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Ford Prefect woke up pleasantly drunk.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy defines "pleasantly drunk" as "A subjective state that varies for all beings, dependent on such factors as individual metabolism, desired level of intoxication, whether or not one has to go to work the next morning, and sheer dumb luck." On this particular morning, Ford was in the delightful state of drunkenness that comes before the hangover and bruises and after the slurring incoherently and stumbling about bumping into things. There was a warm body in bed with him, with a morning salute to match his own pressed up against his thigh, and if there was anything else he had to do that morning, it paled in the face of such temptation.
Ford grinned to himself and slipped under the covers.
He was humming along, humping his own cock happily against the sheets and listening to Arthur's little wakeup noises, when he got the bright idea to do the tongue thing. That was when it all started to go downhill.
Not all of it, really, because the tongue thing had its usual effect; he had to clamp down on Arthur's hips hard with his hands, because there was a great deal of thrashing about and swearing. There usually was.
The swearing, however, was not usually in Santraginean.
According to a highly unscientific and quite possibly made-up poll that appears in the second edition of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Santraginean is the Galaxy's preferred language for vehement self-expression of all sorts. Its excellent vowel-consonant balance makes it trip easily off the tongue, and yet it is easily adaptable to the intensity of a given moment, unlike the glottal stops and tonal variations of G'klarb or the volume-dependent meaning fluctuations of Praxtibetel. Most Galactic travelers pick up a fair bit of the language eventually; Ford hadn't realized Arthur had done so.
Ford shrugged it off and kept going. The moans and curses increased in volume, and the Santraginean obscenities got more creative and began to be interspersed with things that sounded more like, "Yeah, baby, that's sweeeeeeet. Oh, oh, yeeeeaaahh, baby, baby, baby ..."
Ford began to get a sickening feeling that everything was not, after all, all right. Arthur Dent most certainly was not fluent in Santraginean. And he had never called Ford "baby" before, either.
Ford meant to stop, really he did. But a man needs his protein after a long night of drinking and matter-transference. Ford bobbed his head down and did the tongue thing again. And then, of course, it was too late.
He swallowed, and poked his head back up out of the blankets.
"Arthur?"
"Haven' seen 'im, Ford" the man muttered into his pillow, and began to snore. Ford peered at him closely. He certainly looked like Arthur Dent. Same mousy brown hair, same mouth slack with sleep, same foul morning breath Ford smelled every morning.
Ford thought for a moment. Whoever this was clearly knew Ford's name.
And called people "baby."
And could swear fluently in Santraginean.
Cursing under his breath in as many languages as possible (and there were quite a few, including Santraginean, available to him) Ford pulled on some trousers and headed out the door, giving it the vee as it thanked him for making a simple door very happy. He stood in the starboard hallway of the Heart of Gold, weaving slightly, and then stumbled his no-longer-pleasantly-drunk way toward the berth of Zaphod Beeblebrox, President of the Galaxy, inventor of the Pan-Galactic Gargle Blaster, and all-around cool frood.
At some point in the endeavors of all creative beings, the thought occurs that there is nothing new left to create. It has all, the despairing artistes realize, been done before.
The Composers' Guild of Zepulon Minor has developed a unique approach to this particular difficulty. Since every possible aesthetically pleasing musical permutation has already been explored somewhere, by someone, they reason, the best way to originality or some facsimile thereof is to create sound combinations nobody wants to hear. The worse compositions sound, the more original they are deemed to be.
Surprisingly enough, Zepulon Minor's composers are some of the richest in the Galaxy. Recordings of their music can cost as much as small planets, as very few musicians are willing to perform Zepularean compositions even for excessive hazard pay. They are, however, in great demand, as short pieces can be used as weapons of intimidation in warfare between hearing species, while longer symphonies have been known to be lethal to unsuspecting opposing forces.
Arthur Dent awakened feeling as though a Zepularean orchestra were tuning up in his head. He did not open his eyes. Someone was saying, "Arthur? Arthur, is that you?" but Arthur felt as though his brain had been ripped in half. He burrowed further down into the blankets.
