American Hero - George R. R. Martin Page 0,36

first saw Detroit Steel, because Rusty could have turned the rogue ace into an orange-red mass of oxidized metal.

(If the producers had let him. They don’t let us use all our powers.)

The Candle could have melted Detroit Steel into a puddle, but of course he wasn’t allowed to do that, either, so he put a cage of fire around him. I was totally surprised when Detroit Steel hammered the bars to bits, but all that meant was that the Candle made another cage.

After which I had Puffy on the scene. I tossed the red dragon down and made the dragon big and menacing and with an extra-long tail. I placed Puffy in front of the bank entrance, lying sideways with her tail in front of her.

Detroit Steel knocked apart the second cage, then clanked up to Puffy and took a swing and hit her on the jaw. It sort of hurt, but not really. Puffy swung her tail and knocked Detroit Steel back a few steps.

Detroit Steel came forward again, and Puffy knocked him back. And when he came on a third time, Puffy knocked him twenty feet.

He got up to try again, and I thought maybe this time I’d have Puffy knock him down and sit on him, but at that point the producers intervened and declared that the rogue ace had lost.

We were the only team to beat the rogue ace, so we don’t have to vote anyone off.

That won’t stop Cleo from trying to knife me next time, though.

What’s happening now is that all the other teams get to whine to the cameras about how the challenge wasn’t fair, and how if only everyone had done what they said, it would have turned out all right.

My problem isn’t fairness, it’s fakeness.

But obviously that’s just me.

Confessional: Todd “T. T.” Taszycki aka Hardhat

I got to tell, this here has been a total rat [bleep]er of a week, and no two mother[bleep]ing ways about it.

First off, we lost DB. That whole draw thing where they evened up the teams by picking one of us over to the Diamonds? My [bleep]s were trying to crawl up my [bleep]hole. Pardon my French.

Nothing against the Diamonds, you know? But that Jetman guy just gets on my [bleep]. And Tiffani? I used to date a stripper named Tiffani. Spelled the same and everything. [Bleep]ing nice [bleep]s, but mean as a snake. This one reminds me of that one, you know what I mean?

So I was going around the house thinking, “[Bleep] me, man. Here I’ve spent all this [bleep]ing time hanging with DB and Earth Witch and Fox-Boy and Curves, and I’m gonna have to go spoon with that bunch of [bleep]suckers? Team Diamonds don’t give a wet fart about me.”

Serious, I figure if they move me over, I’m off like a prom dress, you know what I mean? So I’m just hoping they pick Wild Fox. I’m not saying I wouldn’t miss the little [bleep]. He’s a funny guy, but he’s about as useful as a limp [bleep]er in a whorehouse. I can hope they’d take him, except they’re not [bleep]ing retards. If I’m Diamonds, I’m taking Earth Witch or Curves. Those are two straight-up powerful bitches. If I was picking my team for anything, I’d be [bleep]ing sure to get them on.

So word came down that they were taking DB . . .

Well, I should have seen it coming. He’s got that whole easy money, chicks for free [bleep]-rock thing going, so I figure how else is Tiffani gonna get a chance to take a ride. Or the fat chick, if he’s into that. I am gonna miss him, though. Guy was like a walking circle jerk, you know? So that pretty much sucked the [bleep] right out of my [bleep]hole.

But at least I didn’t get sent over, right?

Then we got our [bleep]s handed to us by that [bleep] [bleep]er Noel What’s-his-nut. Now don’t get me wrong. I got nothing against the guy just because he’s got a [bleep]. You got to figure if I had a [bleep] and a [bleep] both, I’d probably never get out of the house, you know what I mean?

But the way he beat us, we just looked stupid. Like here’s this big thing we’re supposed to do, and we’re standing there with our thumbs up our butts right to the [bleep]ing elbow. And when that Topper [bleep] was telling us off about not getting so enthusiastic? Pow, right in the yam-sack. And now, we not only