3. The Divine Parody: Act II Diurnal Omissions and Nocturnal Emissions

“Defeating that shadow was nothing compared to filling out all those forms. I think I’m going insane,” I said as we rode the elevator.

“I suppose that was the actual test,” Shadowfox remarked.

“Great,” I exclaimed, even though I knew, much unlike Cassandra, that sarcasm wasn’t helpful at all in this kind of situation. Soon the elevator door opened and a hall that looked pretty much the same as the one on the previous floor, revealed itself before us. As we stepped into the hall we were greeted by yet another strange individual.

“Seems like the Mittens of Consistency were useless,” the person said. I could have recognized that German accent anywhere. It was Lt. Messerschmidt. He still wore his camouflage uniform and army boots. The skin in his face seemingly came off somewhat, revealing the cyborg parts more clearly. Not that it was a pleasant sight or anything.

“Mittens of Consistency?” Cassandra asked, as we stepped closer.

“Yes, the opposite to the Glove of Contradiction. For a brief moment I thought they could stop your powers,” Messerschmidt explained.

“Nothing can stop my powers. You should know that,” I said impatiently.

“That might actually be true. However, this next part of the hunt doesn’t concern you, it concerns your friend Powerfox. It is his sin that shall be punished here,” Messerschmidt said, in his usual monotone voice.

“What, me? What did I do?” Cody said and seemed as surprised as everyone else.

“The shadow mentioned that the floor above resembled Limbo. If we go by that logic, this floor would resemble the second circle of hell: Lust,” Ichabod explained and sounded like a lawyer again.

“And what would that have to do with me?” Cody asked.

“You know very well what I am talking about, Powerfox,” Messerschmidt said.

And thus the Powerfox was accused of the sin of masturbation. Even though technically not considered a misdemeanor anymore by any standards, but apparently still considered a sin by some people, as this Master of the Hunt deemed Cody a sinner. Now Cody, being the fine young gentleman that he was, did of course not mention anything to his friends, but masturbation was in fact his second favorite activity, his favorite being baseball of course. One should not be surprised however, as Cody was sixteen years of age and masturbation could be considered the apogee of puberty after all. But having his secrets spilled out like this, still left him in an exceedingly uncomfortable state. And the embarrassment could be seen in his face, in quite stark contrast to his otherwise dashing appearance.

“Now you made me angry, you stupid machine,” Cody said, while pointing his baseball bat at Messerschmidt.

“I am not a machine. I merely have machine parts in my body, replacing several body parts. Body parts, which I lost in unfortunate ways,” Messerschmidt explained unmoved. “But perhaps you are right. Perhaps I have become more of a machine than a man at this point. I sometimes doubt myself in my ways,” Messerschmidt went on.

“So in the end you are just a stupid machine,” Cody repeated.

“Well, I’d like to think it’s a bit more complicated than that,” Messerschmidt insisted.

“It’s complicated enough already,” I had to interfere. “I already defeated this guy once. Let me take care of this,” I then said to Cody.

“No, he insulted me, not you. I have to do this,” was Cody’s answer.

“However this may have come across, my intention wasn’t to insult. Insults don’t lead to anything. To form an insult one must possess true human emotions after all. And that I do not possess,” Messerschmidt continued to self-reflect.

“Well congratulations, you insulted me without having emotions,” Cody said before starting to swing his bat at Messerschmidt. It seemed Messerschmidt wasn’t carrying any guns this time, unlike the last time we met. Cody swung his baseball bat at any part of Messerschmidt’s body that he could reach, with no regard of it being a cybernetic or a human part. I had seen this bat used as a weapon before, in fact I had only seen it used as such, but this time it seemed more vicious than ever. Messerschmidt’s cybernetic parts broke apart like plastic and finally it was his face that broke apart.

“You’ll regret this…” his metallic lips uttered. Finally, after another blow of the bat, his entire body shut down, making a sound as if a plug was pulled from a machine.