Fragments Fiction

THE ALIEN'S BUNGHOLE

April 15, 2011

Mungo looked down from the balcony of the Pig And Gruel in Culloden, near Inverness Scotland. He stamped for the patrons to acknowledge his presence, like Linda Loman demanding attention must be paid.

"Take this day and shove it sideways all of ya!" Mungo roared like a new Lionheart. The drunks and college students raised their glasses without looking up.

"Hear-hear!" They rumbled, returning to their cri de couer, pints and chips. Satisfied, Mungo descended. His life was tapping kegs of pilsner, ale and bock just like he tapped his current Annie Fanny. Mungo's tally claimed one hundred beers a day for thirty years. Served with a smile, he claimed too. Valiantly facing a brave new world, the undiscovered land of a new day. Christ, did Mungo hate this life he'd made!

"I say guv'nah," Petey O'Pevis raised his blood-rimmed eyes up from his pint, "Like the old philosopher, I would gladly pay you Tuesday for a pint today." Mungo's eyes narrowed and his lips quivered at the ghastly thought of food on credit.

"Damn you Petey, your albatross of a wife was lookin' for ya last night. I didn't say you was drinkin' with Molly Midgen and Millie Merkin in my poolroom. You know what the rule is around here; a tight tongue never runs a tab."

"You got a pair of mean bollocks, Mungo. Us men should stick." Petey slipped a five-pounder onto the bar. Mungo rang it into the cash register.

"Good. Now tell me, which of you three boozy fools stuck a foot into the wall? It needs fixin' or you is gettin' the bill."

"Molly did it. That girl has a kick like..." Petey's hands shook so hard they he couldn't hold his glass. He gripped the glass in his teeth and leaned backwards slurping his own little bit of John Barleycorn through his teeth. A few drops dribbled down his cheeks. He licked the rim of the glass, lapping up the last drops like a dog. Mungo took out his cellphone and keyed the phone number of Petey's house to the screen.

"Now Mungo, there's a priest's hole in yer poolroom. Got writin' on the walls, too."

"A priest's hole, what a revolting thought. Damn Papists spoiled the country with their holier than thou buggery. Can't be any damn good." The sounds of tourist bus and tourists interrupted Mungo.

Three days every week, the busses disgorged tourists from afar. On those days, Mungo stopped browbeating his staff to victimize tourists. Today, a fat American tourist, his equally obese wife and their doggie named Sneezy-Poo who lived in her purse came into his domain and entered his web. The tourist gave Mungo a cheery, chipmunk-like smile and squinted over fat, stubbly cheeks. His wife sat down, doubling and redoubling her chins over her ample bosoms. She could hold four pints on that rack, thought Mungo.

"You must be Mungo McNevin. Our bestest friends Sally and Burt spoke of many happy times in your pub. That's why my wife decided to stop. I'm Albert Wilson but my friends call me 'Bud'. Burt said you served authentic British hamburgers made from ham."

"We serve food here," Mungo said. He considered asking this woman about the Vagina Monologues but he last time he did that, the mayor made him write a letter of apology. After he delivered the letter, the mayor made fun of him by saying that he moved his lips while he read. Mungo hated the mayor less than his instantaneous contempt for Sally and Burt and who cares what the dog is named.

"Say, you Scots know a lot about history but what's fascinated me over the years is British cuisine. Why Sally and Burt said you knew the entire history of Brit cuisine and I said to my wife if there was any place in the world we had to stop, it's this pub. They said you were the perfect host and would show us a really good time." Burt cleaned his glasses with his Scotch Tape plaid tie. Burt might never have read The Ugly American but Mungo had and now he believed Burt to be its star. The pub regulars hid their faces in their pints. Revenge was on the menu.

"I'll seat them at table 13," Cordelia said. Table 13 was as far from Mungo as she could get the tourists. Mungo followed, silent and deadly. When she turned, Mungo stood an inch from her body. She screamed so loud, the regulars juked and cringed.

"Ya gave me a fleg. I dinnae hear ye." She slipped around Mungo and stepped away. Hesitating, she turned back to Mungo.

"I'll take care of these fine people," he said, adding in a whisper, "Two manky fudwad." Cordelia went back to the bar, catching Petey clucking in his pint.

