It was not long that they waltzed down that dusty road than Pamela and ‘Henry’ found themselves walking up to a fork in the road.

“Oh, but which road to take!” Henry exhaled hautily, “Would that I could but saw myself in twain and saunter down both of these two diverging paths. These paths that, if one were to look at them, save of course for the fork in them, would scarcely be able to tell the difference. What is one side of the fork in the road to the other? I honestly cannot say, for once again they look about the same, and even seem to lead to the same location. And with all that, how on Gurth could I ever choose?”

“Henry, there’s no choice to make, it’s not that kind of fork,” Pamela rolled her eyes, bent down and picked up the sterling silver fork from the dust, “It’s all the same road.”

“Oh. That explains a lot.”

On they continued down that singular road, both relieved they’d been spared the agony of making a decision. And while it had not taken long to reach the aforementioned fork in the road, it did take a hood while before they happened upon much anything else, for they were crossing the Aggravatingly Long and Uninhabited Plains.

Indeed, it took such a while that the suns were grazing the horizon by the time they happened upon that most unlikely of sights in that glorious somewhere they where that was itself called the Aggravatingly Long and Uninhabited Plains. That unlikely sight was a glorious, indeed spectacular, five star hotel. It was made of brilliant cobblestone, and ornate sculptures of devilish figures dotted all its corners and arches. Expertly landscaped were its surroundings, giving it the appearance of a sort of oasis. But perhaps the most curious bit about the hotel was that it was tentatively hovering about half a foot above the ground. There were two floating ‘courtesy steps’ that made this distance from the ground trivial to the point of absurdity.

“Well,” Henry cleared his throat, “This looks quite opportune.”

“I don’t know, Henry. I have a weird feeling about this.”

“But Pamela, look at this!” Henry pointed to a lazy wooden sign with the words ‘ROOM SERVICE INCLUDED’ painted haphazardly across it.

“But why is that sign so much shittier than the rest of the hotel?”

“Oh, they probably just forgot about it. I bet management fussed and had some scared new hire slap it together. You’re overthinking this, old chup.”

Pamela suddenly took on the disposition of a scorned chihuahua, “Who’re you calling old?”

Henry raised his hands in defense and shuddered. “Pamela! It was just an expression!”

“Why don’t you keep your expressions to yourself, Henry? You know, just like that other phrase, ‘Express yourself.’”

“That’s not what that saying means, Pamela.”

“Pfft. How would you know?”

“Helloo there. Are yoou twoo looooooking foor a roooooom?” warbled a voice as the hotel door creaked open.

Pamela and Henry jolted and stumbled back a half step at the sight of the Jalabgar. They knew it was a Jalabgar because it was tourqouise, and its skin was translucent. Besides those indicators, the Jalabgar looked not at all human. Its head, if it could be called a head, looked like several terrifying sea creatures all stuck together. There was an enormous set of vertical jaws. About eleven beady, soulless eyes. And two enormous, soulful, yellow eyes. A bunch of lumpy, octopus looking parts and a couple of squids seemed to take the place of hair. It was tall, but it didn’t really have a body as it did a bunch of tentacles dressed in well-ironed pleated material that attempted to shape themselves into a mockery of the human form.

“Um,” Pamela hacked on her own shock, “We’re actually just—”

“Yes, please, hood sirrah!”

“Excellent, glad too hear it. Thoough I woould like yoou too knoow, I happen too be a lady.”

“Oh,” Henry frowned, “Please excrete me. My deepest apologies, misirrah.”

“Quite alright. Noow, coome coome, let me lead yoou too the froont desk. Woould either oof yoou like a squirt of soome coomplementary bug spray?”

Before either of them could answer, the Jalabgar whipped out a large aerosol can and coated both Pamela and Henry in the sticky solution.

“Um, misirrah,” Pamela groaned, “This smells like cooking oil.”

“Yes, it’s a special noontooxic foormula. Noow, here we are, the froont desk.”

And there they were, at the front desk. Pamela stared at the green and white checkerd flooring instead of making eye contact with the Jalabgar at the counter. The entire room was bathed in a sickly orange light that felt almost clinical, if a clinic were a morgue.

“Oone roooooom?” drooled the Jalabgar receptionist.

“Um, two, please,” Pamela hacked as she smelled the sour, moldy musk of the Jalabgars.

“Twoo rooooooms, twoo rooooooms, let’s see here…doo yoou mind if they’re sequential?”

Pamela shook her head, holding her nose. Out of the corner of her eyes she noticed Henry had walked off with the other Jalabgar, whom he seemed to be having a spirited discussion about the dreafulness of men as a monolith.

“Ookay…well…” the Jalabgar made a sad moaning coo as it rifled around a drawer full of mismatched keys, “Doo yoou mind if they’re noot sequential?”

Pamela rolled her eyes and shook her head.

“Excellent. Here yoou goo. I’ll give yoour friend his when he coomes back. The elevatoors are doown that hall and too yoour left. When yoou get too yoour roooooom, be sure too check the paper hanging oon yoour doooooor. Yoou use that too place yoour oorder foor roooooom service. Noow. Hoow will yoou be paying toonight?”

Pamela froze. She had absolutely no money. And she wasn’t really sure if Henry did either, or even where he was.

