Armando Trenton, Bounty Hunter from "Down"

 

The Devil

Are you The Devil’s Advocate or just The Devil?

Couldn’t even wait for the flames to settle

Got your trident aimed at my throat

Tips are on fire, let’s see a little smoke

You’re not the fun kind of devil like in heavy metal

You’re Adam Cole’s kind: an underwhelming level

Couldn’t scream your way out of a wet paper bag

The only words you know are “whore” and “fag”

 

Tell me about every grievance you’ve got

Don’t bother with the tissues for your tears and snot

Yell me down until your throat goes raw

Because nothing you say is against the law

Neither is carrying a pair of 45’s

Use them on poor people in order to “survive”

Tuck them in your pockets when a CEO

Comes around the corner, says “Cheerio!”

 

I guess being The Devil is a pretty sweet gig

Got enough privilege to own all the libs

Own every politician in a thousand mile radius

Still a mystery when you ask, “Why they hating us?”

Self-awareness is not one of your strong suits

Self-reflection isn’t deep enough to get at the root

Live life on easy mode, low-hanging fruit

You got the real-life version of block and mute

 

You get life advice from a fantasy novel

Two millenniums ago, Jesus was the role model

Just imagine if it was a whole different book

That Moms of Liberty didn’t already cook

Dragons and elves on all of the shelves

Orcs and ogres until the final page is over

Kingdoms modeled after communism

Personal stories about kids with autism

 

But why should we take those at face value

When they can be an excuse to disembowel you

When they can be a reason to take the Red Pill

When they can be weapons, not pulp at the paper mill

The Devil’s Advocate can steal all the stories

Turn a gay bar into a bloodbath so gory

Put the powerful in power and call them Tories

Pose in front of the flag that we call Old Glory

 

What a day to be alive in 2025

Where human rights come with fistfights

Where hospital bills break all of our wills

“Let’s have a conversation across the whole nation”

The House of Hathaway

Ah yes, the year 2003: a time in my life marked with bad mental health, suicidal thoughts, shitty education, and fights with online friends over inconsequential BS. So what’s the cure for all of this? Playing D&D with my brother James, of course! Whenever my mind wasn’t being bombarded with schizophrenic voices, I could put it to good use and guide my character through an epic adventure filled with magic and wonder! Or I could completely waffle it and confirm everything my head voices ever told me. Whoever said mental illnesses produce the best creativity needs to have their head mounted on a trident.

Speaking of tridents, guess what my character’s weapon of choice was! Everybody else in the campaign used a long sword because they had war in their bloodlines. I used a trident because I allegedly had fishing in my bloodline. Never mind the fact that the minimum damage on a trident cushioned every bad roll I could have made in combat. Nope! I’m just an angry fisherman named Regal. No last name, just Regal. My brother’s player character was named Riant, which apparently gave him a license to call my character Reg...which is short for Reggie…which rhymes with wedgie! Ugh…

But before we could get into the actual campaign, there was a mild disagreement between my brother and I over where in my bedroom we should sit. He sat cross-legged on the carpeted floor and I sat in my computer chair. He urged me to sit on the floor with him, but I refused. So our campaign began with Regal tending a barn full of animals during a thunderstorm. Weird, but okay. I moved the animals all over the place until lightning struck me and killed me. This was all an elaborate April Fool’s joke to coerce me to sit on the floor with him. I of course didn’t catch on, because, you know, schizophrenia and all. Plus, I had just argued with an online friend the night before and pretty much terminated our relationship, so there was that weighing heavily on me.

Now that I was cross-legged on the floor with James, the real campaign could begin. The House of Hathaway (very British-sounding name if I’ve ever heard one) put a bounty on some guy’s head because he stole something valuable from them. There was a poster on the city walls with his likeness and price printed on it. The poster said he was last seen out in the countryside. So naturally, my first move would be to go out to the countryside to look for this thieving bastard. Riant disagreed. He wanted to go to the local jewelry shop to ask a bunch of questions. Regal didn’t see the point of this, but played along nonetheless. He even asked, “Are you ready to go?” Apparently, this came off like an invitation rather than a demand, so Riant dinged Regal for that one.

