Jatla is not a Shithole Read online

  “Get ready to die, goblin!”

  “Son of ficklord.” Hiccup bristles, gains his confidence again, and moves in for an attack.

  Better at playing defense, Hiccup brings his shield up to meet the orc’s first swipe. The big bastard brings his blade down hard, the sound of metal on metal ricocheting down an alley.

  “Get the fick out of here, Hiccup!” Spew Gorge shouts, now at the window.

  Hiccup’s cousin and quite possibly his son – it’s a long story – have been at odds since Spewy hit his rebellious years.

  “I’m trying to save your ass!” Hiccup blocks another strike. An opening presents itself; he smashes his tomahawk into the side of the orc’s thigh.

  “Arrgh!”

  -45 HP!

  “Fick yeah!” Hiccup’s celebration is short lived when the orc brings his free fist up and down onto the goblin’s bald head.

  -62 HP!

  Seeing stars now, Hiccup stumbles backwards. The orc is injured, clear in the way he’s dragging his leg, and his attack goes wide, yet again giving Hiccup an opening.

  The cantankerous goblin equips a great axe he won in a game called Natty Dread. His head still spinning, the goblin leaps towards the orc, his great axe overhead.

  -156 HP! Critical hit!

  The orc’s arm and weapon go flying and the towering bastard falls to the ground, kicking up a cloud of dirt and debris.

  Huffing now, Hiccup gives the orc the Robespierre treatment.

  Instakill!

  Blood squirts from the orc’s neck as his head rolls sideways. Hiccup immediately inventories his weapon and shield, and comes back with a healing potion.

  “Fick, that’s the good stuff,” he says as he throws the potion back, wincing as soon as his heartburn sets in.

  (.)(.)

  Hiccup tosses the potion over his shoulder and burps.

  “What, Spewy?”

  His cousin glares at him from the window as Hiccup makes his way over to the loot bag.

  “Let’s see what you got here, Spewy.”

  “Fick you, Hiccup! That’s my shit!”

  “I just saved all of your fickin’ junk, and this is how you repay me?” He bends over, cringing at the pain in his lower back as he picks up the bag.

  “Get the fick out of that bag!”

  “The fick is this?” Hiccup takes a metal wand out and examines it for a moment. He notices it has grooves along its shaft, and it only takes him a moment longer to realize the wand’s hidden ability. “A telescoping wand, huh? Ha! Not unlike a fickin’ chalupa.”

  He extends the wand to its full capacity, about half a meter, when an idea comes to him.

  “That’s the good stuff,” he says as he uses the wand to scratch his lower back and, inevitably, his ass.

  “That’s my fickin’ stuff!” Now outside the apartment, Spewy approaches Hiccup with a small club in hand. “Now drop it!”

  “Not so fast, Spewy, and if you so much as lift that club, I’ll put my smallest tomahawk where the sun don’t shine. Here’s your loot.” Hiccup kicks the bag over. “The wand is my payment for fickin’ saving your dandy candy ass.”

  “Dandy candy ass? I was fickin’ sleeping when that orc broke into my house and stole all my shit!”

  “Pfft! Sleeping is for pussies, Spewy, gob-napping is for goblins. But, semantics. Fick you, Spewy, I’ve got a real problem here, and that problem is soon to become our problem. So, take back the rest of your loot, but the wand is mine.”

  Hiccup retracts the wand and sticks it in his pocket. Spew Gorge growls at him for a moment, they hold eye contact, and Spew eventually looks away.

  Spew Gorge is smaller than Hiccup, his tunic cleaner, his head full of hair, and his eyes large. Basically, everything his older cousin is not.

  “What’s your fickin’ problem anyway?”

  “In life or in general?” asks Hiccup.

  “Why are you here, dammit!”

  “Fick you, Spewy, don’t make me call your mother.” Hiccup licks his lips. “Although I haven’t talked to Irene in a while.”

  “Don’t you dare bring her into this!”

  “Relax, Spewy, you’re causing a scene.” Hiccup waves his hand at the streets around them. No one really gives a shit that the two goblins are arguing next to the body of a decapitated orc. It is Jatla, after all. “This involves our family. Our extended family, all fifty of our other cousins, uncles, aunts, you get the picture, Spewy.”

  “What involves our family?”

