There had been discussions about which to use, with arguments being made for all three – the Mattel executives believing that Skipper offered a degree of aspiration for any young girls who might buy the collectable doll, and some of Sidney’s team arguing that Chelsea appeared closer to the ages of the girls who looked up to Sidney but it was Sidney herself who had put her foot down about using Stacie as she was the closest fit in terms to looks and body-type to herself and, after all, this figure was supposed to be a tribute to her! The Mattel executives had been a little concerned about whether they would be able to charge their typical premium price for a collector doll that was basically naked and only half the size of a typical Barbie doll but they had decided that a good solid display box and, of course, the allure to the collector of a completely new body-sculpt for the familiar character, would be enough to justify the price.

That was the other factor that would make this doll a highly sought-after collector’s piece long after Sidney was, hopefully, dead and digested! The Sidney Roebuck tribute Stacie marked the first time in the history of the Barbie range that an official edition would have nipples and a vulva, instead of the often-mocked smooth crotch or moulded underwear typical of the brand. This was something that Sidney had been adamant about for all the toys produced in her likeness. What was the point of trying to remove the taboos around nudity and the uses a body like hers could potentially be put to if toys designed with her supporters in mind send out prudish and confusing messages. How many little girls, she wondered, had thought they had something wrong with them for having a slit between their legs when none of her dolls did? She had also insisted there be no censorship of the dolls in their packaging so no parents could complain they hadn’t known what they were buying!

The back of the packaging showed the special doll from several angles and even featured close-ups of her groin and chest, something that Sidney’s legal team had been warned to avoid when it came to real photographs, showing the brand new “More lifelike” sculpting. Sidney wondered if this special edition would remain a novelty among her plastic fellows or whether Mattel and other toy manufacturers might now start trusting the children they catered to to handle the knowledge that people had genitals! Towards the bottom was a small rectangle cut away which puzzled her for a moment until she looked on the display box to see where it lined up and realised that it had been cut away to reveal the limited edition numbering, not on a sticker which could be faked but actually engraved into the plastic then picked out in gold paint. Since this was a prototype and not part of the actual run, it was listed as “0/12000”. As part of the deal, she had also been promised that numbers 1 and 12000 would be given to her or donated to her family in her name should she get her wish before they were released.

“This actually came out cooler than I expected.” Sidney nodded appreciatively as she turned the box around in her hands, looking at the mounted figure inside from all angles. If the collector wanted to, the box could be opened by removing two screws in the base and the plastic pieces holding the doll in place removed. She supposed that quite a few people would open it up to remove the inner packaging, which was a little unsightly, then pose the doll and close the case back up. For this special edition, Stacie’s normally straight hair was slightly curled and fluffed out much like Sidney’s was when “on duty”. Her boots and hat, as detailed as any Sidney wore herself, were white faux leather.

“Okay, so is that all?” Martha asked, trying to remember the details of the negotiations. She had been a part of them, of course, as she was with everything that went on in the campaign office but with so many irons in so many fires and fingers in so many pies (filled with Sidney-meat, she liked to assume whenever she used the expression), she had a hard time keeping track of all the fine details. But that was okay – she was on top of the things she needed to be on top of and knew enough about everything else that was going on to ensure the cohesiveness of the campaign and ensure everything stayed “on brand”, and there were smaller sub-teams to deal with the minutia of the other elements. For example, it was she who would draft the press statements with Sidney but getting them distributed was someone else’s job. If someone wanted an interview or photo-shoot, she and Sidney would discuss whether it was something she wanted to do and what the conditions would be but then it would be left to someone else to settle on a fee, arrange transport and draft the releases etc.

“Nope!” Sidney grinned. “Two more!” She pulled out more of the brown packing paper, casting it impatiently onto the floor like a child opening their presents on Christmas morning, then reached in, pulling out a soft, plush doll, like a stuffed animal, but looking like her. The peachy-coloured skin was soft velour, the hair fabric ringlets. It was a basic rag-doll shape but Sidney was pleased to see they had managed to give her backside some shape and there was even an added plumpness to her vulva, the pussy-slit made by pinching the fabric together from below. The face was not as flat as she had feared it might be, with the nose and cheeks standing out a little and the mouth and eyes embroidered. This Sidney cuddly toy was wearing pink had and boots, although the tag fixed to her arm implied the other colours were available, and the details were picked out with silver embroidery. “What do you think?” she giggled, holding the toy up next to her own face. “Think people are gonna want to cuddle me at night?”

