Chapter One

Kim stopped for a moment, put one hand against the wall, and pulled her right heel off with the other hand. She shook the overturned shoe once or twice, but nothing appeared to fall out. Oh well, she thought, maybe it's just the seam in my pantyhose, and she pulled the nylon more taut on her foot. Then she slipped the heel backed on, and continued walking toward the Upholstery station.

The attractive young model experienced a swirl of emotions as she made her trek. She was happy that today's gig was halfway over. She and the other twelve girls who had been hired as 'race queens' for the Bubb Classic Auto Show had spent nearly two hours in the main showroom of the exposition hall.

Each girl's job was to look pretty wearing one of a variety of skimpy outfits - some with tight bodysuits and a short flare skirt like her own outfit, some with bikini tops and high cut shorts, others with tight midriff-revealing t-shirts and shorts with suspenders. The footwear also varied, from white pumps like Kim's, to vinyl boots matching the outfit's color, to open toed heels. But, of course, all of the girls wore silky, shiny pantyhose in varying shades of tan.

Kim's nylons were a lighter shade of tan, almost a nude color. So, now that the large scale display segment of the Show was finished, Kim was that much closer to heading home, shedding her male fantasy attire, and slipping into female fantasy attire: namely, a loose fitting sweatshirt and comfortable jeans.

But Kim was also experiencing an eerie, uncomfortable feeling. There was something about this particular show that was different somehow. Unsettling.

She had been a 'race queen' a few times already, at other auto shows and at actual auto races. So, she was used to being ogled by young men in a testosterone tinged display of excess speed, shiny cars, and even shinier women. But this Show was something else. There were still bright lights, classic expensive cars, and all the commercial banners and product placements. But the men attending this Show were not the usual young businessmen acting out adolescent fantasies. These men were older, wealthier, more mature, and more focused. They already owned the expensive cars and the flashy products. Their sights seemed to be set on the only accessories present they didn't yet possess. Namely, the race queens themselves.

The model shook that thought off. That was crazy. This was a legitimate show, sponsored by a major auto company. Bubb Detailing, Inc. owned the largest and most successful chain of auto detailing shops in the country. The owner and founder himself, Mr. Basil Bubb, had personally greeted the models when they assembled and were given their costumes. He was a tall, dark man, with an Asian demureness, a Middle Eastern countenance, a Continental sense of style and demeanor, and a sonorous British speaking voice. He thanked each of the girls for agreeing to participate, and then complimented them by saying he had only invited the best of the auto show models in the land. He reminded the ladies that they would each be rewarded generously at the end of the day, and assured them that this modeling experience would be unlike any they had ever had before. Finally, before taking his leave, he welcomed each of the girls to the Bubb team, a position symbolized by the message printed somewhere on each outfit: PROPERTY OF BASIL BUBB.

As Kim made her way through the corridors behind the main exposition hall, she was a bit apprehensive about the second half of the girls' assignment.

After mingling among the shiny and expensive autos in the large hall, the girls were assigned to stations highlighting the special products and services offered by Bubb's Detailing shops. This would require more one-on-one interaction with the customers, and Kim was afraid that some of the men would expect more one-on-one handling than she was willing to give. Kim had been assigned to the Waxing Room, where Bubb's special waxing processes would be on display. But she found that two other models, Mai Lee and Rinna, were already there. Kim had learned that her good friend, Sikumi, would be alone in the Upholstery Room, and she feared that situation might provide a dangerous invitation to some unscrupulous customers. So she was on her way to join Sikumi in extolling the pleasures of adding luxurious (and no doubt expensive) Bubb upholstery to one's car.

Kim was ready for this day to be over. But she was still a couple hours of sexy posing and fake smiling away from that. Or, so she thought . . . .

The conference room housing the Upholstery display was on a corridor on the other side of the exhibition pavilion from the Car Waxing display. On her long jaunt, Kim had already passed a couple of the Bubb Detailing displays, and waved hello to her fellow models awaiting the beginning of this phase of the Show. Only a couple of the faces were familiar, but as Mr. Bubb had said, the models chosen for this Show were hand picked from all over the country. Kim couldn't help but feel honored by her own selection. Perhaps she did have a future in full time modeling.