So Regal goes over to the jewelry shop to interrogate the clerk. When I, the player, couldn’t think of any questions, James urged me to think like Vic Mackey from The Shield. How would he interrogate someone? What kinds of questions would he ask? If you’ve seen The Shield during its heyday in the 2000’s, you would associate Vic Mackey with ass-beatings galore. That’s how he got all of his information. Was James suggesting that I beat this clerk’s ass? Seemed unreasonable to me. Riant started the conversation with, “Any word of thievery?” I continued the line of questioning with a bunch of “personal questions” that got us kicked out of the shop when the clerk got offended. Why did he get offended? Why was he not cooperating with our line of questioning? My first guess would be because the clerk was a dick who didn’t respect our authority. But Riant insisted that Regal was “asking the wrong questions”.

So after that little kafuffle, Regal and Riant finally agreed to go to the outskirts of town where the real clues led. Regal went home to get an ox to ride on and Riant gave him a weird ass look for it. Regal also got weird ass looks from ordinary citizens for carrying a trident around with him. Never mind the fact that every weapon in the D&D franchise has a sheath and that’s what I was trying to do: put it in a sheath. James insisted that tridents didn’t have sheaths (they totally do), so this was the result: a bunch of crazy stares from the extras of the campaign. Oh, excuse me, the “background artists” of the campaign.

So as Regal and Riant make their way to the countryside (with no ox to ride on), Riant gives Regal a lecture about his poor performance in this bounty hunting mission so far. “Why am I always the one helping you? I wish you’d help yourself.” This would have been the perfect time to mount Riant’s head on a trident, but Regal held back and also held his tongue. The reasonable answer would have been to complain about everybody no-selling the seriousness of what Regal was doing. They treated him like a clown for reasons I would never understand. Then again, understanding everything isn’t in the schizophrenic’s arsenal, especially under heavy medication.

The two bounty hunters go out to the countryside to interview various farmers about the last time they’ve seen the House of Hathaway’s prized thief. Regal goes up to one farmer and says, “Excuse me, can I talk to you for a moment?” The farmer says, “We’re talking now, aren’t we?” Another example of NPC’s no-selling the gravity of the situation. We weren’t talking before, that’s why Regal asked the fucking question! I can’t remember what questions Regal asked after that, but the conversation took another steep turn when the farmer asked why he was being interrogated. Regal admitted to being a bounty hunter and the farmer lectured him about how that lifestyle could get him killed or arrested. To be fair to me, I had no idea bounty hunting was a sensitive issue since bounty hunters are on the same side as traditional law enforcement. But oh well. Can’t put the words back in my mouth now!

Regal and Riant go out to the forest to look for clues and they find a series of footprints in the dirt. Regal’s assessment of the situation was that there was a struggle taking place due to the awkward angle of the foot prints. Maybe a cult had gotten the thief. Was the thief even here? Who knows? Before I had the chance to find out more, our campaign ended when James and I were called away from the game by our parents.

This campaign was supposed to be a tribute to The Shield, but it looked more like The Three Stooges…except there was only one stooge and multiple straight men. That stooge was named Regal. He was a stooge because he couldn’t figure out basic detective protocol. To my young mind, The Shield wasn’t about nuance and politics. It was about ass-beatings and edginess. If Regal tried any of the tactics Vic Mackey used on The Shield, he would have been locked up a long time ago. Regal had no official authority; he was a freelancer and didn’t have any of the privileges of a traditional cop.

I don’t want you all to think that the House of Hathaway campaign was a microcosm on its own. My role-playing abilities suffered all throughout the 2000’s due to my mental illnesses and general naivety. You talk about NPC’s no-selling the gravity of the situation? That happened in pretty much every RPG I was a part of, including ones where I was the game master and had complete control. From 2010-2011, I took the role of Dungeon Master once more, but this time had better results. My players were actually being receptive to my awkward and insane ideas. It’s because of this newfound success that I decided to write fiction on a regular basis, not just movie scripts where the characters went along with each other despite the awkward writing.

To this day, I still have ups and downs when it comes to mental health. The one rule I follow to keep D&D campaigns and creative writing pieces from getting too weird is to not work on them while I’m having a bad mental health day. If the schizophrenic demons keep me boiling with anger or the depression keeps me tired and unmotivated, that would be the perfect time to take the day off. The other important rule I have to follow is to not shame myself for needing a personal day. I shame myself a lot and I think it contributes to my mental health being worse overall. Then again, mental illnesses depend on the victims cycling through negative thoughts. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be mentally ill in the first place.

