This Is Violence

Natron gazed up and down the Tower of Hell with not even mild trepidation. So what if it had spikes and demon masks all over the stone structure? So what if it was crawling with monsters bearing razor sharp fangs and claws? So what if Shivo Black was waiting for him at the top with the intent to disembowel him? Natron wasn’t paid to be scared and he wasn’t paid by the hour. Decked out in black ninja gear and light chain mail while twirling a pair of nunchucks to get his cardio going, the elf warrior stared a hole through the front entrance prepared for battle. It may have been his final battle, but if he had to die tonight, he was going down swinging.

“This is violence!” shouted the elf ninja as he kicked down the wooden door of the tower and faced his opponents with venom in his eyes. Just like he predicted, the bottom level was peppered with little goblins crawling about chewing on the flesh of their victims. Natron bolted inside and whacked the hell out of these bloodthirsty beasts with his twirling nunchucks. Skulls splattered like watermelons as blood and brains decorated the already shit-stained walls. Some of the goblins tried to latch onto Natron and chew him like bubblegum, but they were thrown so hard against the wall that they exploded.

Still leaving goblin cannibals clinging from his arms and legs, Natron ignored the sharp pain and rushed up the spiral staircase while bumping against the walls to get the little bastards off of him. Their slimy green skin peeled off with every bounce against the cobblestone and soon they tumbled down the stairs like a battered slinky. The elf had only murder on his mind and bright red in his vision. Adrenaline surged through his veins like a forest fire. His blood was boiling lava ready to spew.

All Natron could think about was slaughtering Shivo Black for his sins against this world. He took a lovely place like the Ivory Tower and turned it into the shit hole that was the Tower of Hell. This tower was once a holy sanctuary for the elven people and a haven from the demonic forces of this apocalyptic nightmare. Now the beautiful religious artwork and tapestry was torn down in favor of retched demonic masks, skulls of the damned, and strung up corpses of the priests and clerics who once lived here. Passing by these dangling bodies caused Natorn’s muscles to bulge and shiver with raw hatred.

“Must kill…must kill…must kill!” Natron repeated to himself over and over again. His next opportunity to kill came in the form of deformed ogres covered in spiked metal armor and carrying tridents into battle with them. One by one these creatures marched down the spiral staircase swearing at Natron in their native grunt language. The first of them thrust his trident in rapid fire succession at the wily ninja. The elf warrior dodged, flipped, and did the splits to avoid getting impaled. He then delivered a ball-shattering nunchuck blow to the ogre’s groin.

The ogre coughed up a liberal amount of blood and vomited all over the stairs before tumbling down them like a bowling ball. Natron front flipped over the hefty body to avoid getting caught in the avalanche of rotten flesh. The narrow staircase only allowed one ogre to come through at a time, but the next one threw even quicker trident shots than the last. Natron dodged and flipped to evade these shots and then wrapped his nunchucks around his opponent’s neck and threw him down the stairs with a bloodletting jerk.

Instead of wasting precious time dodging trident shots like an acrobat, when the next thrust came, Natron flipped on top of the ogre’s head and dashed across the top of the squadron with his steel sole boots. The chubby warriors tried to thrust their tridents upward, but the ninja was too fast and too brutal for them. His boots caved in their skulls and snapped their shoulders. His nunchuck shots popped their eyes out of their heads. By the time he reached the final ogre, he dropped his knees across the creature’s shoulders and slammed him head first into the corner of the stone stairs.

The ogres were little more than a pile of smelly corpses. Those who lived wouldn’t for long as they rolled down the stairs like whiskey barrels. Blood and muck decorated the walls. The creatures’ saggy flesh lay shredded and slashed across the stairs. Natron stood at the top of the spiral with his hands on his hips while he admired his handiwork. Beneath his ninja mask the corners of his mouth formed a sadistic smirk. “This is violence and nothing more,” he said to himself.

Before he could get too complacent, Natron slowly turned his head toward the wooden door which lead to the top level. This door once held a lovely painting of the elven god Io. Now it held the shackled remains of a skeleton with pieces of flesh dangling off the bones and rats chewing on it like it was their last meal. “Shivo!” bellowed Natron. “I know you’re behind that door! You’d better prepare for the ass-kicking of your fucking life!”

With one savage kick, the rats scurried away and the door collapsed to splinters. The broken door revealed a room full of torture devices ranging from the stretching rack to the iron maiden to the guillotine itself. Dead elven clerics were strewn across the top level with their eyes and tongues cut out. Watching this scene made Natron puke a little bit in his mouth. If he wasn’t burning hot with anger before, he was the embodiment of hell itself now.

