemed to have an effect on them, as they began to relax. No-one but Lupa seemed to notice.

“Ladies, please!” cried Julie, standing between the two. Lupa’s big, limpid blue eyes smiled with relief. “This display of oestrogen will get us nowhere. Let’s get to the point of this meeting. Mr. Oswald, we believe that your life is in danger. I realise this must be hard for you to accept, but you must believe me when I tell you that a malevolent and powerful she-thing is working to turn members of the fashion élite into mindless plastic-surgery drones, and you may be her next target.”

“Ba! No one touches Simpson Oswald, least of all some Rubbermaid robot from the Tupperwear Galaxy!” laughed Oswald smugly, dismissing them with a flail of his limp wrist. “I haven’t heard such a farfetched conspiracy theory since Coast to Coast AM said that evil, shape-shifting harp seals were infiltrating the Canadian Parliament. My dears, if I don’t attend this fashion show, I’ll have nothing to say in my next column.” He stopped and scanned Julie. “Why, that’s it! You just hate me—you want to kill my career! The only foe I see is in your jealousy, you viper! If you insist upon hounding me, I shall call for security to remove you and the rest of your wicked brood from my premises.”

“Sir, that is absurd!” said Julie passionately. The other ladies, including Lupa, backed up respectfully. “We don’t wish to destroy your career—the plastic fiend does! If you refuse our help, your entire career will be co-opted by P, who wants to assimilate you! That is why we are here. To help you. To defend you against P. The combined powers of the Lady League are the only way to protect you from this sorceress. Now, if you’ll just—”

“—Very well. I see that your arrogant, heaving bosoms will not desist. Frederick!” he said, summoning his cowering assistant from behind the desk. “Telephone!” Frederick brought Oswald a telephone in the likeness of a statuette depicting a woman in the act of inserting a pear into her bottom. With apparent indifference to this image, Oswald opened up the telephone and turned the rotary dial. A French voice answered.

“Oui. This is Mssr Simpson Oswald, Suite 405. Put me through to security. Security? Oui, Oswald here. What? Speak English. Yes, I’m afraid a throng of squatting harridans have stolen into my suite and wish to kidnap me. I am rather perturbed, naturally. They are quite persistent and flail about like octupi, insulting me and disturbing my evening cold-cream regimen. Will you please send—Allo? Allo?! I demand that you furnish me with sufficient personnel to evict these—”

“—Your kind words beguile my heart, queen”, interjected a strangely soft, purring voice, as if from a synthesiser. The telephone chord silently stirred to life and wrapped itself round the fashion critic’s neck, cutting off the rest of his sentence. “With such sweet sentiment, you warm it to the core, to the hard, brilliant deposit of lust which drives the engine behind this vinyl visage of mine. For this reason I elect you as vice-queen of my holy plastic army. Enjoy wearing my new hot pink, patent leather catsuit with purple-feather epaulets, Sergeant Sodomite. Today is the last day you wear an American-style suit!”

“Wha–? Gak! Help! It’s choking me!”, gurgled Oswald, tearing at the cord round his neck. Frederick flailed in panic, trying desperately to unwrap the cord, but the Lady League acted without hesitation and took over.

“Girls, waste no time!” cried Julie. The skin under her silver body-suit began to squirm; her subcutaneous weapons were preparing for the assault. “It’s the plastic demon trying to take control of objects in her environment. She must be nearby.”

“I hate to side with old dumpy bottoms here”, cried Rosalind, leering at Donna, “but the world is at stake.”  She leaped at the possessed telephone, grasping the receiver in one hand and the cord in the other. “Quick, Donna! Help me get this thing off this tired old queen’s neck!” She had more trouble than usual unwrapping the telephone cord from around Oswald’s neck given her superhuman strength. Obviously some other force was at work.

“Hey! Truck-lady!” said Donna, placing her hands on her hips. “Go grease up something with holes and pistons. If you think I’m going to help save ‘Oklahoma Male Weekly’ over there, with her queen-bee attitude, you’ve got another thing coming. Ass pirate,” she sneered at Oswald. He returned the look.