I can look back on the House of Hathaway campaign and laugh about how silly it all was. Even if failing miserably hurt my self-esteem for a while, I think I’ve gained some of it back over the years and that’s why my writing career has picked up along the way. Come to think of it, writing novels is basically just playing D&D by myself. Or playing WITH myself, depending on the adult content of any one novel. Hopefully, I’ve come a long way from Regal in 2003 to Garrison Kelly in the present day. I’d like to think so. Maybe. Sometimes. I don’t know. Could you repeat the question?

Armed and Devilish

“The meat supply is growing thin, my pretties. Looks like we’ll have to go back to eating our fruits and veggies,” said Tina Rabbit, watching her forest creatures licking and gnawing at various humanoid skeletons. The bones varied in shapes and sizes. Though they would be unrecognizable to the naked eye, Tina remembered them all.

A family deer licked the femur and forearm bones of a widened skeleton which once belonged to an orc, judging from its massive and rotting fangs. Squirrel children frantically ran and played between the eye sockets of an unfortunate gnome corpse. One gray wolf rolled over on its back and gnawed away at an ordinary human bone, almost crushing it between its mandibles. White rabbits played hide and seek underneath the ribcage and spinal cord of a formerly obese ogre.

All Tina could do was smile upon her furry children. She flipped her long brunette hair backwards and fiddled with her gray dress as she admired her fuzz buckets’ handiwork. “It’s been a while since we’ve had uninvited guests in our forests. I love tender ribs as much as you guys, but I love peace and quiet even more. No harm shall come to my babies or my trees.” She leaned down and stroked a wolf’s ears as it chewed on a skeletal forearm. “I love you all. Each and every one of you. Gather around for a…”

A crow’s squawking interrupted her sentence as the jittery bird of prey circled above Tina. She held out her arm and allowed the little guy to land on her wrist. “What’s wrong, my feathery friend?” she asked in her usual calm voice. “Don’t tell me we have more visitors.” The crow shook and squealed as it tried to find refuge underneath her druid’s gigantic sleeves. “It’ll be okay, little man. Mommy will take care of it.” She pointed her index finger at the rest of her friends and demanded, “Remember, don’t come swarming in until I tell you to. We lose too many furry friends that way.”

The forest creatures continued chewing and fiddling with the humanoid remains while the crow darted out from under Tina’s sleeve and flew slowly enough so that she could follow. The trees in this forest were large enough to hide the most suspicious activity from plain sight, but if there was yet another criminal deal going down in Tina’s neck of the woods, the meeting place would have to be carefully thought out. It would have to be so unobvious that…”Wait a minute…you’re kidding me…”

Tina didn’t have to walk far at all. This new business deal was happening right along the dirt path and there was already a bush for her to crouch down in. “The arrogance of these people…at least he’s got some meat on his bones,” Tina muttered to herself.

And why wouldn’t this buyer be arrogant? He towered over his seller at a whopping seven feet tall. His chiseled body looked like it had medicine balls stuffed in it. He didn’t even have to wear elaborate armor, just legless red shorts, brown leather boots, black straps across his chest and back, and a dark hood over his head that made him look like an executioner ready to chop someone’s head off. To Tina, however, he closely resembled an S&M store that blew the fuck up. She couldn’t help but smile at the same time she was pissed off at the man’s superiority complex.

The seller was a mirror image of his towering client: skinny, frail, covered in baggy robes and an oversized hood, his fingers elongated and bladed, his appearance kept quiet to those with naked eyes. It was amazing that he found the strength to hold a steel briefcase that could double as a tower shield. What wasn’t nearly as impressive was the seven foot tall gimp tossing a sack of gold coins his way and the seller nearly falling on his ass.

“Okay, you little shit,” belted the giant. “All five thousand gold pieces are in that bag. If you don’t believe me, try doing bicep curls with it. Now open the goddamn briefcase and show me what you’ve got.”

The seller gently set the money bag on the ground and twirled his hands around the metal case. “Forged in the fires of hell itself, strong enough to slay the mightiest gods, deadly enough to burn entire cities to a blanket of ashes…I give to you…” He unlocked the briefcase and unfolded what appeared to be a rusty trident. “The Cluster Fork!”

