"So," Pickles muttered, lighting up a cigarette and sitting on the edge of his mattress, "yer havin a sexual identity crisis, eh?"

"I thi…yeah," said Nathan gruffly, slumping down on the floor and leaning against the bed. "You got another one of those?"

The drummer handed down his own cigarette and lighted another. Nathan took a grateful drag.

"So who's the lucky gal?"

"Don't fuckin joke about this, asshole."

"I'm not jokin. Do I know 'im?"

"Better than you think."

"Oh shit. It's not one 'a the guys, is it?" He took the silence for a yes. "Jeezes Christ on a pogo stick, Nate…"

"It's not like I planned this!" Nathan growled. "It just-"

"Sorta happened? Yeah. That's how it works. Friggin sneaks up on ya like a mangy hyena in the dead 'a night, next thing ya know yer bein' dragged across the plains by a whole pack 'a the snarlin' fuckers and-"

"Wait. So you're sayin'…a bunch of fags are gonna kidnap me and drag me outta bed in the-"

"Nate'n. Quit while yer ahead." Pickles puffed smoke like a chimney. "Okay, listen. Yer insecure about yer manhood."

"I am?"

"Yeah. And ya wanna reestablish yer dominance with the opposite sex."

"I do?"

"Yeah. An' the best way to do that is ta get married." Pause. "To a woman."

"I'm not getting married. Marriage is totally lame and not metal."

"It's brutal."

"I don't think that would exactly solve my problem."

"So fuckin what?"

"You really want some bitch queen from Hell lording over Mordhaus? 'Cause that's the kinda woman she'd be."

"Ah, just keep 'er in a pen outside. She'll be fine."

"I'm not getting married, Pickles."

"D'ya not like girls 'r somethin'?"

"Yeah I like girls. I like 'em a lot."

"Got references?"

Nathan flicked ashes all over the floor. "Do the words 'high school cheerleading squad' mean anything to you?"

"Hm. I see. But ya like guys too?"

"I DON'T KNOW, MOTHERFUCKER. THAT'S WHY I'M HERE."

"Alright alright, jeez. Take a chill pill, Nate'n, Gad." Pickles wedged his cigarette between his lips and reached down to steal his pal's composition notebook out from under his arm. Nathan was too angsty to care, letting Pickles flip nonchalantly through the pages.

"Hm," he muttered. "This stuff looks pretty heavy. Y'on anything there, ol' buddy?"

"Actually yeah."

"I can tell. Last time ya wrote somethin this brutal you was trippin so bad it took us an hour t' get ya down from the chandelier."

"You'd be freakin out too if an ocean of blood wanted to drink you."

"Did we ever find out how ya got up there?"

"Never did."

Silence. Smoke wafted through the stale air. (Why does it smell like cat pee in here?) Papers rustled. "So. Have ya said anything t' Skwisgaar yet?"

"Huh."

"Ya haven't told 'im?"

"Told him what?"

"…he is the one ya gotta crush on, right?"

"FUCK NO. How could-"

"Really? Wow. I thought fer sure-"

"-say that kinda shit, I'd have to wait in line to fuck his stupid-"

"Oh. Gad…damn, Nate, I thought Skwiss was bad, but Murderface?"

"IT'S NOT MURDERFACE EITHER, DICKHOLE."

Pickles was absolutely still. "Toki. Toki? Ya think yer fallin in love with-"

Nathan pinched the bridge of his nose. "Please just. Shut up now. Thanks."

"Wow. I jest…wow. I totally did not see that comin."

"Welcome to the club."

"Seriously?"

"Pickles, if you make me say it I am gonna punch your teeth right down your throat, and you will be shitting fillings for-"

"Okay okay, I believe ya. Jest. A little surprised is all. So uh…how'd it happen?"

"When we went to feed the rats on Saturday."

"Ya mean when he fell down an' creamed 'em all?"

"Yeah."

"When he broke like every friggin bone in his body?"

"Yeah. I can't get that image outta my mind."

