Notice

I would like to apologize to those of you who are religiously refreshing this sight looking for more HvZ this week. It's not going to happen. Yesterday was an importantly family day and my final exam for my course is in the middle of the week, so I need to keep my focus there.

I will make it up to you, however. After the final I have no more class and will be able to put more attention towards my writing, particularly HvZ.

Expect shit to get crazy after Thursday.

Until then, kill eachother.

HvZ:P1c

Of course, despite Lucas' distaste for the lot, they bought a considerate amount of drugs from the hippies before passing them.

"Do hippies even do coke?" Jesse asked.

Scott laughed, "Dude, hippies will do anything. They smoke fucking banana peels for christ's sake."

Tony was seeing the car full of himself and his friends from a strange sort of third-person perspective. As if he wasn't actually there, but spectating somehow. The throbbing pain in his arm was gone. He wasn't particularly noticing any pain or discomfort, but when he slid his hand up under his sleeve, he felt the skin around the wound crumbling, falling onto the seat between he and Mark. This pulled him back into himself and flooded him with embarrassment, but as he glanced to Mark for his reaction, it seemed to go unnoticed.

"There's a concert in the park this weekend," Scott explained, "a shit-ton of bluegrass. Some folk shit too, probably."

"My favorite joke ever," Lucas interrupted, "is this: What did the hippie say when he quit smoking pot?"

They had all heard it before, Lucas told it frequently. It wasn't only his favorite joke, but clearly the sole joke he could remember.

"This music sucks!" They all said in unison. Except of course, Tony, who said something like 'mmrgghghhrhhgm'.

"Anyway," Scott continued, lowering an eyebrow at Lucas, "I think on Sunday we should crash the camping area and do a little cleanup. That many fucked up kids are bound to leave some shit laying around."

Jesse found himself curious about the 'festival'. He wouldn't admit it, not in this car, but he sort of wanted to attend. Not so much for the music, mostly for the drugs. And girls. Running around the woods with a thousand fucked up chicks was more his kind of weekend, but this camping trip was annual for these guys, and this was Jesse's first invite. He desperately wanted to be a part of this crew, and for his BB guns they were happy to have him.

Jesse's father, Isaac, was a marine. Jesse was raised in a strict, military household. He was taught to fire various guns at an extremely young age, and was one hell of a shot. His father now, however, was anything but a General. When Jesse's mother died a few years back, Isaac had hit rock bottom and tried to kill himself with a mountain of pills. Jesse found him too soon for the attempt to succeed. The day Isaac got out of the hospital he picked up a bottle of whiskey, and has not put it down since.

Last year, his father made another effort at ending his life when Jesse told him he would not be joining the military. Apparently this time he was victorious, in that he ended his heartbeat for nearly a minute. Unfortunately for him, they had rented a house next door to a gay couple, both EMT's. With Jesse's almost sixth sense for his father's lack of breath and the idol ambulance parked right next door, they once again thwarted Isaac's mission.

Jesse had collected many airsoft guns over the years, and sometimes he even participated in staged operations. They would dress in full camoflage, make teams, and stage various missions of search and destroy. The guns fired small pellets from their orange tipped barrels, which hurt like hell when they struck bare skin, but just enough to know you had been hit if you were wearing the proper gear. A torso shot knocked you out of the competition, but Jesse preferred a sniper role and often blasted the enemy right below the goggles. Once he even lodged a BB in some kid's cheek.

Lucas put a Gwar disc in the player to get the thought of peace and love out of his head. They all sang along at max volume, and even Tony's unique harmonizing seemed to fit. They smoked a huge joint in an attempt to flush the patchouli scent from their nostrils.

The ride ended at the start of a trail, and for the first time in hours, Tony felt something. Panic. The reality hit him that he was going to have to pry himself from the back of this car and walk a trail for over two miles.

They parked the car and everyone poured out, save Tony. He remained in his seat, searching for an excuse to get him out of this trek. As the other boys ran around the car removing backpacks, rifle bags and camping gear, they quietly discussed the possibility that they may have to carry Tony.

It was Mark who said, "Give him some of that blow, that will perk him up."

"Shit, we should all do a line." Lucas agreed.

Tony heard this, and with a never-ending passion for getting fucked up, motivated himself to slide out of the car. He found this extremely difficult, however.

