Authors: Edward Lee
“I-I,” Slydes blubbered. “I don’t understand.”
“Listen, there’s no good place in Hell, but there are places that are worse than others. Like this place, St. Putrada Circle. You must’ve been a real scumbag to be Rematerialized
here
. Yes, sir, a real humdinger of a shitty person.”
“I don’t understand!” Slydes now sobbed outright.
“A Prefect is like a small District. And this one happens to be a Fistulation and Surgical Transversion Prefect. I’ll keep an eye out for Abduction Squads. They’ll Transvert
anybody here, Humans and Hellborn alike, but Humans are the desired target. The Surgery Centers pay the most for Humans.”
Slydes looked cross-eyed at her.
“The short version. Every Prefect, District, or Town has to have an active mode of punishment, while there are some areas, known as Punitaries, that exist
solely
for punishment. But anyway, this Prefect uses Fistulatic Surgery to conform to the Punishment Ordinances. Fistula is Latin; it means ‘communication between,’ and Transversion is, like, rerouting things. That’s what they do here—they reroute your insides.”
Even though Slydes didn’t have a
clue
what she was talking about, he stammered, “Whuh-whuh-
why?
”
Andeen smirked. “Because it’s perverse and disgusting, the way it’s
supposed
to be. This isn’t
Romper Room
, Slydes. This is Hell, and Hell is hard-core. Eternal torment, suffering, and abhorrence is the name of the game. It pleases Lucifer, therefore, it’s Public Law.” She smirked more sharply this time. “Look, go over to that public washbasin and wash the bat crap out of your hair. It’s grossing me out.”
Dazed, Slydes noted the elevated stone basin only feet from the alley mouth. He dunked his head in the water, agitated the rank guano out of his hair, then seized up and jerked his head out when he realized what he was washing in.
“That’s not water! That’s piss!”
“Get used to it,” Andeen said. “Unless you’re a Grand Duke or an Archlock, you’ll never get
near
fresh water. Only other way is to distill it yourself out of the blood of what you kill.”
Revolted, Slydes flapped the urine off his face, then noticed lower basins erected intermittently along the smoky street. “What are those things? They look like–”
“Oh, the commodes. It’s another Public Law. In this
Prefect, it’s mandatory that everyone urinate, defecate, and give birth in public.”
Slydes’s bearded jaw dropped.
“And there”—Andeen pointed—“across the street. There’re the various Surgery Suites.”
Slydes scanned the signs over each transom . . .
RECTO-URINARY TRANSVERSION
URETHRAL-ESOPHAGEAL REVERSAL
UTERO-RECTAL FISTULA
And many, many more.
Slydes could not conceive of any of this.
When he glanced inadvertently between two more spiring buildings, he could’ve shrieked. Far off in the distance, some monumentlike
thing
stood impossibly high, but it was a
figure
. He remembered seeing the Statue of Liberty once a long time ago, on a drug run between Florida and New York—that’s what this reminded him of . . . sort of.
A giant statue
, he thought.
But
. . .
Andeen caught him staring. “Oh, the Demonculus. It hasn’t been up long. Pretty awesome, huh?”
Slydes peered at her, incredulous, then peered back up at the statue. “A Deeeee—”
“Demonculus. It’s farther away than it looks—that’s actually the Pol Pot District over there. The Demonculus is 666 feet high. Looks like a statue, right?”
Slydes dumbly nodded, noting the pointed crown about the form’s head, akin to the Statue of Liberty. But . . . was it a crown, or horns?
Andeen inspected her black fingernails with tiny white upside-down crosses. “Well, it’s not a statue, it’s a living thing—just another one of the Boss’s obsessions.”
The impact of her words finally registered. Slydes looked pleadingly at her. “Living . . .
thing?
”
“Um-hmmm. Once it’s activated, it will tear the shit out of whole Districts to root out insurgents.” She smiled at his
trauma. “For the rest of eternity, Slydes, you’re gonna be seeing some really wild and really awful stuff.”
Her evilly tattooed hand pulled him back into the alley. “And look, there’s an Abduction Squad. The clay men are called Golems. They’re like state employees, public works, police, security, stuff like that . . .”
Slydes watched with a cheek to the edge of the alley wall as a troop of gray-brown things shaped like men thudded down the sidewalk, each shoving along a handcuffed Human, Demon, or Hybrid. The Golems were nine feet tall and walked in formation. Then they all stopped at the same time, and marched their prisoners into various Surgery Suites.