"Details?"

"Blood. Gore. Rat innards. The way he was screaming at me. Pissed as hell. Fuckin bone sticking out of his arm." Nathan put a hand to his forehead. "I think it was the hottest thing I've ever seen."

"WOW. That is interesting."

"Shut up."

"I mean it. So when Toki was bein' all gross-lookin, that's when ya was most attracted to 'im?"

"Yeah. But see, it's not just that."

"Yeah?"

"He came to my room tonight."

"Aw hell."

"Came in, sat on my bed."

"Aw hell."

"Raided my stash, got into my whiskey."

"Aw hell."

"No blood, no gore, no rat shit. Just that little bastard…getting drunk on my bed."

Pickles tapped his ashes and said without blinking, "Ya shoulda fucked 'im."

"…eat shit and die, Pickles."

"I'm serious. He'da never remembered. He's not the sharpest knife in the drawer."

"He's foreign, you idiot. Not mentally retarded."

"Jeezes. Yer defendin him already. This is worser 'n I thought. This might actually be love."

"…FUCK."

"It ain't nothin' t' worry about, every guy has a gay moment in 'is life."

"When's yours gonna end?"

Pickles' expression slid off his face. "That's right, Nate. Go ahead n' push me. I jest can't wait t' hear what the rest 'a the band has t' say about yer little case 'a Toki Fever-"

"Alright. I take it back."

"That's what I thought."

Silence fell again.

"The fuck am I gonna do, Pickles? I can't go on like this. I can't even fuckin look at him anymore."

"Ya need t' get 'im off." Smirk. "Yer mind, that is."

Nathan growled under his breath.

"Write a song about 'im. A love song."

"Wouldn't that just make it worse?"

"Not if it was the shittiest song in the whole world, the stinkin'est piece 'a crap that Dethklok ever produced. Put alla yer love n'queer little mushy feelings inta that song, we'll play it, fans'll be pukin' their intestines out through their noses, an' that'll be the enda that. When ya learn t' associate negativity with that song—a song about yer love fer Toki—ya won't wanna think 'a him that way no more."

It took a while for all this information to sink through Nathan's dense, thick and practically impervious skull, but it did. After a while. "Wow," he said flatly. "That's pretty cool. I didn't know you were so smart, Pickles."

"I'm not," said the red head modestly. "I'm jest really drunk."

And so it came to pass that Nathan Explosion would write a love song, the shittiest metal love song of all time. He thanked the Cucumbrian Wisconsinite of Inebriated Wisdom for his advice, and crawled into the Mordhaus lobby elevator to sleep off the drugs coursing through his bloodstream.

The very next evening he arose, fully refreshed after a nice high, and spent two hours in the shower heaving bile out through his nostrils. When he was at last back to his usual borderline-functional condition, he returned to his bedroom and did a quick scan of the premises. No Toki. Good. But the bad part was that that son of a bitch had drunk his entire stash of personal liquor. Not good. So Nathan decided to go find the rest of the band and mooch some booze off of them.

The other members were discussing dinner plans, and the current argument appeared to be between those in favor of ordering take-out Chinese and those in favor of buying a Chinese restaurant. All parties involved decided that it would be most fair to flip on it. Unfortunately, Skwisgaar was the one being flipped.

"If he comesh down tailzsh we buy a Chineezsh reshtaurant," Murderface stated to Pickles as they stood on the balcony overlooking the grand Mordhaus foyer.

"That ain't fair," the drummer argued. "Skwiss's bottom-heavy."

"I wouldn't know, sheeing azsh how I don't shtare at hizsh fat assh all the time."

"Hey, shuts up about my ass," Skwisgaar snapped, climbing up onto the rail and wobbling unsteadily. It could obviously be assumed that he was not in a rational state of mind.

"Pickle is right," commented Toki, standing by on his crutches. "You does have a fat ass, Skwisgaar."

"Shuts up your face, cripples."

"Count of three?" Murderface offered.

