The Ronin Team Challenge

“What y’all, good?”

Click.

“What-at’s, go-od, chy-all?”

Click.

“Yo…” Mike could only utter one syllable before breaking into uncontrollable snorting.

“Mike, you are never doing the intros again,” Ben sighed.

“Take four,” Cameraman Dajuan yelled.

“What’s good, ninjas?” Mike’s smile stretched to the edges of his face. It only took four reshoots and twelve minutes of backyard Ke-ke-ke’ing to get Mike to act professional. Honestly, a marked improvement over the fifteen minutes it took last month.

“So, y’all already know what’s up. We're the Ronin team, but in case you’re new or have been knocked upside the head, I’m Mike. That tall ninja to the left is Biggy. The overdressed ninja in the middle is Daz. This fat ninja hugging up on my right is Lamar.”

“You better watch your mouth, Mike,” Lamar asserted his dominance with a puffed-up chest. “Unless you want some smoke in your lungs.”

“Do something, ninja. I ain’t scared of your man-titties,” Mike continued with a smirk. “This here is Jaiden, sometimes we call her Jai. She’s the newest member, so give her a round of applause.”

“Hi!” Jaiden beamed. “It’s so lit to be here!”

And last, we got Dejuan’s midget ass, handling the camera.

“Shut the hell up,” Dejuan said, setting the camera down and squeezing into the group. “Ay, look, y’all…I’m little, but trust me, I can beat his ass,” he said to the viewers.

They were on YouTube. Tens of thousands of viewers filled the live chat, some spitting game to Jaiden over the beautiful violet twin knots she was rocking or inquiring about the absence of Biggy’s girlfriend in the video.

“Better than usual, Mike. I got it from here,” Daz said, taking his turn to talk. “So, we’re doing the traditional ‘don’t fold’ challenge today, reacting to a compilation of funny shit, put together by y’all. If we laugh, we lose, and the loser pays $250 to the account that made us laugh.”

“And Imma tell you this right now,” Lamar spoke up. “All y’all goofy asses gon’ pay that $250 before me. I ain’t never laugh to no joke in my life. That won’t change today.”

Dajuan smacked his lips. “Why are you always instigating, bro? Half the time, nobody even say nothing to you, yet you have always gotta start with something with everybody.”

“For real,” Jaiden agreed. “You always be feigning some alpha male shit in the skits, too. Aren’t y’all friends in real life?”

“Yeah, Jay, we're tight,” Biggy laughed. “It’s cool, Lamar just messing around.”

“The hell I am. I’m done too many of these challenges to count and never had to pay nothing. I’m an impenetrable fortress, bitches. I’m an unbreakable goddamn penguin!”

“You got the belly of one, that’s for sure,” jeered Mike.

“Reel it up, y’all. We got a skit to do in the morning. I’m starting the compilation now.” Daz pressed the play icon on the video.

“Ooh! I bought something for everyone. Gimme a sec.” Jaiden rushed into the kitchen, then returned with a Publix gallon of Sierra Mist. She corked the cap off and slid five cups down the coffee table on their set.

“Hold up,” Daz spoke up.

“What?” Jaiden said.

“This suit is made of cotton. I see the way you're gonna pour it in, and the government don't have a thing called Cotton Protective Services, you feel me?”

Jaiden rolled her eyes and gave him the beverage. “Be my guest.”

Daz gave himself a cup first, then Jaiden, to everyone else.

Lamar and Biggy downed it like Vodka. Daz and Jaiden sipped theirs regularly. In the corner, Mike was cranking up the clownery with Dejuan, motorboating the pop and clapping his lips like cymbals so absurdly, Dejuan donned a cheshire grin, prepared to fail the contest as it began.

“Quite good,” Mike said in an absurd accent.

“Bro, you are such a fool,” Dejuan shook his head.

“Really,” Daz said soberly. “Y’all see the video playing, right? That means the contest is underway. And I wouldn’t want to lose if I were you. I mean, I’m just saying.”

“I ain’t laughing,” Lamar steely affirmed. “I dunno about y’all, but it ain’t gonna be me. It won’t be.”

“Does it have to be anyone?” Jaiden wondered. “We can all pass, can’t we?”

“Nah, Jai. Within every single one of these we ever did. We played until someone lost. We had to,” Clarified Ben. “We decided to make it up to the viewers.”

“Right,” Daz confirmed. “I…we wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for all of them.”

