Long drive, could end in burning flames or paradise.

With just one more dip in the road then a right turn to enter a long private driveway to their destination, our two young lovers sit in a comfortable silence. “Travis,” the passenger begins before pausing to apply more bright red lipstick in the mirror, “I liked when this relationship was new and private, you know that. And I was initially upset you accepted an invitation to a New York Jets Owner, Woody Johnson, dinner party at his mountain estate without asking me but I see now that you’re really proud of your brand and I understand supporting you is an important responsibility I have to perform to support you.”

The hunk behind the driver seat smiled at his blonde mate, grasped the skull knob atop the gearshift, and accelerated to the next gear. “It’ll be fun. Besides, you know how I like showing you off.”

Instinctively, her left hand slid over to his lap. But he surprisingly recoiled. “We’re almost there, babe. I can’t show up with an erection in front of these men.”

She was harmed and she could tell he was stressed. She would support him by standing there and looking pretty. Still, she had to vocalize her protest. She was, afterall, a strong woman^tm.

“These men. Gross. Bunch of spoiled pricks who –”

“Not tonight with the NFL Ownership Cartel stuff, babe. Let’s just keep it light. Have some fun. Mingle. And you keep those lips clean,” he downshifted as they approached the valet, “maybe later I’ll let you watch me tug it for you.” He accented his smile, this time, with a wink.

Entering the doors, it was immediately apparent that this was less a gala than a social together of likeminded…Filth. Travis stood tall but exuded no notable confidence. His date stepped in closer to him and snugged his grip around her waist. His fingers hung loose as soon as she removed her hand.

She knew how disgusting these men were. Travis wasn’t like them. He was a player. He worked. He hustled. He was like Her. The men were not. Old. Gross. Ugly. And the odor! Would you believe it? Yet, she scanned the room while waiting for her date to shuffle them from the landing above the crowd, the older and grosser the man, it seemed, the more stunning the date. And not just gorgeous, she noted, but special inside as well.

“Was that,” she asked without turning from the crowd, “Gal Gadot on the arm of 49ers owner, Jed York?”

A horn blasted from the front and through the audience, causing the eyes of the NFL Ownership Family — and their dates — to turn to our couple who stood unmoved from the entry. A hush cut the air silent. One youthful blonde guest gasped and was immediately silenced by a crack from a broad steel-plated cane held by Dan Rooney, her host and date to the event. The other young women were galvanized by their silence.

“Well we see young Kelce has delivered as promised!” Travis’ boss, Kansas City Chiefs owner, Clark Hunt, stepped onto the landing with the couple and addressed the five dozen or so guests before him. “You all may leave then, ladies.”

The silent women severed from their dates and walked purposely out various exits — none of which were through the entryway by which Taylor Swift was locked to a motionless six-foot five-inch block with a grip beartrapped around her ring-less left hand. When the silence had returned to the room, he continued.

“Family! We shall all enjoy the opportunity to befoul this exotic and unappraisebly-rare creature, I am proud to offer the first Bite Of The Apple to our newest Family Member, a businessman, a philanthropist, and the newest owner of the Washington Commanders, Josh Harris!”

How it happened, she was not sure, but now she stood in the middle of a candlelit study before a man she knew to be Josh Harris. The grip around her hand was cold sweat soaked. She ripped down and out of the grip of her groveling date, who could only sniffle and moan, “sorry I thought….we…”

Men. Fucking men.

This relationship was over and, for not the first time in her life, she stood alone to face predators on her own. Her abdomen involuntarily pulsed twice.

And if you never bleed, you’re never gonna grow.

It began.

Josh Harris lurched at her hips. A vain effort that was more the result of a 58-year taking up such debauchery late than any honest lust to lead off some sort of group violation of innocent woman. But he was compelled nonetheless and, smelling her now, he suggested he couldn’t hold back the force building against the front of his pants much longer anyways. But she simply side-stepped his advance. He tumbled to the floor and gazed with the anger of a rejected man. He let out a sharp whistle that echoed down the stone hallway behind him. She grasped at the walls around her, looking for an escape. Instead, her grip made its way to an antique tomahawk that rested upon a bookshelf. She felt perfect balance as the piece left her grip. Harris flinched away from the object upon her display of offense.