"Sure. Eh, ya think he'll be able to hit the couch down there? I mean, it's kind of a long fall. An' the couch is sorta narrow." Pause. "An' he's drunk."

"He'll be fine," the bassist assured. "If he can find the vazshina on a 400-pound whore while shmashed, he can find a couzsh from zshirty feet up."

Skwisgaar tottered angrily. "Fucks you, Myurdol-" And then he slipped. One leg went one way, one leg went the other, and the rail smashed into his groin when he came down.

"Oooh," winced Toki, Pickles and Murderface in unison, cringing.

The Swede was motionless. Then he made a sound like a rusty door hinge opening, his eyes rolled back in his head, and he gracefully tipped over the rail, plummeting off the balcony. One second later a resounding and almighty CRACK came from below, and the three instigators cautiously peeked over the rail. Skwisgaar had successfully struck the couch. He had also flattened it. Apparently the whole thing had split apart when he landed, the impact being strong enough to dismantle its entire structure. Skwisgaar was alive, rolling in the cushions and clutching his aching nuts in both hands and groaning.

Pickles turned to Murderface. "Uh, was that heads r' tails? I didn't see."

"I dunno." Murderface looked over the rail once more. "You know, I think I want pizzsha."

"Yeah, pizza sound better!" Toki agreed.

"A'ight then, let's get pizza," said Pickles.

On their way towards the stairs they met Nathan, who looked a lot worse than most of them remembered seeing him in a long time.

"Hey dude, what's goin' on?" Pickles greeted, aware that he was the only thing standing between Nathan and Toki and perhaps a suicide attempt.

"Nothin," the black-haired man muttered, deliberately not looking at the object of his affliction. "I was just kinda wondering…have any of you seen the couch?"

"Uhhhh…" said Pickles and Toki.

"Ashk Shkwishgaar," Murderface shrugged, walking by. "I think he uzshed it lasht. We're ordering pizzsha, whaddo you want?"

"I don't know. Surprise me."

They got him a pepperoni with cheese.

As they all sat around their massive and hilariously expensive dining table and ate cheap, pseudo-Italian food out of cardboard boxes, Nathan began to talk business.

"There's gonna be a meeting with the manager this Thursday about announcing the new album, so if any of you've got something to say before we start all this, I suggest you do it now."

Murderface belched.

Pickles asked Skwisgaar to pass him a beer from the icebox that was temporarily located in the crotch of the Swede's pants.

Toki chewed on a chunk of his own hair that had accidentally ended up in his mouth along with his pizza.

But there were no objections.

"Good," Nathan grunted. "Next order of business. I'm working on some lyrics now, got…a coupla songs already finished, and I wanna hear what the rest of you've got lined up for music. But seeing as how two of our three guitarists are temporarily out of commission, I suggest that we just talk ideas for now."

"Skwisgaar'll be fine in a few days," Pickles commented, "but Toki'll be at least eight t' twelve weeks before he's ready t' start playin' again."

"And wisouts practice all doze times he is goings to sound like shit," Skwisgaar muttered.

"Screw you!" Toki exclaimed in his own defence. "I can still plays…a little. My cats rub on de strings, but my left hands is still okay. I thinks."

"Maybe he can shing inshtead."

"Toki can't sings, we already knows dat," Skwisgaar muttered.

Pickles mused. "Well if we get 'im drunk enough…"

But Toki shook his head. "I'm not singing. I hates it. Is totally stupid and not cool…no offends to you, Nathan."

Nathan shielded his eyes with a hand to his forehead and slumped down in his chair.

Toki's eyebrows came together in a worried arch. "You okay, Nate'ns? You hasn't said one words to me since last night."

Oh god shut up, Toki.

"What happened lasht night?" Murderface then smirked evilly with his evil gap of evilness gaping in his front teeth. "Shumething we should knowww?"

"Nothing happened," Nathan snarled, putting on a carnivorous face. "Just…talking about the new album."

