The Crazy Ones

The background bickering should have been an obvious harbinger of things to come for Tai. But all that clouded his imagination was Mother Nature’s most beautiful features. Rolling ocean waves washed away the harsh noise. The mountain breeze cooled him off. The desert sun baked him like a batch of fresh cookies. An angelic harpist plucked her strings while her gorgeous voice haunted his mind. Tai could have stayed in this meditative trance forever had it not been for two cellmates who didn’t have gorgeous voices of their own.

“You are such a goddamn idiot!” yelled Electra Shadowwolf, her barbed voice snapping Tai’s eyes open. Of all the muscles on her barbaric frame she could have used that day, she decided her index finger was the most powerful one as she pointed at her partner in crime.

Diesel Reznor swatted Electra’s hand away with his dragon claws and snapped, “This is your fault, you dumb bitch! I don’t know why you’re pointing that ugly ass finger at me! You should be pointing that shit at yourself!”

Tai held his exposed skull in his hand as the dragon man and the barbarian’s conversation degenerated into a cacophonic mess. He couldn’t even tell what they were saying anymore. “Could you two shut the hell up for a minute?” he calmly said to no response, just more shouting. The way their voices echoed off of brick prison walls gave Tai an explosive migraine. He wished someone would smash him over the head with a club and give him a permanent route to peace.

When the throaty voices began to give him schizophrenia, Tai sat up from his cross-legged position and slowly approached his arguing comrades. Despite having a creepy skeleton in an orange kung fu robe staring them down, Diesel and Electra’s attention spans remained on each other and the screaming continued to give aneurisms to anybody who listened.

“Shut!” belted Tai as he snap-kicked Diesel in the stomach and doubled him over. “Up!” He did the same to Electra, causing both of his cohorts to cough and wheeze. Tai didn’t wait for them to catch their breath. He grabbed Diesel by his purple scales and Electra by her brunette hair.

“You two dimwits had one job,” Tai silently seethed. “One…fucking…job. All you had to do was guard the front entrance and you couldn’t even do that correctly. That’s why we’re in here and as far as I’m concerned, it’s both of your faults.” He gave them both a gorgon death stare and whispered, “Shut your asses up and let me meditate. If I have to tell you one more time, I’ll kick you in the head so fucking hard you’ll forget how to wipe your own asses! Are we clear?”

Electra’s fearful expression showed that she understood loud and clear. Diesel, on the other hand, shoved Tai to the ground with one clawed hand as soon as he regained his breath.

“You’re just as much to blame as we are,” Diesel argued while Tai glared at his opponent, unafraid. “If you’re that good at kicking somebody’s head off, why didn’t you do it to the goddamn guards?” Diesel burped, his saggy belly wiggling over his black trousers. “You’re supposed to be some kind of ninja samurai badass, right? Well, all I saw back at the bank was a skinny little prick! And why the hell was I the one guarding the door? I should be the one smashing heads and taking names!”

“You know…it’s not too late to give it a try, you fat bastard. Go ahead. I’m lying on the ground. I’m practically begging you to show me what you’ve got!” said Tai, waving a hand over to Diesel to summon him over.

“Speaking of idiots!” said Electra, her beefy arms crossed over her fur tunic. “If you morons keep this shit up long enough, the guards will throw us all on solitary! We need a plan! We need to talk to our fucking lawyers!”

“You really think some piss-ant public defender is going to get us out of here?” growled Diesel, his scaly nose inches away from Electra’s cavewoman visage. “We’re done for, Electra! This is the last hurrah! And besides, is it really that bad being in solitary confinement? I could use a vacation away from you two dorks!”

Tai nipped up and scowled at Diesel. “And how exactly are you going to benefit from being in a dark room all by yourself? You’d go crazy within the first five seconds. You’d have tears running down your disgusting face like a goddamn waterfall. At least I have my meditation to keep me at peace. You? You’ve got a whole lot of nothing going on in that thick skull of yours. Then again, thinking never really was your strong suit and if it was, we wouldn’t be in jail right now.”