"G'way, Ford," he managed. It came out creaky and hoarse and made his head throb horribly. What had he done last night, to feel like this? He vaguely remembered a party, a party at the Guide offices, and several Pan-Galactic Gargle-Blasters, but this was a hangover that even a Guide party could not have inspired. This was worse than the destruction of the Earth, worse than an hour spent with Marvin, worse, even, than being in Twickenham on a rugby day when the fans have been let loose, all of which were things that had also happened to Arthur. He took a moment out from the excruciating pain to wallow in a bit of self-pity.
"Arthur, open your eyes," Ford was saying. He really was annoyingly insistent, so Arthur did, just to shut him up. And was very nearly sick. How could he possibly be hung over when he was still so drunk he was seeing double? He squinted against the light, but Ford remained stubbornly twinned. Arthur began to experience low-level nausea, in addition to his headache.
The Fords were shoving something at him. Arthur looked blearily down. The something appeared to be packets of peanuts. "Eat the peanuts, Arthur," Ford was saying, the percussive sounds of the "p" and "t"s setting off small explosions of pain behind Arthur's eyes. He shut his eyes, held out his hand, and ate the peanuts Ford handed him with a martyred air.
Surprisingly, he felt better almost immediately.
Once the headache had receded to a dull throb, he opened his eyes again. And promptly shut them, as there were still two of Ford, both wearing an expression of ingratiating cheerfulness that had, historically, boded no good for the life of one Arthur Dent. It occurred to Arthur that perhaps today would be a very, very good day for an extended lie-in. He stayed quite still, kept his eyes closed, and hoped Ford would go away.
Instead, he heard a rustling of fabric and felt a draft as the covers were lifted. Moments later, a delightfully naked Ford (just one!) climbed into the bed and snuggled up to Arthur. Also an acceptable solution, Arthur thought muzzily, and prepared to go back to sleep. Ford, however, had other ideas.
"Arthur," Ford said, slipping chilly arms around him and causing him to squeal slightly, "What do you remember about last night?"
Arthur sighed — so much for the lie-in — and considered. "You, me, Zaphod, Trillian. The Guide party. Getting cornered by some really annoying minor deity from Asgard who kept scuffing his feet on the carpet and shocking me and wouldn't leave off. A few Pan-Galactic Gargle Blasters. And, er, not much after that, really." Arthur searched his brain for further scraps of memories that might possibly have been of the previous night.
"Not much at all...except, hang on, I was going to fly home, but Trillian said I was too drunk, and I said I wasn't, and she said Zaphod was, and I had to take him home too, so we used that Sub-Etha thing you've got, I remember that!" He turned his head and looked at Ford triumphantly, and was immediately sorry, as both Fords were still there, despite the fact that he only felt one of them wrapped around him.
The Fords looked a bit discomfited. "Yes, well, about that, Arthur. I'm afraid we've got a bit of a problem."
"Oh, really," Arthur said, meaning to sound dangerous, but actually coming off a bit panicked. "And what would that be?"
The Fords smiled in a way that showed far too many teeth to be reassuring. "Er," they said, "you haven't looked in the mirror yet today, by any chance?"
"Ford, you just woke me up. Of course I haven't ..." Arthur trailed off as the import of Ford's question hit him. He looked around wildly. The room was dark-panelled, luxurious, and filled to the brim by the enormous bed in which they were currently lying. It was not, in short, their room. He looked at his hands, clutching the bedspread with white knuckles. They were not his hands; there were too many rings, and too many hands, for them to be his. Finally, and with a sense of grim foreboding, he partially relinquished the bedcovers and brought two hands up to touch his face. Faces.
"Ford," Arthur said, in a very dry, reasonable tone of voice with hints of hysteria, light notes of panic, and a bouquet redolent of complete meltdown, "what happened last night, and why am I wearing Zaphod Beeblebrox's body?"
"I'd blame the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation, if I were you," the Fords offered brightly. "You and Zaphod seem to have switched in the matter transference process last night. He's got your body, and you've got his. Bit of a mess, really."
"He's got my ... wait." Arthur spluttered as his brain (brains?) tried to catch up with Ford's statement. Belatedly, he realized what the problem was with his vision, and shut the eyes of his left head. The Fords instantly resolved into one Ford. Arthur ignored the part of his brain that was enumerating all the absolutely fascinating things a normally active, healthy man could do with two identical twin Fords, and concentrated on the bit that was gibbering in panic.
