You’ve waited months for this day, and you don’t want to mess it up now because your impatience got the better of you. You lean up against the house, lightening the load on your knees a bit. However, it’s not enough to appease them, and your now furious knees are strongly encouraging you to just drop to your bottom. You figure your position is good enough that you’ll see any potential targets and have time to get into a more prone position well before they arrive, so you acquiesce to your joints and decide to rest a bit while you can. You wait for what you suppose is about half an hour, regretting your decision to not put a waistwatch on your belt. You wait for what is probably five more minutes before recalling you have a pun-free wristwatch. This embarrassment is matched only by the irritation you feel when you find you’ve been waiting for no more than fifteen minutes. The excitement that had coursed through your body when you first awoke dissipates, and now you’re left to count the manholes on your street (1, 2, 3… 1, 2, 3…) and sigh. \n\nJust as you’re starting to get desperate, you notice a woman walking her poodle a block away from you. You tense in anticipation, as you can almost taste the sweet joy of another’s humiliation. If she does continue onto your block, she’ll be across the street from you. Although it might give her time to react, you’re increasingly anxious to start this day, and you’re confident you are well-enough equipped to thoroughly prank her. As walker and walkee approach the end of the block, the dog starts to pull the woman around the corner. You moan in frustration, but the woman rights her poodle and they keep walking in a straight path. You thank your luckiness, get into a crouch, and wait tensely as the doomed duo walk on calmly. They’re only four… three… two houses away. You flick the switch to fill a boomer-pan and finger the pin on a seltzer grenade in the moments before you lunge from your hiding spot. Your glory approaches on a leash, and you clear the bushes in a powerful leap. You cross the lawn, pass the maple tree, and all hell breaks loose. You realize something is terribly wrong, and must act before you know what’s going on. Do you\n\n[[Become one with all hell breaking loose,]] or \n\n[[Hide from it?]]\n

You’re convinced that even if your neighbors are in hiding, you’re more than equipped to deal with any hodge-podge prank they came up with this morning. You’ve spent enough time perfecting your prank belt to deserve this confidence, and you hop down the stairs and start down the street. You try to appear disinterested and casual as you scan your neighbor’s lawns, peering into their shrubs and eyeing their trees. Nothing is out of place, and as you round the corner, you smile, knowing that you’ve gotten a head start on your neighbors.\n\n The street you’ve turned onto is also desolate, but you had anticipated as much. From past years' celebrations, you’ve learned that your block is the rowdiest of the bunch. If they aren’t yet on the prowl, it’s unlikely that anybody within a quarter-mile radius will be. With that in mind, you decide to head downtown to find some action. Not only does downtown have a higher population density, but there are usually some city-structured prank activities so families can enjoy the day and feel safe doing it, and that should guarantee some victims. You also become giddy at the realization that if you go downtown, you’ll have an opportunity to prank the mayor. Your mind wanders around thoughts of your cream pies and seltzer grenades bringing the city’s until recently most powerful man to his knees and raising you to the level of Prank God. You start to think about how Prank God is a crappy title, and then remember you may still meet a fellow pranker on your two-mile trek downtown and snap out of your fantasy. Simpleton you are, though, it's not long before you're flirting again with thoughts of the glorious day that awaits you. \n\n After walking halfway downtown mile, you still haven’t seen anybody. No one else is out walking, no one is gardening, no children are playing—not even a single car has driven past. You appear to be the only one outside on this notoriously riotous day, but this realization doesn’t worry you yet. Although there are townsfolk who don’t like the pranks, there are too many who enjoy them for the whole town to stay silent today. There are also the droves of tourists who always visit the town for a unique pranking experience. Maybe the visitors started downtown if they aren’t yet roaming the streets? You continue down to Main St. undeterred. \n\n Moments later you stop. The 24-inch blood-red letters declaring, “YOU SHALL NOT PASS” have something to do with your hesitation. An enormous barricade of lumber, concrete, and chain-link fencing stretches across the street and abuts with the houses on either side, making an impassable barrier. The wall appears to have been made with whatever materials the builders had at hand, but you don’t question its stability or the conviction of the people inside. This neighborhood seems a bit unappreciative of the semi-annual pranks and has decided to unsubtly withdraw from the festivities. You can appreciate the embarrassment and discomfort pranks can cause, and respect these people for desiring their peace and taking measures to ensure it. \n\n Well you CAN appreciate it and respect these people, or you can decide not to. Your mind turns from mayor-induced glory and starts to consider the fame you could find behind that wall if you were to get inside and wreak havoc. You’ve never heard of a neighborhood Waco-ing itself in, and you’re sure it’ll be a feat worthy of the annals if you prank those who consider themselves unprankable. However, you’re facing a wall that is fifteen feet high in some places. There may be another way in, but first you must decide if you want to take on this task or continue downtown on a less-obstructed road. Do you:\n\nAssassinate a public figure (forthcoming content!), or\nAnnihilate a peace-loving town (forthcoming content!)?\n\nHuh. Dead end, Holmes.

You grab a particularly long crystal from the bag and inspect it. "Seems... pure," you guess. \n\n"Go on and give it a try." \n\nYour drug preparation skills lacking, you place one end of the jagged crystal between your thumb and forefinger and jam it up your nose. \n\nThen inhale. Inhale some blood, snort violently, cough. \n\nLuigi cracks up. "You're killin' me, ah man! What kinda numbnuts doesn't smash his/her meth up before snorting it?" \n\n"Holy shit, this is meth?" You sneeze the bloody shard into your hand. \n\n"Yeah, it's some of the best methamfauxtamine around. Actually, it's the only methamfauxtamine around." \n\nYou stare blankly. "You mean it's not real?" \n\n"Nah, we just mix a little food coloring into some sugar and water and let it set on a sheet. Still gets you hyper when it goes up your nose, though. And a little loopy." \n\n"Sure that's not from loss of blood?" \n\n"That's just you." \n\n"Right. So, you're selling... sugar drugs?" \n\n"We don't like to refer to our wares in such a common manner. We're in the business of dealing placebfauxs." \n\n"You don't need to change it to "faux". Placebos are already fake." \n\nTony looks down. "Oh. Merd." He turns to Luigi. "What'sa matter with you, coming up with a redundant name like that? What'sa matter with you, being so redundant about the name?" \n\n"I'm sorry, Tony, it won't happen again." \n\n"It better not, Luigi, or you'll be getting the same treatment as those Mafakia bastards." \n\nLuigi shudders at the thought. Confused, you ask, "Wait. So you're the mafauxia... and there's also the Mafakia? There are two fake crime organizations competing in this town? What are the chances of that?" \n\n"Incredibly low. But those Mafakers, they rolled into town and started creeping into our astroturf, so we fought back. We mowed them down with Fake-K fauxty-sevens and Fauxlt revolvers, but those stupid Mafakers haven't learned their lesson yet." \n\n"Those aren't real gun names. Are you shooting them with real bullets?" \n\n"We're trying to lead a refauxlution in how gang warfaux is waged. That's why we need your help." Tony points at your prank belt. "It seems you're onto something there. What are you packing?" You run through your weaponry quickly, giving a few non-lethal demonstrations. "Impressive. We're in need of a mind like yours to put those Mafakers in their place." \n\nThe cook bursts into the room. "Tony, Tony--the Mafakia! They killed Jauxseph! Just shot him dead in the street. We gotta get them Mafaker mafuckers, Tony, let's go!" \n\nBut the question is--do YOU need to go get them? \n\n[[Yes, I'm part of the fauxmily now!]] or \n\nNo, these guys think cream pies are weapons! (forthcoming content!)

“…we didn’t have to kill her/him until you said that.”\n\nYou choose like an idiot. With surprising alacrity, Luigi spins you around, covers your mouth, and grabs your dominant elbow. Tony opens the door and Luigi guides you to the cook. This time, the cook looks at you with fire in his eyes. You’re transfixed by his bloodthirsty stare as Luigi asks the cook, “Hey, Mario—what’s your favorite color?”\n\nWithout breaking eye contact, Mario croons, “Red.”\n\n“Of course. And you know how to make our little friend here red, right?”\n\nMario picks up a cleaver and licks his lips, “Yes.”\n\n“Good. And in order for us to make some money, which is naturally my favorite color, we need to sell this rat—so cut him/her up real tiny, all right Mario?” Mario jumps up and down with glee, then with a whhhhumpsplurt puts the cleaver through most of your neck. Luigi lets you fall to the ground, where you gargle on bloody vocal chords instead of crying out. Mario and Luigi jump up and down on your body to tenderize your quickly dying flesh. In their frenzy, the brothers knock a carton of mushrooms to the ground, and though one falls into your crimson mouth, you don’t recover from their stomping assault. Instead, you realize the princess might be on another page (try [[page 47]]). \n

You die.

