Caswell Lucas Calhoun sat in the small, stuffy square room. It's walls, made up of large bricks, covered with a thick coating of a plastic-like paint reminded him very much of the walls of his elementary school. The entire feeling of this situation: sitting in a little chair, waiting anxious for some ominous authority figure to come in; it all felt very doggerel and familiar.

The room was more comparable to the police interrogation rooms he'd seen on television than the ones back at the precinct in Boston. Two simple steel chairs on opposite sides of a bolted down steel table, all in front of a large mirror. On the table, a heavy, thick glass pitcher, vase shaped with a girthsome handle, and two small plastic cups. A subtle reminder that he wasn't a prisoner there, but part of the 'in.' Caswell considered if anyone was even behind the pane of spy glass, or if anyone watched the monitors connected to the small oscillating camera that buzzed in the top right of his field of vision. He figured it was another test of nerves, and that everyone had headed out to lunch, leaving him to sit, wait and feel the heat. Caswell wouldn't let anyone get any pleasure seeing him squirm. He sat perfectly still in the chair, his shins perpendicular to his thighs perpendicular to his torso, his hands clamped together, fingers interlocking, eyes locked forward, staring at the wall.

As he glared, Caswell's sight started to fuzz and blur. Any movement of an eye would cause a skippy fuzz. Like his vision was being played off vinyl. Caswell made a game of keeping his focus on a single shadow, cast by a single bump in the texture of the wall, allowing the mild hallucinations to keep his mind active, but at all times, keeping a constant awareness of his surrounding. A subtle movement of the mirror could mean that someone had come or gone from the room beyond, which would mean to him that either someone had been watching or is now watching. An increase in temperature would prove that they were fucking with him. Any information possible, he wanted.

He had been at the camp for nine days now, and he had been doing well. He was recruited after... well that's not important now. Nothing of his past was, and they made that very clear. His rank, his merits, his max bench, his kid's finger paintings, his wife's tits, the length of his dick; none of it mattered. They made that very clear. Caswell was unsure of who these people were, but they were high up. Different officers, of varying ranks, all seemed to have different nationalities, which Caswell figured was an indication that this organization wasn't an American outfit, but a global collaboration. Caswell liked being a part of important things, and this seemed to be really god damned important.

The edges of Caswell's vision became black and white static as he focused on not moving his eyes whatsoever. His body held steady, but his mind was becoming more and more entranced. When the door handle turned, Caswell's eyes quickly shot towards the door to study whoever it was coming into the room. The man walked through the door very slowly, preoccupied with the folder in his hand, and quietly eased the door close behind him. The folder remained closed; the man was only looking at the piece of paper clipped on the front. He was an older, big fellow, in his late forties standing at about six feet and weighing probably two seventy-five. His hair, parted to one side, grew gray and he wore a pair of unstylish math teacher glasses and walked somewhat awkwardly in a poorly fitted suit with a very perfunctory nametag on his right breast, "Mr. Benedict." Caswell analytically took in all of this, but above all else, noticed the man's expression. Very firm, almost angry.

"Mr. Calhoun" Benedict said flatly as he stretched his hand across the table. Caswell, swallowed the urge to correct the 'Mr.' title to remind this man of his rank, but that was no longer important. The lump went down his throat hard as Benedict jostled into his seat and again examined the folder. Putting the folder aside, Benedict pulled a small tin from his breast pocket, opened it and placed a single pill on the table. After pouring water into one of the two plastic cups, he placed the pill on the back of his tounge and with a sip of water, swallowed it.

"Good afternoon, sir. And how may I address you?" Benedict's head remained lowered, but his eyes glanced up from the folder and above the top rim of his glasses, meeting Caswell's solid gaze. He offered no reply. Caswell wanted to elaborate, but he knew Benedict understood the question. He waited for a response the way a rock waits for nothing.

"It's 'mister.'" Benedict replied bitterly as he again lowered his eyes and busied himself with opening the folder and shuffling papers. "Mr. Calhoun, today we are going to engage in instinct repression. Are you familiar with the practice?" Benedict asked, raising his eyes. Caswell met the eye contact with firm ferocity.

"Yes, Mr. Benedict. The Freudian inspired method of ignoring primal urges to facilitate clearer cognitive processes." Caswell tried not to sound like a dictionary and hid his would-be smug expression.

