III
Extracts from the interviews of candidates applying for secondment as lamias in the Tartarus Eternal Repository, Afterlife Services England & Wales (Hell).
Chair of the interviewing panel: Glenda.
Deputy chair: Melody.
Glenda: “Tell us why you’re interested in working as a lamia.”
Candidate 1: “It’s the sex, mainly.”
Glenda: “The sex…”
Candidate 1: “You bet! And you guys do loads of that, right?”
Melody: “You do realise that, although it looks like sex, it’s actually feeding?”
Candidate 1: “You what?”
Melody: “It’s how we feed.”
Candidate 1: “So what do you do for sex? Tuck into a Big Mac?”
Glenda: “No, that’s sex too. Only then it’s polite to minimise the feeding side of things.”
Candidate 1: “So I’d get twice as much sex? Brill! When do I start?”
* * *
Glenda: “What aspects of the lamia’s role most appeal to you?”
Candidate 2: “That would be the sex.”
Melody: “Next!”
* * *
Glenda: “Welcome, Eamonn.”
Eamonn (Candidate 3): “Thank you for inviting me.”
Glenda: “So you’re an angel.”
Eamonn: “A principality, to be exact.”
Glenda: “Currently employed in Level Three Heaven.”
Eamonn: “The Happy Hunting Ground – nice place.”
Melody: “And you’ve applied for a secondment in Level Eleven of Hell. That’s quite a switch.”
Eamonn: “Can I be candid for a minute?”
Glenda: “Please.”
Eamonn: “There comes a time when you’re absolutely sick to the back teeth of always having to be nice to the clients. They’ve barely scraped into Heaven by being just on the right side of the morality bell curve, yet they think this entitles them to be insufferably smug for the rest of eternity! Sometimes when I see their self-satisfied, smirking faces, I just want to put on some hobnailed boots and jump up and down on their pointy little heads until their ears are level with their ankles! Don’t you ever feel like that?”
Melody: “Not really – we never have to be nice to our clients.”
Eamonn: “You’re so lucky.”
Glenda: “Can you do transformations?”
Eamonn: “I can do the flaming sword, booming voice routine. Shall I show you?”
Glenda: “By all means.”
Eamonn: (Thunderclap) “SAUL, SAUL, WHY DO YOU PERSECUTE ME?”
Glenda: “Very impressive.”
Melody: “Yeah, but can you adopt a human female form?”
Eamonn: “No – is that a requirement?”
Melody: “Actually, that’s a good question. Biology aside, Glen, does a lamia have to be female?”
Glenda: “I can’t think of any particular reason, offhand. And, if we insisted on it, we’d probably be breaching equal opportunities regulations. Some of the ways we induce agony during sex aren’t easily transferrable, though.”
Melody: “We should be able to rig something up. Like, at the vital moment, he could arrange for rows of spikes to suddenly spring out from the sides of his—”
Eamonn: “Excuse me, but what do you mean by ‘during sex’?”
Glenda: “Lamias generally administer punishment during the sexual act. Surely you knew that?”
Eamonn: “Are you out of your minds? Do you seriously expect me to soil my pristine, immaculate being through intimate contact with that hairy, sweaty, lumpen mass that some laughably refer to as ‘humanity’? What’s wrong with you people down here? Have you never thought of using remote-controlled drones to inflict your torments? I’d rather spend the rest of my days at the bottom of Beelzebub’s personal cesspit than be forced to remain for even a microsecond within twenty yards of a loathsome, icky, smelly, drooling, bum-scratching, pimple-picking monkey descendant!”
(A short pause.)
Glenda: “So… Am I right in thinking the sex part of job could be an issue?”
* * *
Glenda: “Could you give me an idea of what you, if you were a lamia, would include in a treatment pathway for a Level Eleven serial rapist?”
Candidate 4: “First I’d gouge out his eyess, being careful not to break the optic nerves, and inssert them in the opposing ssocketss back to front. I’d cover his body with enormous, ssuppurating soress, inside each of which would be a rabid, ssabre-toothed hamsster. The auditory centres of his brain would be rewired sso that everything he hears ssounds like Morrissey songss. I’d put his feet on backwardss. I’d glue an incontinent pigeon to his head. I’d sseal his mouth and make his arms twitch constantly, sso that the only way he could communicate would be by farting Morsse code. And that’ss just for sstartersss.”
