I Will END You
“I will END you!” screamed Chainsaw Timmy.
Frank stopped whimpering, and his terrified gaze turned uncertain.
“End me?” he said.
“That’s right. End you!“
“You mean kill me?”
“Well … yeah.”
“Oh.”
There was an awkward pause.
“You know. End your life.”
“No, I get it. It’s just a little …”
“What?”
“I don’t know. Histrionic, maybe? Precious? Hackneyed? Something.”
Chainsaw Timmy turned off his chainsaw. He seemed dejected. “Yeah. I’m not really sure. It sounded good on paper.”
“Maybe you could just say you’re going to kill me. Simple. To the point.”
“Right, no, I hear you. It’s just that telling people I’m going to kill them all the time gets monotonous. I wanted to spice things up a bit.”
“Yeah.” Frank thought for a moment. “How about ‘terminate’?”
“I will TERMINATE you!” said Chainsaw Timmy, then shook his head. “It’s a little antiseptic, don’t you think? I might as well say I’m going to homicide you. Does that instill terror? I don’t think that instills terror.”
“No, you’re right.”
“Really, I want to say my piece, as quickly and simply as possible, and then get right to murdering you.”
“Well, how about that? I will murder you!”
“Eh,” said Chainsaw Timmy, fingering the tines of his chainsaw. “I don’t know. Murder, kill … it’s all very accurate, I suppose, but I want this moment to be memorable. There’s a time and a place for prosaic statements of fact, but, honestly, I don’t think this is one of them.”
Frank’s eyes widened, and a slow smile crept over his face. “What if you lead with the verb?”
“What?”
“Yeah, and make it imperative. Make it an order. You know what I mean?”
Chainsaw Timmy narrowed his eyes. “I think so. But give me an example.”
“Die!” said Frank. “Die … you!“
“Huh. Not bad. Not bad at all.” Chainsaw Timmy mused. “But I’m not sure about the ‘you’.”
“You need a noun there, though. You have to personalize it.”
“No, right, I’m not disagreeing. But ‘you’ is just lame.” Chainsaw Timmy thought about it. “How about ‘motherfucker’?”
“Well, I don’t think there’s any need to curse.”
“No, but listen. Die motherfucker!“
“Whoah. Yeah, that’s good. That’s very good.”
“Die motherfucker!” said Chainsaw Timmy, trying it out. “DIE motherfucker! Die motherFUCKER!“
“I like the middle one. I think putting the emphasis on the impending death is the right move here.”
“Right, right. Ok. I think we have our winner.” Chainsaw Timmy started up his chainsaw. “You ready?”
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