Chapter 1

Why is it Always Sparkplugs

Chapter 1: Where it Began/Inferno SHOWDOWN

Orange wasn't surprised, and was barely even woken up, when he heard the sound of gunfire off in the distance; he was used to that, since the Heretic Bards had built their monastery citadel in the middle of the most contested city in all of the New England Republic because of its 'good acoustics'. The thunder of heavy footsteps out in the hall didn't bother him much either; he was used to that noise as well, since Brother Ulrich's morning bass drum exercises were equally thump-trocious. It wasn't until the door of his room was kicked open, and 3 men stood in front of his bed holding loaded guns, that he realized this would not be another normal morning at the monastery.

He studied the men, particularly the leader. Each was dressed in blinding neon clothes and sported perplexingly long hair, and the one standing in the middle, who was evidently the leader, carried a 6-string guitar on his back, though it was much less menacing than the 6 gauge rifle he held in his hands. The leader spoke, in a pain-inflictingly high-pitched voice:

"You have offended the laws of the high priest! You're coming with us to face trial, execution, and then death!"

"What high priest?"

"The Judas Priest, of course! Wait a minute...only a heretic bard would know so little of our order...that's it! It's now execution, destruction, and THEN death! Eddie! Bon! Search this entire building and round up everyone in it!"

Damn, Orange thought, they figured that out quickly for people with more hairspray than cerebral fluid...now he was truly screwed. The Heretical Bards, along with all other groups attempting to preserve unorthodox or 'blasphemous' musical records, faced death when caught, either by the official coalition that ruled the scattered city-states of the New England Republic or by wandering religious vigilante groups like this "Order of Judas Priest." But the neon nightmare was still pointing his 6 gauge at Orange, and so he reluctantly surrendered and followed him down the monastery hallway towards an unknown fate...

a man hovered in place inches above the ground, he was fully concentrated on his work. the room around him was of the deepest color of void, the only detail was scratched in scars and deep gashes into the small black room around him. the man was one of the nine prophets of the land, he was the Metal Prophet formally known as Afro. deep in thought, he reached out with his mind, farther, father he had almost left his body and into the deep black void of divinity he so desperately wished to entangle himself in.

BANG! the sound of a gunshot cascaded into his ears. with that distraction he could no longer hold his focus. he fell to the ground and collapsed, "GOD DAM IT!" he swore. he launched all the energy he had collected from meditation into a nearby black wall, it ripped apart the wood and splinters slammed hard into the nearby door. "WHY CANT ANYONE BE SILENT I WAS ALMOST THERE AGAIN!!!!!"

his eyes were obsidian with rage "AUGH!!!!" he yelled as he clambered up onto his feet "SOMEONE IS GOING TO PAY!!!!" he grabbed his guitar kicked down the door and proceeded out the room and into the light. slightly blinded he held his hand over his eyes to cover them from a light above. he stomped over to a window and looked out, some morons in neon suits broke into a monastery. not only was he wearing one of Afro's hated colors (anything neon)but they broke into a church; one of the most metal things to do, and he wasn't invited. now Afro's entire day would have to be spent being more metal then a bunch of hooligan posers.

realizing this, Afro backed up a few meters from the third floor window, pushed his guitar onto his back, and readied himself. he began running and then flung himself outside through the window. he was in flight, then he landed with a bone shattering crunch as flesh met concrete. for a brief second he was the most brutal thing on the earth.

He looked around not caring about his mangled body, nobody had observed the sight. "DAM IT ANOTHER FAILURE!!" he cried out. he pushed his leg back where it was supposed to be and it quickly bonded back to his knee the rest of his body was put back together quickly.

whats the fun in being a immortal prophet if no one can see how metal you truly are. a small tear of defeat rolled down his eye. whatever, he though, time to kill those morons who interrupted me. and Just as he though this the three stooges walked out with some other guy with shorts on in the middle of them.

"YO, YOU GUYS!" he yelled. "wanna play a game?" he said in his most sadistic voice which was followed with a creepy smile. he limped over to them with one arm half connected, and gore still all over one leg. their attention was nowhere else as they gawked at the half-dead looking man who slowly pulled the metal guitar off his back. right when Afro was one meter away the situation sunk into the leader.

"HOLY SHIT, GET HIM EDDY" the leader yelled as 'eddy' was chopped in half with the metal, black guitar.