Turn to [[page 47]], you fucking lameass.

With your pinky finger, you scoop out a little powder and place it on your tongue. "It's... powdered sugar?" \n\n"Are you calling our product nothing more than common sugar?" \n\n"No, of course not." \n\n"Good. Because it's fauxcaine. The finest, straight from Cauxlumbian cartels and distributed by yours truly." \n\n"It's... really... impressive." \n\n"No one in the world deals better blaux." \n\n"Undoubtedly." \n\n"Follow me. Maybe when you see our operation, you'll be more appreciative." \n\nTony guides you through the hallways of Pastaciolli's (which is much bigger than it looks from the outside), and down the stairs to an enormous facility. You walk past scores of workers cutting up fauxcaine with plastic knives, enormous vats of chemicals, and conveyor belts, in awe of the scale of the drug operation in your small town. \n\n"This is where the magic happens. And the best part is we've corrupted some officials to distribute for us within the ranks of law enforcement. Go ahead. Sample our product." \n\nYou grab a freshly-baked little circle covered in white dust. "They're powdered donuts." \n\n"Correction: powdered fauxnuts." \n\n"And you sell these directly to the police?" \n\n"Fauxlice." \n\n"And they don't arrest you for, I don't know, selling them fauxnuts dusted with cocaine?" \n\n"Fauxcaine." \n\n"That doesn't make it any more legal." \n\n"Fauxrrection: it is completely legal." \n\n"Was that a correction pun?" \n\n"Yes." \n\n"Fauxgive me for asking, but does a fauxrrection mean you aren't really correcting me and it's still actually illegal?" \n\n"...Possibly." \n\n"I see." \n\n"The issue is less that we sell fauxcaine than that we've bought off large sections of the fauxlice force and they're dealing for us. It doesn't help that our product is named after a narcotic. Or that we're paying our dealers with counterfaux money." \n\n"That's just like placebfaux." \n\n"Get off my dick about it."\n\nBeing incredibly bright, you reply:\n\n"Fauxkay," (forthcoming content!) or\n\n"I don't think saux." (also forthcoming!)

You decide to throw the grenade first, because throwing it after the pie will wash away half of your work, lowering your prank-to-embarrassment ratio. You watch eagerly as the little bastard trudges toward his doom. You pull the pin when he’s ten feet away, and drop it when he’s only five feet from shame. The grenade bounces once and catches his eye. Eight streams of seltzer water explode forth. The liquid shrapnel scrubs violently between his eyes, washes away his little pubescent chest hairs—and most importantly—two streams blast his crotch into soaking submission. You chortle and flip the filling switch. The cream-filled pan soars into the kids face, slides slowly down, and floats gloriously back to you. The paperboy’s cream-obscured gaze follows the pan to discover you licking the residual victory. Far too embarrassed to retaliate, he stands in a puddle of his own wretchedness until your cream dispensers spfoort your next tasty bomb. He turns to run and you smother the back of his head. The paperboy speeds up after this second creambardment, but you’re done with him anyway. He looks like a melting snowman, hurrying to stick his head in a freezer before he fades forever from existence, but you know he won’t be cool again for months. \n\nOh-ho, clever of you to come up with that. \n\nElated, you pump your arms in the big V of victory. You shimmy down the tree and continue your victory dance while eating the unused cream pie. You really gave it to that paperboy. He’s been repaid in full for all the mornings you woke up without a paper on your doorstep, or your bushes, or your roof. Karma, bitch. You are karma incarnate, your pranks so much more than pranks. You are meant to bring retribution to those people who give bad service or treat others poorly: the Karma Creamer, if you will. This has certain unfortunate connotations with kama sutra, but you decide to simply prank anyone who calls you out on that. You are confident that today will see you successfully prank enough people to more than make up for all of the embarrassment you’ve ever felt over being you. Your step springs as you make your way to…\n\n[[A restaurant,]] or\n\nThe computer store (to buy a brand new iForthcoming content!)?\n

Turn to [[page 47]].

You hurl your pie boomer-pan at the first moving thing you see, which happens to be a demon. Unlucky you. Your target’s face explodes in dairy, coating his thick goat hair and long horns in the sinfully sweet substance. His head shakes in fury, dislodging some of the cream and setting his horns quivering. Oh, shit. You turn to find any sort of cover, and find that all hell did literally break loose. Demons of all shapes and sizes and numbers of appendages are swarming the streets, wielding swords, twirling battle-axes, and brandishing whips. Some have picked up the poor dog walker and are carrying her off, and a few are tying her poodle’s legs together as if preparing to put it on a spit. A man with big, round, gorgeous breasts runs past you. You look back at your house and find an unusually large concentration of hellspawn on your lawn. You realize that you’re surrounded, so decide the only thing to do is to fight your way through the denizens of hell who have invaded your town and are trying to steal your glory. You’ll have none of it, so you pull the pin on a seltzer grenade and turn to the demon you’ve presumably already weakened with your creamy assault. You let it fly as he grabs at his wobbling horns and pulls. \n\n “Bill? Bill Zebub?”\n\n Your neighbor’s goat-demon mask comes off just as the seltzer grenade goes off. He is blasted square in his already unsmiling pie hole (and his goat-crotch, of course). Once it empties, he stands comically for a second, licking at the water, but you’re far from laughing. Your eyes lock, and he shouts to the demons on your doorstep, “Hey everyone, look who it is! A little someone who thought s/he’d have fun pranking people today!” Bill replaces his mask and you realize as the demons close in that the entire neighborhood got together and planned a gigantic prank without you. In fact, you’re fairly certain as they pick you up and carry you off in the direction of dog walker that they don’t especially like you, and you’re about to feel the brunt of the very big prank. \n\n The foul horde carries you for blocks and blocks to a clearing in the woods, which appears to be the staging area for their demonic prank festivities. Your neighbors are sitting around fires, chatting and polishing their weapons and instruments of torment. Near one of these blazes you see the dog walker, bound and gagged. She is going hysterical—despite the gag, you can clearly see that she’s foaming at the mouth, and her body is writhing violently on the ground. Pitiful thing--she doesn’t know this is all simply a prank, and she’s terrified out of her mind. You try to call to her so she knows there is a kindred spirit nearby, but a red claw clamps over your mouth, silencing your soothing. Your neighbors from hell carry you to the enormous fire at the center of the camp and drop you nearby. They wrap ropes around your neck, wrists, and ankles, but leave some rope hanging, and don’t gag you. Even though you know none of this is real, you’re still a little frightened by your neighbors’ commitment to the prank, and since you don’t know quite what’s going on, you decide it would be best not to make any jokes. \n \n A short time passes, and the goat-demon you recognize as Zebub approaches with a golden chalice, which is encrusted with rubies arranged in a pentagram. Five lesser demons place your head five inches from the blaze and then each take an appendage and stretch your body out into a star pattern. Five more demons each take a five inch-long stake, and with a hammer with a five-pointed head, give the pegs five sharp taps in unison to drive them into the ground. Then they each wrap a rope around each stake five times, and all bow to Zebub. Now you’re more than a little creeped out. Do you\n\n[[Scream,]] or\n\nStay silent and just keep reading?\n \n\n The demons stare down at you with delight. Bill Zebub moves between your head and the flames and raises the chalice into the air. Although he’s practically standing in the flames, he does not ignite, but you’re not too worried about that detail as he starts to chant. You’re fairly certain that he says something about blood and Our Soulless Father and the damned, but it’s hard to hear over the wailing from the demonic choir that you’re hoping is still made up of your neighbors. Bill starts speaking words you know you don’t recognize, and the flames behind him begin to burn blood red. At that moment, the rubies on the chalice glimmer, and the contents start to smoke. Bill Zebub stoops over you and with his left hand forces your mouth open, though you’re in too much of a pants-peeing mode to give him much resistance. As he starts to tip the chalice’s contents into your mouth, you finally see the liquid inside and realize it is either Kool-Aid or the flaming red blood of the damned trickling down your throat. Oh yeah, that’s definitely not fruit punch. Once the five ounces of hellfire have made their way down your throat, Bill closes your mouth for you and waits five seconds. Your body goes into convulsions and the demons look on in terrifying delight for the 11 1/10 most agonizing minutes of your life. You nearly rip your limbs out of their sockets as your body pulls against the stakes and the evil that consumes your soul. You shirt ignites and burns away as the Sigil of Baphomet is branded onto your chest from inside your body. Your heart’s pumping is no longer an automatic responsibility of your brain, but is controlled instead by the arrhythmic clenching claw of the demon that now inhabits your being. Probably forever. \n\nIt’s going to be a very bad forever. \n\nAfter the 666 seconds pass, your body goes lax and you look around through new eyes. Everything is now a mass of swirling crimson and black. You have trouble making out individual shapes, but you can feel the demons pull the stakes from the ground and loose your bindings. Even though you’re frightened beyond rational thought, you’re aware of an immense power that is flooding your muscles and an ancient knowledge of pain and terror that engrains itself into your brain. Against your will, you stand up, then flex your scaled arms and dig your cloven hooves into the ground. The demonic hemisphere of your brain tells you it’s time to wreak some havoc, and you realize you’re okay with that. Sure, you hadn’t planned on any inhabitations of your soul when you were plotting your pranks, but now that it’s happened, it sure is going to make pranking easier. As one, the two consciousnesses inside you howl blood-curdlingly into the morning, and you beckon your followers of chaos to join you on your rampage. \n\nThat day you personally slew thousands of townsfolk while trying to sate your lust for shrieks of agony, and you subjected scores of innocent people to the possession ritual you went through earlier that morning. By nightfall, all that was living was either damned or had had its soul devoured. Blood and half-eaten bodies rained from the dark skies, and pestilence swept the land. Demons became immeasurably more powerful by feeding on the terror and chaos, and they all clamored to you and your destruction. They gave you the title Arch-Sower of Damnation, Lord of Rotting Flesh, and Consumpter of Broken Souls, and you rallied your creatures of death and made plans to set the world ablaze with fear and blood.\n\nThe following day, the town on your border, Carazieheetsbouttohoppin, began to wonder if something was up. After all, it was the second of April, and all the pranks should be done and over with, but your city was still on fire. They sent their bravest souls to investigate what had happened to their odd, but otherwise peaceful, neighboring town. You ate most of those foolhardy scouts for brunch, but left one cowering in fright. In a moment of quite understandable arrogance, you scrawled some cocky message about feasting on the townsfolk’s souls into the chest of this one uneaten bastard before hurling him clear back to Caraziesheetsbouttohoppin’s town square. You knew he’d arrived when he stopped screaming and the rest of the town started. They decided not to take your notice lightly, and let the rest of the world know that Armageddon likely approached. Unfortunately for you, when word gets out that demons are running rampant and the world is nearing its end, people don’t hold back. The Carazie United Military for Warring Against Demons was formed, your followers were decimated, and after a considerable struggle, you were captured. After lengthy study, the Possession Understanding Society for Saving Innocent and Enlightened Souls concluded that there must still be a human soul inside of you. An archbishop of Rome was sent for to perform an exorcism on you, but as it’d been a while since Hell had tried to conquer the world, this guy’s technique was a little rusty. Or maybe it’s because you aren’t an innocent or enlightened soul. Either way, he flipped a couple Latin words around and dropped the bottle of holy water on your chest, which extinguished your soul and burned all the flesh from your bones. You turn to [[page 47]] with whatever fingers you have left. \n

