"Yeah... two pepperoni pizzas, and..." Jack's low, abhorrent voice went through the mouthpiece to the operator on the other line. Not to mention his spit. Poor telephone.

"What?!" Jack literally shouted to the poor operator, who was just trying to do his best to serve the customers, no matter how rude, or how distasteful they could be. "What the hell are you, a fuckin nut?!"

"Oh, just bring me the damn pizza, asshole..."

Jack hangs up the phone, with his fat, greasy hands staining the handset. He went to the couch and settled his fat ass on the poor furniture, and he didn't feel the cries of the couch, which were in terms of its springs moaning out. He reached for the remote on the side table, but clumsy and stupid as he was, his huge arm bumped the bottle of beer, and it went falling onto the ground, spilling rotten beer all over the already stained carpet. The place already smelled like shit, but Jack didn't even bother to clean things up. He figured, there was no need to waste his energy in cleaning this mess up, because he could sleep over the whole fuckin mess with his gigantic ass crushing all the shit beneath him. He didn't care, even if the place smelled like rotten fruits, as he already grew to appreciate that awful stench.

His crude, fat fingers had managed to get themselves to hold the remote, though.

With his heavy thumb, Jack pressed the button and the TV screen flickered on. The remote almost cried in pain, as the amount of force that he had applied on the remote was just too much, like his weight. Jack was abnormally huge, his belly protruding almost as if a dozen babies were inside, struggling to get out. And whenever he had to take a piss, he had to guess where his cock was, as he couldn't see it through his solid gut. And sometimes, if not every time, his piss would spurt out everywhere except the toilet.

He had grown fond of himself, being the useless spot of shit that he was. He actually enjoyed being jobless, being full of shit, and being enormously fat. Jack didn't care of the world outside his little shit hole. He didn't know what the hell was going on outside, and he didn't meet new people. Except for the pizza delivery guy. Talking about the pizzaman, Jack had made his life miserable. Instead of sparing a few tips to the poor, hardworking fellow, Jack would only insult him, and the pizzaman had nothing to do. The guy really didn't believe in the policy 'The customer is always right', but he believed that if he even made a single sound that was unpleasant to this mad gargantuan, he'd sure to be crushed beneath his huge, enormous, smelly ass.

Jack's eyes were on the TV, and his fingers constantly nibbled at the tiny buttons on the remote. He couldn't find a suitable channel for him to laugh at and procrastinate. There weren't any good shows tonight. He twisted his neck, to look at the watch, but that was already such a huge task for him.

The worn watch showed that it was 9:00pm, but he didn't care. He even cursed to himself to even bother to look at that damn time-teller. But there was a knock at the door.

*knock*

*knock*

*knock*

The knock didn't sound like the usual knock of the pizza guy.

"Must be a new guy, old pizzaman must've quit..."

Jack struggled to get off the worn, old couch. In order to support his immense weight, he grabbed the nearby posts which almost came down because of his great force. He couldn't feel the furniture rattle, and that was why the place was almost uninhabitable. He couldn't tell whether the things inside his 'house' were about to break because of him.

"YEAH, YEAH..." he yelled. "Quit knocking the door, will ya? If that piece of shit breaks, it's coming out of your salary."

There could have been an answer, but there wasn't.

*KNOCK*

*KNOCK*

"I said I'm coming, asshole!"

Jack unlocked the various locks that separated his fat ass from the world outside. This is what makes the world a safer place for people, if useless bastards like him were locked up in their own apartments by their disgusting selves.

*KLUNK*

The huge bolt made a huge klunk as it hit the iron railing. It was the last lock.

Jack twisted the doorknob and slowly opened the door. He didn't even bother to look at the peep hole. But what could be more dangerous than a hopeless monstrosity that he was? After the door was already halfway opened, Jack instantly swung it open, almost hitting his fat face.

"OK, how much?!" Jack didn't even bother to look at whom he was talking to, he was looking outside the corners of his door, making sure that the stranger's knocking didn't cause the door to wrinkle.

The man just stared.

"How the fuck much, asshole?" Jack demanded.

The man just stood still.

Jack stared at the man's shoes, and he saw that it was dark, shiny leather. He liked shoes, but none could just find its way with his huge feet. He slowly moved his eyes from the man's feet towards the pants. The pants were black also. It was like one of those Armani bullshits, and it looked expensive. The man was covered with a dark cloak halfway to his shoulders. Jack moved his eyes from the stranger's clothes towards his face. Jack couldn't 'see' the face, although it was there. The man was wearing a brimmed hat, and it seemed to shade the man's face with its shadow.

Jack felt that he was a little 'rude'. He eased down his tone and tried to speak to the man 'politely'.

"I reckon you're not the pizzaman?"

The stranger nodded a yes.

