So…I forgot about this project until last night where I wrote more of it and finished out the outline because I really want to finish it. The idea was that is was a weird post apocalyptic saga that starred my friends and I was writing it like I talk. So. Not eloquently. Like. At all. The new chapters are 4 and 5, but if you’d like to catch up, here is everything that has happened!

Chapter 1

My name is Ryan, I’m 50 years ahead in time of whenever you are right now, and shit has — Just. Gotten. Real.

I know, that’s confusing, and I don’t care. Listen, I don’t have a lot of time. Only like, the next few hours, and then all hell is gonna break loose. Before that happens I’m writing everything that has happened in this past year to me, my friends, and the race we still call human beings. That hasn’t changed. A bunch of stuff has changed, but we still get called that, so there’s at least one win for us. Chock that shit up to the score board, ass holes.

49 years from where you are right now is pretty much the same. It has cars that don’t fly and run on crude oil, it has solar panels that no one uses except for like 3 people and they’re always so uppity about it, and the President of the United States is a white dude and has been since that one time that other thing happened. Then it all went haywire. Because white people are the worst. In case it all goes badly I’m going to write down everything that’s happened as quickly as I can and then put this letter into the time capsule code named “Plot Device” that can very actually go back in time and warn everyone what this planet has become – which is full of ass holes.

See, it all started when this science lab where scientists were paid to do science did something other than science. They might of accidentally sort of started a chain of events that ended in all of the remaining animals on the earth to evolve into genetically enhanced versions of themselves that you could tame if you had the balls. After that, the rest of the animals (who were not already paired up with a human being) were killed off or went to the woods or something, point is they are gone. Now the only human beings and animals left on this earth have their friends and each other. Some notes that are important to the story and that I won’t explain because there isn’t time and also fuck you is that some of these animals can talk, and some can’t. The ones who can’t talk aren’t called dumb to their faces cause that’s just mean but…they are. Sometimes that matches up with the human riding them, sometimes it doesn’t. Whatever blah blah so on and so forth.

Other important things include that there are about 1000 people left alive on earth, the sun is getting hotter each and every day, Pangaea is a thing again so the land is just all mushed together, and there is an ongoing war between the two factions called The Colony and The Disciples Inside the Calamity Kingdoms. I didn’t choose those names, someone else did. Also there are The Outlaws who aren’t really a faction, they are just people who don’t give a shit and are on their own side. That’s where my friends and I come in.

We are the leaders of The Outlaws. Pretty sweet, right? Yeah, I know it totally is.

Are job is to fuck shit up. For everyone. All the time. No matter who is doing what, we fuck it up. We figure the sun will roast us alive, the seas will swallow us whole, or everyone will end up getting stabbed in the face – so we might as well have some fun before any of that happens.

Before I go on with all that has happened in the past year I have to tell you about my crew. I can’t just start using names and telling stories without you knowing some background on these people. First off there is no leader, there are alphas and betas but we all decide what to do together. We aren’t some group of douche bags with one biggest douche bag who thinks they know best. No one knows best. People who think they know best is what got this planet into the situation in the first place. Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, I’ll tell you bout my peeps.

There’s Abby and Mike who are married to each other. Abby, the cunning and the bold, rides Sepharoph (Seph for short) who is the king of the eagles. Mike, the logic and the balance, rides Jasper, the aging moose who is as wise as the amount of years he’s been alive grant him to be. Elliot, the wildcard, rides the Emperor Penguin Duo Koo and Stew who are strapped to his feet and make ice with their belly’s so he can slide around everywhere. Koo and Stew and stronger than most penguins and don’t like each other or change or learn lessons. There’s also Pat, who is on a brown bear that hasn’t changed at all.

Stephanie and JR are here too, they are engaged to be married on a mountain. Steph, the no bullshit go-getter and JR the deceptively kind ninja scientist ride on an albino Jaguar named Bertram and an Elephant the size of a house named Flounder, respectively. Marc, the hungry and bearded, rides a Rhino named Carl with steel for a horn that Marc forged himself in an erupting volcano. As for me, I’m on my trusty flying polar bear named Ralph who shoots acid out of every hole he has in his body. (that includes his butt)

Adam is on an iguana. GBaby is on an Emu. Kate walks. Also there are others who I will get too later as their story wouldn’t make sense yet.

So all of us are in the outpost like a year ago and then some shit got to shakin’, and I mean shaking bad. The earth basically had a fuckin’ heart attacked and changed all of its shit up. The Chancellor, the dick head leader of The Disciples, built a gravity device that brought all of the continents together again because, and I’m quoting Mr. Chancellor here, “Who needs friends when you made the continents friends once more.” Sad as shit, I know.

