I Am Death

Kobra and Lux embraced each other lovingly as they watched the scene unfold from their abandoned building hideout. Black protesters, with rage on their faces and profanity on their cardboard signs, surrounded the courthouse waiting for the perfect moment to unleash their fury. White hooded Klansmen stood on the opposite side with nooses and effigies to show their disgust. In between the two extreme parties were police in riot gear, armed with batons, tear gas grenades, and facial expression fiercer than an entire hunting party of starving wolves.

Lux, dressed beautifully in a fairy-like white dress, black knee high boots, and a glittery mask over her stunning blue eyes, gazed into her lover with and said with the softest voice, “What will happen if this plan doesn’t work?”

Kobra, with a snake’s mask covering his face and black robes with skeletal armor covering his toned body, stroked his girlfriend’s long black hair with soothing comfort and said, “Let me put it this way, my love: we don’t have a choice. Any minute now, the verdict for Keith Turner will be revealed. No matter what it may be, this city will descend into chaos in a heartbeat. I never really did like politics, but I hate senseless violence even more.” He touched a gentle finger underneath Lux’s chin and said, “Everything will be alright. The devices are rigged, everything is in place, and we’ve rehearsed this act until the end of time. They’d be foolish not to be frightened by Death himself.”

“I love you, Kobra.”

“I love you too, Lux.”

The two magicians shared a passionate tongue kiss only to be distracted by the noise going on outside. They peered out their window and saw Keith Turner and his lawyers dancing happily down the courthouse stairs. No shackles. No cuffs. Not a damn sign that he had been found guilty. The long brown-haired defendant even had a sadistic smile on his face. Kobra shuddered to think that was the look he gave the eight-year-old black girl before he murdered her in cold blood. And now the illusionist’s blood came a rolling boil now that this racist son of a bitch would walk free.

Just like Kobra predicted, the scene outside the courthouse descended into madness upon hearing the news that Keith Turner was free. Black protesters shouted and scrambled toward the heavily-guarded murderer while slinging their signs like steel chairs in a wrestling match. The KKK members swarmed the protesters and threw haymakers and shin kicks, not to mention a few choice N-words and other delightful racial slurs. The riot police struggled to maintain order and instead resorted to swinging their batons at anything that moved, be it protester or Klansman. Blood filled the streets of Paulson City and Mr. Turner watched from the stairs above without an ounce of warmth in his heart.

“It’s show time, Lux. Levitate me!” demanded Kobra. The magician had thin wires running through his robes that were undetectable by sunlight, yet powerful enough to hold his 180 lb. frame. Once Lux pounded a few buttons on a nearby control panel, those wires gave the illusion of floatation as Kobra “levitated” out of the window and high above the riot in progress.

Only a few rioters and police officers stopped to watch the floating death angel with wide-eyed awe and wonder. Kobra gained everyone’s full attention when he pulled a tab inside his robes and unleashed a pair of metallic angel wings. He winked at Lux inside the hideout and prompted her to activate the flamethrowers rigged on both sides of the street. This burning gesture was on cue with Kobra raising his arms in the air and extending his fingers like a sorcerer casting spells.

What once was a riot full of angry people and weary cops now turned into a theater with a dumbstruck audience. No more bloodshed, no more racism, just shaky bodies and faces of fear. Kobra loosened a few bladders and bowels once he swung his arms to the side and summoned a hurricane force wind around his body. He threw down his hand and tossed a rigged lightning bolt onto a gimmick fire hydrant, which exploded into a secondary Old Faithful.

One of the cops pulled out a shotgun and tried to squeeze off a few shells in Kobra’s direction. The combination of wind, lightning, and fire blew the ammunition every which way and almost blew out one of the covered-up flamethrowers. Instead of wiping off his sweaty brow in relief, Kobra went right into his distortion box-voiced tirade against the masses.

“Fools! Each and every one of you! You’re nothing but goddamn fools!” shouted the masked illusionist. “You’re gathered here today to spread mayhem and murder, the same mayhem and murder that the idiot in the gray suit was so happy to commit not too long ago!”

