Chapter Two: LULZocracy

Ring around the rosies
Pocket full of poesies
Ashes, ashes, we all fall down
Nursery rhymes are said, verses in my head
Into my childhood they're spoon fed
Hidden violence revealed, darkness that seems real
Look at the pages that cause all this evil

-Shoots and ladders, Korn

Huey tossed and turned in his bed. He dreamt that Jazmine, the biracial girl next door who was too naïve to live, was following him around the neighborhood asking him to let her teddy bear interview him. Huey had tried everything: telling her the truth about Santa Claus, reminding her that Mr. Rogers had died, telling her that Justin Bieber was a computer generated hologram specifically programmed to exploit the tween girl demographic…okay…that one, he was not sure to be 100% accurate. But in the end, nothing would work.

Huey forced his eyes awake and sighed in relief that it was all just a silly nightmare…until he realized that it was memory of what happened three days ago. The young boy shook his head and without noticing that he was the only person in his room, slowly walked out of it. He then stumbled down the stairs to the kitchen to drink a glass of milk. Upon entering the kitchen, he saw a blue-ish glare from the living room and proceeded to investigate. What he saw was Riley, staying up late and watching reruns of South Park.

"Riley, you know Granddad doesn't like you watching this show! Turn it off now."

"Yeah right. Make me!"

Huey leapt onto the couch and wrestled with Riley for the remote. Mid-fight, the boys heard a strange crackling sound.

"What was that?" asked Huey

"Hell if I know, herb!"

The boys looked out of the window and saw nothing unusual.

"How about we call it a night, Riley."

Huey and Riley woke up and wrinkled their noses at the smell of breakfast.

"Hmm. The eggs are mine!" Riley exclaimed as he dashed out of the room.

Riley beat Huey to the table and gobbled up the eggs and grits.

"Hello, boys. How did you sleep?"

"Fine Granddad" replied Huey as he finally entered the kitchen….hey why are you dressed up?"

"Yeah, Granddad," mumbled Riley in between chomps "What's the occasion?"

Granddad was dressed in his best suit and dress shoes. Once he set the pot down in the sink, he adjusted his tie.

"Well boys, remember that old cousin of mine who used to boast about how much richer he was then everyone else and how he was more successful than anyone in our family could ever hope to be?"

"Cousin Dominic?" asked Huey

"Yup. He dead. Thought I'd save you guys the pain of his obnoxious funeral by telling everyone in the family that you two had school today."

"But Granddad," said Huey, "It's Saturday."

"Yeah well, when Dominic said that our family had no hopes of being as successful as him, he wasn't completely off base. Well boys, goodbye."

Riley dropped his fork in excitement. While still chewing food he managed to exclaim, "You mean we get the house to ourselves? Yeah!"

"What? No! Course not. Sarah Dubois is babysitting you two."

"Aww."

"And she's bringing Jazmine too."

Huey sat in silence while staring at his uneaten food before excusing himself.

"I think I've lost my appetite."

"More for me!"

"Huey! I know that you've been avoiding Mr. Bear but he really needs to interview you so he can get that promotion at his job."

Huey sighed and slammed his book shut. "Why, Jazmine? Why is it so important that I do this?"

"Because, Huey. Mr. Bear is working at the Newspaper Place and he needs an article about domestic terrorism—so he chose YOU!"

"But I'm retired—,"

"It doesn't matter Huey! Just help Mr. Bear out! He has three kids and a wife who's a teacher! He needs to prove to his more successful brother-in-law that Liberal Arts Degrees are just as important as and Engineering Degree."

"Where did you get that idea for a rivalry from?"

"Huey!"

"Fine…whatever."

"Okay, question one…."

Riley pressed the "reset" button and ejected the disk on his playstation 2. He tried to decide between his two most favorite games.

Knock, Knock!

"I'll get it," shouted Sarah from the kitchen,

"No," crowed Huey, "Riley will get it since he is closer to the door. Right, Riley?"

The boy huffed and stomped over to the door. He turned the knob and scowled indignantly at the visitor.

"Who the hell are you? And….and why you dressed like a mothafuckin' clown?"

The man outside of the house was dressed in a ratty, purple pinstripe suit. His lurking body was hunched over in a menacing pose. His face was quite another story. Caked in a fading white powder and with red lipstick that seemed to end where the rippling slits in his mouth began. His eyes were smeared with tarry rings of mascara and his hair was greasy, unkempt, and had a slight tinge of green to them, as if it was dyed a long time ago and the man never attempted to re-dye it.

"Well aren't you a charming little kid," croaked the clown, "Are you by any chance Riley Freeman?"

"Yeah…."

"Riley," shouted the agitated Huey, "who is it?"

"You see Mr. Freeman," began the strange suited man, "I am here about your group on the Facebook. You know….the League?"

"Oh, right. Come upstairs where we can get down to business."

"Riley who is—"

"It's someone from my club, Huey. We'll be upstairs."

"Riley-," Huey was cut short by an annoyed Jazmine.

Upstairs in his and Huey's room, he closed the door so that they could have some privacy. As Riley motioned his bizarre guest to sit down at the small, plastic, children's table, he began to address him.

"So, clown—,"

"That's Joker."

"Joker…. I wasn't exactly thinking that I would get a response so quickly. Especially in person. In fact, why you so interested in it? In fact, how you even know where I live?"

Joker unfolded two sheets of papers from his left jacket pocket and cleared his throat.

"Riley Freeman: 8 years and six months old, J. Edgar Hoover Elementary School….you see where I'm going with this? Your privacy settings are just a tad revealing."