As all of this is going on my friends and I are all sitting around, probably intoxicated, and being all like, “woah what’s going on?” Then we found out everyone was going nuts and dying and we said to ourselves, “let’s ride our animal friends into the night and see what’s to do.” So we all jumped aboard our animal friends except for Kate because she walks and went to the biggest building we could find immediately which was a liquor store that was made to look like the Lincoln Memorial. Inside we see the guy standing behind the register who is set atop a big fucking lion.

“Whatchu doin’ fools?” said the guy with the big fucking lion. Then we proceeded to explain to him what was happening outside and he was like “we should drink” to which we were all like “yeah that makes sense.” So we all start getting fucking wasted and next thing you know we sleep through the next few weeks and wake up, only to go outside and see a barren wasteland with nothing left standing as far as the human eyes can see. Seph, Abigail’s eagle friend, flew into the sky and told us that she could see something so we all hopped aboard our animals and headed off once more.

Except Kate. She got stabbed by that Lion.

CHAPTER 2

So, to get us back on track after that jubilant stabbing, we moved away from the giant liquor store that looks strikingly like the Lincoln Memorial and everyone is having a grand ole time watching Elliot ride around on his penguins who are using rusted out cars and broken sidewalks as their own personal half pipes.

“Be careful!” I yelled ahead to Elliot, Koo, and Stew, “The sun is hot today and all the ice your penguins are making will turn to puddles!” I yelled again.

Elliot said, “I don’t care about puddles, I live in puddles, I am a puddle, no one owns me!!!” Then he fell down. It was hilarious.

Abby, from far above everyone on her eagle king except me cause my polar bear Ralph can fly, called out that we were coming up on a building. GBaby sped up on his Emu and it started a race of epic proportions. Adam was in last cause his iguana didn’t give a shit, Kate was still dead, Elliot slipped, Abby and I flew, and Marc and Mike trampled on their rhino and moose respectively. Pat was on a bear. Steph and JR had time to perform a transcendent interpretive dance to the classic “My Heart will Go On” and still managed to beat everyone there on their mighty JagEphant duo.

Once we all reached the building, except Adam who was way back screaming obscenities at his iguana and Kate who was dead, we realized it was a giant yellow fortress, like if a castle was thrown up on by the yellow brick road. The gates opened immediately and we were met by a beautiful man on a metallic demon horse. The man had baller ass armor on and lifted his visor to show that it was in fact Dylan, who we totally knew from back in the day when the world wasn’t shit.

Dylan was all like, “Welcome to The Colony where the bitches flow like wine and the wine flows like blood.” Everyone thought that was weird. All 20 of the peasants came out from their homes to pet GBaby’s Emu. The rest of us, including Adam now who was now whipping his iguana with Twizzlers, went into the main gates and down a long hall way filled with empty dip and dots carts that lead to a big fucking door. The door opened and inside was a bright white room that had a bunch of chairs and a table in the middle of it. At that table there were no chairs, just 4 people sitting on their genetically mutated animals talking about whatever.

Among them were Jess and Jo whom rode Lelu and Lela the conjoined and hyper smell sensitive pandas as well as Allie “The Knife” Rivera who rode a robot crocodile with machetes for arms and Cain Xavier who has an awesome name and is cute until she and Allie stab you in the face and rides an orange bobcat with machetes for teeth. They were all like, “whatchu peeps doing all up in the Colony?”

So we told them this was the only place left and they were like yeah we know and Dylan was all like, you guys want wine? And I was like, totally.

Then we all sat down to talk and we found out Dylan was the head of security for The Colony and the council of 5 run that shit like it’s their job cause it for serious is. They were in an all-out war with The Chancellor of The Disciples and needed help from us, The Outlaws. To which we were all like, “stahp, what?”

They told us that anyone who isn’t factioned with The Colony or the Disciples were considered Outlaws and that we needed to choose a side.

Firstly I said, “I don’t even know what the other side is! I didn’t even know we were in a war, how can I pick a side if I don’t know anything about what’s going on?”

Then Abby said, “And furthermore why is there a war in the first place?”

Then Jasper the wise old Moose said, “Is this fighting really necessary?” To which Mike high fived him cause he made a good point. Steph sorta cringed on top of her Jaguar cause moose freak her out, especially moose who can talk.

Then GBaby said, “I’m on an Emu.” Everyone agreed. Also during this Elliot was just using the walls to penguin board, Pat was playing checkers with his bear, Marc was destroying columns with his Rhino, Adam was teaching his Iguana to love, and Kate was still very very dead.