“You little bitch!” snorted Diesel, throwing the first punch in this eventual battle. His heavy arm whooshed right past Tai’s ducking head. Diesel threw another punch and missed again. Then he attempted a kick to Tai’s ribs, but got his leg caught by the wily skeleton.

Tai wagged his finger at his opponent before laying backwards and cinching in a leg lock on Diesel’s thick calf. The dragon fell backwards and wailed in agony while Tai twisted and cranked on the leg. Diesel even tried tapping out, but Tai cinched tighter and tighter while Electra watched on apparently not knowing what to do or who to cheer for. A bone snapped and Diesel’s screams were even more obnoxious and annoying than when he was arguing with Electra, who stood in the corner with her hand over her mouth in shock.

Tai nipped up and gazed down at his writhing opponent, shaking his head in contempt. He then fixed his wicked stare upon Electra, who shook uncontrollably at what she’d witnessed. “You’ve got a problem?” asked Tai, who stepped on Diesel’s injury on his way to hunting down the barbarian woman before him. “I asked you a question, you ditzy piece of fuck. I said…is there a problem?!”

Electra’s breathing intensified and her eyes widened as she slowly dropped on her butt. “Guards! Help!” she cried out, prompting Tai to grab her by the throat and yank her back up to her feet. His skeletal fingers squeezed her trachea until blood leaked from behind her teeth. In one last desperate attempt at freedom, Electra threw a weak punch to the side of Tai’s temple, but he just smiled and shrugged it off.

“I love it when my favorite women scream for me. Maybe that’ll be something I can meditate on once this is all over.” Tai took a bite out of Electra’s face and chomped off her nose, causing blood and brains to spew out from the gaping hole. While she choked on her life juices, Tai grinned widely as he slowly masticated and swallowed Electra’s nose. “Delicious! It can’t be any worse than the food they serve here in prison, am I right?” No response, only chokes. “I said am I right?!” Too late. She plopped on the ground in a necromantic mess.

“Where are the goddamn guards?!” whined Diesel as he tried to crawl backwards to whatever safety he could muster.

“Funny you should mention that, Diesel. I’ve been asking the same question since you botched our bank robbery. I never did get the answer I was looking for. That’s okay. I don’t need one.” Tai stomped on Diesel’s broken leg repeatedly until it was completely detached from his body. Blood pooled out of the dragon’s wound and his screams became weaker and weaker. Tai smiled down upon his former friend and stomped on his sternum, rubbing his foot in the wound and exploding his massive, fat-covered dragon heart.

“What the hell’s going on in here?!” shouted one of the guards as they rushed in from behind their post. They stared with horror through the bars at the bloody scene: Tai smiling like a demon while Diesel and Electra laid on the ground mangled and obliterated.

The martial arts skeleton mockingly did backstrokes over the puddle of blood on the ground while asking, “Well, boys…are you going to take me to my special little room? Have I been a bad boy today?” Tai laughed like a savage as the guards unlocked the door in a big fucking hurry and yanked him by the arms to solitary confinement.

The darkness soothed Tai’s nerves and kept that hideous grin plastered to his bony face. “Ah…no more idiots screaming at each other. I can finally relax.” He did just that. He sat cross-legged on his bed. He dreamed of the mountain breezes. He bathed in the cool waters of the beach. He breathed in the cologne-like scents of the forest. Diesel and Electra argued about stupid shit. Again. And again. And again.

“No…no…NO! Stop it! Make them go away! Let me out of here!” shouted Tai as he clutched his skull in agony. He could scream all he wanted, but nobody would hear him except the darkness itself and the schizophrenic voices that haunted his mind. Electra and Diesel’s bellyaching grated against his ears. The vessels in his brain enlarged as if they were ready to pop at a moment’s notice.

Then the bank guards taunted him. Then the angel with the harp played the same annoying tune over and over again. If only somebody would smash Tai’s skull in and put a permanent end to his agony. But how does he look for a tool of suicide in such a dark place? Where were the walls? Where were the bars? Where was anybody? “HELP ME, I’M BEGGING YOU!” Nobody answered. Nobody cared.