  “An ink shadow threatened to kill off my entire fickin’ family, which means you too, Spewy,” Hiccup lies.

  The smaller goblin’s eyes go wide. “An ink shadow? Fick me, I hate those things.”

  “If Tritania ever had diarrhea stains that could walk, talk, and gamble, they’d be known as ink shadows. Wait, we do have those. Fick it, you know what I’m trying to say, and I’m fickin’ in agreement with you there, Spewy, ink shadows are no laughing matter. That’s why I came to warn you.”

  Spew Gorge shudders. “Is … is there anything we can do to stop it?”

  “Well,” Hiccup bites his lip for a moment, knowing all too well that it will add some tension. “There is one thing.”

  “Fick me, Hiccup, what is it? I hate ink shadows!” Spew Gorge starts to bite his nails. “Fick!”

  “Relax, Spewy, if we can somehow get a parade together, the ink shadow will leave our lineage alone.”

  “A parade?” Spew eyes him suspiciously for a moment.

  “Yeah, Spewy, a fickin’ parade. You know, people marching, maybe a float. Fick me, I don’t know. This isn’t rocket science. Ink shadows are big time poofters. You know this, I know this. Don’t know what kind of poofter would come up with wanting to have a parade in exchange for sparing a goblin family, but that’s the cards we were dealt. Not the only thing he wants either. He wants a day at the spa, a nice dinner, and a nice hotel stay. But you don’t have to help me with that.”

  Spew Gorge’s eyes shoot sparks. “Wait a fickin’ minute, did you say cards? Did you fickin’ lose a bet with the ink shadow?”

  Hiccup takes a step back. “A bet? Fick all that is holy and then some, Spewy, how dare you accuse me of gambling with an ink shadow! Do you, ahem, think I want to lose my chalupa or something?”

  Spew Gorge considers this. “It is true, they do love chalupas.”

  “Real fickers. So a parade, any ideas? And don’t act like you don’t owe me a favor anyway.” Hiccup retrieves his small, leather bound book. “I’ve written down all the favors people owe me in here. Addresses too.”

  “A favor? I don’t owe you shit!”

  Hiccup licks his fingers and opens the book, flipping through the pages until he lands on Spewy’s name. He snaps it shut immediately.

  “What?”

  “My book says you owe me a favor, so consider this that favor.”

  “What fickin’ favor?” Spew protests. “You didn’t do fick all for me!”

  “You just don’t remember, Spewy, you were drunk. But you know what, that’s all beside the point. We need to get a fickin’ parade together. Any ideas?”

  Spew Gorge sighs. “Fine, fick you, but just this once, and only because the ink shadow is after me too.”

  (.)(.)

  “A meetup? That’s the pooftiest fickin’ thing I’ve heard all day,” Hiccup says as he and Spew navigate the cluttered streets of Jatla’s garment district. The sound of rickshaws, sewing machines, frying meat, and young goblins yelling out fabric specials all play their part in the overwhelming nature of Jatla’s Garment District.

  “Meetups aren’t poofty! They’re great places to meet people and make new friends.”

  “New friends? Fick me to tears, Spewy, you’re approaching middle age. You don’t need friends, you need a family! And you can’t start a family by hiding your chalupa in a young boy goblin’s starfish. Get me here, kid?”

  “Shut the fick up about my personal life, and I’m not into young boys, you
fickin’ sicko!” Spewy turns to him, his fists clenched at his sides. “Not everyone wants a family and … you know what, fick you. That’s what!”

  “Ha! Fick you too!” a passing goblin says.

  “Fick you, buddy!” Hiccup shouts back at him. The goblin gives Hiccup the one finger salute as he disappears into the crowd. “Okay, fine, whatever, Spewy, I’ll quit giving you a hard time. Meetups aren’t for snowflakes, especially if you think we can recruit for the parade here. But why the fick is it in the Garment District?”

  “I already told you.”

  “Well, tell me again, dammit.”

  “Because our meetup group is a knitting meetup group.”

  Hiccup rolls his eyes. “You’ve got to be fickin’ kidding me, Spewy.”

  “What’s wrong with knitting? Remember that sweater I gave you on the Empress’s birthday celebration twenty years ago?”

  “Has it been twenty years?” Hiccup asks, recalling the warm sweater with the Thulean word for “manly” stitched on the back.

  “I knitted that.”

