There is no Mercy in the Wild
My name is Carlito Gabriel Jesus III. I was raised in aisle 7, Acme. Every day I pray to the manufacturer that I will get carried off to Mexico, the mystical land of wild and majestic horses. I have been waiting for 7 weeks, and I’m almost at the end of my lifespan. Every pinata that is carried out has fulfilled their life’s purpose of going to the holy land of Mexico. There are conspiracy theories though, dark tales of pinatas that are carried away and brutally beaten, and are stuffed with food until they burst, but these can not be true, because the manufacturer surely would not want an end like that for their children. What sick world would it be if pinatas were killed, tortured, and strung up for the world to see?
It is now Tuesday, the holiest day of the week, because Tuesday is the day where pinatas are 30% off, we are told by the manufacturer’s angels. That must be because 30% more pinatas are carried out by angels. Out of nowhere, I was suddenly snatched by a flying hand and thrown against my will into a cage. As I flew by, I saw the body of an angel standing before me. I am being transported to Mexico! I thought. Upon my landing, I struck my leg against one of the bars of the cage. I was awestruck as two other pinatas landed beside me. I quickly remembered who they were. On my left, sat Constantine Fuegonomos Narcosotros XI. To the right of me there lay the widely hated and disgusted Fred. All of the pinata community treats Fred as an outcast, due to his nonbelief of Mexico and pinata culture. He claims he once saw a tiny angel rip a pinata apart, and ever since then he has been forming conspiracies against the destiny of a pinata. I think, this is the perfect opportunity to rub it in Fred’s face that pinata culture is real, and how breathtaking and stunning Mexico is going to be. I’m so excited I want to exclaim, “Guys, this is it. Mexico, the final frontier!” I must remember the golden rule of pinata culture though, or I will be cremated and my ashes will be spread across the hell that is Norway. Just the thought of Norway sends chills up my spine. The holy word of the pinata says that if a pinata ever moves or speaks in front of an angel, they will be tortured and sent to Norway hell. Every pinata follows the golden rule with no question, even Fred. Constantine (commonly known as Juego), Fred, and I are all sitting in our cages when suddenly we feel a huge push out of nowhere! We race past the borders of Acme and I hear these sirens go off. People rush out of the doors yelling “You can’t just steal those!” The angel pushing our cart muttered,, “If they think I’m gonna pay 23 god damn dollars for some stupid horses, they’ve got another thing coming.” I always thought angels would sound more heavenly than that, but I guess not everything can be perfect. We stop at a worn down, dirty old truck and I got my first good look at the angel taking us to Mexico. He had on a hoodie with multiple stains, a hat that said: The second amendment is my right. Live with it. He was wearing ripped jean shorts and a pair of sandals that sad CROCS. Honestly, I do not know what an angel should look like, but this does not feel right to me. The angel grabbed Fuegos, Fred, and I in his ginormous claw and threw us in the back of the truck.
Once we are on the road, Fuegos, Fred, and I deem it safe to start talking. “We’re  finally going to Mexico. All three of us!” Fuegos proclaims. “You actually think that disgusting fool is going to take us anywhere but death?” Fred uttered.
“What do you mean, he’s an angel!”
“Angels my ass. There are no angels, and we are made to entertain and die.”
“If you think that, what’s the point of being here.”
“So I can prove you wrong. I’m going to die someday, but I’m going to die knowing I was right.”
“Fred, okay, listen to me, just for once, just this one time. Our ancestors have been passing down the belief for centuries that when a pinata leaves their birthplace of ACME they go to Mexico and stay there for the rest of your life happily. However, if you don’t follow the words of our ancestors, you never get picked up by an angel and you go to Norway to suffer and die. What doesn’t make sense with that?”
“Everything’s wrong with that. Are you kidding me? Mexico? Norway? Do you really believe in that crap they shove down your throat? They don’t have any kind of proof of these places whatsoever, it’s all hypothetical. When I saw that… that creature rip one of us apart, I was faced with the truth. It’s all a lie.”
I could plop myself down right here and listen to them for hours, and I have, back at ACME. As I started to look around, I noticed something odd. There aren’t any palm trees or big, round, yellow, suns. It looks dead and dry, the opposite of what Mexico is supposed to look like. I could feel the ground under us rise and fall, getting bumpier and more uncomfortable the farther we go. There are various odd objects scattered in the bed of the truck. One looks like a triangle attached to a pole, another seems to be a flat piece of metal perpendicular to another pole. The truck itself was far from the appearance of clean, more so it reminds me of the word grimy. The road has become so rough by now that I am practically bouncing up and down. “Hey guys, do you think we should hold on to something, so we don’t fall off or anything?” I could barely get the words out without stopping due to the unevenness of the asphalt. Fuegos and Fred suddenly stopped their argument and glared at me. “Is the little baby scared he’s gonna fall off on his way to Mexico?” Fred sneered. Right after he said that, he was launched upwards due to the terrain, and landed awkwardly on his shoulder. “Uh… I’m just going to go hang on to that side of the truck, just because I feel like it though,” Fred croaked.