First, his legs would work. He wasn't sure his arms were going to provide enough strength to pull himself out of the rear of the hatchback vehicle, but he did manage to gain some momentum and clumsily dove face first into the dirt outside. His legs still stretched into the car. His face had dirt ground into it, and blood was seeping from his nose, but Tony was oblivious to all of this. He rolled himself over, belly up, looked at Mark and said, "Grhddddd msssshhhppp." (Which translates, 'Cut that shit up.')

The four of them were laughing hysterically at Tony's mishap as Mark set out a small mirror on the hood. He never went anywhere without his mirror and a sheathed razor blade, though in actuality he might have done cocaine once or twice a year.

Jesse was the one to help Tony up. He had to balance him on his feet like a toddler. Instead of any consoling or sympathy, he simply asked, "What the fuck is wrong with you?", not expecting an answer.

Tony swayed on his feet, but did not fall down.

When five three-inch strips of powder sat on the mirror, Lucas handed Tony a rag.

"You might blow some of that blood out of that honker before you try and sniff this shit up. Man, you are a fucking disaster."

After blowing his nose in the rag, leaving it crusted with blood and snot, he shuffled himself to the front of the car and bent over the hood. He pulled an already-rolled bill out of his pocket and sucked up all five lines, then fell backwards hard onto the ground.

"Holy shit dude!" Most of them said.

Again Jesse helped him up, even more handicapped with laughter this time than the last. Lucas shook his head. I need to party with this fucking kid more often. He then grabbed the tools from mark and chopped out another four lines, which the other guys were quickly on top of, like buzzards.

Tony felt the adrenaline momentarily, just long enough to know he had done the drug. His body tingled slightly for a moment, then nothing. But he could see better. He could hear the birds now. The cocaine had made its way through his nasal passage clearing everything in its path. He inhaled deeply a breath of air, smelling like he never had before. Underneath the marijauna-reek that spilled from the car, the pine-scented air, and the smell of animal shit, he could smell blood again. Blood that this time, however, was real.

He looked at each of his friends and smelled them out. It was definitely their blood. The scent of it stirred up another feeling in his body: hunger. He did his best to ignore it as everyone around him started loading up their backs and hands with gear.

"Don't suppose you're gonna fucking carry anything?" Scott asked Tony.

"We're lucky if we don't gotta fucking carry him." Lucas replied.

When everything was gathered up, Lucas clicked his keychain and the car let out a slight, single honk to let him know it was locked. Then they started on the trail.

Tony was walking considerably well for his condition. He still had dirt in his face, and Jesse, who took up the rear and followed Tony, could see a matted section of hair in the back of Tony's head, wet with blood. He must have cracked his head when he fell after blasting his brain with the cocaine, and he seemed to be completely unphased by it. There was never a reaction to that fall. Jesse doubted Tony even knew of the injury.

They walked for a while, chanting various Marine cadences that Jesse had tought them. Lucas' favorite by far was 'Napalm Sticks to Kids'. As the trail went on, the sound of a banjo got louder, until they forked off in the opposite direction of the music festival. As the banjo faded in the background, Lucas made another joke, "Sure are a lot of pretty mouths over there I bet."

Tony fell quite a few times, and Jesse was always there to help him back up to his feet. Each time Tony would turn around and grunt an unintelligible 'thank you'. Tony was very easily distracted by sounds all around them. Whether it were leaves blowing along the ground, or twigs snapping in the forest, he was constantly turning his head to listen further for something. When he smelled the moose, without thinking he wandered out of the line of hikers and down an off-path, marked for sight-seeing at a nearby pond.

"Guys."

Jesse stopped, the others kept walkin.

"Fuck! Guys!"

Finally Scott turned around, "What the fuck, where's Tony."

Jesse pointed down the side trail. "He went down there."

Mark sighed and sat on a log on the side of the main trail. The other three followed Tony.

"What the fuck is he doing?"

Tony was up to his knees in the pond, walking out towards a moose that stared back at him chewing some grass. Tony's nose was sort of in the air, and he waded in the pond with his arms up and out, as if simultaneously trying to keep them dry and reach for the moose. He could smell the moose. He could smell its blood flowing through its veins. As he got closer, he could hear its fucking heart beating. He was starving. Mindlessly he closed in on the moose, not at all processing his actions. Instinctively, he was hungry and he could smell food. Without thinking he intended to wrestle this moose down with his bare hands and eat it right there in the pond.