Jess and Jo then said something in unison which was weird, “You guys should all join us and we can take down The Chancellor together” to which Allie and Cain were all like, “yeah that makes a lot of sense, The Chancellor is a douche nozzle and is trying to eradicate everyone’s existence including his own while he rides his giant squid and constantly playing “The River of Dreams” by Billy Joel on a boom box he holds to the sky in defiance of all things sacred.”

“I like that song” said Adam. Almost everyone agreed except for GBaby’s Emu. That Emu is a real prick, but he’s good at being an Emu, so I respect him.

Jess and Jo said (still together like those girls in The Shining, and still weird) “You peeps gotta join us or were not gonna be friends, straight up, dawg.” Cain and Allie sorta agreed. Apparently since the fall of man The Colony changed their main language from English to Ebonics. A bold move on all accounts.

Marc said, “Yall Panda ridin’ pucky poppers threatening us?” His Rhino sneered with delight from the thought of fighting some hooligans. Then Allie pulled a knife, like she pretty much always does.

Pat’s bear didn’t say anything because he was a bear and was busy getting the shit kicked out of him by Pat in checkers. Pat was getting better at checkers every day. The Bear was not. Cause he’s a bear.

Elliot painted the wall with puddles. “Puddle power!” He screamed.

Allie and Cain were waving around sharp objects and Cain was all like, “Dudes you gotta join up, if you’re not with us you’re against us. We’re trying to take down pure evil and see no reason why you can’t see that for yourselves. Everything we do is to try and save this world from pure destruction. The Chancellor will be truly happy to see this world be eaten up by itself!”

Then Cain followed that up with, “And to see the people devour one another before the sun explodes, ending us all including him and his squid. All he wants is to be the last one dying. Standing by himself on this earth until his Squid ingests him for nourishment, dawgs. Is that what you people want?”

“You people?!” Screamed Steph from her now translucent Jaguar that changes colors based on what Stephanie’s mood is.

“I’m offended I guess? I don’t know. Do you guys have any milk shakes around or maybe a pack of dogs for Flounder the giant elephant and I to frolic with?” asked JR with a perfectly reasonable question.

“No, sorry, we don’t.” Dylan pouted, as he was super sad about this too. Everyone was disappointed by this seemingly arbitrary news.

So we got outta there fast. While leaving, Dylan brought us out on his jacked up metallic horse with hoofs as strong as plastic packaging electronics come in and said unto us, “I’ll give you bros a day to get away, but then we gotta come after you, yo. The peeps are all pissed. So it goes, ya know, daddio?”

No one understood Dylan’s jacked up jive turkey Ebonics so we just left in a hurry. And that’s what it is.

CHAPTER 3

We didn’t eat or drink anything while we were at the castle and the world was a barren wasteland. So we all cooked Kate’s stabbed body outside the castle and made coats from her skin, which totally helped us out. Everyone was psyched minus GBaby and his Emu but they were skin hungry and asked to eat all the skin themselves and we were like, no we need coats, so we didn’t care that they were sad. Marc called dibs on the torso. Everyone obliged.

Ralph, my flying polar bear that spits acid out of its butt and mouth and sometimes ears and nose took off along with Seph and Abigail, leaving everyone else on the ground. For the record, at some point in this story everyone starts flying as all the animals have the ability to fly but they must become in tune with their master in order to do so. Ralph and I were tight, so he could fly already. Seph and Abby were like two peas in a pod who could tear apart antelopes, so they were good too. Marc and his Rhino “Carl” were close but they were always fighting about who has the better beard/horn so they just weren’t there yet.

So we all were heading towards The Disciples layer to see what’s what cause we figure we need to see this evil guy for ourselves if we are gonna choose a side although the thought of choosing a side other than our own left a bad taste in everyone’s mouth. Abby and I spotted a pack of other people at a camp from afar in the middle of the barren wasteland with tents set up and fires going somehow.

We both went down to hovering above the ground and then told everyone to speed up. Adam could not keep up so we left him and his regular iguana there. When we got to the camp site it was empty and the fire that was just lit was now doused. As we entered the center of the encampment, several human beings came out from behind the tents and surrounded us. From the crowd of maybe 20 human beings, all riding some sort of medium sized mammal, 3 mid-20’s gentleman came forward who were the leaders of the group we would come to know as The Range Riders. Their names were Collin, who was riding a Silverback Gorilla with laser eyes, Mitch who was chillin’ in the pouch of a giant kangaroo, and The Steve was riding a brilliant red bull named China Shop. I walked up to Collin cause it turns out we knew these guys, especially Collin because he’s my younger brother and his longtime friends Mitch and The Steve were now leading The Range Riders who live off the land and have no faction, like us. Also they set fire to most things.

Collin said, “Hey, what are you guys doing?”