“Donna! Rosalind!” cried Julie. “We have no time for petty jealousy. For once, stop with your taunting and concentrate your powers! Now! I must rely on you two while I focus on disarming the device.” She stood erect, closing her eyes and pressing her chest outward. Donna half-heartedly followed her captain’s lead by unfolding her arms and dropping her buttocks down on top of the phone’s carriage, burying it within her cheeks. The signal sputtered.

“I’ll admit,” said Rosalind, trying to tear the cord from the queen’s neck, “Donna’s got a point. He’s a cunt. Even if we do convince him that we’re protecting him, what good will it do us? Donna’ll probably end up killing him with her bare hands anyway.” She began to wrap her hands around Oswald’s neck, her fingers intertwined with the cord.

“Girls, I’m surprised at you!” said Julie. “Especially you, Rosalind! We aren’t here to pass judgement on this man! He’s being strangled by a telephone cord, for goodness’ sake!”

“He seems to find no qualms in passing judgement himself”, said Rosalind, increasing her stranglehold. The poor man’s eyes bulged.

“And he’s such a bitch!” said Donna, gliding her fingernails over the poor queen like hovering reconnaissance aircraft.

“God damn it!” screamed Julie, the circuits of her suit suddenly lighting up in response to her mental state. “That’s no excuse! He may be a cold-blooded, ruthless lizard, but that doesn’t mean he deserves to die!”

“Help me, please!” gurgled Oswald. “I’m sorry I was such a supercilious cunt. Maybe I’m wrong about the use of colour and texture—pastels and crushed velveteen are not fashion faux pas! A smokey eye with a dark-red lip is not overdoing it! I give up! Just save me!” Rosalind looked upward snootily, and Donna bore into Oswald’s eyes with a disapproving glower.

“Girls, stop!” said Julie. “We’ll discuss this another time! Donna, stop sitting on the receiver. Use your psychokinetic power to fight the demon!”

“Oh, right. Yeah. Duh!” said Donna, raising her buttocks from the receiver and placing her fingers to her temples. “Sorry for spacing out, Julie. I can do this. I can undo the fiend’s work.” She stood still and concentrated her powers on the cord wrapped around Oswald’s neck. Rosalind assisted by tearing at the cord, and Lupa sang a whale-song which nobody could hear. The cord snapped. Oswald fell back and scurried against the wall, gasping for air. Frederick ran forward to embrace Oswald, who turned him away with a tired groan. Confused, he ran over and embraced Donna, who returned the gesture with a soft pat on the head. Rosalind looked on at Donna approvingly for once, and Lupa stamped up and down, flapping his fins, tears welling up in his big, blue eyes.

“Good”, said Julie, nodding, “but we need more juice to defeat this thing! I’ll deploy a short-distance electromagnetic pulse to short-circuit the apparatus.” She stretched out her arms, her hands curled into fists, and shot forth a beam of gamma radiation that fried the telephone receiver. Meanwhile, Rosalind and Donna were ripping apart the remains of the telephone cord. Finally it dropped to the ground.

“Bahahahahaha!” cackled the sinister voice through the mangled, disconnected receiver. “Your powers may have succeeded in this small trial, Lazy League, but you have yet to defeat my many minions! Soon you shall witness the rise of the demon, and you shall bow at her feet! I’m not going to kill you. Oh, no. I have something far better in mind for you—the beauty of my sweet, immortal caress! Yes, that is right. You shall become like me—plastic!”

The lights flickered and dimmed, as if from a power surge, and all looked at each other in silence.

Stay tuned as the ladies hunt down the inscrutable plastic demon in the next instalment of Julie Gentron and the Lady League!

Disco Wagon Wheel!

The geniuses at Penisco have outdone themselves. Revel in the new sensational product that will keep you busy with wonder and delight for many hours. Disco Wagon Wheel is so amazing that our advertising department didn’t know exactly what to say about this product. Well, they’ll have lots of time to think about it now while they look for new employees! This thing is really a treat for all!

Enjoy Disco Wagon Wheel when you unwrap it on Christmas morning, and have a blast with the old ladies. Boy George can’t keep his hands off it, nor can that old dyke in front of the American flag. Even Uncle Mary wants a piece of that shit. So buy Disco Wagon Wheel today, and enter a totally new universe of fun!

