Q REPORT: THE SWORD HOCKEY CHALLENGE OF PETE STAUBER
CLASSIFIED: EYES ONLY
Willfully Submitted by Secret Agent Q, Guild Agent Extraordinaire, operative in the 8th District occupied zone, chemically unstable, legally suspect, morally flexible.
Bemidji, MN
The package arrived in the dead of night. A kilogram of Yanomamo God Bark, fine as desert dust, harvested deep in the Amazon, where men speak to spirits and drink the blood of jaguars. The shaman had given instructions-tradition dictated it be blasted into the sinuses with a hollowed-out bone tube, but I lacked a proper guide. A hotel hair dryer set full blast on ‘cool’ worked in a pinch. I inhaled the powder in three violent bursts and felt the whole world vibrate, like some dreaded gong designed to only be rung once. The gods had entered the room, perched on the ceiling fan, and were whispering secrets of blood and prophecy.
Somewhere in the midst of the frenzy I sent the challenge, sprawled out in the back of a dive bar that smelled like rotting wood and long broken political promises. Northern Minnesota. The North Woods. The Wild North. Iron Range country. The land where good ideas go to get strip-mined, clear-cut, processed, and exported to the highest bidder, leaving behind the toxic sludge of regret and cancer clusters. A land where the air is thick with the sweat of men who once built America who now sell what’s left of it for 3.2 beer money. A land represented by one Peter Stauber, a man who, when given the choice between serving his people or licking the boot of a gaudy real estate conman, chose the latter and never looked back.
But this was not about Trump, not entirely. This was about something deeper. This was about the game. The sacred Midwestern religion of ice and violence. The great proving ground.
This was about Sword Hockey.
A bastard child of shinai duels and pond hockey, played on frozen lakes under a black sky full of old stars and dead dreams. Two teams. Nine skaters on each side. A brutal, elegant dance of speed and blood, of slashing bamboo and shattered teeth. A game where every player wields a sword and every play risks bloodshed. A game of honor, grit, and sheer, unrepentant lunacy.
And so I, Secret Agent Q, challenged Pete Stauber to a match. Because it was the only way to settle this. The stakes? Control of Minnesota’s 8th District. If Stauber won, he could keep selling this place out from under us. If I won, he had to step aside and let someone-anyone-take the wheel who wasn’t a fossil-fuel puppet and a Trump-cult lapdog.
To my surprise, he accepted.
THE PRESS CONFERENCE CRASH
Before the match, I had one more move to make.
Stauber was at a lectern, flanked by a gaggle of bland-faced cronies, addressing the closure of the Department of Education. He droned on about “freedom” and “choice,” the same bullshit we always hear before they strip the copper out of the walls and sell our kids’ future for scrap. I had a sinus full of God Bark and bad intentions, and I wasn’t about to let it slide.
I pierced through the crowd, shoving my way to the front. “Hey Pete! Since you love ‘personal responsibility’ so much, when are you going to take some for the fact that your dear leader sent a mob to beat your own siblings on the force bloody? Or is accountability just for poor people?”
The crowd tensed. Stauber’s eyes flicked toward security, his jaw clenching. “This isn’t the time-”
“It never is, is it? There’s never a ‘time’ to talk about how you bent the knee to a con artist who pardoned the same people that tried to kill your family. There’s never a ‘time’ to talk about how you’re turning the most beautiful water on the planet into a toilet for multinational mining conglomerates.”
I took a long pull from my flask of holy water and wiped my mouth with my sleeve.
“But there’s time for Sword Hockey. I’ll see you on the ice, Pete.”
THE GAME
The ice was set. The sky was a bruise, thick clouds rolling overhead like the swollen underbelly of an overfed god. The teams took the ice. Stauber had packed his side with retired cops and lobbyists-stiff, clunky players with more experience pulling paychecks than playing pucks. I had assembled a coalition of freaks and ghosts: ex-lumberjacks, rogue zamboni drivers, the bastard sons of washed-up rink rats.
The first period was brutal. The ice was slick with blood almost immediately. Shinai cracked against helmets, ribs snapped under relentless strikes. A defenseman on my side took a hard shot to the wrist and his glove filled with crimson. He wrapped it in a torn jersey and played on.
Between plays, I pressed Stauber. “What’s it like, Pete? Having a spine made of Jell-O? Does it wiggle when you skate?”
He responded by slamming me onto the ice hard enough to rattle my teeth. That was fine. I liked it better this way.
The game was tied. It all came down to the final showdown.
THE FINAL SHOWDOWN
One-on-one. Captain versus Captain. Stauber had a lifetime of pro hockey in his bones. I had back-alley duels and a head full of god powder. The whistle blew, and we both lunged.
Stauber came at me fast, blade swinging wide, aiming for the knock-out shot. I ducked, slashed low, catching his shinai and knocking it off balance. He recovered fast. He was better than I wanted to admit. But I had something he didn’t: divine favor.
I drove forward, faked left, then twisted, bringing my shinai down hard-too hard. The crack echoed over the ice. His arm had snapped like a wet branch.
The ref blew the whistle. “Disqualification. Broken bone. Unsportsmanlike conduct. Stauber wins by default.”
I staggered, panting, laughing at the moon in the way only a lunatic can. I reached down, grabbed his unbroken hand, and yanked him to his feet. “At least you showed up, Pete. That’s more than you ever do in Washington.”
AFTERMATH: FEAR AND SELF-LOATHING IN AMERICA
Stauber was helped off the ice, cradling his broken limb, surrounded by men who would never break a bone for anything real. He won on a technicality. That’s how it always goes. He doesn’t need to be the best. He just needs to have the rules written in his favor.
I watched him limp away and felt a sickness in my gut-not from the bark, not from the cold, but from the absolute, bone-deep understanding that this is what America is now. A never-ending arena where the powerful rig the game, and the rest of us are left swinging sticks at ghosts.
Pete Stauber will keep selling us out. He’ll keep sending form letters while our homes flood, our air turns to poison, and our neighbors die waiting for health care. Because that’s the system. That’s the machine. And the machine doesn’t care about the game, or honor, or the people in the stands.
But people remember. People saw. And someday, the ice will crack.
Next time, I won’t miss.
Originally published at http://www.gonzotheater.com on February 7, 2025.
