Like sweet music to every student’s ears (besides maybe Arcanus’), the final bell echoed throughout the school, bringing an end to yet another day at Hardires High. Hordes of students elatedly poured out of their classrooms to either go home for the day or prepare for their afterschool clubs or activities.

The Team Arena Squad of Hardires High exited through the front doors of their red-bricked, three story school and walked between the departing buses to begin their lengthy walk down the shoulder of the ten-lane highway. Fenrick’s mood had cooled considerably since lunch, and the incident wasn’t brought up by him or the others.

Cars of all shapes and sizes zoomed past them on the highway. Some of them beeped their horns in recognition of the four pedestrians, who were considered hometown heroes not only in the school, but by the entire city. Caleo excitedly pointed out a ’68 Dwarfwagon Sleipnir—a classic eight-wheeled muscle car that he greatly admired—as it roared by them.

As they looked down the long highway, the skyscrapers that dominated the cityscape stood in the shadow of the much more dominant Cabin Peak, an isolated mountain with a bare, craggy top and forest-covered body. It had stood watch over the city of Hardires since its founding five thousand years ago—and would undoubtedly watch over it for thousands more.

Eventually, the skyscrapers grew and the highway they walked on shifted into a bridge running over a deep, wide gully. The bridge used to be for a proud river that ran through the city but had long since dried up. The four had to pass under the bridge in order to cross the highway and reach the residential district where Zeratron lived. They ran down the steep slopes of the gully all the way to the litter-filled bottom of the dry river bed and were about to enter the shadowy space beneath the bridge.

Fenrick kicked at an empty tin can, repulsed to see so much trash upon the ground. The dry river-bed was not only a place that careless drivers threw trash in, but also one of the hotspots for crime in the city. Fully aware of this, the four didn’t want to be down there any longer than they needed to.

Before they could enter the bridge’s dark underbelly, they heard the sound of an automobile driving up behind them. They turned around and spotted a boxy, orange-colored van heading their way up the gully. It was distant at first, but as it grew into view, they could clearly see past the broken headlight and cracked windshield two large, misshapen heads. The rear bumper of the van sunk so low that it skidded along the dirt, as if immense weight inside the van put major strain on its suspension. By then, the four realized exactly what it was that came up on them.

“Oh gods, not today…” Caleo groaned.

Once it got close enough, the van screeched to a halt in front of them. The driver and passenger immediately jumped out, and the backdoor slid opened. The van contained a crew of shirtless, muscular, green-skinned humanoid creatures. When they all exited, the van groaned in relief as it was relieved of its hefty passengers. They approached the four with cocky, ugly grins.

“Goblin-kin…” Zeratron said lowly, “what could they possibly want?”

“Look what’s strayed onto our turf,” the driver, an orc wearing sunglasses, grunted out. There were five of them in total; 2 orcs, 2 goblins, and an ogre. The goblins, who were the more ancient and primitive of the goblin-kin (hence the namesake) had darker green skin, long ears and noses, and were smaller and scrawnier than their other kin. The orcs’ stature and height were most similar to humans, but even then, were stronger and thicker than most humans could ever dream. Many of them had sizable tusks that jutted out of their lower jaw. One of the orcs had a spiked mohawk, with each spike dyed a different bright shade of color. The ogre—which was by far the biggest goblin-kin (and no doubt the bane of the van’s existence), stood at the back of the group and was almost a full head taller than the orcs—not only that, but this one had two heads.

“Looks like the much-beloved and treasured gladiator team of Hardires High,” one of the goblins said in a raspy, scratchy voice. “How careless of them to wander right into the territory of the Green Street Posse!” it and the other goblin cackled maniacally.

“Yeah… we don’t really want anything you’re offering,” Caleo said to the goblin-kin. “We’re in a hurry and don’t really have time to play with you all,” he explained. They had a few run-ins with goblin-kin in the past, and it never once ended well.

“Oh, that’s too bad for you,” the orc with the mohawk told Caleo. “Cuz like it or not, we’re gonna beat you senseless like the worthless cunts you are!” It bared its yellow tusks and laughed lowly.

“Wow.” Caleo cocked an eyebrow. “Do you kiss your ugly mother with that disgusting mouth?”

“Um, hate to interrupt, Caleo, but I think you should now that orcs nor any goblin-kin for that matter have mothers or fathers or parents of any kind,” Arcanus interrupted.

