The Labor Pains of Hercules Story 5

The Augean Stables

What a load of crap!





Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit! Literally. Leave it to goddamn Eurystheus and his twisted sense of humor.

“Clean King Augeas’ stables.”

Yeah, right. Like the ass hole didn’t own half the freaking animals in Greece. Like the bastard had ever bothered to clean up after all those animals. Like the livestock weren’t leaving daily deposits on Mt. Shit Sack.

Hercules had heard all of the ‘rain came down, earth got flooded’ He wondered then who the hell ever took all of his family and two of all of the animals in the world on a boat to wait out the flood’ stories going. He’d always wondered who cleaned out the bottom of those boats while they were floating around. Who ever it was, it sure as hell wasn’t Augeas, but maybe someone on that boat would have some tips.

It was his shit luck that the whole boat load was already past Chiron’s coin thing and into the other world. Hercules would have pitched a fit about that but bellowing and stomping never worked with Eurystheus. That asshole would just shrug his shoulders and say,

“Wasn’t me come to you askin’ to get my ass out of a sling. You want the job or not?”

“By the by,” Euystheus was saying them, “You got one day to get it done, Kid.”

ONE DAY?!!!!

It would probably take ten years to clean up all that crap, bulging biceps or no. And that was if the damn animals could hold their bowels and bladders that long. One goddamn day.

Hercules was about to say “Screw that!”, but after fucking up (literally) on the hydra thing, he knew there was a lot of ground to cover.

“One more thing I gotta thank Eurystheus for,” he muttered. “Bugger the old bastard!”

“I heard that!”

Hercules flipped his uncle the bird. Piss on it. He could hear all the way to the….

A sudden thought flashed through Hercules’ mind and he began to think on it. Then he started to grin. Piss on it. Oh, yeah.


#


“Hey, Augeasu, how’s it hangin’?”

“Hip deep in horse shit,” Augeas said glumly. “You know any decent cleaning ladies?”

“Maybe. Maybe I know one who can clean it up in one day.”

“You gotta be shittin me!”

Hercules very pointedly looked around the barn yard.

“Looks like you got enough of that to last a life time. We’re talking about getting rid of it all, remember?”

“Ah, yeah. About that. I been wearing Eau De Cow Plop for so long I can’t get near none of the ladies, you know what I mean? And I’m hurting like hell for a little. Shit. I’m hurting like hell for a lot! You think that cleaning lady would, ah, do something about that?”

“Hell, man! You got sheep don’t you?”

“Yeah. But they’re getting to be a baaaaaaad lay. So about that lady----”

“Ain’t no lady, and he don’t come cheap.”

“I care about that? I got damn near as many drachmas as the Gods. What’s he gonna want for a job like this?”

“A tenth of your best.”

“Best what? I told you I’m hornier than one a my three peckered billy goats.”

“Did the lion and the hydra. That’s enough animal ass for awhile. One tenth of your best cattle.”

“Cattle. Is that all? And you’re the one’s gonna clean up this mess?”

“Uh huh. For one tenth of your best cattle. And in one day.”

Augeas nearly broke down and cried he was so happy.

“Go for it, kemo sabe. I’m dying to get at one of them ladies!”

Hercules went for it. First he tore a big opening in the wall of the cattle-yard where the stables were. Then he made another opening in the wall on the opposite side of the yard.

Next, he dug wide trenches so they would flow through the yard and the mess would flow out the hole in the wall on the other side of the yard. Then he pissed in the trenches----and pissed, and pissed, and pissed, and pissed. It took whatever was left of the allotted day to get the job done, but with all of the piss and vinegar Hercules had bottled up inside of him he finished up in time and then some.

Then he went to collect his due. Augeas was not happy.

“You sneaky assed son of a bitch! Euystheus just told me you had to clean out the goddamn stables! I ain’t payin you the snot outta my pig’s nose for this.”

Now Hercules was not happy.

“You lying, scum sucking sheep screwing cheat! You promised!”

Augeas shrugged.

“So sue me. And you best remember you just washed all the shit outta here. I’m figuring there ain’t a lawyer to be had from here to China.”

Hercules went to China. The shyster wanted sixty percent of Hercules’ tenth of Augeas’ cattle.

“That’s goddamn usury!”

The lawyer shrugged.

“You get forty percent of the cattle or a hundred percent of nothing. Take it or leave it.”

Hercules took it.

“Now how the hell are we gonna win this thing?”

“You got nothing to worry about,” the lawyer assured him. “I got it covered.”

“How?”

“We got a witness that’ll stand up and say not only did Augeas make the bargain, he tried to screw you outta what he promised.”

“What’s that gonna cost?”

“A tenth of whatever we wring outta Augeas.”

“Freakin’ hell,” Hercules sighed, “All right. Go for it.”

By the time Hercules got done paying for the judge and the jury he was down to about a tenth of the tenth he was going to get out of Augeas. Somehow the whole shittery didn’t seem like bothering with any more.

“Oh yeah it is,” his lawyer disagreed. “You want somebody else down the line pulling this crap on you? You give in once, you better believe you’ll be wound up in lawsuits for the rest of your life.”

Hercules went through with it. The jury got seated. The lawyers went at it for a while on all the “Party of the first part,” and “Where as” and crap. Then the judge came in and nobody was seated. Then every body sat on their ass and waited while the judge looked over the papers one more time.

“Ok,” the judge said finally. “First witness.”

Augeas stepped up, got sworn in (then at, by Hercules).

“Your Honor, I never promised this son of a----ah, this hooligan nothing.”

Hercules’ lawyer was on that like a duck on a june bug.

“You trying to tell everybody Hercules did all that cleaning outta the goodness of his heart?”

Augeas shrugged his shoulders.

“Everybody knows this bum’s on work detail. Stupid son of a bitch tried to wriggle out of it with the hydra deal, now he’s trying to wriggle out of this one. I never promised him nothing.”

The lawyer nodded.

“That’s all I got for this one, judge.”

The next one was Augeas’ kid. Hercules started to moan, the lawyer gave him a wink.

Sure enough, the kid swore his father had agreed to give Hercules a reward.

“Open and closed,” the judge decided. “Augeas, pay the man.”

That left one pissed of Augeas.

“Get the hell outta my kindom, the both of you!” he bellowed, “You come back here figure get a look at all the scythe’s I got and figure your asses are grass!”

Hercules and the kid did, with one bonus. Augeas was hopping around so much he slipped on the mud in his barn and landed ass first in the piss Hercules used to clean the place out.

It was a good bet then that it was going to be a looooong time before Augeas got a taste of anything but mutton.