“Maybe you should give that one to Logan?” Martha teased, a little archly, making her young friend and employer blush then giggle. The tag featured by-now familiar branding but instead of Sidney herself, a model even younger than the one of the previous box hugging the doll to her chest in such a way that it covered anything that might otherwise require censorship or open the manufacturer to unhelpful allegations. Sitting her cuddly effigy on the sofa between then, Sidney reached in and took out the final toy from the box – the one she had been most excited to see!

Although this was also a premium product and specifically aimed at adult collectors, the packaging was not quite as fancy as that which the special Stacie came in, it was still respectably sturdy and made a nice display frame for the doll inside. The classification of Adults Only, it had been explained to Sidney, did not necessarily mean that children could not enjoy the toy or parents could not buy them for their young daughters if they didn’t mind putting such an expensive toy in potentially careless young hands, but simply acted as a disclaimer. Anything sold as suitable for children had to meet rigid safety standards which would hinder the creation of this very special doll so marketing it as for Adults Only, essentially classifying it as an art piece, they had more freedom to produce the product they wanted. Of course it would still be created to a very high standard and would be perfectly safe in general but would be able to include the infamous “small parts” that a hypothetical child may swallow and choke on.

“Perhaps I could take this on the show tonight?” Sidney suggested as she turned the box around in her hands. There were no big surprises, really. The back showed off the range of poses this doll was capable of while the sides had pictures Sidney had to double-check to be sure if they were doll or pictures from one of her own shoots, concluding that they were the doll again. The picture on the front next to her name was definitely her ‘though. Although this would also have a small release due to its premium nature, the numbering was not a selling point as it was for the Stacie doll. This collectable would be available only through Mattel’s “Creations” web-store and, by special arrangement, through Sidney’s own website, eatsidneyroebuck.com. The other toys and dolls would be available to order through her site too, of course, but would also be available in retail stores where the majority of sales were expected.

“Good idea!” Martha smiled as Sidney snipped the sticker holding the top of the box closed. Carefully, she opened it then slid the backing card out with the doll attached. This one did not have the thin, plastic ties holding it in place but little strips of a fine cloth like muslin, presumably so as not to damage the expensive doll. Sidney used the tip of the scissors to unpick the knots on the back and was finally able to hold the Ultimate Sidney Doll loose in her hands. “Just remember you need to talk about the game too. Even if it’s not quite ready, we’ve sent them some screen-shots they can use!”

“Uh-huh.” Sidney nodded, only half listening to her friend, he eyes wide with awe as she inspected the deluxe toy. Aside from where the head joined the neck and an almost invisible line around the wrists so that the hands could be swapped out depending on the pose the collector wanted – Sidney tipping her hand, blowing a kiss, hands on hips etc., the doll’s body was entirely seamless, the skin a silicon coating over the inner plastic skeleton. “Wow!” She turned the near-naked effigy around in her hands. “It really looks like they just shrunk me down!”

“Hope nobody tries to eat it!” Martha chuckled, making her young friend giggle. The doll really was spectacular with every detail of the young girl’s body sculpted and shaded with subtle paintwork. This miniature Sidney was wearing a pink hat and boots just as detailed as Stacie’s white ones. Her hair was rooted, of course, and her sparkling eyes made from glass. Sidney herself had gone to pose for this doll, standing naked with her arms loosely by her side in a small room full of strange lights and mirrors while her face and body was scanned from every possible angle to create a 3D computer model. This had then been used to produce a figure, three times the size of the finished doll, that Mattel’s talented sculptors had worked on, making small adjustments, smoothing out irregularities and imperfections caused by the fallible scanning technology and generally preparing the model for production.