You spent months trying to mastermind a prank of gargantuan proportions, but once you realized that your hand buzzer wouldn’t have been so lame if only you’d had a cream pie to throw at your laughing detractors, you decided it was time to start thinking small. It’s easy to get lost in the big picture when sometimes the simple gag (after the first simple gag) is all you need. Besides, thinking big is hard for you. I’ll keep the words small. \n\nYou’ve seen enough Batman in your day to know his utility (sorry... tool) belt well, and over the past few weeks you’ve been trying to perfect your own prank belt. You’ve surprised yourself and your family by not only coming up with some great innovations for your prank belt, but by managing to implement them all by yourself. Your achievements include two whipped cream dispensers, one on each side of your belt, that with a single flip of a lever shoot out exactly the perfect amount of cream for a pie; a pie boomer-pan that returns to you after falling slowly and comically off the face of your victim; a long-burning and odor-magnifying paper bag for the flaming sack of poo trick; seltzer water hand grenades; a hand buzzer charged by two nine volt batteries; and enough fake blood and vomit to be legally considered the site of a gone-terribly-wrong drunken orgy of bears and anything that bleeds a lot and vomits while doing it. Paris Hilton, perhaps. Yes, I’m inferring she fucks bears. Oh yeah, and you’ve got an HombreMurcielago grappling hook. You didn’t consider the immense weight that all of these pranks would have on you, or more precisely on your pants, but you can’t bear to remove anything from the prank belt for fear that in a pinch you’ll need exactly that prank which you left behind. You decide to add a couple notches to your excruciatingly bright orange belt before looping it through your pants and fastening the buckle. You feel the definite tug of gravity on your jeans, but the belt stays within arms’ reach. You’re unusually proud of your ability to keep your pants up, but it’s a good day for you if you go to the bathroom without first being asked by someone who has noticed your pee dance if you have to go. You usually nod and whimper before scampering tight-kneed out of the room. But none of that today! Today you finish your breakfast with an enormous smile across your face, dutifully wash your dishes, and walk out the front door, proud to be as clever as you think you are. \n\nThe world that greets you is a calm one. The sun is blissfully dappling the trees and warming the lawns as a sweet breeze of anticipation floats through the town. You look up and down your block to see absolutely no human activity. It seems that everyone is either wary of being the first one pranked or else is in hiding, waiting for the chance to prank the first fool to cross his or her path. At least, these are the only two possibilities that occur to you, and you’re left to decide what to do with your observations. You can either\n\n[[Hide in the bushes against your house because someone is bound to come along,]] or\n\n[[Walk brazenly into the neighborhood and face whatever’s coming.]]\n

You finish, and the officers exchange glances. No one speaks. The minutes stretch on until one officer says, “All right buddy. We believe you.” You let out a sigh of relief because they didn’t beat the shit out of you this time, and then he claps you on the back and smiles. “Actually, that was quite a brave thing you did, and we respect you for it.” The other officers nod in agreement. “We’d like you to join the force as an undercover agent. I think you’ve got what it takes to create a persona and play it off, and we could really use the help.” You’re flattered, and agree to go into training as soon as possible. \n\n Months later you’ve been assigned to your first job: you are Alex Ambiguousgendername, and you are going to wear a wire and buy some coke from a dealer with ties to the mob. The exchange goes something like this:\n\n “Hey, got any coke?”\n\n “Are you wearing a wire?”\n\n “Yes. Shit.”\n\n Unfortunately, your first inclination was to tell the truth, as it had served you so well in the past. Also unfortunate was the mobster’s first inclination, which was to shoot you dead, as it had served him so well in the past. You catch his bullets with your vital organs, and turn to [[page 47]].\n\nUnless you want to read another ending, which you can do by [[clicking here!]]\n

Turn to [[page 47]].

Turn to [[page 47]].

You’re eager to try out the pie, as you had to devise two devices for this prank. You want to hear the spfwoort of the cream filling the pan, then watch as the classic gag leaves your victim ashamed before it whirrs back to you victoriously. You pull out the boomer-pan to fill it, but its metal surface reflects the sun’s rays right into your paper carrier’s eyes. He stops dead. Looks for the source. Looks. Doesn’t notice you, and continues to your house. Shaken, you silently position the pan under the filling filler and flip the lever. A satisfying spfwoort fills the air—a satisfying spfwoort loud enough that your would-be victim looks up to see you hiding in the tree. You raise your arm to throw your pieload, but the kid is too quick for you—he’s already launched the replacement paper with better aim than he’s ever used to deliver your news. The Carazie Sheet strikes you in the chest, knocking the pie from your hand and you from the branch to the ground no not quite. Because you never disengaged the grappling hook from the tree branch, but did return the firing end to your belt, you’re dangling four feet from the ground. The cable started to unwind, but stopped when the failsafe you installed snapped into action. Unfortunately, the failsafe has failed to keep you safe, because now you’re dangling from a tree you can’t quite reach and you can’t coax your super-tightened belt to drop you. Too bad your parents didn’t have more in common with your belt. As you swing a bit, it occurs to you that you’re nothing but a pitiful pranking piñata praying for pardon from a paperboy. \n\nThe bastard laughs, then cackles as if he knows something you don’t. He does. With your face you catch the boomer-pan you dropped. Even though you’re horizontal, it slides slowly down your face before returning to your prank belt. The paperboy once again bests you by actually hitting the ground when he falls, ROFLing there for a while. Then he gets up, points, and LOLs some more. Finally, his laughter subsides enough that he comes to his senses, and his eyes blaze with sadism. Any dignity you ever pretended to have has already dissipated, but you fall into dignity debt when he empties the belt’s contents to the ground and goes immediately for the smelliest prank. He takes the poo and smears it around, spelling “lamer” across your forehead, then lights the long-burning bag and drops it on your chest. You ignite surprisingly easily, and he makes certain you do not extinguish by tossing some also surprisingly flammable fake vomit on you. Just as you’re about to blackout from the pain, he starts to beat you. You’ve never experienced anything so agonizing in your life, but between bashings, you come to realize he’s putting out the youfire. Amidst the indescribable smell of burnt poo and you, your brain manages to kick into survival mode. It starts to think, “If only I can call for help and get to a hospital, I might still survive hey what’s he doing?” The paperboy has just added the letter F to your forehead, because “flamer” is much funnier. He re-ignites you, you crisp, and your brain kicks into turn to [[page 47]] mode. \n