"What the hell do you want?"

The stranger reached for his inner pocket, and it looked like he was pulling something. Jack backed off a little, as for all he knew, it could be a gun or something. He didn't want his miserable life to end just yet.

But the hand revealed a card. The stranger handed the white piece of paper towards Jack's unsure fingers. Jack unwillingly received the card, but he should. At least he thought he should.

"What's this?"

"I'm conducting a survey," the man said. His voice seemed a little too low than normal.

"On what," Jack hissed, as he tried to look at the man's eyes. The stranger looked back at him, and immediately, Jack avoided the stare. He returned his gaze towards the card.

"Aren't you going to let me in first?"

"Why?"

"People might see us..."

"Uhuh..." Jack was quite unsure about the man, there was something in him that Jack felt was 'unusual'. But saying that was overrated, as he never had other visitors before.

Jack let the man in.

The stranger seemed to move very slowly, but when Jack had turned his head around to face the man, they were barely a foot from kissing each other.

"Sit," Jack said. "And don't you expect nothin from me, I ain't offerin you shit here..."

The man just stared at him. Either the man was nuts, or he simply ignored the hideous stench of the apartment, not to mention the horrible appearance of the living room.

Jack again settled his ass on the couch where he had been sitting before the man knocked. The spring made a whirring sound, until Jack was finally accepted by the couch.

"So, what the hell do you want from me?" Jacked demanded.

"I'm conducting a sur--"

"Yeah, yeah," Jack interrupted the man impolitely. "Yeah, you're conducting a survey, you already said that to me. But what's this shit about, man?"

The man's eyes were still fixed on Jack's. If he hadn't known any better, he could have sworn that the man didn't blink.

"I'm conducting a survey on people and the way they live," the stranger said.

"Yes, right. Could you hurry it up, I'm expecting pizza, and I ain't sharin it with nobody, especially not some weird folk like you."

"You see, the world today is not like it was before. The world is not anymore becoming efficient and productive. People who have little or no care about the world around them cause all these. Before, people worked hard to earn a living. But today, a lot of the world's population spend their time in their houses, doing absolutely nothing, and--"

The stranger was cut off by Jack's whining.

"Hey, if you've come here to insult my ass, you better--" Jack's voice literally trailed off. He had something to say, but somehow he was held back.

"...and that's where I come in." The stranger paused, and took a deep breath.

"And what does that got to do with me?" Jack realized that he could 'talk' again.

"If you haven't already noticed, you are one of those people, Mr. Keating. I have been keeping an eye on you for such a long time now, and I have found you to be really useless."

"How the hell could you be able to watch me, you don't even know me, asshole. Get the hell out of my house or I'm gonna call the cops." Jack yelled.

"Please, Mr. Keating, let me finish..."

Jack realized that it was no use resisting. This stranger had some kind of control over him.

"What do you want me to do?" Jack demanded.

"Oh, it's pretty simple, really," the man again placed his hand inside his cloak, trying to fetch something from inside.

The man held out some sort of rolled parchment. He held it out in the open, and the paper just rolled down, by itself, or perhaps by the man's strange 'powers'. Whichever it was, it was just too damn weird.

The parchment appeared to be some sort of contract. On the upper left of the paper was a symbol. It looked like one of those neo-Nazi figures that Jack saw on the news. The symbol had two vertical lines, and a horizontal line that were crossed together. The lines were placed within a circle, and all of the lines were red. And then the man continued.

"You just have to sign this little contract of mine..."

"Why?" Jack swallowed.

"Don't you want to live like this for the rest of your life?"

Jack gave out a small laugh. He laughed at himself, looking as proud of his worthless ass as usual.

"Yeah, man... I mean, who doesn't, you know..."

While his throat laughed meaninglessly, his entire spoilage agreed with him by shaking violently, like a crazy jello.

"All right," the man continued. "I offer you to live like this for the rest of your life, IF you sign my contract."

Jack's eye twitched.

"What's the catch?"

"Oh, it doesn't really matter to you..." the stranger, maybe for the first time, looked away from Jack's eyes. "Sign the paper, and you'll receive it all, plus bonuses..."

"So, you offer me to live like this for the rest of this goddamn life, right? I think I get what you mean..." Jack pulled a piece of leftover food from the counter and continued. "You're from the government, right, and you're into some scam or something, and you want me to keep silent about it, and by doing so, I am guaranteed that the government will not bother me with taxes or any other bullshit, am I right?"

The man smiled ominously. "Hmmm... I guess you could put it that way..."

"ARE YOU KIDDING?" Jack almost jumped from his couch. The floor rumbled under his weight. "THE HELL I'M NOT SIGNING THAT SHIT! GIMME A PEN, DAMMIT!"

The stranger pulled something out of his cloak, the very same spot where he had pulled the card and the large parchment. What else could he have in there?