When this technology had first become available in the early 2000s, their Mattel contact had explained, some toy companies had used to exclusively to create the head-sculpts for their figures using direct scans of the actor’s heads. While in theory this should have resulted in a perfect likeness, many fans and collectors remarked that the faces created by sculptors looked far more like the characters in question than these scanned ones, leading the industry to reassess their use, settling eventually on a combination approach as had been used in Sidney’s case. Stroking the doll’s skin with her finger-tips, Sidney could not quite believe it. She had hundreds of dolls, of course, any she wanted! Her father had bought her any she’d ever asked for and toy companies had sent her promotional offerings too, as the daughter of a famous billionaire philanthropist, before she had become a celebrity in her own right, but none like this!

It did not feel like smooth plastic but like real skin. Carefully, she started to pose the roughly ten-inch figure and found that the limbs and joins moved naturally, the silicone skin not bunching, creasing or stretching as she had thought it might.

“This one’s definitely going on the desk!” she grinned, pushing the right boot into the grip on the plastic stand that came with it and swapping out the hands so she could pose little Sidney with one hand on her hip and touching a finger to the brim of her hat with the other. “Think they got a good likeness of my butt?” she giggled, turning the figure in a full circle to show it off.

“They got everything perfect!” Martha laughed, as familiar with Sidney’s naked body as the girl was herself, if not more so! “I bet the artists had a good time!” It was very rare indeed to see Sidney blush but Martha was sure that she saw pink spots form on her young friend’s cheeks. “Okay! So, the game?”

“Oh yeah!” Sidney exclaimed, moving the now-empty box onto the floor and picking up the tablet once more. The next puzzle was one of those where the player had to shoot a coloured ball to make others of its colour disappear, although in this case it was rhinestones of course! The next was a TETRIS game but instead of sets of blocks, the pieces were little cartoon Sidneys in an assortment of uncomfortable-looking positions! Once again she was offered the chance to “cash out” her points but opted to continue, the next two puzzles earning her enough points to cook her cartoon-self’s rump!

“Ooh great choice!” the cartoon Sidney cooed at her in her own voice. She turned and wiggled her shapely cartoon bottom teasingly. “So how would you like it cooked?” Three options popped up on the screen – an oven, a frying pan and a barbecue.

“Ooh decisions, decisions!” Sidney chuckled before hitting the picture of the frying pan. The Sidney on the screen clicked her fingers and a frying pan appeared in her hand. She set it on the stove behind her and then bent forward, wiggling her rump from side to side. A cartoon knife appeared on the screen, flashing to indicate that it should be pushed. Sidney put her finger-time on it and dragged it across her counterpart’s juicy-looking backside. The cartoon Sidney gave a little yelp then giggled, exclaiming “That tickles!”

The knife then disappeared and the severed buttocks began to blink. Sidney put her finger on them and dragged them to the frying pan. When she got close enough, they dropped in and began to sizzle. Relieved of her posterior, the cartoon Sidney turned back to face her then stepped aside.

“Mmm, smells so good!”

Seconds later, the rump floated up out of the pan and presented itself on a plate. Sidney repeatedly tapped it with her finger, a new bite-mark appearing with every tap until the plate was empty. The rump of a little Sidney outline in the bottom left-hand corner lit up, marking progress.

“This is pretty fun!” Sidney grinned, turning to Martha. “Do we have any cheat-codes or anything so I can see what happens if you get enough points for a whole-roast?”

“I think so?” Martha reached to take the tablet from her. “Yes, here we go! They’ve put demo versions of each level we can jump to.” She tapped the screen a few times then handed the device back to Sidney. The hat and boots of the character on the screen had changed colour but otherwise the screen looked much the same, aside from the high point-count in the corner.

“Wow, Joe!” cartoon Sidney exclaimed. “You did great! Guess you really are hungry! Well you’ve earned your reward, so how would you like me cooked?”

“Why’s she calling me Joe?” laughed the flesh and blood Sidney.

“Because we’re watching a demo level,” Martha explained, “She’s just giving generic responses.”

“Makes sense!” Sidney nodded. As before with the rump, three cooking options popped up on the screen – an oven, a spit and a stew-pot. Sidney opted for the oven and the cartoon Sidney once again praised her choice as the scene changed to Sidney kneeling in a roasting pan on the table, head down and wiggling rump in the air, still wearing her hat and boots.

