Mechantula Read online

  Contents

  Copyright

  -1 - Carlione's Pizza

  -2 - Another One Rides the Bus

  -3 - It's a... Mechantula?

  -4 - Belly of the Beast

  -5 - The Great Escape

  -6 - Down the Wrong Hole

  -7 - Bowels of the Beast

  -8 - Killer Robots Attack!

  -9 - Guardian at the Gate

  -10 - So Lonely

  -11 - Flushed

  -12 - Zero the Hero

  Thank You

  Other Books by Steve R. Yeager

  About the Author

  Copyright © 2015 Steve R. Yeager

  Cover Copyright © 2015 Steve R. Yeager

  All rights reserved.

  This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  FIRST EDITION

  -1-

  CARLIONE'S PIZZA

  DAVID MURPHY SAT on an uncomfortable toilet seat in the filthiest, run-down restroom in the worst pizza joint in all of San Francisco.

  And what made matters worse, he was the manager of the joint.

  The restroom stank. Really stank. Dave had earlier asked his delivery driver, Zane, to clean out the stalls three times already, but Zane was far too preoccupied to bother with such mundane matters. Most nights, good old Zane could be found messing around with one of the waitresses behind the food chiller, or smoking dope in the back alley. If not for the crap wages the owner paid, Dave would have fired Zane’s ass long ago.

  While adjusting his butt cheeks on the toilet seat, Dave glanced around the reeking stall, trying to take his mind off his inability to move his bowels. The walls surrounding him were covered with graffiti, mostly gang related. However, the occasional depiction of both male and female genitalia decorated great swaths of the peeling green paint, and two new works in particular stood out. One read: Call (508) 555-3010 if you wanna score sum gud weed. Another was a crudely drawn picture of a penis, greatly exaggerated, of course. And judging by the misspellings and lack of talent or artistry, Dave figured both drawings had been rendered by none other than too-cool-Zane.

  Shaking his head in disgust, he glanced down at the comic book loosely held in his flour and sauce stained fingers. The title read Marspocalypse in bright red ink. Licking a finger, he flicked to the page where he had left off the night before and scanned down to the second panel, thinking just how lousy this book actually was. He knew he should have trusted his original instincts and trashed this rag earlier. Zane had told him how awesome this particular issue was, which should have been a strong hint to ignore it completely. And for a brief moment, he toyed with the idea of wiping his ass with it after finishing his business, but knowing the way his day had been going, he’d probably slice open his sphincter on the staples.

  The storyline had been bothering him since the beginning. It was a couple of noob writers’ attempt to use the five-man-band trope, and the shallow characters couldn’t have been more obviously designed to fill specific roles.

  “Bunch of amateurs,” he muttered.

  When he finally got around to finishing his own novel, it would be fresh. It would be new, original. Not like this lazy-assed, bullshit, rainbow-farting-unicorn style of chump writing. His story would be dark, depressing, and hopefully make people hate themselves for having read it. His would be the good shit everyone talked about for decades.

  He paused to lick his fingers again and turned to the next page, then the next, then again, flicking through the book more than reading it. He couldn’t have been more disappointed with the story. It just plain sucked. And, as he reached the book’s big conclusion, the part where the five cardboard characters joined forces to defeat the oh-so-scary Martian invaders all too conveniently—he wanted to vomit. He was sure the writers thought they were being clever, showing no growth or development in their characters at all, and probably thinking they’d be labeled ‘literary’ or ‘innovative.’

  But Dave wasn’t buying that bullshit for a second. Literary, my ass.

  Disgusted by the book and frustrated by his continuing constipation, he tossed the book against the stall door. The comic landed in a puddle of what he hoped was only leaking water. He watched as the pages slowly drank in the liquid and became a sodden mess. He supposed all those happy-go-lucky assholes out there in the world would find that ending somehow fulfilling. The everyday man, turned hero, saving the world. So easily, too. Pffffft. Like that ever happened. Ain’t like no Clive Barker. Not even his bitch.

  He could do better. He knew it.

  Grunting and straining, he again attempted to relieve his burden. Still nothing. He couldn’t even get that right. Such a simple thing as moving his bowels was yet another reminder that he was becoming a goddamned pathetic failure of a human being.

  The outside door to the bathroom creaked open. The obnoxious metal-on-metal scraping noises caused him to freeze and plant his feet on the floor. He could never go when others were nearby.

  Footsteps.

  More footsteps. Big slappy feet.

  “Yo!” came a voice. It was Zane’s. “Dave-man, you dying in their, bro?”

  “Can’t I get five minutes of peace?”

  “It’s dead out here, man. And it’s after two… Can I split now? I need to take Lacy home. Make sure she’s safe, like. Gotta be a gentlemen about these things, ya know.”

  Walk her home and pound her against the wall in your fleabag apartment, more likely. Still, at least Zane was getting some. The closest Dave had gotten to a real woman lately was the booth babes at Comic-Con way back in August. He still had one babe’s naked image in his memory bank and had been making frequent withdrawals from her account on a nightly basis. What was her name again? Shawna, Jean, Dawn, something like that. Probably not even her real name. He sat up straight on the toilet. He wanted to say to Zane: No, you can’t go home. You need to stay and do your goddamn job.