Even as Keith Turner stared daggers at him with a brown-toothed smile, Kobra wouldn’t shake and stutter so easily. The magician pointed an elongated, bony finger at the killer and shouted, “If you think you’re going to get away with your sins so easily, you’re sadly mistaken! I am Death himself! I am nightmare fuel! I speak the words of every victim you have claimed! That girl you killed had a name! That name is…”

“Shut up! Shut the fuck up!” Keith interrupted with a booming voice. “Does anybody else here think this Angel of Death garbage is a bunch of bullshit?! Am I the only one who sees this cocksucker for who he is?! You don’t scare me, snake boy! None of y’all niggers scare me either! White power!”

With Mr. Turner performing a Nazi salute, the KKK members did the same before clashing with black protesters and riot police once again. Their nationalist rage transformed back into pants-wetting, voice-stealing fear once Kobra shot a lightning bolt a jimmied mailbox and ignited the flamethrower underneath. “Silence, you fools!” shouted the Angel of Death.

“If you think those streets are bloody now, keep testing my patience!” bellowed Kobra. “I shall turn this city into hell itself! I shall turn this world into a necrocosm! I shall avenge every restless soul…”

“Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah! Yeah, we get it! Armageddon and shit!” yelled Keith with his arms folded and arrogant anger etched on his face. “Tell you what, shit head! Why don’t you float on down here and I’ll rearrange that pretty little snake face of yours! No more magic tricks and hocus pocus bullshit! Just you and me slugging it out, baby!”

Kobra sweated profusely inside his costume trying to think of ways to keep his bluff alive. He had an idea, but it was risky. But with no risks came no rewards. Either this would pay off or it would get him killed. “Tell you what, Mr. Turner,” said Kobra in his usual demonic aura. “Why don’t you come over here instead! You think this is a gimmick?! You think this is a fairytale?! I don’t deal in fairytales, you sodomite! I deal in death! Bring your bastard ass over here and prove to me you’re more than just a coward who targets children!”

Keith took off his suit jacket and angrily threw it to the floor before cracking his knuckles and putting his dukes up. He breathed heavily like a beast ready to jump on its prey. But then he chuckled egotistically and said, “Who am I kidding? I’m a free man. I’ve got nothing to prove to you. You’re the one breaking the law, not me. Hey, officers! Do your job and put this pinheaded asshole on trial! Maybe these jiggaboos out here can get a hashtag going on Twitter that says Snake Lives Matter or some shit.”

“Suck my dick!” shouted a random protester who threw a cardboard sign at Keith. With kicks, punches, elbows, and knees being thrown every which way, the rioting crowd and the armored police were back to square one with the bloody violence.

Kobra had one last trick up his sleeve and he had to make it count. He turned to his lovely partner Lux and gave her thumbs up before dragging that thumb across his throat. She smiled and nodded at him before pulling the biggest lever her control panel had. Slowly but surely, a parked police van on the sidewalk levitated off the ground with the same invisible wires to support it, though nobody could see them.

The fighting ceased once again despite Keith Turner’s constant bellowing that this was just another “hocus pocus stunt”. The higher in the air the van got, the more the crowd parted like the Red Sea. Protesters, cops, and Klansmen alike dispersed from the streets running like Olympic athletes. They left behind a battlefield of blood and bodies. There were even wounded bodies in the streets struggling and crawling to get away.

“This is horseshit! This is absolute horseshit!” Keith complained. He jumped into the nearly empty streets and started kicking the dead bodies of black protesters. “I’m so sick of this crap! Black lives don’t matter, motherfuckers! Your lives don’t mean shit to me! I’m sick of that stupid goddamn hashtag going around the fucking internet! You hear me?! I said do you hear me…”

The wires, being thin enough to evade detection, were bound to snap with that much weight underneath. Kobra knew this part of the illusion was a bad idea and covered his eyes, not wanting to watch his cinematic masterpiece crumble beneath him. But the sound of metal crunching on concrete deafened his ears, he opened his field of vision again to see that the only thing crumbling beneath him were Keith Turner’s bones. He was crushed underneath the wrecked vehicle with just his head poking out and his eyes bulging from his skull.

The poetic justice brought laughter to Kobra’s throat from the depths of his belly. It was an evil laugh that only a sick and sadistic demon could pull off. He even raised his hands to set off more flamethrowers and lightning bolts to keep his gimmick alive in the eyes of those still hanging around (which weren’t many). The howling laughter continued even as Kobra was slowly being pulled inside the hideout by Lux’s controls.

