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—