“First you need to oil me!” cartoon Sidney instructed and a bottle of oil appeared on the screen as the knife had done. Sidney touched it with the tip of her finger and dragged it over so it hovered above the animated meat-girl. She tapped it four times so globs of oil were dispensed and landed on the willing piggy’s back, the bottle becoming progressively emptier with each tap. When it was empty, the bottle disappeared and Sidney then used her finger to spread the oil around until her avatar took on a yellow-tinged shininess all over. “Now I need stuffing!” the oiled-up girl gleefully announced, rump still wiggling. Sidney couldn’t help giggle as she dragged the vegetables from the basket that appeared over to the wiggling rump and dropped them in one by one, accompanied by little “Ooh”s and “Aah”s from her eager-to-roast avatar that somehow sounded far more suggestive in context than they had when she recorded them.

“Nearly done!” cartoon Sidney assured her once the basket was empty, the last vegetable being a carrot which now stuck amusingly out of her bottom, green leafy top and all. “Now all I need is a shiny red apple in my mouth and it’s into the oven with me!” The apple in question appeared floating in the air and Sidney dragged it to her avatar’s face where it popped into her waiting mouth/ Prompted by little yellow arrows that appeared on the screen, Sidney opened the oven, moved the oiled and stuffed meat-girl into into in and pressed the button to start cooking. The door closed and a timer appeared on screen in the form of a clock-like dial set to four hours. She tapped it and it rapidly began to count down, the time counting down in thirty seconds during which the Sidney in the oven turned first pink then brown. A ping indicated that the meal was ready and the roast girl floated out of the oven and onto a platter on the table.

As she had with the friend rump, Sidney tapped the delicious-looking roast repeatedly with her finger-tip, each tap removing more of the golden-brown flesh and revealing the white bones underneath, filling up the little outline figure in the corner in the process. Although it was in very unrealistic cartoon form, closer to something that would happen to Bugs Bunny than how her real-life slaughter would be, seeing herself stuffed, roasted and served on a platter in this way was getting Sidney quite hot and bothered and the tingle between her legs was growing in a way that would demand to be seen to before too long. By the time she was done tapping on the screen and the outline filled up completely, the roasting pan was occupied by a clean, white skeleton, still wearing the hat and boots and with a mane of curly blonde hair. To Sidney’s surprise and amusement, the skeleton then stood up and addressed her.

“Well that was fun!” the skeleton managed to grin in a very friendly way. “You sure were hungry! How about we try that again?” She screwed her eyes shut as if concentrating and glowed golden for a moment then there was a flash and loud pop and cartoon Sidney graced the screen once more, whole again in all her grinning, naked glory. “Still hungry?” she asked as “Yes” and “No” buttons popped up but did not seem to respond to being tapped.

“This is the demo version because you wanted to see the end.” Martha reminded her. “If you decide to play through the actual game and get enough points to whole-cook, well, you,” she chuckled, “or if you cut away all the meat piece by piece and get to this screen that way, pressing Yes will restart the game and you’ll get to choose the hat colour again but won’t need to put your name in unless you specifically click that you want to change it. If you press No, it just shuts down until next time you want to play, at which point it just asks you to pick the colour again and starts from the beginning as normal. Are you okay?” she asked as Sidney handed back the tablet. “You seem a little distracted?”

“Huh?” Sidney was snapped back into the moment. Seeing her roasted body slowly consumed until only bones remained made the tingle between her legs even more urgent and she was desperate to see to it. “Oh, right! Yeah. The game’s great, tell them to go ahead and launch!” She smiled. “Sorry, was just thinking it’s probably time to start getting ready for the interview? I need another shower before I get changed. It’s kinda warm in here!” Martha was about to remark that it was less than an hour since her last one and that the air-conditioned office really wasn’t all that warm, despite the early September heat outside but then she realised that her young friend and employer was really just wanting some private alone-time to process her feelings about the game. The idea to give the young girl a little treat popped into her mind and she smiled very slightly to herself.

“Good idea!” she smiled, “But first I just need your signature on a few forms about the toys. They’re holding back the Stacie until next August,” she reminded her, “but they want to put the others into production pretty much right away so they can be in stores by the beginning of October, in time for Christmas.”