Melody: “Mummy, the bad woman is scaring me. Make her stop.”
Glenda: “Melody, behave. I apologise for my frivolous colleague – please continue.”
Candidate 4: “Next I’d rip open his abdominal cavity and unravel his gutss, keeping the top end attached to his sstomach still insside his body. I’d twist the gutss tighter and tighter until they formed a long, thin thread, which I’d weave into a tapesstry. Eventually I’d have a hundred or more victimss attached to the edges of my massterpiece: a woven image of a ssyphilis bacterium ssuffering from PMT.”
Glenda: “Now she’s scaring me.”
* * *
Glenda: “What do you see yourself doing as a lamia?”
Candidate 5: “Having a ton of sex – Aarghh!”
Glenda: “Melody!”
Melody: “Mmm?”
Glenda: “Spit that out.”
* * *
Glenda: “Thank you for coming, Cosmo. Please take a seat.”
Cosmo (Candidate 6): “It’s pretty warm around here, isn’t it? I’ve never been down this deep.”
Glenda: “Ah, yes. It says on the application form that you’ve worked at Levels Three, Four and Seven of Hell. Why do you want to try your hand at Level Eleven?”
Cosmo: “I need the experience. To get upgraded to band five, I’ve got to have evidence in my development portfolio of working in the widest possible range of Hells. So this secondment looked like a really good opportunity.”
Melody: “So you didn’t apply because you’re attracted to the idea of being a lamia as such?”
Cosmo: “I suppose not, if you put it that way. But I’m sure the work is fascinating.”
Glenda: “How extensive are your transformation skills?”
Cosmo: “Just the usual. I can do large/small, male/female, blend into the background, ghostly apparitions and disembodied voices…”
Melody: “Speed?”
Cosmo: “Five seconds at most, usually less.”
Glenda: “Very good. How much do you know about what a lamia does?”
Cosmo: “Before coming here I swotted up on the relevant NASTI guidelines. That’s the Normalised Afterlife Standards of Treatment Institute’s technical instruments and—”
Melody: “Yes, we know.”
Cosmo: “Right. Well, going by those, it looks like most lamia-mediated punishments revolve around sex.”
Glenda: “And how does sex turn into a punishment, do you think?”
Cosmo: “Your clients are mainly monks?”
Melody: “Hah! They’re the most sexually obsessed of the lot.”
Cosmo: “Well, it’s not exactly spelled out in the guidelines, but I imagine you suddenly and unexpectedly transform into something terrifying.”
Melody: “Correct – our chief weapons are surprise and fear.”
Glenda: “For goodness’ sake, Melody, we’re trying to hold a serious interview here!”
Melody: “Why? We’re done, aren’t we?”
Glenda: “I guess so. Cosmo, if you’re still interested, the post is yours. Can you start tomorrow?”
Cosmo: “Thanks! I’l
l have to clear it with my line manager, but I’m sure tomorrow’s okay.”
Glenda: “Excellent. You’ll be here, won’t you, Melody? I’m appointing you as his mentor.”
Melody: “Now wait just one minute!”
IV
The following morning, Cosmo turned up punctually in the Tartarus lamias’ office, his hair and sideburns neatly trimmed, his reddish skin freshly scrubbed, his curved ram’s horns painstakingly polished. He’d visited his parents the previous evening to give them the news, and his mother had insisted on his making a good impression on his first day – this despite the fact that lamias were a bunch of shameless hussies and no better than they should be, if you asked her. She’d even cajoled him into wearing a suit, although he had drawn the line at a tie.
To be strictly accurate, it wasn’t so much an office as a cave, uncomfortably hot for anyone not cold-blooded, and eerily lit by a flickering glow that emanated from the bare rock walls. Three doors led to, respectively, the corridor outside, a separate, smaller office, and a kitchen with adjoining toilet. The main office contained five workstations, a number of filing cabinets, a printer/copier and a trio of snakes. The two larger specimens – one coloured brown with gorgeous black-and-gold dorsal patterns, the other grey, green and cream with a deep scar running down the left side of her face – he already knew from the day before: Glenda and Melody. The third – a slim, yellow twelve-footer with golden eyes and an animated, friendly expression – was introduced to him as April.
