"FUCK YOU SOHINKI!" Joven shouted in a heated rage, nearly snapping his controller with just his hands.
"Ha ha! Get wrecked!" Sohinki responded, laughing maniacally at his co-worker's rage.
The cast of Smosh Games were currently in the middle of filming for their Thursday night show, Grand Theft Smosh, where they played GTA V Online. After a number of suggestions, they chose this episode to take part in a 'Parkour' map, which was a Deathmatch where you started with just a Jerry Can and you had to work as a team to get up a series of extremely difficult obstacles to reach a cache of weapons and try achieve the most deaths in the time. Lasercorn teamed up with Sohinki, whilst Joven played alongside Wes. Sohinki had managed to get to the cache first, so he used a helicopter to kill Joven and Wes, lift Lasercorn to the cache and annihilate their opponents. Just that moment, as Joven was about to reach the cache, he was blown up.
"GODDAMNIT LASERCORN!" he shouted at the orange haired 'psycho' of the group. "STOP FUCKING BLOWING ME UP ON THE COURSE!"
"But it's hilarious!" Lasercorn retorted. He was practically laughing his head off. "You're failing so badly, it's embarrassing yet amazing and really funny!"
"You two have an unfair advantage, since you were able to get to the weapons first, so it's unfair!"
"Calm down, Joven," Wes reasoned, laughing in both amusement and annoyance, "both teams had the same chance to get their first, so-"
"FUCK OFF, WES," Joven interrupted, turning to the jacket clad gamer, "THIS IS NOT ABOUT YOU!"
"Woah, Joven!" Lasercorn snapped, putting down his controller. "Don't take your anger out on Wes just because you suck!" Joven's blood began to boil as his hands started twitching.
"Yeah, we're supposed to be a team here and you're biting my head off," Wes added, grateful for the defence Lasercorn gave him, "I've actually managed to get kills this game. What have you done?"
"Besides failing?" The three of them laughed at Sohinki's joke, whilst Joven's body began to tremble vigorously, his face grew red with anger and the table he was at rumbled.
"I think everyone watching can agree," Lasercorn stated boldly, "that this is a world class 'hash tag Jovenfail'!"
And in just one second, with the sound of metal penetrating brick, all sound in that room had stopped. Sohinki and Wes looked towards Lasercorn in shock, who looked, with fear riddled on his face, above him at a knife- a regular, metal kitchen knife- lodged in the wall just above his head. A few of his hairs had been caught by the knife in the wall, while a few others fell down onto the table above him. The three of them followed the direction in which it had been thrown to Joven, whose arm was still outstretched and his body was still shaking in a major rage, his eyes practically red as the tears flowed from them.
"A-are you okay, Lasercorn?" Wes asked after a long silence.
"J-Joven," Lasercorn whispered, nearly crying in fear as he ducked so as not to catch his head on the knife, "w-w-why d-did you d-do that?"
"Do I really need to say why?" he said, his voice shaky and aggressive.
"Joven, you could have killed him," Wes went up to his friend to comfort him, "and you don't sound like you even care!"
"Congratulations, Wesley Johnson, you have correctly answered the million dollar question!" His sarcasm sharply flew across the room to his supposed friend with huge force as he stood up and waved his arms about in an additionally sarcastic manner. "You've discovered that the three of you are all a-grade assholes, so your grand prize is go fuck yourself!"
"Joven, what's the matter with you!" Sohinki yelled at the part blind man he had worked with for over five years. "That's classed as attempted murder, and to one of your closest friends!"
With a swift punch to the face, Joven knocked Sohinki to the floor and silenced him. The scream in pain that could be heard from the fallen man as he hit the floor could be heard throughout that floor, while blood trickled from his nose.
"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" Joven had finally lost it, standing over the fallen gamer. "I'M SICK OF YOU THINKING THAT YOU CAN LOOK DOWN ON ME WHENEVER THE FUCK YOU LIKE! IT'S NOT EVEN JUST FOR THE SHOW, LIKE YOU'VE CLAIMED IT TO BE! IT'S FUCKING EVERYWHERE!" He directed his focus to Lasercorn. "THE SAME GOES FOR YOU, WES, IAN AND ANTHONY, PRACTICALLY EVERYONE! SO NO, I COULDN'T GIVE A FUCK IF I HAD JUST KILLED YOU OR NOT!"
