The Zip Files Bk. 01: Zip Unzips Ch. 08

"God damn, what a slut," Zip said, shaking his head in awe, once she was finally out of sight. Then, whistling, he turned and resumed his prowling.

Remembering his original idea before he got distracted by Denise and her shopping bag full of panties, he wandered back down the mall until he found what he was after: a small clothing shop that shared a wall with a Starbucks, so he could leech their wifi. He ensconced himself in a chair near the changing area, his back to the wall separating himself from the coffee shop seating area. His current data plan was meager enough he had to husband his mobile bandwidth, and what he wanted to do now might use a lot. Getting out his phone, he started searching.

For what he was going to do next, he didn't really want to be tracked. He had a VPN that he mostly used for torrents. He turned that on, and deployed a few more tricks his nerdier friends had told him about, back when he still had some - and hoped it would be enough. But he also decided to choose his target location carefully.

"Let's go outside the US..." he said. "The government most certainly has agencies out watching for people like me, so if I'm going to do something this public I should do it in a country that's not likely to return the NSA's phone calls."

He initially thought about trying North Korea - but thought better of it. If anything he did was tracked, being one of the few Americans who had just started watching such a stream might be the kind of thing that they could track down. He needed a stream that plenty of people would already be watching, so he could be lost in the digital crowd - just in case. Knowing that a sizable number of wealthy mainlanders had been buying up homes in the area, mostly because several of their daughters were his classmates, he went with PRC state media; searching around until he found a suitable live webcast with at least one female presenter.

The one he hit on opened up, and showed a studio with one male and one female anchor. The male anchor was sitting behind a big news desk while the female anchor was standing, as they held some sort of scripted conversation on current events. Images of things like container ships or military aircraft flying occasionally showed on the screen behind them. The female anchor was wearing a cream-colored blazer over a black blouse and a black skirt that reached almost to her knees. The male anchor was an older dude, while the female one was young, slender, and extremely pretty.

"Guess some things never change no matter who's in charge" Zip mumbled, admiring her.

He searched around for pictures of the female anchor, which took some time due the language barrier, but eventually found some. He managed to find one of her wearing the same outfit. He looked at it, and willed her skirt open. He went back to the live feed.

She was still talking, fully clothed. Nothing had happened.

"Alright," he said. "Let's escalate."

He pulled up an older video clip, and tried again with her in motion, then went back to the live feed to check. Again, nothing.

"Moment of truth..." he said. Staying on the live feed, he focused on the skirt, and willed the zipper down, just a little.

Almost to his shock, he saw her skirt loosen and slip down a bit. He was so surprised it actually worked, he slipped up - and sent the zipper down all the way.

The Chinese anchor gasped as she suddenly felt her skirt go billowing away down her legs - live in front of the entire world. To one side, the male anchor dropped his jaw wide open and stared. Her eyes wide, shivering in shock, the pretty anchor blinked into the camera. She didn't seem to know what to do.

From out of the bottom of her blouse and blazer there extended a skimpy black panty... the scoop front of which was low enough to show off a little of her flat tummy. Shouting started to break out around the studio... but the cameraman, apparently horny enough from having to stare at the anchor all day that he could not help himself, turned and zoomed in on her, giving Zip and her entire country and the entire world a nice good look.

Yelping in shock, the pretty half-undressed news anchor tried to whirl away and hide - but all this did was spin her body around and let everyone see the whale's tail the skimpy thong back of her underwear made, above her little round bubble-butt. Louder shouts and bellows broke out around the studio as the thong-clad ass quivered in full center-frame upon the camera... and then the live web feed finally cut and what Zip assumed was the Mandarin equivalent of 'we are experiencing technical difficulties' came up on his screen instead.

"Huh..." Zip said, staring. For a moment, he wished he had recorded that. Then he realized there had been no need. He tabbed over to a search engine. Sure enough, the internet was already getting flooded. Most of the content was still in Mandarin, but the pictures of the stunned news anchor caught on camera in her panties told him instantly what they were discussing. And in real time, as he repeated his search, he could see the flood of global commenting spill out of the Mandarin internet and onto places like Twitter and Reddit. Within minutes, clips of the incident were up on Youtube, for himself and every other man on Earth to view again and again if and when they pleased.