"My my, that's nearly textbook," Benedict returned with a sour tone. Caswell ignored the urge to give Benedict a smart assed 'thank you.' "Calhoun, what would you think are among the urges we attempt to impede, and that we therefore work to ignore in this practice?"

Humans' eyes have a tendency to dart back and forth when thinking up an answer to any sort of question. Caswell was well aware of this, and concentrating, he held his gaze directly on Benedict's left eye. When making eye contact, Caswell was against the doctrine of starring at the bridge of the nose, directly between the eyes; he thought it produced an inorganic stare. Also, he thought it very important not to switch between eyes. When you're starring at one eye, the stare-ee cannot tell that you are doing so, but when you switch between the two eyes, they can tell, and it makes the stare-er seem flinchy. So Caswell starred, deep into Benedict's left eye and answered, "Anger, lust, self---"

Benedict interjected, "Yeah? Pride and Envy too? What about Sloth?"

Unimpressed with the pathetic oaf's blatant sarcasm, Caswell relaxed his jaw, unclenching his teeth and continued. "Self preservation," the words came out slow and regulated.

"Those are obvious. But there are others. Things you would never think of. To begin today, we are going to look at an instinct that may surprise you, and that is very difficult to overcome."

"And what might that be, Mr. Benedict?"

"Laughter."

Caswell knew Benedict was just squirming in his seat, waiting for, 'Whaaaat?! Laughter? You can't be serious! Tell me more!' But he would offer no such masturbatory, false astonishments. He might, if he was with some half-friends at a cocktail party, but this was serious. This was important. Caswell's unbroken stare spurred Benedict to continue.

"Are you familiar with laughter's evolutionary origins?"

"I am not, Mr. Benedict."

"Primapes, Calhoun, use different grunts to warn of different things." Caswell knew that the word was 'primate' but allowed Benedict to continue. "One grunt will mean, 'danger on the ground' while another will mean, 'danger in the trees.' They use these as basic communication." Caswell continued to listen patiently, hiding his extreme uninterest. "Anthropologists believe that this is the basis of human laughter. That laughter was originally meant to signify a non-threat. For example, if a group of hunters moved through the forest and one saw a wolf, but noticed that its hind was crushed under a tree stump, he would laugh to notify the others that there was a wolf there, but it was no threat. Do you follow?"

"Yes, Mr. Benedict" the notion was a new one for Caswell, and it indeed peaked his interest, but from his facial expression, nobody would be able to tell, especially not Benedict.

"But now, we are refined human beings capable of complex communication. There is no need for laughter. Laughter is a left over reflex from a long evolution and it can serve as a very distracting instinct." Benedict gave a benevolent pause, as if to allow Caswell a moment to absorb the thought. "Now, earlier I ingested a pill. This pill is going to affect my gastric system and will give me gas. In early human history, when hunters were stalking prey, if one of the men flatulated, he would laugh to let the rest of the party know that it was him, and not a wild animal or another group of enemy hunters."

Caswell could not help but find the situation funny. This terribly dry wretch of a man, speaking of early Homo Sapien flatulence. A small fissure smile cracked at the side of his lips.

"Not good, Calhoun. You must ignore your primal urge to laugh for the remainder of today's session. Complete failure in this exercise could be met with punishment as severe as termination of camp enrollment."

"I'm not sure I understand the exercise."

"I'm going to sit here and fart, and you're not going to laugh."

The sentence hit Caswell like a wet sandbag. Caswell immediately wrestled with the bubbling rise of laughter in his stomach while every muscle in his face contorted, restraining a smile from bursting out. Caswell knew he needed to regain mental base level and focused with all his might to snuff the laughter. Just as the last dying giggles were leaving his system, the solemn man across from Caswell slowly leaned to the left edge of his chair and a long, loud, whop-whopping, wet fart crawled out from under Benedict. Caswell began breathing heavily and rapidly, his abdomen convulsing as the laughs kicked about in his gut.

"Excuse me."

Caswell's lips exploded like a popped balloon and the hot air of his laughter rushed out. Both of his hands wrapped over his mouth as he folded in half, as if to try to conceal and trap the roar. Caswell tried to think of any horrible thought he could find. Nazis slaughtering Jews, young girls raped, a man cutting another man's head off. No matter how hard he concentrated on these thoughts, or how macabre the images he thought up, they were quickly dissolved and replaced with the immediate memory of Benedict's pursed lips articulating the words, "Excuse me." Every attempt to tame a laugh only gave birth to bigger uncontrollable laughs.

