Whoever codified the Geneva Conventions and didn't add ticking as a non-conventional means of torture should be thrown to hell and tickled for eternity. Forget waterboarding — this is the real deal. 

You can't control it, you're out of breath, and you get a sore throat. Every inch of your body constricts like a worm while you're both crying and laughing, fixing your torturer a positive reaction that his tight 5 standup routine couldn't get, even after a two-drink minimum. All I'm saying is that getting tickled is worse than being punched in the dick. 

In fact, I would very much prefer to be dick-punted than to be fingered like a piano by two of the most sausage-fingered weirdos this side of any clandestine finger-fighting league, of which I had to infiltrate once posing as a Nicaraguan wrestler nicknamed "El Finger Magicos." 

As to why I had to do it, it's hard to tell when I'm pissing my pants. What is with today and me doing biological functions on my clothes? Thankfully, thanks to a freakish high school accident, my pee smells like passion fruit juice. Again, something I would love to further elaborate on if it weren't for my body slowly losing consciousness from asphyxiation, or choking on my spit, or an aneurysm.

Again, ticking is a murder method not codified, and one you can easily get away with. 

"aight, that's enough," says the teenage mafioso. 

As the two gorillas move to reveal the torturous twink, I leak through virtually every orifice in my body. And yes, it is as hot as you may think it is. 

The petite soft-drink grabs me by my strong, chiseled chin, and immediately pulls back as blood trickles down his finger. When I say that my chin is sharp, I mean it. 

"so," says the Lilliputian lawbreaker, "are you gonna do it, or naw?"

It is to note that he did a snap sound between the "it" and the "or naw." I feel whatever the male equivalent of a big thot energy coming from him. 

Also, what?

"What thing?" I say between breaths. 

He looks at me for a second, then at his goons for two more, and then at me for a second further. I know that vacant look of a cow getting ready to be turned into a burger — he is monologuing. 

"oh, so you're mocking my stease, aren't ya?" says the beautiful bandit. "jus' because of my boyish looks, my socially conscious twitter feed, and my funky fresh style, do i have to be sum kind of dolt?" 

"No!" I say, trying to cut him off. "I'm just saying that-"

"youse sayin' that just because i have soft skin, incredibly luscious lips, and naturally perfect hair, it means i'm a disappointment, dad? don't i make you proud, dad?" he says, punctuation every comma with a shove. 

"Dude, I think you're working on some issues there," I say. "But that's not the point, you forgot to-" I begin to say, but he shoves a finger in my mouth. I think he tried to put it over my mouth, but overshot it. He tastes like coconut cream pie. 

"no, no. don't waste your breath," says the metrosexual monster. "i understand. i look soft and cuddly, so you wanna trample me. you're dead wrong, mister. guys, make him cry."

As the two punching bags of noodles play me like a sax, I can barely get out a simple fact that this banana for brains seems to be missing. 

"You didn't tell me what you want!" I say between cackles. 

Both of the goons stop mid-tickle, making me lose my balance. As I hit the floor, I realize that while my pee smells like passionfruit juice, it most definitely doesn't taste like it.

"what did you just say?" says Brayden. 

"I said," I say, sayingly, "you didn't tell me what you want me to do! At least tell me why you're torturing me for."

I can almost see the gears turn inside that pretty head of his' while a dial-up modem sound screeches around him. We stand there — well, I'm tipped down — waiting for him to react for over a minute until he blinks twice, shaking his head from side to side. 

"whatcha talking about, homeboy?" he says. "of course i did, right? jungkook? harry?"

Both of them look at each other, then at me, then at him, while I look at both, and Brayden to them. Eyes dart around the room like a pirate convention on a rickety ship in the middle of a storm. 

The Mediterranean meatball coughs twice, cleaning his hand on his suit. "Well, look, boss-" he begins to say, but Brayden's backhand across his face, leaving an imprint of his signet ring, stops him on his track.

Brayden grabs the goon's head like a baby would a melon, rubbing it gently. "didn't i tell ya not to call me boss? i'm not your boss, daddy is your boss. i'm your bro, you friend, your chum, your buddy. i'm friend, not boss."

Ah, I see where he is coming from. Daddy issues, inferiority complex, loneliness, never taken seriously. But what's his angle? If he's like Hayden and me, there must be some kind of twist. 

"Okay, bro," says the Mediterranian beefaroni. "You see, you didn't tell him what you need...bro."

"what? of course i told him, didn't i?"

"Nu-uh," I say. "You didn't." 

"jungkook?" he says. "you're the smart one here. tell me i didn't torture someone for funsies."

Jungkook, the asian riceball, scratches his bald head while mumbling incoherently — the universal sign of being a dumbass.

After another brief pause for monologuing, he goes behind me, immediately feeling my hands being untied.

"yeah, that's gonna be a yikes from me, dawg," he says, extending his hand toward me. "happens all the time."

"I would say 'don't worry,' but this is the second time a bad boy makes me go to the bathroom on me," I say, grabbing his hand. 

Only, he moves it at the last second, making me slip and fall on my urine again. 

"syke," says Brayden, giving me a killer smirk with his perfectly white, yet crooked teeth. Sexily crooked. 

"What the fuck, man?" I say, using the momentum to do a tactical roll, straight into Jungkook's legs. "I thought you were cool, and shit." 

The boy makes an annoying, nasally sound that seems like a piglet trying to laugh when he realizes he is made of bacon, and thus both doomed and delicious. I believe that is his laughter. 

"look, desperado," he says, kneeling down, which didn't modify his height that much, "i'm not a bleeding heart like hayden. i don't even bleed."

