36 - The Zranti Beast

THE PANTY BREAST

Having been driven through the floor by the psychotic Karl Simpson, Ben Chatham is assumed dead.

However, having received eye-witness reports of a dead-ringer for Britney Spears being kidnapped by an anachronistic Gestapo Reichsfurher in the middle of Hampstead Heath, Dr Owen Harper is, predictably, the first one on the spot.Needless to say, he's more than a little disappointed to discover that the bruised, crippled and scantily-clad damsel in distress is none other than the single-most irritating prat in the world trapped in a hot chick's body. While Owen desperately searches for a suitable length of gaffer tape, Ben...

Screw it, explaining the continuity will take far too long. Suffice it to say, the story proper begins with Ben Chatham relaxing in her Cambridge apartment. Or rather, a voluminous cardboard box with "Cambrige Appartment" scrawled on the side in childish handwriting.Ben Chatham drinks rainwater from a cracked mug with 'absinthe' written on the side, struggling to read a heavily stained Telegraph from June 4, 1992, when her mobile rings. After a struggle, she pulls it out from under many soiled pictures of Jonas Armstrong and David Bowie.She is surprised that she still has credit for her phone - she is even more surprised to hear the voice of Chris Jennings, an old friend from university.

"Hello? Is Ben there? I'm in a spot of trouble..."

"This is Ben."

"Erm... you sound sort of different."

Ben gives a smouldering look as she remembers her infliction with a most inferior form. "Look I turned into a woman and I would seriously appreciate you not making a fuss about it, OK?"

"Okaaaaaaaaaaay... yeah, well, I was wondering you could come around. I've still got the same house. Yeah, I still haven't moved out of the Uni accommodation. It's frigging great here! But, yeah, I wanted you to come around because I know about your experience with the... extraterrestrial."

Ben concentrates hard, thinking of a good excuse to avoid spending time with another human being...

"Fuck off."

"Please!" says Chris, his voice now tense "It's really quite important that you come around now! Right now!" There is a hiss of wild, crackling electricity down the line and a sinister, evil laugh. Ben assumes that Chris is being immature and throwing some sort of rowdy party, which is all the more reason not to go. She takes this one board with her next response.

"Fuck you, Chris."

"Ben!" cries Chris, his voice clearly cracking "I'm just five minutes away! I can see your box from my window! Please!" The noise of the party begins to drown out Chris's words, as the electronica reaches new heights, and there are the noises of sizzling meat, and snapping bones.

"I never liked you, you know, Chris. I bet this is a wind-up. Oh wait, I forgot: fuck you and the horse you rode in on!"

Ben hangs up, ignoring the shameful last minute entreaties from Chris: "Arrrgh, no!", "My flesh!", "Please for the love of all that is-ARRRRRGHHHH!" and so forth. Ben goes back to her 'sofa' made from urine/newspaper mache in an unusual bout of creativity.

Later that night, a gigantic flaming monster not unlike the one from Lord of the Rings walks into a MacDonalds, hoping for some Earth-style sustenance. After a quarter-of-an-hour of waiting in line, the creature finally reaches the counter.

"Hello, sir, may I take your order?"

"Soon! First you must explain to me this Earth concept of... 'mc'" murmers the pyroan gravely.

"...what?"

"You offer me 'Mc' chicken burgers.... but also chicken sandwiches. There are 'mc' shakes... but then there are just 'shakes'. You offer me 'mc' with some meals, but not with others. Yet regardless the pricing does not seem to accomodate the 'mc'. Is this something that you earth-dwellers take for granted? Do you mockingly refer to your high radiation levels, by offering a square root of the value of inherent energy in your dishes? Is that all this is? A joke?"

The clerk glances at her manager. There is no help there. "Erm.. yeah."

"Very well!" proclaims the alien. "In that case, Earth-creature, I shall feed myself on... A BACON AND EGG McMUFFIN!!!"

Thunder rolls ominously in the background, as the clerk finds herself trembling pitifully. "I'm sorry...erm..."

"SORRY?!" it roars, its breath singes the clerk's incredibly goofy novelty hat.

"That's part of the breakfast menu..." squeaks the terrified clerk "... which is only available nine to eleven and dear god please don't kill me... "

It is at this moment that the alien creature declares that human beings, by idiotically dictating the times of day whereupon certain sustenance can be entertained have stripped themselves of all independant thought and freedom, becoming slaves to their own petty infatuations and constructs, and eventually nothing but mere machines of their own making.