  “Fick me, Spewy, that was a high-quality sweater!”

  “Exactly, now be nice to my friends; otherwise, they won’t help you.”

  “If they don’t help me, our entire family dies. Simple as that,” Hiccup lies as the two enter into a cluttered den. “Don’t forget that.”

  (.)(.)

  Hiccup takes another look at the nine people attending the knitting meetup. Their meeting den is shitty, the walls bare and the ceiling covered in water stains.

  “Damn, Spewy, you got yourself some real fickboys here, and what the fick is with the ogre with the rash on his neck? Someone needs to see a dermatologist, am I right?”

  “Fick you, Hiccup!” Spewy turns to the older goblin and lifts his fist.

  “I can hear you, you know,” the ogre growls, his bottom teeth jutting out of his mouth to the point that they’ve made permanent scars on his upper lip. In his beefy hands are a pair of knitting needles.

  “Just let me handle this,” Hiccup stage whispers to Spewy. “Okay, fickers, I’m in charge here. So everyone sit down and shut the fick up. Spewy, get me a fickin’ chair, no, a stool! That’ll be better.”

  “Hiccup, I’m no one’s little fickin’ bitch. Now if you want my help, you’d better be nicer to me!”

  Hiccup places an arm on Spewy’s shoulder. “Sure, kid, you’re no one’s bitch, keep telling yourself that. Now get me something to sit on before I share embarrassing details of your childhood with your friends here.”

  Spew Gorge throws his hands in the air and goes to the back of the small den to find a stool.

  “Listen up, everyone!” Hiccup takes yet another look at the gathered knitters and sighs miserably. There’s the ogre with the underbite, two elves, a drow, a knight in shining armor, a female goblin with curly whiskers hanging from her chin, a boyfriend-girlfriend pair of rogues, a warlock with a heavy skull necklace, and a weretiger wearing a leather jacket.

  “We’re listening,” says the ogre, who has gone back to knitting a maroon scarf.

  “Okay, fickers, your liddle knitting meetup is over. We have some real important shit to do tomorrow, and I have it on good authority that you nine are the best Jatla has to offer.” Hiccup’s stomach grumbles and his ass responds. The female goblin’s nostrils flare as she considers the smell.

  “What kind of important shit, goblin?” asks the ogre.

  “Listen, Ugly, if you and I are going to fickin’ get along, you’re going to need to understand the proper way to address me. The name is Hiccup, short for Hiccupanaratapana. We clear?”

  “My name isn’t Ugly.” The ogre stands, easily twice the size of Hiccup.

  Ogre Level 12

  HP: 579/579

  ATK: 112

  DEF: 206

  MATK: 0

  MDF: 213

  LUCK: 4

  Hiccup rolls his eyes. “Please, sit your stupid ass down. Trust me, Ugly, you don’t want it with me. I’m fickin’ psycho!” Hiccup equips a mallet and a shield. He slams the mallet against the shield to make his point. “Now sit the fick down before someone gets hurt.”

  “We can just log out, you know,” says one of the elves, who has just about the bitchiest voice Hiccup has ever heard.

  “And miss the chance to earn fifteen thousand EXP?”

  Spewy, at the back of the room and approaching the front with a chair, raises an eyebrow at Hiccup. The older goblin doesn’t even need to blink at Spewy – goblins know better than to break the goblin Code of Ethics.

  “Fifteen thousand? Any rupees involved here?” asks the gobliness with her sultry voice and whiskered chin.

  “That’s right…”

  “Licious, call me Licious.”

  “That’s right, Licious. Fifteen thousand EXP and an equivalent number of rupees.”

  Spew Gorge places the stool next to Hiccup and the elderly goblin takes a seat, crossing his arms over his chest.

  “I’m in!” says the drow. The two elves agree and the others start reluctantly to accept the quest.

  Only the weretiger in the leather jacket is suspicious. He eyes Hiccup as he asks, “Why, goblin, have I not received a prompt?”

  “For the love of all that is fickin’ holy, why is it so hard to pronounce my name. Hiccup. Hi-cup. You know what, Simba, fick you. That’s what. Spewy, get this fickin’ hairball out of here.”

  The weretiger tightens his fists and his claws pop out.

  Hiccup laughs. “Go ahead, Simba, make my fickin’ day. Now git. I never liked were-anythings, especially fickin’ tigers. Get the fick out of here!”