It seemed not only like a great idea to him at the time, but his only choice. From the moment he stepped off the main trail, leaving his friends behind him, he had forgotten where he had even come from. He had no awareness of where he was. There was only him and the steady pumping of blood throughout the moose.

Jesse took a shot, catching him in the shoulder with a BB. Tony did not feel it at all, but the moose heard the firing and fled into the woods on the other side of the pond. Tony stood there for a minute, completely unsure of what happens next. When he picked up the scent of the life of his friends, he turned around. They were all standing there laughing at him with confused looks smeared across their faces. He was able to work out the situation in his head. He was standing in a fucking pond, being ridiculed, while Jesse stared down the scope on an orange tipped CheyTac Intervention A200, pointed right at him.

He started his way out of the pond, and he really wanted more of that coke.

Writer's blah?

Yesterday I reached my first roadblock in the rule of no revisions/no editing.

Today I conquer it.

A quick update:

I'm still here!

I have been working on the novel like a madman.

I will be sitting down for more HvZ today or tomorrow, so definitely expect to see something over the weekend.

My course will be completed soon, and I will need to kick the shit out of a final, then there will be more time for all of you.

A quick thank you to art submitters, critics, fans, and just plain all around cool people.

Also, the world was robbed of a fantastic voice this week, Peter Steele of Type O Negative. Say what you want, but they were a great band and this is a very unfortunate loss.

But, if anyone can come back from the dead, it will be him, so lookout!

TRUFAX

One lonely, chilly April eve,

in not too far a place,

someone did come, you wont believe!

The Devil showed his face.

He stepped from flames and into sight,

and pointed at a man.

A man who cowered, blind with fright,

and pissed himself again.

Again, for Satan had been here

more than once before.

The devil had all times been clear,

"I gave another chore,"

"yet still it seems my task mistook,

with no regard for me.

For the last time, work on my book

and no more poetry."

The man he promised to get done,

the assignment he had earned.

He knew it not to be any fun,

sitting in Hell, bored... burned.

So henceforth ye shall ne'er get

a poem on this site.

I've got a bunch of other shit

I really have to write.

Weekend over, back to work.

Yes, currently my "job" is to bring you stories.

Pretty cool, huh?

I am also taking some classes for a professional job, so that all of the people I spend my time with are not fictional/dead.

I have been poking about the internet and have developed a bit of a concern regarding the formatting of Hippies vs Zombies, so allow me to lay it down for you:

HvZ is going to be in 3 parts. Part 1: An Inconvenient Tooth is underway. What you have read so far, is only a part of Part 1. What that means is this: Today I plan to "publish" Part b of Part 1. Until I figure out how to use tags, I am going to simply title the story parts for organization. So sometime later today, look for HvZ:P1b. Then HvZ:P1c, and so on. When the part changes, you will know because I will label the first one accurately, "Hippies Vs Zombies Part 2: A Bridge Over the River, Why?" after which it will be HvZP2b, etc.

Is that confusing enough?

Eventually, the wife tells me we will be able to set up tags, in which case you will be able to click the HvZ tag and be taken to the project in its entirety.

I wanted to explain on this because I was getting the feeling from various posts that Part 1 was up on the blog in full. This is again, not the case, as there will be more of Part 1 today.

Thank you for your time, now get back to work ppl.

HvZ:P1b

You have seen this car before. a 1982 two-door hatchback Ford Escort, hideous orange paint-job. Rust lined the bottom around the edges. The car sat low to the ground when it was full with Lucas and his friends, you'd think its guts were scraping the road anywhere it went. The inside of the car reeks of a hundred different bachelor scents, all masked by one pine-scented air-freshener hanging from the rear-view mirror. Crumbs from every snack ever enjoyed in the car litter the floor. The rear passenger seat had a sticky sludge from a Pepsi-can ashtray that had been spilled a few years ago. The syrup would not lift, and had become a sort of dunce-cap for your ass. You could judge your standing with Lucas and his crew by whether or not they made you sit in the goo.