"Ford, how do you know Zaphod's got my body?" he finally asked, proud of himself for sounding relatively calm. It was a good question, a reasonable question, and his voice hadn't cracked, though he might have shrieked just a little bit, just at the end there.
"Er." Ford said, and his smile lost some of its intensity, making him look almost sane. "Well, I woke up first, you see, and I was feeling a bit frisky, so to speak. And, well, you know that thing? That I do with my tongue? The one you like so much, that makes you squeak?"
("I do not squeak," Arthur squeaked.)
"Er, well," Ford continued hurriedly, "you called me 'Baby,' when I did that, in several languages I'm fairly sure you don't know."
"You did. The tongue thing. To Zaphod." Arthur noted, in a completely detached and totally calm way, that his decibel level was rising rapidly. Ford looked aggrieved.
"Here now, I think you're focusing on all the wrong bits of this. I thought he was you, Arthur! I woke up first. He wasn't even awake. And he looked like you." Ford looked earnest - or as earnest as a half-drunk Betelgiusian Guide reporter can, which isn't very.
"So, you stopped then, right?" Arthur folded his (Zaphod's?) arms across his chest, which left him with one arm over. That didn't seem entirely right, so he uncrossed them again and instead fixed Ford with what he hoped was an intimdating glare. "Tongue thing, 'Baby,' 'whoops, sorry, wrong fellow, didn't mean to intrude,' was that it?"
"Er," Ford said.
"Oh my God," Arthur said. "You utter slag."
Ford, unwisely, looked flattered. "I thought he was you, see, but then he said "Baby," and I did think ... but then I was already down there and ..."
"Ford," said Arthur, "shut up."
Arthur closed his eyes briefly and wondered if he should try to go back to sleep. Perhaps the world would be better the next time he woke up. But now that he was more awake, he could feel the weight of his second head on the pillow, the slightly different responses of muscles controlled by two central nervous systems, the minutely faster beat of his heart ... the sensitive skin of his morning erection. At least some things stayed constant, he thought with a sense of relief, reaching down to pet it almost affectionately.
His fingers touched an unfamiliar exposed ridge and he snatched his hand away. Arthur shuddered slightly, rolled his head to the side and fixed Ford with a flat stare.
"I," he said, "am having a very bad morning. I have acquired, overnight," and his voice rose an octave and a few decibels, "a second head and a third arm, lost," and his voice rose again, "an important body part ..."
"Wait," Ford interrupted, looked horrified. "You lost ... you mean, Zaphod hasn't got ..."
"Hasn't got a foreskin, that's right, Ford," Arthur spat. Ford looked relieved, but quickly regained his earlier expression of dismay as Arthur took a deep breath and launched back into his complaint.
"... And found that my alien boyfriend has cheated on me ..." As his voice rose to a shriek, it was promptly muffled by Ford's mouth. Ford pulled him into a deep, enthusiastic kiss, and for a moment, there was blessed silence.
If Ford Prefect were truthful, a state of affairs which, to maintain his professional reputation as a Guide reporter, he tended to avoid at all costs, he might confess that he had originally begun sleeping with Arthur Dent mainly because it seemed to be the best way to (a) shut him up and (b) calm him down.
Over time, other benefits to the arrangement had become clear, such as the fact that Arthur, when not panicking and when well-supplied with tea, wasn't half-bad company, the convenience and novelty of having a flying boyfriend, and the not-to-be-discounted fact that Arthur could also do the tongue thing. Still, it had all originated from Ford's extremely low tolerance for shouting and carrying on, especially first thing in the morning.
The technique worked much better, Ford discovered, when Arthur Dent had only one head.
After a brief "mmmpphh!" and a little flailing, Arthur opened his other mouth and continued at top volume, "And that said cheating boyfriend's stupid Sub-Etha Sens-o-whatsit has accidentally switched my body with that of the President of the Galaxy..." He was cut off again, as a quick-thinking Ford shoved two fingers into the mouth that wasn't already busy with kissing.