"Ga-waaan," Cordelia smacked the back of Petey's head. Their eyes shifted back to Mungo. Eyeballing made Mungo madder than a hatter and he'd take it out on the tourists.

"Well sir, here at the Pig and Gruel, we take historical authenticity to the extreme. Some of out patrons eat the original fried ham patties, other settle for beef patties, which if I may point out, are less than historically accurate. I like the food in my pub to be authentic in all respects," Mungo explained. Burt blinked his eyes, raised his glasses and then lowered them.

"I've never heard about beef being substituted for ham but if you insist, my wife and I will be glad to try it and since we heard so much about you, please call me Bud. I feel a kinship formed between us long ago." The wife arranged her purse on a chair so that Sneezy-Poo could watch them. It barked and Mungo snarled back, scaring it. Sally busied herself with her makeup. Mungo glared at the woman and turned to the husband.

"Bud, you say. You look more like a Ned to me. And your lovely wife, well she puts me in mind of one of our local heroines, Senga Numpty from East Cundy, a truly courageous woman. Her daughter is rightly famous for inventing the word - skankalicious - when she was written up in the Daily Post." Mungo struck a pose, left hand on his hip and right hand in the air like a tea spout. He swished his hips. Cordelia interrupted with the water. Burt sipped the water then touched his wife's chubby hand.

"Honey, we're going to have some authentic food for lunch. Isn't that great?"

"Of course darling. I hope this isn't like our trip to India. You know what all those curry spices did to Sneezy-Poo." She spoke in a nasal, high-pitched squeak altogether out of place for her size.

"I remembered his medicine this trip." He petted the dog.

"I reminded you enough. Now Mister Mungo, we always buy Angus Beef. We get it special, just for my little darling," she said. Mungo's head jiggled side-to-side like a bobble-head doll.

"Angus get out here!" Mungo yelled to the back of the pub. The bar's short-order cook, barkeep and poobah came out from the kitchen.

"Angus, tell this man about our gourmet burgers, you know the authentic hammy ones." The color left Angus' face. The Pig and Gruel had no specials. Angus stuttered and started to describe something vague about patties but Mungo interrupted. "Not that Clootie Dumplin we served at the Vicar's banquet but a wee scunner."

"A what?" Angus gasped. "I don't understand ye, Mungo."

"This fine morning we're going to do one of our world famous specials. Today be Gourmet Food Day for the tourists. We going to make them an authentic English hamburger brought not by the Earl of Hamburg but got from the Archbishop. The rare delicacy of ground ham as it was prepared back in the seventeenth century and we'll only charge half the usual," Mungo explained.

"And shall we throw in a pint of the good ale?" Angus asked, watching the fire streak Mungo's eyes. Free ale was a stab in the back, a knife in the gut, amputation of the left testicle. Angus knew when Mungo said free ale he meant charge double and Angus hated when Mungo made fools of the tourists.

"Trust me, dear friends. The next thing you eat will be worthy of the Queen and served only to honored guests." Mungo stepped against Angus and pushed him back to the kitchen with Cordelia. As the swinging door closed behind them, Angus started to object but Mungo ignored him and began searching the pantry's lower shelves on his hands and knees. From the lowest shelf, he pulled out a gift-wrapped package containing a dozen cans of Spam. Angus gripped his stomach and whimpered like a wounded puppy.

"Grind it. Throw some capers on it, add a fancy garnish, make it look gourmet and then serve it on a bun. Twice the price too."

"But them cans is five years old," Cordelia whispered.

"Potted meat don't go bad. What the BawBag doesn't know won't hurt him."

"I won't serve it."

"That's why I'm a pussy magnet and you're a poof."

"No need to get personal. I didn't say I wouldn't cook your damned spamburger. I said I wouldn't serve it. Cordelia can serve it."

"Aw good one you are. Send me out with a plate of canned crap for bletherskates who won't tip me anyway," Cordelia grumbled.

"Be happy you got a job, ya whiny, hash slinging Molly."

"If I didn't need this job, I'd tell ya to shove that Spam but I need the coins."

"Keep those two dobbers out of my hair. I'd like to roast that yappie little dog she carries in her purse but the health inspector would be all over us for butchering the beast. Don’t' they know I got more to take care of than their stupid ignorant desire for British cuisine, not even good Scots meals. Make the spam and cover it in prune sauce or cover it in salt and Bechamel. I dinnae care. Serves their fat, overfed carcasses right. If it kills them, deny everything."