"What's going on?" they heard Anthony, another member of the group and one of two members of the real Smosh, ask as he walked in with Ian, the other member of the real Smosh, and Flitz, another member of Smosh Games. They looked on in shock at the scene they saw in front of them.
"My God," Flitz gasped, "what happened here?"
"Here's what happened, Flitz," Joven, smirking evilly, sneered at his co-worker, "just let me grab a camera." He picked up the camera from his desk, which was still filming, and directed it so it recorded Joven's face. "Smosh fans of the world, here's something new for ya- I QUIT!"
He barged out of the room, shoving the camera into Flitz's stomach as he made his way out of the room. While Flitz and Anthony watched their angry friend leave his job, and his friends, behind, Ian and Wes started tending to Sohinki and Lasercorn, helping them back up to his feet.
"Guys," Ian asked, confused yet terrified, "I think you better tell us what happened. That way, we can decide what to do about him."
While the others sorted that out, Joven ran for his life, heading straight to the elevator. He made sure not to look as the other YouTubers and video makers on that floor gave him strange looks, since they surely heard what had happened. He made sure no one else got in the elevator as he headed to the bottom floor. He got out and headed straight for the door, ignoring anyone and everyone he passed, until he was finally outside.
"So long Smosh Games," he yelled, taking a final look at the building. He made a beeline for the parking lot, desperate to get away from that building which had caused him a lot of misery, despite how much he earnt working there. He got into the parking lot and headed straight for his car, not noticing that he knocked someone over on the way. He unlocked the car door and practically jumped inside, slamming the door behind him. He started up the car and drove out as fast as he could, throwing caution to the wind as he left.
As he did so, Mari, the only member of Smosh Games who had not been in the office that morning, watched him leave, not bothering to get up off of the floor. She just stared at the exit in confusion.
"What the fuck?" she asked herself, slowly standing up and picking up her bags as she did so. "Was that Joven? Something doesn't seem right, I better check he's okay."
Joven kept driving around LA, no clue where he was headed other than away from the office. His grief began to replace his rage as his journey continued. His mind was full of questions, like 'what have I done?', 'where do I go now?' and 'why am I such an idiot?' These thoughts began to distract his judgment, as he nearly drove into another driver, who honked his car horn at him angrily. When the sun started setting, he drove straight to the Santa Monica pier. He didn't even bother to get out of his car- he just sat in the driver's seat and look out at the sea.
'And I'm the dumbest idiot on the planet!' He thought in anger, banging his head on the wheel. 'Now it's just a matter of what happens next! Even if I don't go to jail for what happened back there, I'm basically without a job, so I might as well be dead right now!' He put his head against the headrest of his chair and closed his eyes. He reopened them and looked back out the window towards the sea, which he would have seen was glistening under the setting sun. The only thing he found, however, was Mari right by his car, causing him to scream loudly and flinch backwards.
"Aah!" Mari screamed as well, tripping into the barrier. Joven got out of his car straight away, worried that she had hurt herself, and shut the door behind him.
"Oh my god, Mari!" he moaned. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm fine," she moaned back, rubbing her back, "a little sore, but I'm used to that. What are you doing out here? I've been looking for you for a good few hours now!"
"Oh," he sighed, staring out into the sunset-lit ocean as he leaned against the barrier, "not much. Just needed to do some thinking." He knew he couldn't tell her about what happened- he didn't think she would even care that much about him to go looking for him, so he didn't want to lose her as a friend, since she seemed like the only member of the group who cared about other people, or at least him. "How long have you been looking for me?"
"Ever since you left the parking lot," she explained, copying Joven in leaning against the barrier, "you knocked me over and just drove out like you were on the run or something."
'So that's the reason she came looking for me,' he thought, not even trying to look at her, 'she doesn't care about me at all. She just wanted to make me look bad for knocking her over. I bet the others told her what happened and she's just come to hand me in.'
"Oh, sorry about that," he let the tears fall from his eyes, just turning his head to stop her from seeing them fall, "sorry that I've been such a terrible friend for three years. Doesn't really matter, you won't have to put up with it for long!" Mari's eyes widened- she couldn't believe that her friend would think like that, and then saying that he was basically leaving deeply hurt.
