2A: Devil

There's a devil on my shoulder.
He’s rap, rap, rapping at the door.
I tell him ‘go away, you sonofabitch’, but still he knocks some more.

There’s a devil on my shoulder.
I hear him all the time.
He whispers words of warning on promises sublime.

There’s a devil on my shoulder.
There used to be an angel too.
But that goat-faced fuck done bent him over, then his days were through.

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2B: Shattered

“You okay?” Corey Smith looks up to me from one knee as I blink out of my daze. My vision punches its way through the glaring sun that kisses the ground of the dusty clearing that we’ve been led to in the heart of Camp Wannapoeia. Corey slides a large box out of the entrance to his tent and gives it a small shove. The tent inside clanks a little as the box squeezes between two others at my feet. “I feel like something’s bothering you.”

“I…” I fight away this nagging feeling. Of falling. Of shattering. Of the end. But… “It’s nothing, don’t worry about it.”

“You sure?” he asks. “You’ve been kind of distant…”

Before we can continue, a raised voice interrupts, shouting in the background.

“American bop musician Taylor Swift’s voice is like the sound of one thousand South Koreans giving birth compared to the famous North Korean song ‘Don’t Ask My Name’!” The North Korean War Criminal stands next to an unlit firepit with his hand on his heart, and begins singing from the top of his lungs with a voice that sounds exactly like one thousand anybody’s giving birth.

“내 이름 묻지마세요 이름을 묻지마세요
그 무슨 큰일했다고 이름을 물으시나요”

Centurion sits on a felled log, exasperated. It’s been a trying day for him. Our ride here was long, uncomfortable, and silent. Then there were the trust falls. And now? This.

“Uh… what’s he doing?” Corey asks.

“Singing, apparently.” Centurion throws his hands in the air. “And for some reason belittling Taylor Swift, when I never even brought her up.”

“It’s okay bud,” I chime in from the background, not even turning to face them. “You’ll shake it off.”

If Centurion wasn’t rolling his eyes before (and he was), he’s definitely rolling them now. Extra rolls, even.

“What’s the song?” Corey keeps his focus on the War Criminal.

“Something about not asking what his name is,” Centurion replies.

“It’s usually sung by women,” I interject. Centurion squints his eyes at me. “And it’s about putting his nation first and remembering the country’s name rather than being concerned with your own.”

“Easy for you to say,” Centurion… jokes? “How do you know all that?”

“How did you understand it?” I return volley.

“Marriage,” he states simply, defusing the tension.

“Do you think we could all learn it as a team building exercise?” Corey asks, and bless his heart I think he’s genuine. Ironically, in the most successful piece of unification work so far, both Centurion and I give Corey the same ‘what the fuck is wrong with you?’ look.

“No!” Centurion stamps his feet down. “Hell no!”

“Just let him get it out of his system,” I suggest.

“Right…” he says, still almost-mesmerised watching the War Criminal. Centurion smacks his hands against his knees as he gets up off the log, which grabs Corey’s attention.

“So… tents?” Centurion asks, clearly remembering his Captain Obvious hat.

“Yes!” Corey says. “I was thinking that we could have a little race. First to put up their tent wins! Not counting mine of course, since it’s already up.”

“What’s the prize?” Centurion asks.

“Uh…” Corey stumbles, clearly giving away that he had nothing prepared. “You get the night off of firewood duty?”

“That’ll work!” Centurion agrees. “Only one problem. We’re down a man.”

With his thumb, he points to the spot where the War Criminal had been singing. He’s gone! And the glory of his jingoistic fervor has gone with him.

A strange silence sweeps across the campsite.

A bush rustles.

“Over there!” Corey shouts, as we turn to the bush’s direction. We hear a scampering sound and chase into the treeline. But when we get there… nothing. There’s not a sign of the North Korean War Criminal.

Another rustle.

And another.


Three. In different directions.

Without speaking, we split up.

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2C: Harbinger

I make it back to the campsite first, alone.

“Oh fuck…” Spying my personal duffle bag tucked alongside everyone else’s against the log Centurion had been sitting one earlier, I rush over to it. It’s open! I rifle through it. Shirts? Check. Jeans? Check. Possibly clean underwear? Check. Universal Championship? Still check. Except… “My wig!”

“What’s wrong?” Centurion asks as he arrives back on the scene, similarly alone. His white sleeves are rolled up, and his suit jacket is slung over his shoulder. With the lack of warning he received, Centurion didn’t exactly come wearing the most appropriate clothing. “Also, where did your bag come from? You didn’t even bring it out of my car.”

“Somebody took my red clown wig!” I shout back.

“But they left the Uni Title?” he cocks an eye, peeking over my shoulder. I ignore him.

“My wig!”

~~~~~

Corey hears the yelling first. He steps out of the bush to find his ‘partner’ screaming at an Asian woman and her young daughter. A man - the woman’s husband - begins hurriedly closing in. Jumping into action, he races to get in-between. He holds a hand up to the approaching man, and pulls the War Criminal back.

“Hey! What’s going on?” he says. “We were worried about you!”

“Aha!” the War Criminal smiles. “See, you traitorous scum? The Dear Leader works in mysterious ways, and today, he brings me Corey Smith to vanquish our foes!”

“Sure… but they’re not our foes” Corey replies.

”That’s what you think!” Corey just keeps pulling the War Criminal away. He gives a wave of capitulation to the husband, as the Criminal continues. “Look how the little one has taken to American pony show. Will you help me re-educate them, Corey Smith?”

“How about we just get back to the others?”