The look of suspicion lessened in Riley once he saw that they were printouts from his Facebook page.

"Fair enough. I still didn't think that I'd be hearing this soon for a group I posted just yesterday."

"I have my sources. I happened to be nearby the neighborhood anyway and I…well….came to the house a bit too soon."

Riley realized that this Joker was the one who was at their house that morning. That thought was almost as unsettling as the fact that every so often, quite frequently, Joker would start licking his lips. Riley wondered if the licking was a habit he developed while his scars were healing. Like how a child's mouth will hurt if there is a cold sore and they feel compelled to keep licking their lips after they talk to attempt to quell the pain. Except that this habit would turn into a subconscious tic that became more and more integrated into his personality every time he uttered a word that pleased himself deeply.

Joker then read off of the second page that he had printed out.

"THIS IS FOR ALL THE REAL TROUBLEMAKERS, CRIMINALS AND STRAIGHT UP VILLAINS OUT THERE! JOIN RILEY'S LEAGUE OF UNHOLY LEGENDZ (LULZ)! NOW!"

"Well, Mr. Freeman," hissed the clown, "I am a criminal as a well as a villain and I do enjoy creating quite the chaos….wouldn't you say that I am qualified?"

"Hell, yeah. As long as you're ready to straight up mess with some bustas heads and make them think twice about thinking, then yeah. You're in."

The man laughed and licked his scars mirthlessly.

"Hahaha. Psychological campaigns? Belligerence? Well this definitely brings me back to when I was a young one. Sure, as long as I can…make some modifications to plans along the way…?"

"Sure. As long as they're good and all"

"Oh believe me Mr. Freeman. They will be good. You are familiar with my work, aren't you?"

"No."

"Really? Not the Gotham City incident?"

"What was that?"

"I…I single handedly forced Gotham city down to its knees, making it submit to the throes of sweet chaos! You….you've never…it was everywhere! It was primetime news for eight months!"

"I don't watch the news."

"The effects are still being reported on in some newspapers!"

"I don't read the newspaper."

"Forget it, just never mind. The point is that I think you will attract an interesting group of people. You see Mr. Freeman, although you may not have heard of me, I am still a very notorious criminal. Why do I do what I do? Well, the money is always a fine and dandy bonus…but I rarely do my job with cash in mind. I am interested in the very same thing that your advertisement promotes."

"Um… what?"

"Oh you know what I'm talking about. The LULZ. That was why you stylized the spelling of "legends", right? So it can have a "z" to fit the idiosyncratic acronym?"

"Uh, yeah. Course I knew that."

"You see, I also do things—things that other people would regard as vile, evil, or just plain sadistic—simply for the so called lulz."

"Uh….oh yeah, like when you wanna sneak into some dude's house and replace his milk with vinegar, his car tires with rolled up black tee-shirts, and slap his ho as a preemptive strike so she won't snitch on you?"

"Well yes…my…you're quite the creative one, aren't you? You see I was thinking of a similar situation…like what if instead of milk, it's the printed money in the National Treasury, and instead of replacing it with vinegar, you replace it with say…one penny for every missing $5,000. Just to really mess with people's heads…huh-huh-huh…it would uh…..cause quite the chaos…wouldn't it?"

Riley shrugged. "Yeah, I guess that's ok…you know, I kidnapped Oprah once."

"Really? You…you did it by yourself?"

"Well…no."

"Oh, oh. I know! You kidnapped her for a ridiculously high ransom, hijacked her show while on broadcast, tied her up, and then you-,"

"Nah…nothing like that."

"Oh. Well…what have you done?"

"I helped stop the Hateocracy."

"That was you? Hmm. Wikipedia said nothing about you…"

"Well, it was me and my brother…but yeah, you shoulda seen it! I round-housed so many of those punks I was called Afro-Samurai Riley in school from then on."

"That's very good. Yes…you see, when I read your group announcement, I knew from then on that you were what I was looking for. You see, just as Stinkmeaner had spawned a Hateocracy, devoted to nondiscriminating dislike, I think you and I could benefit from creating a LULZocracy. With a little mentoring from me and our future league-members, I think that you will turn out just fine and be able to develop those diabolical tendencies."

"Hell yeah!"

Well then Mr. Freeman. I guess that will be it for now, won't it?"

"Yeah, I'll post the date for the next meeting."

"Good. See you around..."

The disturbed clown cautiously left the room and closed the door. As he entered the hallway, he noticed the other black boy eyeing him suspiciously.

"I would hope that you are at least familiar with my work?"

The boy with the large afro maintained eye-contact with the man until shifting his unyielding stare to Riley's door.

"I am. And as someone who knows what you are capable of, I would prefer that you would not be visiting my brother any longer."

The man laughed and lipped his mouth's slits vigorously at the child's demand.

"HAHAHA! You see um…."

"Huey."

"Huey. I'm just a friend of Riley's. Just a friend who is helping him get his little club up and running. As long as he and I are amigos, I think that he should have the last say as to when I am welcome… and when I am not."

Huey's pervasive stare grew colder.

"My brother may be a knucklehead, but he is nothing like you."

"Not yet."

"I think it's time that you left."

The deranged clown creeped down the stairs as slowly as possible—obviously to annoy Huey. Before leaving the house, Joker turned to face the boy and cackled maniacally.

"You need to smile more Huey. You seem like the type that would forget how to smile after awhile. Such a shame since you are too young to be this jaded. Maybe I will just have to carve you a new smile…..aha,Hahahahhhahah…. Hahaha….like a little Jack-o-lantern."

And then he left as swiftly as he arrived