Tina giggled through her nose and had the two businessmen looking around for potential spies. She put her hand over her mouth and crouched down even lower.

The buyer swiped the trident out of the seller’s hands and swung it around with as much effort as a toothbrush. He even used the middle tip to pick his teeth and the other two tips to scratch his back. “Not bad,” he said sarcastically. “But how the hell is this supposed to be worth five thousand gold pieces! I can’t even buy a whorehouse full of slutty women with that kind of money!”

“That’s no ordinary trident, Mr. Jackhammer.”

Tina giggled again, but still managed not to attract attention her way.

Waving his hands over the rusted weapon, the seller said, “The Cluster Fork has been passed down from several generations of demonic forces. Entire wars were won with this piece of weaponry. Religions were split apart by this trident’s might. The Cluster Fork…”

Tina figured “Mr. Jackhammer” had enough of the hokey salesmanship as evidenced by the seven-footer jabbing the seller through the heart with the trident. That wasn’t where the heinous assault ended. A fiery circle formed around Mr. Jackhammer and melted not only his opponent’s corpse into ashes, but also the bushes and trees in his vicinity.

One of the trees had a crow’s nest inside. The family of scavenger birds angrily flocked around their attacker’s head and pecked at his face like their beaks were deadlier than medieval weaponry. Jackhammer put and end to the assault by grabbing all of the birds in one massive hand and crushing them into bloody feathers.

“Oh no…no, no, no…no…” Tina whispered as tears ran down her face. She tried to keep quiet as she snorted mucous up her nose, but accidentally let a scream slip when a family of grizzly bears came out of hiding and surrounded Jackhammer for a beat-down.

The giant stabbed one of the bears through the gut and slung his now fiery body around the others, reducing them to barbecued meat done a little too well. Jackhammer raised his weapon high in the air and laughed like a madman as a flaming aura danced around his already powerful body.

Tina couldn’t stop screaming at the instant horror as Jackhammer laid devilish eyes on her. He pointed the Cluster Fork at her and growled, “Ain’t so funny now, is it, bitch? Go ahead! Laugh it up! I double dog dare you! Don’t be shy!” No response, only jitters. Animals of all kinds, squirrels, wolves, deer, and birds, flocked away from the roaring inferno and all Tina could do was stand there with vibrating legs. “Answer me!” Jackhammer shouted.

She couldn’t answer, so a running deer did it for her when it bucked her on its back and carried her deep into the woods to safety. Tina’s wobbly legs made it difficult for her to stay upright during the chase and she came close to falling off several times. Jackhammer on the other hand had no problem sprinting through the woods lighting trees and shrubbery blaze. Another deer tried to kick him in the ribs, but all it got in return was a trident up the ass.

Tina shrieked and kept one hand over her eyes while the other was on her mount’s antlers. Images of her fluffy friends dying left and right in mass genocide assaulted her mind and sped up her heartbeat. Her blood grew colder and her skin dampened like a waterfall. After the deer halted and Tina stopped mumbling whiny slogans to herself, she slowly lifted her head to see that she was indeed underneath a waterfall and she wasn’t going crazy.

“You think a little bit of water is going to stop me?! I’ve seen infected pussies that were wetter than that!” barked Jackhammer with a fiery background behind him and his arms folded.

Tina slipped off the deer’s spine and backed up a few steps alongside her animal companions. She wanted to form a snappy comeback, but all that came out of her trembling lips was slobbery drivel.

“What’s the matter? Cock got your tongue?!” Jackhammer chuckled. “That’s okay. You’ll have plenty more reasons than that to be on your knees for me. I’m your majesty now! I rule over everything! Now be a good little girl and take off that sexy dress for me!” He licked his lips and caused Tina to shiver even harder than before.

