One o'clock in the morning: Darry sat at her large desk in the "office" part of her clinic, doing paperwork. She read through the long and convoluted application form for an External Affair that Tasha had prepared.

 She turned up the Billie Holiday cd in order to drown out the sounds wafting down the hallway. Between Caeryn's powers of extortion and Darry's knowledge of the more tortuous chiropractic techniques, they had convinced the General to give Emmy a break. Now all Darry had to do was find a place to store all of the Mary Kay products she had bought in the brief time Emmy had been a patient. What was she gonna do with all that stuff? Everyone knew she never wore anything but Lancôme.

Darry stretched in her Anne Klein loungewear, flipping through the pages and double-checking the signatures. The application form had been signed in triplicate (as required) and was witnessed and notarized. The witness signature just had "Grrrr" written next to the date, but it was on the appropriate line, so Darry authorized the form and set it in her "out" tray. Down the hall, it sounded like Ban's desk was getting a workout.

The General didn't make it easy to stray, hence the whole application process. Darry hadn't bothered with it. After all, she was the Director for Distance Learning and External Affairs. Besides, if she stopped having an external affair the university would lose its funding. "Gee," she thought. "I boff the Senator and the school gets money. What does that make me?" She thought a moment longer. "Indispensable," one part of her brain answered.

Another part of her brain said something else not near as flattering, but she chose to ignore it. Besides, she rationalized, she'd be seeing him even if he weren't keeping her in $2000 suits. That fuckable voice alone was enough to continue her dalliance. She almost caught Shana swooning at it the other day.

Good thing the General had too many other things to worry about. Right now, for instance Darry mused, he should be worrying about dehydration.

Darry picked up the next file in her "in" box and carried it into the back of the clinic. There stood the menacing bounty hunter. He had been occupying himself by opening jars and drawers and cabinets, inspecting their contents.

He didn't look near as menacing as he usually did, but that might have been because he was busy squeezing out the entire contents of a tube of KY jelly all over his hands and the front of his armor.

Darry absently handed him a roll of paper towels and plonked the dossier down on the metal desk by the drug cabinet. "Her name is Aya. She fancies herself a bit of a Sith Chick, but she doesn't know who she's messing with. No one calls him 'Bob' or 'Palpy' and lives. So, it's either you, or I hire one of my colleagues at the SPEB, and believe me, you'd be much more humane."

"As you wish," the suit of armor said cryptically.

Just then, there was a rhythmic knock at door. Darry first thought was that the General and Emmy might have "worked" their way down the administrative hallway, but the swell of dramatic music alerted her to another presence.

Deftly shoving the bounty hunter behind a screen and hoping he could somehow read the file through that helmet, Darry straightened her cardigan and walked to the door. She opened it just in time to have Dande faint dramatically across the threshold.

"Oh, bloody hell." Darry fumed. She glanced around. Not directly seeing the General and Emmy, and not hearing any heavy breathing or moaning because of the dramatic violin crescendo, Darry risked having the bounty hunter help drag Dande into the clinic and lay her across one of the exam tables. Then she pushed him back into a little room and closed the door.

Dande was just coming around, not a hair out of place. "Forgive me, Nurse Darry, I think I came over with a spell of the vapors." She lifted an arm to her forehead and did a rather believable impression of Kate Winslett. "I do hope the child has not been affected."

Darry made a big show of placing her hand on Dande's flat belly and nodding encouragingly while saying, "Uh-huh, I think he's fine."

"He? He? You mean I will bear the Master a son?" Dande's large eyes began filling with tears of joy.

"Uh, yeah, sure, whatever," Darry mumbled, but Dande wasn't listening. She was in a Happy Place.

 Just then a strange buzzing like noise came from the little room in which Darry had thrown the bounty hunter.

"Well, I'll just give you this tonic," Darry said to Dande, handing her a trial-size bottle of Scope, "and you should be fine." She ushered Dande to the clinic door and escorted the Wench down the hall past the discarded black leather pants, green velvet skirt, and empty Nutella jar.

Once Dande was safely ensconced back in her room, Darry high-tailed it back to the clinic, where the bounty hunter was just leaving the little room.

"So," Darry said, "You think you can handle it?"