“Uh ooh. Did soomeboody foorget their wallet?” the Jalabgar cooed patronizingly, “Doon’t woory, we can take IOOUs. Just as loong as yoou lend us something valuable oof yoours too hoold oontoo foor the night.”

Pamela rifled through her pockets, unable to find anything of any value other than her lovely locket, the thought of which handing to a Jalabgar made her sick to her stomach. She shrugged.

“Wait a secoond. Hoow aboout that nootebooooook?”

Pamela felt a tinge of adrenaline as she weakly handed the Jalabgar her notebook.

“Noo need too looooook soo nervoous. We’ll give it back too yoou toomoorroow.”

Pamela nodded and headed off to the elevators. Only, she couldn’t rightly find the elevators, for with the absence of her notebook and the naked Jalabgar drawings she’d been sketching during the awkward encounter she could scarcely remember the directions to them, and consequently took a right when she ought to have taken a left.

At a normal hotel, and indeed even at many abnormal hotels, a wrong turn would not have been that big of a deal. But this hotel was run by Jalabgars. So when Pamela took the right down the hall she was met by a foreboding red staircase. It looked like blood had been draining through each step. Did they butcher their own meat here? She felt her stomach tie into knots and her cervix squeeze tightly.

“AAAAAIEEEGH!” screamed an undeniably human voice. In fact, it sounded quite similar to Henry’s.

“Cluck’s sake,” Pamela muttered under her breath as she rused down the staircase and into the dimly lit room.

She saw Henry standing shirtless. Three Jalabgars in white aprons and chef’s hats were sprinkling various seasonings and oils over his body and giggling gleefully.

“Pamela!” Henry blurted with joy, “What a pleasure that you’ve come here! These kind Jalabgars were just treating me to a free spa session! They just waxed my back, it was quite painful. You’re just in time to get in the hot tub with me!”

Pamela looked at the hot tub. It was a giant saucepan, and was nearly at a rolling boil.

“Get the cluck away from Henry, you…you hamned Jalabgars!” Pamela growled, swatting at the Jalabgar’s grotesque heads as if they were giant, menacing flies.

“Pamela, that’s not a very polite way to talk to our Jalabgar friends. They were only trying to—”

Pamela grabbed Henry by the belt and yanked him away from the ‘hot tub,’ dragging him towards the stairs as the Jalabgars sighed in disappointment.

“Pamela, I’m absolutely astounded by the bitter rudeness you’ve—”

“Shut the cluck up, Henry.”

“But—”

“Just shut the cluck up.”

Henry huffed like a scolded puppy as they walked up the stairs and towards the elevator, which beckoned dimly with a light blue glow.

“I can’t, I just can’t clucking believe you’d let a bunch of Jalabgars try to eat you, Henry. You ought to know better.”

“Eat me? Pfft! Why, Pamela, that’s absurd.”

“Is it, Henry? Is it?”

“Why yes, I think it is.”

DIIING

The elevator slid open. Pamela sighed in relief when she saw nobody was occupying it, but felt some bile rise in her throat when she saw a bloody handprint on the ceiling. At least it looked old.

“They ought to get a better cleaning crew,” Pamela muttered to herself as she pressed the button to the fourth floor.

“Pamela, I’m starting to get the impression that you harbor some negative feelings towards Jalabgars.”

“What gave you that idea, Henry?”

They stood there in silence as the elevator rocked and shook and shuddered upward.

“Do you really want to know?” Henry started, “Because if you do, what gave me that idea was the derisive way you called them ‘hamned Jalabgars.’ You know, Pamela, Jalabgars are people, too.”

“No they’re not, Henry. They’re Jalabgars.”

“I know they’re Jalabgars, but I was just saying that, spiritually, you know, Jalabgars and people aren’t all that different.”

“Well hood for Jalabgars, I guess. But having a soul doesn’t make them people and not Jalabgars.”

“Why?”

DIIING

“Because they eat us, you clucking imbecile!” Pamela screamed just as the door slid open to a disgruntled-looking elderly Jalabgar.

“Um. Is everything ookay oover here?” warbled the jostled Jalabgar.

“Yes!” Pamela stormed out of the elevator in a huff.

“I must say, yoou smell absoolutely divine,” mused the Jalabgar to Henry as it reached out a tentative tentacle.

“Why thank you! Such kind people you Jalabgars are.”

“Kind and hungry!” Pamela scurried back over and snatched Henry’s wrist in a vicelike grip. She turned back to look at the Jalabgar and belted, “Have a hood night!”

“Pamela, I daresay you’re going to hurt their feelings if you keep carrying on this way.”

“Hood! Cluck their feelings! I hate Jalabgars!”

“Awwww…” sadly sighed a Jalabgar who had just rolled a custodial cart out of a nearby room.

“Pamela, you’ve got to go apologize to them. That was just uncalled for.”

“Henry, they nearly buried you in garlic. What would you rather my reaction be, exactly?”

“Maybe a little bit of humanity and compassion, is all.”

“Henry…” Pamela froze, noticing she’d reached his room, “Here’s your key. Do me a favor and don’t do anything else stupid tonight, okay? Seriously, minimize your contact with the Jalabgars. You’re making me nervous.”

“You’re making me nervous, Pamela. I never knew you were such a hateful person.”

“I can’t help the fact that I like being alive, Henry.”

“Still though.”

“Just take your key already.”