"Mmmpphh!" Arthur said again, indignantly, but was promptly distracted by the mechanics of managing two busy mouths and an armful of extremely horny and motivated Ford Prefect.
Ford was kissing Arthur for all he was worth, and working his fingers in and out of Arthur's other mouth. His free hand was groping beneath the covers, and when he felt Arthur stop struggling and start rubbing up against him, he figured that he could let up for a moment.
"Lost your foreskin, have you?" he gasped, running his hand over the area in question. "Shall I kiss it and make it better, then?" Not waiting for an answer, he started to slide down the bed to do just that, but was stopped by a hand on his arm. Arthur looked confused, and the eyes of his non-finger-sucking head were glazed with lust (the other set were closed in bliss), but he said, "Wait ... wait, Ford. You can't just ... it's not ... I'm in Zaphod's body, for crying out loud, Ford. It wouldn't be right."
Ford halted his downward progress, but left his hands where they were, moving them casually. "So let me get this clear, Arthur. It's not right when it's your body, but not you, and it's not right when it's not your body, but it is you." He stroked a little harder, watching Arthur's eyes glaze further. "But I've already been with your body, so I was half-right, but only half. In order to be totally faithful to you, doesn't that mean I have to be with you now, like this - get the body and the mind, so to speak?"
Arthur gurgled slightly around Ford's fingers and nodded his other head in lust-induced automatic agreement. "Yes, I ..." and then he stopped, looking perplexed. "Ford, are you sure that makes sense?"
"Absolutely," said Ford, and scooted the rest of the way down, wrapping his mouth around Arthur's circumcised erection and humming happily.
"Ohhhh, well, that's all right, then," Arthur panted weakly. He suddenly felt that Ford's fingers were rather inadequate for sucking, and pulled impatiently at Ford's hip, trying to get him to turn around.
Ford Prefect was a contrary man, and often refused people things for the sheer glee of watching them turn red and shout. He was a capricious man, given to ballsing up others' plans for the pure pleasure of changing his mind. He had been known to send back dishes that were, in fact, exactly what he had ordered, just to see hardened waitresses cry. But when push came to shove, Ford Prefect knew where his towel was. He removed his fingers from Arthur's mouth and scrambled about a bit until his hips were up closer to the pillows.
It took Arthur a moment to coordinate both heads. It had been easier to manage when his cock - or was it Zaphod's cock? - was not enveloped in a hot, eager mouth, and when wet, clever fingers were not teasing inside him, bit by bit. His necks wobbled, and he went in and out of double vision a few times before remembering to close one set of eyes, but he finally managed it. And really, Arthur found, it was quite amazing what one could do when given two mouths rather than one.
Silence, blissful silence, reigned for a few moments, broken only by sighs and suckling sounds. Then sighs turned to moans, and the moans got louder.
Ford came first.
The moans continued, interspersed now with words. "Oh! Oh ... yes ... oh ... oh, oh, yes ... oh ... Ford!"
Then it was silent again, except for the heavy breathing, which eventually calmed and receded.
"Ford?" said Arthur, after a few moments.
"Mmmm?"
"What are we going to do?"
"I thought we could have a bit of a lie-in before breakfast, actually." Ford dragged his body around so that he lay with his head on the pillow, and snuggled up.
"No, Ford," Arthur said through clenched teeth, "I mean what are we going to do about the fact that thanks to your bloody Sub-Etha Sens-o-thingy,"
("Sens-o-Matic," Ford muttered.)
"... Zaphod and I have apparently switched bodies."
"Well," Ford said brightly, "why do we need to do anything? That ... thing you can do now, with the two heads, that's even better than the tongue thing."
Arthur glowered at him, but Ford continued gamely, "And perhaps Zaphod's perfectly happy in your body, you never know ..." He was interrupted by a sudden, blood-curdling scream from the other side of the ship.
"Ah," said Ford. "Apparently not." He looked at Arthur as though he had just realized they were naked, sweaty, and lounging about in a bedroom (and in one case, a body) that properly belonged to someone else.
A someone else who, judging by the rapidly increasing volume of the continued screams, was entirely distressed already, and headed their way.
"Oh, dear," Ford said, "this will be awkward."