The man held out a quite expensive-looking marker, and handed it towards Jack. The man hadn't moved himself from that position, but he seemed to have moved closer, to reach that pen towards Jack's hands. Jack had no time to realize that, as he was excited. He hasn't been this excited since he started this horrible lifestyle of his.

Jack snatched the pen from the man's hands and removed the cap. Although he found it hard to write because of his fat, greasy fingers, he had managed to scrape up the least of his handwriting.

"You said something about 'bonuses' earlier, didn't you?" Jack asked while he was still busy signing the paper. He halted, just to be sure.

"Ahh, yes... Bonuses. Of course, whatever you want, I can give..."

Jack had started to wonder why the man always used the pronoun 'I'. He began to think that this man was some high-ranking official, or something, as 'he' could give anything Jack desired. The man continued with his 'speech'.

"...you just tell me what it is, and I'll fix it up for you..."

"As you already may have observe, I have this problem about my weight. God knows I couldn't take a proper piss, as this huge belly traps my vision," Jack slapped his huge stomach a couple of times. "... besides, I couldn't do something 'exotic' with this lump of shit here, you know what I mean?"

Jack pulled an eye towards the man.

"So I was wondering, if I sign this contract, could you help me slim down a bit. Not like those liposuction bullshit, those things hurt, I guess something far-fetched, you know...?"

The man again gave Jack that strange, blinkless 'stare'.

"Ohh, yes, Mr. Keating. Sure. No problem. I'll have you 'slimmed down' as soon as you finish signing that contract..." the stranger confirmed.

"Now, sign, sign, sign..."

Jack resumed the broken line that he had paused earlier, and he had finished signing the contract. He was quite unsure whether he had made the right decision, but there was only one way to find out...

He handed the parchment towards the stranger, but he kept the pen in his fists.

"Can I keep the pen?" he asked amusingly.

"I'm sorry, Jack, but others have to use it also..."

"All right.," Jack handed the pen towards the man.

The stranger breathed out a sigh of relief and stood up from his chair.

"OK, Mr. Keating. Expect no more of the government, and about your weight, consider it slimmed..."

Jack stood up from the couch, strangely, without struggle, as he usually did to just get off the couch.

"Pleasure doing business with you..." the man's voice trailed off.

Jack was going to shake the man's hand but he heard something move behind him.

Nothing.

He turned around to face the man, but he was gone.

Strange son-of-a-bitch...

Jack closed the front door and went back to his couch.

"What's taking the pizzaman so long?"

*RUMBLE*

All of a sudden, Jack felt a soft rumble, but he couldn't tell where it was coming.

*RUMBLE*

There it was again... It was getting louder by the minute.

*RUMBLE*

*RUMBLE*

Jack realized that the strange, low rumbling was coming from his own stomach.

"Dammit! My stomach's asking for that goddamn pizza, and the pizzaman ain't here yet."

All of a sudden, Jack felt like he wanted to take a shit. He stood up, again without any struggle. He wondered about that.

As he made his way towards the bathroom, the rumble in his stomach kept rumbling.

Jack reached for the door knob and twisted it clockwise to open the bathroom door. He went in the room, not minding to light the bathroom up, and directly placed his ass upon the toilet. He felt a really excruciating pain in his ass, almost as if he was going to give birth.

As the first shit dropped on the toilet, the rumbling stopped. Jack took a deep breath and continued pushing shit out. He realized that it was unusually painful. He never had any experiences in taking a shit which was so damn painful. He tried looked at the bowl beneath his ass and saw that it was not shit which was pouring out of his ass.

It was his own intestines,. The bowl was already half full with his bloody entrails, and Jack wanted to get up. But he can't. He wasn't through in taking shit yet. There were still more fats to be disposed of.

Seeing his own guts in his toilet made him throw up. But it wasn't normal shit that was coming out of his mouth.

It were disgusting red, oozy things which looked like catsup mixed with melted butter that came out of his mouth. Jack felt them leave his body through his tongue, as he tasted his own bloody internal organs slowly coming out of his mouth.

He tried to say something, but the words were kept in his head.

Why is this happening to me?

Jack shit and threw up himself to death, releasing his own internal organs through the various openings of his body. His nose bled with portions of his brain, which when coming out, looked like watery, ground pork. His body could simply take no more, and he had already 'slimmed down' a bit too much.

His soul had left him, but something told him that even his soul wasn't free. He had signed a contract, and he hadn't realized until now what the conditions were.

Not then.

Not until now.

There was a long way to go downstairs, and Jack could only hope that it would not be as 'provoking' as to what had happened to him 'upstairs', if it was right to call it that.

The pizzaman never arrived.

The End

Copyright 2001 by Dominic Sanchez.

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