Angus nodded the order. Cordelia, holding her tray in front of her body like a shield, blocked Mungo.

"You going to talk those college kids about fixing the hole in the pool room wall? Them's the only boys you can get to cheap enough and still satisfy the Historical Commission," she said.

"Of course. Won't let the place fall apart an' we won't disappoint the Hysteria Commission." He left the kitchen and went out to the pub proper. Six pints sat empty, waiting for his master touch to tap the keg.

The Pig and Gruel, once an upscale pub with the traditional glossy-black lacquered façade, gold-highlighted columns, divided lights and copper appointments, boasted a well-appointed kitchen, a private dining room, a backroom without a snooker table ever since the Texas Hold'em craze, basement storage, washrooms and a 2nd floor apartment for Mungo. Originally named and decorated by Mungo's first wife, eschewed by his second, completely neglected by the third wife, and abandoned by his five sons, the Pig and Gruel had a certain Je ne sais quois.

In plain words, the pub had fallen from grace and seen better days. Regardless, Mungo kept the old place looking respectable. "Townsfolk Good" was what he called it. It the pub smelled bad, looked dirty and was filled with locals' intent upon drinking their livers into the grave. Mungo washed the exterior with a garden hose, once a month, every month, rain or shine. And during the busy seasons of soccer and football, he hosed the spew and urine into the gutter, sometimes two or three times a day depending on how bad the loss or how magnificent the win. The odorific essence of stale beer, fag ash and humanity permeated the ceiling beams, the brick and mortar, and the plaster that filled the spaces in between. My Sistine Chapel was what Mungo called the smoke-beiged walls and ceilings.

This day, with wall damage to repair and a complete lack of ability to plasters other than mustard, Mungo looked to his cheap labor pool -- grad students from Inverness. At the far end of the bar, eating Cullen Skink and Bridie, sat two Slade Kincaid and Salvatore "Nash" Storm. They had pull with the Historical Commission and a hooptie, whatever the hell company made it, covered in automotive body putty. For sure, as the girlies said, they had to know how to plaster.

Mungo approached like an evil mist descending from a smokestack. Slade nudged Nash as he ate a bacon butty.

"Mrs. Lovett got her moobies in a wringer," Slade said, indicating Mungo.

"Awryt!" Nash drawled.

"To what do we owe this honor Mungo old sod? Are we having a tragedy today? Or perhaps, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, historical-pastoral." Slade leaned his chair back on two legs.

"I'm afflicted with eejits, arses and hemorrhoids. You two better start eating at the Golden Hind's Bollocks and Grill. I don't think I can stand watching two twitchy poofs eat my food any more without reaching for the rat poison." Mungo tried to leave. Slade slid his chair back to block him from leaving.

"Calm down ya fat old balloon. He's just having at you." Nash said.

"If we weren't banging Cordelia, we wouldn't be paying attention to you at all." Slade clutched a hand to his mouth, playfully mocking. Mungo's face stayed granite. He didn't crack a smile.

"I've been told you two boys work for Professor Buttkiss, the head historical man at the University an' preservation people."

"His name is Burton-Karns and if he ran up a tab, it's not our responsibility." Slade shoved food into his mouth just like every other American slob. Great God almighty don't they ever learn manners, thought Mungo.

"Petey says there's a priest's hole in my pool room," Mungo blurted out the words. Slade and Nash both choked on their food in mid-bite and struggled to swallow without gagging.

"We gave up priest for Lent," Nash said loud enough to set the regular drunkards giggling. Mungo sneered back. Nash squinted his eyes and wiggled his nose.

"Pity ain't it. I thought you two were hot shots at the University. I guess I'll have to find some other hard up archeologists or anthropologists in Inverness."

"Don't mind Nash," Slade wiped his mouth on his sleeve. "He forgot his contacts this morning and his mind wanders when he can't see straight. It's a disease. I give him six months before he's camping on your stoop with a tin cup and white cane." Mungo folded his arms and tapped his foot.

"You'd think a couple of ambitious students would be happy to check out a priest's hole. Maybe find an art-ee-fact or something."