Harris slid against the wall with with a weak slump, releasing only a trickle of blood from his mouth — as it was the back of his skull that had been obliterated when the stone made contact. She was not going to let this draw out into a fucking month’s worth of Today Show segments.

“FUCK YOU!” She charged across the room and forced her knee forward until she felt the cartilage in his face was destroyed. The blood ran down her leg and pooled in her right pump. One of his teeth had sliced the skin above her knee.

She looked to her date. Travis stood dazed but still helpless. Big fucking erection now though, of course. He was in over way over his head. For her, this was just another Tuesday.

I’d be the man.

She’d seen this bullshit before. She didn’t have time for this man-child. Go fucking shoot a Chunky Soup commercial with your mommy, Pussy. She severed her cares for him. I mean, what a violation of trust, right?

But looking beyond her now-latest ex, she saw dozens more members of the NFL Ownership Family advancing into sight down the hallway, the group marching in a chaotic wave towards the double-doors of the study. She backed up and tripped on the paw of a bearskin rug laid before the fireplace. The stumble caused her arm to reach for the mantel, inadvertently dropping an oil lantern that fell to the ground when a hidden passage in the wall opened, revealing a dark and narrow chute into which she fell. The lantern rolled against the bearskin rug and leaked its fuel. The rug erupted in flames that spread across the curtains to the sofa and, then, engulfing the entire room, drawing back the Familys advance even as the quickest members reached the study unable to witness her manner of escape.

The room into which she fell would best be described by most as a literal armory for the Russian mercenary Wagner Group. For Taylor Swift, who was scared, off her meds, and bleeding Carrie, it was Adequate. Running her fingers over the knives, guns, and explosives displayed before her, she quietly sang to herself as she prepared to address the Family. Singing calmed her.

‘Cause we’re young and we’re reckless….We’ll take this way too far….

The Family stood 31 strong on the grounds surrounding the burning building. Watching. Just Watching. But for the entryway to the mansion, which was constructed of stone, all was lost when the fire from the study leapt to the magnificent tapestries that lined the halls. The air funneled the heat through the hallway, driving the Family back to the main level and then onto the grounds through the main exits, which now belched flames out as a reminder to the Family of the consumptive nature of Fire.

Exiting from a cellar door on the rear of the property, she emerged thankful that the subterranean armory was fire-separated. From a safe space in the darkness, she saw the Family Watching. Just Watching.

She flanked them, a one-man platoon.

I’d be a fearless leader. I’d be an alpha type.

She ran as fast as she could at an unsuspecting Arthur Blank, driving a claw hammer through the side of his skull before her bare footsteps made an audible noise on the wet grass. Kneeling against the darkness opposite the flames, still on the periphery of the men and women in formal attire that would now be perfect for an execution.

She grabbed a grenade attached to her bandolier, pulled the pin, and lobbed it to a group of motionless Family near the entryway steps. Before its crescendo, she repeated this delivery to a smaller group about twenty feet away.

Twin blasts shocked and halved the size of Family. Flesh and fluids rained down in a pair of synchronized sheets. Blood further-slickened the dew-soaked twilight lawn. Most importantly, her presence was now revealed. She charged into their sight, barreling at the most confused members of the Family standing near Travis’ vehicle.

Mark Davis stood crying, wiping hot brain matter from his hair. She pressed a bayonet knife through his spine just above the drawstring waistline of his pants. He ceased crying and wiping; now twitching in the mud and gargling as a dark puddle formed around his abdomen. A small win possibly worth savoring momentarily. But.