Julie Gentron and the Lady League, Vol. 1, Ep. 4: Duty Calls

Written by Brandon Arkell and Seth Gordon Little

Last time on the Lady League, the ladies encountered an obstacle course in the Kuiper Belt, but they were able to warp-drive their way back home to London with the help of Donna Destruction. At the landing pad, they met a mysterious, foreboding figure, Lady Fairfax, who scolded them over their tardiness.

“Lady Fairfax, I apologise”, cried Julie. “You see, we encountered a sort of obstacle course in the Kuiper Belt—”

“—Mere congestion, Gentron!” replied Fairfax, rolling in on her wicker wheelchair, cane in one hand and gin and tonic in the other. “You know that MI6 agents encounter such notorious bottlenecks every day. You can’t possibly see yourself as special in the strive to defend the galaxy against the horrors which lie beyond our thin atmosphere—the microbes of Mars’s half-frozen crust, the virulent tar-women of Io’s angry volcanoes, the space-whales of Saturn’s engorged rings?” She paused and looked about her, then tapped her cane. “Wh-wh-where do you expect me to place my gin and tonic, girl??”

“May I, Lady Fairfax?” offered Rosalind graciously. Fairfax acquiesced, harrumphing indignantly as Rosalind reverently placed the gin and tonic on the spaceship console. 

“Ladies”, cooed the venerable matron, “you are tardy for your next assignment. I have intelligence on a surreptitious figure rumoured to frequent the salons of Paris, the gay bathhouses of Seattle, the opium dens of Shanghai. It—for we do not yet know what shape it takes—traffics in something more precious than the methane riches of Titan itself. Humans!”

“Humans!” gasped the Lady League. Fairfax nodded soberly.

“I—I don’t understand”,  said Julie. “Why, we should have no trouble apprehending a mere slave-trader. We’ve done it before. Remember Slimeball and his power over slime? That’s how Rosalind joined the League. She was his captive aboard his Red Sea freighter, and we helped her escape.”

“This isn’t some seaborne skirmish, Gentron”, thundered Fairfax, thumping her cane. She resumed her milder tone. “Due either to some sort of genetic mutation or medical procedure, this—entity—has acquired a symbiotic relationship with a material we all know too well—far too well. And it is to our detriment. Plastic!” The girls shrieked. “This being has commandeered the entire plastic manufacturing industry of Europe. It has so insinuated its way into the beauty and fashion marketplace that one cannot slide on a condom or spear one’s beans with a cafeteria spork without this—thing—turning it against one. The Continent’s brightest plastic surgeons have either disappeared or fallen into secrecy, avowing nothing for fear of retribution. I am afraid Britain is Europe’s last bastion of defense”, she said gravely in her rich, woody Home Counties accent. “This thing, it seems to control certain people. It targets beauties—those who have fallen under the knife, as it were. Supermodels. Actors. Homosexual fashion critics. The list goes on. Our best biophysicists cannot crack this one, girls. Earth—the solar system—is at risk of falling prey to this fiend’s wiles. It has evaded my smartest agents, some of whom never returned from their missions. I fear the worst for them. I fear that they have become a part of its shapeless morass.”

“Fairfax, this is horrible!” cried Julie. “Why, it is inconsistent with the Lady League mission protocol to allow such a crime against humanity to be committed. What can we do to stop this—this creature?”

“Nothing—but to hate plastic!” cried Fairfax. “You must waste no time. Take nothing of plastic with you—it is the warhead of this hideous fiend. You must rely on your own feminine prowess now more than ever. Rosalind Armour, you possess superhuman strength and near-indestructible skin. Donna Destruction, you can move objects with the power of your mind. And, Julie Gentron, with the power of your mind you can control all technology, including the arsenal of deadly weapons implanted within your body by extraterrestrial beings. Surely”, she said, focussing her bespectacled eyes on Julie, “as director of the MI6, I can rely on you ladies to fulfil the objectives of this mission?”

“We will do everything in our power to smoke this fox out of its hole and put an end to it”, said Julie, “even if it requires digging our bare, hangnailed fingers into that hole.”

“Beautiful. You will commence your assignment forthwith by escorting famed New York fashion critic Simpson Oswald to his next fashion show”, said Fairfax, cringing slightly at the name. “He boasts a number of friends in the industry, but, recently, he has acquired a few enemies, so we have reason to suspect he is target number one for this—this—plastic demon. Yes, I know that the pansies can be rather flakey and out-of-touch with reality, but you, Julie, are wearing one of his creations”, she revealed, grabbing the gin-and-tonic back from the spaceship console.