The illusionist stripped off his robes, skeletal suit, and angel wings to reveal a T-shirt and jeans underneath. “How did I do?” asked Kobra with a sexy smile on his face.

Lux wrapped her silky arms around her lover’s neck and said in a seductive voice, “I hope they give out Oscars for performances like that. You were wonderful, my dear. You even had me scared for a minute. Come here, sweetheart.” The magic-wielding couple pulled each other in for an emotional kiss. This illusion was a long shot in the making, but it paid off handsomely. Magic was real whether it was in the bloody streets of Paulson City or in the embrace of two passionate sorcerers.

“I love you, Kobra.”

“I love you too, Lux. Don’t ever forget that.”

Dale Update

***DALE UPDATE***

After successful heart surgery, my step-dad Dale is finally home from the hospital. He seems to be in the same good spirits he’s always in as evidenced by his ability to enjoy a rerun of NCIS: Los Angeles on TV. He’s only been away for a short while, but everyone here at the house missed him. The animals are especially glad to see him back judging from how Tori jumped up on Dale’s chest and purred like a lawnmower. He’s going to have to make a lot of phone calls to his distant family to tell them how he is, but he’ll survive. See what I did there?

As part of his recovery process, plenty of things in his life are going to change. He won’t do as much heavy work as he normally does, he can’t eat fatty or sugary foods anymore, and he’ll have to take a shit ton of medication in addition to what he takes now. Since Dale’s going to be eating healthier meals from now on, we all will and quite frankly it’s about time. I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t make the best food decisions and it shows with my lack of cardio and my big belly. Maybe with more rabbit food around the house, I’ll have no choice but to take better care of my body. Losing weight is important to me, but now that there’s going to be a stronger support system in place, I can actually do it. More importantly, Dale will have a lot longer to live.

Peace and order have been restored to the Haines-Temons-Stevens-Wilson household. Dale still has some resting and recovering to do, but that’s the easiest part of this whole ordeal, especially when the animals all want to snuggle around him. At first we worried that we wouldn’t be able to take care of our 15-year-old Springer Spaniel Maggie anymore. She’s blind, deaf, senile, and shits and pisses on the floor on a regular basis. With Dale out of the hospital and recovering nicely, Maggie can also continue to enjoy her elder years on this earth. The running joke around our family is that this house is a retirement home for both elderly animals and people. Nobody seems to have a counterpoint for that joke. Hehe!

Mom and Dale’s east coast vacation is still off the table, but Mom is optimistic about the two of them being able to see Paul Simon perform in Denver in late June. I swear to god, you should see Mom’s face light up like a Christmas tree anytime I give her a Paul Simon CD for a gift. I gave her one for Mother’s Day along with Trevor Noah’s memoir and she grinned from ear to ear. Come to think of it, Father’s Day isn’t too far away either. I hope Dale will have the same reaction when he opens his presents. Hell, it’s the easiest bet in the world!

That’s all I have to say for now. In short, Dale’s doing just fine now and he’s going to keep doing fine as the years go on. Thanks in advance for your positive vibes. I’m Garrison Kelly and I’ll see you next time!

***WEEKLY SHORT STORY CONTESTS AND COMPANY***

It’s another week at the WSS and this time the prompt is “Eye of the Storm”. I have a funny feeling that we’ve had that prompt before, but maybe it was worded differently. I’m not entirely sure, but I have a short story ready to be written nonetheless. It’s called “I Am Death”, but it’s not about the Muslim heavy metal band with the same name in my recent first draft novel Demon Axe. On the contrary, it’s much, much different!

CHARACTERS:

1. Kobra, Street Illusionist
2. Lux, Kobra’s Assistant and Girlfriend
3. Keith Turner, Racist Murderer
4. Nameless Black Protesters
5. Nameless KKK Members
6. Nameless Police Officers

PROMPT CONFORMITY: Kobra’s angel of death gimmick involves heavy windstorms.

