Chapter 160: The Cock of the Walk

Editor: nnpdad

Ain’t found a way to kill me yetEyes burn with stinging sweat
Seems every path leads me to nowhere
Wife and kids, household pet
Army green was no safe bet
The bullets scream to me from somewhere{br}

Yeah they come to snuff the roosterYeah here come the rooster, yeah
You know he ain’t gonna die{br}

-Jerry Cantrell Jr.

Well, that took some balls - to walk into my camp and present himself as the ‘Cock of the Walk.’ To tell you the truth, I didn’t much appreciate it. His sub-chiefs stood up and he was fully announced; it was an annoying series of titles in my mind and it took far too long. At that point, my patience ran short and it was time to set the table.

I looked over at Sheriff and quietly said, “It’s time show them what we got, bro.” With that, I set Brin to ‘Protect’ and both Sheriff and I rose to our feet and our full heights. Sheriff easily had a foot on each of them and probably a hundred pounds or so, also. I wasn’t far behind.

You could see the look in their eyes change instantly. Giants apparently did walk the land and now so did fear.

I slowly walked around behind them as they stood stock still. I stopped immediately behind them and then slowly and menacingly said in my deepest and angriest voice, “I am the Narrator!”

A deep baritone from the massive black man in front of them said, “I am the Sheriff.” Brin, as his input, merely gave us a menacing growl, reflecting his desire to either compete or just to be ‘one of the guys.’

It took me a moment to calculate my next move - not a minute, but just a moment. I was behind them and they couldn’t see me, so I noisily slid my knife out of its sheath, it was an unmistakable sound in the silence following our pronouncements. I then walked back around them and casually took my original seat again. Sheriff followed my example.

All eyes were upon me as I casually picked up my whetting stone and began sharpening my knife.

I took the center stage by doing almost nothing after a tiny show of rudimentary physical force, I had exhibited grace and was rewarded with pompous grandstanding. How did they really expect me to react? I hadn’t started this fight. Everything here was their doing and they couldn’t even claim to have announced or negotiated before the battle.

So I simply sat and sharpened my knife, Sheriff did the same, but damn that dude had chosen a huge blade; it looked more like a short sword. He wasn’t a knife fighter, though it did have an incredible visual effect due to his sheer size. Maybe we should see if we had any research material back home and tribal him up a little more in the future, just a little special effects to add to his already frightening demeanor. Not a bad asset to have with you when you deal with the tribal types; not that we all aren’t tribal types, but hell, most of us can’t even remember the names our own early family tribes.