"Aw, Nash and Slade straight," Nash said in a stupid, low-pitched voice. The regular drunkards laughed and hooted. He gave a little bow, lifted his dish and slid the remaining Cullen Skink and Bridie into his mouth. He made um-um-good noises and bowed to another round of catcalls and hoots from the local drunks. Nash grabbed Mungo by both shoulders and pulled him close as if to kiss. Mungo pushed back.

"Quit being such a knobdobber and smile. Of course we'll go peer into your hole. There's no reason to get your baw bag in an uproar." Slade said. He grabbed his pint and with an up-your-kilt flourish, drank it in one breath and wiped his mouth on his sleeve.

"How about you comp our food and pints if we examine your minjin hole? Got to be worth at least a lunch?" Nash asked. Mungo's hands rose to chest height and formed claws. He growled and sneered and then relented with a nod of his head. The trio walked past the bar toward the Pool Room. As they passed by Petey, he released a clarion call from his rectum to the entertainment of the rest of the locals. Petey added voice to his mephitic expulsion.

"That's a kiss for Father Murphy," Petey said.

"You're goin' ta burn like a heathen banshee." Mungo waved his hands to clear the air. Slade couldn't resist making a comment.

"You been cursed by the Black Bishop of Snogspatch Abbey, Petey, three days before ya die, yer arse stinks like the dead and falls off. Ya can't get to heaven draggin' your arse behind you." The locals burst in to laughter.

"Don't encourage the old neds," Mungo said, turning on the fluorescents in the poolroom. A plastic tablecloth covered the Texas Hold'em table. Used rubber goods gave evidence of the previous nights carousing. Nash stabbed a decorated toothpick into one of the rubber items, held it up to Mungo's face and then flicked the doof into the trash.

"Tapping off the tarts in Texas again, Mungo? Which of the local beauties was floggin' her man last night?"

"Petey and his Sweeties did the how's your father last night and kicked a hole in the wall." He pulled the tablecloth that was nailed above a boot-sized hole in the wall next to a serving table. Slade and Nash giggled, playing the nudge, nudge, wink, wink with elbows.

"Petey? I thought the old drunk weren't nuthin' but blootered. Downright pickled."

"Argh, me inner pirate says there were two trollops." Slade examined the hole in the wall.

"Petey was a bright Keelie five years ago. PhD's in Quantum and Astronomical Physics. Then my bitch of an ex-wife decided that she couldn't live without her darling baby boy and when he refused to marry her in some bizarre ceremony she cooked up, set about gelding him. Almost succeeded too. She got one bollock in a jar of formaldehyde and about to take the other when the police stopped her. Petey's been a piss artist ever since."

"That would tend to mess up your mind," Nash said. Mungo could lie with the best and always seemed loaded with tales of extraordinary happenings but this seemed to be the truth.

"Forget Petey. The Royal Regiment plays Texas Hold'em tonight. It's bad enough they go running their scuddy arses through the back rooms, staining the chairs with their butt snot, pointin' their Bobbies in the wastebins and flowerpots. That there hole in the plaster will be an excuse for some berk to punch or kick or ram it bigger an' bigger. Tomorrow morning, we might all find the next passage to India. Damn peanut baws drunks."

Mungo stood back and let Nash and Slade poke around the outside of the hole. Slade measured the hole and stepped away.

"We can screw plywood over it temporarily. Then tomorrow, we'll come back with a sonar hickey, thingie Professor Burton-Karns just bought. It can look inside the wall and tell us if it's worth ripping up the wall or just filling it up with cheap foam insulation. How's that sound?" Slade asked.

"Now just a minute, partner, I can't resist." Nash shoved his entire arm into the hole up to the shoulder. "Who da thought our very bestest friend Mungo, our very own pub owner and private party man, had a priest's hole he could hide his unmentionable things in," he said as he fished around. Mungo swallowed his gagging sensation.

"Lookie weesack, this building dates back to the twelfth century. I ain't responsible if you find some fusty dead rat," Nash laughed and twisted around, exploring the hole.

"We dig up dead bodies for fun and profit. What's a stinky rat between friends?" Unexpectedly, he yanked up. "I got it."

"Got what?"