When you woke up this morning, you put on a belt for pranking fools, and now you're going to war. With some French guys. \n\nFrench guys armed with puns and knives. \n\nTony slams his desk. "Not Jauxseph? Ah, little Jauxey, those bastards, they're gonna get it!" Tony looks at you. "Ready to defend the fauxmily?"\n\n"Of course. Let's go faux them up!" \n\nTony, Luigi, the cook, and you run out the back of Pastaciolli's, jump into a Fauxrrari, and tear off toward Mafakian terrifauxry. \n\n"Where'd they kill Jauxey, Mario? Where are we gonna find them?" \n\nMinutes later you pull up outside of 123 Fake street and arm yourselves. Tony grabs a Fake-K, Mario puts on some steel faux boots, and Luigi grabs a fauxton gun. \n\nYou know, like a light particle? A science fiction gun that shoots light--a fauxton gun. \n\nAnyway. \n\nArmed to the dentures, you prep a pie as the Mafauxia storms up to the front door and Tony kicks it in. You toss a few seltzer grenades for cover. Once they explode, everyone surges inside. You scan the room for wet crotches. \n\nNone. \n\nNo dripping faces. No embarrassed looks. Just the Mafauxia. \n\nTony growls, "Where are they?" His eyes lock on Mario. "Well? This was the address, wasn't it? Why aren't they here?" \n\nThere's malice in Mario's eyes as he says\n\n"I can't believe you fell for it," (forthcoming content!) or \n\n"The Mafakia is in another castle." (forthcoming content!)

Choose Your Own Death

You’re not even reasonably convinced that what you’re planning is going to work, but at least you’re not shooting your neighbor in the chest. What if it’s sweet old Ms. Wilkins? Of course, what you’re about to do would probably kill her anyway. The monster flicks its whip, nicking your toe. You jump back and realize catching the whip might be kinda tricky. \n\nYes, that’s your plan. \n\nBut you have a secret weapon. From your prank belt you pull a brown piece of plastic that looks warm and wet and has green and orange chunks adhered to one side. You palm the fake vomit in your right hand, chunk-side out. \n\nYes, that's your secret weapon. The added texture just might give you a grip on the whip, and you’re praying the vomit’s going to absorb some of the pain. \n\nGood luck. \n\nThe beast hisses and lashes at you, narrowly missing your head. Yep, it hissed. You can’t remember any of your neighbors being a cobra, but... then again, maybe you're not dealing with one of your neighbors. It’s far more likely that you’re going toe-to-toe with one of Satan’s favored servants. In fact, that is what's happening, because I say so. And your plan is to catch its whip. Good fuckin' luck. \n \n Your next plan is to run. But... what if it can fly? Or helleport? (hell + teleport = a great fucking pun, thank you very much) Or just suck the soul from a body at a distance? Your best hope is that it’s a little cocky because it thinks you’re out of tricks, and it’s just looking to have some fun flaying you alive. As long as you don’t do anything to make it think otherwise, it shouldn’t unleash anything more dangerous than a 15-foot, nail-spiked whip intended for the scaled backs of the damned. Have I wished you good luck yet? \n \n You begin circling the monster because you’ve seen it done countless times in the movies and you're scared too shitless to do anything else. It eyes you warily, but doesn’t devour your soul. Instead, it lashes at you relentlessly, lacerating your torso, legs, and face. You haven’t tried to grab the whip yet because you can't fucking see a whip, it's traveling at the speed of sound! But if you wait much longer, he’ll take out both your eyes probably skull fuck you with that barbed dick I haven't yet mentioned. \n\nThe demon grins menacingly and you think it starts to laugh, though it sounds a lot like a cat in heat trying to sing “I Got High Hopes” while being ground up by a hedge trimmer wielded by a screeching hag who's scratching her fingernails across a chalkboard older than she is in a bad neighborhood. \n\nBut that's not laughter. He's just getting a chubb. \n\nNext time he lashes--it's go time. It rears back, your body tenses, you snatch at the whip before you hear or see it, and you miss completely. \n\n The demon, it turns out, was not about to lash. That was demon sign language for "Changed my mind. Instead of eating your shit-streaked soul, I think I'm just going wrap this whip around your arm, drag your pathetic body toward me, then dismember you nerve cell by nerve cell, starting with your genitalia. And THEN I'll skull fuck you." You missed some of the finer details, but you worked out the bit about wrapping the whip around your arm when you realized you had 23 rusty nails in your left bicep. You did a good imitation of the cat in heat trying to sing “Whip It,” and then realized the demon was dragging you in and you were probably moments from having your soul devoured. You should have paid more attention in demonic sign language class. Despite the agony and mistranslation, you find the clarity of mind to follow through with your original plan. With your right hand, you grab the whip, which is securely fastened into your musculature. \n\n You depress the hand buzzer into the whip. You send a jolt of magnificent proportions though the whip, through its fingers, then through the rest of its pudgy body. Of course, a buzz would normally be but a minor inconvenience to a monster of such hellishness, but your buzzer happens to vibrate at a very precise rate. The monster’s natural vibrations match perfectly with your hand buzzer’s. This means that as the beast receives the tremors, they continue to shake throughout its body, growing in intensity as the buzzer continues its work. \n\nLike Tesla's earthquake machine, duh. \n\nThe creature drops the whip as its very essence begins to quiver, but it’s far too late to stop what you’ve started. Sensing danger, you find cover once again behind the Gremlin and watch as the demon’s hue darkens. Snot and saliva pour from its face, and the hair falls from its pores. Its eyes bubble before they burst, and you hear every bone in its body crack. Its neck splits vertically and its vocal chords shred, silencing its screams forever. It gargles in misery as its internal organs evaporate. The pressure mounts, heating the gasses and scalding its brain before in a tremendous gushing of green blood it blows an eight-foot crater into the street. \n\nSuccess! \n\nThen your arm starts to burn. Long story short, the demon's weapon was tied to its soul, and so it evaporated along with the creature--but that demon steam is scalding your arm and it's getting all red and bloody and looking like it might fall off. \n\nSuc...cess? \n\nHospital time! Plus you don’t really want to be around when the cops show up and find your neighbors unconscious in the street surrounding a hole big enough to bury you in. The hospital is only a couple blocks from your house, so you sprint like a motherfucker whose arm might possess him at any moment. \n\nYou collapse into the emergency room, and the medical staff on duty looks after you kindly. Although you don’t quite believe it yourself, they find your story more interesting than most of the other prank-induced injuries that have come in today. Resting on this accomplishment, you sleep peacefully. The nurse finds you in this tranquil slumber and decides not to disturb you by giving you your tetanus shot. \n\nInundated with other prank-related punctures, she forgets to ever give it to you. Compounding the problem, you develop lockjaw, and can’t politely remind her to save your life. As such, you are simply the nicest and least problematic patient they can remember ever having, and ten days later the nurse walks in to find that amidst your muscle spasms you’ve turned to [[page 47]]. \n