“And like I said, the state pays more money for Humans, so that’s why we gotta get you out of the Prefect.”
Slydes whipped his face back around, and repeated, helplessly now, “I don’t understand . . .”
“Once you’ve seen what goes on here . . . you will. Oh, and check out this chick.”
Slydes watched as a morose-faced nude woman who appeared to be half Human and half Troll staggered toward one of the street commodes. She leaned over, parted her buttocks, and began to urinate out of her anus.
“See?” Andeen asked. “Oh, wow, and check this out! Here comes a Uteral-Oral Fistulation . . .”
A woman in a bloody smock labored down the street. She was covered with red-rimmed white scales . . . and was obviously quite pregnant. She held a scaled hand to her bloated belly, and when she could walk no longer she stopped, leaned over, and—
SPLAT!
—out gushed a slew of amniotic water from her mouth. She maintained the uncomfortable position, and as her belly began to tremor, her jaw came unhinged. Her throat began to impossibly swell, and as her stomach shrunk in
size, a squalling, demonic fetus slid hugely out of her mouth and flapped to the pavement.
“How’s that for the spectacle of childbirth?” Andeen jested. “Pregnancy is a big deal in Hell, Slydes. If Lucifer had his way, every single female life form here would be pregnant at all times. You see, the more babies, the more food, fuel, and fodder for Lucifer’s whimsy.”
Slydes leaned against the wall, moaning, “No, no, no . . .”
“Yes, yes, yes, my friend. And if you think
that
was bad, get a load of this guy. Remember what I said about pregnancy?”
Slydes’s gaze involuntarily veered back to the street. This time, a Human man stumbled along. He wore a wife-beater T-shirt and stained boxer shorts dotted with Boston Red Sox insignias. If anything, though, his stomach looked even more bloated than the woman who’d just delivered a devilish baby through her mouth.
Slydes stammered further, in utter dread, “He’s not—he’s not—he’s not—”
“Pregnant?” Andeen smiled darkly. “Male pregnancy is a fairly new breakthrough here, Slydes. And you can bet it tickles Lucifer pink. Teratologic Surgeons can actually transplant Hybrid wombs into
male
Humans and Demons. It’s a trip. Watch.”
Slydes watched.
Grimacing, the bloated man stepped out of his boxers and squatted. Amid boisterous grunts and wails, his rectum slowly dilated, then—
He shrieked.
—out poured a gush of what looked like squirming hairless puppies, with tiny webbed paws and little horns in their heads.
“Ah,” Andeen observed, “a brood of Ghor-Hounds. Pretty rowdy, huh?”
“Rowdy!” Slydes bellowed. “This is FUCKED UP! That guy just pumped a litter of PUPPIES out his ASS!”
“Yeah. And watch what he does now . . .”
Gravid stomach gone now, the exhausted man abandoned his litter on the sidewalk and trudged over to one of the street commodes.
What, he’s gonna take a piss?
Slydes wondered when the man poised an understandably shriveled penis over the commode.
The answer to his question, however, would be a most resolute
No
.
Now the man’s cheeks billowed. He began to grunt.
And his penis . . . began to swell.
“Ahhhh,” he eventually moaned as the penis, next, began to disgorge firm stools. Quite a number of them squeezed out and dropped into the commode. When he was finished, he pulled his boxers back on, and at the same time caught Slydes staring agape at him.
“What’s the matter, buddy? You act like you never saw a guy take a shit through his dick before.”
“In case you’re wondering,” his hostess said, “the procedure that guy underwent is called a Recto-Urethral Fistulation . . .”
Slydes reeled. When he could regain some modicum of sense, he glared back at Andeen, and howled, “This is impossible! Women can’t have
babies
out their mouths! Their mouths aren’t
big
enough! And men can’t shit
turds
through their cocks! Their
peeholes
aren’t
wide
enough! It’s IMPOSSIBLE!”
Andeen seemed amused. “You’ll learn soon enough that in Hell . . .
anything
is possible. Now come on.”
Dizzied, aghast, Slydes trudged after her. She walked fast, her high breasts bouncing, her flawless rump jiggling with each stride. “Once I get you out of this Prefect and on one of the Interways, you’ll be a lot safer. Believe me, you
don’t want to hang out here.” She grinned over her shoulder. “You’re damn lucky I’m an
honest
Orientation Directress, Slydes.”