“Should I adopt serpent form too?” he asked.
“It’s not compulsory,” said Glenda. “Here in the office you can dress how you like.”
“But I’ve been practising,” Cosmo persisted, eager to show off. “Would you like to see?”
“Of course – go ahead.”
Cosmo closed his eyes and concentrated. His body wavered, narrowed, stretched. Within moments, he had become a menacing, sixteen-foot snake with an orange belly and a red back covered with green-and-black diamonds. His eyes were pitch black, his mouth filled with wickedly sharp teeth. Four tiny limbs protruded from his sides.
April burst out laughing; Glenda wrapped the end of her tail around her snout to conceal a smile. Melody said: “Congratulations, kid – you just turned yourself into a skink.”
“Getting rid of arms and legs completely is really hard,” Cosmo admitted. “But I nailed it last night, honest!”
“When not dealing with clients,” said Glenda, not unkindly, “we generally revert to our native form – it’s more relaxing. I suggest you do so as well.”
Cosmo resumed his normal shape, feeling not a little humiliated. April set off to get some sleep, promising to meet up for a jabber at the end of his shift, and Glenda also excused herself, citing the need to catch up with the paperwork. She slithered off into the smaller office. Cosmo was left in the intimidating presence of Melody, who loomed over him as if debating whether to speak to him or have him as a snack with her morning tea.
“Tartarus,” she said, adopting a didactic manner, “specialises in punishments that fit the crime. Lamias specialise in punishments featuring sex. How would you therefore characterise our client base?”
“Sex offenders?” Cosmo suggested.
“Rapists, paedophiles, stalkers, sadists, misogynistic trolls, dirty old men, wannabe dominatrices, poo fetishists, assorted perverts, people who check their text messages during sex… Yes, sex offenders, in the main. And what do we do to them?”
“Give them a dose of their own medicine?”
“A concentrated dose. Repeatedly.” Melody’s tail curved up and dexterously picked up some sheets of paper from a nearby desk. She extended them to Cosmo.
“You will be handling three cases today. I’ve printed out brief details – take them.” Cosmo did. “Case notes are attached to an email I’ve sent you. This is your workstation,” – with her expressive tail, she tapped the desk from which she’d just taken the printouts – “so you can study them in a minute.”
She brought her head down level with his and raked him with a short-range glower.
“We’ll do the first one together. Lucky boy, you’ll be in a threesome with me – an honour so rare it may well make you unique throughout the afterlife.” She tapped the top sheet in Cosmo’s hands with the tip of her tail. “Borderline paedo – three sexual assaults, two rapes, one resulting in suicide by the victim. We’re going in as feral thirteen or fourteen-year-olds. Can you do a predatory teen?”
“How’s this?” Cosmo asked, transforming.
Melody stared at him wordlessly for an unnervingly long time. Eventually, she said: “By ‘predatory’, I did not mean ‘resembling the thing in that Arnold Schwarzenegger film’.”
“Sorry.” He tried again. Melody shook her head despairingly.
“Forget the case notes,” she said. “Go and practice in front of a mirror – there’s one in the loo. You have twenty minutes before we need to be on our way. Try to come up with something I can bear to be seen in the company of. I take it you are at least fully conversant with all the various human sexual positions and permutations?”
“Ah, well…” Cosmo began.
“Well what?”
“Well…”
“Please don’t tell me you’re a virgin!” Melody cried, aghast.
“No, of course not! Not exactly…”
Melody hung her head.
“I want to die,” she whispered.
Cosmo tried to think of a way to break what was threatening to become a painful silence.
“Are there many teenagers in Tartarus?” he asked.
“In my humble opinion, it’s where they should all be.”
“No, I mean, won’t the client know something’s wrong when he’s approached by two apparently willing ones? He must have been here long enough to have had any number of catastrophic sexual encounters. Surely he’ll be on his guard?”