I replied “We’re heading towards The Disciples layer to see what’s what.”

Elliot said, “We heard The Chancellor is a real dick.”

“Yeah,” said Mike “We want to see it for ourselves.”

“I’m on an Emu!” exclaimed GBaby. Everyone ignored him except Pat who gave him his patented stern nod of acceptance.

“Well,” said The Steve “I wouldn’t do that if I were you guys. It’s a total poop shoot.”

“Why not, also hi. I’m JR. It’s very nice to meet all of you. I really like your Gorilla, he looks top notch.” said JR, the ninja scientist. His giant Elephant Flounder high-fived him with his trunk.

“That shit sucks over there” said Mitch “Ole Chancy Chancellor is a real dick. His cult and him do weird shit all the time like move the continents back together. It’s a real drag. ZING.”

“That all sounds stupid.” Said Marc while poking his Rhino in the face to make sure Carl the Rhino knew what was what. Carl did not approve.

“Stop poking Carl, Marc. He’s going to retaliate.” Abby said making a solid point.

“He knows the rules,” Marc said “I’m the king of this here domain.”

“Alright then, just wait for him to impale you I guess.” Abby said while teaching her eagle about the importance of hydrogen bonds.

“My roots are growing out!” Steph yelled out of nowhere, “which makes me look like I’m not even trying.” Steph said even louder while looking at her hair through a mirror that she made out of crushed limestone while riding full speed on her translucent jaguar on the way to this moment like a true boss.

“Does that really matter right now, ladyface? We’re over here trying to save what’s left of this weird world.” Asked Michael.

Steph replied, “Uhhh yeah it does Mike, I’m over here lookin’ fierce, and it’s the main reason we’re constantly doing so well, so, like, whatever shut up.”

“Yeah,” Collin said “Just maybe never go over there bros. Nothing good can come from going over there and messing with that crazy dude.”

“This guy seems like a real ass hole” I said. “Someone should sick a large animal on him to eat him while he is still living.” Everyone concurred. “What do you guys say? You wanna go fuck some shit up for the sake of fucking some shit up?” Everyone cheered except for Adam because him and his iguana had just gotten there in time for us to start walking again.

“This is bull shit guys” Adam said while wearing shorts all the time.

“Hey Adam,” Elliot piped up for the first time in a while cause I forgot he was here for a second, “When you gonna finally teach that iguana to be at all useful?”

“When you don’t cry at the end of Toy Story 3, dick.” Adam said with malice, punching at the sky in heat.

“Shut up ya good gosh darn fuckface!” Elliot boisterously threw his words like anchors into the sea, “It’s a sad story about love and loss. WHATEVER DON’T EVEN. SHUT IT WITH THE YA KNOW. I CAN’T EVEN RIGHT NOW.”

“BUT CAN YOU EVEN?” Steph cheered.

“NO. I CAN’T EVEN. THAT’S THE POINT OF TALKING IN CAPS LOCK.” Elliot took a breath and calmed down. Koo and Stew, his penguins who were underneath/attached to his feet looked up at Elliot like he was a crazy person which is an unsubstantiated fact maybe.

“You guys should go before the sky turns off the light.” Collin said.

“That was a weird thing to say,” I replied “But you’re right. Let’s head out.”

“I’m still on this Emu!” GBaby once again said out loud for some reason. No one cared still and we all moved on. But GBaby didn’t care cause he lives his life like nobody is watching except for his Emu who is always there so it’s a pretty straight forward system for living that he is comfortable within and he doesn’t have to explain that to anyone, so he doesn’t. Then the Emu made a face like he was saying “whaaaaaaaat.” We all laughed and we went on our way.

CHAPTER 4

So we kept on trekkin’ towards The Disciples layer. Abby and I were up in the air scouting long into the night. At some point all the humans except for me fell asleep while the stars shined, both in the air and on the ground. The animals stayed the course and would ride through the night unless told otherwise.

Suddenly above me the sky got darker in only way area, which happened to be moving closer to me. It was about 500 feet away and way higher up than I was. Slowly it crept towards our pack, like the dark shape had nothing but time. Out of the clouds a giant mouth opened, and it became clear very quickly what it was.

At some point most sea life out evolved the sea and moved right past the land and into the sky. This gave the riders who put time in under the sea a special leg up on the competition who now had animals that could traverse all the ground and air you put beneath them.

