The night was quiet as I waited for him to come to me. Shadows crawled across the wall of my darkened tent as I watched in vain for his distinctive silhouette. Elephants, strongmen, bearded ladies, snake charmers – each false hope only served to sharpen my anticipation. I could feel desire building in me, from the soles of my size 25 shoes to the tip of my red squeaky nose.

“Are ye lookin’ for someone, matey?” a voice whispered in my ear.

I tried to turn around, but strong arms wrapped around me, locking in a firm embrace. Moonlight filtered softly through the thin tent walls, highlighting the sharp contrast between his sun-darkened hand and the pale polka-dots of my jumper. I shivered at the sight of his hook glinting in the dim light.

“Aaargghh, cold, are we?” His hot breath brushed against my neck and I shivered again, but definitely not from the temperature.

He laughed quietly at my body’s response, but it was cut off by a sharp intake of breath as I softly raked my fingernails across his hand.

“Aye, the clown has claws!” he exclaimed.

His arms loosened, and I turned around in his embrace.

“Is that your sword, or are you happy to see me?” I purred. He pulled me closer in response, crushing the purple and pink petals of my trick flower between us. Cold water oozed from its center, a sensual contrast to my burning skin.

“Yaaarrr, me sword be always glad to see ye,” he growled.

“Did you hear the one about the clown and the pirate?” I asked. “She loved to walk his plank.” Two soft toots on my horn emphasized the punch line.

“Aarrgghh,” was his only response. I watched, frozen in time, as his head slowly dipped towards me. I felt the coarse brush of his beard on my cheek, then the touch of his lips. The fire of my passion was mirrored in his eye.

His mouth possessed mine, seeking and demanding. My nose softly squeaked as it was crushed between us, a victim of our hunger. Fingers ran through my rainbow hair and cold metal dug into my back, pressing our bodies closer.

“’Tis your buried treasure I seek,” he murmured.

“Just connect the polka dots,” I whispered.

Captain Gaspar Camembert was careful to bar the door behind him as he returned home for the night. A series of murders had shocked the once tranquil port of Brebiou. An assassin was loose, with a heart seemingly as black as that of a black-hearted raven.

Gaspar found his wife sitting by the fireplace, gazing into the flames. He could not read the expression on her beautiful face. Was it sadness? Regret? Trepidation? Apprehension? Constipation? Perhaps, thought Gaspar, I should ask her.

“Mimolette, what is wrong? Do you fear the murderer who haunts our village?”

She looked up, the usually limpid pools of her eyes disturbed by trickles of tears slowly streaming from her eyes like streams slowly trickling from two round pools.

“Oh Gaspar,” she cried, her ample but not too ample bosom heaving, “I have no need to fear the killer, because I am the killer!”

“Gasp!” gasped Gaspar.

“Remember how we met, my husband? Your pirate ship, the Raclette, intercepted a merchantman carrying me from Nippon, where I was studying ninjitsu.”

Gaspar’s head spun, as if he had spent the evening at the local tavern downing tankards of cheap wine. In fact, that was how he had spent the evening, but his confusion owed nothing to alcohol. “Ninjitsu?”

“Ninja are master assassins, and I sought to learn their secrets. They treated me like a clown at first, but over time I earned their respect, and mastered their art.”

“You see, Gaspar, invaders from outer space seek to conquer Earth. Their scouting force is based here, masquerading as simple villagers. I belong to an organization dedicated to stopping them. We arranged for your ship’s path to cross with mine. Being your wife was the perfect cover, but I have come to love you and will no longer hide the truth.”

Gaspar sat silently for a moment. He was a very simple man, with a very simple mind. Could a hot-blooded pirate be happy married to a cold-blooded ninja?

Of course, she was very beautiful. Gaspar embraced his wife. “I vowed to love you forever, and I shall.”

With a joyful smile, Mimolette returned her husband's embrace. Yet beneath her smile, beneath the organic layer covering her beryllium frame, Mimolette remained troubled. The most brilliant scientists of her time had devised her cybernetic brain, but could it ever truly know this thing called love?

The door to the captain’s cabin flew open with all the fury of hurricane. Black Todd half-dove, half-tumbled into the small space inside, hauling a half-wrapped robot across the threshold cradled in his arms like a bride.

“Yar, this be the perfect spot, says I,” he cooed kicking aside clumps of kelp and slamming the door behind him.

His ruffled shirt was soon torn open by the lifeless metallic hands of the Sentient Emulation eXperience-bot as it sprang to life. She chirped and whistled at the revelation of his broad, hairy chest.

“You are running an unregistered copy of this software,” the robot intoned. “Would you like to continue?”

The pirate only chuckled before letting out a soft, “Yar.”