“We have the option of selectively dimming memories or boosting oxytocin when targets get too skittish,” said Melody. “That mainly happens with women, though – males of the species seem to have the ability to selectively dim their own memories on being confronted with amenable femininity. It’s pitiful, but convenient. Go and practice in front of the mirror.”
V
Cosmo was slumped at his workstation at the end of the shift, getting on the outside of a hard-earned mug of tea, when a pretty blonde girl with golden eyes traipsed into the office. She was wearing jeans, a plain white T-shirt and bulky trainers which somehow accentuated rather than augmented her short stature.
“Hi!” she exclaimed.
Cosmo straightened up in his seat.
“Hi,” he echoed. “Can I help you?”
“It’s me, dimbo – April!”
She wheeled out the chair from behind the nearest desk and plonked herself into it.
“How did your first day go?” she demanded, leaning forward and grinning inquisitorially.
“Not very well, I think,” Cosmo confessed
“Tut, tut. And how are you getting on with Mel?”
“Even less well. I’m sure she doesn’t approve of me. She’s pretty fierce, isn’t she?”
“That’s all on the outside,” said April, waving a dismissive hand. “Inside, she’s the consistency of cream cheese.”
It occurred to Cosmo that this girl was a hopeless judge of character – the threesome had been the most terrifying ordeal he’d ever undergone – but also that it would be discourteous to alert her to the fact.
“And how do you like being a lamia?” April continued.
“It’s fine,” said Cosmo cautiously. “Although I hadn’t realised it involved so much biting. I can’t get the taste of human out of my mouth.”
“I’ve got something special for that.” April swivelled her chair around and opened the top drawer of her desk. “Hold your hand out.”
Not sure what to expect, Cosmo nervously extended his hand, palm up, and April shook some Tic Tacs into it
.
“Help yourself to these any time you want,” said April, replacing the container.
“Thanks.” Cosmo put his allocated ration in his mouth. “Lamias are sure a lot different from what I was expecting.”
The stiflingly hot room turned a few degrees cooler.
“And what was it you were expecting?” April asked, in a tone of voice which would have set alarm bells ringing for five hundred yards in all directions, had there been any, but which somehow inexplicably bypassed the ones in Cosmo’s head.
As a direct consequence, Cosmo now made two gaffes for the price of one. Taking them in reverse chronological order, the first was to open his mouth and say: “Well, you guys do have a bit of a reputation among other demons, don’t you?” The second was to, shortly before opening his mouth, put his mug down on the surface of his desk, thus affording April the opportunity to rise to her feet, pick it up and empty its contents into his face. The best that could be said for the whole episode, from Cosmo’s perspective, was that said contents had already had a reasonable amount of time in which to cool down.
“I’m very sorry that, in order to advance your glittering career, your lordship is compelled to spend some time hanging around with us sluts and slatterns on Level Eleven!” April shouted. “To make it a bit more bearable for you, I’ll stop polluting the air you breathe and go and get myself gang-banged at the nearest convenient dogging site!”
She stormed off at a speed which meant she’d reached the office door in the time it took a soggy Cosmo to leap out of his chair and yell: “Hey, wait!” By the time he too reached the office door, it was slamming shut in his face.
Cosmo punched the wall in frustration – not a terribly smart thing to do because, as has already been noted, this was made of rough-hewn stone, so it retaliated by giving him some painfully skinned knuckles. Swearing and clutching his injured hand, he turned around to face the centre of the room, which was now occupied by a large brown python with a quizzical look on its face.
“I see we are already making friends with our new workmates,” Glenda observed mildly.
“I didn’t,” Cosmo babbled, “that is, what I meant… All I was trying to say was that some of the other demons, well, they say stuff about lamias. You know that, don’t you? Rude stuff. Only, now I’ve worked here for a day, I can see you’re nothing like that – like what they say. You’re real professionals! I mean, professionals in the way you approach your work, not as in… And anyway, I never believed you were like that in the first place, or I wouldn’t have applied for the secondment. I didn’t come here expecting wall-to-wall sex, I… Oh, balls! This is coming out all wrong again!”
Enraptured: A Novelette About Lamias Page 2