But there was no time to waste enjoying the show. Martha Ford advanced at her female peer to receive Taylor’s pick hand crushing her windpipe. Younger, faster, stronger, prettier — it was too easy. Ford didn’t even fight back, electing to use her final efforts to erratically press a Life Alert bracelet. She was no Lady and these were no Gentlemen.

Jimmy Haslem, seeing Taylor single-handed, advanced to control her left arm. She released Ford — unable to detach without getting slivers of paper-thin skin under her french tips — and used her now-free second hand to swing a blade from her belt and through his pants, leaving a gash across Haslem’s left thigh. He fell against the vehicle’s trunk as she raised the knife and plunged it into the side of the gas tank, releasing a stream of fuel directly into Haslem’s wound. Stepping out of the car was Shad Khan. With a swift snare, she pulled his cigar from his puffing lips, and tossing it thoughtlessly onto Haslem, who opened into flames and raced from his position leaning against the vehicle. The flames were the last thing Khan would ever see as her hands returned to rake his eyes into a bloody ooze puddling mostly in his moustache.

Michael Bidwill approached her, walking hesitantly around the front of the car. She could feel that he didn’t want her. But he was approaching, she also felt, on behalf of the Family — out of the darkness, Robert Kraft, with one hand holding his flaccid penis and the other holding up his trousers, lunged at the attractive woman without second thought, as was his practice. He forced his face to hers and parted his lips to offer her still-perfect red lipstick his pock marked tongue. She resisted momentarily then leaned in and vacuumed his slime into her own mouth, where her teeth severed the unhealthy flesh with ease, fluids exploding from her mouth, out her nose, and down her throat. He jerked his head away and stumbled backwards. His pants fell to his ankles and she brought a new blade from her hip, swinging it in a full bottom-up arc that barely brushed against his flesh, but cleanly opening his scrotal sack and allowing two swollen, infected, puss-filled protrusions to drop out. She gathered the testies with a tug and turned to Bidwill, who stood dumbfounded. She rammed her fistful of bloody Kraft into his mouth and controlled the bachelor to the ground, assuring that this would not be a pair of genitalia his throat would reject. He flailed on the ground next to Kraft as his respiratory system arrested. She spit out the tongue.

“You know you both fucking love it.”

A crazed cry came from the darkness near the fountain below, growing in strength, she could feel the threat bearing down on her —

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeee Haaaaawwwwww!!!!!!

The face of the devil himself emerged quicker that she could have ever imagined. Jerry Jones bared his teeth as he crested the hill and entered her vision, just feet from where she stood. He leapt and tackled her, maintained a dominant position as they slid on the wet grass before settling into place in a pool of blood next to Mark Davis’ twitching leg. One cryptic hand reached for the heat between her legs; the second, a revolver holstered under the left breast of his jacket. Her clearly audible cries of No only seemed to fuel her attacker.

The gun was out and he thumbed back the hammer, his other fingers maintaining a grip of familiarity on the ivory handle. The piece fell below her view — then she felt the front sight caught on a piece of her skirt, the only resistance he felt as he cursed and screamed, continuing to try to force the muzzle into her womanhood. She freed one arm and reached futility at her attacker. The skirt tore; the muzzle pressed ahead; and Jerry Jones smiled.

“NEVER FUCKED A WHORE WHILE SHE WAS IN THE MIDDLE OF DYING OF A SHOT TO THE COOCH!!! SUCK THAT, HARRIS!!! I’M FUCKING CRA–”

She was instantly overwhelmed with a gasping breath smelling of burning flesh, hair, and polycotton. Jimmy Haslem, still engulfed in six foot flames, flailed around the bumper of the vehicle and tripped on Mark Davis’ still-twitching leg. Haslem’s momentum carried him into Jerry Jones, knocking him off Taylor and leaving him trapped beneath Haslem, the flames spreading from Haslem’s suit to Jones’ all-white tuxedo. He was burning alive. She sat up and manipulated the revolver to her own control, aiming it at the incapacitated octogenarian.