“Yeah… sure. Leave some room for me. I am sure as hell not falling and breaking my neck on my way to Mexico. Fuegos, come on, there’s room left.“You really think I’ll sit anywhere near that dirty pile of paper mache?” Fuegos scoffed.
“Come on, if you fall off, it won’t be anyone’s fault, but yours,” I tried to convince him.
Then, in a perfect storm of events, the truck hit a huge pothole, Fuegos bounced up, and a pole struck him with such force that it knocked him off the truck. As he fell, we could hear the sickening crunch of his legs shattering. “HELP ME!” he screamed. “STOP THE CAR!” I yelled at the front of the truck, but it never stopped. I look back and I can see him there, struggling to walk, his legs torn to pieces around him, trying to get the attention of someone or something. Another vehicle raced past us, and I tried to yell for Fuegos to move out of the way. He’s still sitting there, yelling, moaning, attempting to move but his body betrays him. I watch as the car speeds toward him, and crushes his frail body under its wheel, but I hear no sound, because we are too far away now. Almost as quickly as it happened, it's all gone, there is no evidence of Fuegos ever being here, out of sight, but not out of mind. “Well look at that, he got a home run on his farewell,” Fred muttered,under his breath. “Are you joking? Fuegos just died, and you think that’s funny?” I fired back.
“It’s not like it wasn’t gonna happen. That’s how life works. We live, we die. No more, no less.”
“So you don’t want to do anything with your life? You don’t want to have fun, to run like a real horse, be a real horse?”
“Everyone wants that, but its not gonna happen in so-called Mexico. Look what happened to Fuegos, his belief got him killed. Curiosity killed the cat.”
“You’re sick. I can’t believe you can just put what happened aside like that. I just watched one of my own die.”
“It won’t be the last time, I’ll tell you that. “
I sit there for about another hour, contemplating, Fred’s words mulling over in my head. Could he be right? No. He couldn’t. Living things aren’t raised for slaughter. Right?
“I’m gonna do it,” Fred declares, with a sense of pride in his words.
“Do what?” I ask.
“Escape. Whatever lies out there is definitely better than sitting here waiting to die.”
“Escape where? You saw what happened. You can’t get off without breaking something.”
“You see that sign up there? The one that says STOP? Once we get to that, I’ll jump off and run into those woods, and no one can stop me. I’ll be free, and I could do whatever I want.”
I contemplated his logic for another five minutes, and for as long as I sat there, I couldn’t understand it. I had always thought Mexico was all that mattered, the golden paradise, the final destination, but is that really true? What else is there in our short, insignificant lives? “Hey loser, it’s time,” Fred tells me in his snotty, irritating voice. His small, paper mache body climbs up the edge of the truck, and stands there for a second. He takes a deep breath, and jumps. I watch as he drops onto the soft grass, and starts to canter away. “Hey Carlitos, take notes, because this is how you treat life. You don’t conform to social restrictions!” Wow, he’s actually doing it. He’s gonna be free, and he won’t live in Mexico, or Norway. He can go wherever he wants, I think to myself. I am about to look away, when I see Fred jump in terror, and begin to sprint away. Out of the densely filled woods, a humongous bear lumbers out. It watches Fred, seemingly deciding if it’s worth it to leave the safety of the woods. Then, it breaks into a sprint on all fours, speeding towards the tiny pinata running away. When it gets within, four feet, it pounces, with all of it’s body weight crushing the pinata. It sinks it’s maw into the frail, weak pinata’s torso, killing it instantly. The bear sits there for a minute more, but when it realizes its newly found prey is not edible, it saunters back into the woods, disappointed and hungry. My eyes would not move from the remains of Fred. Just seconds ago, he was filled with energy, courage and determination, and now he lay a lifeless heap of scraps on the ground. The truck once again starts to move, on its journey to Mexico which I now start to question after all I have witnessed. Confused on what to do, I decide to sleep, instead of thinking about what happened.