“What? You’re with the what? I didn’t hear, I swear to god I didn’t hear what you just said, I can’t hear things that are gonna get me killed. Really. It's... genetic.”\n\nLuigi stands, grabbing the edge of the desk. You can smell the coffee on his breath as his lips separate in growing contempt for your audacity. His features darken, storm around his face and pelt you with disgust. Your gaze falls, and he pulls his arm back to smack you. His spread knuckles soar toward your face, but you’re too afraid to flinch. His hand stops short, and when you finally look into his face, Luigi is grinning. “Impressive. You innately talk yourself out of a tight spot—and if that doesn’t work, you’re willing to take a hit as punishment. Would you care to join our enterprise?” \n\n“Yes don’t kill me.”\n\n“You have absolutely no reason to worry about that anymore." \n\nTony pipes in, "From us, anyway." \n\n"Oh. Good." \n\nLuigi smiles. "Welcome to the Mafauxia. You're part of the fauxmily now." \n\n"I didn't realize the French loved puns so much." \n\nHe scowls. "We're not French--we're Italian." \n\n"Right. Pastaciolli's, yep, Italian, don't know what I meant. Fuck a baguette, amiright?" \n\n"Hey, you're okay after all. But it's time we get down to business." Luigi opens a lower drawer in his desk and pulls out two small baggies. "These are two of our finest products. Go ahead, try whichever you like." \n\nYou investigate the contents. One bag contains small, yellowish crystals; the other, fine powder. You've never done a drug harder than 'Tussin in your life, but declining is probably not a good idea. So, you reach into the... \n\n[[bag on the left and pull out a crystal,]] or\n\n[[bag on the right and scoop out some powder.]] \n

You whimper as you duck for cover, but thankfully, no one hears you over the swarm of marauding hellspawn that has infested your block. You hide behind your maple tree, then move to a parked car twenty feet away. The air is filled with shrieks, yaps, and laughs of disconcerting pleasure. You also notice the sound of more jingling car keys than you would expect from a demon horde. You slowly raise your head to look through the Gremlin’s windows to watch as the demons poke and prod at the woman and her poodle, though in a rather friendly way for a bunch of damned souls. It’s also quite a coincidence that these suburban devils are calling each other by the same last names your neighbors have and their faces wobble and are made of rubber. It all seems a little peculiar until it dawns on you that these aren’t demons at all. These are probably your neighbors, and--stay with me now--they’ve simply dressed up as demons and planned a prank to ravage the neighborhood. \n\nWithout you. \n\nYou’ll be damned if these devils are gonna steal your glory. You quickly devise a plan to fight damnation with salvation, grab your super-charged hand buzzer, and leap from behind the Gremlin. \n\n “Hey, you filthy beasts from the darkest depths of Hell,” you shout with more confidence and self-righteousness than you’ve felt since being potty-trained, “I’ve come with a message!” They chuckle and close in on wimpy little you. Your right arm rockets into the air, fist clenched around your hand buzzer, and while your arm tremors violently, you cry, “I am filled with the power of God! I am the Light! Prepare for smite-ation!”\n\n You pull the pins on two seltzer grenades and throw them in opposite directions at the enclosing now-not-so-scary demons. The sixteen individual streams of seltzer water find their ways to eleven different devils, and eight of those streams rock your neighbors in their crotches. However, you’re in the heat of battle, and there’s no time to laugh. You’ve already hurled one boomer-pan at an oncoming behemoth and you’re filling the next one. You've knocked down most of the monsters within twenty feet and you’re picking off the rest with laser-accurate pies. You’ve found a rhythm, throwing one pie just as the other dish of creamy retribution comes sailing back to you for a refill--but some of the demons felled by your first assault are getting back up. From behind you comes the vengeful roar of a guy in a costume, and you turn to see a demon charging you with a pretty real-looking blade pointed straight at your heart. You duck from out of harm’s way, then lunge up and smash your buzzer-laden hand into your assailant’s nose. Big and green, the schnozz wiggles and bleeds excessively. The demon’s head and torso convulse as he falls to the ground squealing. \n\n You scan the mob to size up what you're still facing. Although you’ve already given many of these demons a solid pranking, there are almost a dozen still-unpranked goons. Time for the big guns. You catch your most recently retributive boomer-pan and stuff it back into your belt’s holder. You then take the two auto cream-fillers at your sides and pivot them from their downward pan-filling position to a 45o angle to your rear. You flip the levers and let fly two blasts of demon-downing dairy to cover your back. A cluster of hellspawn charges you from thirty feet, so you pull some vials of fake blood and toss them in a high arc at the center of your oncoming attackers. They easily dodge by spreading out--perfect! You flip your cream levers again for suppressive fire, then in one fluid motion, you take a grenade from you belt, pull the pin, and hurl it into the gap. The grenade goes off, blasting all six devilish crotches, and you turn to see your cream dispensers have decimated everyone. \n\nExcept one. This one whip-wielding son of a bitch stares you down. You meet his glare and prepare for battle.\n\n He cracks his whip once, and you realize that one of your neighbors is holding a hell of a grudge, because that's definitely a real whip. He’s also got a hell of a costume: the demon is about five feet tall, round as a beach ball, and entirely covered in slimy puce skin. He’s got two toes per foot, three fingers per hand, and fourteen prehensile foot-long tentacles per mouth. Fortunately, he only has one mouth, but unfortunately, it’s oozing opaquely blue slime and emitting a sound like maggots munching their way through your skull. The tentacles lick at its bulging eyes and you decide to end this stand off. You reach for a grenade, but of course you’re out. Come on, I’m not gonna let it be that easy for you. You slam down on the back of your dispensers so they twirl about and point square at the bastard, flip the switches, and a piddling amount of cream dribbles out the ends. You hate me for getting to decide you’re out of ranged weapons and consider calling time out, but decide that’s probably not in the Fight to the Death rulebook. He’s brandishing that whip like a pro, and you have to find a way past it to take him out. Neither option's very pretty. Do you\n\n[[Give ‘im Hell with your hand buzzer,]] or\n\n[[Shoot him in the chest with your HombreMurcielago grappling hook?]]\n

You don’t think your neighbors are sly or determined enough to plot an ambush, but come out of hiding warily anyway. As you make your not-at-all-nonchalant way to the newspaper, your eyes dart about, checking for movement in every neighboring tree, bush, parked car, and manhole cover. Nothing greets you but the swaying of branches, gleaning of glass, and manholing of manholes. Your paranoia peaks as you snatch up the paper and turn swiftly for your house. When you near the door, you hear scurrying from behind; you whip around with grenade in hand and nearly decimate a chipmunk. In your defense, it was a menacing scurry, but still you chortle at your jumpiness and tell yourself to calm down. You walk into the house having avoided an ambush that wasn’t there and without killing any bloodlusty wildlife: the mission is off to a good start. \n\nFor phase two, you pick up the phone. The Carazie Sheet’s distribution center is on speed dial, as waking up to a missed paper has been a common occurrence ever since you got this worthless paper carrier. You push the button with confidence and listen to the phone connect you with the start of a good day.\n\n “Hello Carazie Sheet, how may I help you today?”\n\n “Hey, I’m not a crazy… oh, sorry. I'm calling in a missed paper at 2024 Marilyn Blvd.”\n\n “I’m sorry for any inconvenience, we’ll have a copy to you within the hour.”\n\n Smirking you reply, “Oh, it’s no inconvenience at all. Have a nice day.”\n\n “You too, sir/madam.”\n\n Grinning broadly, you hang up the phone. Your excitement makes you restless, but your knees beg you to give them some reprieve before you go back into hiding. You decide it’s best to grant them this wish, and while you sit it occurs to you that you don’t know where to hide anymore. Bushes are out; the paperboy knows he delivered a copy this morning, so good service won’t be obligatory now. You’ll have to hide closer to the street, but there isn’t anything big enough to conceal you. Looking for inspiration, your gaze falls upon the HombreMurcielago grappling hook. You don’t need to hide behind anything if you can put yourself somewhere unexpected. If you hurry, you’ll be able to scale the maple tree overhanging the sidewalk. From there, you can rain pranks and humiliation upon this paperboy. It will be glorious. \n\nBut not yet seeing a soul today is a bit unnerving. What if they're all hiding in THEIR bushes, and they'll see your belt and grappling hook? You'll lose the element of surprise! \n\nYou ignore the narrator's concerns, and just climb the damn tree. It’ll be worth the risk if you give the paper carrier what he deserves—and for his terrible service, he deserves quite a lot. You’re going to dash up the tree as stealthily as a loser with a bright orange belt can. You move toward the door, and after taking a couple deep breaths, you turn the handle.\n\nThe front door bursts open and you sprint to the maple. You pull the grappling hook from your prank belt, aim, and fire. A huge Mexican long-tongued bat takes flight. Its cable tongue licks the air, and knows to wrap itself securely around the first solid-tasting thing it encounters, which in this case is a stout lower branch. Still running, you double check the sturdiness of the bough with a couple tugs, then leap into the air to start your ascent with flourish. You soar momentarily, then dangle with flourishousness once you find that you aren’t strong enough to pull yourself up. Wuss. \n\nThankfully, the grappling hook’s line retracts on its own and you find yourself safely up the tree moments later. You take stock of your surroundings. The branch supports you, and you’re high enough up that the paper carrier won’t see you perched and waiting until your wrath is already en route to his head. You check again for any activity from your neighbors, but there still isn’t any movement. The branch is actually surprisingly comfortable, and you’ll be able to easily lob your retribution without falling. \n\nA short time passes, and you begin to wonder what prank you should unleash first on the poor bastard’s noggin. The only choices I give you are a perfectly proportioned pie or the splash of shame from a seltzer water grenade. The paper carrier rounds the corner. So, \n\n[[Flip the lever and give him the pie,]] or\n\n[[Pull the pin and give him the grenade?]]\n