  But, that wasn’t Dave.

  He sighed. “Yeah sure. Go on home, I’ll be out in a minute to close things up. Tomorrow, I’m going to need you to clean up this restroom, okay? It stinks—and it’s filthy.”

  “No problemo, Dave-man,” Zane replied. “And lighten up a little, will ya? Maybe you need more fiber or something? Eating the shit we serve here gives me the squirts, so you must have one rock-hard colon there, bro.”

  Dave knew Zane was—in his own way—only trying to help. That made him want to punch Zane in the throat even harder.

  Resigned to his continual state of constipation, he lifted himself from the plastic toilet seat. His butt-cheeks had become stuck there, and the seat rose along with him until his bare skin lost adhesion and the seat dropped back onto the bowl with a clank. Grunting, he pulled up his Captain America underwear and his Levi’s stretch jeans until they rested under his protruding belly. He checked himself to make sure he wasn’t hanging out, then zipped up.

  “See you tomorrow,” he said to the toilet while unlocking the stall. Stepping to the sink, he spurted out some pink soap and washed his hands while glancing at the mirror. He quickly looked away, grabbed a paper towel, and carefully dried his hands. Then he washed his hands again, just to be sure. The restaurant—it seemed—always felt like it had seeped into his very pores.

  Pushing his way out of the restroom with an elbow on the door, he returned to the main part of the establishment. Lacy was there and already hinting heavi
ly at what she wanted from Zane. She was leaning against him and trying to run a hand down inside his pants.

  Dave shook his head before noticing that the two smart-asses he’d served earlier were still in their booth, chatting away like chipmunks. He’d hoped they would have left by now. Those same two had been in the restaurant for most of the evening, solving all the world’s problems. He had picked up parts of their conversation, and it took all of his willpower not to bash their hippie heads together and tell them how retarded they sounded. Most of that time, they had gone on yapping on about carbon emissions and non-organic foods and how it all had messed up the planet. He hated that crap. He hated them even more for being the hypocrites they were. Here, they were eating food in the luxury that was Carleone’s Pizza Palace for Christ’s sake. The only thing organic in the place was the black mold growing on the walls.

  Idiots.

  Dave stepped closer to Zane and Lacy, who were pawing at each other by the door.

  “Can you two get going before you make our customers sick?” Then, he rethought what he’d said. Zane should have to clean the bathrooms first. “Wait, I mean—”

  Lacy cut him off. “Thanks, Dave-man, we’ll see you tomorrow, boss!” She winked and pulled herself tighter against Zane.

  Dave watched them leave, taking a moment to be envious of the white-trash debauchery in which they would soon engage.

  If only…

  He checked the clock on the wall then the hippies. It was ten minutes past closing time. Great. Time to give them the boot.

  “Ahem,” he coughed into his closed fist. “I’m looking to close up here,” he said in their direction as he approached. “Is there anything else I can get you?”

  “No, man,” the particularly pretentious looking male hippie replied. He was wearing a Che Guevara tie-dye shirt with a peace symbol on the back.

  “Ok, great then… well goodnight,” he said, hinting again. They ignored him completely and turned back to their conversation.

  Damn hippies.

  It wasn’t their ideas that he hated so much. It was how they went about pushing them on everyone and how ill informed they always sounded. Like a religious cult. He hated that about San Francisco. Hippies were everywhere. They were a damn plague.

  Mumbling to himself, he weaved around the tables, clearing off leftover food and garbage then spraying the surfaces with disinfectant and wiping it away with a clean white rag. He would glance over at the hippies from time to time, only to see them glancing back at him with annoying looks on their faces before returning to their private conversation. They seemed to be making sure their “private” conversation was being said loudly enough that anyone left in the restaurant would be able to overhear it.

  Dave collected more things and began emptying the garbage he’d swept from the tables into the receptacle by the front door.

  “Dude,” the male pretentious hippie said. “You aren’t going to place all that extra food in the same bin as the cardboard and paper, are you?”

  That was exactly what Dave was about to do.

  “Sure am, duuude,” he replied gruffly, unable to help himself. Dave watched the hippies both roll their eyes, overacting their shock and dismay.

  “See,” the female pretentious hippie said. “This is just the problem with our city. Nobody cares about our future.”

  Dave wanted to say: Yeah… cuz’ pizza crust being mixed with paper towels is the world’s biggest problem right now. But he actually said nothing. He continued with his business, clearing off the remaining tables.

  “Dude,” the male hippie said, “are you aware the damage that cleaning product does to the environment? The bottle is plastic and will never degrade, and the chemicals inside are damaging even more things. You shouldn’t use stuff like that.”

  “Shouldn’t use,” Dave mouthed, then walked over to stand by their table. “What does my shirt say?”

  “Huh?” the male hippie said.

  “My shirt, what does it say, right there?” Dave prodded his nameplate with his middle finger.

  “Carleone’s Pizza Palace,” pretentious female hippie replied.

  “What else?” Dave added.

  “David.”