As the clouds were pushed out of the way a giant white whale, at least the size of 8 VW buses and the weight of 72 trucks full of GoGurt shipments, broke through with its mouth open wide, trying to catch SkyCrill. On its back was a terrible teenage girl who talked vaguely on the internet back in the day, but now that there was no internet she just trolled the skies looking for people to annoy. She was known as the MobyDonk. I peeked around the specimen who paid no attention to me to check on the rider. She was asleep. Thank goodness. If she was awake she would have made her white whale do all sorts of things whales do to us, which no one knows what that is, it’s a mystery that very literally no one knows the answers too. Hence the word mystery.

When the burning sun came over the horizon The Layer became clear. Unlike The Colony, The Layer was not a castle but instead a series of underground tubes used like mazes that all feed back into the sea so that The Chancellor could take a swim whenever his giant squid felt like it.

As we approached the series of tubes we stopped short as a large fire bolt shot up from the horizon. Everyone woke up in an instant while Abigail and I flew downwards to meet them and consult in their endless wisdom. In the distance a swarm of killer bees the size of couches flew upwards in a helix shape – all of them surrounding the biggest god damn squid I had ever seen, black as the night, and with The Chancellor on his back. I could almost recognize the man riding the squid but it was too far away. Marc spoke up behind me.

“Huh. Well. That looks. Awful. I don’t think we can beat all of those dick bag bees.” Marc said.

“I concur.” Said Mike, “That seems like more bees than zero, so, I concur.”

“Well poo.” Eeked Steph on the ground “That sucks nuts.”

“Yeah, but whatever” Elliot said, petting his penguins who were finally getting some much needed rest, “Maybe we just go off and keep doing our own thing like we’ve been doing? I’m sure if we stay out of everyone’s way they will just leave us alone and we’ll be fine.”

I squinted harder to try and figure out where I knew The Chancellor from right as the killer bees shot towards the ground, eating the dirt and quickly making a whole new tube – out from which came another fire bolt that shot miles and miles to our left, scorching the earth as it went.

“I feel like this is Elliot’s fault.” GBaby said. His emu started break dancing in agreement.

“Well, it’s pretty clear” JR said, “We are going to need more people to help defeat this dude or we do nothing. Which one are we all feeling? Maybe we should vote?”

“Voting’s for nerds!” shouted Marc.

“You’re a nerd!” Steph said.

“Okay! We’re all nerds!” screamed Abigail, “But we still need to vote. All those in favor of doing nothing and just sorta chillin’ like villains?”

GBaby raised his hand, as does Elliot.

“All those in favor.” I said. Everyone else raises their hand.

“Well fuck us I guess.” GBaby said.

“True.” I said.

“Alright, well I think we should split up to cover more ground.” Pat said while punching his bear in the stomach because that’s how you have to scratch a bear when it has an itch.

“Pat is a dick and also he’s right.” I said.

“BUDDY SYSTEM!” JR said while slinking up next to me and Ralph while Adam finally arrived on his very tired iguana.

“Really JR? You’re gonna ditch me?” Steph said as her jaguar turned red.

“We’ll be together soon, and I want this god damn elephant to fly, sorry Flounder for talking about you like you’re not here, but, I figure if one of us starts to fly around we’ll both be better off and the best way to do that is to pair with a flying creature like Ralph to learn it’s ways.” JR smiled real big and gave a thumbs up. Steph was like, “You’re such a nerd.”

Adam spoke through his teeth, “I call Ryan or Abby, someone who can fly. I can’t do this anymore. I’m at my wits end. I just want to die. Please, be considerate, and have me go with someone who can fly!”

“Okay cool, Adam, you go with Pat and his regular bear.” I said. Pat and the bear bumped fists in triumph.

“Yeah, and JR can go with me that’s fine.” I said, “And Steph you go with Mike and Jasper the aging Moose.

“What!? You gotta be shitting me you dingus. You KNOW I’m deathly afraid of moose why in the balls would I ever do this?” Steph was shouting and hitting her Jaguars head every time she made a point while the Jaguar nuzzled the ground unaffected.

“This is a perfect time to face your fears, Steph. Maybe it’s the last thing you need to do to make Bert the Jaguar who sleeps through you hitting him fly his ass off? Ever think of that?” JR grinned, walking the thin line, cause he was still in trouble for ditching fo sho.

“Fine. I’ll do it. But not because you told me to or you asked me too but because I am an independent woman and I’ll fuckin flip this moose a gosh darn new one if it gets close to me especially when I’m asleep that’s just gross.” Steph pursed her lips and crossed her arms in protest.

“Cool” I said, “And Elliot you go with GBaby because you two are the best of friends.”

“That’s false.” Elliot was shaking his head and making a frown face.

“Yeah, we’re not huge fans of each other. I think he stinks like piss.” G said.

“Right, and I think G should live with his head up that Emu’s butt all the time.” Elliot said while the Emu scoffed at the idea but then gave it a little bit of thought which was slightly concerning from G’s perspective.