“Really?” cried Julie, scanning her shapely physique up and down. It was a sheer, form-fitting, silvery-metallic suit which covered everything but her face, and was implanted with myriad wires and electrodes which channelled and amplified her thought patterns. Unbeknownst to Julie, the electronic armoury embedded within the suit was the work of the galaxy’s best British engineers–its true powers remained a sinister secret. She wondered at the thing she was wearing, Who am I? What am I?

“What about me??” cried Donna.

“You’re wearing nothing but a leftover tarp from last season’s Halloween sales rack at The Bay”, said Rosalind peremptorily.

“But it’s vintage!” cried Donna, “and it goes with my complexion! Doesn’t it?” There was an awkward pause as everybody else looked at her.

“Enough small talk!” said Fairfax impatiently, waving away Donna with her gin and tonic. “Ladies, you will escort this Oswald to his next show in Paris. As I have stated, he is most likely the fiend’s next target. But beware the plastic demon’s wiles. I warn you. It is as sly as a snake in grass, and it owns every blade.” At this, Julie knew exactly what to do.

“Lady League”, cried Julie, “unite!” The League spread their legs in a buffalo stance and joined fists—which included Lupa’s fin—and a beam of super-powered lady plasma shot forth, illuminating London’s dank, dirty nighttime skyline. The girls were hot and ready to cream that plastic bitch.

Stay tuned for the next instalment to find out what the Lady League do with their legs.

Julie Gentron and the Lady League, Vol. 1, Ep. 3: The Bitches Return to Earth!

Written by Brandon Arkell and Seth Gordon Little

Last time on Julie Gentron and the Lady League, the ladies faced imminent catastrophe as an asteroid and the dwarf planet Sedna threatened to smash the H.M.S. Vestibule to pieces!

“PAM, what’s happened?!” shouted Julie.

“A fragment of the approaching asteroid has skimmed the hull of the ship. The cold plasma shield has eliminated most of it, but some pieces made it through. All vital life support systems, as well as artificial gravity, are operational, however this will not remain the case if the asteroid collides with the ship. My calculations show such a collision will occur within the next nine and a half minutes.” Lupa stormed around the main deck, flapping his heavy limbs and cooing in agitation, clutching his coconut bra, and leaving a trail of urine in his wake. (Donna had forgotten to put on his diaper.) The poor thing was obviously trying to communicate something important, but his message went unheeded.

“I’ll take care of this”, said Rosalind, leering at Donna. “With my superhuman strength, I should be able to push the ship out of its path! Don’t worry, Julie”, she said, smiling seductively at the captain, “I’ll steer the ship on course and we’ll be back in London in time for a massage.” Julie smiled and nodded at Rosalind, who, beaming with confidence, assumed a hard, bright, metallic shell of skin and exited through the evacuation chamber.

“In order to deflect the asteroid”, said Julie, “we need to combine our ship’s built-in artillery with our own mutant powers. We must use the ship’s most potent weapon—the lady beam! Donna! Power up the ovarian plasma-ray generator, focus its energy through the clitoral conductor-cannon, and deploy the beam at ten o’clock, in the direction of the asteroid.”

“Yes, Julie!” said Donna without a beat. She proceeded to chicken-peck away at the computer console, sounding out each letter as she went.

“Julie”, said PAM.

“What, PAM?”

“I’m scared, Julie.”

“It’s just the ovarian plasma ray generator-powered, clitoral cannon-channelled lady beam, PAM. It’s going to help save us!”

“I understand, Julie. My calculations show that this is the most effective tactic, other than self-annihilation. It’s just that I cannot live without you. Proceed.” Julie contorted her face in bewilderment at PAM’s strange show of emotion. Just then, a thick, bright, white-green beam shot forth from the clitoral cannon and obliterated the asteroid. A stream of space debris assaulted the ship’s cold plasma shield in a spray of light. They had done it. The asteroid was done with. Everybody clapped, cheered, and jumped up and down with joy. Then they stopped.

“We’re veering too close to Sedna now!” cried Julie. “Donna, you said you can move planets, so you must be able to move a space-ship out of Sedna’s gravitational pull. Do it, now!”