"Joven," she placed her hand on his shoulder, trying to get him to turn around to face her, "what are you talking about? You've been a great friend for me! And what do you mean 'I won't have to put up with it for long?' You're not... leaving, are you?" The silence answered her question, causing her to gasp. A couple of tears started forming in her eyes. "I can't believe this. Joven... why? Why would you want to leave?"
"It's just," he tried to explain it to her, but couldn't find the words, "well, I mean, y'know what it's been like. I," he paused, looking down to his feet. He noticed the luggage bags in her hands and stopped. "Why do you have bags?" She looked at him funny when he finally turned to face her. "I thought you were staying with Peter all week. Actually, what are you even doing here? Shouldn't you be with him right now?" It was her turn to turn away from Joven so he couldn't see her tears. Joven's eyes widened as he realized what this meant. "Oh my god. Mari... he- he left you... didn't he?"
She made a muffled whimper and gave a tiny nod as her tears fell onto her shoes. Joven was shocked- he couldn't believe that her boyfriend of five years would break up with Mari, especially since Mari was, pretty much, his best friend and he thought that she was such an amazing girlfriend to him. Slowly, he placed his arm around her shoulders and pulled her into a hug, allowing her to sob into his chest. She dropped the bags so she could wrap her arms around his back.
"I-I'm sorry I di-didn't let you guys know about this," she sobbed, her tears thoroughly dampening Joven's Batman t-shirt. "I g-got there on S-Saturd-day and he t-took me to dinner, but h-he told me th-that he was fa-falling for someone else!"
Joven just stood there, wide eyed and mouth ajar. It hurt him to hear Mari in such pain- even he was crying now as he cradled her head under his chin.
"Mari..." was all he could get out. They just stood there in silence, not even bothering to move. The only sounds they could here for moments were the waves crashing, cars driving by and other people on the pier. As soon as Joven's phone began to ring, he took it out of his pocket, not letting go of Mari. He looked at the contact name- 'Anthony'- before turning his phone off completely and putting it back in his pocket. "I am so sorry that this happened to you."
"Don't be," she whispered in response, her tears slowing down, "it's not your fault. Oh God, look at me. I'm a mess."
"Mari," he soothingly cooed, moving his head and bending down so he could look her in the eyes, "if he thought he was doing the right thing by leaving you, he's an idiot. You are deserving of only the best and don't ever think otherwise." She laughed slightly, smiling with a blush on her cheeks.
"Damnit Joven," she giggled, "you always know how to make me feel better." She wiped her tears away as she let go of the hug. "Now that you've helped me, it's my turn to help you. Why do you want to leave?"
After a sigh, Joven locked his car, then walked with her to a bench on the pier. Once they got there, he explained the whole story to her, from the moment they started recording the video to the moment he drove out of the parking lot. When he was done, he looked at Mari, who was just looking down at her feet.
'Seems about right,' he thought, sighing as he looked down at his own feet, 'and so goes the only real friend I had at Smosh Games.'
'No, Joven,' Mari thought, shaking her head as she started to get teary eyed again, 'I knew this annoyed you, but this? I never thought this would even be possible.'
"Listen," Joven said, breaking the silence, "I should get going. I need to go home, get something to eat and wait for the cops, I guess." He stood up and started to walk away, but he felt Mari grab his hand. He sighed, thinking that she wanted to hand him in right there and then, but he didn't expect what she was about to say.
"Joven," she stood up, her voice soft and shaky, "you are not going to jail. Do you know why?"
"Why?"
"Because we're heading back to the office and you're all going to apologize to each other."
"WHAT!?" Joven shouted, attracting the attention of others on the pier who shrugged it off. "Mari, I mean no offence by this, but how the hell do you expect THAT to happen? After what I did, I'd be surprised if they haven't got the whole security team set to stop me."
"Look, Joven," she argued, grabbing his other hand and standing up, "I'm not going to just blindly say what you've done is right. I'm surprised you would even throw a knife!" Joven looked down at his feet in shame. "But," he perked his head up slightly, "I also know that this isn't the real you. I know that, on any other given day, you would have been able to shrug it off, continue with the game and finish the recording like nothing happened, because that's the sort of person you are- strong, reasonable and forgiving." She laughed a little, thinking back to a favourite memory of hers. "Although, you may have to take another waxing for this."