“Sounds good!” Sidney smiled, signing with a stylus on the forms which Martha had loaded on the tablet, two signatures for each product and an additional form releasing the pre-approved photos and any likeness of her captured in the toys for advertising, use in catalogues and general publicity, whether direct use or as a photo of the products or packaging.

“Getting eaten’s gonna need less paperwork than this!” Sidney chuckled, handing back the tablet. Since the game was being produced in-house, she did not need to sign any documents for that, just give her verbal agreement for the release to be rolled out. “So, is that everything?” she asked with a slightly impatient smile.

“Go on!” Martha chuckled, taking the tablet back and submitting the forms. “Have fun!” she teased. “I’ll get things ready out here.” Although Sidney often got ready in the dressing room of the studios where her interviews were being filmed, this particular show often had fans waiting outside and sometimes press too so it made sense to arrive “in character”, as if it was a mini red carpet event. She had been to a few of those, of course. For the first one she was invited to she had worn a nice black and silver dress with her hair elegantly styled but nobody had recognised her and there had even been a degree of negative, although polite, feedback from the organisers. Since then, any public event she had been invited to, whether it seemed appropriate or not, she had attended in the near-naked state by for which she was most recognised. This presented a degree of challenge in the colder months but, she required to walk into an event in front of photographers, she would wear a blanket in the car with the AC on so that she would be used to the cold then drop the blanket just before she got out so she had only to walk the length of the red carpet or cross the pavement before being inside the heated building where her state of undress led to no discomfort. For events where there were no photographers lurking outside, she could arrive in a thick winter coat and take it off upon going in.

Relieved that the business was over and eager to get down to a different sort of business, Sidney closed the door of the en-suite bathroom and slid the bolt across. She was used to working out nude in full view of the office and of course her “uniform” left nothing whatsoever to the imagination, not to mention the fact that larger-than-life full-frontal photographs of her naked body were plastered on giant billboards all around the country so on one hand, worrying about anyone walking in on her in the shower seemed a little silly, but on the other, her primary purpose for the shower was far from a simple freshening-up and there were certain things she still believed her supposed to be private. Despite her relaxed attitude to her own nudity, not to mention what she was campaigning for, there was still a lot of her conservative southern upbringing that stuck with her and shaped her attitudes.

Once sure that she would not be disturbed, she reached in and turned on the shower then quickly stripped off her clothes, dumping them on the floor since she would not be needing them any more that day. They would be collected up by the cleaners when they came in after close of business that day and, since they were from the same team as the cleaners at her father’s hotel where she was staying while in LA, they would get the clothes laundered and returned to her room. The day after next, she would find them with her others in the wardrobe or chest of drawers in her suite as if dealt with by the laundry fairy!

After reaching in and checking the temperature of the shower with her hand, Sidney stepped in and felt the refreshingly hot water crashed over her body. With her eyes closed, she thought about the game once more but this time imagining herself in the place of the cartoon figure, being oiled by unseen chefs with rough hands then her ass and pussy stuffed with no thought for her comfort, only for making her a delicious meal.

As she pictured the scene over and over, the eleven year old leaned back against the tiled wall of the cubical, reached between her legs and began to deal with the real reason for the shower. It had been Jessie who had first shown her how to do this nearly three years ago. She had always known it felt nice to touch herself down there but the actual technique of having two fingers inside while she rubbed her clit with her thumb had been a revelation! She imagined herself slid into the oven and feeling it heat up around her.

Then she began to picture herself as it likely would be for real, stood in a sterile room, naked with none of her makeup or costume to deflect attention from her body, family and close friends eyeing her young body as food while the butcher sharpened his knife. Sometimes she imagined her head cut off with an axe, or being stunned and rendered unconscious by an electric cattle-prod but most times, now included, she imagined her throat cut with a large knife. She fingered herself more urgently as she tipped her head back, almost subconsciously, inviting the blade’s deadly kiss.