“Shut the hell up, Archie!” Caleo turned on his teammate. “You just ruined my joke. For once, could you try not to be a goddamn nerd about everything?”

“That’s what I’m saying,” Fenrick blurted. “He just can’t turn it off!”

The goblin-kin quickly grew irritated over the fact that their threat went ignored.

“Didn’t you hear Psycho Hawk?” The lead orc with the sunglasses roared. “What he says is the truth. We’re gonna beat you all down and fuck you silly!” It made another vulgar threat to the four.

“Oh yeah? You and what penis?” Fenrick asked. After a short, heavy silence listening to the cars on the bridge above, both him and Caleo started to laugh hysterically.

The Green Street Posse looked absolutely enraged by the two laughing at their expense. It was no secret that all goblin-kin had no reproductive organs. They were born from much different means than the other humanoid races: from the vast Birth Mire in the center of their homeland of Fluffy Meadows. They grew in the ground like planted seeds and then emerged fully-grown from the muck. Because of this, each type of goblin-kin (goblins, hobgoblins, orcs, trolls, and ogres) are biologically the same and aren’t separated by gender.

The lead orc with the sunglasses pulled a big, rusted knife out of its pants and twirled it around. “How bout I fuck your throat with this knife, blondie?”

Caleo and Fenrick ceased their laughter and turned their attention back to the matter at hand.

Caleo sighed deeply and shook his head, “So, you all really want to do this?” He asked them.

“This and so much more,” the mohawked orc answered and pounded his fist.

“What about you, Ogre, got anything to say?”

“It doesn’t know how to talk,” one of the goblins told him.

“It’s got two brains and two mouths, but can’t talk?”

“Nope.”

“Figures.”

Without hesitation, Caleo made his move and was on top of the goblin-kin gang in a flash, targeting the knife-wielding, sunglass-wearing orc first. He jumped in front of him and bent his knees, lowering himself. When the orc looked down, trying to process the swift movements of the human, Caleo delivered a swift uppercut straight to the jaw. The orc stumbled back a few steps, dazed, but not down for the count.

One of the goblins lunged at Caleo, looking to claw at him with its sharp nails, but it stood no chance against the skilled fighter. When it was within reach, Caleo hammered his fist down onto the back of its head, driving the goblin facedown into the hard dirt. Once the first goblin was down, the orc came rushing back, stabbing at the human with its knife. Caleo had no fear of the sloppy attack; he side-stepped the knife and swatted the orc’s arm away with ease. When the orc was stumbling and vulnerable to attack, Caleo delivered a swift strike to the face that shattered its sunglasses. Those two powerful strikes were all it took to take the orc down, and it collapsed onto the ground.

Fenrick was next to jump into the fray. Inspired by his captain’s fearless charge into mortal danger, he jovially charged towards the mohawked orc with his fist cocked back. He landed a punch right into its green gut, but the orc’s abdomen was as hard as stone. Fen felt his knuckles crack and splinter with pain. He gave a pain-filled yelp and tried to shake the hurt out of his hand, leaving his opponent with an easy opening. The orc swung his massive, meaty fist with full force and connected with Fenrick’s jaw. Fenrick fell to the ground with both hand and jaw throbbing in pain.

Before the mohawked orc could do any more damage to Fenrick, Zeratron was there to defend his teammate. He tackled the orc to the ground with a shoulder spear to the midsection. They both tumbled to the ground in a heap. Once Zeratron powered himself on top of the mohawked orc, he rocked it with a few heavy punches to the face. Dark, bubbling blood erupted from the orc’s pierced nose. Zeratron delivered one final knockout blow that put the second orc out of commission.

Wanting to avoid any further conflict, Arcanus performed a quick hand sign to cast a sleep spell on the goblin that jumped at him. It immediately dropped like a rock onto the dry river bed as if it were a feathery mattress and snored loudly. While the ogre looked around, bewildered over the sudden defeat of its posse, Caleo took advantage. He jumped on the hood of the Green Street van and jumped again into the air and launched a spinning roundhouse kick that connected to the side of one of its bulky heads. The head that was kicked knocked hard into the other head of the ogre. It stumbled around in a daze. “Uwahh,” one of the heads moaned, “Urghhh,” the other one groaned. Arcanus conjured a quick, sputtering fireball in his hands and launched it at the ogre’s massive chest. It exploded violently on impact and the ogre lurched backwards. With a charred mark on its torso, the massive ogre finally fell to the ground with an earth-shaking thud.

