Snake Oil

SNAKE OIL

By Rich Conti

Zelda fell asleep after she wore me out again. I couldn’t fall asleep, although I wanted to. I had to stay awake and think of a way to get away from her and take that damned gadget with me.

How was I supposed to know any of the things worked? They were just gizmos to sell to gullible rubes. The alien I bought them from told me they were children’s toys where he came from. I got the entire shipment cheap. He said he had to get rid of them fast and was happy with my offer. I always wondered why.

“Tell your customers they’ll heal whatever ail’s ya!” the alien said, slapping me on the back to congratulate me after he made the sale. The only thing I wanted was to buy really low and sell real high so I could make a windfall profit. The gadgets had exceeded my wildest dreams. I was rolling in money, and I still had a huge supply left.

I gotta admit my sales spiel was pretty good- the best I’ve ever used for any of the crap I’ve sold over the years. None of that shit worked, either, but I never stayed around long enough for anyone to demand their money back. A traveling con man learns that lesson early, or he doesn’t get to be a traveling con man very long. He might even end up a dead con man.

This time, I was stupid and didn’t leave immediately after the sale. I hung around for a good meal and a clean bed. Big mistake.

Zelda had lined up along with all the other suckers I worked up to a buying frenzy. They waved their money pleading with me to take it before all the doohickeys were sold out. I never mentioned that I had a warehouse full of them. I thought they all were duds. Just blinking LEDs, weird musical tones, and not much else.

Zelda came back early the next morning. She was a knockout. I saw she carried the gadget and vaguely remembered her from the day before. She wasn’t a knockout then. I recalled wondering how the decrepit woman had enough strength to stand up. She had stretched out her skinny arm and could barely hold her money. I was afraid she would drop the gadget after I handed it to her. She didn’t. Instead, she hobbled away and I assumed I would never see her again. I also felt sorry the device was a dud.

She wasn’t hobbling now. She was almost dancing. “Thank-you, thank-you, thank-you!” she yelled before she grabbed me, hugged me hard, and kissed me. I thought she would squeeze the life out of me. Luckily, she didn’t.

She invited me to lunch at her house. Not realizing how stupid I was being, and following the stirrings in my cock her fervent hugs and kisses stimulated, I accepted. We never sat down at her table. We went straight to her bedroom and I’ve been there ever since.

Zelda rolled over and her hand fell on my crotch. Even in her sleep, she wanted sex. I wished I knew some local men I could call to take my place. I made it a point to never make anyone’s acquaintance wherever I went. I kept careful records so I wouldn’t go back for a long time and no one would recognize me and remember my con.

My penis was the only one available to Zelda. I found out later it was the only one she could crave. That was another effect of the gadget. Imprinting. I was doomed.

“Just yesterday I was dying,” Zelda told me after the first time I made love to her. “Your device saved me. I didn’t know how else to thank you. I don’t have any money, so I thought you might enjoy some sex.” I did enjoy it the first time. It had been a while. The ones after that? I enjoyed each one less and less.

By the fifth day, I wasn’t having any fun. Zelda was still going into orbit, thrashing around, and screaming my name the second I slid inside her. I have to admit that kind of enthusiasm does wonders for a guy’s ego. I felt happy to please her. Afterward, I just wanted to run away while she slept. My dick is begging for mercy. Somehow, I feel there isn’t going to be any.

I began wondering why one in a million of those devices worked. Did I have others that also worked? I hoped not. I also wondered where they came from. They looked like unique toys and they charmed people, but they weren’t supposed to do anything but look cute. Unless Zelda was somehow tricking me, she had looked like she was near death the first time I saw her but she sure was healthy now. I prayed I was healthy enough to keep up with her sexual demands. The device healed her. Maybe that was what they were all supposed to do when they actually worked.

Five days ago, I wouldn’t have imagined being any woman’s sexual slave. Some other guys might think that was their dream life, especially if their partner was as lovely as Zelda. I just wanted to run away.