~~~~~

Cracking twigs cause Centurion and I to snap our heads backwards. Corey gives the War Criminal a small, encouraging nudge, and they join us back at the campsite.

“Found him!” he announces.

“You motherf…” I storm up to the War Criminal and, glaring at him, snatch my red wig from his head, and shove it back into my bag. “What do you think you were doing?”

“Honestly, I wasn’t even going to ask about that,” Corey says. “Still won’t. How about those tents?”

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2D: Pitching/Catching

Each of us takes a tent and we fan out to the four corners of the firepit, with Corey’s spaced a little further back. I muse to myself how Morbid Angel would get a kick out of the crucifix shape we form.


My spot is to the left of Corey’s, and I get to emptying the tent canvas and poles.

~~~~~

There’s a devil on my shoulder.

~~~~~

“Have you spoken to Thad?” I ask him as he passes on one of his near-supervisory sweeps.

“No,” he replies. “We’re kind of keeping our distance with this whole War Games thing, you know?”

I nod in understanding as I stretch the canvas across the ground and begin to fasten the tent poles together.

“I’m surprised you’re asking,” Corey says, and I turn to face him. “I know you’re not his biggest fan, but he’s still my friend. If you knew his full story...”

“I know enough,” I interrupt. “I know that he looks at you befriending me as if it's some sort of slight against him, but won’t apply those same standards to how his own relationship with Louis affects you. Ask yourself, have I ever once told you not to be Thad’s friend?”

“No…” he says, before he really thinks about it. When he does, I can see the penny drop behind his eyes. “No, you haven’t.”

“That’s all in Thad’s head,” I resume. “Louis has though. About you. He’s telling Thad that I’m saying it right now. And Thad chose that. Not over me, but over Dolly. I can’t help but see that Thad chose somebody who he knew would tell him it’s okay to be the bad guy, over somebody who would push him to be better.”

“He would argue that I did the same,” Corey offers.

“Except I’m never going to ask you to choose between us,” I point out. I know it makes him uncomfortable, but times like this bring a smile to my face. It’s like we’re back at the start. Not of this trip, but of this journey.

“So we put Doc down and it’s all hunky-dory,” he offers, and I sense he’s more telling himself that than me. “You’re pretty much the Anti-Doc, anyway.”

Levity in dark places. The Corey Smith Special. Good, he’ll need more of that. It’s good to see that glimmer in his eye again. It’s good to feel it in mine.


~~~~~

But that goat-faced fuck done bent him over, then his days were through.

~~~~~

Something rustles.

A harbinger of...

“You did it Comrade Centurion!” the North Korean War Criminal exclaims, catching Corey and I’s attention. “Dear Leader of Coreytopia, Corey Smith, his trusted companion and Universal partner in hindquarters, and I, the most successful fire-bringer in North Korean Peace Corps, will provide for us on this night with the wood of the forest of America!”

“Partner in hindquarters…?” Corey whispers to himself. “What the… hey! How the hell did you do that so fast?”

“He’s like three-thousand years old,” I scoff. “He probably saw the tent get invented.”

“The tent was first patented in 1856,” Centurion says, as he walks back over to the gear bags, winking at me in the process. “I should know, I was there.”

And grabs his bag. Picking it up, a glimmer becomes a flash.