There was only one more display to pass before she entered the hallway containing the Upholstery Room. It was one of the larger conference rooms, and the sign out front indicated that this display highlighted the patented Bubb Scenic Painting procedure. There was a glossy photo of a van whose side had been emblazoned with the image of a scantily clad jungle girl standing beside a large tiger. Standing outside the door of the Paint room were three race queens, apparently waiting for someone to unlock the door and let them in. Two of the girls wore yellow bikinis and yellow heels, with tan nyloned legs shimmering like gold in the hallway light. The girls, one with long black hair, the other long blonde, were unfamiliar to Kim. But she did know the third model from previous auto shows.

"Michelle," Kim paused and greeted her friend, "do you get a commission on all the tigers you sell?" Both girls laughed.

"I believe Mr. Bubb is more interested in our resemblance to the jungle girl," Michelle retorted. Her black leather top and shorts, along with matching boots, did suggest an action figure like the painted girl on the van. "Did you know that Sikumi is in the next display room?"

"Yes, I'm headed there now. Just want to keep her company. I was an extra wheel at the Car Wax display."

Michelle gave a quick nod of her short black hair toward her bikini co-hosts, who were talking and giggling to each other. "I know what you mean. If things are slow here, maybe I'll walk up and join you both later."

"Sounds good," Kim said, then waved and continued on. After a few more steps, she rounded a corner, then spotted Sikumi standing impatiently outside a closed door. Both Kim and Sikumi had shoulder length black hair, but Kim was a few inches taller than her friend, all of which seemed to be in her long attractive legs. Sikumi had a curvier figure, including an ample bust. Her face was also rounder than Kim's, a feature highlighted by the front-turned flip of her hair style.

Sikumi's outfit was also in contrast to Kim's. While Kim's body hugging, high-cut leotard and short skirt emphasized her long attractive legs, Sikumi's outfit complimented her body strengths. The shorter model's outfit was bright red vinyl, with a bra-like top that pushed her large breasts upward and outward, creating large cleavage. Her tight red vinyl shorts barely encased her voluptuous hips and derriere. And red vinyl boots that almost reached her nylon encased knees cast onlooker's eyes upward toward the very feminine top half. Red vinyl gloves completed the ensemble.

The bright red of Sikumi's attire also matched the fiery temper the model was prone to exhibit in certain situations. Like, when she was kept waiting. Like now.

While Kim shouted a greeting, Sikumi barely waved and shouted something else. "These idiots don't know what the hell they're doing!" She shouted, and Kim both laughed and tried to quiet her friend. "First, they take us off the show floor and tuck us away in these smaller rooms, turning us from models into salespeople. Which is not going to work, right?" Kim opened her mouth to answer, but her friend continued ranting. "Then, I have to stand here waiting for some flunkie to come unlock the door, I guess because they don't trust me to be alone for ten seconds with their precious merchandise."

"Well, actually Sikumi, I think all of the models are having to wait. The door to the Waxing Room was locked, and so was the Painting Room - Michelle is there, by the way. And walking over here, all of the models were standing outside of their assigned rooms. So, it's not they they don't trust You personally. . ."

"No, they don't trust any of us! Oh, well, this should be over with pretty soon. And boy will I be glad. This whole thing sorta gives me the creeps."

"Yeah, me too," Kim agreed, feeling a little better that someone else sensed the oddness of this whole affair.

"Especially that Bubb guy. He was like some kind of Dracula, or evil villain or something. If he'd had a moustache, he would have probably twirled it the whole time he was leering at us."

"Don't exaggerate, Sikumi, he wasn't that bad," Kim countered, partially in defense of their employer, and partially because you never knew who was listening to what you were saying. "Let's just watch for one of the crew to come unlock the door."

Almost as soon as she finished that statement, she heard a click come from the area of the doorknob. Sikumi reached out, turned the door knob, and the door to the Upholstery Room swung open.

