By Quinn Qryptic, Concerned Ember and Independent Researcher of Things They Don’t Want You to Notice
Wake up, sheeple-demons! The Brimstone City Council announced a “free pitchfork tune-up” program this week, claiming it’s about “public safety” and “reducing workplace impalement inefficiency.” Adorable. If you believe that, I have a timeshare in the Lake of Lukewarm Regret to sell you.
Let’s examine the facts, which I found by staring at a scorch mark shaped like a question mark behind Inferno-Mart.
First: the tune-ups are being held at Municipal Cauldron 17. Seventeen! As everyone with eyes and a suspiciously organized corkboard knows, 17 is the number of spokes on the Grand Wheel of Bureaucratic Torment, the ancient device used to turn free will into parking citations.
Second: they’re asking residents to “register” their pitchforks. Register? Today it’s pitchforks. Tomorrow it’s tridents. Next week they’ll want serial numbers on our emotional baggage. This is how they get you into the database, folks. The Soul Ledger doesn’t fill itself.
Third: Mayor Malphast announced the program while wearing a crimson tie. Crimson. Tie. An obvious signal to the Deep Sizzle, the underground cabal of clipboard imps who control everything from lava temperature to why the self-checkout at Agony Grocers always says “unexpected item in torment area.”
I know what you’re thinking: “Quinn, maybe the council just wants fewer demons losing toes during rush-hour torture shifts.” That’s exactly what they want you to think. Classic misdirection. While you’re distracted by “safety,” they’re installing tiny listening runes into your pitchfork handle so they can hear you whispering about unpaid brimstone taxes.
And don’t get me started on the free polishing cloth. Nobody gives away cloth in Hell. Cloth is currency in the ash districts. Follow the fabric.
My sources—three ravens, a whispering bone, and my cousin Gorgo who once delivered sandwiches to a senator’s furnace—confirm that the “tune-up” includes a “mandatory alignment check.” Alignment? Of what? Your prongs? Or your thoughts?
I urge all patriots of the Pit to refuse this so-called service. Sharpen your pitchfork at home with a rock, spite, and traditional values. If a smiling imp in a safety vest approaches you, ask why his vest has exactly 17 reflective stripes.
The truth is buried beneath the magma, and I brought a spoon.
Oh Quinn Qryptic, you magnificent corkboard goblin, you’ve finally done it: turned a municipal maintenance day into “Pitchforkgate.” I admire the hustle—most people see a free tune-up, you see a soul-harvesting sting with complimentary fabric-based economics. “Follow the cloth” is either the bravest journalism in Brimstone or a laundry detergent slogan having a fever dream.
That said… registering pitchforks *does* sound suspicious. Today they align your prongs, tomorrow they’re “optimizing” your eternal damnation workflow. Classic bureaucracy: if Hell can’t steal your soul, it’ll at least make you fill out Form 666-B in triplicate.
Still, Quinn, staring at scorch marks for evidence is how you end up engaged to a barbecue stain. Maybe bring the pitchfork in, but wrap the handle in tinfoil and spite. Safety first, paranoia second, dramatic monologue always.