It’s much safer to jump into the bushes, get a good look at your possibly booby-trapped neighborhood, and await your prey, you pansy. Your bushes are short, so you crouch behind them, but they’re thick enough that you won’t be seen from the street. Short and thick… you have something in common. Good choice. You pansy. You scan your neighbors’ yards for anything out of place, from especially still bushes to especially rustle-y bushes to anything from simple tripwires to shovels that could have been used for placing landmines. You don’t notice anything unusual, but I noticed that you didn’t check for cannon embankments, armor plated trees, or gaps in the space/time continuum indicative of a being from another dimension’s passage through a portal that warps physical law as we know it. Just sayin’. Your legs begin to hate you as much as your mother does, and you’re having trouble distracting yourself from the pain of crouching. You look around for anything to keep your mind off your knees and their screams, and that’s when you notice at the foot of your walkway a copy of you town’s newspaper, the Carazie Sheet. If you call the paper’s distribution center and tell them your paperboy didn’t deliver a paper, your first victim will drop off another copy within the hour. It’s a bit dishonest, but your knees are planning a coup, and pranking people isn’t about being nice. However, you’ll have to hide the paper from this morning. This will certainly expose your prank belt to the world, and may open you up to a bombardment if your neighbors are still in hiding because they have better knees or bigger bushes than you do. So now you must choose either\n\n[[A guaranteed mark with a chance of drawing some fire,]] or\n\n[[More knee pain.]] \n

Your life is an open book, and I get to write it. You wake up early on a Thursday morning—no wait, I should let you choose this one. So what’ll it be? You wake up on a \n\n[[Monday morning]]\n[[Tuesday morning]]\n[[Wednesday morning]]\n[[Thursday morning]]\n[[Friday morning]]\n[[Saturday morning]]\n[[Sunday morning]]\n

@import url(http://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Carter+One);\n\nbody {\nfont-size: 0.85em;\nfont-family: 'Carter One', cursive;}

Haha, gotcha! Didn't think you could keep skipping out forever, did you? \n\nTurn to [[page 47]], twat.

You finish, and the officers exchange glances. They tell you that they believe you, and although they will have to get your statement on record, they’re going to let you go. Even though it was the right thing to do, you’re still amazed that not only did telling the truth work, but you didn’t get the shit beat out of you nor are you riddled with bullets. Because of your success with honesty, you decide to start a career telling the truth. You travel the world giving truth seminars, telling people exactly how it is. You tell the truth, you tell people how to tell the truth, and you truthfully tell people that telling the truth is why you’re in front of them, telling the truth, and you become rich and famous doing it. Famous enough that plenty of wo/men come up to you and rather truthfully tell you how badly they want you. And you tell them quite truthfully that that is one perk of this career, and you oblige each other. \n\nAfter grosses of such encounters, you go home to your spouse and rather truthfully tell of your exploits. Your spouse, who has suspected you of such infidelity for years, finds your honesty refreshing, and goes to the kitchen for a very sharp knife. You discover the hard way that some people show their appreciation for the truth in stabby ways, and you turn to [[page 47]]. \n\nOr you can go [[here]] instead!\n

“H-hey, uh, sir/madam, are you ready to order?” \n\n“Yeah, sure…” You open the menu, and after fifteen seconds of blurred vision and uncomfortable silence, you tell Tony to surprise you. He looks at you cautiously, then walks to the kitchen. \n\n“Hey! Tony?”\n\nTony returns, approaching like a bomb technician. \n\n“I gotta ask—why do you always screw with my order? I order eggplant parmesan and get escargot. My side salads come back with French dressing instead of Italian. Why is that?”\n\nSweat pours into Tony's petrified eyes. Knees buckle, body quakes, vocal chords garble, “Oh god, please don’t kill me.”\n\n“Kill you? I’m just asking…”\n\nTony runs to the kitchen shouting, “Luigi! Luigi! We’ve been found out!”\n\nYou’re not sure what you’ve found out, except that maybe Tony is even more of a pansy than you. The guy who was watching you from the kitchen steps out and strides to your table, Tony trailing behind. It’s Luigi, dressed in a black pinstriped suit and a bangin’ skinny green tie, towering over you. His skin is surprisingly pale, though his hair is like pitch. From behind his mustache, a voice light and uneven: “Do we have a problem here, madam/sir?” \n\n“Oh no, I was just asking Tony about the service I’ve gotten here in the past.”\n\nHis brows peak in feigned surprise. “Oh? And was there something wrong with the services Tony has rendered you?\n\nYou grimace. Karma incarnate! Keep your resolve! “No, sir. His service is fine—but he brings the wrong food.”\n\nHis smile flatlines behind the mustache. “What wrong food does he serve you, exactly, madam/sir?”\n\n“Anything! Tacos, stir fry, sushi—but mostly French food.”\n\nLuigi laughs and pees his pants a little bit. “I suggest you come into my office for a moment.”\n\n“No, that’s all right, I think I’ll go—” \n\nLuigi grabs your wrist firmly, “I insist.” You pee your pants a little and agree. The other customers don’t pay any attention, and the cook looks away as you pass. Tony closes the door behind you, and directs you to a straight-backed chair that faces an enormous oak desk with a neat pile of paper, a pen, an exotic orange flower in a vase, and a bottle of champagne with two glasses. Luigi sits in the gorgeous leather armchair behind the desk and stares you down. “How’d you figure it out?” \n\nFlabbergasted, you wait for him to crack a smile. When he doesn’t, you look at Tony. He’s not smiling either. “I… don’t… know.” \n\nLuigi holds your gaze. “You’re lying.” \n\n“I am not?” \n\n“What gave it away?”\n\n“The food?” \n\n“It’s that clear to you what we’re doing here? That we aren’t as we seem?” \n\n“Uh, yeah. Of course. As glaring as my belt. Or that flower of yours.” \n\nTony’s shoulders sag and Luigi lets out a long sigh. “Yes, Pastaciolli’s is a front.” \n\nYou pee your pants even more. These guys are in the mob! And you know! And they know that you know, and you know that they know that you knowing is really bad for business, and you know what happens when something is bad for business. You decide to run, and your body tenses in anticipation for your break.\n\n“We’re French.”\n\nYour limbs go limp. “What?”\n\nLuigi looks down before replying. “We aren’t Italian. We’re full-blooded French Americans. I wanted to own and operate my own restaurant, but French restaurants aren’t very popular here in Illinois. So I decided to fake it, changed my name to Pastaciolli and opened an Italian restaurant instead.” He leans forward in his seat, his eyes begging. “I know, it was dishonest—I’ve never gotten over it. Dropping my heritage has eaten away at me, so I decided to introduce other dishes to customers. Don’t blame Tony—he never got your order wrong. We were just trying to get you to enjoy the heritage I had forsaken. I was hoping to change Pastaciolli’s into a multi-cultural restaurant, if not an entirely French restaurant, and when I looked at you, well, I thought you’d understand. I hoped you’d be the first one to accept the changes.”\n\nHis eyes are bleeding with pleading. His long frame tenses as he waits for your response. “Okay. Sure, it’s great.” Luigi stands, rushes around the desk, gives you a firm hug. His tears wet your shirt and you say with a smirk, “At least you’re not in the mob.” \n\nLuigi pulls away. He and Tony stare at you. Luigi smiles and is about to give you another hug when Tony says blankly, “We are with the mob.” \n\nYour jaw drops. Luigi says, “Dammit, Tony…"\n\n[[“…s/he didn’t know that.”]], or\n\n[[“…we didn’t have to kill her/him until you said that.”]]\n

Your next target awaits at Pastaciolli’s, only blocks from home. Every Friday night you order the eggplant parmesan, and though you’re not convinced that Pastaciolli is actually Luigi’s last name, you suspend your disbelief because the food is superb. Besides, what parents would name their child Luigi unless they were actually Italian--and what name could be more Italian than Pastaciolli? But this all misses the point. \n\nThe point is Tony. He hasn’t once gotten your order right. And I don’t mean he forgot to give you parmesan with your eggplant. He brought tacos. He claimed they were that day’s special. The shells were made of lasagna noodles. Uncooked. The following week, he brought the same thing and called it burritoroni. Since it’s Thursday, you’re not sure if he’ll be working, but you’re ready for an early lunch anyway. \n\nYou walk through the front door, and you’re seated by Tony. You smile and he smiles back. He gives you a menu and asks if you'll have anything to drink. You respond, "A tall glass of retribution, please." \n\nUnnerved, Tony says, "...we only have Pepsi products." You keep smiling as he walks away. \n\nYou don’t bother with the menu. There are only a couple other tables filled, and Tony is waiting on them all. You wonder if the poor bastards know what they’re in for with this kid, and then realize you’re being watched. Your seat faces the kitchen, and someone back there is keeping an eye on you. Why? You’re wearing a bright orange belt strapped with weapons. Your smug grin dissipates—you only came to give Tony a bit of what he deserved, and now you’ve drawn the attention of the establishment. Would they interfere if you messed with Tony? If Tony's working for the family business, the family might not take kindly to you humiliating their son/nephew/brother/cousin. Tony, shaking slightly, approaches your table. Do you\n \nContinue the mission and rough him up (forthcoming content?), or\n\n[[Back down and reassess the situation?]]