"Well..." Zip said as, with another search of the anchor's name and then another, he saw the number of 'hits' seem to double with every passing minute even in English... rapidly shooting up past the hundreds to the thousands and tens of thousands. "That... made a bit more of an impact than I had planned."

He put his phone back into his pocket, and thought about things for a second.

"Yeah..." he said. "Even if it's in a foreign country, that... might get some people in some government building's notice. I should probably cool it for a bit."

He had been planning on having some fun inside some changing rooms while remaining outside of them - seeing if he could affect garments he couldn't actually see but knew were there, among other things. But he decided to postpone that for later. He could always try it with a pair of Mrs. Sablier's panties from the relative safety of his own basement, after all.

So instead he wandered the mall for a bit, went out and grabbed a late lunch from a food truck and then returned. His bus ride in and out of town had eaten up a fair amount of time and it was now late afternoon, edging into early evening. He didn't really want to go anywhere else, given the hour and the heat. Going back into the mall, he wandered some more, mostly just admiring the lovely bodies on display in short-shorts or blue jeans - and doing his best not to do anything to them.

Then, coming around an escalator in a relatively quiet corner of the mall, he looked up - and nearly skidded to a halt.

"Oh, shit," he said.

Before him stood his gorgeous history teacher, Cassie Creed. Only she was quite a bit more under-dressed than he had ever seen her in a classroom - wearing what appeared to be an extremely short cotton skirt and a tight form-fitting T-shirt. Her skirt was so short, and hung down so low over her epic ass, Zip instantly regretted that he had just forsworn the use of his powers.

She was standing just outside a shop that sold T-shirts, posters and other such paraphernalia, and seemed to be bemusedly eyeing the better-displayed merchandise. Before Zip could get done doing the same, she looked up - and spotted him.

"Well, hello there, Mister Zilch," she said to him. Her smile broadened. "Have you been having a really productive weekend?"

'God damn those eyes' Zip thought, as they bore into him.

"Yes, of course, Dr. Cr... Cassie," he replied.

"Good to hear it," she said.

Since he had already been made, Zip decided that trying to slip away immediately would just look lame and suspicious. Besides - why bother, when staying to chat gave him a chance to ogle her some more? Cassie usually looked good - but rarely this good. Given the briefness of her outfit it seemed to him she must have been out exercising and swung around afterwards.

"What are you doing?" he asked her, for lack of better options, as he took up a closer position; one at a more suitable range for both conversation and for checking her out, as the position of her head dictated.

"Just amusing myself is all," the gorgeous redhead said. Standing before him, a little smirk on her lips, she gestured towards several of the T-shirts hung up before them. "You're a pretty attentive student of history, Zip," she said. "Can you spot the inaccuracies?"

"Huhum..." Zip said.

Before them, the T-shirt shop had several items out on display, clearly intended primarily for tourists. Most of the ones up front were 'villains'. Super-mutant likenesses these days were very tightly controlled, but villains' were not - which had the side effect of making their merch much more widely available and popular with small-time hucksters like these.

For instance, the Silver Fox had been just as involved in the manhunt for Iron John as the Horned King had. Or rather, according to the public record he had - if you believed local legend you would get the impression he had been too busy sleeping with every nubile young woman in town to put any actual detective time in. But regardless of his actual role the Silver Fox hadn't 'turned evil' just afterwards, so if you wanted his shirts they had to come with official Titan League branding at a huge markup, and only from authorized retailers. By contrast the Horned King was unable to issue any cease-and-desists from his stasis chamber in trans-Uranic space; so his image appeared in every other little tourist-trap shop along the beachfront; or the mall for that matter.

Further back in the shop, Zip could see a few Saturn Society shirts for sale, too. They were probably also technically bootleg, but a lot safer. While you would absolutely get nailed for selling unauthorized Golden Boy, Lady Liberator, or Whirlwind merch in the United States, Saturn Society stuff wouldn't get you hassled nearly as much - particularly if you were small fry.