There was a bong under a seat for emergencies. The water had never been properly emptied from the bong after use, and always seeped out onto the floor. Marijuana stems and seeds were scattered through-out. If marijuana was half the weed it was accused of being, it might have taken root and grown into full bushes in this car.

Lucas always drove, Scott always got the front-passenger seat, known to most as 'shotgun'. Scott never called'shotgun' anymore. The car was so infamous throughout this part of the state that you knew three things just by seeing it pull up: 1) Lucas driving. 2) Scott Shotgun and 3) If you hadn't been in it before, you got the sticky seat.

Today was no different. Lucas was driving, his seat as far back as it would go. Hie steered with a fore-arm as he hung one arm out the window and the other draped over the steering wheel, his driving hand tapping Led Zeppelin beats on the dash. Scott rolled joint after joint in the passenger seat, twisting up an entire ounce for the weekend trip. They always preferred to have their smoke rolled up upon purchase of a bag, partially for ease and mostly because they were convinced they would avoid an "intent to sell" charge by only carrying cigarette packs filled with joints. Not that they were ever pulled over. Somehow, though the cops in this town knew quite well the mischief that went on both in the car and wherever it went, they never once bothered to stop them.

They tore down the road, though Lucas was always good about maintaining the speed limit. There were two stops. The first stop picked up Jesse, who had all the air-rifles. Next they grabbed Mark, who brought all the camping gear. This left Tony, who was still another three miles down the road, but on the way to the park road they would take to the mountain. Tony, living the farthest away from Lucas' house, almost always ended up sitting on the fossilized soda spill, and today would be no exception.

They pulled in front of Tony's house and honked. Scott finished rolling the last of the bud just as they arrived, and with tradition, he lit the last joint he rolled as they waited for Tony to come outside.

Tony, though taking the better part of a half-an-hour despite the constant honking outside, stepped out of his house, and fell to his knees in the doorway, dropping his bag and covering his face. He had not really seen the sun yet that day, and it burned his eyes. He still felt quite terrible, and he was unsure how much of it was from his original condition or the vast quantity of pills he had taken throughout the morning. It had been a good while since he had last thrown-up, mostly because he was through trying to get anything down.

Scott had gotten out of the car to let Tony in, and Mark got out to make sure he didn't get pushed into the middle, the forsaken corn-syrup dungeon. The two of them stood outside the car watching Tony as the sun crippled him. The entire car shook with laughter. Lucas remembered how drunk Tony had been the night before, since he dropped him off after the party. Tony had been passed out the whole ride home, when he wasn't throwing up outside the window. He had been in some kind of fight and left a good stain of blood all over his seat, which Lucas would now keep preserved as a trophy.

"Man," Mark said as they helped him to his feet. "You really were fucked up last night, bro. You sure you wanna do this? The weekend planned ain't gonna make you feel any better, for real."

Tony didn't say anything. He snatched a pair of sunglasses right from Mark's face and put them on. Laughing, Scott helped him to the car. Tony felt like an old man being escorted to the car this way. Five people all packed in to the Escort, and it dragged off down the road.

They drove towards the highway, but took a turn shortly before onto the park road. The park road, Stonecreek Road, was the main entrance road to the State Park and Nature Preserve. About three miles in, you reached the actual State Park entrance, where a small gatehouse sat in the middle of the road.

Lucas stopped at the hut, where he gave his driver's license and the names of his passengers to a park ranger. The ranger took down the license plate number of the car. Handing Lucas his license back, the ranger asked, "Where are you boys headed today?"

Scott leaned over Lucas to answer. "We're staying the weekend at Flat Pond, doing the mountain on Sunday."

Lucas looked at Scott annoyed, but nodded at the ranger to confirm.

The ranger scribbled on his clipboard again, and gave them a half-sheet of paper to display on their dash, as well as a park map which included all of the hiking trails. "Be safe, drink plenty of water..." He said. Then, pointing in the back seat to Tony, "...and get this one some sleep."

As they left the gate behind them, they all agreed that Tony looked like shit. Scott had the medicine. "That motherfucker needs to hit this joint.