Incelbordination, Final Chapter

The Patron Saint of Involuntary Celibacy chased Valerie Sand down the empty streets, his breath becoming hungrier and hornier as he got closer to the bare-legged beauty. Every step led her into a nyctophobic nightmare while Antero Magnus grinned with fanged teeth at the loveliness of it all. He could smell her cold sweat and it was more intoxicating to him than any high-end perfume. Just like in true horror movie fashion, Valerie banged her knee against a light post and crumpled to the ground sobbing.

Antero’s Cheshire Cat grin widened as he savored this moment with slow, deliberate steps. Oh, what he wanted to do to this unfortunate victim. Where would his hands explore first? Her smooth legs? Her lovely feet? Her ample breasts? The buffet-like possibilities gave him a tingling sensation in his ball sack. “So beautiful, Ms. Sand…now you’re going to share that beauty with me whether you want to or not.” Even with tears raining down Valerie’s face, Antero saw no qualms about leaning in for what would surely be a passionate kiss. And then…

“Who are you calling beautiful?!” shouted a gruff voice that awakened Antero from his dream. The horny dream allowed him a temporary vacation from his real nightmare: a dark prison cell with a hairy muscle freak lying in the upper bunk bed. The terrorist took a while to catch his breath and dry his cold sweat. He even felt the scar across his face to see if it had scabbed and it did. Rough ridges of dried blood decorated his already creepy visage.

Antero’s cell mate leaned over the bunk bed and scowled at him, his hairy tattooed face a mosaic of true terror. “You must be having another one of your wet dreams. You keep that shit up and I’ll make sure you won’t be involuntarily celibate anymore! I’ve been looking for an excuse to jump you and now I might have found it.”

“Yeah, get yourself locked up in solitary. Great idea, champ,” scoffed Antero as he laid on his back with his hands behind his head.

The hairy beast laughed his ass off in a throaty, barbaric voice. “You really think these guards give a shit what happens to you in here? I could butt fuck you until your intestines fall out and nobody would come to your rescue. This ain’t no PC liberal-ass college campus, buddy. This is the big house.”

Antero swallowed a lump of saliva and feigned bravery when he said, “You’d better knock that shit off. I used to lead…”

“You used to lead what? A bunch of horny losers who are pissed off about not getting laid? Is that supposed to mean something to me?!” The cell mate jumped out of bed and stood over Antero with heavy breathing bouncing his colossal chest up and down. The incel leader backed up a little bit even though he was in the bottom bunk and had nowhere to go. “That pretty little mouth of yours doesn’t know when to shut up. It’s like it’s got a mind of its own. Why don’t you put that mouth to better use?”

The prisoner dropped his pants and underwear to reveal a forest of greasy hair underneath. Antero intentionally shielded his eyes so that he didn’t have to see what redwood that forest was hiding. He didn’t get much of a choice after that when the cell mate clutched Antero’s jaw and caused him to thrash around in the vice-like grip. “Shut the fuck up and stop moving around!” shouted the cell mate, orders which Antero blatantly ignored as he yelled for help.

“Like I said, nobody’s coming to save you! All your horny faggot friends are getting some of what you’re about to get. All the guards are busy making sure you don’t get out. That just leaves you and me, buddy, you and me. We make a perfect couple, don’t you think? You can be my housewife. You can scrub my dishes. You can do my laundry. You can…”

Shuddering at the idea of what he was about to do, Antero reached for the prisoner’s erection and bent it with so much force that it snapped in two. The screams that erupted from his throat afterwards transformed this prison into a bear enclosure. Antero’s cyan eyes lit up with psychosis as he watched his cell mate drop to his knees while clutching his broken junk.

The terrorist got out of bed and stood over his foe with a disgusted scowl. “You see this? This is what involuntary celibacy is all about. This is what I used to preach to my followers. I bet you got a lot of ass during your time under lock and key. But now those days are over. They’re especially over after you get out and find a real woman. Oh wait, I forgot…no woman will never want to date you again!”

As Antero laughed like a crazed movie villain, the prisoner threw a punch aimed at his gut. The arm moved too slowly to make a connection as Antero grabbed the prisoner’s elbow and twisted the arm into a bone crunching submission hold. The incel leader’s expression dripped with lust while the prisoner begged for his life. “No more jerking off for you!” said Antero as he hyper-extended the arm with a resounding crunch.