In particular Zip could see several shirts featuring Le Deluge, who was pretty easy to spot since the standard image was basically a tiny black human outline in a gigantic ball of water. He also saw Tempus Carnifex - the Time Killer - the Society's leader and founder, both in and out of his helmet.

And there were also several of the hotter ladies of the Society as well. Dream Maiden, of course. But also Barong Rangda, dressed quite a bit skimpier than Zip remembered ever seeing but really emphasizing the long tongue. And also Gravity Girl, who he guessed had crossover appeal; being readily saleable both to women who wished they could carry their figures like she did, plus also garden-variety perverts like Zip.

But while the shop had a lot of Saturn Society merch scattered further back, the front row was almost all 'villains'; which made sense: they were probably the best sellers. Wearing shirts with various 'evil' likenesses was a popular choice among the more jaded and cynical sort of youth, even in San Caj - though you usually needed to be from a higher social rank than Zip to have it come off as 'rebellious bad boy' rather than just 'edgy loser'. In a bid to pull in more tourist dollars, the main ones on display featured the relatively few superhumans who had some connection - however tenuous - to the city or its history.

These were the ones she was clearly looking at, so here he focused his attention.

Upon one of the shirts right in front of them was the Horned King. Zip stared, but while obviously highly stylized - done in the aesthetic of a heavy metal album cover - it still seemed essentially accurate to him. The many horns sprouting up from his flesh - including the ring of them around his head that had given him his name - looked a little overdone but basically accurate to the way the mutable mutant usually presented himself. He had his hand outstretched and was in the midst of creating a new snarling minion in the way Zip had understood he had always done it - by budding it off from his own unstable flesh.

"I dunno," he said. "Seems about right to me. But they put him away right after I was born, so I wouldn't really know."

Cassie shrugged, and then smirked.

"Fair enough," she said. "It gets the basic idea across, I will admit. But there's one little detail that is quite off."

Reaching out, she tapped at the streamer of ectoplasm reaching from the Horned King's palm down towards the snarling little monster at his feet, which looked like it was going to rush at the viewer the moment it was complete.

"It is true," she admitted, "that the Horned King created his servants by budding them off himself, and then using the brief period where they shared his power to mold them into what he wanted. But... that's not how he did it."

Turning, she gave Zip a coy look, and arched an eyebrow - as if expecting a guess.

"Uh," Zip said. He was confused, but not about to turn down yet another chance to look her up and down. "How, then?" he asked.

She gave him a disappointed little pout of her lips, as if sad he hadn't tried his luck with her challenge. Then she shrugged, and smiled.

"I'll give you a big hint," she purred. "Superpowers emerge at puberty, mostly. So how do you think it is that a teenage boy might discover that bits that he squirts off himself continue to move and change according to his will, in the first place?"

Zip blinked at her for a couple seconds. Then, suddenly he got it.

"Oh," he said. "Ohhhh!"

Cassie nodded, a big smirk on her lips.

"Admittedly, they would have a hard time putting the real method on a T-shirt," she said, turning back to the fake version in front of her. "At least one that anyone could legally wear in public."

Strutting forward, she entered the shop - her head turning from one side to the other, as if looking for something of interest. Zip followed her, eagerly. Or, more precisely, he followed her amazing ass eagerly, his eyes glued to it as it swayed back and forth amidst the racks of merchandise. Once more he cursed that he had just forsworn the use of his powers. But even without them, her skirt was so short it seemed like if she bent over even a little he would see everything.

But despite some tantalizing swishes he never quite got a glimpse. Spying something of interest to her, Cassie spun around, ending his opportunity to freely admire her figure. She pointed at another shirt. Zip tried his best to look at what she was pointing at, and not her breasts.

This one turned out to be a shirt featuring Iron John. He was coming right at the viewer, cloaked in his long hair - and looked ready to tear his next victim limb from limb. A couple bullets were bouncing off his flesh, just to indicate how doomed the hypothetical viewer was. Which of course would be whoever the quite edgy wearer of the T-shirt was currently talking to.