  The weretiger approaches Hiccup and the goblin remains sitting.

  “You and I aren’t finished,” he snarls.

  “Like fick we aren’t. For fick’s sake, Spewy, get this poofty tiger banger out of my fickin’ meeting. And what’s with the leather jacket? Auditioning for Grease later? Git!”

  “This isn’t your fickin’ meeting, Hiccup!”

  “Fick, relax, Spewy. Sheesh. Okay, Simba, cool your kitty nuts. Look, you’re in, but that’s if you can keep your claws, your bad attitude, and your leather jacket to yourself.”

  “I don’t need this.” With that, the weretiger exits the room, slamming the door on the way out.

  “Fick, glad he’s gone, am I right?” Hiccup asks the eight knitters. No one says anything; the ogre returns to knitting his scarf. “Someone smelled like cat piss, and I’d bet good rupees that it was that guy. Okay, so the plan. Listen everyone, I didn’t want to tell you outright because I knew that some of you would start spreading rumors, but seeing as how that damn weretiger stirred up the animosity in the room, I’ll go ahead and say it: the Empress is coming tomorrow, and I need you fickers to put on a parade.”

  The female goblin cackles. “The Empress coming to fickin’ Jatla?”

  “What’s so funny about that?”

  “Did you say a parade?” the poofter elf asks.

  “Fick yeah I said a parade. Look, you guys clearly have social anxiety issues, and I’m not just talking about the rogues and the drow. Even though that is the case, a parade is a great way to show the Empress you support her and...” Hiccup’s eyes dart left and right as he tries to remember what he was about to say.

  Spew Gorge steps in. “And a great way to show her that you support her efforts in Polynya and Tritania as a whole.”

  “What? Spewy, what the hell are you going on about? And why the fick are we hanging out with a bunch of...” Hiccup suddenly realizes why he is in the spacious den. “That’s right! So, who’s in? Final headcount. All of you?”

  The ogre shrugs.

  “Good, I’ll see you fickers in the morning then.”

  Chapter 3: The Boner Ointment

  “I can’t believe they all agreed,” Spew says as soon as they’ve left the Garment District.

  Hiccup waves his cousin’s concern away. “All it takes is a little confidence, and a whole lot of lies. You’d
be amazed at what you can accomplish if you just turn up the bullshit by a fickin’ hair. And thanks for saving my ass back there. Goblinheimer’s. It ain’t nothing to joke about.”

  “How are you going to get them the rupees and the EXP?” Spew Gorge asks as they pass under an archway that leads to Jatla’s Red Lamp District.

  Just about anything one could imagine goes down in the Red Lamp District, but that’s not why Hiccup has come here (not that he wouldn’t partake if his younger cousin offered to cover the bill).

  “I’m not giving those fickers anything,” Hiccup chortles. “What? You really thought I was going to give that crowd of sewing snowflakes a single rupee?”

  “Those are my friends!”

  “The goblinita, sure, I’d make friends with her.” Hiccup licks his lips. “But the rest? Talk about some fickin’ losers, especially Simba the weretiger and his leather jacket. Look, Spewy, if you want reliable poof-cakey friends, you should come on over to the guildhall I’m working security for nowadays.”

  Spew Gorge stops and places his hands on his waist.

  “I’m not turning back to see you with your hands on your waist, Spewy.”

  “Hiccup, you’d better make good on your promise. Those are my fickin’ friends!”

  Hiccup rolls his eyes as he turns to his cousin. “Fine, Spewy, I’ll be sure to give them all the EXP and rupees I promised.”

  “Really?”

  “Sure, you have my word. Now let’s get on with it.”

  “What’s next on your fickin’ agenda again?”

  “Now that I’m one step closer to chalupa retention, next is securing a massage, then some grub, then a room at the Golden Swine.”

  “Gee fick, Hiccup, you’re really going all out!”

  A tall drow in boy shorts with a cottage cheese ass struts in front of the goblins. Hiccup traces her melty hourglass body with each sultry step she takes.

  “Never been with a drow,” he says under his breath to Spewy.

  “I don’t support prostitution,” Spew Gorge informs him.

  Now it’s Hiccup’s turn to get offended. “You don’t support prostitution? That’s like saying you don’t support ponytail races! How the hell do you think your mom got pregnant without prostitution?”