The cell mate laid on the ground in a broken heap of screaming and snapped body parts. Just like in his wet dream, Antero’s nether regions came alive with electricity. “You think I’m just a horny kid who can’t get what he wants? I’m a man’s man. I always get what I want in the end. Incelbordination isn’t going anyway anytime soon just because I’m stuck here with you. We are everywhere. And you? Now that you’re guaranteed a life of celibacy…you’re just one of the boys!”

“Fuck you, pal!” shouted the defiant prisoner, who received a few kicks to the ribs for his efforts.

“You know what?” said Antero. “I’m done playing games with you. I used to know a guy who was just as pathetic as you are right now. His name was Oswald Crow and I thought there was something special about him. Well, I’m done with thinking anybody’s special, including you. It’s a shame since you’ve got a few feet over Oswald. You could have been one of the great all-time Incelbordinates. But no…you’re just another victim of the system!”

Antero grabbed the prisoner by his unkempt hair and dragged him to the toilet while making straining noises. As grimy as the terrorist’s fingers became, it would be a nothing compared to having shit water cover his hands while he held his opponent’s face in the bowl. The prisoner kicked and gurgled with whatever strength he had left, but Antero refused to let up and even allowed his own eyes to roll in the back of his head for extra psychosis. The harder the prisoner struggled, the tighter Antero’s teeth clamped down. And then…the struggle stopped and the prisoner was limp, his lungs and mouth full of disgusting toilet water.

Antero shoved the prisoner to the ground and stood over him triumphantly. Giving a speech to nobody in particular, he shouted, “You see this?! This is what your prison system produces! He came here looking for an outlet and now Satan is shoving a trident up his ass! Anybody else want some?! Are you ready to give me the woman I deserve?! Or do you just want to sit there and bleed like this moron?!”

The cell door flung open and revealed a squadron of pissed-off looking prison guards carrying batons and pounding them against their own palms. The captain gazed down at the prisoner and then narrowed his venomous eyes at Antero, who looked as though he was just caught masturbating. “What do you want on your tombstone, you little shit? I’m asking for an undertaker who wants to bury you next to Uncle Tuomas.”

“You want a quote? You want a fucking quote?!” asked Antero with extra psychosis in his voice, never once causing the guards to flinch. “I got one for you. It’s about damn time you showed up!”

“Fair enough,” said the captain before whacking Antero across the stomach with his club. The terrorist felt as though he was going to vomit himself inside out after such a blow. And then another baton shot caught him clean across the back of the head. And then a kick to the shoulder rendered him useless. And then repeated stomps to the sternum slowed his heart rate down to dangerous levels. The terrorist could feel his eyelids getting heavier than a grand piano while his crunching bones created a melody of beautiful music.

The beating eventually stopped and Antero was dragged out of his cell by his wrists, his body bloodied and broken while his mind drifted in and out of consciousness. He might have met his maker, he might not have. He could feel the devil’s trident entering his sensitive areas and he wasn’t even dead yet. Before that all important dinner date with Satan himself, he heard a nearby prisoner whispering something that put a smile on his face: “Death to Chads and Stacys!”

THE END?

Silent Warrior, Chapter 22

“I wanna go home…take off this uniform and leave the show…but I’m waiting in this cell because I have to know…have I been guilty all this time?”

Scott George’s trembling rendition of “Stop” by Pink Floyd was met with a sarcastic golf clap from the shadows of his jail cell. A familiar voice said, “Good one, buddy. You really do have the prettiest little voice. The last time I heard singing that good, you were bawling like a big baby over your daddy’s grave.” With shadows now covering only half of his face like a neo-noir villain, Alan Young’s hideously transformed visage sent chills up Scott’s spine. Tattoos on his arms, a short Mohawk, and scars on his face marked Alan’s metamorphosis from childhood brat to demonic tormentor.

Unwilling to let this bruiser shake him any further, Scott descended into bathos by angrily joking, “What the hell were YOU doing at a graveyard anyways? I was grieving my dead father. What about you? You can’t get laid any other way, so you’re going to give necrophilia a try?”