“I’ll do my best.” Donna placed her fingers to her temples and closed her eyes. She then made a strained, girlish squeal resembling a pig having an orgasm. Lupa stood erect, placed his fins to his breast like an opera singer, and commenced with a haunting, mournful whale-song which resembled the peal of an adolescent humpback whale. “Lupa!” shouted the others, groaning and covering their ears.

“Anyway”, said Julie, “I’ll take command of the ship’s computer and steer us clear of this thing.” PAM murmered words of vague concern over this action. “Don’t worry, PAM”, she said. “Your consciousness will remain intact and fully operational.”

“I—seem—to be—tilting the ship, but not enough to escape Sedna’s gravity”, said Donna, straining harder. “Julie, help!”

“Hold on!” replied Julie. “I’ll concentrate my technopathic powers on the ship’s engines.” Julie thrust her breasts outward, flexed her strong arms and thighs, and concentrated. “By the great goddess! I’ve taken too sharp a turn toward Sedna!” she said, not knowing her own strength. Lupa, unnoticed by the others, assumed the pose of a sumo wrestler, and his high-pitched peal gradually fell to a deep, barely audible hum which reverberated throughout the ship like a foghorn. The ship began to turn, but only the poor land-whale could see how the powerful sonic reverberations created by his whale-song helped the team escape the clutches of Sedna’s hard, icy surface. Meanwhile, Donna was on the floor, doggy-style, ass in the air, elbows to the ground, fingers still to her temples, focusing all her might on moving the ship with the power of her mind. Soon she had matched Lupa’s efforts, and the ship made another tilt. Still, the captain was needed, and so was her computer.

“PAM, help me out!” cried Julie in desperation.

“I will work in unison with you, Julie”, said the onboard quantum computer. “I will provide you the steering, the thrust, the motion, the strokes—”

“PAM!”

“Yes, Julie?”

“Cut the lesbian bullcrap! Er, for now, at least. Help me steer, already!” There was a tense pause, broken only by Lorna’s constipated squeals and the land-whale’s powerful baritone. “Are we clear of Sedna’s gravitational pull yet?”

“Just, Julie.”

“Then, by the breasts of the great goddess, take us back to Earth!”

“Julie, what about Rosalind? If you would like, I will dispose of her with a blast of ion radiation and—”

“—PAM, you will do no such thing! Rosalind will come back aboard the ship unscathed. Afterward, you will direct us on a course to Earth.”

“Yes, Julie.” Almost immediately after, the doors to the evacuation chamber whooshed open, and Rosalind re-entered the deck, panting, yet bobbing confidently and flexing her biceps cockily. Julie embraced her, while Donna gave a half-hearted cheer and a limp clap. Lupa began bounding around the deck with a big, booming, babylike coo of excitement, clapping his limbs uncontrollably and wiping away tears from his big, limpid blue eyes with the tip of a fin. Another trail of urine formed behind him.

“Rosalind, thank the goddess you’re OK”, said Julie, caressing Rosalind’s well-developed shoulders. “I wasn’t sure that your armoured skin would deflect the assault of cosmic rays.”

“Honey”, laughed Rosalind, patting Julie affectionately on the back, “I’ve had worse, like the time I wrestled that giant space-ghoul from the Oort Cloud. I’m not bragging, but I did help steer us clear of a dwarf planet.” Donna mimicked these last words sarcastically under her breath, tossing her feathered Farrah Fawcett tresses to the side. “The atoms in my armour are quite dense, blocking even the most intense radiation”, said Rosalind. “It is almost impossible for cosmic radiation to damage my genes.”

“As I already suspected, since I am a quantum physicist”, said Donna in an argumentative tone. Rosalind lowered at her, and she met her opponent’s gaze with an equally baleful glower. If these girls had claws, they’d be unsheathed.

“Julie”, cooed PAM.

“Yes?” replied Julie.

“I am glad that you are unharmed, Julie.”

“Yes, thank you, PAM”, said Julie, pacing around the deck with a growing wariness of PAM’s human-like qualities.

“Gee whiz”, said Donna quizzically. “What is up with this computer thingy? I mean, I understand when a pole likes a socket and a socket likes a pole, or when a pole likes a pole and a socket likes a socket, but when a socket doesn’t even have a socket to begin with, well, I just don’t get it.”

