Achmed bin Mohmed is dead.

Achmed bin Mohmed is dead.

Shot in the head by a well-aimed bullet from the rifle of US Marine Joshua Jackson,

Achmed bin Mohmed is dead.

A short lifetime ago Achmed bin Mohmed was nobody. A crazed right-wing fundamentalist nutjob with a chip on his shoulder.

Back then, US Marine Joshua Jackson’s superiors had deemed it fit to channel this rage against their enemies.

Now, Achmed bin Mohmed is dead.

But not before entire armies of people exactly like Joshua Jackson had been awoken from their suburban stupor and drawn out to the faraway desert.

For you see, Achmed bin Mohmed had seen through the subterfuge and had decided to fight back.

But now that the armies had served their purpose and Achmed bin Mohmed was dead, you couldn’t help but wonder, had the armies been created because of him, or he because of the armies?

It does not matter now, for Achmed bin Mohmed is dead.US Marine Joshua Jackson will go home to a hero’s welcome. Medals and ovations and drinks and meals on the house. But it won’t last.

For as long as the Joshua Jacksons of the world exist, upright, noble, virtuous, fighting to vanquish the oppressor and end tyranny everywhere.. as long as people like him exist..

The Achmed bin Mohmeds of the world, upright, noble, virtuous, fighting to vanquish the oppressor and end tyranny everywhere.. well, they’ll never really die out either.

The Boy And The Old Man

He liked playing in the dirt. Dirt was fun. The other kids never saw beyond the sand and grime but there was something more to it. There was a whole microcosm of existence. An entire world unknown. Of course, he didn’t know all these words. He just knew that if he sat really still on the edge of the pit he could see a lot of interesting things. Ants building an empire, cockroaches mating… you just had to have patience and you could see a lot of interesting things. He was a very clever young boy this one. Rather a recluse, but clever nonetheless. He’d always known that he was slightly different from the other kids. The clear contrast that this situation represented between them and him was not lost on the boy. They were all over in the corner of the park with the slides and swings making a racket, their mums and dads sitting back, watching them approvingly. The only person who could see him, was some old man sat on a bench a few hundred yards away. He liked it that way. People ask a lot of really dull questions when you were around them. The kids you could probably forgive, but the adults who’d been around for forty or fifty years each… he wondered what their excuse was. He was awoken from his reverie by a unique sight. A couple of Fireflies looked like they were about to mate… he had seen this before and he knew he was in for a treat. Fireflies usually put on a good show when they mate. But as he sit back in anticipation, one of the Fireflies just swallowed the other one. The insects never ceased to amaze. There was so much one could learn from them.

The old man put on his glasses. Age had not been kind to him. You could see that he had led an interesting existence, pockmarked as he was with the souvenirs of battles past. But the life force was deserting him. It was getting dark fast and the only light was from the Fireflies flitting about. He had been watching the boy for a long time, transfixed. Every detail was exactly as he had remembered it. The trees, the darkness, the insects… everything. He wondered if the boy could have had any friends at all. All alone like that in a dark corner of the park. Unlikely; he seemed too wrapped up in his own little world.

The boy was interrupted from his day dreaming by the sight of the old man getting up from his bench. He seemed to be walking towards him. The boy was annoyed. Why would no one leave him alone, he wondered. A wave of contempt swept over him as watched the frail old-timer hobble closer and closer. He hoped he would never be in that particular predicament some day. He hoped someone would put him out of his misery long before he was such a sniveling wreck.

The boy crumpled and fell to the ground. The old man put his gun away and waited for the inevitable to happen. It was the best way, the only way he muttered to himself under his breath. I had to be stopped. And this was the best way. A few minutes later, the old man ceased to exist. He had done it. Saved the world. From himself.

The Great Sandwich Maker

There once lived in a quiet, unassuming man in a quiet unassuming corner of the universe. Outwardly, there was nothing special about this man. The kind of man you’d pass by on the street and think “boy, that’s the kinda man you’d pass by on the street”. But, exactly like the billions of other people out there, he was completely different from everyone else. If there were two things that defined this man, they were sandwiches and marijuana. You see, our quiet unassuming man was a complete and utter pothead. But he also made the some of the best sandwiches ever known to humankind or any other kind. Sandwiches which have been variously described as “Utterly fantastical” and “The best thing since, well, sliced bread”. — But like with all great drug-addled artists, and let no qualms be made about that- this man was an artist, there was a catch. You see, he only made two sandwiches everyday. One for himself, and one for sale to the first person who asked to buy it. He would then proceed to use the money to buy himself some righteous mj and spend the rest of the day baked out of his head.

Now obviously, all this begs the question, why didn’t he flog his talents to a soul-less corporation for all it was worth and retire on the proceeds of the assembly line like any other self-respecting person would do?

Well, blame the drugs, blame the quiet, unassuming nature of his corner of the universe, but the blasted guy had gone and achieved a sort of inner peace, contentment, nirvana, the great up-above if you will. Normally people are all for this sort of thing. They queue up to listen to these people speak and spend crazy amounts of time convincing other people that they too should join the queue and so on, ad infinitum. Messiah types are usually well-loved, let alone a messiah who could craft the perfect ham and cheese. But the problem with our man was that he never spoke. Not much anyways. He wasn’t mute or anything, but stuff like “pass the salt” and “it looks like its about to rain” are hardly considered messiah worthy. In a perfect world, people would’ve realized he was a cut above your average Buddha because he didn’t feel the need to sit under trees bang on about how bloody enlightened he was. But obviously we don’t live in a perfect world and people didn’t realize that or anything resembling it. What they did instead was brand him a pretentious fuck. That’s right. The people, in their infinite wisdom, took probably the only man in the history of time to discover the answer to The question and not feel the need to lord it over everyone else, and branded him a hipster.

Now, one of the advantages of being enlightened is that you tend not to give a fuck about trivial things such as what people think. One of the disadvantages of being enlightened is that you also tend not to give a fuck about the machetes in their arms as they march towards you angrily. Self-realization’s a bitch that way. Asides aside, the people had decided that enough was enough and the time for action was upon them. And what do you do with a goose that lays golden eggs? Why, obviously you rip out its entrails, stick them on a mechanical framework and see if it still does its thing. As evil flash mobs go, this was a pitiful one, used as they were to the oft-referred-to quiet and unassuming nature of life where they lived. And it was no surprise that they failed in their rather lofty mission. You see, no one was really sure what the machetes they carried were for and the only methods of interrogation any of them seemed to know were “asking really nicely” and “with a cherry on top”.

In their quest to unearth the answers to the mysteries of our life or at least get a decent sandwich recipe out of the bargain, it appeared as though the people had failed miserably. But unbeknownst to them, they had actually succeed at a little. Or failed even more miserably. Depending on how you view the situation. You see, their feeble little inquest had produced one definite outcome. Depriving the man of his precious marijuana for a while and thus snapping probably the longest unbroken trip in the history of pot. On the one hand, this had the desirable effect of making him a little less enlightened and a little more stupid and human-like. But on the other, it also had the rather more undesirable effect of making his sandwiches decidedly average. Rather like every Subway 6-inch you’ve ever eaten.