She slowly stood, shifted the sights from Jones, and shot twice. Alex Spanos and Zygi Wilf, two men who had been cowering on the ground behind a stump with their arms over their now-incomplete heads, tears streaming down their faces, and piss in their pants, slumped into each other. She unloaded third and fourth shots into the side of Stan Kroenke, who was hobbling across the lawn, collecting sizeable pieces of flesh that might replace the arm, ear, cheek, eye, penis, or shoulder meat the original grenade had ripped from his body. Kroenke fell to the ground and, on a slight incline, slid downward to darkness.

She squinted her eyes to see two silhouettes still staring at the burning building. A fifth shot caught Amy Strunk square in the back of her head. A single head bobble and her figured fell into a lump. Number six rendered the gun expired and spun Gayle Benson off her footing and into the inferno via a blown out floor-to-ceiling window. Taylor found her helpless screams of agony only slightly warming inside.

Jim Irsay twitched on the ground. The lower half of his body had been detached by one of the grenade blasts but he had had clawed himself to within ten feet. She could see a crazed look in eyes. She stared at him, almost with pity, and pulled the final grenade from her vest. The pin came out with ease and she leaned over to grab a fistful of Irsay’s hair, picking him up nearly vertical before delicately placing the grenade on the ground and dropping his torso atop to accept the impending blast.

She stepped behind a tree. Half a body was still surprisingly good at absorbing the shock, she considered.

After the sounds of Irsay’s flesh striking the nearby trees passed, she stepped out and looked around. There was no activity beyond a few known Family who were screaming, moaning, or choking. Free of threats, she identified a single vehicle parked near the stone entrance. As she approached it, Roger Goodell stepped into view and struck her with an open hand.

She was too exhausted to fight. He screamed at her. He kicked her in the back. She rolled and barked in agony. He kicked her in the ribs. He picked her up and bounced her across the hood of the car, her body tumbling to the ground. When her shoulder landed on the lowest stone step, she heard a snap.

Goodell stepped over her and up to the doorway. Her head was in the crook of her good arm, trying to imagine how she could ever stand up….let alone defeat this beast.

Next Chapter.

Was it a moment of blackout? She heard Goodell’s voice booming in threats and blame but it was not directed as her. She rolled forward and saw standing atop the entrance landing Roger Goodell and Travis Kelce. Kelce, still frozen, stood as Goodell raged with the intensity of the fire that framed them. Tears streamed from Kelce’s eyes. Flames licked at the wooden valet stand that, until now, had been adequately distanced from the destruction of the evening. Sparks patterned from loose wires where a large light fixture once hung to illuminate the guests’ safe exits.

Goodell pointed to Swift. His screams ended and only Travis could hear his now-steady words. Travis looked to his lover. More tears. His gazed turned back to the dominant man before him. Travis stepped into Roger Goodell with a monstrous embrace. Goodell, wholly-embraced but standing firm, did not reciprocate. Travis reached up and grabbed the live wire above them. There was a flash and she could only hide her face.

Hearing Travis’ moans, Taylor regained consciousness. Protecting her damaged shoulder, she stumbled to her feet and up the steps to the source of his voice. She found the men on the ground, fused in their embrace. Goodell’s lifeless being was charred and melted to Travis, who was pinned beneath the death that was now a part of him. He cried. He apologized. He begged her through gasps to put him out of his misery.

She stepped forward, straddled his face, and partially-squatted to release a voiceless insult of piss and blood into the eyes of the weak coward. No breakup songs for this asshole. He begged more. She made her way to the vehicle.

Look what you made me do.

She raced off the property as the fire ripped through the accessory buildings on the campus, coming as close as to lick the bumper of her escape car. Bursting onto the pavement and towards Civilization, she exhaled. The radio DJ cut in to report a missile attack had leveled the entire eastern Wisconsin region. Disinterested, she turned the dial on the radio and nodded her head as she returned to her hunt for True Love.