FicWad

Chapter 3

Articles, Essays, Awards, and Interviews





/Keep the Fire Burnin'/

by

REO Speedwagon


Keep the fire burnin',

Let it keep us warm,

The world will keep on turnin',

let it turn you on, let us not stop learnin',

We can help one another be strong,

Let us never lose our yearnin',

To keep the fire burnin' all night long,

You've been changing so much, I'm not sure you're in touch with what's real,

You just come, and you go, never letting him know how you feel,

And I'm living here in doubt,

There's so much to talk about,

I know that we can work it out,

We can keep the fire burnin',

Let it keep us warm,

The world will keep on turnin',

Let it turn you on, let us not stop learnin'

We can help one another be strong,

Let us never lose our yearnin',

To keep the fire burnin' all night long,

We've been through this enough it gets rough,

but there's nowhere to run,

This is where we belong, we are strong,

We can never give up,

If we wanted to, we could,

But we've always understood,

To keep looking for the good,

Ooh, Keep the fire burnin',

Let it keep us warm,

The world will keep on turnin',

Let it turn you on, Let us not stop learnin',

We can help one another be strong,

Let us never lose our yearnin',

To keep the fire burnin',

Keep the fire burnin',

Let it keep us warm,

The world will keep on turnin',

Let it turn you on, let us not stop learnin',

We can help one another, be strong,

Let us never lose our yearnin',

To keep the fire burnin' all night long.



Roughly a week had gone by since Shego had sat for her centerfold, and so far, everyone was being extremely tight-lipped about who was winning the Playmate of the Year, or even if she was in the running,

"Tell me the truth, Stoppable, am I in, or out?" Shego asked, when she cornered Ron outside of Hef's office one morning,

"Shego, I can't tell you that, Hef prefers that no Playmate in the running be told who's in the lead, or even if they made the cut, that information is told at a luncheon that's held a week before Christmas, at which time I won't be here, I'll be going back to Middleton, and spending Christmas with Kim." Ron stated,

"I thought you were Jewish?" Shego asked, looking at Ron with a hard expression,

"I was born into a conservative Jewish family, I converted to Christianity about a year ago." Ron explained,

"Whoa, what did your parents think of that one?" Shego asked,

"They backed me on it, one hundred percent, said that I was old enough to make my own decisions, and left it at that ." Ron explained,

"And neither of them gave you any grief over it?" Shego asked, now arching an eyebrow in disbelief,

"Well, not without some grief, my mother was a little upset at it for a while, but she got over it." Ron replied,

"You plan to tell Kimmie what you do for a living?" Shego asked, referring to Ron's job photographing nude women for a men's magazine,

"Not at the moment, it's still too soon." Ron explained,

"Well, you'd better tell her soon, or she's gonna find out some other way." Shego commented,

"I know, Shego, and that's what scares me." Ron commented, now walking out from in front of the office door, and leaving it open.

Shego let her curiosity get the better of her, and she decided to walk into Hef's office, only to find Hef looking over several pages of something, a plain manilla envelope sitting on the ornate oak desk he was sitting behind, and a satisfied smile on his face,

"Whatcha reading?" Shego asked, sitting across from Hef, with a smile on her face,

"Interview for next months issue." Hef replied, now placing it back into the envelope, and looking at Shego with a question in his eyes.

Shego kind of cringed at the look, but shook it off,

"Who's it with?" Shego asked,

"Roland Pond, the senior record promoter for Capitol Records." Hef explained,

"'Pond scum', you actually went ahead with an interview with one of the dirtiest promoters in all of music?" Shego asked, bewildered at Hef's choice of interview subjects,

"He's not that bad," Hef said, looking at Shego, then adding swiftly, "is he?"