"Well, enter my lovelies. Enter!" She said, in an exaggerated vampire-like voice. Kim gave her a playful slap, and the two models entered the room.

Both girls' senses were assaulted by a strong and familiar smell. Kim had expected a leathery scent, but this was different. Somewhat like plastic, but not exactly. Sikumi sniffed, and looked at her friend. "You smell it, too, huh?" Kim nodded. The shorter model walked around the room, inspecting the various car seats in different colors displayed around the room. She removed one of her gloves, then reached out and felt a blue seat, and then a brown one. "Wait a minute, I don't think this is leather." She leaned forward and smelled the brown material covering the car seat. Then she smelled the loose glove in her hand. And she laughed out loud.

"Can you believe this? The great Basil Bubb Detailing Inc., and all the expensive cars, and the rich and powerful congregating in the showroom to purchase his exclusive wares. And what is Mr. Bubb selling?" The model assumed an exaggerated pointing pose, running her hand up and down the car seat. "Shiny, squeaky, luxurious . . . cheap vinyl seats!"

She continued to laugh as Kim walked over and felt the seat covering. "You're right, Sikumi. This is vinyl. But there must be some explanation."

Sikumi was still exploring, and found a video cassette labeled "Demo Tape." "There's a note here instructing the model to please insert the video." She walked to a monitor on a nearby tall stand, and inserted the tape. "Let's see what Mr. Bubb has to say."

Red letters on a black screen proclaiming "BASIL BUBB PRODUCTIONS PRESENTS" appeared first, along with a time counter in the bottom right hand corner of the screen. Then some up-tempo music accompanied the footage of a man driving a luxury sedan along a country road. A narrator then spoke: "Sometimes, even the man who has everything wants a little something more."

"Yeah, right, like cheap vinyl covering his expensive leather seats," wisecracked Sikumi. The footage and the narration continued, while the time counter continued to advance.

"And for the lonely man on a long journey, companionship is hard to come by. That's why Basil Bubb Detailing has developed THE ROAD COMPANION seat covers, to help relieve the tension of everyday driving."

"Interesting marketing concept," Kim offered.

"I was thinking more along the lines of 'what a crock of crap' concept," Sikumi countered, bringing a chuckle from her friend.

 The car in the commercial pulled over to the side of a deserted road. While jaunty music continued to play, the man pulled off the cap of his cigarette lighter, and then pulled out some long plastic tubing from the storage compartment between the front seats. "THE ROAD COMPANION is easy to use.

Just plug in the special hose to any lighter or AC adaptor." The man in the commerical did just that, and then held up the other end of the tubing, which branched into two units. The man plugged these into two button-like fixtures on the passenger seat. "Then plug the special inflators into the nipples of the ROAD COMPANION seat cover."

Kim and Sikumi looked at each other, with incredulous grins on both of their faces. "Inflators?" asked Kim. "Nipples?" asked Sikumi. "It couldn't be," Kim shook her head, and continued watching the video.

But it was. "In minutes, THE ROAD COMPANION comes to life." Both models literally gasped at what transpired next on screen. First, two rather large and distinct female breasts began to appear in the seat cover. As the breasts formed, the outline of a female form began to appear in the vinyl. That outline soon began to fill as well. Kim and Sikumi were both riveted to the action on screen. So much so, that neither model noticed that the counter in the bottom right corner had reached the 05:00 mark, and started to flash. Neither did the girls hear the lock click on the door of the Upholstery Room, nor the small beep of a trigger mechanism attached to a large tank just beneath the floor of the room. A gap appeared in the floor, and clear liquid vinyl began to ooze out, moving slowly but steadily in the direction of Sikumi's red vinyl boots.

The models continued to stare at the monitor, where the on-screen action was about to leave the land of Bizarre, and enter the city limits of Kinky. The lifesize blow up doll - aka ROAD COMPANION - was fully inflated by now. Kim had seen sex dolls in catalogs, and in adult novelty shops, but those dolls resembled inflatable beach toys with naughty bits added on. The doll in the commercial looked real, at least as real as a female figure made of vinyl or rubber could look. All of the doll's features were so lifelike. If not for the fact that the doll was all one color from head to toe, and made a squeaking sound when the driver ran his hand along her voluptuous figure, you would almost believe that somehow a live female was being inflated and brought to life.