“Oh, you’re hilarious, Scott. You’re just fucking marvelous. It’s especially ironic considering how you got yourself in this jail cell to begin with. Though I do admit, you couldn’t have found a better piece of ass than Adrienne fucking Simpson, I’ll tell you that right now.”

Scott bolted out of his bunk bed and shouted, “Don’t you ever talk that way about her again, you fat piece of shit!”

“Or what? You’re going to strangle me and get me kicked out of prison like you did on that bus ride? Come on, dude, you’ve got way too much to lose and you know it. You throw one punch at me and it’s off to the hole for you. Me? I don’t give a fuck where I go from here. The only thing I’ve got left to lose is my own sanity and even that’s questionable.”

Folding his arms and giving his cellmate the gorgon death stare, Scott asked, “What do you want from me, Alan? You want to keep making my life a living hell? What for? Why me? Why not somebody else? Answer me, damn it!”

Alan stood up quickly and barked, “You want to know why?! I’ll tell you why. I don’t do it because of your skinny ass body. I don’t do it because I can. I don’t even want your survivor’s benefits from your dear old daddy kicking the bucket. The reason I gave you hell all those years is because of who you are.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Of course you don’t, because you’re too blind to see it. Your massive ego won’t let you. Well, I’m here to tell you that you’re a phony. You like to rage against the machine and all that bullshit. Guess what? I’ve always wanted to rage against the machine too. Growing up with Aloysius tends to do that to a man. All this talk about communities and worms and puppets and shit…if I ever do get thrown in the hole, that’s probably what I’m going to think about the most.”

Scott’s expression softened and his arms went limp at this revelation. But he would still hold his ground against the much larger and much more aggressive cellmate.

Alan wagged his finger at Scott and ranted, “Yeah, that’s right. The old Freudian excuse. I can play that card until the end of time. I abuse other people because I too was a victim of disgusting shit. That would be the convenient answer. But that’s not it. Aloysius is just one piece of the puzzle. It’s the whole world that fucks with my mind the most. And you, you’re the biggest hypocrite of them all. You claim to be about individuality and personal freedom, yet here you are sucking up to the teachers so that you can get the best grades. Don’t you see, Scott? You’re doing what they’re telling you to do. They’ve got you by the balls, buddy! Me? I don’t want a pointless career. I want to watch the world burn. Being in jail waiting for my sentence gave me time to think about it and that’s what I want most out of life.”

Scott half-grinned and shook his head before saying, “So that’s it, huh? Because life didn’t turn out the way you wanted, you want to watch the system around you collapse. Well, guess what, lard ass! My life wasn’t exactly a bed of roses either! I too have nightmares that keep me from getting the sleep I deserve! I haven’t eaten a decent meal in god knows how long! And yes, I’m in jail because the world wants me to be here! But I don’t want to watch the world burn! You know why? Because without a world to live in, there’d be no place for people like Adrienne to grow up. I know not everybody in the world is a Mr. Simpson clone. I don’t paint everybody with the same brush like you do. There are good people in this world and they’re the people I’m fighting for! I don’t care how long I have to stay in this cell, because I won’t let jail break me!”

Alan blitzed towards Scott, grabbed his shirt, and slammed him against the wall. “Bullshit!” the bully shouted. “You’re not going to beat the system that easily! Everybody who comes through here turns into the ugliest fucking monster imaginable! You’re no different from the rest of the losers in this jail! You’re going to break one way or another and if I have to be the one who breaks you, goddamn it, I will!”

“Go for it, Alan! Make a move! You’ll be taking those words to solitary confinement! It’s just like you said to me a few minutes ago! That shit works both ways, my friend! You want to take a swing at me?! Go ahead!”

Alan smiled sadistically and bore his yellow demonic fangs while clutching Scott’s shirt tighter than before. “If that’s what you want, then ask and ye shall receive!” Alan dropped his victim with a right hook to the gut, causing him to cough and wheeze violently. Scott even spit up a few droplets of blood. Alan grabbed his hair and said, “You see that? That’s what happens when you don’t eat your meat, let alone your pudding. Yeah, I can quote Pink Floyd too, buddy. Look around you: nobody’s coming to save you because nobody cares. I bet watching the world burn sounds pretty fucking good right now, doesn’t it?”

