The glass-panel door opened with the chime of the door sensor, easily heard from anywhere in the shop. The opossum leaning against the counter beside the register stood up a bit straighter, a smile crossing his muzzle. "Afternoon, Vicki! Looking for anything particular?"
The critter who the clerk had addressed was not exactly normal, nor was her reason for coming. She was a phonodroid, a type of artificial intelligence constructed with analogue data technology in some anachronistic pursuit of an aesthetic. Her metallic skin was a very well-polished purple, with little rainbow bands decorating her surface. Her chest-plate, however, had the appearance of a highly polished wood, surrounding a tape deck and its associated buttons. Directly beneath was a glass panel over her stomach, which allowed the vinyl inside to be seen spinning, with the needle shifting about to access different grooves. On each thigh were a set of two speakers set within similar wooden panels to her chest, as well as the whole of her feet. Her fingers shared the same wooden appearance as well, extending from beneath the larger plate contiguous with her forearms that made up the back of her hands. The palms matched the bare metallic look of her long, segmented tail, the thick limb tipped with an oversized power plug.
Her eye-visor changed up its oscilloscope-based display to show happy eyes and her metal ears perked up away from where they usually dangled on either side of her head. "Oh, Mark, I'm glad it's you on shift!" Her nose-bulb flashed as she spoke, her needle-arm rapidly flicking about to access the different phonemes fast enough for an unbroken vocal experience. She walked from the door towards a ladder that was set up to access the higher shelves. "I like you." Her visor changed to show a momentary wink, before she turned her attention to the vinyls stored within their cardstock sleeves.
"Oh... uh... thank you." Mark blushed lightly, stepping out from behind the counter. "Is there a certain type of LP you prefer to consume?"
Swaying her large tail, she casually put a wood-patterned foot on the bottom rung of the ladder, before starting to climb, her joints quietly squirking against each other from just how well-polished they were. "Any analogue media is good, but I really prefer mass market records. Quick press, cheap polyvinyl... It's junk food, I admit." She giggled a bit to herself as she took a few off the shelf and held them under one arm.
The opossum swallowed, looking at her thick tail where it met up with her hips. Whoever had constructed her had spent time making sure she had a bottom-heavy figure to support that large of a tail. "And... uh... what about your... custom records?"
Vicki's visor showed a pair of ovals beneath wide eyes, appearing to be a cartoony blush. She turned her face away, her large tail's plug grasping onto the shelf next to the ladder, revealing the tines to be able to grab like fingers. Her powerful rear limb easily rolled the ladder along to another section for her to peruse. "I don't cut records, myself..." She murmured as she started selecting LPs again.
Mark cleared his throat, making a cursory check to make sure no other customers would be coming in shortly. He looked back to her. "I know that you can... well... make people into media... Happened to Polly, after all."
Not looking back at him just yet, the phonodroid swayed her shapely hips, releasing the shelf with her tail to let it hang and sway as well. When she turned her face back to him, her display had taken on a bit more flirtatious of an expression, blush gone. "Only if I really like them." Her voice had modulated a bit, still cheerful but a bit smoother.
Walking closer to the ladder, the clerk swallowed, fidgeting and tapping his index fingers together in front of his chest. "Do you... really like me?"
Vicki's display showed her eyebrows cocking playfully to one side. "I already told you I do~ When I came in."
Mark's cheeks flared in a blush, twitching.
She took the stack of LPs that she had been accruing and placed them on the top step of the ladder, thankfully flat and broad enough for them to stay put. "And when would you like to be claimed by me, cutie?"
The opossum tensed up, his blush deepening. He fiddled his fingers together, eyes darting to the door and then back to her hips, then to her teasing expression. "Uh... S-Surprise me?"
Vicki's face returned to its cheery look from when she entered the shop. "Okay!" Her voice had changed back as well. At first Mark thought that she would just go back to browsing, but instead, she kept turning past the shelf until her rear was facing the clerk. The metallic tail lifted a bit as she leaned back, the spread tines at the tip's plug pressing against the opossum's back to keep him in place.
Then she toppled off the ladder. "Ooops~" She called out playfully as her glossy rear end plummeted towards the very much flesh and blood critter.
Mark let out a yelp, his instinctive attempt to step back blocked by the tail at his back. To his surprise, he didn't feel a hard impact, a soft warmth pressing down against his face, then against his shoulders and arm... and then he realized he was the softness.
Vicki thudded to the floor rump and tail striking the floorboards at the same time, shaking every shelf in the shop. The phonodroid planted her plug against the wood and pushed, getting her feet under her soon after.
As soon as she was standing upright, a bare vinyl record peeled off her rear and fell towards the ground. With a jut of her hips, her plug's tines caught it before it could touch wood, then passed it to the synthetic wood print of her fingers. She looked down at the record, on which there was a paper sticker with a silhouette of a feral opossum curled up behind the text printed on it. 'Mark Gold, Vicki Records. Side A: Cute Blushy Noises'
She held open the glass cover of her stomach and carefully slipped the record past the one currently under the needle into her deep, hidden storage. "Surprise~"