"Oh God, don't remind me of that!" he laughed, causing a laughing fit between the two. "Look, I'm willing to make up for what I've done in whatever way possible- that's not the issue. What is the issue is getting the other guys to forgive me."
"I have my ways," she sneered, smirking widely. They then heard a loud rumble, emanating from Mari's stomach. "Oops," she scratched the back of her head, a blush appearing on her cheeks, "I forgot to have lunch earlier. Oh dear."
"Why don't I treat you to dinner?" Joven offered, smiling at her intently. "It's the least I can do since you're actually willing to help me. Plus," Joven practically mirrored Mari's blush on his own face, "I... I know you only just broke up with Peter, but I've... kinda liked you for a while now and I'd really like to go out with you." Although Mari's blush grew from the thought that Joven liked her, she nodded. "Come on," he wrapped his arm around her, "I know a great French place just a few blocks from the office."
"Sounds great," she replied, putting her arm around him as he led her to his car.
After they enjoyed a lovely, quite romantic dinner at the restaurant Joven knew, Mari convinced Joven to stay at her place for the night. Joven slept on the couch and in the morning, following breakfast, they headed to the office. Joven dressed up smart in a white shirt with black trousers and shoes, knowing that he had to make an impression if he wanted any chance at forgiveness. Mari, who was sat in the passenger seat, wouldn't admit it, but she thought Joven looked very handsome dressed like that.
"Alright," Mari asked as Joven parked the car, "you ready for this?"
"Not really," Joven replied, laughing slightly, "but there's no better time like now, I guess."
"Don't worry," she gave him a light kiss on the cheek, "you'll be fine. I'm right here for you, don't worry."
"Thanks Mari," he returned the kiss, only on her lips.
They headed out of the parking lot and into the building through the connected elevator. As they headed to their office, Joven got a few strange looks- he had expected this, but it still made him uncomfortable. Once they got there, Mari went in, welcomed by the other six members of Smosh Games with greetings. This all stopped, however, when Joven walked in. Joven never looked at any of them- just his own feet- as he made his way to a seat.
"Say, uh, Mari," Flitz asked, breaking the silence, "could you care to offer an explanation?"
"Well, after Joven's issue yesterday," she began, explaining what had happened after he stormed out of the office, "I went looking for him, since he bumped into me."
"Hey, wait a minute, Mari!" Ian interrupted. "You're back! You weren't meant to be back until tomorrow!" Everyone, but Joven, glared at the bowl haired YouTuber. "Oh, wait, wrong thing to focus on."
"Anyway," Mari continued, going over everything that happened from them bumping into each other outside the pier to them coming to the office. She left out the part about her explaining she broke up with Peter and about her and Joven going to dinner, since they didn't even know she broke up with Peter. "Now that you know what's going on, Joven, I'll leave you to say what you have to say to Sohinki, Lasercorn and Wes."
"What about us?" Anthony asked. "Are we not important?"
"Just because it's called SMOSH Games doesn't make everything about you two," she nagged at them, pulling them into another room by their ears, "same for you Flitz, so get in here."
Flitz followed the whining duo and Mari into the other room, closing the door behind him. For a while, Sohinki, Wes and Lasercorn just stared awkwardly at Joven, and each other from time to time, whilst Joven just looked down at the table he sat himself at.
'How do I start this?' he asked himself mentally. 'I didn't think I would even get this far.' He twiddled his thumbs for a bit, thinking about what to say. Eventually, he just sighed and looked at his co-workers, something he hadn't done in nearly twenty four hours.
"Look, guys," he finally started, getting them to look at him again, "I'm really sorry about yesterday. I really don't know what came over me. I never thought about what I was doing- my anger just sort of consumed me. I'm not expecting you guys to forgive me straight away- heck, I didn't even think I'd be allowed back in here- all I'm asking is a chance to say I'm sorry. If you do ever decide to forgive me, I am prepared to do anything to show how sorry I am, up to but not excluding waxing."