“Okay perfect I’m glad we’re all in agreement” I said. “Now, Adam and Pat, you go back to see Mitch, CollBollPoliWOG, Steve, and the Range Riders and tell them we need them to come help with a bunch of killer bees…you know what, maybe leave out the bees. Tell them there’s gonna be pizza.”

“Got it.” Said Pat. The bear and the iguana looked at each other like this might as well happen as the Iguana climbed on the bears back with Adam still on it.

“Fuck yeah” said Adam, “this is next best thing!” The bear bucked up and threw Adam off of it. “OH COME ON!”

“Good, now” Abby said, “Marc and I will go to the forest to talk with those dirty dirty forest people –  perhaps Carl can get on board and start flying as well. Carl’s horn turned bright red in delight at the thought of fuckin’ flying through the sky. Marc’s beard also turned red with excitement – the heat from both warmed everyone up instantly which was also a nice thing.

“We’ll go around and to the sea I guess? It seems like the closest and easiest so I choose that ya dumb dicks.” Said Elliot while GBaby agreed.

“Good, you guys go guzzle sea men and Steph and Mike you guys go to the Mountain and see if those weird alternative human and animal people will join up with us.” I said.

“Where we gonna go?” JR asked me.

“We’ll go back to The Colony and tell them we now understand what they were talking about and they don’t have to try and kill us anymore. When everyone is done, meet at The Colony and then we will march on the swarm” I said.

“That’s sounds pretty dope.” JR said.

“Yeah. It totally is. Dope.” I said.

And with that everyone dispersed in their own general directions.

“I just want to point out that I’m getting shafted harder than shaft gets shafted when he’s getting a hand job.” Adam said. No one was paying attention. But the iguana laughed and that’s all that mattered to Adam.

Another fire bolt flew up from the horizon and an evil laugh was heard permeating throughout the world. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I knew that bro on that squid but I would have to put that behind me for now. I had 5 psychopaths to convince to fight a war against super icky bees. Flounder the Elephant and Ralph made noises at each other as animals do. Little did I know that was the last time I would see one of my friends. OH SHIT CLIFFHANGER WHAT.

Chapter 5

“Do you get the feeling that they put us together because both of our animals can’t fly or speak like they’re dumb shits?” Adam asked as him and Patrick walked over the wasteland while the sun rose over the edge of the world.

“Probably. I don’t know” said Pat. His bear snuffed hard out of his nose.

“Talking to you has been like pulling teeth and we’ve only been walking for like 8 hours. For the love of shit say something more.”

“Say some interesting shit and maybe I will.” Pat stuck his tongue out at Adam as did his Bear.

“I’m going to impale you up your turd hole with a blunt hammer.” Adam said.

“See, now that would make for some interesting shit.” Pat said, smiling wide.

“This is balls.” Adam said.

About 500 yards away from the Range Riders encampment the bear and iguana started to pick up speed as Adam and Pat mushed them along, creating a dust cloud behind them. Out from the camp came Mitch in his Kangaroo pouch, CollBoll on his laser eye silver-back, and Steve on his RedBULL (not sponsored) along with all 20 of their friends – all riding towards Adam and Pat.

“Well shit, do you think they’re coming over here to tell us they are big fans of ours and that we are welcome to stay as long as we want?” Adam said.

As they gained ground Pat squinted and saw CollBOLL wielding a katana from atop his Gorilla. “No. I don’t think so. Battle stations!” Pat’s bear opened its mouth wide and picked up its pace with his fangs twinkling in the rising sun light while Adam’s iguana stayed as like, a regular old iguana.

“Pat! Don’t leave me behind! Pat?! Are you listening? You’re not listening. I’m gonna die. Great. I’m gonna die on top of a ding bat iguana who can’t even talk. That’s just great.” Adam mumbled through his teeth.

As they reached each other Pat’s bear stood on its hind legs while Pat stood on top of his bears head, making him tower over everyone. Mitch, PoliFOG, and The Steve sauntered on over to PatBear.

“Whatchu turkey’s want??” said Mitch.

“I’ll get straight to it,” Pat said, with Adam finally reaching them all on foot, his iguana far behind whom he totally sorta abandoned.

“We, The Outlaws as we are calling ourselves now not my idea I think that name is stupid for the record, rode over to see The Chancellor.”

“How’d that go?” Steve said. “I bet it went badly. Dumb ass.”

“It was fine except, well” Adam spoke up, “We saw all the killers bees and the fire balls and the whatnot and thought to ourselves, ya know what, maybe we might need some help killing all of these things to keep them from destroying the world ya know? So. That’s why we’re here. To ask ya’ll mother truckers to get all up in our grill and help the world out.”