"The man lugs a trainload of shit behind him that would fertilize the Sinai, I wouldn't buy an apple from the son-of-a-bitch, even if he was /GIVING/ them away." Shego replied, a hard edge to her voice,

"How's that?" Hef asked, not noticing the door open up again, and Ron walking into the office, standing against the wall directly behind Shego,

"Do you know why he lost his job with Def Teen Records, or did the interviewer conveniently leave that bit of information out?" Shego asked,

"Not too sure, but something tells me that you know all the sordid details." Hef replied, now looking at Shego with interest,

"Oh, yeah," Shego replied, an evil grin spreading across her face, "he was run out of Def Teen on a rail by the Oh Boyz, because of a foiled kidnaping attempt that he did nothing to prevent." Shego commented,

"Now this is interesting . . . where did you find that one out?" Hef asked,

"During one of my many trips into prison, I ran into a one Senor Senior Senior, and his son, Senor Senior Junior, they made the attempt, and tried to get SSJ a singing contract with Def Teen, if it weren't for Kim Possible, the Oh Boyz would've stayed missing." Shego replied,

"So, those two thugs stole one of Def Teens hottest acts, and Pond refused to lift a finger to help?" Hef asked,

"Yup, he was only interested in the money, not if they lived, or died, if Stoppable hadn't messed up, and ended up getting kidnaped with them, Kimmie never would've gone after them." Shego replied, now turning around to see Ron,

"She's right, Hef, I was a bit of a stumblebum back then." Ron stated, a slight smile on his face,

"And you found all this out in prison?" Hef asked,

"Yep, it's amazing what a couple of months in the cooler can do for your brain." Shego replied, still smiling a very evil smile,

"So you're saying that this interview isn't hard-hitting enough to lend itself to the interviewer's title?" Hef asked,

"Nope, in fact, it's pure fantasy." Shego replied, now laying the twenty page interview onto the table, and frowning,

"Well, I need someone that will dig for answers, and I think you might be right for the job, in fact, Ron and I were discussing placing you on the staff." Hef explained,

"Me . . . on the staff . . . in what capacity?" Shego asked,

"Interviewer, and Investigative journalist." Hef replied, smiling,

"That works . . . I was starting to get bored in this place." Shego replied, now smiling,

"Make no mistake, you're still bound to the terms of your release, so any interviews you conduct will have to be done here, as for actually going out into the field, I think that you and Ron would make a good team, you, writing the story, and Ron, taking the pictures." Hef explained,

"Oh, give me the hard job, Hef." Ron stated, which caused Shego to laugh,

"I won't be too hard on you, Ronnie." Shego purred,

"Something tells me otherwise, Shego." Ron stated, laughing.



December 28th, 2005, and the choice for Playmate of the Year:


Shego was sitting near at the head table with the other eleven Playmates that made up the twelve centerfolds for 2005, and waiting for word from Hef on who had won, when Hef stood at the podium, the room immediately went quiet,

"And now, the moment you've all been waiting for, the selection of 2005 Playmate of the Year." Hef said, now opening a silver envelope emblazoned with the Playboy bunny logo,

"As you all know, the Playmate of the year is chosen by the senior staff, and by the amount of issues sold of that particular Playmate's centerfold . . . and the winner of the 2005 Playmate of the Year is . . . Sarah Gogh . . . Miss December." Hef said, in a booming voice that seemed to carry throughout the room.

Hearing her name rooted Shego to the spot, she had no trouble doing interviews, but speaking in public?

"I've never done this before." Shego said, looking at Julie McCollough, who was sitting on her right side,

"Relax, and just be yourself, you'll do good, trust me." Julie replied, a smile on her face.

Shego walked up to the podium, still shaking slightly, as she took the award from Hef,

"Wow," Shego stated, caught completely unprepared for this turn, "if I knew I was going to win, I would've had a speech prepared." she added, in a joking manner, which did get a couple of laughs,

"Well, first off, I need to thank Hef for giving me the opportunity to pose, and of course, to the person that took the pictures, unfortunately, he's not here, having gone home for the holidays, but my thanks go out to Ron Stoppable, for the phenomenal photos he took, I wouldn't be up here if it weren't for him."

Shego quickly let slip a small smile, and found her seat, without saying another word,

"Keep it short and sweet, huh?" Julie said, as Shego sat back down,

"Just following some advice my grandfather gave me when I was very young . . . K.I.S.S., keep it simple, stupid." Shego replied with a smile,

"Good advice." Julie said, cracking a slight grin.