SYNOPSIS: Protesters, counter-protesters, and cops are gathered around the Paulson City courthouse awaiting the verdict against Keith Turner, who went on trial for murdering an eight-year-old black girl. Keith is eventually found not guilty and the outside crowd erupts into riotous hysteria. Kobra and Lux use their illusionary tricks to convince the police and KKK members that Kobra is an angel of death who came to earth to cleanse the world of evil and tyranny. Among the magic tricks he uses include levitation, pyrotechnics, voice manipulation, and Hollywood windstorms. Kobra and Lux hope that their bluff will be enough to scare people into leaving the black protesters alone and releasing them from police custody.

***LAW & ORDER: SVU PARODY OF THE DAY***

In New York City’s war on crime, Olivia Benson with duct tape on her mouth is considered especially erotic. The detectives who are clearly masturbating in the background are part of an elite squad known as the Sexy Victims Unit. These are their stories. DONG, DONG!

Demon Axe, Chapter 13

It didn’t matter how many times Daniel Mercer screamed for help, because not even his heavy metal death cry could wake the dead bodies left in the holding cell. As he sat in an even darker room with his hands and legs bound, the brutalized corpses of his friends kept flashing across his face like schizophrenic ghosts. He screamed for them to go away and stop haunting him, but the louder his screams became, the less his tortured brain cared.

No matter how many times he tormented himself with these images, it couldn’t compare to the actual strobe lights dancing and flickering across the room, each of them blindingly bright to where closing his eyes didn’t relieve the soreness. Obnoxiously loud music blared in the background and pierced his eardrums like a poisonous dart. Not even Daniel’s shrieks for help could drown out this familiar heavy metal beat. The same grinding guitars, funky bass, and machinegun drums that he had grown to love were being used to make his ears bleed. The vocalist’s death growls were indecipherable, though something about a “Valentine’s Day Massacre” seemed vaguely familiar.

“Turn it off, Roger! Turn that shit off! I can’t take it anymore!” shouted Daniel. Instead of getting what he demanded, the volume was turned to its absolute maximum and the strobe lights were even faster and even more grating on his eyes. The music could probably be heard from miles away, but Daniel was right here feeling his brain turn to mush, either through physical brain damage or going insane.

His eardrums went numb and his vision made him a candidate for Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder jokes until the end of time. In what Daniel thought was his temporary moment of freedom, the ghosts of his fallen comrades paid him a visit once more. The original members of Demon Axe were the first to show their floating heads and dangling spinal cords.

“You fucked up, Daniel. You fucked up badly, my friend,” said Vulture Man.

“When is enough going to be enough? How many more of us need to die so that you can keep making a living?” said Pig Man.

“We didn’t ask for our heads to be chopped off. We didn’t sign up for war. We wanted to play music. How the hell can I bang the drums with no arms and no legs?!” shouted G-Pac.

Tears rolled down Daniel’s eyes and added to the fiery sting he felt from the quickly blinking lights. He couldn’t even hear himself say, “I’m sorry, guys. I wish I could take it back.”

“Wish in one hand, shit in the other, see which one fills up first!” blared a familiar Arab accent. The image of Tarantula Man with a mangled body and limbs hanging in odd places danced into view. “You promised us paradise. You promised us heavy metal. Well, the only heavy metal I ever got was the blade of a machete! That shit hurts like hell! But it doesn’t hurt nearly as much as knowing my band mates will never see their guitarist again.”

“What about MY band mates, Daniel?” said Bear Man as he crawled into view with the lower half of his body missing and the rest of his body bloodied to a pulp. “Did you think I was going to forget about the boys and girls of Juice? Did you think Tarantula Man was going to forget about I Am Death? Just because you took our names and gave us these disgusting aliases, doesn’t mean we’re your permanent bitches!”

“Lady Killer?! What kind of a goddamn name is Lady Killer?!” The aforementioned drummer of Juice crawled across the floor leaving a pool of blood in her wake. “Face it, Daniel: this is all your fault. Every one of us is dead because of you! What did Roger Zee say about hastening the inevitable? Did it have to start with us?!”

The members of Daniel’s various bands all shouted together in a cacophony of swear words and vitriol that rivaled the heavy metal music playing in his torture cell. The tears became hotter and more plentiful. The rage inside him exploded like a gasoline fire. He could feel his limbs growing stronger and his teeth grinding away. In a voice he could finally hear, Daniel screamed, “Shut up! Shut the fuck up!”

“Why should they, Daniel? Are they saying things that you don’t want to hear? But isn’t that the purpose of heavy metal music: to bring the truth to light?” asked Johnny Vega, who had gushes of blood pouring out of him like a river of violence.