The caresses that had made the squeaking sound alerted both girls of what was to come, so to speak, in the remainder of the video. Sikumi quickly stepped to the monitor and turned it off. "Damn!" she said, turning back to face Kim. "No wonder Bubb Detailing is so successful."

"True. You can't buy those kind of seat covers at the corner drug store," Kim agreed.

"And I certainly don't plan on selling them here, either. Come on, let's get out of here - what the hell?" She said, staring past Kim and toward the floor.

"Something's leaking."

Kim turned and saw the widening stream of clear, thick liquid heading their way. "I don't think it's a leak, Sikumi." She pointed to the slit in the floor from where the liquid originated. "It looks more like it's being pumped into the room."

Kim backed up to stand beside her friend, and both ladies surveyed the scene. "This is too creepy, Kim," Sikumi stated the obvious. "I think we should make a run for it."

"But it's between us and the door. And it looks kind of sticky. If we step in it, I'm sure we'll be stuck," warned Kim.

But Sikumi was undaunted. She stepped gingerly toward the approaching fluid. "I think I can jump over it about right there, and get to the door. If I get stuck, I'll just pull my leg out of the boot, and you can give me a hand."

"I guess so. But I still wish we knew what it was. What does it smell like?" The long legged brunette asked her friend as Sikumi stepped closer, preparing to jump.

"Actually, it doesn't smell any different from anything else in the room. I'm going to give it a try." Sikumi prepared to jump.

But Kim thought about what her friend said. "If it smells the same, then it must be - vinyl! Sikumi, I don't think you should jump. Let's try to find another way out."

"No, I can make it!" Sikumi said, then stepped back a few steps for a quick running start. Her jump would have been strong enough and long enough - if the liquid hadn't risen and grabbed hold of her vinyl boot in midair. "What the hell! Did you see that?" Sikumi was stuck now. Stuck fast in the clear ooze.

And instead of flowing past her, the liquid seemed to be flowing up the model's boot.

     "It's vinyl, Sikumi! Some kind of strange vinyl. And its attracted by other vinyl." Kim saw the migrating liquid, and realized that other than her pantyhose, everything Sikumi was wearing was made of vinyl. "You've got to get out of that stuff, Sikumi!" She stepped toward her. "Loosen your boot and I'll pull you out!" As Kim stepped closer, she only hoped that there was no vinyl in her high heels. As she gave them a quick glance, she noticed Sikumi reaching down to unzip her stuck boot - with her vinyl gloved hand! "No!" Kim screamed, but it was too late. The clear vinyl quickly shot up Sikumi's red vinyl glove, and when the model tried to pull away, she pulled the vinyl near her vinyl bra. In seconds, both breasts were covered with the thick clear solution.

"Help me, Kim!" the trapped model cried out. Kim started to warn her to stay still, but Sikumi was thrashing madly about, trying to loosing the grip the vinyl had on her. Her movements were so unsteady, that she began to lose her balance. Before Kim could reach out to steady her friend, Sikumi fell into the pool of vinyl that had formed around her boots. Now the vinyl spread from her boots up her nyloned legs and onto her red vinyl shorts. And with the model firmly in its grasp, the stream of liquid vinyl began carrying the trapped beauty further into the room, toward one of the car seat displays. A car seat display that did not already have a vinyl cover.

As the stream moved forward, Kim felt the ooze flow under her heels, and begin to cover her foot. It wasn't vinyl, but somehow it sensed that there was something alive inside the leather, and began to pool, ready to attach itself to Kim's stockinged foot. The model quickly realized her peril, and pulled herself up on the stand holding the monitor, leaving her vinyl covered shoe behind. Unfortunately, her own narrow escape made it impossible to make even a last ditch effort at rescuing Sikumi. Once she was clear of the liquid, Kim looked around to spot her friend. She cried aloud when she saw that a large patch of the clear vinyl had turned the same shade of red as Sikumi's outfit. Kim strained through her tears to see if she could distinguish any part of Sikumi's body from the vinyl that had engulfed her. She could not.