The next attack in Alan’s arsenal was a knee to the chest, bouncing Scott against the metal bunk bed and causing even more heavy, blood-laced breathing. “Pathetic. That’s all you are, Scott.” Alan turned around and sat down on his bed while watching his victim collected what was left of himself.

Scott sat against his bunk and heaved some more, his lungs and heart working overtime to make sure he didn’t drop dead right then and there. And then he mustered up enough oxygen to get these words out in a clear voice: “Is that all you got?”

Alan’s hamburger face morphed into monstrous rage when he stood back up and shouted, “No, it’s not all I got, you dumb shit!” He pulled a shank from under his pillow and glared down at his prey with venom and fire in his bulging eyes. “You just don’t know when to break, do you? That’s alright. You don’t ever have to worry about breaking ever again. As your daddy will tell you…dead men tell no tales!”

The bully jerked Scott up by his neck and held the blade to his throat, drawing a tiny droplet of sweet red juice. “You see that, Scotty boy? That’s what jail is really like. You haven’t been here that long and you’re already knocking on hell’s gates. Say hello to your dear old daddy for me!”

Scott’s rage glowed a brighter shade of red than the goop pouring out of his mouth, nose, and throat. A night in solitary confinement would have been a welcome time to rest his bones if it meant he could live another day. He forgot all about the possibility of losing his sanity in a dark room. Did he really have it to begin with?

Scott swung his leg backwards and made Alan a permanent cast member of the Nutcracker Suite, causing him to drop the blade and leaving him open for a sharp elbow to the nose. Alan’s already demonic face looked like it went through a wood chipper after that blood-curdling blow. Both combatants lay limp on the floor floating in and out of consciousness while the sounds of boots pounding the cement floor flooded their ears.

Scott could hear the cacophony of swear words and authoritative threats as both he and Alan were being dragged out of their cell, though in different directions. He could distinctly hear one of the guards threaten, “You’re in a lot of trouble, little boy!” Although, he couldn’t discern who it was being said to. Either way, Scott knew he was up shit creek without a paddle, judging from how roughly he was being dragged away from the scene of the fight.

Was it this easy to break in prison? Was there anybody out there truly strong enough to withstand such a torturous grind? Scott couldn’t think of one person that fit the bill. Even superheroes would go crazy in this shitty place if they didn’t get brutally murdered. Getting out on a sweetheart deal didn’t mean shit either. The prisoners were dead inside by the time they tasted freedom, thus ensuring this place’s status as a graveyard rather than a real housing facility. At least when death or insanity washed over Scott, he would be reunited with his father, which wasn’t much of a silver lining considering he would also lose Adrienne forever. Scott took a temporary vacation from the ultra madness when his vision faded to black.

Prison Riot

VERSE 1

Having a badge doesn’t make you a good guy

Having the cell keys doesn’t mean this is goodbye

Having a nightstick doesn’t make you a tough guy

Having latex gloves doesn’t make this a blood drive

For far too long, you’ve had a monopoly on power

Beat our asses raw in the middle of a cold shower

Locked us in solitary for not a damn good reason

Hunted us like animals in the midst of open season

CHORUS

Let’s start a prison riot!

No longer will we be quiet!

Swarm on you sons of bitches!

You will pay for all the stitches!

VERSE 2

Let’s send a message to the world they can’t deny

The whole prison system is a bold faced fucking lie

You’re not killing crime by stripping us of time

You’re stuffing your pockets while screaming, “Mine!”

The lust for money is the root of all that’s evil

In a land that brags about us being born equal

How dare you strip us of our right to be people?

When our lives are over, there won’t be a sequel

CHORUS

Let’s start a prison riot!

No longer will we be quiet!

Swarm on you sons of bitches!

You will pay for all the stitches!

BRIDGE

Orange jumpsuits burned in a bonfire

Prison guards bound and gagged with wires

No more of this for-profit bullshit for hire

It’s what happens when the underdogs conspire

EXTENDED CHORUS

Let’s start a prison riot!

No longer will we be quiet!