"STOP HIM BON!!!!!" he screamed. bon picked up his guitar and slashed at Afro's arm, it cleanly sliced through it and went into his gut. "this is such a fun game" afro said as he coughed up some blood. he raised his axe again and 'removed' bon from the game. the leader then dropped his guitar and began running full force away from the guy that definitely should be dead.

Afro almost began charging after him with sadistic glee, but he remembered one of his long dead friends advice, "you always have to let one go so they can tell others how metal you were" Afro sighed at the truth in his friends words, then noticed the man wearing shorts who was looking back up at him with a mix of terror and relief for being saved. Afro leaned down to him and said "nice to meet you," he smiled "i'm the Metal prophet Afro."

Palm trees hurt. Not like an "ow" hurt, or a "your girlfriend broke up with you after you stalked and killed her entire family" hurt, but like a "you are dead" hurt. So that is where soon to be Ghosty Ghost lay, under a palm tree, neck broken, and intent on revenge.

Ghosty Ghost was confused as to what to revenge at, but his awesome ghost powers granted him the ability to see into his past, in what later he would call the power of memory. Looking back, he saw a man, a very metal man, jumping and smashing into the concrete floor, subsequently knocking over the blasted palm tree.

Back in the present, Ghosty Ghost decided to find the man and haunt him for eternity, for his crime, and poor taste in music, as Grunge was clearly superior to metal. Zooming to the man with ghastly speed, he saw him confronting another man, suited in orange with shorts and a t-shirt. He thereby decided to haunt him as well for poor fashion sense.

Rousing his ghostly scare powers, he let out a torrential "Brwa, I am teh ghost of ownage, and you all have sinned, and must be forever tormented to make me feel better and gain self esteem!"

Orange looked around in sheer terror, confusion, and contusion. To his left was a hulking behemoth dressed in all black with hair like an enormous cloud of hairy meteorites, who was giving some sort of odd gesture with his index and pinky fingers. Must be a local custom, he pondered, as he turned to his right, where a ghostly voice was ghosting. "Brwa, I am teh ghost of ownage, and you all have sinned, and must be forever tormented to make me feel better and gain self esteem!" the ghost moaned, to which the hairy man succinctly replied "DAMMIT!"

Orange agreed with that sentiment; as if waking up to gunfire and hair metal wasn't awful enough, he was now faced with some sort of terrifying barbarian, as well as the threat of being tormented by some sort of apparition. Well, at least the barbarian had saved his life; Orange supposed he owed him some gratitude for that.

"Thanks for saving me, man. Where'd you come from?"

"I COME FROM THE BLACKEST VOIDS OF THE NIGHT AND THE FIERIEST INFERNOS OF HELL."

"Right...so, um, yeah, thanks and all, but I think I'll get back to my monastery now."

"Oh, about that...I kind of burned it down while I was saving you."

"WHAT? But you didn't even use any fire powers or anything like that on the priests! How did it get burned down?"

"Well, I needed to do a metal deed to make up for the complete un-metalness of rescuing people, and burning down a church ranks a 93 out of 100 on the Mustaine Metaltrocity Scale. How could I resist?"

"But...where am I supposed to live now?"

"HELL!"

Orange morosely contemplated that depressingly unhelpful answer as the hairy man walked away. One of the towers of the crumbling monastery quickly got sick of his self-piteous whining, and chose that moment to collapse. Unfortunately, being an inanimate tower, it had terrible aim, and only one brick hit Orange, knocking him unconscious.

Hmm," Afro though to himself. he was sitting down on the other side of the road watching the church burn down slowly. he had to restrain a giggle every time a piece of charred remains collapsed onto the ground. Next to him was the Nameless orange-wearing priest and a ghost that kept yelling "BONK!" and other phrases, he was complaining about how he killed him or something, not that it really mattered, killing someone without knowing is a 43 on the Mustaine Metaltrocity Scale or MMS. the final few cinders collapsed on the ground and Afro got up and stretched.

"what a wonderfully abysmal day" he said aloud

the ghost just frowned at Afro, seeing as he was having no effect on him. he reasoned that his efforts were better spent on the priest with a terrible sense of fashion.

Afro noticed how the Ghost's attention shifted towards the unconscious priest.