Two days later:

Shego was sitting in a small room on the main floor of the mansion, across from her, sat the senior promoter for Capitol Records, Roland Pond, and Shego was frowning,

"So, you're saying that you left Def Teen records on your own?" Shego asked, looking at her interview subject, those emerald green eyes boring a hole into the man's chest,

"Yes, I left Def Teen because I felt that I had gone as far as I could with them." Pond replied,

"Not what I heard, and believe me, I found out another story." Shego commented, all the while, the small tape recorder in front of them kept on recording their conversation,

"And what did you hear?" Pond asked,

"That you were fired." Shego replied,

"Where did you hear that from?" Pond asked,

"Well, let's just say that I have my sources, and I did some digging of my own, and got the transcript of a meeting that the Oh Boyz had with the Def Teen Board of Directors . . . they asked for your resignation . . . the board decided instead to give you your outright release." Shego commented, still staring daggers at the man,

"And just how did you find out about this?" Pond asked,

"I happened to have tangled with the girl that brought you down with Def Teen, one Kim Possible." Shego mentioned,

"Really . . . and who are you?" Pond asked,

"Well . . . I currently go by my given name, Sarah Gogh, but for many years, I was known as Shego." Shego finally said, causing Pond to look as though someone had dropped an atomic warhead right where he sat,

"This interview is over . . . have a nice day, Miss Gogh." Pond said, standing up,

"If you want a chance to vindicate yourself, now is the time, otherwise, I /WILL/ go to print with what I have." Shego commented, now shutting the tape recorder off, and placing it into her pocket,

"Are you blackmailing me?" Pond asked,

"Nope, I don't make threats, and thanks to a couple of friends, I don't use blackmail to get what I need anymore, if you want to end the interview, fine by me, it's your right under the Constitution, I'll just take what I got to print right now." Shego commented, in a matter-of-fact voice,

"This interview is over, I'm leaving." Pond said, now storming out of Shego's makeshift office,

"Don't say you weren't warned." Shego said, now turning to the computer directly behind where she was sitting.

She began typing furiously, as though the keyboard had done her a serious wrong, when Ron walked in,

"Where's Pond going, he seems real agitated about something." Ron said, looking at Shego, and the ferocious nature with which she was assaulting the keyboard in front of her,

"He decided to try to run roughshod over me during his interview, so I hammered him." Shego commented, without even looking up,

"How?" Ron asked,

"I confronted him with his past." Shego commented airily,

"Uh-oh, something tells me that this is not going to be good." Ron stated,

"Hef wanted a hard-hitting interview, well, I didn't pull any punches with 'Pond scum', nor do I have any intentions of giving any of my interview subjects any lenience, just because they're some kind of superstar." Shego commented, her usually clear emerald eyes extremely bloodshot,

"Well, if that's what Hef wanted, but remember, there is such a thing as Plagiarism, and fraud laws in the journalism world, Shego, you need to have proof, and obtain it legally." Ron replied,

"I did, I contacted Def Teen Records, and got the meeting transcripts between the Oh Boyz, and the Board of Directors, why else would I bring that up in an interview, I'm not that stupid, Ron." Shego said, getting defensive quickly,

"Pull back the claws, Shego, I was only making sure." Ron said, backing away slightly, knowing what Shego could be like when in a bad mood, and it seems that this interview had put her in just that way,

"I know, Ron . . . I got all of my eggs in one basket for this one, I wanted to nail his ass to a wall for some time now, and I finally got the chance to do it, legally." Shego replied, smiling an evil smile, and placing her now completed interview into a plain manilla envelope, sealing it, getting up from her desk, and heading for the door,

"Ron, be a sweetheart, and turn off the light when you leave, please?" Shego asked, placing her hand, palm up, underneath Ron's chin, and allowing it to seductively be dragged across his chin, and jaw line, she then turned, walked out the door, and disappeared from sight.