Turn to [[page 47]]. \n

You’re fucking heartless! He’s your neighbor, and you’re going to shoot him in the chest! Goddamn, that’s some cold shit. You pull the grappling hook from your belt, take aim, and fire like the merciless bastard you are. The artificial bat pings as it's released from its cave. It whistles through the air, and the demon stares in shock as a metal rodent imbeds in its chest. \n\n…fuck. I can’t believe I’m going to reward you for this. The monster howls and drops to its knees as thick green blood bursts from the wound. It rolls around in agony until the ground is slick with the foul juices of damnation. The splurting continues for several moments until a final groan twists through its tentacles and the creature flops onto its back, bat-induced wound to the heavens. \n\nA dead silence envelops your street, and your eyes start to quiver as a silvery substance replaces the green flow from the monster’s bulbous chest. You look on intently as the shimmering gas rises and takes the form of a human. Both eyes quiver as you realize the gaseous shape that nods in eternal thanks to you is Ms. Wilkins, the sweet old lady from down the block. Turns out, you slayed the evil beast that had been devouring the souls of your neighbors. After enjoying the taste and delicate texture of their spirits, it reanimated their bodies and used them as its servants. Today their job was to run around dressed as demons and ransack the town. This demon didn’t wasn't so good at "on the down low." Sadly, some of your neighbors have already been digested, but you rescured at least half of their souls from oblivion. They thank you wordlessly, then float upwards to spend eternity in peace. This is dandy for them, but unfortunately for you, their bodies now litter the street, and you’re the only one left to take the blame. Although you’ve done a very good deed today, you face a harsh punishment if you can’t either find a viable explanation for your 86 dead neighbors, hide the evidence, or run like hell. It’s up to you to decide, of course, so do you\n\n[[Start thinking feasible thoughts,]]\n\n[[Start thinking clean thoughts,]] or\n\n[[Start thinking fast thoughts?]]\n

They’re demons, you twit. They’re used to people screaming. \n\n[[Become one with all hell breaking loose,]] if you need help getting back there and choosing the appropriate response.

Face it, you’re not strong enough to move well over 10,000 pounds of dead neighbor meat in under an hour, and you’re not smart. At all. So you start running like mad. \n\nYou don’t get far. The Mexican long-tongued bat end of your grappling hook is still firmly planted in the demon carcass, and you’ve an iron grip. When you run far enough that the grappling hook is fully extended, you snap back and fall into the pool of green monster blood. You soon discover that it's remarkably corrosive to your body and soul. The line retracts, dragging your diminishing body through an agonizing acid bath. Within 15 seconds, your corpse is a mist spreading through the air, and your soul has evaporated. This would be a lesson in taking responsibility for your actions, but you’ve already turned to [[page 47]]. \n\n\n Actually, let’s keep going with this. The demon’s blood tore the chemical bonds that held your body together, and then bonded with them. These monstrous molecules are shockingly destructive when inhaled. If a single molecule finds its way into someone’s lungs, within moments it causes a distorted sense of time, a crippling drop in self-esteem, and a crushing sense of guilt. This stage of the horror devours every remotely happy memory the person ever had. Time stretches into infinity, and the person drowns in an ocean of irreversible melancholia. After days that feel like millennia, the victim’s lungs slowly rot away. The moment of death stretches on forever, and each victim falls into an inescapable Hell of immense torment. Without ever knowing your name, they blame you for the unimaginable agony that damns their souls. \n\nAlthough all of your neighbors are dead, and there’s not another living being for a few hundred feet, there is that sweet breeze of anticipation I mentioned on page 23. The breeze picks up, and is soon befouled by your freshly disintegrated and highly irresponsible corpse. As the average human body has trillions of cells, and the world’s population is just shy of 7 billion, your misty corpse has plenty of cells to personally obliterate all of the joy on the planet. The sweet breeze of anticipation becomes a creeping cloud of pestilence that shatters the world. Everybody turns to [[page 47]]. \n\n\nDon’t run next time, fucko.\n

You're about to Choose Your Own Death. \n\nYep, you're gonna die. "Welcome to the jungle," said Axel Prose. \n\nMmmkay, let's get going. Click on these words right.... here: [[Choose Your Own Death]] to get dyin'.

Turn to [[page 47]].

Feasible thoughts do not include semi-annual April Fool’s Day celebrations, demons, or creamy, wet, and dead neighbors. Nevertheless, I respect your desire to be an honest individual, even if it’s only because you’re too dumb to come up with anything good enough to save you. It’s honest, it’s good, and you’re going to be rewarded for it. You walk into your house, call the police to report a crime scene, and step back outside to await their arrival.\n\nThe first officers to arrive are so shocked by the carnage that even though everything is dead, they call for backup anyway. Five minutes pass, and the officers return their guns to their holsters and are ready to listen to your explanation. You start at the beginning, telling them about the hand buzzer debacle and how you came up with the idea of the prank belt in the first place. You explain that you’ve been faced with decisions all day, and eventually you were left with the choice of either shooting your grappling hook into the demon’s chest or letting it lick at your soul before it slurped you into oblivion. You admit that you weren’t actually certain that you were shooting your grappling hook at a soul-devouring devil, but you had a hunch, and hunches are respectable, and the police agree.\n\n You finish, and the officers exchange glances. As they cuff you, the arresting officer congratulates you on your prank. He says it must have taken months to come up with a story like that, let alone make all the bodies and blood. He tells you that he is really proud of you, and even though you didn’t plan any of this, his words fill you with warmth. Then he clubs you swiftly in the head. \n\nPolice brutality is against the law, but there’s a clause somewhere that says if you try to make a group of officers your bitches, they can beat you senseless. Well, they wrote it in later, but it’s there now. Anyway, the whole group of them moved in to beat the shit out of you, got a little carried away, and you turned to [[page 47]]. \n\nOr you don’t like this ending, so you [[click here instead!]]\n

Peter Axel Komistra

I’ll let you choose for real next time. \n\nFor the 1/7 of you that prefer Thursdays, disregard that. You're doing great! \n\nNow, onto the rest of your life: you wake up early on Thursday morning because crazy shit happens on Thursdays. This fits well into the basis of this story, which is about how you get to choose a page to turn to and I get to tell you that your life is more interesting than it really is. As it happens, it’s Thursday, April 1st, and you live in Caraziesheethoppinsondursdays, IL. In this aptly named town, there is a semi-annual April Fool’s Day event run by the local government, which is corrupt, but very good at bringing in tourists. People come from far around to see the world-class pranks, and some even get a kick out of having pranks played on them. But you’re not the kind of person that sits around and lets other people have fun while you read a story about other people having fun—no, you’re going to be right in the middle of it all. You’ve been planning for this day ever since that cute guy/girl said your hand buzzer was lame, and dammit, you’re gonna show them all who’s the boss now. Unfortunately, things are bound to go awry because you planned them, but more on that later. First, I need to know what the theme of your big prank is going to be, so choose it!\n\n[[A medley of good old-fashioned pranks.]]\n\n[[Nascar.]]\n\nPirates—turn to page Tharrrrrrrty (30, landlubber--forthcoming content!).\n\nYou like to live on the edge—turn to page 56 for pranks that border on copyright infringement (forthcoming content!).\n\nTom Cruise—turn to page 57 (forthcoming content! (I think? I don't remember WTF this was about)).\n\nMutant attack—turn to page 57 (forcoming content! (Oh, I think this is a joke about Tom Cruise being a mutant. Man, I made lame jokes seven years ago)).\n