As such, they are UNWORTHY OF THE GIFT OF LIFE!!!

Most people would say that this is an awful lot of crap to read into the menu-system of a shitty franchise restaurant, but Lawrence Miles at least shouts out "Right on, man!" as the monster burns down the store, along with everyone else inside.

After the roof collapses on the fire-beast's head, giving him a minor concussion, and he realises that he's still very, very hungry, he decides to give up on the genocide and instead find out what it is these humanoids call 'Sub-way'.


The next day, Ben is trying to solicit one of the many university students as a prositute, but, as always, is having incredible problems due to constantly referencing her past as a bloke.

While completely failing to seduce a bespectacled Astronomy major for a pound, Ben hears that Chris Jennings was brutally murdered in his apartment last night? And Sally Bennet got an iPhone!

Ben is left alone, feeling a bizarre and entirely new feeling. Her cool mental processes, or the ones that are still functioning anyway, try desperately to pin down the curious sensation. When she does, it seems to be a small but vocal array of neurons chanting "You murdering wanker, you murdering wanker" over and over. Ben recalls seeing something similar on Wikipedia one time...

"I can't be feeling that "guilt" crap, can I?" Ben considers. "It's either that or... some horrible woman hormonal thing... ew. Yuck. I hope it IS guilt. Lots of guilt. I am a naughty, naughty girl. I must make amends. Uh... amends, amends... how can I make amends? I'm so lip-smackingly perfect! Oh, wait, I remember. Chris is dead. I'll check out his flat and hunt down the son of the bitch that killed him! It's the Christian thing to do!"

Ben wanders around for four days and nights, lost thanks to her own stupidity before stumbling across a crime scene. All the important homicide specialists, forensic pathologists, criminal psychologists and amateur slueths have been and gone - even Operation Helter-Skelter! By now, the only police presence is a Saxon-supported job creation scheme for people on the dole to be paid thruppence to wear a police helmet and scare off riffraff.

Ben strides up to the guard and tries to bluff her way into the crime scene but half way through her lengthy explanation about the secret government agencies she dare not name but Cambridge police cross at their, the guard looks at her and grimaces. "Oh, that is so embarrassing. I need a drink."

Ben looks baffled as the guard wanders off, and then realizes she actually IS experiencing some strange female biological cycle and her ragged underwear is now drenched in blood. Mistaking it for her usual incontinence, Ben shrugs and throws the soiled garments on the floor before inviting herself into the crime scene.

Inside, Ben finds the microwaved corpse of Chris Jennings, and notes its actually giving her the munchies. Looking through the evidence bags left behind after Touchwood Three made an appearance and accidentally unleashed a five-dimensional alien soduku game that turns humans into violent, skin-shedding zombies, causing forensics to be lost in the narratorial ether.

Delighted at what appears to be a lifetime's supply of meth amphetamines, Ben starts munching them... and discovers that they are just Fox Glacier Mints. Nevertheless, her absinthe-pickled brain reacts violently to the icy minty flavor and she smiles idiotically before falling over.

At that point a woman enters the flat and discovers what appears to be a half-naked Britney Spears lying unconscious in a pool of menstral blood. The woman quietly backs out of the room and runs off.Ben sits bolt upright, her sugar-sparking synapses concluding that the woman must be the one that murdered Chris Jennings - criminals always return to the scene of the crime and the strange extra-dimensional howls and crackling electricity could easily be mistaken for some vulgar chav harlot!

Ben stumbles out of the share house and sees the woman running off - no doubt to report to the cunning, civilized and certifiably insane managing director of the local furniture showroom, who is secretly in league with Welsh druids, the CIA and a strange conspiracy for half-human monsters to replace Corrination Street actors!

Such a thought makes her giddy and she heads back into the flat for a quick nap. She finds a whiteboard covered in equations, schematics, formulae, logistics, a few games of Hangman, a quick sketch of Adam Rickitt with arrows tattooed on his smoothe chest, and the phone number of someone called "Maria Hotlips Jackson".

Ben wipes the board clean and writes four simple words: ALL CHAVS MUST DIE! with a little love heart above the I. Smiling happily, she decides to crash out on the mysterious metallic couch covered in lights and switches that actually just happens to be a space transmitter.

Ben punches some buttons in the hope the couch will become more comfortable and play a Bowie compilation album, only for it to start playing Chris' Nobel Prize acceptance speech he had been rehearsing.

