friend blood TikTok humanity earl gray meatshield bullets corpse weightroom friend Ancient Romans colosseum

"God Dammit!" Sardinsky yelled, while letting go of the collar of the kid in front of him who was a foot shorter. 80 pounds lighter. Or at least that kid had been those things. Now he... or it, was just a corpse. Sardinsky looked down at his white polo. It had been perfect, immaculate white just a minute ago. But now there was

blood

on it. Most of it belonged to the kid he had been holding onto, using as a

meatshield

, but some of it was his. He couldn't feel the

bullets

yet.

His eyes could see that he had been shot, but it didn't feel the way he thought a bullet would feel. He thought he would be more fearful... like he would be facing death. He thought gratitude would rush into him and he would no longer have a care in the world except to live and see his family. Well his mom at least. But none of that happened. Instead he simply felt annoyed.

He stared down at the

corpse

laying lifelessly in front of him. The one who had taken the bulk of the bullets. Sardinsky spat down at it. "You should've hit the

weightroom

you fucking prick. Look at what your skinny body did to me." he touched his bullet wound once more and then it suddenly came. Not the gratitude. But the sharp pain. "Fuck!" he yelled.

He grabbed for his phone, but that was broken. A bullet had hit it. He tossed it on the ground and then reached for the corpse's phone. He tried to call his girlfriend Zoey, but he couldn't remember her number. He didn't remember anybody's numbers. He heard of a time when people had to remember such things. But these days you didn't need to. You didn't need to remember anything. You could open up your phone and what you wanted to consume was waiting and ready for you. This fucking nerd watches the most boring shit, he thought as he was flooded with the corpse's recommendations.

---

Three weeks later he was visiting his

friend

... the friend he despised. Kyle Sardinsky. The jock who's season had gone down the toilet after he had been shot during the school shooting. On the bus to the hospital he had thought about that one girl who had been sitting behind him. The one not doing the hand motions. The only other one besides him who hadn't been following along the moves done by The Blue Man.

In the previous three weeks The Blue Man had begun doing more and more erratic hand moves. People argued that this was some ploy to cover up the fact that the murder he had committed on

TikTok

had started a spiral of copycat influencers who were now murdering people for their followers' entertainment.

It seemed like

humanity

was going down the toilet. He had heard from

GabrielGreco

, the local cafe bum who sat around all day preaching to anyone willing to listen to him at the Espresso Den Cafe. Sometimes he would sit and listen to Gabriel. It felt like a respite from all the same stuff on TikTok. The fast jerky video motion, people teaching each other how to do things like how to make pasta a certain way or how to change out a door frame. Listening to Gabriel felt more like... something he couldn't remember because he had never experienced a life where you didn't just consume content from morning to night. But it was one of those things he imagined people were describing when he read old books.

He once told his friend that humanity was going down the tube. He had basically given his own version of Gabriel's lecture, which was worse: less concise and not as punchy. So maybe that's why his friend had countered the argument, his face unconvinced. "Humans have always been killing each other. This is just us using social media to do so. There's nothing new here."

And what could he say to that? it was true. The

Ancient Romans

threw prisoners into a

colosseum

, and watched them spill each other's guts out onto blood stained glass. They cheered it all on as entertainment. So why not have influencers strangling someone on TikTok? Why not have mass shootings filmed live?

"Read more history, buddy." his friend said. That made him think he should learn more history so that he would have a better argument.

At the hospital Sardinsky was watching The Blue Man on the big screen. He wasn't following the hand motions though.

"Brought you some goodies."

"You? Or your mom?"

"Both of us."

"Yeah?" he took out a box of fancy assorted chocolates. "You're into these?"

"Well I'm the one who brought them over, ass."

"Glad to see you."

"How you feeling?"

"Better."

Sardinsky had gotten out of the school following the shooting. He had been hit in a vital spot in his stomach, but he hadn't known it. It was only once he was carted off to the hospital that his serious condition was recognized and the staff rushed to save his life. He ended up being in a coma for just under two weeks.

"Everybody's been worried about you." he said.

After tearing the plastic off the box of chocolates he looked over at him without opening the box. He then reached into the bag he had brought and took out a canister of tea. 

earl gray

.

"Oh yeah? I doubt that."

"Man we all thought you were dead."

"Yeah but I'm the biggest asshole at school aren't I?"

"You're still our friend."

The nurse came in and offered to make the tea without saying anything. She used strictly body motion. Sardinsky said he'd take one. A moment later he realized the nurse was asking if he wanted a tea as well. He said he would love one.

"You don't need to be nice to me just because I got shot. I know you don't like me."

The bizarre sounds of the Blue Man dancing filled the room.

"You're still my friend."

"Friend. What does that even mean? We like to use words like friend, but we've deflated any meaning they once had. People just make up whatever they want given what's convenient."

"You think it's convenient that I'm visiting you at the hospital?"

Sardinsky furled his right eye brow. "Maybe. Maybe this is fun for you."

"I don't like you, but I never, not once, thought about getting pleasure out of seeing you like this."

The tea came.

"I'm actually glad that you're recovering."

"Fuck you, prick." Sardinsky raised his tea glass up to him and they cheers'd before taking a sip. The tea was well brewed. The perfect temperature. Just under 200 degrees farenheit for Earl Gray.

After chatting for a bit there was a presence at the door behind him. Sardinsky had a look of shock on his face. The presence behind felt heavy, and based on the look on his friend's face he felt like something ominous was about to happen. He took his hands off the tea mug and turned around.

It was the Blue Man.