Pantsbearer (11-24-2011)

“Surrender the pants, human! Let this accursed unlife end!”

Burl’s moustache bristled at the very idea of giving up his affordable, sensible pants, his knife leaping into his hands. “These pants cost me twenty dollars, and I’ll never give them up! Never!”

The underwear-wearing demon swung its long spear, almost cleaving both Burl and Doris apart. The blow glanced off Doris’ heaving chest, thanks to the steel-reinforced chaoskini she wore. She smirked, her own dagger spinning across her fingertips.

Burl gave her an assuring nod, his ruggedness resplendent due to the awesome power of his pants. “These pants have made me a god among the unclad, and you’ll never reclaim them for your dark purposes, demon! Go back and tell Gustav The Dread he will never have them.”

“There is no need for that.”

The demons fell back as the sky itself yawned open, a flaming gate opening into a world filled with roiling horrors. Gustav strode out of it on his multi-headed steed, the horse spewing clouds of frost from each of its mouths. Gustav’s bright pink boxer shorts shone in the fading sunlight, the reflection almost dazzling as he rode toward the two people.

Gustav spoke from behind a scraggly moustache and beard, the unkempt hairs quivering with each word. “When you went to the Moustache Appreciation Society Ball, you had no idea what fell actions your own coronation speech would sow over our world. Your own fears gave way to powers you should never have used!”

Burl pointed his knife toward Gustav. “All I did was imagine everyone in the audience in their underwear! How was I supposed to know that these enchanted pants, sewn from a god’s foreskin, would grant me such power, and especially at such a sensible price!”

Gustav roared, his four hands rising up with a wood axe in each palm. “You can undo this curse! You can return our pants to us, so that we can go to the store and buy our adult magazines and cat food without shame! Your will can return our world to its former glory, as experienced by our fathers during the Age of Jeans and the Bell-Bottom Years!”

Burl stood up to his full height, Doris clinging to his side. “These pants are mine!”

Coupled with the awesome power of his moustache, the pants sent out a shockwave that ripped through the gathered forces, eradicating the underwear from their bodies. In shame, the demons ducked behind bushes or stood in front of convenient waist-high objects. They hissed and cursed his name, but none of them would dare move against him.

Gustav stayed behind his horse, coaxing the beast to trot as he kept pace behind it. “I suspected you were capable of evil like this, so I sought out aide.”

It made a rippling sound as it tore through the earth at Burl’s feet, as if a thousand corduroy wings were all beating at once. Its giant belt loops tore up chunks of dirt, dislodging boulders as it rose up on its two thin legs. The top opened up, its razor sharp zipper snapping at the sky as it loosed a howl unlike anything he’d ever heard a pair of pants make before.

Gustav laughed, almost letting the horse move too far away from him in his excitement. “Yes, yes! No man with a moustache would ever allow his reputation to be sullied by Three-Quarter-Pants the Fell, scourge of all Pantsbearers! May his thousand names burn our forsaken countryside to cinders, so long as he gets rid of you!”

Burl looked up at the giant pair of shants, fear gripping him for the first time since he’d taken on the responsibility of Pantsbearer. He looked to Doris for support, the moment of weakness damning him as it gave Three-Quarter-Pants a way to hurt him. With blinding speed, the huge pair of Clamdiggers fell on her, its zipper gnashing at her almost-nude body. Even its razor teeth could not pierce the chaoskini, though, sparks raining off Doris as the metal zipper scraped across the thong and top.

Burl rushed to help her, a rain of spears falling down on him as he ran. Many of them fell short, the demons cursing at him from behind the objects they used to cover their nakedness. Gustav moved to intercept him, his horse trotting as fast as he would allow.

Burl heard a disembodied voice from his pants, and smiled. “Believe.”