Sonia Marquez, who had no arms or legs, scooted over to Daniel with a wicked glare on her face. She rasped, “If I had my limbs right now, I would suplex your ass until the end of time. And to think, I actually had a crush on you. I would have been a hell of a lot better of a lay than that Raven chick you were running around with! What has she ever done for you anyways?!”

“Don’t you ever talk about her like that again!” Daniel roared, his fiery voice blowing away the spiritual essences of his former friends. He kept breathing fire and poison until all that remained of his traumatic insanity was the loveliest thing he had ever seen: Raven Triscloud in a purple Celtic dress. Daniel’s tears felt chilly on his cheeks as they soothed his burning pain. They were even more freezing when Raven blew him a whirlwind kiss.

“Find me, Daniel. Help me. You’re my only hope. You are our only hope. You must stop Roger Zee before he destroys everything we love,” said Raven in a beautiful high-pitched voice.

“I’m sorry, Raven…I tried so hard…I tried…” sobbed Daniel.

“It’s not over yet, Daniel. Not by a long shot. Find me, my love…find me…find me…” said Raven in a voice that got progressively softer until her spiritual essence was blown away by a tornado of obnoxious sound.

Daniel screamed for her to come back, but she never did. All that remained was a bright white light and the shadowy visage of a familiar middle-aged man. The raging heavy metal music was gone, the strobe lights were dim, but Daniel was so far down the rabbit hole that all he did was shake, grunt, sob, and bleed. He could barely hear the shadow figure call his name. There was no way this could be Raven or any of his friends. This man had a bald head. And pointy ears. And green skin.

Daniel, with now free hands, wrapped his fingers around the shadow man’s throat until he could feel the wind being sucked out of him. The grip became tighter than a hangman’s noose and more violent than barbed wire. Finally, the shadow man said, “Daniel, stop it! It’s me, Detective Shawn Henry! I’m here to help!”

The Lord of the Pit’s grip weakened until his arms were limper than spaghetti. That was all of the fight he could put up after being tortured for so long. His body felt like it had been crushed in a trash compactor. His skin felt raw and shredded like meat. His crotch felt wet and smelled like rancid fruit. His mouth, ears, nose, and eyes felt like he was drowning in a lake of blood and lava.

Despite the cataclysm of agony he was in, Daniel could comprehend what Shawn was saying as the detective held out a familiar shape. “I got your microphone out of the evidence locker and came here as fast as I could. Mr. Mercer, this isn’t a police station. This is a black site. We had it shut down for obvious reasons, but it seems Roger has brought it back to life.”

With a mouthful of biological sludge, Daniel struggled to say, “Where is she? Where’s Raven? I need her…”

“Don’t worry, Daniel, we’ll find her, whoever she is. But right now, the world needs you, buddy. I’m sorry for arresting you and bringing you to this awful place. My family’s lives were on the line. But given Roger Zee’s reckless ways, I doubt they’re even alive right now. Terrorists don’t keep their end of the bargain, which is why we’re not supposed to negotiate with them. I’d rather my wife and daughter be in a better place than spend another minute with that…that…” Tears formed in Shawn’s eyes as he wiped them away with his calloused fingertips.

Daniel spit out the venom brewing in his mouth and said, “The word you’re looking for is asshole, Detective! Roger Zee is an asshole! And if he lays one fucking finger on Raven, I’m going to kill him!” The burst of anger caused him to cough up more bile and blood.

“You have your microphone now, Daniel. You can do this! We can do this!” cheered Shawn.

The Lord of the Pit breathed heavily for a while and said, “Fuck heavy metal. Fuck it! I don’t need it anymore. I can’t listen to it now. If we’re going to kill this motherfucker…well, fuck, where are your goddamn tanks and drones and shit?!”

“Daniel, I know you’ve been through a lot, but if you give up on your music now, then…”

“Then what? I’ll actually have some peace for the first time in my life?”

Shawn’s expression became solemn as he grabbed Daniel by his back and legs and carried him baby style out of the black site. The Lord of the Pit, whose magical microphone sat in his lap, glared at the instrument of destruction with poisonous disdain and said, “I hate you, you stupid microphone. I fucking hate you!”