The whole briefcase comes to light.

~~~~~

There’s a devil on my shoulder.
He wants me to let him in.
Oops! Too late! He found a way! Now who wants to see me sin?

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2E: Same Book, At Least

“Now I know what you’re thinking, how did this rag-tag band of misfit toys even get a signal to transmit from out here? Well there’s nothing that a little North Korean ingenuity can’t MacGyver together with just couple of twigs, an old water bottle, a piece of plastic I found in Andy’s wallet, and some shining rock thing that he had.”

“What piece of plastic?! That better not be where my credit card went!”

“WHAT SHINING ROCK!? THAT BETTER NOT BE URANIUM!”

“Relax, Corey Smith. Uranium is much less effective than superior North Korean plutonium!”

“That doesn’t make me feel better…”

“Would listening to Chris Chaos again help?”

“I think I’d rather eat that plutonium.”

“Oh I hear ya! I spent so long last month telling Chris how he hasn’t learned a damn thing, and he just goes on to prove me right! He’s still acting like a teenage girl trying to insult people about their looks.”

“It’s not like he can insult anyone about their successes and failures.”

“Oof… Cent burn. Those are rare.”

“What?”

“I said you make a good point! Unlike Chris. I guess he can’t get fucked up with all those ‘OOOH SPOOKY MIND GAMES’ that Thad thinks I play at, if he just keeps my name out his mouth. Except… Atty Atara tried that and while I had hoped I had beaten some sense into her, I think I might have broken her instead. Worse still when it comes to Chris… I fucking called it! It really is a good thing I just pointed him back to last month to get my opinions on him, because absolutely zero has changed on my end, and evidently on his. It really tells you everything you know that Theo hasn’t pulled him out of that team, doesn’t it?”

“That Theo just wants to see him get rail-roaded again?”

“Right you are, Cor’ Bear! Now I know War Games is happening at the site of the original Woodstock and all that, and it probably gets Chris feeling nostalgic since it’s been about the same timeframe since he had a fucking sniff of relevance, but instead of revisiting his favourite songs from the days when everyone else at least used lube on his asshole, the only lyric Chris Chaos should be concerning himself with right now is ‘Rape Me, again.’

“Dude… too far.”

“Really? Is it too far if I point out that Bobby Bourbon claimed being a kamikaze was a good thing, and I wish him all the best in his fucking suicide mission?”

“Depends, are you being literal or metaphorical?”

“Literal! This is war, Corey Smith!”

“Maybe not the one he said.”

“Wise call.”

“Speaking of dead men though, cock your shotguns lads because we’ve got a fucking walker! Andre Dixon’s actually here! And here I was thinking he died. Or… is that the twist? See, everyone knows that the speech bubbles above Andre’s head are in orange. But when he turned up in Louis’s puppet show they were green!”

“You see colours?”

“You don’t?”

“No…”

“You’re weird, Andy. Are you even the real Centurion? Your colour-words were different earlier today too.”

“Yes, I’m real.”

“If you say so! Still not convinced about Andre though, guys! The man says he’s not going to start with Corey, but then goes and does that anyway! I don’t think this imposter Andre even knows which way is up! Did Louis just find a generic man with a criminal record and plug him in the role? That’s all he sounds like, but it’s also what the real Andre sounds like too. So confusing! Fake-Andre might not want to shit on me but I will absolutely shit on him! I just don’t have too, because Miss Fury clearly outlining how unimportant you are to BOB kind of does it for me. That is, when she can pull herself away from banging on and on about Corey’s briefcase. I already know, kids! I can fucking see it right now! Still… they just can’t get enough of us now, can they? Pity they’re just singing the same song as the first round. Speaking of repeating shit, hey Cor’, how many times have you stomped Andre by now?”

“Two.”

“TWO?!”

“Yep!”

“Jeez, if he thinks you ain’t shit without Thad, what does that make him?”

“A kamikaze!”

“A BOBbie is a BOBbie, I guess. But I think there might be something in the water cooler at Lou’s office, because both ‘Dre and the good ‘doctor’ himself are on a similar sort of kick. This is the second time that Louis has tried to play the ‘everyone’s favourite’ card against me, and it’s the second time that it’s fallen flat, because just who are the people pitching a tent over me, bud?”

“Enemy of the State Andre Dixon.”

“Me. Err… not like that.”

“Add some people in the crowd too - but they’re the same people who cheer Thad, so we're at a bit of a stalemate there! That’s it though. Literally everyone else comes at me as if they think I’m some sort of a fluke, or fad, or gimmick. Just ask your own team. But this is the sort of logic that falls apart when the puppeteer has his hand up others’ asses but his head up his own. It’s a lesser version of the same error Bobby Bourbon makes when he says that people are complaining there is a BOB team, or being surprised how he wasn’t picked in the first round. Nobody is saying that.”

“Except maybe Robert Main.”

“And nerds on some internet podcast, but that ain’t canon.”

“Right. But the rest of us just don’t care. And it’s also the same type of error that Thad makes whenever he says that people pretend he isn’t as good as he is. Who, Thad? If even I - arguably one of your biggest critics - haven’t said that, then who is out there discounting you?”

“Robert Main.”

“Well we’ve got a common denominator there, don’t we? Sorry Dolly, but Charlie’s Carnies are as fucked as the fact that BETSY GOT TO CHOOSE HER REPLACEMENT WHILE WE GOT TOLD TO TAKE CENTURION! WHAT THE FUCK?!”

“Hey! I’m right here!”

“That’s the problem! So is the pattern of delusion in Dis-Continuum. No matter how much Thad wants to claim that he’s beaten me, let me remind you of his own words:”

Quote:“Battle royals are a crapshoot and have never been about who is better.”

“No fucking mind tricks needed there, Thad. But do you notice anything that’s changed? This is different than High Stakes or MayDay. I’m not out here riding on pure force of will - not that I don’t have it. This… this is purely about me fucking getting mine! And I sure as shit don’t need a story about blinding lights at the top of a mountain that never goes anywhere to do so.

And I thought I was bad, Lou’?

I'm going to Eat You All. Shit, I’ve already left such an impact on Louis that his mind has finally started deteriorating and he thinks I’ve been around since August instead of November.

You were in the High Stakes match, Lou! Just how many brain cells did I kill at MayDay?

Or does it just feel like an eternity that you've had to live with the failure of your choice in Thad?

It's kind of telling, bud, that you go straight to blaming Corey for our team name. You're frazzled. All mixed up. So desperate to drive a wedge. But ask yourself, of all people, who do you really think would have done that?

LOL!

Fuck Thad.

But fuck his hashtag too."