Sitting across the room in a throne of bone was Shivo Black himself. With his fingers tapping against themselves and a smug look on his demonic face, he didn’t look too worried that Natron had completely leveled his forces. Why would he? Shivo could easily tip the scales at seven feet tall and god knows how many pounds of muscle. His hairy brown flesh, spiraled horns, sharp fangs, and golden armor gave him the appearance of an oppressive warlord. When he stood up and towered over the smaller Natron, the demon king’s muscles pulsated with sadistic might.

“Not even death can save you from me, you little shit weasel!” barked Shivo in a throaty voice. “This tower belongs to me now. Those faggot elves can burn in hell for all I care. Their religion means nothing to me. Their lives mean even less. You’re not a hero to your people. You’re a walking corpse. Time to die, you pathetic child!” The demon spread his metallic wings and soared through the air right at his target.

Natron tucked and rolled on the ground to avoid getting slashed by Shivo’s sword-like claws. It was all the ninja could do since the demon was surprisingly fast for a man his size. Shivo threw heavy kicks that shattered his own torture devices when they failed to hit their intended mark. He breathed fire upon the ninja and Natron tucked and rolled some more. “If you can’t do any better than that, you’re going to lose!” roared Shivo. “Then again, your people should be accustomed to failure by now. They lost their Ivory Tower and now they’re going to lose the last shred of hope their pathetic souls ever had. Die, you little puke! Die!”

Shivo breathed another stream of fire upon Natron, who by this time was huffing and puffing through his mask and drooling wildly to keep his tongue from burning. He had exerted so much energy during this mission that his ribs felt like he was in a sumo wrestler’s bear hug. His legs trembled with such force that he couldn’t stand up all the way. When the ball of fire sailed his way, the fact that Natron collapsed in exhaustion and evaded it that way was pure luck.

King Black folded his massive arms and chuckled in delight. “So this is it, huh?” he said. “This is the man who slaughtered my ogres and goblins like they were small children? I wasn’t expecting comedy tonight, but I’ll take my laughs wherever I can get them.” Shivo flew towards the fallen Natron with his arms extended, intending to impale the ninja upon contact and put and end to this “comedy” as he so eloquently put it.

Lifting his head slowly to see the blades blasting toward him, Natron’s last burst of energy came when he threw a nunchuck shot and shattered Shivo’s claws like glass. The demon screamed in tremendous pain while the tips of his fingers bleed profusely. King Black cursed in his diabolic language while Natron did a weak attempt at a push up to bring himself to his hands and knees. Every little movement felt like he was trying to bench press a small car. He huffed, puffed, and wheezed while struggling to stay on his feet.

“You little piece of shit!” growled Shivo. “I’ll break your ass in half and feed you to my rats!” The demon threw a powerful side kick, but Natron quickly wrapped his nunchucks around the king’s ankle.

With the steel chain cutting off the circulation to Shivo’s legs, Natron gazed at him with nuclear heat and said in a raspy voice, “You know nothing about my people, you ignorant sack of shit!” Natron spun Shivo around by his leg and leaped on the demon’s back before wrapping his nunchuck chain around the beast’s throat. He squeezed with enough tightness to make the guillotine jealous. The iron maiden couldn’t even dream of the sharpness Shivo felt in his lungs. The king’s neck stretched like taffy as his windpipe collapsed into a heap.

When Shivo was down on both knees gasping for air, Natron released his chokehold and allowed the monster to vomit his own blood and organs. With one last twirl, the elf ninja smashed his nunchucks against Shivo’s head and splattered his brains all over the floor while breaking those hideous horns in two. The revenge was complete. The elven race was avenged for their heavy loss. Natron could do nothing but smile with tears in his eyes as he fell backwards into a deep slumber.

This entire scenario played out on a computer screen for a teenaged boy in his bedroom decorated with music posters and dirty laundry. Natron was not only his screen name, but it was one that would be synonymous with gaming greatness. The teenager laughed gently to himself in disbelief that he actually beat this ultra-hard game. He even gave himself a light applause. It was the first time he smiled since his father went away to fight in an overseas war. Daddy was quite the gamer in his day with Super Mario Bros. and Double Dragon to his credit. Now the second generation followed in his footsteps with a victory over the appropriately named This Is Violence.

Now it was time to watch the ending, which was usually the reward for such a hard game. The elf ninja woke up in a bed made of the softest material as sunlight caused him to slowly squint his eyes open. Could this really be? Was the elven name restored to its former glory? No.

Instead he was at the bottom floor of the Tower of Hell once again, this time with living goblins holding the corpse of the teenager’s dead father like a hand puppet. The kid recognized the face, the uniform, the haircut, and most importantly, the bloodstains all over his body. As the goblins laughed and chanted, “You’re daddy’s dead! He’s never coming back!” over and over again, the teenager’s sudden elation at beating the game turned into tear-filled sorrow. His cheeks were hot, his eyes were sore, and his screams were leonine. He even banged on the keyboard like a savage several times for good measure.