How would it feel? She wondered. Would it be like when she cut her finger with a scalpel when cutting out pieces of card for a craft project? Or more like when she cut her leg on a piece of rusty metal that had once been part of a tractor when messing about near the barn on her grandparents’ farm? She head heard that sometimes blades were so sharp, like Japanese katanas or Arab scimitars that people beheaded by them took a second or two to notice and initially thought that the blade had missed its mark! Would it be like that, perhaps? She knew that as her blood drained she would feel cold and hoped it would not take long. Would the butcher wait until she was dead to start gutting her or get straight to work while she bled out? She would just be meat after all, her human rights signed away, gone. Just livestock ready for processing!

Forgetting herself for a moment, Sidney let out quite a loud yelp as she reached climax, hoping a moment after that the sound of the shower was enough to mask and sounds she made and that Martha was not paying attention outside the door! Quickly, she squirted some shower-gel into her hands and gave herself the quick freshen-up that the shower was supposed to be for. She did not wash her hair this time, having done so after her work-out not too long before, but she did give it a quick rinse so that it would be easier to style. Martha would over-see her transformation from regular ol’ Sidney to Sidney Roebuck, media darling, but Suzanne and Tracy would likely be on hand to do her hair and makeup as they always did. She wondered what colour hat and boots combo Martha would pick from the few they kept in the office? She had no real preference.

There was no point in putting any clothes back on and a towel for modesty seemed silly since she was about to prepare to bare all on national television so, after drying her body and patting her hair enough to stop it dripping but leaving it damp enough to style, Sidney unbolted the door and went back out into the office holding the ends of the small towel around her shoulders. What she saw as she came out made her stop in her tracks from surprise and the pink spots to appear on her cute round cheeks once more!

As well as the three expected women, Logan was stood in the office waiting for her, standing beside the desk chair that had been turned for her to sit in while the team worked, space cleared on the desk for the makeup box and other tools of their trade.

“We’re running a little behind,” Martha explained with what could only be described as a wink in her voice, “so Logan’s very kindly agreed to help with the cream while Tracy and Suzanne get ready. Hope that’s okay?”

“Um… sure!” Sidney grinned, feeling her blush deepen.

“Don’t worry,” Martha spoke in a reassuring tone, more to Logan than to Sidney, “I’ll deal with the front, you deal with the back!” Because her own skin formed the bulk of her outfit, it was important that it looked its best when she appeared on television and the moisturising cream that was usually rubbed in prior to her appearances gave it a silken sheen. For her own part, Sidney liked imagining, as Martha or one of the makeup team were rubbing it in, that she was in fact being oiled for the oven just like her cartoon self in the game.

As she was well used to, Sidney stood still with her feet apart and her arms loosely by her side while she watched her hair and makeup team fuss with their equipment. Martha unscrewed the lid and peeled the foiled-paper seal off a new tub of moisturising cream and scooped some into her hands.

“Take some and rub your hands together,” she explained to Logan who knelt behind Sidney, “warm it up a little.” Although she could not see, Sidney heard the squelching sound as he did as he was told then started to rub it into her back and shoulders which she supposed to be the most neutral body-part he could find to start with. At first it felt like he was trying to touch her as little as possible – it reminded her a little of when she had gone to the beach with her brothers as a much younger girl, when the family had been on holiday in Venice, Italy, and they had put sun-cream on her. Already young men by then, they had been a little annoyed at having to look after their little sister when they wanted to be snorkelling and chatting up the girls clad in bikinis or less. Already self-aware enough at that age to recognise that she was something of a “third wheel” cramping their style, she had not asked them to take her again and had instead persuaded Mrs Morino, a local lady hired as a tutor, to take her along with her own family. It had been fun to have children her own age to play with outside of school and Sidney had enjoyed those outings far more than with her brothers, despite their generally close relationship.

“Make sure you rub it nice and evenly!” Martha reminded him, trying not to laugh at his awkwardness as she began the familiar task of moisturising Sidney’s belly and chest. As professional as she tried to be in these situations, Sidney could not deny that she liked when Martha’s creamy hands rubbed across her perky nipples and she was pretty sure Martha enjoyed it too, or at least recognised how much she liked it, since she would often give them extra attention with her thumbs or give them a light pinch or teasing tweak when she was done. Logan was moving down now, towards her very firm and shapely backside. As always, she imagined she was being oiled for the oven or spit, easy to imagine Logan’s larger, rougher hands as the hands of a burly chef who saw her as nothing but another ingredient.