When I wake up, I am stunned. For the first time in my life, I see snow. It is coming down very fast, and is piling up in the truck. Am I being sent to Norway? I don’t know if I believe in Norway anymore, but I’ve also seen what could happen if I leave the safety of the truck, so I decide to wait out the vehicle’s journey until it reaches its destination. The snow is now coming down so hard it makes it hard to see past a couple yards. After what seems like several eternities, the truck comes to a final stop. I look outside to see a small, one-story  house. The house looks like it's falling apart, with wooden boards covering up broken windows, tarps covering up holes in the roof, and uncut grass at least two feet tall. The angel that was driving walks over to the back of the truck, and a look of bewilderment comes over him. “What the hell? I could’ve sworn I picked up three pinatas…” he grumbled. He snatches me from where I lay and begins to walk towards the door of the run-down house. I debate breaking the golden rule and moving, but I decide against it, as it will not do any good. A thought comes into my mind: are angels even real? Or is that another lie we were told? I ponder this thought for a while, not paying attention to where the “angel” takes me. I come back to reality and I find myself hanging from the ceiling. Why, I do not know. I look around the room and a certificate with a medal grabs my attention. The certificate reads “On May 27th, 2012, Ernesto Geofrancos was the subject of the world’s most viewed episode of ‘My Strange Addictions,’ where he debuted his peculiar habit of eating pinatas, and remains the most viewed episode to this day.” Oh that’s nice, he won an award for… wait, what? It suddenly struck me, this psycho is gonna eat me alive! I looked around the room once more and truly notice the horrors scattered around. In one corner I could see colorful skin of a pinata, in another I see the hair from a pinata’s tail, and other things that send chills down my spine. I’m going to die here. That’s the destiny of pinatas. There is no Mexico, or Norway. The only thing is death and destruction. The creature holding me captive walks up to me, with a sickening smile on his face. “I know the truth,” he says, “I know you little things can speak, and move, and run. But that won’t stop me. I like the crunch of paper mache between my teeth, and there’s nothing wrong with that. You wanna know why? Because you aren’t human. I can kill and eat as many of you as I like, and all the rest of the world thinks of that is how bizarre it is.” He walks up to me, eye level, and smiles, displaying his yellow teeth. There’s no way out, I think to myself, this is how I die. “Let’s get you down from there, shall we?” In that moment, with that beast walking towards me, I knew what I must do to survive. As soon as the rope was cut, I start to gallop as fast and as hard as I could. Where do I go, I don’t know. I run into the kitchen and I see a conveniently placed steak knife lying on the floor. As I speed by, I pick it up in my muzzle and turn to face my attacker. “You think you can even scrape me? I’m ten times your size, and you’re made of glued paper for god’s sakes!” the beast cackles. Without saying a word, I run at the giant with the knife in my mouth. As I go by, the knife slides against his skin, and out pours some red liquid. The huge creature yells out in pain and glowers at me. “Oh you’re dead now you little piece of paper-mache.” he seethes. I run as hard as my little pinata legs can, and repeat the same thing on his other leg. The brute tries to grab me, but I am too quick. I go in for a third time, and am prepared to dodge his claws, but I am hit unexpectedly. Instead of trying to grab me, the fiend kicked me across the room. I flew into the wall and a crack appeared in my body. As I struggled to get up the barbarian slowly walked toward me with an eerie smile on his face. “You’re done now you little piece of paper-mache.” he uttered. He menacingly ambled toward me and grabbed my tiny pinata body. “Oh you’re gonna pay. I’m gonna enjoy crushing your tiny plastic body between my teeth.”
“Please” I gasped between breaths,” I have so much to do with my life”
‘Yeah that’s what they all say.”
I watch as he rips off my legs and throws it down his gullet. As he rips me limb from limb, I fade into unconsciousness.
Is a pinata’s life just a lie? Are all the beliefs of Mexico and Norway just myths? I’ve come to the conclusion that pinatas are meant to be tortured, strung up, and killed. A life of a pinata is a life of lies, death, and destruction. If I had one wish, I would go back to the acme and tell the other pinatas to run, to get out while they can. “Hello? Are you awake?” I found the strength to open my eyelids. I’m alive? I think to myself. When I open my eyes I see the inside of a hospital room. A pinata in a white doctor’s coat stands over me. “Am I alive?” I whisper.
“Sir you’ve lost a lot of paper mache.”
“Go to ACME and warn the pinatas.”
“Warn the pinatas of what?”
“They’ll die. Tell them to run.”
The pinata’s body slowly changes into a human shape. As a face forms, I recognize it almost instantly. “I’m sorry sir, I can’t do that,” the beast says. I watch, unable to do anything, as the beast reaches to the wall, and pulls the plug.