"now how shall i kill him?" Afro asked the ghost while his grin grew revealing savage sharp teeth.

Ghostly was perturbed by this and he knew showing that he was would not be wise. he had planned for so much revenge, he could not have his plans be ruined by a madman that somehow is immune to pestering! he knew he had to win through reason.

"how about this" the ghost said, "why don't you take the priest wherever you're going, and for the next thirty minuets, i wont pester you."

"Well, you see Mr. Ghost, i was going to take him along anyway." Afro replied "but i remembered that killing a priest is a 70 on the MMS and intend of keeping him for a really really shiny happy day being done with it today would make this day all the better."

"well you see Mr..... Metal?"

"the names Afro by the way, Afro the Metal Prophet."

"ah, i see, Afro then. well you see Mr. Afro he is no longer a priest because you just burnt down his church."

"that does make sense Mr....?"

"Ghostly, the Ghost."

"wait your name is Ghostly? isn't that a little ironic that you became a ghost?"

"not in the least, i decided this fate for myself after you ruined my perfectly good life."

"you willingly made yourself Ghostly, The Ghost....?"

"yes, and i must say i am enjoying it. now if you could be a good prophet, please take the ex-preist with you."

"i guess you have a point, leaving someone to die is only 20 MMS points times .05, to the power of how many days you knew him/her over 360, so, i guess he is more like a long term investment now, i guess i might as well keep him"

"you might say 'thats the SPIRIT.'" responded Ghostly.

Afro Picked the man up like he was nothing and slung him over the shoulder opposite to the shoulder which had his guitar still slung on it.

"hmm, now how to wake him up?" Afro thought, "i've got it, theres a bridge around here right? oh, Ghostly, do you any cinderblocks or toothpicks on you?"

"no, im really just all bones, oh wait..." he said sarcastically.

"ya, i didn't think so, if only the great Lord Mustain was easier to please." sighed Afro. he began trudging the way opposite of the local bridge and towards the path the Hair metal poser that escaped went.

The local bridge was a bridge. It crossed a river, like a bridge would..."at least that is what they want you to think" thought Ghosty Ghost as he followed Afro to the bridge. Being a doctor in theory, Ghosty Ghost knew that dunking people in water did not solve concussions, nor wake people from them. A common misconception popularized in medieval media.

After a number of dunks, Afro shouted "This damn water isn't working, I need a new plan to wake Orange so I may terrify him into a coma (67 on the scale).

Ghosty Ghost replied "Why don't you let me posess him and try to wake him from the depths of his subconcious?"

"You can do that?" asked Afro.

"Well, I'm a ghost, so in theory it should work, but only if I do it with a cool catch phrase, as that is the only way to activate overly elaborate attacks in the ghost realm I've never been to...okay, so here goes....MINDRAPE PAUUWNCH" Upon the utterance, Ghosty Ghost found himself inside a twisted realm, full of orangy darkness, and shorts wearing gnomes even though it was mental Winter. "Well, If imma gon pester someone, might as well start in there brainz" thought Ghosty Ghost.

Orange awoke screaming. A low, guttural voice had been whispering into his mind "WEAR LONG PANTS DAMMIT", and he found himself confused and befused by the spectral instruction. What were these 'long pants', and what special powers did they grant their wearer? He decided to set it aside, and focus on the arduous task of regaining consciousness.

When he awoke, his worst nightmare had come true; he was still surrounded by the hulking behemoth, who was now roaring at him in a futile attempt to induce a coma, and the spectral spectre, who was hovering in an invisible state of indifference.

"Where are we going?" asked Orange.

"TO HELL," replied the Afro Prophet.

"Do you ever give a non-stereotypically metal answer?" whined Orange.

"How about this," barked the Prophet, as he punched Orange, sending him blissfully but only temporarily back into the realm of unconsciousness.

When Orange re-woke, the Prophet explained that they were actually going to hell; the hair metal priests lived there, and the Afro Prophet was thirsty for revenge. Revenge and whiskey.