Tony lifted his head up, which went from its lowered, hanging position, to straight back, resting on the seat-back behind him. He peered through his eyelids, which were too heavy to move. Looking down his cheeks through the crack of light just under the sunglasses, he tried to tell Scott what a fantastic idea he had, but he couldn't get any words out. All that came out was a garbled moan, which made him feel like an asshole. He lifted his arm, very slowly, and held out his hand, which told Scott enough.

Bringing the joint to his face took almost every bit of strength Tony felt he had left. The last bit went towards filling his lungs with the smoke. He held his hit for a long time, his hand falling down to his leg, bouncing the half-joint up into the air, then to the floor of the car somewhere. Scott lit another joint. There was not enough room for people to move and look for the renegade spliff, and of course Tony didn't react at all. Jesse and Mark weren't sure he ever let that hit go.

Tony completely lost himself again as the THC spread. He felt himself unable to control his body at all, though he seemed to remain conscious. He could hear Jesse's panic and see Mark waving hands in front of him. He could not hear anything they were saying, but soon Mark was pounding on his chest. They had pulled the sunglasses off him, and Scott was turned around now, prying one of Tony's eyes open. Tony could see them doing all of this, but he could not feel a thing.

Lucas was pulling the car to the side of the road. Tony was reminded of the very second time he ever smoked the herb. He blacked out then for twenty minutes, give or take. They had been on their way back to school from a drive out to a scrap-yard, and Tony remembered none of the ride back. He hadn't really felt much of anything the first time he smoked, but after the blackout, his second was standard: Giggles, munchies, the lot.

He thought of this moment as the same sort of thing, except there was no blackout, he was aware of his surroundings, though blurry. He had somehow lost his hearing and feeling throughout his body, as well as his ability to speak. He was suffering some sort of tunnel-vision but he could see. He wondered how his sense of smell was. It was when he attempted to taste the air that he realized he had not been breathing.

Breathing is supposed to just happen. Tony had some how forgotten, and for almost a half-hour he hadn't taken a breath. After taking that last toke, it never came to him to exhale. He never consciously made an effort to breathe, and in this case, it therefore never happened. When he finally did exhale, a cloud of smoke filled the car and clouded his vision almost entirely, but not before he saw each of the other passengers erupt into hilarious laughter. He laughed himself, but again only a moan leaked out.

Lucas pulled the car back onto the road and resumed the trip. Scott lit another joint. Jesse was a bit weirded out by Tony, and shuffled himself closer to the window. Mark was still laughing, unable to move on, already retelling the tale of when Tony stopped breathing for nearly thirty minutes. It was a great story, and Mark's impression of Jesse's hysteria had them all laughing soon. All of them except for Jesse, who stared out the window and never passed the joint again after he was handed it, and of course Tony, who actually was laughing somewhere inside, but only grumbled and moaned occasionally.

The rest of the ride they told jokes and smoked joints and shortly before they would get out and start walking trails, they passed the first vehicle since entering the park. A full-size, black school bus was parked in the road, leaving barely any room for the car to get through. That anyone had made it even this far through these roads with a bus, was very impressive, but they had clearly given up at this point and left it.

After passing the bus, they also passed nine people all buried underneath tremendous backpacks, walking the side of the road. Some of them carried walking sticks. There were a couple with hand drums tied to their waists. A cloud of smoke followed closely behind them. One of them was strumming an acoustic guitar while walking, and singing. Almost all of them had nappy, dirty dreadlocks, male or female. Some of the men were wearing skirts. One of the women was wearing nothing, but her long, straight hair covered her breasts. They marched in a line, slowly, dragging sandals and flip-flops or bare-feet through the dirt, singing lyrics to a Grateful Dead song, "Dire Wolf".

"Fucking hippies," Lucas sighed.

***

More shit, finished.

Today I finished a short for an upcoming Severed Press anthology sequel.

The first anthology, titled Dead Bait, I was just a tad too late to submit for.

Anyone who knows me (or has seen my tattoos) knows that I could write about shit in the water all day long, so I was more than glad to whip something up for the Dead Bait sequel.

I have written a story called Sleeping With the Fishes and will finish editing and submit it tomorrow. For any reason should this story not make the cut, I will hold on to it for my own collection of shorts.

If it is chosen, however, it will be alongside a story by both Steve Alten and Guy N Smith, which is so far beyond fucking phenomenal, I cannot imagine it to be so.