"Calhoun" Benedict grunted with disdain.

"I--- it's just... this---" Caswell couldn't even form thoughts let alone a cogent string of words.

"God damn it Calhoun!" Benedict's voice rose as he smashed his fist down onto the table.

"This is just... this is fucking ridiculous!" each word forced through a thick, jovial chuckle.

"Oh yes, Calhoun?" Benedicts steaming and haughty reply was interrupted by steaming and haughty roar of gas that only inflated Caswell's already uproarious laughter. "What exactly is so god damned ridiculous? It's a natural, bodily process."

Caswell's stomach muscles were aching and he was very much short of breathe. "Look at you! It's--- this... you're a fucking joke!" Caswell had meant that the cirumstances were a joke, but appropriately enough, the Freudian slip encapsulated the entire situation.

"Yeah?! Know what? Fuck you, you loser piece of shit! You're a fucking---" A high pitched squeaker interrupted the tirade. Caswell howled, banging the table for mercy, tears streaming down his face. Shooting up from his chair, Benedict screamed, "Fuck you! Shut the fuck up, right fucking now!" A succession of angry sloppy farts accompanied the command. Caswell's laughter turned into wild yelping, which fueled Benedict's anger, which fueled the flatulence, which fueled the laughter.

Benedict grappled at his chair and hurled it towards the maniacal laughter. The chair soared over Caswell's head, which he narrowly averted, and slammed loudly against the wall. Caswell straightened in his seat and swiftly turned his head. The sudden flight of the chair-turned-projectile had frightened Caswell and dampened his laughter into a vauge smile and a cocked eyebrow. Benedict's shoulders stooped and his arms, heavy with rage and fatigue, sagged towards the floor. Caswell struggled to smother the fading smile while searching for something to say. Heavy, furious breathes, moved in and out of Benedict's chest making it swell and deflate, swell and deflate.

Caswell narrowed his eyes and shaped his lips to say something, but before any sound of language was made, another sound roared out of Benedict's anus. It sounded like a diesel engine trying to turn over. Caswell could restrain the tsunami wave of giggles for no more than a billionth of a second; the sight of the hunched, furious man panting and farting was too powerful. The crashing wave broke through, as all waves do, and rushed over Caswell.

"STOP FUCKING LAUGHING!" Benedict screamed, his head trembling and his cheeks shaking under the power of his voice. It looked like blood was going to spill out his eyes, it sounded like each string of his voicebox was tearing to shreds. Benedict stomped towards the bolted down table, and grabbing upwards at one corner, tried to flip it in a grandiose display of fury. The table shook enough for the cups and the heavy glass jug to teeter and fall. The jug, having wobbled off the edge, shattered beside Caswell. Although a forceful lift, the table stubornly held its bolted position, making Newton's second law push down just as forcefully on Benedict. His heels slipped forward and, losing his balance, he flopped backward, falling hard on his side. The impact of the abrupt fall forced another sonorous fart to blast out of his ass. This reduced Caswell to a comatose of laughter; a quivering pile of giggles.

"I'M GOING TO FUCKING KILL YOU!" the flushed man yelped as he scrambled to his feet to charge at Caswell. Benedict's fist landed a solid blow to the face, for the recepient was in no state to react or defend himself. The laughter flipped back in his chair, landing hard on the cement floor. Benedict straddled his trainee and began laying a torrent of fists on the person in the chair. Benedict instinctively and ragingly grabbed the handle of the shattered jug, now a glass mason trowel in his hand, with horridly jagged sides.

Benedict raised the glistening glass into the air and forcefully brought in down, lodging an edge of it into the opening of the mouth. With all of his weight leaning into the handle, the crystaline shards ripped through the flesh of the cheeks and moved to the back of the throat. Gargled chuckles crept though the forming puddle and vibrated up through the jug handle. He continued, ravenously pounding and pounding and pounding, leaving between his knees a mess of bone and meat, saturated in a pooling, black liquid.

Benedict's weight slumped backwards; his shoulders and face drooped towards his hands; his hands clamped together, fingers interlocked. The silence of the room throbbed in Benedict's ears. When a meager squeal of a fart broke the quite, he breathed a single chuckle. A disgusting and slippery smile spread across his face.

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