He achieved little more than a loud chuckle from Lasercorn. After that everyone went silent again. Joven looked down at the table in front of him, while Wes, Sohinki and Lasercorn looked amongst each other. They weren't sure which way to go from there- the path that takes them back to where they were before the whole incident or the path that lead to a seven man (and woman) Smosh Games.
Sohinki sighed, breaking the silence. "Look, Joshua," he finally spoke, "I really want to forgive you. Seriously, man! It's just, I never thought that your 'rage'," he showed his exaggeration with air quotes, "would become... y'know, this, man! I saw a doctor yesterday and he said that my nose was almost dislocated!" Sohinki pointed at his nose, which had been plastered up and was purple with bruises. The sight made Joven wince. "And Lasercorn, after you left, he was shaking for half an hour."
Lasercorn just nodded, not wanting to remember the events of the previous day. He looked over at Joven, seeing tears form in his eyes behind his glasses. It surprised him to see such emotion from the man who was seen as the most emotionally stunted- except for his rage- of the group.
"I never thought that one of my closest friends," Lasercorn reiterated, "who I work with everyday, would turn on me like that. I had never come quite so close to death- not when we did the zipwire, not when we were in those hamster balls, not on Ninja Warrior, never. I really felt as if you wanted me dead when I saw that knife." Joven could be heard sobbing now. "Yet, I get why you did it." Joven looked up, allowing everyone to see his sad face. Wes, who just watched them say what they had to say, was starting to cry as well, with Lasercorn and Sohinki on the brink of tears.
"Joven," Wes stated, attracting everyone's attention, "if you had spoken to us, we would have settled down with the jokes. We're not monsters- we care about how you feel! Normally, we've just seen you walk away like nothing happened and I've always felt like, 'wow, that takes him a lot of guts to put up with all this'. I would never have managed to do as well as you have."
At this point, Joven couldn't hold back. He leaped up and tackled Wes into a tight hug, crying harder than ever expected.
"I'M SO SORRY!" he yelled through tear, his words wobbly from emotional pain. "I WOULD NEVER DO ANYTHING LIKE THIS TO YOU OF MY OWN CHOICE AND I NEVER WILL!"
"WE'RE SORRY TOO, JOVEN!" Wes cried hard as well. "WE DON'T WANT YOU TO LEAVE!"
Sohinki and Lasercorn, who had been fighting their tears back the whole time, let go. Sohinki approached the two in a more hesitant manner, slowly approaching them and wrapping his arms around, while Lasercorn just did the same thing as Joven.
From outside, the others could hear everything- hell, so could everyone in the building. Anthony, Flitz and Ian looked gobsmacked, wide eyed and open mouthed- they never expected such emotions to reveal themselves from the four- while Mari looked somewhat heartbroken at the pain her friends were in.
"That is them, right?" Flitz whispered, not changing his expression. "It's not some tape recording?"
"I don't think so," Ian whispered back. "I think aliens took over them!"
"Or they've been hypnotized, blackmailed, held hostage, maybe even-" Anthony rambled on until Mari shut him up with a soft punch on the arm.
"Of course that's them, you doofs," she smiled, teary eyed, "I think they may be able to get past this."
Nearly fifteen minutes later, the four guys emerged into the main gaming room, eyes slightly puffy. Joven had his arms around Wes and Lasercorn in a friendly manner.
"Well?" the three guys and Mari asked at once.
"Looks like I should get back to work," Joven answered, receiving cheers and applause in response. Everyone shared a group hug, welcoming their 'blind' friend back into the group. After Anthony explained what Joven needed to catch up on and explained that they would celebrate later that day, everyone but Mari and Joven went into different rooms, getting ready for the Game Bang. "Thank you so much, Mari," he praised her, holding her hands gently, "this is all down to you."
"Don't be silly," she replied, blushing at his tender grasp on her, "we need you. All of us."
"And I need all of you too- especially you." He placed a soft kiss on her cheek, before she skipped to her desk. Joven watched her skip away, before heading back to his desk. On the way, however, he heard a comment that he knew he'd hear again.
"Update the Wikipedia profile," Sohinki said, leaning against a wall not far from where Joven kissed Mari, "Marishire is real!"
THE END