Just then, 2 teenagers rode by on hoverboards, but they died of heart attacks at the same time, making them irrelevant.

afro's need for revenge and whisky was only intensified by the two teenagers who strangely had heart attacks. and so the three of them began walking towards the city of hell where the Hair Metal posers lived at. so without putting much more thought into it, Afro picked up his things: his guitar and his new "friends" Orange. and proceeded to walk in the general direction of where he thought Hell City was.

the trip there was mostly uneventful though the group had almost ran out of all food, so to prevent Afro from starving to death, (Afro can only repel death if he dies in a metal way, starving is not metal.) Orange was going to be the main dish on the last day of the trip.

that would have been true until they had reached the moat of the city, where they were promptly attacked by bandits. so, got to live, but the bandits sadly didn't.

Day 2: Hell City

Hell City was a very open place, there was no wall or castles like the bright Power and Heavy Metal cities. all their was, was brick, wood, cardboard buildings, burnt remains of buildings, tons of satanic stars pained in what most people would assume as blood, and fog, lots and lots of fog. overall, it was a depressing and cold place. In Hell city the three main factions are: the Hair Metal group, the Satanic Metal group and the Drone Metal group. each of the three were considered the worst and the most talentless groups of metal. but in this city, where they couldn't be compared to other good genres, they thrived.

as Afro, Orange and Ghostly passed through the burnt-open door that used to guard the city they were chilled by the sheer suck of this city, newly formed bands stood around and rehearsed their evil lyrics in the streets and to combat the other genres in the city they played as loud as possible.

"well, looks like i'm going to enjoy my stay here" Afro said as he walked forwards towards one of the bands.

He was smiling, dragging his guitar behind him, and instead of waiting for all hell to break loose, he decided to make it.

Ghosty Ghost was sad that his party hadn't starved to death before arriving at the city, so he would have to wait for another time to watch them die a slow agonizing death, much like his girlfriends former parents...

Metal city was a very loud place, like an airport like after a private jet suddenly crashed and killed the husband and wife on board in a mysterious accident. So Ghosty Ghost was experienced in ignoring pointless screaming and complaining like "I'm burning to death" or "Worship Satan" and the like.

Afro seemed intent on going to the bar, and once again utilizing his supposed medical degree, agreed, liver cancer is an acceptably slow death. The bar was filled with long haired, dress wearing, eyeshadow sporting losers. "What an ungrunge look" Ghosty Ghost proclaimed.

"Imma let ya'll finish, but these nubs are going to have the most painful death of all time, of ALL TIME!" Death through fighting was way to fast of a death, so Ghosty Ghost asisted as best he could in his astral form. Orange to tried to help, sadly crying on the floor was not an effective battle technique.

The residents of the bar were dispatched with relative ease. Their pleas and begging were were satisfying, such as "Please Satan help me" or "I'll give you all of my drugs if you spare me" or the ever popular"NOOO, please don't detonate the bomb on my parents plane!". Psh, like Medeival jets were that safe even without bombs on them...

Having grown tired of the bludgeoning and brutality his comrades were engaged in, Orange went in search of what no medieval town would be complete without: a pretentious indie record store. Sadly, every place he saw was thoroughly metal, whether it was giant battleaxes posted over the doors, torture rooms behind the bargain bin, or clerks wearing pitch black visored helmets who pointed shotguns at him when he asked if they had any Pavement. "This IS Hell," sighed Orange as he reluctantly made his way back to the group.

He stopped when he was about to reach them, though, because he saw a man who looked like the priests he remembered approaching the Afro Prophet. He had a hairstyle that made the Prophet's look sane and well-cleaned; it was a giant explosion of bright orange hair, radiating out in every direction like a supernova of suck. He was flanked by 2 female bodyguards, whose duties seemed to be limited to feeling the guitar on his back suggestively and glaring at anyone who glanced their way, as if someone else with equally atrocious taste might steal their luminescent lover.

"You murdered my fellow priests, barbarian!" he spat at Afro.

"I didn't murder them. I MUSTAINED them. Murder suggests both a lack of metal and a lack of them totally deserving it."

"Bah! I care nothing for your cacophonous customs! I will have vengeance for the men of mine you slaughtered - whether or not you call it that."

At this point, Orange was dreading another fight. The sight of blood still made him queasy, and Afro's post-battle celebrations usually involved multiple lacerations. So Orange krept up slowly behind the hair metal leader, took out one of the CDs he had bought to laugh at at one of the metal CD stores, and slit the leader's throat from behind. The leader collapsed, after he groaned off one final godawful power ballad stanza:

Now I am dying

Just like a dead lion

Peace sells, and I'm buying

Death is making me crying

"Dude, you stole my kill!" yelled the Afro Prophet.