“Right in between the cheeks!” Martha instructed as Logan rubbed the cream onto Sidney’s buttocks but seemed to be trying to avoid getting too intimate. “The combination of studio lights and 4K cameras is very unforgiving! If you miss any spot and she does a twirl it will show up as a weird pale patch and make her look like she has a skin condition!” She chuckled lightly getting ready to moisturise Sidney’s most intimate area as she had done so many times before. The young girl gave a happy but very quiet sigh, trying not to react as the handsome young man’s big but gently fingers pushed between her firm, round buttocks, the tips brushing her sensitive ass-hole. As always, she but her lip as Martha oiled between her legs, making sure that her plump, smooth vulva was well moisturised even inside her slit, ready to show off her delicious meat on camera. Soon both workers were finished, meeting around her feet, then she was invited to sit down in the chair to get her hair and makeup done.

“Logan’s going to come with you,” Martha explained, “so he can touch up your bottom when you get there if needed!” Her cheeky wink made it clear that the double-entendre was intentional. Sidney giggled, then chatted to Martha about the upcoming interview as she usually did while the hair and makeup ladies worked. It was long and tedious for her and required sitting still for far longer than she was comfortable so it was nice to have the distraction.

“So what colour am I wearing today?” Sidney asked when they had exhausted the other topic of conversation.

“Oh yes!” Martha grinned. “With all the excitement about the game and the toys I forgot to tell you! Logan, would you go fetch the box, please?” The young man did as he was told and was back moments later with a large box although this one had clearly been opened already. “I had to check them on delivery.” Martha explained apologetically.

“No problem!” Sidney smiled, a little annoyed that she had to sit still while her nails were being manicured and painted and so couldn’t investigate for herself. “So, let’s have a look?” she grinned. Martha reached in and pulled out the brand new hat and boots. “Well, that’s certainly something new!” Sidney exclaimed, surprised to see a variation on the very familiar design that she had not seen before. “They gonna work on TV with all the lights and stuff?”

“Should do!” Martha nodded. “They’re got this coating on that means they’re actually no more reflective than what you usually wear, you know how the stones catch the light sometimes?” Sidney nodded. “But depending on angle, the colours and shapes will change so make sure you move as much as possible!”

“Yeah, that’s not gonna be a challenge!” Sidney laughed. Always a very animated speaker who talked as much with her hands as with her actual mouth, she tended to move her head a lot when being interviewed too, often turning to look out over the studio audience and flash them a smile or to grin directly into the camera as if making eye-contact with the folks at home. She also tended to sit with her legs cross, more for comfort than any real sense of modesty, and would swing or tap the foot that was on top when she talked as if keeping time to a song. It was a subconscious “tick” she did without thinking and only, it had been noted by people who worked closely with her, in a formal interview situation.

The hat and boots in question were very much in her normal style, as was expected by her audience, but instead of being coloured leather, either faux or genuine, these had a plastic surface that at first appeared silver but was very quickly revealed to be holographic, reflecting different colours and shapes like and oil-spill on the ground. Sidney was definitely impressed and excited to reveal them to the public. She wished she’d had them in time for the latest Star Wars premier which she had attended in white hat and boots with silver accents but, in concession to the occasion and to add a fun cosplay element, with a matching belt and holster on her hip in which she carried a toy blaster just like the ones from the movie and had worn her hair in Princess Leia’s trademark “earphone” bunches which had become a look very much associated in the public imagination with the character even ‘though she had only sported the style for the first movie. That look had taken longer than her usual curls and even required hair extensions but she felt like it had been worth it and her efforts had certainly gone down well with the public and media alike!

Martha knelt down in front of Sidney like a supplicant paying homage to her Queen and eased a pair of surprisingly thick cotton socks on to make the boots comfortable then helped her on with her boots.

“You’re hat, m’lady!” Martha grinned, standing up and holding out the Stetson to Sidney once her hair, makeup and nails were complete.

“Why, that you!” Sidney giggled, already looking almost unrecognisable as the tom-boy she had been just half an hour earlier. She set the hat on top of her sculpted curls and the transformation was complete. “Time to go?”

The End