Just as quick as it started, the fight between the Team Arena Squad of Hardires High and the Green Street Posse came to an end.

“I almost had him, I almost had that bastard…” Fenrick said as Arcanus aided him to his feet. “Ouch! I think my hand is broken!” He gingerly held his swollen fist in his undamaged hand. “We might need to go to a hospital. This is pretty serious guys; my hand hurts really really bad!”

“Well at least we know your jaw ain’t broken,” Caleo quipped as he stepped over the downed ogre with his hands in his pockets.

As the other three surveyed the scene, Caleo had already moved past the altercation and headed under the bridge. The other three quickly followed suit, leaving the Green Street Posse lying unconscious and bloody upon the ground. The scuffle ended up serving as nothing but a minor roadblock on the way to their destination.

“I’m glad we made it out of there mostly-alright, but I can’t help but feel saddened by what happened back there,” Arcanus said once they came out the other side of the bridge. “The goblin-kin were not always so hostile. At one time, they were actually quite civilized and friendly.”

“Shit, apparently it was ALL fine and dandy before our time,” Caleo said. “The goblin-kin were peaceful botanists that got along with everyone, the elves weren’t an army of racial extremists, and gnomes weren’t a bunch of rabid drug addicts.”

“Indeed, those seemed like quite pleasant days. I wonder what happened that made things go so sour.”

“Well, with the high elves it’s obvious,” Caleo continued. “They just couldn’t stand the fact that humans and elves were marrying more frequently, not to mention the fact that they were producing more offspring together than before. I read an article a while back with a quote from some elf-supremacist that said it ‘damaged the integrity of the pure elven race’ and then shortly after that they went and closed off their borders to all non-elves.”

“I remember reading that as well. Such an awful thing to have happened. It’s been two years since the closing of Sunnymoon I believe; you barely see any elves around these days.”

“I say good riddance.” Caleo spat. “Elves have always thought themselves superior to humans and dwarfs and all the other races. It was obvious even when they tried to pretend that they weren’t. They always looked so pretentious and cocky with their colorful hair and high cheekbones and smug demeanors; I can’t say I ever got along with any of them. A few half-elves I met were decent, I’ll admit, but full ones were always stuck-up assholes. The rest of us can get on just fine without them.”

“Not all elves are like that, I believe. I’ve never met one before, but from what I heard the wood elves are a noble bunch, but are a very private people and probably didn’t greatly oppose their lands’ borders closing as long as the High Elves left them alone.”

“That doesn’t make them any better in my opinion. Just lesser of two evils really.”

“Yes, you do have a point,” Arcanus said as he looked up the side of the gully to find a good way back up. “And to think, when God War 4 occurred it was the Heroes of Hardires—four humans mind you—that saved the elves from being annihilated by Yogg-blah.”

“Sunnymoon being saved by humans… I guess they choose to forget about that part of their history.”

“Gah, I’m so sick of hearing about ‘The Heroes of Hardires’ all the damn time!” Fenrick derailed the conversation. By that time, a noticeable bruise had formed on the side of his jaw. “Heroes of Hardires this. Heroes of Hardires that. It’s all anybody in this city can talk about cause it’s their only claim to fame. It’s mighty convenient that no one ever mentions the fact that none of them were actually born here.”

“That may be true, but it doesn’t change the fact that once the Fourth Great War started, all four of them were citizens here and worked for the Hardires Guard Unit.” Arcanus countered.

Fenrick only rolled his eyes and looked up at the sky, saying nothing else.

“We’re almost there,” Zeratron cut in, driving the final nail into the conversation.

They followed Zeratron up the steep slope out of the dried river and found themselves on the other side of the highway. At last, they were within distance of the residential district. Multiple tall structures stood only a short walk away—some MUCH taller than others.

“So, which one of these is your place?” Caleo asked, looking around.

Zeratron pointed up towards the top of one of the tallest skyscrapers in the entire city—an elite star high-rise apartment complex.

Our four heroes managed to easily overcome the impromptu tussle with the Green Street Posse. Now nothing stands in their way from getting to Zeratron’s pad to watch the newest episode of The Bob and Ziggy Show. But is the Ziggy Ratt from the television show truly the same person that Fenrick encountered in the courtyard earlier? Find out next time on Clubs and Stubs!