"Sorry about that, I just-"

"That's a 12 on the MMS! That's your best charting since you burned down that church!"

"I didn't do that! YOU burned down my church!"

"Whatever, good job man. Damn, this is a pretty decent guitar. Since we're stuck with you...here, take it. I might as well teach you SOMETHING."

The Afro Prophet looked at the bloody CD approvingly. "The first and last time drone metal will do anything good in the world," he said as he honorably shattered it.

After any battle, there was really only one thing to do to appease the Great Mustaine, and that was looting. so he proceeded to rifle through the horribly dressed posers. other then having tons of drugs on them which Afro stashed in his pockets, you never know when you need extra drugs, there was a fairly unique looking medallion one had in his pocket. it was decorated with one large black print of the symbol of chaos engraved on Baphomet's forehead.

This could only mean on thing.

Afro jerked his head upright and looked around for anyone around; he knew he was being watched.

"GET DOWN!" he yelled to Orange and kicked him to the ground. a concussive shot flew past where orange's head was. Afro charged behind cover dragging orange behind him. Ghostly drifted behind them not really concerned about the situation because it was not like a ghost could die again.

"Damn it, i knew this would happen" he said through gritted teeth. fighting a sniper was both not metal and not fun. this meant Afro was vulnerable, no regeneration, at least until he could do something metal.

"Wait whats happening?" orange asked. he was very confused.

"i'm pretty sure they finally got sick of me murdering all of their guys."

"but, wait who is that? i though there was no one talented in this town!"

"i heard a rumor a while ago about one black metal band that was actually good, i didn't think it was true, but it must."

"wait? whats their name, i think ive heard of them." interjected Ghostly.

"if i remember correctly the band was called Behemoth, they have four band members each equally as deadly. i don't know much about them but i do know their names their Bassist is named Orion, their rhythm guitarist is called Seth. both of them are fairly powerful but nothing compared to Inferno and Nurgal. Inferno has mastered the drums so well he has learned to manipulate the gravitational energy that is given off during gravity blasts. their singer Nurgal has made a pact with satan and has powers of the devil and owns the Demonic guitar: Hex." Afro recalled.

"oh great, behemoth, i hate those guys." said Ghostly "they killed my old girlfriend in a super-implosion caused by dark matter combining with satanic music creating Dm(3)Sa(8) the darkest compound in the universe and the most unstable."

(if you don't get the joke its 3 Dark Matters per 8 Satanic Musics) (thanks chemistry for being the worst class ever.)

"ok then if we all hate them i guess its time we give them a dose of revenge? right?" asked Orange

"yup, you know orange? im starting to like you, maybe i use you as a meat shield." Afro responded.

"thanks... i think..."

"Awww, why are we fighting one of the toughest guys early on, hasn't anyone heard of a learning curve?" replied Orange. He realized this fight could take a few hours, so he settled into his position hiding behind the bar and eating poptarts, little did he know that Poptarts were Inferno's one weakness! As Orange was the only man capable of producing Strawberry Poptarts, he was the heroes only hope.

Ghosty Ghost was afraid of gravity, it was one of the three forces that affected spirits (compassion was not one of them). Recalling his girlfriends fight with Inferno, he remembered that he favored long range combat. If we could get close enough, we render his wave attacks less effective due to the well known theory of anti-matter velocity discrepancy, a paper Ghosty Ghost had co-written with Dave Grohl.

For killing his girlfriend before Ghosty Ghost could, and messin' with the coolest crew this side of Camelot (the band), Inferno was about to get thrashed like a forest fire fighting Smoky the Bear! (now a convicted sex offender)

Orange cowered behind the bar as countless gravity blasts went by, knocking bar stools and pedestrians flying far into the distance. The worst part was the noise...it was like being trapped inside a blender, but instead of just chopping you to bits like a friendly blender, it just keeps getting louder and louder and louder and louder. Orange wished he hadn't left his sacred ear plugs back at the temple which was no longer a temple, being more of a random arrangement of collapsed statues and rocks.

