Fire Will Have Its Way

(From Left) Medusa Rothschild, Three Extremely Tampa People, Prescott Bush IV, and Rex Grossman I

When Prescott Bush IV first walked into the Chamber of Encumbrance in the GrossmanSachs offices deep beneath 666 Wall Street, he didn’t know what to expect. He had known of the room for years, of course, as all senior staff at GrossmanSachs heard rumors of its uses, both to reward and to punish. And nobody could forget what happened to Medusa Rothschild. Poor Medusa.

Times were strange at the G0dbank, as they often are. Time travel makes it hard to know for sure how long embattled Sexg0d Rex Grossman had been on the run. The Grossman 2012 manhunt campaign certainly seems to have stopped at nothing. Many speculated the disappearance of Grossman was the beginning of the end for the bank of blood and time.

If you're reading this, you are the resistance. And a total failure.

Bush took it the hardest. He wanted to merely watch Santana Moss get 2 catches for 18 yards and happily return to his gangrenous limb collecting, but he couldn’t. Every time he saw Greg Olsen get open across the middle, something came alive inside him, something that he rarely felt unless Night Court reruns were on. But as quickly as it came, it was gone. Because Kyle Orton was charged with getting the ball to Greg Olsen, and life was empty and meaningless.

So he sought distraction. He would fill his Sundays with his favorite hobby: time-travelling practical jokes. But when even popping out of unearthed tombs blasting Here I Go Again by Whitesnake while wearing nothing but his favorite codpiece, “Cuttlefish of Cthulu” made famous by GWAR didn’t make him laugh, he knew there was no hope.

Once Howard Carter had this thing staring back at him, any curse was welcomed as long as it brought swift death.

He was lost, and his very public unraveling didn’t help his standing with the G0dbank. After his third nuisance arrest for standing outside Johnny Knox’s duplex holding a boombox above his head, he was demoted from acting president. His response was sadly predictable: he tried to fire the death ray straight into the Earth’s core in hopes of destroying the planet. It didn’t work, because the heat level was set to SLOW COOK RIBS and not THE WHOLE GODDAMN JETS TEAM DURING VICK’S KENNEL’S CHAMPIONSHIP RUN.

After trying to destroy the earth, Bush was congratulated profusely by the board of directors at GrossmanSachs for his villainous enterprising, but publicly, they could no longer be associated with the only man Dick Cheney ever let watch Videodrome with him.

Cheney used to always ask, so who's the cigarette then? And start laughing maniacally.

With no job prospects whatsoever, Bush was forced to take the most demeaning work imaginable, as Secretary of the Interior in Trump’s administration. It was difficult even getting out of bed in the morning, knowing he was only the 9th ranking Nazi in the White House. He would lie awake ashamed at what his grand grandfather would think. He knew he would hear soon enough when the old man is re-animated for the Pokemon Wars.

You hear "This Used to Be My Playground" by Madonna and don't know what to feel.

He wasn’t meant to do whatever the hell the Secretary of the Interior is supposed to do. He was meant to lead, or at least to take orders from someone really fucking awesome like The Caretaker himself. When he would be out feeding deer or petting grass or whatever hippie shit his job entailed, he would be routinely haunted by the same questions. How did Mo’Nique know there was a gaping hole for MJD to find in his beloved Bears defense? How could a series of Chinese Generals out-trade him when he had a fucking time machine? Who the fuck is Dr. Heinrich Odom? Why would anyone name a team Skins All the Way? Did El Mundo Pequeno fake Philip Seymour Hoffman’s death to distract people from Gronk’s bizarre suspension? Why did Beanie have to steal that playbook? Why did the G0dz take Jahvid Best up to heaven the instant he ingested that third power pellet? Was Eric Decker’s sexuality a cover for waiver wire antics? Did WOPR even lift, bro? How could anyone get away with harboring a magi? Couldn’t he just be like Al Bundy and not give a shit?

At these prices, you can't afford not to get kicked in the nuts for five dollars just to stay competitive.

That was the one. That was the question that haunted him the most. Why did he have to care so damn much? And when he opened the door to the Chamber of Encumbrance, he hoped the answer would be staring right back at him.

The chamber was a large, empty, stone room, with a single black desk. Bush immediately felt a sense of deja vu, but he knew he’d never been here before. Why did it look so familiar? Then it hit him. This was Al Pacino's office in The Devil’s Advocate. At first, Bush thought this was very strange. Did they make up the chamber to look like a set from a fairly forgettable late 90s movie? Or did the makers of the film somehow know what the chamber looked like, and base their set off that?

A screengrab from the first DVD Bush ever owned, because it came free with his DVD player. Coincidence? He also got Sphere and never watched it.

He walked over to the desk, and forget why he was there for a second because he was thinking of how hot Charlize Theron was in that movie.

WAIT A MINUTE! He stopped in his tracks. Did someone yell that or was it in his head? No, okay, it was in his head. Why did he just scream internally? He thought it through, and a smile crept on his face. Because holy shit. If this is the set from Devil’s Advocate, and this isn’t my office, but I’m walking in it. Doesn’t that make me Keanu Fucking Reeves?

It was the greatest feeling he ever felt. His powers were limitless, he felt like if Keanu Reeves was in Limitless, and then took the super Adderall with him into the Matrix. He felt that power surging through his arms, he was ready to fight a goddamn tiger or a mountain named after a tiger, or whatever, anything that--

The door to the chamber opened, and Bush turned around, powerful and unafraid. But what he saw immediately took that strength away. It was Keanu Reeves.

“Oh, hey man. Didn’t know you were in here. Let me know when you’re done; I like to come in here and think sometimes.”

More pertinent than ever.

And just like that, Keanu was gone. And so was Bush’s confidence. He wanted no part of any of this. It all just hurt too much. He wanted to just go back to his moon bunker and watch alien porn. He was such a joke. He couldn’t even get it up with the aliens whenever he had the chance, so he just watched the porn. He knew the self-cuck is very common among Nazis, but it didn’t take the shame away.

He wasn’t fit to lead GrossmanSachs, maybe he never was. He just wished Rex would come back. He knew the stresses of competition proved too much for the Sexg0d, but what made anyone think Bush would be better equipped to handle the crippling regret of a poorly played flexback?

Just play him at flexback, what could go wrong?

No. He wouldn’t do it. He couldn’t do it.

He sat down at the desk in the Chamber of Encumbrance. There was nothing here for him. What is the point of this whole damn room, he thought? What a waste of blood and time. He opened all the desk drawers. Nothing. Just more empty bullshit. Were there desk drawers in Devil's Advocate? Did it matter?

Wait.

There’s something.

A single cigarette. Strange. He only smokes stiizi now. He doesn’t even have a lighter. It must be meant for him, though, right?

He picks up the cigarette, rolls it over in his hand, contemplating its heft. Then he saw it. On the cigarette were written three words in Sanskrit. He translated them immediately in his head, but wasn’t sure what they meant. He kept saying it over and over again. But every time he said it, it made less sense. But there they were, three words, clear as day:

MUST JOKINGLY CARE.

But what does it mean (dot com)?