The red vinyl poured itself into a metal frame that surrounding a cloth car seat, and it quickly assumed the car seat's shape. Once it filled the frame, large fans activated surrounding the seat, cooling the lava-like vinyl, and making it stiffen quickly. The process was a quick one, for in a matter of minutes the fans stopped, and the frame fell away. The car seat now looked like the other vinyl models in the Upholstery station. Only this one was a bright cherry red. And more importantly, and more horribly, this car seat had once been Kim's dear friend.

The Upholstery station grew quiet for a few moments, except for Kim's soft crying, and the slosh of the liquid vinyl heading back to its underground tank.

    But there was another sound, a distinct whirring noise. Kim looked up, and saw a video camera hanging from the ceiling, pointed at the new red seat cover display. She wondered how long the camera had been taping, and she wondered why it continued when the horrible deed had been done. But then she realized there was still one more scene to film.

Kim's gaze returned to the red display, and as she expected, she saw plastic tubing shoot out of a wall socket, and attach themselves to the 'nipples' of the seat cover. Soon, large voluptous breasts began to form, and a familiar outline appeared in the red vinyl. Kim watched in horror as Bubb's newest ROAD COMPANION came to life, a sexy and well-built love doll who looked remarkably like her friend Sikumi. Because, of course, that's who it was.

Once Sikumi's new, vinyl form was fully inflated, the camera stopped, and a different video monitor on a nearby table came to life. There was Sikumi being trapped in the vinyl river, pulled under, her body and outfit merging with the goo and turning it to red vinyl. It was all there - flowing into the frame, cooling and stiffening, and then the final ignominy of inflation into a lifesize sex toy. Kim let out a hateful giggle. If the first commercial didn't convince Bubb's special customers, this second commercial certainly would.

"You bastards!" Kim screamed. "You murderers!" The model was only trying to cope with the unnatural horror she had just witnessed, but as she lowered her head in grief, she realized that the retreating vinyl had heard, or felt, the vibrations of her scream, and were flowing toward the monitor pedestal on which she sat. Kim knew she wasn't wearing vinyl, but considering what had happened to Sikumi, who knew what that substance would do to her leotard covered body once it had her in its grasp.

She pulled off her remaining shoe, and tossed it a few feet away from the pedestal. The vinyl headed toward it, assuming that its victim was trying to escape. Kim looked around for an escape route, but saw none. And then she looked up.

She had caught a break. The monitor pedestal was directly beneath a rather large air vent. Kim stood up on the pedestal, and was able to reach the vent, but the opening lever was stuck. Her movement had alerted the vinyl once again, and it was now flowing up the pedestal, only a few feet away from Kim's stockinged feet, standing on tiptoe and straining upward.

The model looked down once to see that she only had a few seconds before the goo would begin attaching itself to her nylon soles. And once that happened, she would undoubtedly lose her balance and fall into the vinyl just as Sikumi had. Kim gritted her teeth. She would not become a seat cover/sex doll for one of Bubb's rich clients. The clear goo was only inches from Kim's feet when the lever finally moved. Kim quickly pulled the vent down, and began to pull herself up, lifting her feet away from the goo just in time. She quickly pulled the vent back into place, then looked down the corridor of the air shaft. That was the direction from which she had come. Back toward the Waxing Room. Past the Painting Room.

Michelle! She was in the Painting Room! It was highly likely that Basil Bubb had something insidious in mind for all his specially selected 'race queens,' just as he had for Sikumi. Maybe she could reach Michelle in time, and they could figure out a way to go for help.

Before she crawled off, she looked back through the vent at the red vinyl doll that was Sikumi. She saw as the thing that had been her friend began to deflate, and reshape itself into a red vinyl ROAD COMPANION. Goodbye, my friend, Kim thought. I will avenge you. And the model headed down the airshaft toward the Painting Room.
 
 
 

To Be Continued...