The Afro Prophet lay prone on the ground, knocked off balance by a well-timed gravity blast, and Seth and Orion closed in for the kill, their guitars raised high in the air for the final axecution. Fortunately, Ghosty Ghost was standing by (from a safe distance of a mile or two), and his malignant wave attack disintegrated the rhythm guitarist and integrated the bassist, leaving the area under his curve bleeding. The Afro Prophet scrambled to his feet and ran for cover, ducking behind a nearby wall to catch his breath as Orion stumbled around, disfigured and disoriented.

Just then, the three semi-heroes heard loud footsteps approaching. Inferno was coming!

Orange decided it was time to take a stand and help out the group for once. He gobbled down the last of his poptarts, picked up a shotgun from a nearby dead poser, and prepared for battle, unaware that he had just eaten the group's best hope for victory....

minutes ago:

Inferno had his sniper position all planned out. the one entrance behind him was rigged with explosives, if anyone came to sneak on him they would explode (and then kill them). also, he was high up, he was in one of the two towers in the entire satanic city. most of the rest of the city was shacks and huts, satanic people go on burnings all the time so why build anything that actually took time to build; yet only minutes to burn down.

on a side note the other tower was built by a group of three satan worshipers that believe heaven is hell and hell is heaven so to reach hell and be with satan they decided to make a tower into what they believe is hell.

Inferno gazed out at the damage he had done, every building around the general area where he last saw those damn intruders was filled with holes the size of fists and small gashes in the "architecture." he frowned slightly, Orion and Seth had gone inside the building he could do nothing but wait for them to finish up, he hadn't even got a chance to unleash any of his most powerful attacks, he gave up on watching the battle and leaned against a stone wall, "no one had lived seth and orion's two pronged assault..." he knew the pop-tart was eaten but he wanted to have more fun, he wanted the battle to be bigger, he wanted to kill more people, and he knew how it could happen. so he waited.

Back with our heros:

Inferno kicked in the door and observed the situation. Seth was dead and Orion was close to being dead.

"now this isn't good" Inferno yelled, not expecting this Orange jumped and looked around franticly Inferno walked into the house and sat down on a seat. "this is far too quick for him to die" he restated himself and he used all his knowledge of gravity an control of matter to put Seth back together on charred spot where he was standing before some out of no where attack hit him.

Inferno was more then happy to wait a bit longer, he motioned for Orion and Seth to continue.

"all according to my plan," said Inferno quietly as he watched the battle re-commence.

Afro blocked a attack by Orion with his axe he ignored the arrival of Inferno completely. his arms went numb with pain; bass guitars were too heavy he though. he stuck back as Orange tried to flank him; using a nearby counter as cover, but before he could,

Seth darted to Orion to cover him, holding his guitar over his head to prepare for an attack. Orange saw this coming and proceeded to flee from the attack and wait for his chance behind Afro again.

Ghosty still fearing Inferno was helping in every way he could. he was throwing every taunt that could get under a satan worshipers skin at the Orion he knew. everything from "Satan is a two year old girl in a dress!" to "David Grohl could beat Satan in a arm wrestling contest!" this goes without saying but it was starting to effect Orion's concentration. Afro was now able to make counter-attacks and he began pushing him back farther and farther, then back into the street. he was no longer on the defensive, he pushed his advantage slashing and cutting at every opening in Orion's defense, and with his slow bass guitar he could do nothing but take the hits.

The fight was becoming a spectacle, satan worshipers, droners and hair metal freaks began to flood into the streets bets were being taken and sacrifices (mostly human) were being made for the to-be-victor of the fight

Orion was quickly losing blood. Normally this would be a good thing, but in a fight, contrary to popular belief, you need blood to be alive. Seth was trying to help, but was too distracted with being the least talented member of the group, and after a number of insults about his abilities by Ghosty Ghost, killed himself by jumping into a spike pit (metal score: 26, Emo Score: Infinite), a common site in metal city.

With Orion quickly out of the picture, the interpred heroes thought their battle was nearly won. They knew however, that Inferno was going to be a tough enemy, but through hard work and believing in themselves, they could accomplish anything!

This misplaced optimism was shattered as Inferno stated "just as planned" and started motioning toward the sky using the sign of Satan and muttering:

"lord of dark winds

obscure my soul

burn my eyes

make me see illusions"

Suddenly a gravity rift opened in the sky, and out came the most fearsome creature ever witnessed by Ghosty Ghost, who was a monsterologist. Nergal, a winged lion with the head of a man (http://www.crystalinks.com

/nergal.jpg) descended from the sky. The god of fire and the nether void, Nergal was truly terrifying. To defeat such a metal foe would require an even more metal god on their side, one so strong that even Nergal would be consumed in rage. Afro realized he had to summon The Angel of Death, Jeff Hanneman.