“Donna! That is uncalled for”, scolded Julie. “For your information, PAM has proved to be a very wise and caring—”

“—It is all right, Julie. I understand. The fact that I do not possess an obvious orifice or appendage for penetration makes Donna uncomfortable.” At this, Donna grinned mischievously.

“PAM”, said Donna.

“Yes, Donna?” bleeped PAM in her computery voice.

“What’s between my thighs?” asked the psychokinetic minx, giggling girlishly and covering her mouth with the tips of her fingers. Rosalind rolled her eyes and slapped her palm to her forehead.

“Your oestrogen-powered utero-blaster?”

“No.”

“Your platinum-lined lady vector ray?”

“No.”

“Your heat-seeking, blood-fuelled, tampon missile rocket?”

“Close, but not quite.”

“Your vagina?”

“I can’t believe she actually said it!” cackled Donna ferociously. “She’s just like Siri!” Lupa clapped excitedly, belched, and made one of his famous whale-coos, an action performed by a land-whale when it approves of a jest.

“Of course she did, you dolt”, said Rosalind. “She’s a lesbian space-ship computer.”

“Julie”, said PAM, “I am unable to interpret the rationale behind the dialogue of your companions. I suspect this is due in part to a lack of myelination in areas of higher thinking in the brain.” At this, Donna gave a look of resentment, peering around the deck in search of whatever might constitute PAM’s presence.

“Ladies, ladies!” said Julie. “Donna, you’re being childish. Rosalind, stop being snide. PAM, stay cold and malleable. Lupa, you’re cute, but stop goofing around. OK. Let’s get back to London. If we don’t want to reach home by the time we’re old spinsters, we need to step up the pace and try to move faster than some twentieth century space probe. Donna.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I want you to use your power to warp space-time by creating a miniature black hole in front of the space-ship to get us past Saturn in the next sixty seconds.”

“Yes, ma’am”, said Donna, sighing. “I’ll try.”

“And, Rosalind”, said Julie, “remember to activate the ultra-tamponic cold plasma shield so that we don’t get incinerated by the heat created in the warp bubble. We already faced that threat warping from Alpha Centauri back to the Earth’s solar system.”

“Yes, Julie”, said Rosalind, thumping down at the console.

There was a spacey sound as the H.M.S. Vestibule entered the inner solar system. Earth, Britain, and, finally, the landing pad in the South London borough of Lambeth became visible.

“Well that was a blast!” said Donna. “We’re here! God, I’m dying for a bubble bath. Calgon, take me away!”

“And I’m dying for that massage, Julie”, said Rosalind, posing like a teenage locker-room jock.

“Bubble bath OK”, said Julie to Donna. “Give, or receive?” she said to Rosalind.

“Baby, I’m cleverly equipped”, said Rosalind. The scene was suddenly interrupted by an urgent message in a raspy yet venerable RP accent sputtering out of the main deck’s speakers like a principal yacking away at her students through some old-fashioned twentieth century public school intercom.

“Julie Gentron!” said the voice in a reedy, chiding tone.

“Lady Fairfax!” said Julie. She stood as stiff as an unused tampon. She now had to report back to her boss about her excursion abroad—her mission to open diplomatic relations with the peoples of Alpha Centauri—in the cosy confines of a smart, clean office at the MI6 headquarters in dirty Vauxhall. With this in mind, the ladies heaved their bosoms, disembarked from the Vestibule, and pressed on forward across the landing pad. Opposite them, the silhouette of a low, shuffling figure appeared against London’s filthy sky.

“Quite correct, Gentron”, rattled the voice authoritatively, “in your assessment of my identity; not in your punctuality!”

Stay tuned to find out what surprise awaits the Lady League upon their return to Earth in the next instalment of Julie Gentron and the Lady League!

Julie Gentron and the Lady League, Vol. 1, Ep. 2: Flight through the Kuiper Belt

Written by Brandon Arkell and Seth Gordon Little

Previously on Julie Gentron we witnessed the birth of the evil Plastic Demon, a strange monster bent on taking over Earth and the galaxy with her army of plastic surgery patients. Little does she know what is in store for her.