As I lay beside her, sleepless, I started to fantasize about how much money I could end up with if all the devices worked. Then I wondered if I could find someone to repair them. Then I wondered if there was anyone who could break this one so I could get away from Zelda. Then I thought about what would happen to her if the device stopped working. Would she go back to the decrepit nearly-dead woman she was when I first saw her? I felt guilty for being selfish. Despite being her sex slave, I was starting to like Zelda and wouldn’t want anything to happen to her.

I knew I was trapped, a fate almost worse than death for a con artist. I also knew although I was a good con man, I wasn’t going to be able to con my way out of Zelda’s grasp. The device wouldn’t let me.

I regretted buying those devices from that alien and realized why he accepted my low offer so readily. Son-of-a-bitch knew one or more of the devices wasn’t a dud. He probably watched and waited for me to sell the good one to somebody, just to see what would happen. Maybe that’s how he gets his jollies. I hope he had his fun.

A month after we met, I told Zelda the full story. I never expected her reaction. “Are there more of these things?” she asked.

“Yeah, thousands in my warehouse, why?”

“You wanna have some fun?” Fun other than sex? Sure! I nodded. “Let’s go looking for someone to buy them.”

“You’re devious, but I love it.”

She worked up the best con I ever saw. She had a photo taken the day before I met her. She looked like a walking corpse. We went to places where shady characters hung out and took the gadget with us. A couple of the people we approached had seen the device before and knew it was a dud. She showed them the photo to convince them it wasn’t. No one believed the photo was her ‘before’ picture. They weren’t interested.

Then a stranger sat down at our table. We couldn’t see his/her/its face. “Where did you get that?” the stranger asked.

“I bought a shitload from a guy last year. Why?”

“Where did he get them?”

“I didn’t ask. Why?”

“Do you have any more?”

I nodded. “Back in my warehouse. Why?”

“How much you want for them?” Zelda and I looked at each other. Maybe our spaceship had just come in.

“Fifty-thousand.” I’d only paid ten and made almost a hundred thousand on the ones I’d already sold. I knew I wouldn’t be able to sell any more. Zelda didn’t want me traveling around. I didn’t have any choice.

“I’ll give you forty.”

“I’ll agree only if you tell me what you know about them.”

“You really wanna know? You’re not gonna like it.” Zelda and I looked at each other and nodded. We were willing to take a chance.

“They’re from the other side of the galaxy.”

“Who made them?”

“Well, robots created the originals. They’re the ones that function.”

“This one works,” Zelda pointed out.

“That’s probably the only one in the batch that does.”

“So the rest of them are worthless?”

“Not exactly.”

“We don’t understand.”

“The duds were manufactured by humans on the robots’ many planets.” We knew of robot factories that made products for humans. Why not human factories that made products for robots? Seemed fair enough.

“It’s not fair, my friend. The real working devices are remote controls the robots use to control their human slaves. They keep the slaves happy and healthy in order to get more work out of them. The fake boxes don’t work. They are illegal on the robots’ planets.

“The counterfeit gadgets are manufactured by a human revolutionary underground that trains cells to pretend to respond to the fake gadgets so the robots think they’re working, but they’re not. The plan is to infiltrate robot cities, fool the robot overlords, and overthrow them, eventually.”

“So how did they end up here?” I couldn’t help asking.

“I don’t know, exactly, but I suspect the robots were fooled into thinking they were working devices and shipped them here in preparation for an invasion. They would have tried to use the devices to enslave your planet.”

“Oh. And what will you do with them?”

“Take them back so the infiltration on the robot worlds can continue.”

“If the humans overthrow their robot masters there, then they can’t come here. Am I right?” I asked. The stranger nodded. “Take them all. Here’s the code for the warehouse. Keep your money.” The stranger thanked us and walked away.

“He was probably lying,” Zelda said.

“I know. But what if he wasn’t?”

“He’s likely the same alien who sold them to you. He probably plants one good one in the batch, waits for it to be found, and then tracks it. Then he gets the warehouse full of devices for free and re-sells them to another con artist. It’s a nice con. Steady income, possibly for life.”

“Yeah. But what if he was telling the truth? What if we just saved the earth?”

We never knew if we actually saved the earth. All we knew for certain was that the device brought us together. It saved her life and that was enough.