If you dont know who those guys are, you have no business poking around this blog, and should therefore fuck yourself in the ass with a chainsaw.

That's the kind of game I am playing. You are a contestant or you are dead to the world.

J

I keep forgetting to add titles.

super wasted post hooray!

(20 min later note: im too drunk to accurately complete a sentance. no one cares.)

A thank you.

The response to HvZ thus far has been overwhelming.

I appreciate each and every one of you that have stopped by.

More is coming very soon, I am just as eager to find out what happens next as anyone.

I can tell you this: There will be drugs.

Also blood.

J

Books that kill.

To the side, just below some foul language, you will see some magic floating books. This is, of course, unless you live in a fucking cave and still dial a phone to connect to the internet. Please, for the children, upgrade yo' shit.

Anywho... The books are from a publishing company called Severed Press who, like a messiah, provides you with some awesome fiction by some awesome people. They make people die, and that makes me happy. Included amongst these books are various anthologies. Dead Bait was one I was lucky enough to get my hands on. It's got some great (and really fucking weird) stories in it, and it excited me to be part of this team. Soon Severed Press will publish Zombie Zoology, a collection of undead animal stories. Your very own me has a story in that book called "Gift Horse", and it will really piss you off.

Severed Press will also be publishing a book, "The Preposterous Baron Grill", for which I have spent countless nights slaving in the pits of Hell, researching. More on that later.

How did all this come to be? It's fucking fate, deal with it.

You can find out more about Severed Press here.

P.S. Special thanks to "Zombie Books" for linking me on facebook. I have longed for this day.

Maybe you read the poem Sad Kraken. Maybe you thought, "Shit, this would make a great children's book. One that would teach them, 'Hey kids, if you wanna hang out with people, don't barge in and start eating them.'" Maybe you are also an artist, and you would like to send me some pictures of the Sad Kraken, in a style that can be appreciated by young minds.

I am dying to see these pictures. If you have time on your hands, and a pencil in one (or crayon, marker, etc), go nuts. Email me pictures of what you think the Sad Kraken looks like, or drawings of scenes straight from the poem! Who knows, if I like it, I might just do something REALLY cool with it.

Email your art to: justin@jgilliammartin.com

Make sure I have a method of which to contact you, and most importantly, make sure I can open your file!

Let's do it!

Alright, I'm gonna start this up here pretty soon. Things to remember are: I will write for as long as I see fit, and as often as I see fit. Please just remain patient, I won't leave you hanging forever. Also, keep negative comments to yourself, or email them directly to me at justin@jgilliammartin.com, and I will deal with you appropriately.

Lastly, this is being typed directly from my head onto this blog. There are bound to be typos, fucked up sentences, maybe even problems with continuity, who knows. Expect an edited version you can pay for someday perhaps, but don't bitch about free shit.

And without further delay....

Hippies vs. Zombies Part 1: An Inconvenient Tooth

Part One: An Inconvenient Tooth

The smoke was so thick in some places, you would need special equipment to see. Gunfire riddled the air, as well as the occasional explosion. Jets were heard soaring overhead. Helicopters hovered above with the distinct sound of their artillery spraying targets below. Every so often you could hear the lone shot of a sniper, no doubt striking a target somewhere. When the bombers flew by dropping their payload, it was so loud it shook the chandelier in the room downstairs.

Tony sat in his chair, less than a foot from his video screen, playing a war-shooter online, something he would do for hours on end without interruption. When the parents weren't home he would turn the stereo sound up so loud, passers by had to wonder if they were under attack.

He wore a backwards cap and a headset used for communication with online teammates. The smoke was from a nearby bong, which Tony kept sucking from to try and relieve his hangover. At twenty-three years old, this would be his worst hangover yet. He had been at a house party the night before, of which his memory of was completely erased. He had woken up this afternoon to immediate throwing up. He was unable to keep down a coffee. The marijuana was the only thing to settle his stomach, but it failed to do anything for his headache or general weakness.

He noticed, despite his increased accuracy in taking down virtual enemies with his digital M16A4, that his hangover was growing worse by the minute. He felt as though he might pass out at any time. His mouth was heavy with saliva and his thirst for water was unquenchable. Every muscle in his body ached, but not like usual. Tony swore in an email to a friend earlier that morning that his body felt like it was shutting down.