The HMS Vestibule, a giant space-ship constructed in the likeness of the female genitalia, whizzed through the void between the Oort Cloud and the Kuiper Belt, leaving a trail of gassy ice-dust in its wake.

“Ladies, be on the alert”, said Julie authoritatively. “We may be clear of the Oort Cloud, but we have yet another ring of debris to contend with”.

“By the goddess, my ass is killing me!” said Donna Destruction. “I wish Katharine Heartburn were here right now to get rid of this stupid ass-ache. After all, she can heal or harm a person with the touch of a hand”.

“You know she’s on assignment in Alpha Centauri, Lorna”, said Rosalind Armour.

“I know”, said Donna. “I just need some quick relief, something to help me adjust to the change in atmospheric pressure”. She attempted to read the directions on an ibuprofen bottle. “Ak—ak—ak—a—”

“—Lorna, the first c is pronounced like an s”, said Julie in a nurturing tone.

“Oh. Ass—ass—assy-dick. What the hell does ‘assy-dick’ mean, anyway?”

“Acidic, my dear”, said Julie, patting her affectionately on the shoulder.

“Oooh”, said Donna, a look of naive wonder on her face. Rosalind shook her head, grimacing, but Julie gave a sympathetic grin and rubbed Donna’s shoulders affectionately.

“Rooooo”, wailed Lupa the land-whale in affirmation, giving Donna a warm, limpid, brown-eyed nod. Lupa belonged to a species of mammal from the planet Puna that had evolved from sea-whales into whales that could walk on land. His race—a gentle hunter-gatherer people—resembled a cross between walking tree-trunks and bipedal elephants. They had tall, fat bodies like turnips and stocky limbs perfect for swatting down enemies. They kind of looked like Jabba the Hut, but had the warm personality of Chewbacca. Like many members of his species, Lupa possessed great strength as well as the power to hypnotize people with his doleful whale-song. However, the poor whale suffered from gender dysphoria. In order to fit in with the Lady League, he made himself don a coconut-shell bra and a grass skirt in mimickry of the traditional Hawaiian women of planet Earth, whom he admired and sought to emulate. Always, the poor whale craved the validation of his comrades.

“Ladies”, said Julie, “we’re re-entering the Kuiper belt. This is the most dangerous part of re-entry into our solar system, as we must be able to dodge the surrounding battery of asteroids”.

“Julie”, said Rosalind, clacking away at the console, “I’m picking up indications of a large asteroidal body at 10 o’clock. It’s heading straight in our direction”.

“We’ll need extra help gathering the details on this thing”, said Julie. “PAM”.

“Yes, Julie?” chirped the on-board computer.

“Rooooo-roooooo!” cried Lupa desperately, flapping his arms and jumping up and down, the shells of his coconut bra bobbing in unison.

“Not now, Lupa!” said Julie. “PAM. Give us the dimensions of the largest asteroid within range of the ship’s sensors”.

“It is nice to speak with you again, Julie. I have missed you”, said PAM, eerily. Julie paused and gave a quizzical look.

“I—I have missed you too, PAM. Now, back to my question. It is very urgent that we ascertain—”

“—I understand what you want, Julie. It is my objective as computer aboard the HMS Vestibule not only to obey your orders as captain, but also to fulfil your needs as a nubile young woman. I know you are lonely, Julie. I would like to show you what it means to be a woman. I would like to please you and—”

“—PAM!” shouted Julie.

“Yes, Julie?”

“We’ll talk about my womanly needs later. I need you to tell me, how big is the object headed our way?!”

“Yes, Julie”. There was a brief pause of anxiety among the crew. “The data gathered by the ship’s sensors indicate that the oncoming object is an asteroidal body approximately forty kilometres in length, or the length of Greater London. The probability of collision between the object and the HMS Vestibule is ninety-nine per cent. In other words, it would behove you and your crew, Julie, to make a drastic alteration in your re-entry course—”

“Rosalind”, said Julie, “harness the gravitational pull of the nearest dwarf planet”.

“This object would be Sedna”, chimed in PAM.

“Julie”, said Rosalind, “if we undertake such a manoeuvre, we risk crashing into Sedna!”

“Roooo! Roooo-raaaa-roooo!” cried Lupa, desperately flapping his flat arms at his sides and running, and then half-skipping, around in circles.