“Huh?”
“There are a lot of dishonest ones. They’d tip off an Abduction Squad and turn you in—for money, of course.”
“Huh?”
“Just come on. I know, you’re confused right now, and you can’t remember much. Eventually it’ll all sink in, and you’ll be all right.”
Slydes sorely doubted that he would ever be all right, not in Hell. But he did feel some gratitude toward Andeen for endeavoring to get him out of the abominable Prefect.
Anywhere, anywhere
, his thoughts pleaded.
Take me anywhere because no matter how bad the next place is, it can’t be as bad as this
. . .
“Here’s the shortcut out, and don’t worry about the gate.” She lifted something from beneath her tongue. “I have the key.”
Thank God
. . . Slydes followed the lithe woman down another reeking alley whose end terminated in a chain-link gate closed by an antiquated lock. When Andeen finnicked with the key, rust sifted from the keyhole.
That thing better open
, Slydes fretted.
“I guess the hardest thing to get used to for a Human in Hell is, well, the insignificance. Know what I mean?”
“Huh?” Slydes said.
“No matter what we were in the Living World, no matter how strong, how beautiful, how rich, how
important
. . . in Hell we’re nothing. In fact, we’re less than nothing.” She giggled, still jiggling the key. “Do you follow me, Slydes?”
Slydes was getting pissed. “I don’t know what’cher talkin’ about! Just open that fuckin’ lock so we can get out of here!”
She giggled but then frowned. “Damn. This bugger’s tough. Check the alley entrance, will you—”
“All riiiiiiiii—” But when Slydes looked behind him he shrieked. Proceeding slowly down the alley was a congregation of the short, dog-faced, implike things he’d seen previously on the street. They grinned as they moved forward, fangs glinting.
Slydes tugged Andeen’s arm like a child tugging its mother’s. “Luh-luh-look!”
Andeen’s tattooed brow rose when she glanced down the alley. “Shit. Broodren. They’re demonic kids and they’re
all
homicidal. The little fuckers have gangs everywhere—”
“Open the lock!”
She played with the key most vigorously, nervous herself now. “They’ll haul our guts out to sell to a Diviner; then they’ll screw and eat what’s left . . .”
“Hurry!” Slydes wailed.
Suddenly the pack of Broodren broke all at once into a sprint, cackling.
When they were just yards away—
CLACK!
—the lock opened. Slydes peed his jeans as Andeen dragged him to the other side. She managed to relock the gate just as several Broodren pounced on it, their dirty, taloned fingers and toes hooked over the chain links.
“Jesus! We barely made it!”
Andeen sighed, wiped her brow with her forearm. “Tell me about it, man.”
“What now?” Slydes looked down a stained brick corridor that seemed to dogleg to the left. “How do we get out?”
“Around the corner,” Andeen said.
They trotted on, turned the corner, and—
“Holy motherfuckin’ SHIT!” Slydes yelled when two stout gray-brown forearms wrapped about his barrel chest and hoisted him in the air.
Tall shadows circled round in total silence.
Slydes screamed till his throat turned raw.
“One thing you need to know about Hell,” Andeen chuckled, “is that
trust
does not exist.”
Five blank-faced Golems stood round Slydes now, and it was in the arms of a sixth that he was now captive.
One of them handed Andeen a stack of bills. “Thanks, buddy. This guy’s a
real
piece of work. He deserves what he’s getting.” Then she winked at Slydes and pointed up to another transom. It read:
DIGESTIVE TRACT REVERSAL SUITE
.
“For the rest of eternity, Slydes,” she intoned through a sultry grin. “You’ll be eating through your ass and shitting out your mouth.”
“Nooooooooooooo!” Slydes shrieked.
The Golems trooped toward the door, Slydes kicking and screaming, all to no avail.
“Welcome to Hell,” were Andeen’s parting words.
Slydes’s screams silenced when the suite door slammed shut, and Andeen traipsed off, greedily counting the stack of crisp bills. Each bill had the number one hundred in each corner, but it was not the portrait of Benjamin Franklin that graced each one, it was the face of Adolf Hitler.
Six words drifted across his mind when he entered the bar:
A whore is a deep ditch
. . .