"Really? I don'ts remember that. I was just so much drunk, is all blurs to me. I thinks I falls asleep, 'cause all I remembers is waking up in your bed-"

GOD. KILL ME.

The four bandmates stared at Nathan, who suddenly realized that he had said, shouted, that aloud. He then began to sweat barbecue sauce. "Huh. Ha…ha."

Pickles had no blood left in his face. At that moment he resembled a terrified version of Raggedy Ann. Blank eyes and everything.

Nobody made a sound. Finally Murderface cleared his throat, which sounded like somebody dropping a load of Jell-O down a garbage disposal. "Yyyyeah. Sho, anyway…"

"Um. Right." Nathan tried not to panic, but his eyes wouldn't listen to his brain and he ended up staring at Toki, who still had a few strands of hair dangling out of the corner of his mouth. For a moment he seemed almost relieved to have Nathan's attention, but suddenly the Lyrical Visionary suffered another acute attack of nerves.

He stood up and declared, "I think I've got food poisoning. This pizza's giving me the shits." And then he was gone.

Toki frowned dubiously. "That's the second times he's done that. I thinks he got somethings wrong with his gusto-in-terrestrial track."

"Hoo boy," Pickles muttered under his breath. "Way t' go, Nate'n."

There was a showdown that night at Mordhaus. A mighty man, overcome with guilt and frustration and afraid of his own misguided emotions, faced off with his bed. He stood like a mountain, glaring down at the crumpled sheets that had hugged the broken body of his oblivious beloved, and fought the urge to throw himself into their vile, homoerotic embrace.

For like three seconds.

Uttering a ragged growl of surrender, Nathan fell face-first onto his bed and snorted up the smells in the sheets like free blow at Studio 54. And then he was there—Toki was. The noxious model paints that he loved to huff, the still-fresh fiberglass-resin casts, the L'Oréal Metalhead shampoo, the liquor, the steel, the armpits that smelled better than roses just because they were Toki's. All the scents were there, and all the sense was not.

I wanna die, thought Nathan dully. I feel like shit. I don't wanna leave this room. I wanna kill something. I hate everything and everybody in the world. I wanna go to sleep and never wake up. I wish someone would just set me on fire and put me out of my misery.

Yeah. This was love alright, in its most disgusting, abhorrent emo-ness. And because emo is known to be the number one cure for writer's block (or depending on your view, the number one curse for anything), Nathan suddenly felt the urge to write down all his horrible feelings.

So he grabbed his composition notebook, dug a Sharpie out of his bedside table, and started to write. He got really high in the process, and by the time he was starting to wonder how Sharpie markers could smell like half-rotten bananas, he had finished. The whole notebook stunk to high heaven now, and if the crap Nathan had written wasn't enough to make himself sick then the marker fumes would be the thing do it. He tossed the notebook to the floor and rolled over, trying to get that nauseating odor out of his nostrils.

Mm. Soft sheets. Toki smells. Much better.

Apparently it was a little too much better, because Not-So-Li'l-Nathan had gleefully sprung into a full salute. But, looking on the bright side, at least it hadn't happened in public. Like usual.

For the third time in less than a week Nathan found himself with a fistful of dick and a mind full of Toki. "Ya shoulda fucked 'im," said Pickles. It echoed a billion times in Nathan's head, and when he spurted cum into the sheets he wished—for just a moment—that he had followed Pickles' advice.

He fell asleep still wanting to die, sprawled out in the rapidly-crustifying Toki-scented covers.

a few days later

In the Mordhaus rehearsal auditorium someone was shredding a live guinea pig with an amplified cheese grater. Oh wait, that's only Toki playing his guitar. Never mind.

Skwisgaar was in a state of physical agony. Even the earmuffs and industrial-strength earplugs weren't enough to keep the noise out. "My god he's is killing me. I t'inks I'm goings to be throwing up he's sounding so terrible."

Pickles tried to be nice. "This's our first session since his accident, douchebag. Have a little compassion fer Chrissakes."

"What?"