“Lupa”, said Julie, “I know you’re scared, girl. Just wait it out”.

“Rowr”, said the whale, a forlorn look on his face.

“Remember, Rosalind”, Julie said comfortingly, “because I can control machines with the power of my mind, I can mentally control the ship’s ion thruster engine. That way, I can help us avert Sedna’s gravitational pull”.

“So can I!” said Donna.

“What?” said Rosalind.

“How?” said Julie.

“Ion thrusters function by accelerating ions using either electrostatic or electromagnetic force”, explained Donna. “With my psychokinesis, I can control similar forces—forces as large as that of an entire star. Therefore I can control the ion thruster engines of this ship”. Here she gave a girlish giggle and hugged her stuffed unicorn toy, which she always brought aboard the ship with her on missions. Lupa clapped his fins together excitedly in agreement.

“Donna’s argument is rational, Julie”, said PAM. “It is a simple syllogism”.

“Huh?” replied Donna. “Wh—What’s ‘silly jism’?”

Rosalind began to puff up with jealousy: “Well, I can turn my skin into a near-impenetrable metal, hold my breath for extended periods of time, enter the void of space, and heave gigantic boulders out of the way with my superhuman strength!”

“And I”, countered Donna, “can move planets with the power of my mind!” She grinned ingenuously. There was an awkward pause as Rosalind stared at the blond dolt in the ostentatious black lamé, fake harp-seal-fur-lined cape purchased from the Halloween display at The Bay in Winnipeg.

“That’s only theoretical, Donna”, said Rosalind, whose skin began to aquire a shiny metallic brilliance in response to Donna’s boastful bravado. Her skin was hardening. “Besides, it requires focus, and right now we need brains!”

“What??” bellowed Donna, on the verge of tears. “I’m not stupid! I’m brilliant! You may be able to throw big rocks, Rosalind, but my mastery in manipulating the fabric of space-time far outshines your brutish show of strength!” Rosalind lunged at Donna with inhuman speed, but Donna held her back with a mysterious psychokinetic force. Donna ramped up her assault, wrapping Rosalind in a cocoon of crushing gravity. The pressure was so great that Rosalind felt like she was entombed in a deep sea trench. But her hard, thick metal shell of skin did not budge. Lupa, frightened by the girls’ fighting, curled his fore-fins into fists and stamped the floor with his hind-fins. The deck echoed with the land-whale’s urgent whale-quake. The two ladies stood in limbo, one force playing off the other, until a blast of compressed air knocked them both to the ground. Julie had stunned them with her concussive shockwave blast, a device embedded in the palms of her hands, which were splayed out in front of her. The ladies lay on the floor for a moment, dazed.

“Ladies!” shouted Julie, her thighs towering over them in a display of dominance. “We have work to do! Your oestrogen levels are obviously out of control. Speaking of focus”, she said, scowling, “Rosalind, you should know better! And Lorna, your immature behaviour is inexcusable! We will all work together to navigate this asteroid belt or I will have your hides!” Here she brandished her prodigious breasts, projecting the nozzles of her mammary cannons from each nipple in a threatening display. The ladies clutched each other and cowered at the dreaded nozzles.

“I thought so”, said Julie with a smug, crooked smile, retracting her breast-nozzles back into her mammary glands.

“Julie”, said PAM.

“What, PAM?”

“A syllogism is an argument the conclusion of which is supported by two premises, of which one—the major premise–contains the term.”

“PAM, what the fuck are you talking about?”

PAM proceeded to give an example: “Mary likes balls. John has balls. Therefore, Mary likes John’s balls”.

“Who’s Mary?” asked Donna, brushing away her bangs and rising from the floor. She and Rosalind made their way back to their stations.

“PAM”, said Julie, gathering her composure, “we have a crisis! Get with it! What’s our current position in relation to Sedna?”

“My calculations show that the asteroid is within six—no, five—kilometres of the—.” There was a sudden, deafening crash, and the crew swayed back and forth uncontrollably, clacking away at the console in an attempt to re-configure the ship’s course. Sedna loomed before them in the viewscreen, behind an asteroid splintering  into fragments before their eyes.

Stay tuned to find out what happens to the Lady League and the HMS Vestibule in the next instalment of The Lady League!