Swarm on you sons of bitches!

You will pay for all the stitches!

Let’s take back our freedom!

Come for the throne and kingdom!

We are humans, not animals!

We’re the good guys, not Hannibal!

FINAL LINE

Red Alert: there’s a disturbance in the machine, fuckers!

Burning Dragon

“Halt! Who goes there?!” shouted the poleax-wielding guard at the entrance of the Doom Hammer Temple. His brown leather armor, painted up face, and military stance gave off a “don’t fuck with me” aura that had many men shaken to their core. The guard’s blade was only inches away from the intruder’s throat and ready to slash it open at a moment’s notice.

The metal armor-wearing, blue scaled man-dragon Brock Soulburn gave a sadistic grin with his razor-sharp mouth and bladed tongue. “You’re shitting me, right? You fuckers have something I want, something that will give me a big ass payday and all the roasted chicken and red wine I can handle. Mmm-mmm-mmm! I want that Night Terror mask. I want it now!” With one vicious chomp, Brock took a bite out of the poleax’s blade and chewed it like a tender steak before swallowing it with a deep gulp.

The guard’s wide-eyed stare and shaky body took away his aura of intimidation in a big fucking hurry. “Holy shit!” he whispered fearfully before Brock breathed fire on him and had him dancing around in pain. The guard rolled down the stony temple stairs and bashed his body against every corner of almost every step. He was left a broken and fiery heap on the ground with nothing left to do but die like a bitch.

Brock gave a hearty belly laugh as he moseyed inside the stone-built Doom Hammer Temple. A small army of guards swarmed in on him with poleaxes ready to slash him to pieces. They threw their wildest and most savage strikes only to have their weapons gnawed on with Brock’s bear trap mouth.

With a mouthful of blades and wooden splinters, the man-dragon spit them out and rained down violence and fire upon the squadron of guards. The warriors dropped to the ground with shattered bones, spraying blood, and burning bodies. Those who weren’t caught in the crossfire continued to swarm in on Brock only to have their faces punched in with an anvil of a fist and their ribs shattered with a battering ram of a kick.

The entire guardianship of the temple resembled an ocean of fire, blood, and powdery bone meal. Brock was kind enough to breathe a harsh breeze upon the flames and douse them out completely. They were tall enough to obstruct his view of what lied ahead of him. At the bone-built altar was the placeholder for Night Terror, an evilly-smiling mask with dagger horns, bladed fangs, and bright neon red eyes.

Brock’s clear path to victory was weakly halted by an elderly shaman in a red robe and pig mask on his knees praying and crying at the same time. Even with the beastly mercenary approaching him, he never stopped praying and chanting. Whatever god he was pleading to couldn’t save him from getting a smack across the back of the head, which opened his skull and splashed his brains around the already messy floor.

“Damn, that was too easy!” boasted Brock Soulburn. His own delightful laughter rivaled the creepiness of the mask he came to collect. He even strutted towards the bone altar without even a modicum of effort to claim his prize. “Alright, you scary son of a bitch, your ass is coming home with me, baby!”

Night Terror convulsed with laughter as the mask came to life and planted a cartoonish kiss on Brock’s mouth. As the sickened dragon was wiping the flavor off of his mouth with his beefy arm, the mask gave off a series of high-pitched “Hoo-hoo!” chants as it floated around freely and crazily.

“You sick bastard! Get your ass back here!” shouted Brock before breathing fire in Night Terror’s direction. The swift mask flew out of the way as a stream of flames followed him around the ceiling of the temple. Night Terror’s path lead him back to Brock, where this time he licked the man-dragon’s pointy ears with a sloppy dog tongue. The “Hoo-hoo!” chants and spinning around continued.

After Brock wiped the slime out of his ear with his meaty finger, he clenched his teeth, growled throatily, and tightened his muscles in anger. With one monstrous claw, he ripped a chunk of stone out of the ground and chucked it like a baseball at Night Terror. Unsurprisingly, the mask dodged with deftness. Brock continued to rip chunks out of the stone floor and fling them at his target, but all he hit were pieces of the temple wall and a few sacred artifacts.