After a match of capture the flag, Tony shut his game off. Giving in to the hangover, he was convinced to go back to bed. He went for a shower first, but was stopped in front of the mirror at the sight of himself.

His arm was a dark red, spreading down from his shoulder. The dark circles under his eyes looked like he hadn't had sleep for a month. He brought his left hand up to his right shoulder, and shocked himself at the touch. Searing pain was below his T-shirt sleeve, that blackened his vision when he winced from the slight brush of his hand. Slowly, with his teeth firmly clenched together, he lifted the sleeve.

There on his arm, surrounded by blackened flesh, was a bite mark. Teeth marks from a human being. The first thing to go through his mind was Carla, who he had planned to break off his relationship with at the party. Whether he had or not was amongst the forgotten details. Had she bitten him in response? He had not expected her to take it well, but never knew her for a biter.

He brought his shoulder around, closer to the mirror. He studied the wound and traced it lightly with is finger, drool leaking from between his clenched jaw. As he graced each tooth-shaped dent in his arm, the pain became more severe. Finally, at a certain point there was a flash of pain so intense, Tony nearly lost consciousness.

Gently pulling his sleeve down over wound, now pulsing with heat and pain, he made his way back to his bedroom. From his nightstand he withdrew a baggie of pills. He threw a few of the blue ones into the back of his mouth, and picked up a day-or-two old bottle of beer to wash it down with. As he tipped the bottle, a cigarette butt floated up to and kissed his upper lip. He vomited simultaneously, showering his nightstand, wall, and parts of his bed. The bottle hit the floor but did not break, but oozed a filthy brown sludge full of ashes onto the carpet.

Recovering from the retching, he again took three more blue pills from his little bag. He brought them over to his desk, where he used a lighter to crush them all into a fine dust. Using a rolled up twenty-dollar bill, the only cash he had, he sniffed the powder up into his nostrils. He gagged a bit, but did not heave. It wasn't long after another bong hit that the pain started to lift, and he was in the shower.

Tony had a dream in that shower. Though standing up, the soothing feel of the warm water falling over him had rendered him into a sleep. Tony thought it felt more like a coma. His dream was of a party, and there were a number of inhuman guests. They were humongous frog-men with razor sharp teeth, and they lurked everywhere, consuming barrels of beer at a time. They were jumping around on the furniture, eating from the ounce of weed on the table, handfulls at a time. Some bottles of beer they simply tossed into their mouths, and chewed to shards, lapping spilled beer from the floor. They drank everything in the house, and a few sat in the basement chewing their way into the keg. When his dream-self investigated this, Tony could only stare in awe of their ability to devour. He laughed as they finally punctured the keg, firing a steady piss-stream of beer into the air. They danced around it triumphantly, and Tony joined them in their celebration. One of them turned to him, handing him a joint and said: "You don't look so dead."

Tony snapped out of his mini-coma, and turned off the water. Stepping out of the shower he was reminded of his shoulder pain upon reaching for his towel. He brought it to the mirror again. After being washed, there was no question that a person had bit him. The wound was inflamed with red, and surrounded by a bruise almost completely around the arm. He could see what looked like a white pus in the most painful spot. He grabbed some hydrogen peroxide from the cabinet underneath the sink, and poured it all over his arm, letting a large amount of excess wash all over the floor.

Surprisingly, he felt nothing when the peroxide hit, and it failed to wash away any of this white spot. It was when he slowly touched a finger to it that he realized it was a solid object. Like a piece of glass, this white stone was imbedded into his flesh. The drugs had covered up the majority of his pain, but when he touched this thing, there was no hiding from the sting.

Tony considered the hospital for a short moment. There would be problems with all the drugs in his system currently, along with who-knows-what from last night. His probation officer knew what he was up to almost constantly, but documentation of it would be bad.

Later in the day he had plans with a few friends to go up into the mountain for the weekend. A little camping trip with some homemade wine and most likely some ruckus with air rifles. They always started out by firing BBs at cans, but as more of the drink flowed, the target range increased. The hospital might interfere with this trip, and Tony couldn't have that.