Mitch, Steve, and Collin looked at each other and started to laugh, as did the rest of the rough riders behind them when the lackeys realized their leaders were laughing to make it look like they agreed but in all reality it was kinda windy and the lackey people had no idea what was going on.

“Listen, this doesn’t have to be complicated. Help us or we will all die.” Pat said.

“We’re gonna die anyway ya dumb ass,” Mitch said, “the sun is going to explode like, any second, and if that doesn’t happen then that giant squid will eat you when it chooses too. There is no chance to defeat that dick bag.”

“Also, there’s that whale.” Steve said.

“Right, the whale. Also the ghost.” Collin nodded.

“Yeah I don’t know about any whale or ghost or whatever. My point is if we don’t try what in the name of cheese curds is the point?” said Pat.

“The point is to live as long as we can and not go on a stupid suicide mission where 20 of us face hundreds of bees with teeth and those weird eyes and the stinger with fire in it, ya know, the god damn things of nightmares” said Mitchell.

“Okay, then let me make this clear.” Adam said now also standing atop his iguana’s head which is working less than what Pat was doing in fact it was sorta just squishing his iguana, “we are all going to die. So we are all going to fight. And that includes you douche nozzles. Now. Either come with us to help or I will straight fight you fuckers and you’ll die right here right now. Die now, die later. Pick one.”

“Come at me fluff nut.” Steve said while petting his Bull’s face.

Pat leaned into Adam, “I feel as though you just made this get real.”

“Yeah” Adam said.

“Your iguana is suffocating. Get off its head.” Pat whispered for no reason.

“Oh shit! Sorry dude. That was my bad.” Adam exclaimed and got to the ground to try and reshape his iguanas flattened head.

The iguanas eyes lit up as it shook it’s head and said, “No, that’s cool, I freakin’ love when people put their entire weight on my nose. It’s the best.”

“Holy shit you’re talking!” Adam screamed into eternity.

“Yeah, your courage did it? Maybe it was you being a dick to those guys? Like standing up for yourself in a weird maniacal way? That could be it. Honestly, I’m just glad I can tell you out loud to get the fuck off me cause I’m not even a fully grown lizard, there is no way you should be riding me. Like. At all. Also, for the record, my name is Todd. And I’m the best and only iguana there is. Look at my moves.” Todd shook his shoulders a bit. “It’s all in the shoulders nillas.”

“What does nillas mean?” Asked Pat.

“It’s like the N word for white people.” Yelled Todd.

“Oh. Well. Okay. Then make sure never to use a hard R or I will be straight pissed about it.” Pat said.

“Dually noted” Said Todd.

“Are we fighting or what?!” Collin was shouting over the crowd behind him and the bear in front of him with his katana still high up in the air. “My arm is getting tired, I want to rest this sword in someone’s eye socket.”

“Cease them!” Mitch said as the 20 troops behind them came around and took Adam and Todd away.

“Oh god damnit Adam! I just learned to talk and they are going to murder us, that’s just great.” Todd was so peeved while being dragged away across the dust and dirt.

“I’m not psyched about being tortured either you idiot. I wish you never started speaking. At least before I could ignore you and stand on your head.” Adam wiggled as much as he could to try and break free but the mongrels carrying him away were stronger than one person was so that math just didn’t add up. While the 20 dudes carried Adam away, Mitch Collin and The Steve looked back towards Pat who was now coming at them, claws out.

Collin swung his katana left and right as his Gorilla shot a laser from its right eye towards Pat who dodged it as he was now running in a circle around the 3 Ranger Riders. Collin tried to bring the katana down into the circle but narrowly missed Pat who was kicking the bear in the side and whispering sweet nothing’s in its ear about honey to make it go faster.

Mitch took his giant kangaroo pouch and pushed it forward, like he was holding the reins on a horse and entered the circle, giving chase to Patrick whose constant running was starting to kick up more and more dust, making it harder to see and breath. The dust hit the back of Steve’s throat making him flail wildly and accidentally hitting the top of ChinaShop’s head, sending him off in a frenzy toward the shack town where Adam was being carted off too while screaming obscenities in the distance.

ChinaShop ran faster than the rest of the Riders gang and ended up beating them to the shack town, gesticulating in a large way, quickly knocking down most of the houses and putting of the one fire they had which had taken them two months to start. With nowhere to hold a hostage now the Riders started to cry uncontrollably and dropped Adam/Todd to the ground. Steve and ChinaShop, tired from their escapade, fell to the floor and instantly started to nap like nothing was happening. Adam and Todd turned around and started to run back towards the fight.