The armor nodded, á la "RotJ- The Special Edition", and left the clinic. Darry walked into the room and pulled the x-ray film out of the camera. Hmmmm…

Thinking that this might be a good job for a lackey, she picked up her cell phone and dialed Cal's room.

"Mulder."

"Why the hell do I keep getting you every time I dial this stupid phone?" Darry shouted, true to her phone practices.

"I have no idea. Who is this?" Darry picked up her prescription pad and scribbled on it.

"My name is….Elsmilla Henfield," Darry said, walking around the clinic and turning off lights. She stopped and collected several bottles from the small clinic fridge before shutting the office door and locking it behind her.

"Are you wanting to report a strange or paranormal event?" the Mulder voice asked.

"Absolutely," said Darry, hanging up the phone, as she opened the door to the General's office.

Since the violins had stopped, she could hear that the two-person party had moved outside and into the bed of azaleas Shana had planted after the demise of her roses. Darry walked to the desk and deposited the bottles of Gatorade, Irn Bru, and aspirin with a prescription saying "Take all of these."

* * * *

Carrying the film over to the dorms, she found Cal's room. It wasn't hard. The door was covered top to bottom with pictures of the General, from his earliest baby photos, to the recent studio shot Julia had taken for the new university prospectus.

Darry pounded on the door. The door next to Cal's opened and a figure in an orange chiffon flouncy nightgown glared at Darry with beady eyes.

"Grrr."

Tasha's face emerged from around the orange-clad figure.

"Tasha! What are you doing here?" Darry didn't know what made her more disgusted: Tasha pre-empting her external affair or the poor fashion sense in mixing red with orange. "I haven't even processed your paperwork."

"Practicing." Tasha grabbed the back of Mr. Vocab's garment and hauled him back into the room.

By this time, Cal had come to the door and was looking up at Darry with sleepy eyes. He was wearing footed pyjamas with little blue lightsabers on them. His braid was barely hanging on by a thread, and his ponytail had come undone.

Darry thrust the film into Cal's hands. "I need this developed. Take it to Julia's first thing in the morning and bring it back the minute it's done."

"What are they?" Cal asked, trying not to yawn. It didn't pay to upset one of the General's Hos.

"The General's x-rays."

Cal's face brightened. "Wow, can I look at them?"

"When you've brought them back to my office in the morning." Darry turned on her heeled heel and left the dorm.

* * * *
As she walked back across the dark campus by the deserted rugby field, a low growling could be heard. She ignored it. It was either the Ginzu Sisters or the mastiff, and she wasn't on either of their hit lists….yet. Or, it could just be Space Dog trying to hump Wicket's leg again.

Darry approached the staff mansion, hoping not to be seen. The General had managed to pass on Diebin's cold to everyone except herself (high doses prophylactic Echinacea) and Emmy (non-exposure), and Darry didn't feel like answering the midnight calls for Nyquil, hot tea and mustard plasters.

* * * *
The next morning Cal ran down the hall toward the clinic, photos in hand, braid streaming behind him. He gave only a cursory glance into Ban's office where Brenda was busy re-shellacking the desk.

Shana stormed out of her office and grabbed Cal by his tunic, his boots coming to a swift stop on the polished marbled floor. "What the HELL happened to my flowers?" She screamed at him.

"Eeep," Cal replied.

Diebin, who had been having espresso with Darry and a sequestered guest, walked out of the clinic and told Shana that the mastiff had been foraging for a bone left over there from the Paleozoic era.

"Ah, " said Shana, blinded by science. She retreated to her office and dialed Mr. Vocab's dorm room with the intention of ordering tulips.

"Tasha, what the hell are you doing over there?" Shana could yell almost as loud as Darry when she wanted.

"Right!" The General emerged from his office, dark circles under his eyes and a bottle of aspirin in his hand. "What the hell is going on out here?" he growled.

Diebin, going slightly weak at the knees, sidled up and calmly explained that Shana's flowers had been demolished (again) and when she called for the groundskeeping staff, she dialed Tasha by mistake. Cal, meanwhile, just stood in a kind of open-mouthed gormless awe during the exchange.

Caeryn strode down the hall, already unbuttoning the jacket she was wearing. The General looked up. "Caeryn, have a seat. I'm still a little hungover." He gestured toward a chair in his office. "I'm just popping into the clinic for some more aspirin." Caeryn walked in and started making herself comfortable.