Black Todd’s breath came in raspy gasps as S.E.X.-bot explored his neck and shoulders with her cadmium lips, occasionally giving him a mild static shock. These zaps only made the mad pirate laugh louder.

“Yo, ho, ho!”

Then, tossed by the roll of the ship on the sea, Black Todd flung S.E.X.-bot up against the wall and fell against her from behind, fiddling with the dials on her chest.

“Sensual feeling 92 acknowledged,” she responded in an electronic monotone. “Seductive response 28 confirmed.”

He clinked his gold tooth against her titanium audio input sensors, then brought her close to him for a passionate kiss, pressing his tongue hard against her tungsten tasting sensor.

“Now,” he whispered, “for me to find yer buried treasure.”

Black Todd’s right hand went to work trying to unfasten her CPU cover, but the hook on his left hand made in difficult.

S.E.X.-bot pulled away.

“Initiating sensual process number 24.”

Suddenly the bulky metal cover came crashing down, revealing her most internal wires and circuits.

With the full scope of her titanium matrix exposed to him, the pirate, his tongue lolling, let out another soft, “Yar.”

The two consumed each other in a powerful embrace, and the waves of passion overcame all the ships of reservation in a tsunami of lust.

S.E.X.-bot suddenly pulled away again.

“You are running this program without anti-virus software,” she intoned. “Would you like to continue?”

Black Todd’s one eye darted from left to right. Then left again.

After a moment of salty hesitation, he let out a soft, “Yar.”

The curtains rustled in the open window beside her bed. Something swept silently around the room, brushing gently against her curly green and red hair.

Was it just the cool, night breeze? she thought. Or was it something else?

“Hello?” she called out expectantly.

No answer.

Trembling with anticipation, she rolled away from the window, pulling the satin sheet tight around her red and yellow polka-dotted nightgown. Where her face touched the pillow, the circle of rouge painted over her bright white makeup smeared, giving her cheeks the look of a full, pink flush.

Suddenly, behind her there was a noise. She sat up and scanned the room, her heart beating her desire in her ears as she strained to hear in the dark. Her body felt knotted, fear and lust twisting inside her like a balloon giraffe gone awry.

“Is someone there?” she called out.

Nothing.

Excited, she lay back, forcing her taut muscles to relax.

And then he was upon her. A whirl of black from out of the shadows.

All she could see were his eyes, piercing through her body like the hollow points of a blow-dart. His mouth fell on hers like a judo chop of passion, luring her to open fully to his kiss. They tussled on the bed, and he began to feel as much of her body as he could, the tingle of his touch like the tiny points of throwing-stars on her skin.

She became languid, abandoning herself to his silent attack.

Her enormous, fuzzy red slippers parted and he set the full weight of his sheathed katana sword along her inner thigh. His kisses melted sweetly on her mouth like a banana cream pie to the face and her heart beat carnival music as they dove under the covers, their hands rolling circles around the center ring of the big top.

Then he pulled out his numchuck and, gripping it tightly in one hand, began to twirl it in front of her. He caressed the smooth, red bulb of her nose with the other.

HHOOONNNNKKKK.

“Hold on,” Cheryl said, sitting up abruptly and turning on the light. “What do you think you’re doing?”

Henry fumbled back. The numchuck went slack in his hand.

“This isn’t working for me,” she said.

“Why? What’s wrong?” her husband asked. “Do you want to be the ninja?”

“No,” Cheryl said, “this is just too weird.”

Even from across the reef I could feel the caress of his gaze. I turned to tell him to stop, that his timing was so far off that he was practically shifting into another dimension, but the sight of him whisked the air right out of my gills. The light of the suns danced through the ruby waters and shone in his eyespots. The mucous glistening on his skin betrayed his anticipation; I knew my own glands were working overtime. I wanted nothing more than to entwine myself in his tentacles and merge my soul with his for all eternity.

"Captain," I said, hiding my lust beneath pure professionalism, "the dry-landers' caravan is approaching."

He bulged with assent and turned to the crew, "At your posts, you spineless bkerrks! Get ready!"

My tentacles quivered at the raw power in his voice. Sensing the vibrations, the captain drifted over to me and brushed his antennae against mine. Soon, Love. Soon we will become one, he thought into me. I nearly gasped aloud at this psychic penetration. My gills fluttered in foolish frenzy; my tentacles writhed and twisted around empty water. I dared not touch him in front of the crew, yet it took all my control to keep from rubbing my gills against his and marring his flesh with beak marks.

In the distance, the caravan was a tiny shadow, blocking precious sunlight and stirring the waters of home. A rush of livestock and herders scampered out of the way of the dangerous wake gifted by the caravan. We stood in wait, grappling hooks and harpoons at the ready, tentacles stilled in the current and skin trembling with the promise of riches.

