Report by Roberto Cantos.
Translated by Luismi McGregor.
No one remembers what the young man’s name was, or what settlement he grew up in, or why he was lost one day, shortly after his voice got worse.
For long days of thirst and sun-scorched skin, the young man roamed the land of red rocks. His shadow was already thin; his breath barely a hiss as the great silverback Mongolongo found him and, with snorts of satisfaction, dragged him into his filthy but unusually flirtatious lair.
In the early days, the great Mongol fed and cared for the young man. He gave him water in the bowl of his calloused hands and grains and roots which he chewed in his own mouth. But when the young man was strong again, the great Mongol began to torment him. Five, ten, fifteen times a day. Hundreds of times every moon. Thousands every year. At first, the young man cried, moaned and kicked. He cursed his luck and wished he were dead. But slowly he learned to relax. One day he was able to sit up again. Soon after, he could walk properly. In the evenings, between visits from the great Mongolian, he remembered the words his father had once taught him: “That which does not destroy us, makes us stronger. And his determination grew.
One night, the great Mongol was late. The young man, expectant and prepared, almost feared that his master had suffered misfortune. Such was already his degree of acceptance of his fate. So good was he already at withstanding the onslaught of fate. Finally, as dawn broke, the great Mongol appeared. With his two hands, he grabbed the young man and led him out of the lair. He kicked him out of the way. He was setting him free!
The young man, confused, shaken, exhilarated and terrified, ran, ran, howled with fear and happiness, as he ran away towards the rising sun. If he had looked back, he would have seen how the first light of the morning caught a flash of light on the cheek of the great silver-backed Mongolongo.
For a moon, the young man survived by hanging around the sad little village of Pozotriste, close to the beast’s den. Eating whatever he could find, stealing, begging, offering his talent in exchange for crumbs. A little out of hunger, but also out of a certain nostalgia. Until one day he felt a terrifying stabbing pain in his right egg. Frightened and writhing, he went to the barber, a man of fame and many talents. Stiff Blowjobs no less: barber, toothpuller, quack, fortune teller, loan shark, weekend hitman and mindfulness coach, among other things. But we’ll talk about the origin of his vast wisdom another day.
Stiff, after examining the young man’s egg, ventured a verdict: “You, young vagabond, have contracted the worst of all egg curses, one that only punishes those who give their flesh to Mongolians with delight. Thou, young wanton, hast got BADDLES! And very fat ones at that! You must have been in league with the Great Mongolongo, who has been martyring these lands for years now.”
Why the barber Stiff spoke so old and so finicky, we’ll explain another day.
“What?” asked the young man, confused.
“That you’ve got BADDLES, you filthy bastard,” replied the barber Stiff. “To cure them – and if you don’t, their rottenness will intoxicate you to death – you must perform a metonymic transubstantiation of the source of Evil”.
“What?”
And the barber Stiff explained in more mundane terms the healing ritual to the young man.
—
The reddened gaze of the big, silver-backed Mongolian clashed with that of the young man, who, trembling, did not lower his own. Slowly, step by step, tense as crossbow springs, they approached each other. The big Mongolian, breathing heavily, placed his huge claws on the young man. It tried to turn him. “No,” said the young man, firmly.
Holding the big Mongolian’s iron gaze, the young man crouched down and began his task. As the great Mongolian spasmed and writhed, the young man felt the pressure building in his head. But he could not stop; he must go on if he was to be saved! Finally, both were left to succumb. The big Mongolian, to ecstasy. The young man, to cervical fracture. And cranial.
When he awoke, the young man was different. A riveted collar was around his neck. His face was gone. Girths and a mask held together the fragments of his skull, splintered by the great Mongol’s passion, and hid his skin, covered with scorched scars from friction with the monster’s mighty pubic hair.
“You misunderstood me, you vicious mongoose,” said the barber Stiff, sitting by his bedside, disgruntled. “You had to eat it, not eat it. Do you understand? Tear it off and eat it fried, boiled or grilled. Do you understand? Dirty!”
But the young man had changed inside too. He had no memory of the reveries of his prostration; only confused images of unleashed power and lust, of whole gangs rising over the dust towards the firmament, of himself driving them, and of huge, titanic hamburgers!
Now he felt strong, determined, aware of everything. Fearless. Free. Unique.
Without answering Barber Stiff, but without taking his eyes off him, he put his feet on the floor, got out of bed and stood up.
“Oh!” said the barber Stiff.
The young man was now taller, more beautiful. His musculature glistened in the yellow light of the lamp as if freshly oiled. He was also handsome: his gesture was firm, but sinuous and elegant; wild. The barbarous seed of the great Mongolian had found a fertile substratum in the steely character of the young man and had borne fruit.
The young man left the dark alcove and stepped out into the glowing world.
How the young man came into possession of the Alegradias is a matter of speculation and legend among many bands of the Wasteland. Some say he took it from the dreaded mercenary Clit the Handsome after fighting him for thirteen days and thirteen nights. Others, that he had it built by a Junkman who hoarded the knowledge of the World of Old, and then unleashed it on him so that no one else would have access to it.
The fact is that when, after living countless adventures as a thief, bandit and mercenary, and taking over the leadership of the feared Blue Oyster gang, and terrorising the area of Puentechatarra, he arrived at the lair of the Great Mongolongo for the third time, the young man was wielding the prettiest, blackest and most macabre pipe in the whole Páramo: the Alegradías. It was said that Alegradias had killed the entire band of Mong the Cruel in a single day. That he went through Tannhauser’s Gate, which was very big, and hit Tannhauser, who was lying in wait behind it, and blew him up. That he could hit a beast from the pit from… the hell of a long way.
“Admit it, you don’t come here to hunt,” were the cryptic words Homoeroticus heard in his mind. “I am the source from which you suckle,” he continued to hear, as the creature licked its paw on the young man’s shoulder once more.
He still hesitated for a moment. Sweaty, hot memories, tempting, comforting, stood for a moment between him and the future. But suddenly his gaze hardened again, like ice. He raised the Alegradia and unloaded a shot into the big Mongol’s face, unknowingly perpetrating one of the most blushing phallic-Freudian metaphors in the history of wargaming backgrounds.
He then devoured the creature’s sinewy limb, which lay limp at his feet, and marched briskly on to Pozotriste.
When he reached the wretched village, he exclaimed “I’ve chased the Great Mongolongo! Reign enthusiasm! This is now called Pozoguay!” and, exultant with libidinous energy, he began to chase everyone, giving his share to anyone he could catch, man, woman, animal or vegetable without distinction. And they, in turn, infected by the hero’s furious joy, chased others, and soon the whole of Pozoguay was a big party.
Meanwhile, two men watched from a distance. One was a little grey man, insignificant. Joe, an irrelevant little man like so many others in the Wasteland. “I thought that young man was a bujarras and I was going to have the mongolongo put him looking at Puentechatarra,” he remarked.
“That one you see is no longer a young man. And he’s not a bujarras. He doesn’t distinguish between genders when it comes to buggering. He has transcended such minutiae. That is Lord Homoeroticus, called to very high destinies. He is pansexual.”
“You talk funny sometimes, Stiff.”