“Oh,” Jaiden nodded, a faint smile tugging on her lips. “Good for them. I knew it before, but I’m glad I’ve been reminded again how y’all got like this.”

“You watch us?” Daz asked.

“I wouldn’t be here if I didn't. I owe you. Since freshman year, you showed me how it ain’t pointless to gush over the things you like.”

Jaiden was a novice to the crew, but not a neophyte to content creation. From the 6th grade’s beginning, she launched her own channel with daily vlogs and Evangelion video essays. It never took off. Her immediate family and cousins in Ohio were her only viewers for two years. Even after integrating editing and following the steps of a brand marketing elective in 8th grade, notoriety eluded her. Let’s just say that a black goth nerd with a passion for Seven Days Grace and anime wasn’t a selling archetype. Neither for her generation, nor the ones before. Jaiden quit at 107 subscribers, three years in the game, to pioneer her high school life the regular way. Listen to rap. Make friends for a change. Become an actuary. Something realistic, that’ll make mom gush about her at work. One night after marching band practice, Jaiden revisited anime content after a year-long hiatus. That’s when the Ronin Team introduced themselves to her. A black six-man squad that did anime shorts, skits, cosplays, and gaming streams on YouTube, with 668k subscribers. Now, 908k.

They were everything the world taught her black people weren’t supposed to be. Nerds. And they were a hit. Not only that. They were students at Frederick Douglass Academy just like her. She watched a video. Two, four, eight, sixteen, sixty-four. She binged them for a whole weekend, crying over the procurement of something she’d never thought she’d receive. Validation. At school, they were just a chill group. Many students rocked with their content. It didn’t stop them from being treated like their own people, away from the characters they played in their videos. Jaiden used that opportunity to approach Lamar in English Honors as a Junior. Outside the channel spectacle, Lamar was generous enough to introduce her, leading to Jaiden’s dream come reality. Of course, she’d return to her own channel as well, now that the love for the game was rekindled.

“How does it feel?” Lamar asked, being right beside her.

“Cool,” Jaiden replied. “I didn’t think my first video would be a live stream, but I like it. Honest.”

“That’s lit, Jay. We struggled at first to get our footing too. It gets easier. It does. There are prices to it, but it gets easier when you ignore ‘em.”

“What prices?”

“What y’all whispering about?” Mike blurted.

“That ain’t your business, is it, ninja?” Lamar snapped back.

“Hey, now. You usually ain’t so quiet. I’m curious. That’s all.”

“Shit,” Biggy cursed. Biggy doesn’t curse. Something was up.

“Did the video freeze?” Jaiden asked.

“Nah. Look what’s coming next,” Biggy replied. The upcoming video started getting everybody to sweat: A Gary’s mod animation credited under an infamous name: The Jinkler. Better known as the compilation demon, for never failing to make a single reactor crack in his videos. The team watched this skit before. Aside from Lamar, it's made each of them crack up before. The team gripped their seats for dear life. From the intro, the boys were starting to crack. The Jinkler’s could make any type of comedy a weapon and chain them interminably together like an assault. Mike buried his whimpering into his legs. Dejuan struck his legs, trying to focus on the pain. Biggy clenched his face and ass muscles, and Daz started tearing up. Lamar sat upright, impassive. Just light work, no reaction with this guy whatsoever. The room throbbed with that giggly tension to the point where breathing was a danger zone. The Ronin team was barely keeping it together, and the chat’s creative insults loosened the gears with every comment.

“These ninjas are literally becoming Broly before our very eyes.”

“Sour patch Ronins!”

“Cherry-tomato-face- ass ninjas!”

Jaiden tried to keep her composure, but remarkably less than her other members. From injuring themselves to involuntarily shaking.

When it ended, Mike’s index nail was torn from the nail bed. Blood trickled out of Daz’s tongue. Jaiden, Bobby, and Dejuan for unharmed and unamused after their composure resurfaced. It seemed everyone survived this challenge, before Lamar let out a wheeze. Next, a snort. He sneezed in his shaking hands. Finally, a boisterous laugh from way down his gut. The self-proclaimed king of not laughing. The member with a sense of humor drier than sandpaper laughed, and at a video he didn’t even think it was funny, unlike the others. On the screen, the chat was ripping him apart. HE LAUGHED. THE KING IS DEAD. The Jinkler strikes again. The Jinkler himself was in the comment section and typed, “Pay me $250, King.”