And beside me was my captain, valiant of heart and stalwart of tentacle! My love of him surpassed the expanse of the sea and the deathly land beyond. Each glance my way, each velvet word or graceful motion of his limbs – each was worth a thousand works of art, a million diamonds.

Together we waited as the world dimmed in the growing shadow. In the dark, I could see nothing but him, and my glands pumped out buckets of mucous in my eagerness to be one with him.

The caravan had arrived; our merging would have to wait.

The moon hangs low over the Capulet castle. The only break in the darkness of the orchard below is the sudden flash of light reflected in Romeo’s katana blade as he stalks through the branches of the trees, leaping the wall.

His heart beats a thousand promises of a single forbidden glimpse of Juliet, yet tenses at the imposing fortress before him. Only a hundred yards separate him from her, but his heart pounds so loudly in his chest he worries it will betray him to the guards surely hidden in the shadows around him.

Instead, the silence is broken by the sudden shatter of glass as a man is flung through one of the castle windows.

“But soft,” Romeo whispers, “what man through yonder window breaks? Tis from the east...”

Backlit against the shards of glass still clinging to the window sill stands Juliet, dressed head to foot in a pure white jumpsuit.

“...And Juliet is the ninja that threw him! It is my lady, it is my love! Oh, that she knew she were! Arise fair ninja and kill the envious!”

Juliet leaps from the tower, somersaulting through the air, and lands gracefully in the courtyard below, a few steps from Romeo. He stares at her, her eyes the only visible part of her body.

“The brightness of her cheek would shame these stars,” Romeo whispered, “as daylight does a lamp. Her eyes in heaven should stream so bright that birds would sing and think it were not night!”

She looks at Romeo, her head tilted to the side in puzzlement, about to speak.

“She speaks yet she says nothing,” Romeo thinks. “What of that? Her eye discourses; I will answer it...”

Suddenly, three ninjas spring from the bushes beside them, their swords hissing through the air with thirsty steel.

“I am too bold,” Romeo thinks, readying his weapon. “Tis not to me she speaks.”

Before Romeo can act, Juliet backflips and lands atop a ninja, breaking his neck, then produces two throwing stars from the folds of her suit, whipping them past Romeo into the chests of the two ninjas behind him.

“Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven,” Romeo sighs.

Juliet removes her mask and kisses Romeo. The two stand fixed in a passionate embrace, their pulses fluttering in unison.

“Ay me,” Juliet whispers in his ear. “Romeo, Romeo... Where for art thou, Romeo?”

Chapter -5-

Peanut came bounding out of his tent as the tiny little car pulled in to pick him up. Inside the little car, his friends, Ah Choo, Bongo, Buttons, Chuckles, Doodles, Dumpling, Freckles, HoBo, Jingles, Kornflake, Krusty, Lollypop, Noodles, Patches, Pockets, Scooter and Tipsy were all there to cheer him on. Today was a big day for Peanut. He was about to ask the girl of his dreams to marry him.

As Tipsy drove the car around the circus ring toward Reese’s tent, Peanut thought of the right words to say to his love. He squeezed out of the tiny car, and made his way up to the door with the “Reese’s” sign on it. Before he could honk his little horn, Reese suddenly appeared in the doorway.

She was so beautiful with her sparkling pink and purple hair and she had her biggest red smile painted on her porcelain white face.

Peanut suddenly felt shy and was unable to speak. Embarrassed, he looked down at his big clown feet, while he tried to figure out how to start. He got an idea, and a light-bulb over his head beamed. He looked into Reese’s eyes and handed her a flower. As she brought it toward her large red nose to smell it, it squirted her. They both giggled.

Peanut pulled Reese close to him and gazed into her small dark eyes.
“Reese, I love you. You are the only girl to make me giggle. Just the thought of you makes my horn honk. You are the reason I paint my smile bigger everyday. Will you make me the happiest clown alive and be my wife?”

Reese smiled and squeezed in closer to Peanut.
“Oh Peanut, you are going to make my white makeup run. I adore you, and would be happy to be your wife.”

Their bright red lips pressed firmly against each other and their big red noses bumped. It was the most passionate kiss either of them had ever experienced. They both had smeared red lips and white smudges on their big red noses. Peanut pulled Reese closer. They kissed again and the little horn in his baggy pants honked repeatedly.

A few months later, they wed. Shortly thereafter, Buttercup was born. The sign above the tent door now reads, “Reese’s Peanut & Buttercup.”

Author’s note: Sorry, I was craving chocolate while writing this story.