In the accurate belief that no one in the world had ever tried to microwave a potato in the Antares Galaxy, Chris has developed a microwave transmitter able of sending lethal radiation faster than the speed of light which will fry anything that gets in the path. Of course, there is the downside that there is no way of telling if the transmitter works, and even if it does, random objects in another galaxy are now being vaporized for no apparent reason, which might upset the natives.

However, as Chris notes, "There's no room for sentiment when you're a mad scientist!"

Just then, Ben is awoken by a distinctive crunch crunch noise, getting closer and closer. Ben then notices the smell of burning flesh, the screams of the dead and dying, and the sound of fires burning out of control.

Craning her neck, Ben peers out the window and sees a giantic flame monster of purple energy striding down the street towards the lab, causing explosions and killing hundreds every second.

"Oh," she says quietly. "Another pepthaline fire beast," she muses, remembering that bonfire night she dreamt about once in a longwinded and terribly unconvincing manner (see Bathfarter)

At that moment, the woman returns, frantic. She screams that the creature has been summoned to Earth by Chris' demented transmitter and is now on the rampage. The only way to stop it is to lure the creature into the house and transmit it into another galaxy ASAP!

"Why are you telling me this?" asks Ben.

"Just making it clear in my head," the woman explains. "I'm Tara by the way, what's your name?"

"Ben - Ben Chatham."

"Nice to meet you, Ben Chatham, now run for your... wait a minute! You're the Ben Chatham Chris was desperately trying to contact as that thing scorched the flesh from his bones! You let him die, you complete insane bitch!"

Ben tries to run for it, but after weeks of malnutrition her smoothe limbs are pale and useless and she immediately collapses. Tara picks up a handy buzz saw, switches it on and strides towards the helpless transsexual twit!

Just then, the fire beast smashes through the house, causing the walls and roof to explode in flame and leave the whole place a burned out wreck. Tara and Ben look up in surprise as the creature roars...

"DIDN'T YOU KILL MY BRUVVA?!"

"Aw, come on!" Ben protests. "That was a dream!"

"OH, THAT MAKES IT BETTER, DOES IT? YOU CRUEL BASTARD!!"

Ben turns desperately to Tara and begs her to save him. Her. You know what I mean.

"NOTHING CAN STOP ONE OF US!" the creature booms. "ONLY THE LEGENDARY PANTY BREAST OF FATAL DEATH COULD EVER STOP OUR INDESTRUCTIBLE FURY - AND SINCE NO ONE HAS ANY IDEA WHAT A PANTY BREAST IS, YOU'RE WELL AND TRULY FUCKED!"

The creature steps closer, one blistering foot of energy stepping on Ben's soiled panties. The creature groans in disgust. "OH, GOD, THAT IS HORRIBLE! DEAR GOD, IT'S STILL WARM!"

As Tara and Ben watch on in disbelief, the extraterrestrial fire monster hops on one leg trying to peel the underwear stuck to its foot. However, at that point, the monster overbalances and falls straight onto Ben - specifically her left nipple.

"ARRRRRRRRRRRGH! MY FUCKING EYE! OH GOD! OH GOD, GOD IT HURTS, OH GOD, THE PAIN!" the creature rolls over, light spewing from its injured head. "TRUST ME TO GET THE HARD ONE! OH, GOD, HONESTLY! HOW FUCKING STUPID IS THIS? I CANNOT FUCKING BELIEVE IT! I JUST CANNOT BE-------"

With a puff of sulphor, the monster vanishes from the material universe.

"Well, what do you know?" Ben marvels as she brushes soot off herself. "It turns out girls have some kind of use against alien monsters after all. I sure never saw that coming, did you, Tara?"

Tara stares at Ben in disbelief.

"I know you've just lost Chris and I'm actually gay... well, a gay transsexual, so actually, I'm straight... Anyway, do you want to sleep with me tonight? I was thinking of taking up squatter's rights on this place."

Ben looks around the smouldering ruins.

"Maybe it needs a lick of paint. And a well stocked bar full of finest French absinthe, a stereo system of Bowie and ABBA, and some tasteful throwrugs..."

Tara shakes her head and switches off the buzzsaw. "You're not even worth beheading," she sighs and strides out into the night.

"Stupid bitch," Ben mutters to herself as she gets comfortable on the microwave transmitter once more. "Probably her time of the month or something."

THE END