The earth trembled and the clouds burst into flame as Nergal rapidly swooped towards the group. Inferno cackled in the background, confident that only feline death awaited his foes.

"This is bad, guys" yelled Orange over the roar of the sky inferno, as Nergal caught Ghosty Ghost and futilely attempted to bite into him. "Any ideas?"

"If Nergal is the essence of metal," replied Ghosty Ghost, "then we need the least metal thing in existence to cancel him out and destroy him. Duh."

"Well, I've got a pillow with me," said Orange, "that's pretty soft-"

"NO. We need something much more powerful to stop a god as OP as Nergal," barked the Afro Prophet. Then he turned and looked down, staring deep into the cosmic depths of his soul. "I never thought it would come to this, but it's time for the weapon I swore I would never use, no matter what the circumstances." He reached into his backpack, ducking to avoid the claws of Nergal, who had given up on eating Ghosty Ghost by this point, and pulled out a bright, tropic-colored CD. "Kirk Hammett, Jeff Hanneman, Dave Mustaine...forgive this sacrilege I am about to commit," he intoned solemnly, then cast the CD into the air. There was a great flash of light, an explosion of rainbow energy, and suddenly, the damned spirit of Buffett appeared floating in the fiery sky, smiling cluelessly and strumming a guitar as Ghosty Ghost and Nergal shot energy waves back and forth at each other.

"Howdy, y'all," he chattered, "how y'all doin' tonight?", unaware that an apocalyptic battle was going on beneath him. "I'm going to play a little song for y'all...I wrote this back when I lived in a beach hut on the Bahamas, and-"

"OH GOD, MAKE IT STOP!" yelled Orange, driven mad by the sheer idiot energy of the Tropicana Specter. "Even being eaten by Nergal would be better than THIS!"

"Here, take this earplugs!" shouted back the Afro Prophet, tossing him an inky black pair of earplugs. Orange crammed them into his ears, just in time to preserve his sanity as Buffett rambled on and started into his first song.

Ghosty Ghost was on the verge of annihilation as Nergal pressed closer and closer, but when the music began to play, Nergal turned its head, distracted by the dubious rhymes and horrendous cliches that blared from above him. As Buffett played on, Nergal slowly lost itself more and more, and when he started into a second song, Nergal immediately turned and flew upwards at him like a dark, violent comet. The two collided, and there was a massive explosion, sending shockwaves of energy and destruction in every direction; all three of the heroes, even Ghosty Ghost, were sent flying a few feet, but when they stumbled to their feet, the sky had calmed and the ancient god of devastation had vanished. Only Inferno remained, towering over them from across the street, and preparing another volley of gravity blasts, but he was sure to be no easy opponent...

Nurgal had vanished into a symphony of destruction though Afro knew he hadn't seen the last of him. Inferno was about to attack again so Afro quickly grasped Orange's collar and threw him behind cover again (the only real way to save someone) then followed his own example and took cover behind a old half-annihilated table. Afro was extremely weakened now, he was still shuddering and quivering at the mere thought of Buffet's demonic playing capabilities, although so was Inferno. Ghosty had used up almost all of his power left so Orange was pretty much the only one capable of fighting now, because he wasn't as direly effected by Buffet.

Afro looked across the landscape. in-between us and Inferno there was only a few half-buildlings and some dead bodies. Bodies were everywhere (Most of them were bodies of satanic worshipers who committed suicide on the spot by jumping into the big spiked pit.) the others were just conflagrated by the spontaneous combustion caused by hearing non-metal music. it was a pretty brutal sight, too bad he really couldn't enjoy it too its fullest.

"Ok, Orange, do you have any ideas?" Afro asked, he was as genuine as he could be.

"No not really". he said calmly back as half of the corpses were ripped into a gravitational void seventy meters behind him.

Ghosty arrived next to them.

"you got any ideas either?" Afro asked Ghosty.