Night Terror mocked his attacker some more by sticking his dog tongue out and wagging it like a cartoon character. With his blood boiling, his teeth tight, and his veins ready to burst like blood bombs, Brock ripped up one more chunk of the floor and threw it with an even faster velocity. This time the projectile found its mark. The stone slab nicked the mask in the forehead and caused it to whirl around like a leaf before it landed on the ground, presumably down for the count.

“And stay down, you sick piece of shit!” shouted Brock before he stomped his way over to the mask to claim what was rightfully his. He picked up the fallen mask by both sides of its face and shook it violently while screaming, “You hear me! Stay dead, you stupid bastard! Stay! Dead!”

Night Terror came back to life and shoved his wet tongue up Brock’s nose, causing the dragon to spin around and hack up a huge wad of spit. The mask floated high in the air once again and laughed at his opponent while the man-dragon pounded the floor with both fists and shouted, “That’s it! I quit! I’ve had it with this crap!”

Before he had the chance to storm out of the temple, Night Terror made a silly sad face and said, “Quit? You can’t quit now, my friend. You’ve come this far and made so much progress. How can you quit when things are going so well for you? Did you already forget how delicious and wonderful that roasted chicken and red wine will taste? Surely, you can’t get it for free.”

“Oh, shut up, you disgusting prick!” shouted Brock with his arms folded like an annoyed child. “Everybody knows that nothing in this world is for free! That’s why I became a mercenary! It’s called work! You may want to try it sometime instead of irritating the piss out of everyone who comes here!”

“You want money?!” screamed Night Terror, which snapped Brock out of his angry trance. “There are easier ways to make money than by blindly doing what you’re told and going on suicide missions like this one. For example…”

Nightfall had cast its winter shadow over the Steel Wolf Barbaric Tribe. Everyone should have been tucked away in their straw huts for the evening, but the orcish warriors were standing around with their weapons drawn and anxious poses about them. Some of them tapped their feet, some of them banged their spears on the ground, but the seven-foot tall chief sat in his throne of bone with a chest full of gold at his side, his beefy fist underneath his chin, and a vicious look on his face. Their mask should have been retrieved by now in what should have been a simple mission for a simple-minded mercenary.

The orc barbarians got into military stances as the silhouette of a muscle-bound dragon warrior appeared at the wooden gate of their village. The chieftain stood up from his throne, grabbed his chest full of money with one hand, and hauled the heavy equipment toward the shadowy figure, thinking the job was done.

“Brock Soulburn!” shouted the chieftain in his authoritative voice. “We have the money we negotiated for earlier. This chest contains our finest and most ancient gold that we have harvested from our sacred grounds. You can live comfortably for the rest of your life with this kind of gold. All we ask for in return is the Night Terror mask, a treasure more valuable to us than any form of mainland money. Do you have the mask with you?”

The shadowy figure of Brock Soulburn slowly walked into the torch light of the orc village. The other warriors came closer with their spears drawn in case he tried something funny. Their intimidating figures turned to shaky cowardice when they saw Night Terror grafted on the face of the dragon warrior, who said in a newly demonic voice, “Get your own damn mask!”

The possessed dragon warrior breathed fire upon the entire cast of villagers, including the chieftain. This wasn’t ordinary fire. The flames were a bright blood red with a poisonous green center. The flames had also created a much larger blast zone. As they were burning into a pile of ashes, the barbarians’ souls were flowing out of their mouths and into Night Terror’s own sadistic grin. Even the mighty seven-foot tall chieftain dropped to the ground with a thud as his ancient soul was consumed by this savage fire. The more souls Night Terror / Brock Soulburn consumed, the bigger the man-dragon’s belly got. He even let out a loud burp that was so powerful that the flames were put out.

All that remained of this now dead village was that big juicy chest full of gold, to which Night Terror swirled his tongue around his face in anticipation. The mask carried the possessed body of Brock Soulburn over to the chest, who kicked the lock open with deadly force and opened it up to an orgasmic response. So much gold. So much treasure. So much delicious roasted chicken. So much heavenly red wine. In his demonic tone, the possessed Brock said, “Mmmmmmm, yummy food!” before hanging his sloppy tongue off the side and drooling heavily.