"This one is even worse," she said. "There are at least two big things wrong. Any ideas which?"

"Hmm," Zip said. He thought a moment. 'She seems awful flirty' he thought. He had already nailed one teacher. Even if he had resolved not to use his powers right now... maybe he could still bag a second?

"What do I get if I win?" he asked her.

Her eyebrows went up. Then she giggled.

"Then you'll get my gold star," she promised him.

"Uh..." Zip said. He wasn't sure how to interpret that. But, feeling sudden desperation, he turned back to the shirt. He searched it up and down. But really, he had no clue. 'I really should start studying this stuff' he realized. He had been so busy trying to figure out the application of his own particular powers, he had yet to invest much of anything into trying to study how the rest of 'his' people functioned.

"Is, the, uh, hair the wrong color?" he asked. It stood to reason to him that someone named 'Iron John' would have black hair, not golden blonde. "And, uh... longer teeth?"

Cassie sighed, and shook her head. "Looks like I keep my star a little while longer," she told him.

Reaching out she tapped the two bullets bouncing off the painted wild-man's flesh.

"This is the big one. Iron John was called that because they thought he was immune to bullets. Turns out, they work on him just fine. Reality is, no-one ever managed to shoot him because he always knew to be where the bullet wouldn't."

"Oh..." Zip said.

He did his best to pretend he was paying attention to what she was saying, instead of the way her breasts were swaying and jiggling as she talked. He had spotted two little bumps,extending out from the center of each of her large jugs, through the fabric - and had suddenly become absolutely convinced that under her T-shirt she wasn't wearing a bra. His dick jumped, inside his pants, at the thought.

"I didn't realize..." he added.

Cassie shrugged - seemingly oblivious to the seismic reaction this was producing first on her chest, and then in his pants.

"They didn't have much reason to correct the public story," she told him. Leaving the 'they' unexplained, she leaned forward - far enough that, despite the magnificence of his current view, Zip was suddenly disappointed he wasn't standing behind her. Reaching out a finger, she tapped the painting's midsection.

"This is the other one," she said, caressing the ratty leather speedo the artist had depicted the snarling Wild Man as wearing. "Reality is, while Iron John would discard old clothes frequently, and was photographed a couple times naked, the idea he traveled that way is a myth; combined with the misconception of his invulnerability and the fairy tale reference that spawned. He valued clothes - good boots and backpacks especially. Which is why he would take new ones from his victims whenever possible. This artist has shown him in a leather thong, to be able to sell the shirt. But, well, if that was what he was wearing then, bluntly, by all accounts it seems doubtful the real Iron John would fit into that."

"Oh?" Zip said, surprised. "Uh... how would you know that?" he asked.

Cassie took a deep breath.

"If he had a choice, Iron John only killed men," she informed him. Then, seemingly wanting to leave the implications of that un-explicated, she took another step onwards. This took them from the T-shirts to a set of posters that were for sale. She gestured at the first one.

"What about this one?" she asked.

Zip took one look, and was pretty sure he knew her answer.

"That it happened at all?" he said.

The poster depicted both the Horned King and Iron John, having their fabled conference. If Zip remembered correctly his history textbooks still said that if this event had happened there was absolutely no proof of it, so it should be considered a myth. But, it loomed very large in local legend, alongside the Silver Fox's putative romantic prowess. Because if it had happened, then it had almost certainly taken place somewhere in the wilderness around San Cajetan - making it one of the very few events of historical note to ever occur near the city. Still, as a history teacher and, so far as he knew, outsider, he figured Cassie would tow the official line.

But she surprised him by immediately shaking her head.

"Sorry, that was a trick question," she said. She gestured up and down the poster. "The artist has certainly taken some liberties; mostly to make the participants look more 'bad-ass' than they likely did... well, and to represent Iron John as not quite so filthy as he most certainly was. And the nudity thing, again. But, besides that, not only did this happen, it probably looked much like it is depicted here."

"Really?" Zip asked.

She nodded. "Yes," she said. "We know for a fact that they spent a great deal of time discussing many things. We do not, however, yet know exactly what the results were."