The full moonlight shimmered in reflection on Betsy’s bulbous rubber nose. Bram felt his incisors elongate in response to the crimson gleam, a sharp contrast to the thick layers of paint that clung to every curve of her face. He had met very few women in his life that intrigued him as much as Betsy did.

He reached out and ran one icy hand through the springy curls on her head, letting his fingers twine with the green and yellow strands. The colors evoked feelings of his mortal life. They reminded him of sunny days and soft green grass. Just thinking about her sent his last meal coursing through his veins.

Betsy noticed the way Bram was looking at her and smiled. How she envied his pale skin! She spent hours each day spackling on layers to attempt what he did so naturally. She felt the strength in his arms, and shivered at the thought of what his super-human strength could do to her body. Sometimes, when they were together, she felt as though she were flying. Sometimes, they did fly. Another bonus of dating the undead.

She reached for him and pulled him into a spontaneous embrace, and marveled at how his cool skin helped ward off the balmy night air. She reached up and touched one sharp incisor with a look of wonder on her face. How would it feel to have those teeth against her neck? As if he could read her thoughts, he smiled, and pulled her closer. She smiled hazily to herself just before his lips made contact with her neck and thought, life is good.

The robot lay draped over the bed, its polished bosom heaving in the dim candlelight. It’s body was like several sheets of metal riveted together by the hands of God, and the ninja could do nothing but stare. He’d been hired to kill the robot, but now, as he hid in the shadows and examined its perfection, he wondered how he could kill a creature so beautiful, so well oiled, so perfectly greased and ready to perform. In the darkness, the ninja hid, and his eyes gleamed with desire.

"Beautiful," he murmured, and the robot stirred. It sat up and offered its cylindrical hands to the shadows, fingers spread open--as open as the ninja’s heart.

The ninja moved out of the darkness, and his grace was forgotten, all his years of patience and practice thrown to the wind in a momentary fit of passion. He gave up stealth and dashed across the room. He took hold of the robot and he kissed it--a kiss as sharp as a ninja star, as devastating as a roundhouse kick to the gut.

With a series of beeps, the robot pulled away from the ninja. The look upon its face was unreadable, blank, and its eyes were blue…as blue as the deadliest ocean. And from its mouth came words for which the ninja could never have prepared himself.

Its voice was a purr as the robot said, "A fatal exception has occurred at 0028:C0011E36 in VXD UMM (01) + 0010E36. The current application will be terminated."

“No,” the ninja whispered, hands going to his mouth as he fell to his knees. “No.” The blue death had taken yet another one he loved. What had he done to deserve this? Tears streamed down his face, and as the full realization hit him, as love and beauty lay near-dead upon the bed in front of him, he turned his face to the heavens and screamed, “Why God? WHY? She was so beautiful!”

And then he cried into the night...before hitting the robot’s reset button.

“Thhank Yoouuuuu” – The Gbot’s LED eyes flashed in admiration as Chen Solo lifted her onto his trusty space galloper. She had just witnessed him finish of the last of the feared ninbots that had threatened to take over the whole of Rotobia for the sole purpose of supplying them with spare limbs and can openers.

Chen Solo kicked the go-button on his trusty space steed and they started in the direction of Los Bagos, the Capital of Rotobia.

“So, what’s your Serial missy”, Chen asked in his western accent. “Ohhhh,” Before she could utter another word, the Gbot’s heat monitor gave of a warning beep. She quickly pushed her emergency “cool down” button and continued in a raspy voice “ It’s Q769T00, but you can call me QT for short.” Chen felt the hydraulic arms tighten around his muscled torso as he kicked the space horse into hyper speed. He had dated a lot of non-humans before but second to the “Big Jelly” from Corlandis, this had to be one of the strangest girls he had planned on getting to know better. He had already planned on were to take this ladybot for a very special dinner.

Later that evening as the oddly but intriguing couple took the transporter to Chen’s hotel, QT turned to him. “Thank you for a lovely night out, I still can’t believe that you knew that Gbot’s enjoyed ice skating. I only hope that I can get to an oiler tomorrow morning, as my joints will start rusting if I do not get them lubricated as soon as possible. Chen turned his face so that QT couldn’t see him smile. Things had definitely turned out the way he had planned. “I happen to have a bottle of emergency oil in my saddlebag.” “Thank you, but I can’t possibly reach everywhere I need to.” Chen made a notch in his mental walking stick. “I also happen to be a qualified robotic engineer” QT quickly pushed the “cool down” button for the umpteenth time that day...

The following morning QT switched on as the first ray of sunshine fell on her solar panel. The room was empty and she walked over to the window. On the horizon, a dust cloud was painting a line across the desert. She knew that she would probably not see Chen Solo again…She had never felt better greased than that particular morning.