It Has Come To This

            “So, it has come to this, eh?” Pock remarked, as he backed himself against the edge of the cliff. “I can’t help but feel like I’m trapped in a sequence from the Lion King. Do you feel that way, Han? Can you smell the déjà vu, the law suit coming our way?” He reached the edge of the cliff, and couldn’t help but sneer at his nephew, Han. What a pitiful child he had been. Now he thought he was all grown up, and could play with the big boys. How sweet.

            “What the hell are you babbling about? You killed my father when I was a kid, blamed me, and now all these years later, you want to talk to me about some stupid kids’ movie? Do you know how much crap I took from other kids until I learned that the Hitler Youth cap you gave me isn’t socially acceptable here, or anywhere else that ISN’T your house?! When people only know you as ‘Nazi Boy’, you don’t feel very welcome in the foster home, damn it!” Years of ridicule swept back through Han’s mind, making his hatred of his uncle that much more intense. The only two friends he had from his foster life, Tim-Bob and Paul, had been his only solace during that time.  “I still can’t believe you agreed to go on this safari with me. What did you think was going to happen? That we would kiss and make up?”

            “That did cross my mind, I’m not going to lie about that.  How could I pass this opportunity up, though? It’s Africa, and you’re my nephew! Sure, we’ve had some difficult times between us in the past, but I thought surely we could work past that if we killed some hippopotamuses.”

            “It’s hippopotami, you jackass!” With that, Han raised his hunting pistol and fired away at his uncle in a blind fury until he heard the gun’s empty click for a few seconds.  As his uncle fell from the top of the cliff, Han couldn’t resist shouting down at him “You could have lasted a bit longer, but that grammar mistake was the last straw, asshole!!” Suddenly, clouds zoomed in from all sides, and a spontaneous thunderstorm erupted around Han. “Oh, great. Now it’s raining. The hippopotami are going to be back out soon.” He ran back to the rented Land Rover and drove away from the crime scene as inconspicuously as possible while in a Land Rover. “Why do they only come in white?” Han asked himself as he tried to be sneaky, which wasn’t easy while driving a large, white, English brick on wheels.

            As he drove away, he saw three odd looking natives walking towards the cliff with expectant looks in their eyes. There were two men, and a woman. The woman and one of the men looked intelligent and purposeful, but the other man was in a violent giggling fit, and Han wasn’t sure how he could walk and laugh that hard at the same time. The others hit him every once in a while, seemingly in an attempt to shut him up, but he only laughed harder, until his giggling grew to a howling fit of laughter, and he couldn’t walk anymore.

            “Now that I think about it,” Han said to no one in particular, “this does seem oddly familiar.”