Somewhere in the goblins’ song and dance, they managed to throw the last bit of salt on this festering emotional wound: “April fools!” The teenager’s raging tears poured like the blood of the elf ninja’s enemies. In a way, he wished he was dead instead of his father. Maybe if he could find a belt somewhere in his room, he could see him again. Wiping away the tears and sucking up the snot in his nose, the teen sat in his computer chair with his head hung low not knowing what the fuck to do. His heart was in more pieces than the skulls of the ogres on the staircase.

Now that he thought about it, This Is Violence wasn’t an official game made by a reputable company. It was given to the kid by a “friend”. The game showed just how friendly it could be when the elf ninja took over the screen and spoke to Natron like he knew him. “Are you going to let those bastards talk to you like that? The world hates you, Natron, but we don’t. Your dad didn’t die because of a war. He died because of the politicians who sent him to war. You need revenge. You need it badly. Come join our outfit and we’ll show you how to get revenge. It’ll be just as bloody and delicious as this game turned out to be. You’ve already completed the first step. Now you can be your own ninja and start a worldwide revolution. Come join ISIS!”

The teenager gazed at the computer screen still sniffing and snorting. He never felt more offended in his life, not when the jocks shoved him around at school, not when the cyber bullies picked on his art work online. What that ninja said was vile, sadistic, and borderline insane. Yet to the kid known as Natron, those words made the most sense out of any “so-called” loved one he knew. “Let’s do this!” he said to the computer screen.

Dark Prophecy

“You wanted to see me?” said Charlie Marks, a leather jacket and jeans wearing high schooler who was too cool for school. Judging from his lackadaisical posture and bored facial expression, he felt he was too cool to be in the same office as his art teacher.

“Yes, Charlie, I did want to see you. Have a seat. Don’t get too comfortable, because this has suspension written all over it,” said Rebecca Waters, a brown dress wearing blonde who sat cross-legged in her office’s computer chair with the posture of a judge presiding over a criminal court case.

When Charlie took a seat on the wooden stool and twiddled his thumbs nonchalantly, Rebecca pored through her file folder until she found the piece of “art” that brought the two of them together that day. It was a cartoon of a distorted faced Special Olympian dressed in a bicycle helmet and a dirty diaper. If that wasn’t offensive enough, the caption of the drawing said, “The Prophet Muhammad” in big bold letters.

Charlie took the drawing from Rebecca’s hands and stared at it uncaringly. “Yeah, so?”

“What do you mean, yeah, so? You know full well why that’s unacceptable. Not only is it disparaging to the mentally disabled, but it’s extremely disparaging to the Muslim community. There are over five hundred Muslim students who attend this high school. What do you think they’re going to do if they see this drawing?” said Rebecca in an authoritative voice.

The “artist” pretended to look at his drawing from multiple angles, but he was really just turning his paper upside down and sideways to stall for time. When Rebecca asked an impatient, “Well?”, Charlie responded with, “They’re probably going to strap bombs to their bodies and blow me into pieces. Is that the answer you were looking for? Are you actually worried about this kind of crap going on? You say there’s five hundred Muslims going to school here? I bet not one of them has the balls to take me on over a stupid drawing. Ever heard of Freedom of Speech, Miss Waters?”

Rebecca shook her head no, cleared her throat, and said, “Listen, Charlie. There’ve been plenty of awful things going on in the news lately with terrorism and general ignorance toward certain people. Remember hearing about the ISIS attacks in Paris a few weeks ago? Of course you don’t, because you’re not smart enough to pay attention to world politics. If you were, you would know that this ‘funny’ cartoon is the highest form of prejudice toward the Muslim community. I’m not worried about what the students will do to you. Because let’s face it, none of our students act anywhere near as badly as the ISIS terrorists who committed that awful attack in Paris.”

“Well then, what are you worried about, Miss Waters? What, is ISIS going to raid our stupid little school and start shooting everyone in sight because I drew a cartoon? Don’t they have better things to do with their lives? Newsflash: those crazies halfway around the world don’t give a shit about Paulson City kids like me!” said Charlie Marks in a more animated voice complete with frantic hand gestures.

Rebecca hunched forward as if she was in a secretive conversation with her student and asked, “You didn’t post this drawing to your social media accounts, did you?” No answer, just a stupefied look on Charlie’s face. “Well, did you?!” The student gave a cheeky half smile and it was obvious at that point what his answer was.

“You idiot!” screamed Rebecca Waters. She stood over Charlie like a giant ready to breathe fire on some helpless villagers. “Do you realize what the hell you’ve done?! Are you so thickheaded that you don’t realize the gravity of what’s going on here?! Yeah, it may be a stupid cartoon to you, but it’s much more to the people online and around the world! It’d be the same thing if you posted a drawing of a black guy eating watermelon or a gay guy in tight-fitting bicycle shorts! You don’t do that! There are certain lines you just don’t fucking cross!”

