Nicolas sat in the office, staring blankly at the ornate crown
moulding that flanked the oak paneling and chewed on one of his
fingers absentmindedly.  The leather chair squeaked softly with the
bouncing of his knee, and every so often he would turn to face the
doorway in a vain attempt to hear the conversation in the next room. 
Two voices no, three his publicist and two men.  They were steady,
confident and calm.  He knew they were coming by, but until
yesterday he had no idea what was going on.  He leaned his head back
and gazed at the ceiling, then closed his eyes.  From what he
understood, there was a website created by a fan that had some
questionable material on it nobody would give any details, but they
indicated that some of it was material that was less than desirable for
his reputation.  As much as he wanted to respect and appreciate his
fans, there were always a few of them that left him sour the
troublemakers, the ones who meant well but were a little too eager
and anxious.  Nic never made folly of those with mental imbalance, but
inevitably he encountered them from time to time.   They seemed to
be especially skilled at making themselves known to him, and although
he would never admit it, they made him want to give up the movie
business and hide under a rock.

          After a few minutes of conversation, his publicist led them into
the office.  By this time, Nicolas had tuned everything out, and didn't
hear them approach the chair.  He was startled from his alpha state by
a clammy hand with long, tapering fingers.
         "I'm Jason.", the taller man said, and thrust his hand out to Nic
as he stepped forward.  His starstruck fervor showed, and this made
him a little nervous for a moment.  "I'm a huge fan of your work, Mr.
Cage, and I'm prepared to do anything I can to put a stop to this.  The
agency might not have mentioned this, but I've actually been doing
some work on this case on my own.".  His last comment was made
with a smug, fake nonchalance, and the other techie tried not to roll
his eyes.  "I have all the equipment necessary IP maskers, decoders,
trackers there's no way she would ever track my identity."
           "So you said this woman has a message board?  What does it
say about me?".
           "The whole board is about you well, some of it's about your
wife.", the short guy said, not daring to look him in the eye.  A sick
churning in Nic's stomach caused him to slump down in the leather
couch.  "But this particular woman doesn't say anything about her. 
Really, aside from her stories, she's been keeping a low profile.".
           "Stories?".  By now, he was tuning out most of what was said,
but he was still curious enough to know about this.
           "Yes they're pretty graphic.  Some of your people Annette,
your lawyer they think that it would be best if they were taken
down.".
           "Why?  Are they lies?".
 The two techies glanced at each other nervously, sharing a
quick, dry smile.  Finally, Jason spoke up.  "No not exactly.  They're fiction, and she does make a disclaimer on the site.  But they're pretty graphic, and if they were copied and posted on other sites, some people might think
they're the truth.".
           Nicolas simply nodded his head and crossed his arms over his
chest.  The last thing he wanted was for people to think more of him
and his personal life than he cared to share.  He was an intensely
private man.  "So how do we intend to take care of this issue?"
           "Should I show him?", Jason asked, grinning eagerly.  The other
techie just shrugged his shoulders and looked away hesitantly, his
hands in his pockets.  Bending over, he opened a large satchel and
pulled out a laptop.  After finding a spot on a nearby desk, he fired it
up.  Finally, he turned to Nicolas, still not really looking him in the eye.
"We have a MySpace account set up it doesn't have your name
on it,", he added hastily, "but we made it look legit.  A big fan would
probably think it's real.".  The short kid plopped down in front of the
keyboard and tapped something in a profile appeared, plain and
unadorned with a light silver background.  Nicolas jumped out of the
leather chair to get a better look.  He leaned down a little, peering
over his shoulder.  
           "Can you put stuff on it, like pictures?".
           "Well, yeah",  Jason said, scrolling down the screen.  Nic saw
some familiar faces under the 'Friends' listing.  "but we didn't want to
put too much on there.  It wouldn't look believable.".
           "Why is my son on here?".
           "Oh, that's not his real profile.  We just made one up.", the other techie said as he scrolled to the right.  Looking closely at the picture, of a pudgy teenage boy in Goth makeup, he realized it was in fact someone else. 
"See?  It's me!", the short kid said, snickering under his breath.  "My
proverbial 15 minutes of fame.".
           "We didn't pimp your profile because, theoretically, you would be
too busy to do that, right?", Jason said, standing a little too
close to him.  He smells like sausage, Nicolas thought with disgust,
subconsciously stepping away.
           "Well, yeah, I guess that makes sense so all of those people
aren't real?".
           "Right.  We created them just to make things seem more
realistic.  The idea is to get this person to sign up and hang on long
enough to track her.  We just joined her message board and
mentioned this profile.", he said, scrolling down further.  "You know
'Oh, I heard about this profile, but I don't think it's real', yadda yadda
yadda.  I think it will get her interest.".
           "Fishing.", the other one said, staring intently over his partner's
shoulder.  "We want to catch this chick.".  Nic found himself
scrutinizing it as well.
           "Pythons?"
           The two techies look up at him expectantly.
           "No, no I have cobras.  Not pythons.", Nic said, pointing at the
monitor, under 'Interests'.  "We need to change that.".
           "Oh, yeah right.  OK, we'll do that.".

          The two men piddled around in the office for another half hour or
so while Nicolas paced outside, fretting over what might be circulating
about him and his family online.  By the time they had left, he had
moved on to other things it was an issue he was certain they could
rectify, and this wasn't the first time someone had used a computer to
screw him over.  He thought about the mass email that was sent to
everyone in his address book a couple of years back.  Ridiculous
childish bull****, he thought to himself.  An invitation to a fictional
party, with reference to he cringed when he thought of it, and rolled
his eyes in disgust.  Even if what's been written isn't as embarrassing
as the email fiasco, it still had to end.

          That evening, after his son was put to bed and his wife had
wandered off to another room, Nic picked up the notepad the techies
had left on the desk.  He went directly to the website, and on the left-
hand side of the screen he clicked on the link called "Tales".  He was
directed to links for several stories, and five hours later he realized
that he'd not only read every single story even those that were not
yet complete but was left with a stack of printed pages and a raging
flush of embarrassment and sexual adrenaline.  It wasn't so much the
content of the stories themselves, but the fact that they were all about
him.  The fact that a woman would find him so sexually appealing, and
for reasons that went beyond his fame and image, and then write such
detailed, structured stories to express herself he was intrigued and
wondered about her identity.

          After looking up the ID and password for his fake MySpace
account in the notepad, he accessed the page and waited after a few
seconds, it loaded.  He had a message.  At the moment he clicked on
it, he wondered if maybe this was really such a good idea it wasn't
exactly ethical, but if they could find out who this person was, then at
least it would solve a problem.  The last thing he needed in his
professional life was more problems.
 
           The message was from someone who had a little girl, or knew
someone who did a tiny pink and lavender fairy-child, touseled
blonde hair highlighted by gauzy nylon wings, popped up.  The name
didn't look familiar at all, but after opening the message he realized
her identity it was her, the woman they were attempting to bait.