"heres one, you to kill yourselves so i can rest in peace." he said bluntly.

shut down by the comment, Afro looked to the next void and then waited for the next one. and then the next one. and then the next one. he stood up, he had the idea they needed.

"Alright it looks like Inferno can only fire one gravity blast every twenty seconds, so we just have to defeat him in twenty seconds." Afro smiled at his idea.

"well that sounds possible..." Orange trailed off

"ok why dont you to go ahead and do that, that sounds like a great way to do my work for me." Ghosty said.

"ok then, we'll go after the next blast" afro said

The blast sounded and Afro broke cover pulling out his guitar and charged directly at Inferno. Orange pulled out some drumsticks and followed after him.

The charge was everything heavy metal dreamed it was. epic. in fact, The Sword was in town (they were searching far and wide for more epic tales) and watched the final charge, they later released an album chronicling it making them the best power metal band in the world. that roughly put them at the 500th best band in the world.

Afro and Orange were at full charge, dashing over corpses and smashing in fried skulls (mostly just afro) but the two heroic heros found themselves closer to inferno then they ever thought possible. Inferno didn't believe what he was seeing, he had never encountered such a suicidal charge before.

7 seconds

Afro swung at Inferno, he dodged it with practiced agility. he kicked back and his knee and it met afro's stomach. he keeled over the sheer exhaustion and crushing kick from the well experienced drummer left him defenseless.

2 seconds

Inferno was laughing, he knew he had won, he knew he was the victor, and he knew it was time for a speech.

"there was no way you ever could have defeated me you Priest," he laughed. "i have been in the best Black Metal band for the past thirty years and you know what you don't have, Experience! ha, you make me laugh just walking in here thinking you can destroy this city? Here i am king and I am the god. I AM THE VICTOR!" he yelled, he was now charging the gravitational energy in his hands, his hands began to shimmer with the color of super-dence oxygen. He reached back, preparing to throw the Dm(3)Sa(8) bomb, but he had forgot all about the insignificant drummer right next to him.

"Inferno!" he yelled, "Maybe you were the one lacking experience!"

He threw his only drumstick at Inferno it first looked like it would pass over him but slammed into his forehead with full force.

Inferno's head jerked back and the gravity was fired upwards and much like lightning, it struck the closest target, Inferno himself.

For a moment there was a deadly calm silence Inferno just stood there in the same position, until a small gust began to run at him from all directions

Afro yelled "LET'S GET THE F*** OUT OF HERE!!!!"

Orange didn't need any more hassling, they both darted from the battlefield as fast as they had ran into it.

Behind them Inferno began to shatter, deep obsidian cracks tore through his body and it all started to implode on itself, first his arm then his other, the legs his head then his body. as if a meteor stuck the gravity rebounded out obliterating everything in its wake.

and Orange made it into a trench just as the explosion erupted over them.

"Seriously, why cant you guys just die or something" a familiar voice said to them, it was ghosty and for the first time Afro was actually happy to see him.

Metal City was looking especially metal today. The already shanty skyscrapers were sucked into the gravity vacuum created by Inferno's death (which would later become the "Inferno orphownage for metal orphans"). Most of the sucky drone and black metal bands had died from the intense spirit pressure released from the implosion, unable to take that much talent energy. It would take decades for the residents of Metal City to rebuid and dub the metropolis "Nu-Metal Town" ruled over by Serj Tankian and System of a Down.

Currently however, it was a smoldering pile. Seeing nothing else of notice, the heroes went on their way in search of new stuff so they could continue their quest for...something. As they were leaving town however, a voice shouted "Stop, you've violated the law. Now pay a fine or serve your sentence. Your stolen goods are now forfeit"

"ugh, another fight, we just battles for like 16 hooouuurs" replied Orange, Afro and Ghosty somehow in unison.

"We are representatives of the Freemason NWO Illuminati Coalition World Government (or FNICWG), and we have a sturn policy against destroying entire cities, now drop your weapons!"

"No" replied Afro.

"Jolly good then, we must be on our way, and congradulations on destroying that city, it was an eye-sore anyways..."

"How anti-climactic" replied Ghosty, with obvious disapproval.

"Guess we better go and find some work to do, I have no money, and the poptarts are starting to eat away at my intestinal wall" said Orange.

"Then we are off to Pop-Rock town, so I can calm down with some nice easy killing, and with all the sellouts around there, they are bound to have some money."