Charlie looked into his teacher’s furious eyes with five second fear and then smiled his idiotic smile again when he said, “You swore, Miss Waters! Naughty, naughty!”

The art teacher fluffed her hair in frustration, let out a pissed off grunt, and plopped back down into her computer chair. She sat there for a minute taking deep breaths to calm herself down while Charlie was smiling and chuckling at her.

“What are you laughing at, you moron?” asked Rebecca. “You think bigotry is funny? Well, I don’t. This school doesn’t. The whole point of school is to teach you the ways of the world and how to coexist with the people you share that world with.” She snatched the picture from Charlie’s hand and presented it with disdain. “I’m not letting you get away with this. This kind of sick, demented garbage is punishable by suspension, maybe even expulsion if we feel you’re not learning anything from this.”

The smile slowly disappeared from Charlie’s face. “You can’t do that,” he said in a defeated tone.

“Oh, but we can. And we will! But you know what, Charlie? I don’t want you to be expelled from here. I want you to be punished, but not in that way. Maybe a cartoon doesn’t warrant that kind of extreme punishment. But you’re saying depicting the Prophet Muhammad in that way doesn’t mean anything. I’m saying it does and many will agree with me, including the Principal.”

Charlie’s eyes darted from side to side before he asked, “So…what do you want me to do? I mean…there is a catch to me not being expelled, right?”

“For starters, I want you to log onto my computer, go to your social media accounts, and take down the picture before anybody sees it. Ah, who am I kidding? It’s probably spreading across the internet right now. But I’d still appreciate it if you’d take it down before anybody gets hurt.”

Mr. Marks stared at his teacher like what she was asking him was too much to handle. After a while of stalling, Rebecca sighed and said, “Listen. I told you I didn’t want to expel you from here. You know why? Because up until this point, you’ve been doing A and B-worthy work in my classroom. You are a talented artist in many ways. But this drawing crosses so many lines on so many levels. So instead of putting you on the chopping block, I’d like you to meet somebody.”

Using her smart phone, Rebecca signaled her special guest to enter the office. He was a giant of a man with dark skin, a bald head, and a scraggly beard. He stood over Charlie Marks like the offensive artist was merely a worm on the sidewalk ready to be stepped on. He was introduced by Rebecca as Kamal Sadollah, one of the five hundred Muslim students she referenced earlier in the conversation.

“Relax, Charlie. I’m not here to hurt you. Allah wouldn’t forgive me if I did such a thing to you. But I have seen your drawing on Face Book and Twitter. It was the most disgusting thing I’ve ever seen in my life.” He placed his thick palm on Charlie’s quivering shoulder and said, “I know my religion and my culture doesn’t mean much to you. But it means something to me. I turned to Islam because I needed direction in my life. And guess what? I haven’t gotten in one fight since. I am a member of the high school wrestling team and any battle I have will be on the mat and nowhere else.”

“Okay, I get it,” said Charlie in a nervous tone. “You’re pissed off about my drawing. But you have to understand something. I didn’t do it because I wanted to piss you off personally. I did it as a joke. I thought it would be hilarious and I still think it is. Am I right?” he said with a half-hearted chuckle. Neither Rebecca nor Kamal was laughing. They were staring holes through him with their sniper scope vision.

“Here’s the deal,” said Kamal as he put his face closer to Charlie’s. “Either you take down that picture from Face Book and Twitter and anywhere else you have it posted, or I’m going to do something you’ve always wanted to do with your narcissistic pictures. I’m going to share that drawing. I’m going to share it with every Muslim friend and family member I know. And then I’ll share it with atheists, Christians, Jews, and anyone else who will listen. By the time I’m done distributing it, the entire world will know how much of an asshole Charlie Marks is. I won’t hurt you. I never will. But I can’t say the same for anyone else who sees that picture.”

“Charlie…listen to me,” said Rebecca. “You’re too young in your life to play the role of a villain. If that many people know about what you’ve done today, then your life will be ruined. I don’t want to see you end up that way. So please…do the right thing. Take down the picture.”

Kamal handed Charlie his smart phone and said, “Here, you can use this if you want. Don’t worry, it’s not hardwired to an IED. We’re not all stereotypes here, Charlie. We’re real people with real desires and real dreams. Do you have desires of your own that you want to see through? Then keep the world from seeing your worst side.”

Charlie Marks had tears in his eyes after being dressed down by Kamal Sadollah and Rebecca Waters. They broke him without ever once laying a finger on him. All they had to do was something every religion preached: talk to their enemy. After wiping his tears with his jacket sleeve, Charlie put Kamal’s smart phone to use and began the process of taking the offensive drawing down from the internet. It would be a huge weight off of his shoulders afterwards and that felt good.