Ozzy down under

Ozzy awoke with a headache like he'd been kicked in the temples by a tap-dancing gnome in steel-caps, and a tongue that felt like a pub carpet in Digbeth circa 1974. Around him stretched a world that looked suspiciously like Smethwick, only with better double glazing, fewer discarded trolleys, less boarded up pubs and a faint smell of burnt Spam and guilt. 

“Sharon?” he croaked. 

“No use, Mr Osbourne,” came a nasal voice like a disgruntled call-centre worker from Dudley. “You’ve gone and died. Dead. Kaput. Carked it in the night after an ill-advised attempt to microwave a Scotch egg in foil.” 

Ozzy turned slowly. The figure addressing him wore a cheap suit from a bygone era, clip-on tie, and had a laminated name badge:

HELVIS (Demon Grade 7 - Temp Contract)

"Where the—what the f—" 

“Welcome to the Underworld, Mister Osborne... Sector B12,”  Helvis beamed. “We did it up to look like Smethwick to ease the transition.  You’d be amazed how many Brummies don’t notice they’re dead for days.  We just pipe in a bit of UB40 and tell them the 87’s been cancelled again.” 

Ozzy blinked. “You’re saying I’m dead?” 

“As orange loons pants!” Helvis said brightly. “But don’t worry, you’re in good hands. Satan’s on his jollies to Israel.  He's just popped off to his static caravan near Eilat for a week. Likes the snorkelling. I’m holding the fort while he gets some sun on his scales.” 

Ozzy rubbed his eyes. “Jesus Christ…” 

“On sabbatical,” Helvis nodded. “Now, before your orientation, any final requests or admin?” 

Ozzy looked up, hopeful. “Can I get Villa on the telly down here?” 

Helvis paused, glanced side to side, and leaned in conspiratorially. “Well… between you and me, yeah. But keep it quiet. The Devil’s a Baggy.  There's a whole corner of Hell with that Jeff Astle mural and screens showing 'The Liquidator' on loop. Makes me sick.” 

Ozzy groaned. “Figures. Hell really is eternal.” 

As they wandered deeper into Sector B12, past Greggs, demon jobcentres, and a cursed Costa where Benjamin Zephaniah served lumpy flat whites to Tories from the 80s, they came to a large glowing chamber.  A  flickering neon sign read: 

WELCOME TO THE SHREDDER OF SOULS – PPE REQUIRED 

Inside, slumped like a pile of cold mashed potatoes, was Don Arden. 

“Don fucking Arden?” Ozzy gawked. 

The old bastard looked up, pale and greasy, with a horrified twitch.  Something large, white, and unmistakably hollow-bodied jutted from his arse. 

Don closed his eyes in despair, “Not again,” he whimpered. 

From behind a curtain of scorched velvet, Steve Marriott emerged, shirtless, grinning like a devil on speed.  He was dragging a Gretsch White Falcon, still glistening with infernal lubrication. 

“‘Ello Don,” Steve chirped. “Time for your encore.” 

“No, not the guitar, please! It’s still in there from last Tuesday!” 

With a cry of primal revenge and showbiz glee, Marriott rammed the guitar back in, strings first. Don screamed, the Gretsch twanged somewhere between a C# and existential despair, and a small puff of brimstone emerged from his mouth. 

Ozzy turned to Helvis. “Is this every day?” 

“Oh yes. Sometimes twice if the lads are bored. Now then, to business. Yams got a job 'ere.  You’re to oversee Don’s eternal punishment.  Feed him, feet first, into the bacon slicer.  On loop. Forever.” 

Ozzy hesitated. “Do I get PPE?” 

“Just a tabard that says MEAT HANDLER 666.” 

Helvis pulled acover of and industrial scale bacon slicer.  All spinning knives.  It was called Kevin.

"Fucking Bostin'!" declared Ozzy, "I did me fucking apprenticeship at the abattoir on one of them fuckers!".

Kevin the Slicer smiled and winked in a way that only an inanimate object could, an industrial monstrosity with a whirring appetite, visible resentment, and stamped MADE IN TIPTON revved into action, Don began to crawl, squealing like a wet accordion.  But it was too late. Ozzy hoisted him by the ankles. 

“You managed me like I was a kebab with legs,” he said. “Now it’s your turn to go on the bloody grill.” 

The machine whirred. The bacon slicer crunched. The Gretsch vibrated violently, crunched and spat out a bloody F-chord. And somewhere in the distance, a choir of lost accountants began singing Paranoid in Gregorian chant. 

MEANWHILE, NEAR EILAT 

Satan reclined in a folding chair outside his static caravan, legs crossed, shirt open, red skin glistening. He sipped from a lukewarm can of Maccabee and sighed. Next to him, Benjamin Netanyahu sat twitching, sweating, and looking profoundly uncomfortable. 

The Devil smiled. “Now Benjamin… about Gaza…” 

He took another swig, eyes narrowing. 

“And your imminent future.” 

Netanyahu tried to stand. The Devil’s tail coiled lazily around his ankle and yanked him back into the deck chair. 

“Relax,” Lucifer said. “We’ve got all the time in the world.” 

From deep below, a faint whirring sound rose, the hum of a bacon slicer chewing through cosmic injustice.  A muffled scream echoed up through the crust of the earth. The Devil raised his can in salute. 

“To poetic endings.” 

For all his bad press he was quite big on justice.

And as Ozzy became accustomed to his new surroundings, where the lava flowed like Bovril, the air smelt permanently of burnt sausage rolls, and his father-in-law screamed on a loop like a malfunctioning fire alarm he began to settle in.   Between shifts on the slicer, he caught Villa on the telly (albeit slightly delayed, thanks to infernal licensing laws), shared roll-ups with Steve Marriott behind the sulphur bins, and occasionally moonlighted in the house band for the Punishment Karaoke Lounge, where Mussolini did a passable “Don’t Stop Believin’.” One afternoon, as he wiped blood off his tabard and watched Don being hoisted into the slicer for the eighth time before lunch, Ozzy lit a cigarette, exhaled slowly, and grinned. 

“I’m gonna fuckin’ love it down here.”