  “Under that.”

  “Manager,” the female hippie added with disdain.

  “Right, The Manager,” Dave repeated. “I run this place. My rules. If I want to put a pizza box in the same goddamn bin as all the other goddamned, leftover, shitty food—I will.”

  They stared back at him in shock, as if no one had ever spoken to them that way before. But, Dave was not done with them yet. He pointed outside. “I have to put up with assholes like you preaching to me outside these walls every goddamn day. Recycle this, save that. Don’t use this or the world will end. Bullshit. In here, Dave’s the boss. So you two need to mind your own goddamned business, finish your pizza, and get the hell out of here. Got it? From now on, this is a hippie-free zone.”

  He turned away and went back to wiping down tables. He knew he had crossed the line. Like them or not, they were paying customers, and he didn’t own this place. From the corner of his eye, he watched the two glancing at each other then him. Finally, making exaggerated noises, they stood and gathered their belongings.

  “We’re so outta here, man,” the female hippie said. “Some people are so rude… so selfish.”

  “If I wasn’t such a good person,” the other said loudly, “I would take back the tip I left. It was for that nice woman who served us. Not you, Manager Dave. Make sure she gets it. And… And lucky for you, I’m not some right-wing asshole like you, or I’d...”

  I’d what? Dave thought. I voted for Obama, goddamn it! But Dave again kept his mouth shut and continued to wipe down tables and spray his earth-destroying cleanser.

  After the door had closed to the sound of a dinging bell, Dave went to the table the hippies had left and collected the money they’d made such a big deal about.

  Two quarters? “Real generous, douchebags,” he said to the closed door.

  A short while later he swept the floors, set the alarm, and locked the front doors. All he wanted to do now was to get his tired ass home and into bed.

  Leaving out the back, he weaved his way through the alleyway to his old shit-pile of a car. It was dirty, beat down, and one of the junkiest vehicles he had ever owned. But he was too damn poor to afford anything else.

  He fumbled for the keys and inserted one into the lock—of course it didn’t work. He raised a hand and balled it into a fist, knowing he had to do the same trick he often did to unlock the door—a quick bang at the bottom of the door panel followed by two raps at the top near the window.

  It took three attempts, but the lock finally popped up. He flung open the door and plunged himself into the driver’s seat.

  Something stuck him in the back like a dagger.

  He winced as he leaned forward. With his right hand, he reached behind himself and felt around for the culprit. A spring had poked its way through what was left of the cloth seats. With a few quick adjustments, he found a way to sit so it would not stab him directly in the back—only somewhat. That meant leaning sideways and having to sit at an awkward angle.

  Then a foul odor hit him.

  It wasn’t just any old foul odor. It smelled of old socks and sardines and half-digested vomit.

  The culprit, as it turned out to be, was a fuzz-covered pizza sitting in a half-opened box in the back seat. It was green and white and utterly disgusting.

  Breathing through his mouth, he tossed the Carleone’s Pizza Palace box out the window into the alleyway, somewhat near a garbage can. He’d deal with it tomorrow.

  As he started to breathe through his nose again, he smacked his tongue against the roof of his mouth to get rid of the bad taste stuck there. He’d been mildly hungry earlier and had planned to pick up some chicken nuggets on the way home, but the rank, moldy pizza put him on a one-day weight loss plan.

  With a quick come on baby, he put th
e key in the ignition and twisted it. The car did not start. It only turned over a few times and died. He again did his little trick—one bang low, two high on the dashboard this time—and turned the key.

  The engine started.

  Smiling to himself, he listened to the engine purr like a cat choking on a hairball.

  Thinking of home, he clunked the car into gear and let the rolling junk-pile idle onto the deserted street. Soon enough, he could log onto his Xbox and blow the crap out of some aliens for an hour or two while drowning the night away with a six-pack of cheap beer. He might even get lucky and pass out. Though, he also figured if he got up early enough, he might get some time to work on his novel. He’d rewritten the first chapter over forty times, and it was just about perfect.

  So, that meant chapter two awaited him.

  This early in the morning, the streets were devoid of any traffic other than the staggering hookers done for the night and the random bums pushing shopping carts full of recyclables. He hated this part of the city and knew the sooner he got out and onto the freeway, the better.

  That wasn’t going to happen.

  His rusting, shit-pile of a car suddenly decided to start rattling and lurching. The engine coughed, sputtered, and put a valiant effort into not quitting.

  “Don’t break down on me now,” he said, pumping the gas pedal to keep the car running.

  As if it wanted to add even more joy to his day, the engine wheezed one last gasp and stopped cold.

  “Damn it,” he whisper-shouted, banging his hand on the steering wheel.

  He guided the coasting car into a parking spot along the curb.

  After another ten minutes of effort to get the car started again—and watching for muggers—he gave up, got out, and kicked the driver’s door panel as hard as he could. The metal dented and stayed dented for a few seconds before popping back out.

  Dejected, he ran his gaze down the lonely street. What now, genius?

  He remembered that there was an early morning bus he’d used before he’d gotten the car. He checked his watch. If he hustled, he could probably catch the bus.