Back behind them Mitch and Pat had caused such a dust storm that you couldn’t see inside of it from what once was the shanty town. Inside the dust storm the battle brewed as Mitch and his Roo got off track for one moment and ran straight out of the storm to see Adam and Todd running towards him. Adam was losing ground as Todd ran faster and faster.

“How are you running this fast?” Asked Adam while breathing heavily and with a twinge of anger on his breath, “Could you always run this fast? Have you been short changing me ya god damn dick?”

Todd’s tongue flopped out of his mouth and his eyes opened wide as his weird feet went quicker and quicker in front of him almost to the point of him tripping over his own new speed. “No! I swear. I’ve never been able to run this fast. In fact, I’ve never fought anything in my entire lizard life. This is exciting!”

Mitch and Roo locked in on Adam and Todd and stood ready to fend them off quickly, hopefully squishing Adam’s head in, and being done with them.

Adam was still losing ground to Todd who was now glowing from the tip of his tail to the front of his neck, making it look like his head was going to pop off at any second to reveal a fireworks show.

“What the crap is happening to you ya god damn lizard?” Adam started to fast walk while Todd kept going, “You got this man! I’ll be right there. I’ve been riding a lizard for a year and not running, this was such a poor choice, I did NOT plan this well.” Todd’s feet were getting bigger and bigger – at one point he vaulted up completely, going from a 4 legged creature to a 2 legged creature, his front legs retracting slightly to become arms. Adam scoffed at this change until he realized what was happening. Within 5 minutes he went from having an iguana that couldn’t talk or carry things or pretty much do anything to an exponentially growing and talking Todd lizard.

Inside the dust cloud the bear and the gorilla finally met in the middle. On top of them Collin was swinging towards the bears ears hoping to clip Pat in the forehead and end this shit. Underneath all of that though, Pat scrambled near the Gorilla’s feet, getting off within the dust storm so Collin couldn’t see.

Through the fighting the laser beam shooting gorilla didn’t notice Pat climbing up it’s back – getting closer and closer to Collin as he swung violently towards the bear, once hitting and scraping across the bears entire face, opening it up – only to close together once more as the bear screamed into the dust and went into overdrive, punching straight forward as hard as it could. The Gorilla from Manila started to fall back, losing its balance as Pat reached its apex and donkey punched Collin off his monkey.

The Gorilla fell to the ground in pain while the bear raised up in triumph as the dust cleared. When the Gorilla looked up towards the town a dumbfound look washed across his face and he got up on all fours as fast he could, picking up Collin in the process, and started running the other way.

“Yeah, you better run!” Pat said, high fiving his bear who apparently can regenerate instead of talk which was awesome for Pat because he didn’t wanna talk to his bear at all, he mostly just wanted to keep mumbling and having the bear understand what was going on. That was sorta perfect. Pat grinned from ear to ear, happy to have won that battle all by himself. He turned to make sure Mitch had been taken care of, but as he pivoted he was met with a leg. Just a giant, fuck off leg. Right in front of him. Green, and scaly, with sharp jackhammer looking nails coming out of its feet. As Pat looked up he saw Todd, the once iguana, now standing 3 stories tall and Adam on top of its head screaming as loud as he could with his arms spread like he was Leo on the Titanic.

“I’m the king of the world!” Adam screamed while shaking his head side to side in amazement. Todd had Roo and Mitch in his clutches and after he shook them like you shouldn’t a baby real quick he put them down, freshly dizzied. When he knew it was safe, Collin’s Gorilla stopped running and Steve woke up from his power nap. All of them slowly gathered around Todd’s feet and looked up at the towering Godzilla like lizard and the psychopath on its back punching the sky.

“Well” said Collin, “I know when I can’t win. And this is one of those times. Cause, ya know, giant lizard. So. Sure, we’re in. Wherever you wanna go, we’ll go.”

“TIGHT!” Adam’s guttural plea to the world rang out over the lands as Todd’s much more intense scream shook the land around them and further wrecked the shanty town.

“Plus” Steve added “You guys destroyed our home that took a really long time to make because you’re very inconsiderate. So. Sure. I’m in.”

“Yeah” Mitch said, “Whatever they said. Sounds solid. Let’s go fight a squid with evil in its heart.”

“Cool,” said Pat. “Very cool.”

“OH MY FLUB THIS IS NUTS!” Adam squee’d while hugging his giant lizard friend. “I don’t have to walk anymore!”

Todd reached around with his tiny and shitty arms and grabbed Adam by the shirt, putting him on the ground. “For that you have to walk eight miles.”

“Well….shit.” Adam said as they all started to walk towards The Colony and his shorts grew to pants, marking the end of his only short wearing era and the beginning of his rebirth.