"You're going to the clinic for more aspirin?!" Diebin yelled at the top of her lungs. All eyes turned to stare at her while a door could be heard slamming.

"I think I just said that," the General said, eyes narrowing. Caeryn's jacket came flying out of the office door.

Hurriedly, Darry emerged from the clinic carrying a handful of drugs. "Brenda, be a dear and take this up to Emmy, please." The Ho-in-Training scurried out of Ban's office, and went to run the bottle of Nyquil up to the sick (and sore) Smut Queen.

"These are for you," Darry said, handing the General and a bottle of Lucozade and vitamin E. "I'll see you at-" she glanced at Diebin.

"Three," the secretary confirmed. Caeryn's jacket was followed by her shirt.

"Three," Darry said to the General.

Darry grabbed Cal by the braid and yanked him into the clinic just as a lacy bra came flying out into the hall.

* * * *
Jael and Darry examined the x-rays. "I asked you in here because I need an artist's impression. I have no idea what I'm looking at."

"I thought you knew how to read x-rays," Jael said turning one upside down and then right side up again on the lighted wall panel.

"I CAN read x-rays when they're of people," Darry said, "but you can clearly see that it has to go this way, or else the little label that says "Made in Hong Kong" is backwards."

'But what is all of this stuff that looks like Styrofoam peanuts?" The Geek Art Goddess asked.

"Well normally, I'd say that's where someone's intestines are, but you're right, that looks more like packing material."

"Here's another one with writing," Jael said, holding it up to the light. It was roughly blaster shaped. "Property of ILM. Not a real gun-requires sound effects enhancement." Jael read.

"Shit," Darry spat.

* * * *
At three o'clock, one of the windows of the clinic opened.

"I saw the General from the inside!" Cal enthused for the hundredth time.

"Grrr…" said Mr. Vocab.

"It was great. He is soo cool. Even his internal organs are awesome." Cal was on a roll.

"Aaahhhgg!" Thunk. A figure half-climbed, half-fell out of the clinic window and into the newly repaired flowerbed.

"Grrr…."

"Ahh, there you are my apprentice."

"Grrr?" The maintenance man looked behind him and saw his Master crawling on hands and knees through the tulips below Shana's window.

"I was just leaving, you know." He looked up at Cal. "You wouldn't be able to tell me which one of those cars is Darry's?"

"It's the midnight blue BMW right over there," Cal motioned. "Uh, who are you?"

"Grrr…"

"You came from the clinic, right?" Cal pointed in the direction of the clinic exterior.

"Yes, umm…"

"Oh, you must be one of those pharmaceutical reps Darry is always getting calls from."

"Yes, that's right. That's exactly what I am."

* * * *

Aya walked into the parking lot, just as the Senator was adjusting the rearview mirror in Darry's car. She opened the passenger door and slid into the leather seat.

"We goin' for a ride? Bob?"

"Absolutely."

Across the lot, the menacing bounty hunter looked at Aya framed in the crosshairs of the scope. He squeezed off a round from his blaster.

It was a pity that just at that moment, somewhere in Australia, the sound effects guy had just nipped out for a smoke.

"Click, click," went the impotent weapon.

* * * *

Darry hopped out of the General's office, pulling on her right Gucci pump. Caeryn looked through her office door into the hall.

"Wanna go to Happy Hour at Wangers?"

Darry thought for a moment. "Sure, I'm happy enough." She heard a chuckle from behind the General's office door. She rapped on it. "You're supposed to be sleeping."

"Yes Nurse," came the muffled response.

"Let me just get my purse."

Ban came out of her office. "I can't breathe with those varnish fumes in there. I'm coming with you."

Darry walked out of the clinic and fished in her Louis Vuitton handbag for her keys. "Hold up Hos, I can't find my keys."

"Who's driving?" Caeryn asked as Darry gave up and locked the door from the inside and pulled it shut.

"I will if I can find my damn keys."

The three women walked past the General's garage and into the car park. Darry still had her head buried in her purse. Finally she looked up. Something was…wrong.

"WHERE THE FRACK IS MY CAR?"
* * * *
End