"I SAID THIS'S ONLY OUR FIRST ah fuck it."

Thankfully the horrendous cacophony stopped and the rest of Dethklok breathed a sigh of relief. Skwisgaar gratefully removed his auditory protection, flipping his blond hair over his shoulder with typical arrogance.

Toki looked noticeably worried as he sat awkwardly in a chair with both of his cast-encased shins sticking straight out, gazing down at the guitar in his lap. "I thinks it need some works, guys."

"No shit," Murderface mumbled, upending another bottle of Aleve.

"You's would sound betters if you plays wis a fucking stump-of-an-arms. Pfft." Skwisgaar fingered his guitar silently. "My mom can plays better dan yous."

"Your mom can do lots of thing better than me," Toki agreed, then added maliciously: "Like sucks cock."

Seventy years from now historians would agree that this was how the Second Great Scandinavian War started. Skwisgaar had hoisted his guitar above his head like an axe, shouting death-threats in Swedish while Toki egged him on with the two pointed ends of his Flying V aimed right at the other guitarist's still-tender testicles.

(Kids, this is why making fun of somebody else's slutty, slattern whore-of-a-mom isn't a good idea, no matter how tempting it may be.)

But Skwisgaar was aware that he had a slutty, slattern whore-of-a-mom anyway and was only arguing for the sake of his own pride. Luckily Nathan stepped in and saved him from a humiliating defeat by calling a truce.

"Alright guys. Shut up and take five."

Skwisgaar, forever alien to English idioms, asked, "Five whats?"

"Minutes."

"Oh."

Toki's depression was apparent. "I think I needs five personal days."

"You don't need five personal days," Nathan muttered, avoiding all eye contact. "You're practically getting five months' vacation so-"

"This is not vacations! This is…broken bones hell. Sick days."

"You're not sick, Toki."

"Okay, then I'm broken."

Nathan tried to keep his cool and not overreact. Both were slightly impossible. "Look. If you're healthy enough to play wheelchair polo up and down the halls at 3 a.m. then you're healthy enough to play the guitar. Now fuckin play that riff so we can make some goddamn progress."

Toki wasn't used to anything aside from the typical harshness from Nathan, but that was just brutal. He tried to mask his surprise with an angry face, but his bottom lip was trembling.

"Jeezsh Nathan," Murderface drawled, "that wuzsh a little mean don'tcha think?"

"No. Alright, taking it from the top: Skwisgaar, don't worry about the licks so much for now. If Toki can't grind out a decent sound then just take over for him. I wanna see how this thing comes together. Everyone got it?"

Pickles sighed and poised his sticks at his drum set as the others readied themselves. A count to three later and the metal that millions of people paid to go deaf to roared through the auditorium. No lyrics yet, just getting the feel. Nice and heavy, good solid rhythms, definitely less melodic than their usual style. Still, it just didn't sound right without Toki in there…but wait, the stubborn little guy finally came in at the end of that first refrain, and some kind of fantastic noise issued from his amps.

The fiberglass resin of his cast scratched against the steel strings and created a sound like that of a thousand lumberjacks revving their chainsaws in a series of alternating chords. They went twice more through the refrains before they all just stopped playing and stared in awe at the crippled Norwegian.

Nathan: "Holy fuckin hell."

"Toki, that was the most awesome shit I've ever heard," Pickles gaped. "How'dja do that?"

Toki shrugged with one shoulder. "I just plays likes usual, you knows, not worry about my cats on de strings."

"Well whatever the hell it izsh you're doing, keep doing it," Murderface said. "It'sh brutal."

Skwisgaar pouted off to the side while Pickles cracked a wide grin at Nathan. "Sounds like somebody owes somebody an apology," he hinted with a wink-wink-nudge-nudge-say-no-more look.

Nathan replied with a glare that doubled as a threat for bodily harm. The drummer opted not to say another word for the sake of his own mortality, and wondered how in the hell they were all going to get through this album with so many secrets threatening to destroy the lovely murderous camaraderie they shared with one another.