"I dunno, an artifact. It feels real funky." He made a few attempts to twist his arm into a position to get it out of the hole without success. Finally, he yanked and broke out creating a bigger hole. He held what appeared to be Flash Gordon's space pistol with a fat barrel and pistol grip. There were strange markings on top, a blunderbuss-like business end and a trigger.

"Some sort of something or other," Nash held it in his hand and fingered the controls.

"Never seen anything like it." Slade said as he fished a book with strange markings out of the hole.

"Looks like a bleedin' Dr Who prop. I was hoping for Papist gold and jewels, a crucifix or cup or candlesticks," Mungo said.

"This don't look 900 years old," said Nash as he pointed the device at Slade and pulled the trigger, expecting nothing. A yellow beam shot out the end. Slade twisted in pain as his face changed. He grew horns, fur sprouted from his body, his thighs stretched tight against his jeans and sandals fell off his hoofed feet. He screamed and so did Nash and Mungo. Nash pulled the trigger a second time and Slade changed back into human form. The three men stood silent for a couple seconds before they all screamed. Nash set the device on the table and tried to wipe the unseen remnants of it off his hands. Mungo threw his kitchen towel over the device. Slade's hands rubbed his head and body.

Hearing screams, Cordelia stuck her head in the door and before she could ask, Mungo blocked it and yelled at her.

"Go away ya dingy woman. Nothing happened. Just men working in here."

"Weirdoes." Cordelia answered. Mungo locked the doors. He went to the side bar and grabbed a pint bottle of whiskey. Without stopping, he drank half, gasping for air in between gulps and pointing the bottle at the device.

"Blasphemy. Satan's shite in my pub to drag me to hell," he said. Slade picked the device and studied it.

"It projects an illusion. It's not real."

"No, I saw the horned beast. That weren't no hallucination," Mungo's voice cracked with fear and he swallowed to continue. "I'm not a choob, ya wankers. I know what I saw."

"What you thought you saw is a magic trick." Slade held one hand out in front of it and triggered it again. Yellow light projected out the barrel making his hand look beastly. He nodded to Nash who held out his hand and let the yellow beam play over it. Nash's hand appeared to grow claws and webbed fingers and then returned to normal when Slade turned off the device. Mungo cowered back and away from them, empting the rest of the pint of whiskey. His knees buckled.

"Get a plank of ply and seal the damned hole. No priest hid there. The devil hid there. Evil hid there. It's the legend, the legend of the horned beast."

"Legend?" Slade asked, guiding Mungo to a chair.

"A children's story, I always thought it was to scare kids into eating our vegetables and cleaning our rooms. The horned beast is real. It's here. It's in my pub." His shoulders heaved as he sobbed. Slade put an arm around his shoulders and got shrugged off. Mungo wiped his tears with both hands.

"The story says that a thousand years ago, on the Vigil of Easter, the horned beast came down from hell on glories of lightning to mock the Risen Christ. Its gaze was so awful that men changed into hellish creatures. It made them sinners. It made them monsters until the beast was defeated in the bogs and sank back to hell."

"Ooooh! A houghin' boughin' bog." Nash laughed.

"A blighted boobah," Slade said. Mungo slid from the chair and crawled into the corner with a second pint of whiskey bottle. Before Slade could stop him, he drank a third of the bottle and knelt like an altar boy.

"Destroy it! It's black, black as the Earl of Hell's Waistcoat! It's the devil's handiwork," Mungo whimpered. Slade pulled him away from the bar.

"Don't go oot yer nut, Mungo. It only creates the illusion of change. We'll seal the hole with planks and then bartend the poker party tonight. No more. No one need ever know. No one will suspect anything happened. Not Angus or Cordelia. Not Petey. Not the soldiers. No one. Go upstairs and sleep off the whiskey."

Slade gave Angus and Cordelia a plausible excuse and took Mungo to his apartment. He went to the local woodsmiths and purchased several square feel of planking. Nash had the tools ready at the poolroom.

When they were alone Nash spoke up.

"Whatever crap we tell Mungo, I felt my hand change." He squared the hole to match the planking.

"It's quite a stimulating sensation when your body transforms. Take your clothes and stand there. You'll have an entirely different perspective on life."

"You think it's safe?

"I'm not babbling about hysterical sinners and my eyes aren't tiny red coals. This thing isn't Satanic. It's some sort of extraterrestrial artifact."