He went to his closet for his belt and grabbed his box of paraphernalia. He took his hemostat from the box and went back to the bathroom. The belt he rolled up into a four-inch long bunch, and put it in his mouth, biting down. He used a lighter on the end of the hemostat, heating up the clamp. When it smoked a bit, he put it to his arm, and without thinking or preparing any further, he grabbed hold of the white nugget and yanked it out.

He screamed through the belt and spit it across the room. He dropped the hemostat and it dinged as it hit the floor, the foreign object that was in his arm still sailed through the air. He was able to catch it, and he held it tightly in his hand until the peak of pain passed. When he was able to look at it, he rolled it around in his palm and studied it. The look on his face went from curiosity to complete turmoil. He held before him, a tooth. A human tooth that he had just removed from a bite wound on his arm. Whoever bit him, bit him so fucking hard, they left a tooth in his flesh.

Surely he would need to seek medical attention for this. A tetanus shot, no doubt. Infection was not only very possible, but Tony felt it guaranteed by the evidence found. Of course, with the weekend planned as it was, he would wait until Monday to see the doctor. His boys would be around in a few hours to pick him up. He cleaned the wound with alcohol and more peroxide. He put an ointment (with pain-reliever) on it and wrapped it with a bandage. He decided to hit the bong again, and put a couple more of the little blue guys in his nose. For the remaining time before his ride showed he loaded up his digital assault rifle and got some kills. He got a lot of kills. He was very impressed with his current ability to hunt down these other players, and was extra satisfied every time he spilled their blood-red pixels. He could almost smell their blood, he knew where they were almost every time. He could smell their blood in his mind, and it fucking smelled delicious.

***

See, was that so bad? Allow me to clear up a few things before we move on. This is going to take some time. You need to be patient. And of course, by you, I mean myself, and the few people who are tortured enough to waste time coming here.

There might be more poetry, I really cannot say. You may have noticed that the address to this blog is sadkraken.blogspot.com. This is the kind of evil shit I am up to. None if this is planned, other than content ideas. I sat on that fucking poem for over a year. Originally I think I planned it as a tragic short story, the kind you wish someone had told you about through tears as a warning not to read it. Now its a poem, it rhymes, and in the true spirit of freestyle, I think it kicks this shit off well.

Up next, in very small pieces over a very, very long time, we have a story about a group of zombies that learn drugged out drum circles are very easy to wipe out. Or are they? I've got a black school bus full of drunk, dirty, drum wielding wookies that have other plans. Or do I?

Here be a blog.

Yes, I am going to blog, on top of my packed agenda of other useless shit I do. Better yet, I am going to primarily use this blog for posting short stories and sorts of the free kind. The best part is, these stories will all be typed directly into this blog, which means they will be completely unedited and all-in-all, terrible. First, below, you will find the first poem I have written in over 20 years. Mostly because let's face it, poetry is rather lame. However, if you come back for more after my shitty poem, you will be treated to the first episode of my first true project for this blog: Hippies vs. Zombies: The Undead and the Brain-dead. It's going to be a fun ride.

BUT FIRST: A bit of a disclaimer. I am a writer. I have opinions. I am more than likely going to say offensive things in every post, possibly about you or your mom. I say fuck, A LOT. If you are easily offended, and killing yourself is not an option, I suggest you read some other pussy's blog. However, should this sort of thing excite you, then by all means, read on.

And now for the main event:

Sad Kraken by J Gilliam Martin

Leagues and leagues beneath the sea

there a hungry kraken be.

Buried half-below the sand,

longing for a life on land.

For hundreds, perhaps a thousand years

the kraken cries his kraken tears.

Til came the day which he did move,

and slid from his slumbering, kraken groove.

Towards the surface, he did rise

heretofore unseen by eyes.

A ship did sail in his monstrous path,

soon consumed by monstrous wrath.

Tossed in violence amongst the waves,

those not eaten, found watery graves.

Alas the shore, he reaches mud,

his mouth agape, teeth stained with blood.

A village glows in lights and steam,

upon first sight, the air lifts screams.

The people arm themselves for fight

(though some protest for kraken rights).

A mass of tentacles destroy,

the tiny town, as though a toy.

Alas, tanks and bombs prevail,

and the poor kraken turns his tail,

to once again sleep in the sea,

sad and alone, for eternity.