She didn’t want to look her potential rapist in the eyes. She didn’t want to look at any other part of his body either. Instead her mind was pumped full of images of fiery treetops falling left and right. And then she had an idea, but her anxious tummy told her not to use her animals like that. Then again, her options were limited. It was too late for this forest. It would forever be known as a criminal hideout for shady deals. Mother Nature had been too kind to these crooks even in death. But it wasn’t too late for one more forest…

As Jackhammer cupped his ear and mockingly listened in for a response from Tina, she swallowed a lump and raised her finger in the air before casting it down upon her opponent. Swarms of squirrels and rabbits crawled all over Jackhammer’s body, leaving little rabid bite marks in their wake. Tina made a slash mark across her throat and instructed a deer to kick the trident out of Jackhammer’s hands, which it did after several long seconds of the giant snapping the necks of the little creatures.

“Damn it!” Jackhammer shouted repeatedly as he chased after the trident, which was being sucked down the stream and into the waterfall. Tina instructed the wolves to bite at his ankles while she instructed a nearby grizzly to knock down a burning tree over the distracted giant. Not only were his legs bleeding buckets, but the tree found its mark: right over the skull of the arrogant giant.

But it didn’t faze Jackhammer. It just made him smile evilly at Tina, who slowly backed up as he stalked upon her. He threatened, “I can get the trident later. I’ve already got a spear I can impale you with!” He dropped his legless shorts and exposed his ugly, mushroom-infested dong to her. Tina was so busy looking away that she plopped backwards into the water, not knowing where to go next.

“Open wide, little lady!”

She reached behind her and felt something sharp. Deer antlers! It felt so wrong to use a corpse in such a way, but when she fearlessly jammed the antlers into Jackhammer’s crotch, he bent over and howled in misery. But he ripped them out and tossed them aside like it was nothing despite the heavy bleeding. His smile grew wider and more sadistic. While deer, wolves, and bears ganged up on the seven foot savage, Tina swam away feeling like a coward.

The sounds of animal bones crunching and flesh being ripped and shredded pounded her brain and caused her to swim faster. She picked up her speed again when she heard the familiar leather boots clomping beside her. Every animal and every weapon tested against this giant failed to keep him down for long. And then…she threw something else at him. Something random. Something unexpected. And as soon as she threw this final weapon, Jackhammer’s agonizing cries were accompanied by crackles of fire.

Tina turned around and used a nearby deer’s antlers to help her out of the water. But she saw the same thing her companions did: burning flesh, blackening blood, and a once indestructible god turning into a pile of rotten meat and ashes. All because he had the Cluster Fork sticking out of his chest.

She couldn’t celebrate yet. She dashed over to him and collected his ashes in her front dress pocket before yanking the trident free. She and her animal companions outran the growing fire that consumed their home. Tina’s legs were still wobbly and she almost fell back into the water, but she was carried by a grizzly bear at the last minute. For now she could relax, but even that was impossible with all the violent imagery her mind played out for her.

Tina couldn’t even dream the hour away. A numbed out brain wouldn’t let her. Adrenaline kept her nerves ice cold. Her heart wouldn’t stop beating. She kept expecting either a fiery trident or another kind of “spear” to assault her any moment now. She watched her forest home go up in smoke. All that was left for her was this new grassy field where a significantly smaller animal army greeted her with sympathetic licks and head bumps.

“I’m sorry, my friends,” she cried. “Your home is gone. Everything we’ve worked to build is gone. Mother Nature lost. She never loses. I don’t even know if we can start over again…unless…”

Tina wiped multiple tears from her eyes and sprinkled Jackhammer’s ashes amongst the empty dirt. Multiple animal minions brought their dead loved ones into the pile as well as the bones of previous criminals who made deals in the now burning forest. They all gathered around with Tina leading them in a speech.

“You see this, everyone?” she said while choking back more tears. “The rain will come again one day. And when it does, these ashes and bodies will grow into another tree. And from that one tree, a new forest will grow. Life will begin again. But that won’t be for years to come. Mother Nature’s rebirth is always a slow one. But what shall we do for now? How shall we sustain ourselves until those years pass?”

Turned out the grass was quite delicious to the animals as they munched on it with fervor. If Mother Nature yielded these tasty results in such a short amount of time, perhaps the rebirth of the forest wouldn’t take long either. Tina smiled and fell on her back before releasing more tears to rehydrate the ground. The wolves licked her tears clean, signifying forgiveness for being used in combat so recklessly. It was their home too and they had the right to defend it. She hugged them around their necks and tried to fall asleep in her new cuddle-puddle, but to no avail.

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.