"Well OK. But no more than thirty seconds." Nash pulled his sweatshirt over his head, dropped his jeans and kicked off his sneakers and socks. He stood naked. Slade smiled.

"Won't need more than a few seconds, actually."

The beam hit Nash square in the middle of his chest. Hair grew over his arms and legs, hot and itchy at first, the cooling, invigorating. He heard his skull crackling as horns grew out of a new bony ridge on his forehead, his ears pointed and a scraggly beard grew on his lengthening chin. His thighs thickened and feet shrank into hoofs. He twisted and turned as his entire body shifted to a new skeletal structure. When he stood upright, his manhood engorged, throbbing. He wobbled on his new legs and controlled the primal emotions inside his new and savage body. He breathed deep and rubbed his newly formed muscles with rough and clawed hands.

"To share a body with an intellect once again. Good thought to leave an artifact. These people are inquisitive, sturdy souls." Nash's voice rumbled out of his chest, deep and determined.

"We have the gun and the book. Now we recruit a crew."

"I want to take this Mungo who is infinitely egotistic."

"Petey the drunkard knows science and tonight's gamblers, soldiers who take orders."

"Agreed Trierarch!" Slade triggered the device a second time and Nash changed back into human form. Once again, human hands felt human body. He slipped the book and the device into his backpack. Together, they planked up the Priest's hole, filled the cracks with plaster patch and painted the wall. When they finished, it look like nothing happened.

The night cooks and waitresses roused Mungo from his alcohol-induced sleep.

Mungo checked the kitchen and bar's prep for evening and tapped a new keg before he summoned the courage to look into the poolroom. Slade and Nash stood on either side of the small bar wearing vests, armbands and visors like American Wild West casino dealers.

"There never was and isn't anything behind that wall but ruins," Nash said. "We thought you needed some dealers so you didn't have to look at the wall all night." Mungo gave them a quick look before he examined the wall. No evidence of the Priest's hole could be seen. He hugged Nash and Slade a second time.

"That wall's magnificently yildy. I gotta say I went a little flumpty on you two. I'm such a fool. I'm so black affronted. Don't tell anyone about it. Please don't tell anyone about what I said." Mungo gave them another hug in gratitude.

"Ain't nothing," Slade answered.

"I hate to stick you with the soldier boys. They're a gang of sheep humpin' choochters from Largs Vegas." The three men laughed as Mungo set up the barrel and tapped it.

"We never had sheep humpin' players but we did have land mines and two baggers at fraternity poker nights. None of those frat guys could hold their liquor and by midnight, we had forty, fifty men getting shit-faced and puking over each other, stairwells, ice buckets, ball caps, everywhere but the porcelains. You only got ten soldiers for two tables of poker. It's going to be an easy night no matter how much beer they drink. How rowdy can ten naked soldiers get?"

Mungo took the reigns of the proposition and drove it to a gallop. "It's not the rowdy. It's the watering. These sassanacks paid for the entire barrel and they will drink it down to the dregs. But if ye don't watch them, they'll piss in the plants and empty bottles and anything else that dinnae object. I'll warn you two, if they declare bollocks to the barricades, throw their scuddy arses outside because they're goin' to stage pishin' contests for distance. Ain't a Dondeen among them but they got wallopers like firehouses and can piss over the roof of me pub to win a bet."

"We'll order them to lower their periscopes or we'll smack them down like naughty boys," Slade said. He stepped behind the tiny bar, turned away from Mungo and licked his lips.

"Gonnae no' dae that. Them scrotes ain't light in the army boots like you two dandies. They hit like bricks and brass knuckles." Mungo propped the door of the poolroom open and left. Nash and Slade spoke low so no one outside the room could hear them.

"Think he'll talk?" Slade asked as he set out the poker chips.

"Mungo is pathologically incapable of speaking the truth. He's unique, vulgar and insulting; a magnificent specimen." Nash caught sight of the first soldier entering the bar and talking with the regulars. He gave an approving nod.

"One of our new crew."

"I wonder if home world is the same after a millennium?" Slade said. He shuffled the decks and daydreamed of two moons drifting over the ocean of dreams and herds of dreezik roaming the inner plains of his home world in the constellation of Ophiuchus. In a few hours, he would walk on his home world once again.

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