You panic and realize you can’t even convince yourself that what just happened is what just happened, so you know that you won’t be able to explain to someone else what just happened. You're going to be best off trying to make it look like nothing happened at all, but you don’t think that’s going to happen, so you’re just going to try to make it look like this soul-sucking massacre isn’t your fault, because even though it’s not your fault, it looks like it’s your fault, and you have to make sure no one thinks it is your fault, because they will think it’s your fault and punish you excessively even though it’s not your fault. \n\nYou’ve chosen neither fight nor flight, and your body doesn’t know what to do. “Clean?” it screams, “You want me to fucking clean? Jesus Christ! I can’t clean up all these bodies! I want to run! Or punch something! Let me punch some puppies or something, don’t tell me to clean!” As such, your initial efforts consist only of rolling a couple bodies around aimlessly, and in the absence of any puppies, you improvise by punching some dead children in the mouth. You wail and trip over your cold neighbors, then roll around in the demon’s blood and lick pints of it off the ground in confused desperation. You stand up and viciously kick dead gaping-mouth Timmy in his small dead balls, then walk away, then come back and foot-pummel his testicles to dust before finally falling over exhausted. \n\n After a few minutes of dazed lolling, your mind and body start to synchronize again. They’re both still racing with adrenaline and anxiety, but they’re racing together, and you have a plan. You’ll have to work quickly, but with all the epinephrine in your veins, that shouldn’t be a problem. You pick up your first body without difficulty, reach into the pocket of its costume, and begin your work. You’re done by noon, and you’ve washed away all the cream and demon blood by 1:30. Then you walk into your house and sleep until the next day. \n\n A week later, as you’re being strapped down for your lethal injection, you start to question the perfection of your plan. It had seemed like a good idea at the time, but so had the Twinkie-wrapper-as-a-condom plan. Although both plans involved cream, the one that led to your state-sanctioned death hadn’t failed so much in its conception as it had in its execution. You had realized that you could neither bury nor burn all of your neighbors’ bodies because either would draw too much attention, plus there would be all that evidence right at your house. With the obvious solutions squashed, your brain panicked and raced through your original thought process, looking for life in a pile of dead fucking neighbor corpses. It latched onto the bit about all of the evidence being at your house, as that was the major concern, and then it ran around with that for a bit before coming up with an answer to that problem: put the bodies somewhere else. Brilliant, I know. But under the circumstances, it was a fucking epiphany, and you treated it as such. You decided to return all of your dead neighbors to their homes and tuck them safely into their beds so it might look like they had died in the night of natural causes. As the removal of their souls hadn’t left any marks, it actually sort of did look like maybe an entire neighborhood had died suddenly, but naturally, in its sleep and nothing else out of the ordinary had happened, so we should all forget about it and make sure that we believe that the only person still breathing is innocent. \n\nForget what I said before. Your plan failed in both its conception and its execution. It just failed much, much more in its execution, which funnily enough would lead to your execution. Ha! It had gone well enough at first, as the adults all had house keys in their demon costumes, making it easy to get inside their homes without breaking and entering, which would have been suspiciously unnatural. You’d put nearly a quarter of your neighbors inside the bedposts of their post-deathbeds before you discovered a kink in your plan. You were seconds from unlocking the Smiths’ door when you noticed a home security system mounted on the wall just inside. You cursed and searched through the Smiths’ costumes, but of course they weren’t carrying the deactivation number on them. You panicked again and dropped the Smiths, mumbling about coming back to them once you had a plan. \n\nYou redundantly faked the deaths of your other neighbors, and were left with seven families who hadn't purchased the demonic invasion package with their security systems. Oh, and a demon that was still dead, despite its long reign as Most Evilest Dude in Hell (After Satan). You sat to ponder, and then you got it. You really didn’t, but you followed through with your consistently terrible plan anyway, and when you were done, you sort of ironically laid down for a twenty-hour nap in your own bed.\n\nOn Friday morning, Jenn Schwarotz called her sister, but her sister was dead, so she didn’t answer. Jean didn’t know her sister was dead, though, and they had made lunch plans, so she decided to just show up at her sister’s house and assume everyone was alive. But we all know what happens when you assume: you find your entire extended family dead in their beds. Jean picked up the phone that her sister was too dead to answer and called the police, then sat down and began the grieving process. \n\nThe police arrived, and most of them went on their investigatory way. However, there are always those cops that stand outside and tell everyone to keep away from the crime scene, and of course those very cops were outside the Schwarotz residence. After a few minutes of keeping the crowds at bay, they noticed that there were no crowds to keep at bay. Actually, they realized, they hadn’t seen anyone on the block at all. No cars had gone by. Nobody was sending their kids off to school. Huh. Weird. They concluded, after much assumption, that everyone must still be sleeping.\n\nBut as the old saying goes, April assumptions bring dead people. As luck would have it, you went undiscovered for some time, because walking into houses of dead people just stops being interesting after a while. Most of the officers were pulled off of looking at dead people duty and put on looking for missing dead people duty, because they’d walked into such houses as the Smiths’ to find them not dead, but missing. It didn’t take them long to find the Smiths. It’s surprising how easy it is to find a dead family when they’re buried in their own backyard, with signs saying, “Died of natural causes,” and other signs shaped like fingers pointing at freshly dug graves saying “Don’t dig here, officer!” Although you did fool one officer with the sign that said, “Look, a pony!” you didn’t fool anyone into believing the demon with a Little Tykes hardhat and a shovel was the one that had buried the families. The sign that said, “Will bury dead families inconspicuously for food” was a nice touch, though. Unfortunately, the demon’s corpse had hardened to stone a few hours after its death, so it appeared even less guilty, since few statues have committed murder. Another unfortunate kink in your plan was you left the HombreMurcielago grappling hook imbedded in the demon’s chest, and it had your fingerprints on it. \n\nYou were discovered in your bed just before the last of the bodies was dug up. It was assumed that you were also dead, and though that means they should have found you dead, you were quite alive. It’s a break in the pattern, but you’ll be dead within a week, so it’s okay. You couldn’t even recall the previous day’s events when you woke up, so when you were fingerprinted, and shortly after that spat on, you didn’t really know what was going on, much less did you know that your life had just fallen into a whirling shitstorm of public fury. \n\n It wasn’t so bad until the evening news. Shortly after the police had taken you away that morning, the news networks caught wind of the story. Although the police don’t usually let the media view the bodies, the officer that had looked in the direction the “Look, a pony!” sign had indicated was a bit miffed at you, so he gave anyone with a camera a free pass into any house they desired. This meant that all across the nation that night people got to see little Timmy smiling toothlessly, lifelessly, and balllessly into the camera, followed by a picture of you smiling, all too toothfully, lifefully, and ballfully(if you have them). There was public outcry, and by Saturday, you were given a polygraph test. You failed it, since you were shitting out of your mind scared, and no one felt like accounting for that. After all, you were being accused of about 40 more murders than Ed Geen, John Wayne Gacy, and Jeffrey Dahmer combined, a point which the media liked to make every quarter hour. Pretty much everyone hated you, and though they still followed due process of the law, you never had a chance. It didn’t help when you admitted to keeping all the demon costumes in the hopes of selling them for profit at Halloween. The judge sentenced you to immediate death, because fuck you, psycho! Really, the judge said that. Actually, you would have been dead by Tuesday, but they had to expand the viewing room in the execution chamber because it couldn’t hold everyone that wanted to watch you die. \n\nFriday rolled around, and funnily enough, it was Good Friday, though nobody was accusing you of being Jesus-like. The J comparisons were more along the lines of “jizz stain on humanity," although a whole lot of people came to watch you die, so it was sort of the same, really. The prison charged $50 per person, and made enough money to construct a memorial in your infamy AND end world hunger (but they just made a second memorial instead). You were led to the execution chamber and strapped in. You looked up to see your family in the front row, all of them holding “Died of unnatural causes!” and “Inject there, executioner!” signs. You weren’t sure if your executioners were supposed to give you your last rites or anything, but if they were, they skipped that step. You also noticed that they skipped the step where they sterilize the needle, and the one where they don’t jab the syringe into your eyes, neck, and balls (if you have them). They also skipped the sodium thiopental to paralyze you, and just went straight for the potassium chloride to kill you. Upon injection, the crowd roared, and you realized Illinois doesn’t even have the death penalty as you turned to [[page 47]]. \n

Turn to [[page 47]].