"Yeah," says Harry, whose last name I am inclined to believe is Styles. "Bro's skin is made of cabbage."

"And blood is balsamic vinegar," says Jungkook. 

"that's right," says Brayden. "i'm a delicious little cabbage roll. put some meat in me, roll me up, and gobble-gobble, bitch."

"Gobble-gobble!" yell both goons in unison. 

"I am so confused right now," I say. 

"look, i don't know you. youse some weirdo greaser for all i know. my daddy taught me a few things before going to jail. the first one is always to sell single-ply toilet paper to hotels, because people ain't gonna steal a roll of single-ply paper. i mean, who is finna steal single-ply toilet paper? that's some sick fuck right there."

"Hella sick," says Jungkook. 

"and second," he says, leaning towards me, "is never trust someone who smells like a bitch. you know what i'm smelling?"

You know, this is too much. I don't want anything to do with these weirdos. You know what this smells? Like fucking plot. 

"Lemme guess, a bitch?" I say.

"no, like passionfruit juice," says Brayden. "and bitch. if you wanna hang out with us, you gotta prove your mettle. get your hands dirty. earn my trust, ya know?"

"Honestly, that is the last thing I wanna do," I say. Whatever mafia thing he wants me to do, it isn't worth it. I prefer to spend my last year in the vent. What has joining with other bad boys brought me, beside diarrhea and torture? "Do tell me, why would I be dipping my toes in whatever mafia crap you got cooking?"

With a snap of his fingers, Brayden's goons bring me up by the armpits, putting me back into the chair. 

"see, this is why you don't torture first and ask later. now we have to torture you all over again, remind you on how totally not cash that whole thing is, k?"

Never mind, I do wanna do it, if to get away from this. 

Ticking is the worst.

"So, what's the situation?" I ask as we walk to the exit of the hangar. Me and Brayden on front, the goons on the back. 

"this is the situation, homeboy," says Brayden, taking a hit out of his Juul. Smells like bacon and teen spirit. "this 'mafia crap' you're speaking of, i hate it too, okay? i never asked to be in the family, but with daddy in prison, and him not trusting no bitch, i'm the one in charge."

"You're the Simba to his Mufasa," I say. 

"yeah, something like that. i just wanna go to school, be a normal, if extremely hot, good boy, and go join greenpeace to save the whales, or something." 

That took a huge leap. Didn't take him for someone who cares much for the environment. Then again, mobsters are not known to leave a huge carbon footprint. What do I know?

"so, like, if i can't fight this family thing, might as well use it for good. stop littering, start selling biodegradable toilet paper, stuff like that. you get me?"

Hey, he might be an idiot, but he seems like not such a bad guy. Leaning into your bad boy-ness to do good is not a route I have taken, but it's a perfectly good strategy. The sky is big enough for various bad-boy approaches. 

"Yeah, play the cards you were dealt," I say.

I jump forwards as he pats me on the back. For being such a short stack of pancakes, he is surprisingly strong. 

"exactly. play the cards i was dealt. you get me."

We leave the warehouse, only to take a sharp right and walk into an identical warehouse. 

"I respect the hustle. You know, I also-" I begin to say, but again, a finger is put into my mouth. This is no accident — it's a pattern. 

"i don't care," he says. "first, earn my trust, and then, i might give a fuck about your story."

Nope, he is not nice. He's an asshole. Point taken. 

The warehouse, just like the other, is empty, save for a chair, a lightbulb dangling above said chair, and a person with a bag over his head. 

He is definitely not a good person. 

"so, here's the 4-1-1," he says. "i wanna go back to school, but i got a little situation about the cops tryna catch that culprit of something that might've involved me that i gotta work out first. a misunderstanding, really."

"I see," I say. "Does it have to do with the person in the chair over there?"

"as a matter of fact, it does," says the idiot. "you see, that man, a security guard, thinks he saw me torch down a local makeup factory because it's trying to encroach in my family's business."

"And you didn't?" 

"no, i didn't," says Brayden. "i torched it because they tests on animals illegally, duh."

Can you be an asshole by accident? Because this guy is really pushing the line between accidentally evil and evil good. A chaotic neutral kinda guy. 

"that guy over there is the only witness to the deed. we grabbed him while the building was burning and have kept him here ever since. quiet fella, really stoic, ya know? i just need you to go and convince him that, if he says something, we might break his kneecaps. but like, nicely."

"I see. Why don't you or your goons do it?"

"Because," says Jungkook, grabbing me by all around the neck, "if things go south, we don't wanna be linked to it."

So they are using me as a scapegoat in case things go wrong. Great. 

"You will do fine," says Harry, putting his hand on my back. "Just sweet talk him into shutting up."

"And if it doesn't work?" I ask. 

"you don't want me to answer that," says Brayden. "besides, we're gonna be behind him all the time. mostly exuding menacing vibes. and some vape smoke." 

Let's just get over this. The path of least resistance, the path of least resistance, the path of least resistance. 

I place myself in front of the man, with the trio behind him, doing JoJo poses, or some kind of weird crap. 

This is it — I'm gonna be a mafia strongman. Not the shittiest thing that has happened today, to be honest. 

The first step, as any movie and real-life kidnapping and interrogation technique dictates, is to remove the bag placed over his head, but as I remove it, there is a grim realization that flashes in my mind. 

"Hey, Brayden," I say. "This is a mannequin, not a person." 

"oh, dip?" he says, moving around to face the mannequin head-on. "oh yeah, my b. we grabbed it in the middle of the night thinking it was a person. so, i guess no witnesses. see ya tomorrow at school?"

This guy is neither good nor evil. He is a grade-A idiot.