“Oh shit,” Jaiden craned her neck to the right to get a closer look at Lamar. “Look at him go. I guess the king folded first, eh.” Jaiden’s innocuous teasing was overshadowed by grim quiet. All the members unanimously frowned at Lamar without a word.

“What’s up with y’all?” Jaiden commented. “Why the silent treatment?” Lamar was still laughing uncontrollably. He had yet to notice. He would notice. He probably already noticed. The price to pay was never a minute late. Lamar shed his tough mask and opened his eyes again, tears welling at the ducts.

BOOM

And now, where Lamar’s body was, lingered a mist of red. Blood and meat chunks crawled down the drywalls, deep into Jaiden’s eyeballs. The set was not exempt. The YouTube screen flickered beneath a spray of Lamar’s insides. A rib chunk or two clattered against the ceiling fan, and Jaiden’s clothes, along with the floor were coated dark red with a few good strokes

“Hot damn! That ninja went everywhere!”

“Thank the lord, he didn’t get on my suit.”

“A lotta good that impenetrable fortress did, huh?”

“And there’s a lot of Lamar that we're gonna need to mop off this set,”

With the compilation over, the four remaining young men were free to burst into hearty cackling. That never got old. That invisible release that seized the losers from a bolt out of the blue always sent them after every compilation. They couldn’t help but liken their deaths to a volatile fart held inside for too long.

“Scuse me, Shawty,” Mike skipped Jaiden, running Lamar’s pockets for his debit card. “Alright, $250 to a Mr. Jinkler’s PayPal, yeah?”

Jinkler plugged a “HELL YEAH” in the comment section.

“As usual, you never disappoint with the edits, bro. Good shit!” Mike dispensed Lamar’s identification and savings into the bin once the fee was paid.

“Alright. So…”

“We're done for today,” Daz said. “I think the numbers speak for themselves.” Daz smiled pleasurably at the screen, with 8.9K viewers, and $5 to $500 donations received within the comments. “We did well. All of us. So, Mike. Close it for us.”

“Alright, ninjas. That’s it for this stream, and that’ll be it for this week. We promise to have another skit or two out for y’all this month, so please like and subscribe. Double-tap that bell to be notified. And put an F in the chat for Lamar, y’all. Later.”

Click. Dejuan ceased recording. The Ronin Team will return next week.

“You know what? I am gonna miss him,” Dejuan sighed. “Lamar was our villain. No one could bring that boss energy to our skits like him,” lamented Dejuan, wiping Lamar’s legacy off the screen with a cloth. “I don’t see anyone replacing him.”

“It’ll happen,” Daz replied. “It always does when it comes to the press, man. I haven’t been in a stage play since middle school, but I remember the first rule they ever taught us: ‘The Show Must Go On.” I mean, it went on with the others who failed, so it will go on without him. You are right, though, man. Lamar was good at what he did.”

“I already got connections we can check in with, too,” Biggy confirmed with a surprise journal, summoned under the table. He opened to the middle, passing an index of forty or so names crossed with an X. “Like Isaiah here. He went straight to the ICU after graduation last summer. He used to rock with us.”

“Yeah, no Biggy,” Mike chimed in. “I doubt he’s gonna drop all his important shit in Osaka to ride our business. I mean, he has a girl there too, you know.”

“Maybe Jaiden knows someone,” Dejuan said.

“Maybe. Yo, Jay. Congrats on the first video. Do you know anyone who could fill in for Lamar?” asked Daz.

The pleasant faces of Jaiden’s friends beamed upon her the way the sun grazes the surface of the ocean. That image of colored excellence, that illusion of camaraderie, had drawn her into a nightmare, tailored in the cloth of a dream. Jaiden did not speak. It was impossible. Her throat was locked, her breathing was shallow, her senses were inert from the point-blank explosion she endured, and the blood of Lamar beautified her face and hair like conditioner. She glared, mouth agape at them: Mike, Biggy, Daz, and Dejuan, and at their laughs, their nonchalance, their Kamishimos discarded to reveal Ghoul’s farming death for content. Her mouth and body were open in suggestion of an utterance to come. Nothing. Not a scream, not a run, not a strike, not a jolt upwards for a place to hide. Jaiden just looked at them. No blinking, no moving. Just a thousand yards stare at her idols. At the exposed gargoyles behind the channel. At the Gargoyle,s she joined.