Trigger Warning Chapter One

“A short, sharp cry in the night made Jake Rivers look up from the book he was reading. To be honest, he was glad for the distraction. He was on the verge of throwing the book against the wall of his dorm room in disgust. Since it was a hard copy, a thick trade paperback he had bought in the university bookstore for an outrageous price, and not something he was reading on his phone or tablet, he could have done that without breaking anything. Although the book was heavy enough it might have dented the Sheetrock.”

So the first paragraph of the book is blatant padding, that’s always a good sign.

He goes over to his window and gives us a mental map of the campus.

“Another cry. Definitely female.”

Not sure why that needed its own sentence fragment, but ok.

“It didn’t take him long to get down the stairs. A group of students was sitting in the lobby talking about something—he heard the words “microaggression” and “privilege” and “cisnormative”—but Jake didn’t even glance at them as he went by, and none of them called out to him.”

I want you to try and construct a sentence or a conversation using all three of those words correctly in a brief enough period of time for somebody to overhear all of them as they walk past.

He comes across a man holding a woman’s arm and yelling at her while she tells him to let her go and that it’s over.

“Jake was still moving toward them, but he stopped as he heard what the woman said. A grimace tugged at his mouth. Lovers’ quarrel. None of his business. That was an old-fashioned attitude, and he knew it. But almost everything about him was old-fashioned, including his dislike of a woman being mistreated.”

Well which is it? Are you old-fashioned in the sense that it’s none of your business that a woman is being mistreated or in the sense that you have to step in when a woman is being mistreated? I thought part of the reason people idolize being old-fashioned is because of how uncomplicated it is? This shouldn’t even be a conundrum because nobody gave a shit when women were beaten back in the 50’s, so the correct old-fashioned thing to do would be to lecture her on listening to her man and doing what he says. How exactly being “old-fashioned” ever got tied into protecting women from abuse, I will never understand.

“Of course, if he did step in to help her, more than likely she would stick up for her boyfriend and turn on him instead, accusing him of perpetuating the patriarchy and the myth of women needing to be rescued. He already got enough of that crap every day.”

That sounds like an incredibly unlikely outcome in any realistic scenario since this guy is physically accosting her, but I’m also certain that Jake Rivers has read ahead and is 100% correct that this is going to happen. After all, this is Trigger Warning, a world of oversensitive libcucks who behave exactly like the strawmen Johnstone has constructed regardless of how much it goes against the behavior of any human being on earth.

“Then the son of a bitch had to go and slap her. Jake heard the crack of open hand on flesh and stopped in his tracks. He swung around, took several more steps until he could see the two of them fairly well in some stray beams of light filtering through the trees from the library. Couldn’t make out too many details because the light wasn’t that good. But she was petite and blond while the guy was good-sized, with dark hair and a short beard.”

Wow, it’s like I’m really there. “Good-sized,” what a wonderful descriptor.

“Something was odd about the shape of his head, and after a second, Jake got it. The guy’s hair was long enough that he’d pulled it up into a bun on the top of his head.”

I love that Jake sees a guy with a man bun and his immediate thought is “Wow, that guy’s skull is fucked up.”

“Jake ran his left hand over his own buzz cut. He’d had fairly long hair once, half a dozen years earlier, but he had never worn it in a bun. And if he ever grew it back out, he still wouldn’t.”

Is now really the time to think about how much you hate man buns? Right here in the middle of this confrontation?

Jake tells him to let her go, the guy tells Jake to back off and mind his own business, then we get to this odd comment directed at Jake:

““Are you one of the football players?” Kelton College had a football team, but it hadn’t won a game in three years. “You’re big enough, but Olmsted’s not the athletic dorm—””

The narrator wants us to know that Jake is a big manly man who’s nothing like these soy boys, I guess.

““I’m not a football player, and you need to let go of the lady.”

“You don’t have to call me a lady,” Annie said. Just as Jake had expected, she sounded halfway offended.

“I’m trying to help you—”

“That’s no excuse for perpetuating stereotypes and spreading toxic masculinity.””

I was right, Jake did read ahead! This is totally the way people talk, especially when they’re being assaulted.

“Jake couldn’t hold back a sigh. Even scared and in trouble, Annie couldn’t stop herself from parroting some of the garbage that had been forced into her head. Not for the first time in the past half-dozen years since he’d enlisted, Jake found himself wondering if the people he fought to defend really deserved it. He’d always concluded that they did, but sometimes it wasn’t easy to convince himself.”

Obviously Jake didn’t defend any of us, he just helped invade other countries for oil, but in his mind, he did defend this country. From his perspective, he’s basically saying “This woman is annoying to me. I should’ve let America be destroyed by terrorists.”

Anyway, this guy, Craig, decides to go on the offensive.

““I’m not scared of you!” Craig shouted. “I don’t care how big you are! I know Krav Maga!” He had just started some sort of fancy martial arts move when Jake hit him with a left hook to the belly.”

Do you know what fucking Krav Maga is?? This is one of the most deadly military martial arts in the world. I have to assume Johnstone thinks Krav Maga is like yoga or something and just picked it because it has a foreign name.

So Jake beats the shit out of Craig, and then Annie gets pissed off at Jake for it.

“She came at him, hissing and spitting.”

Picture this happening and try not to laugh.

“He should have stayed with that weighty tome about how capitalism was the worst economic system and America was the most evil country in the world.”

I went to the wrong college, I wish my classes were as badass as this.

““You . . . you fascist !” she screamed. “You oppressor!”

“Hell, lady,” Jake said, knowing the word would get under her skin again, “how’d you know I used to be in the army?””

*canned laughter*

“Jake heard a sudden rush of footsteps behind him and turned to see several black-clad figures charging him. He couldn’t make out their faces, and when they yelled, “Fascist! Fascist!” and the words were muffled, he knew why. They were wearing hoods over their heads. Then they were on him, swinging bicycle chains with locks on them, metal pipes, and other objects turned into clubs, and this peaceful night on the small, elite college campus turned into a fight for his life.”

Whoa, where the fuck did these guys come from? Is he getting attacked by fucking antifa ninjas?? Were they summoned when the word "fascist" was uttered?? Are we going to have antifa Shredder in this book?? I have to admit, this has successfully hooked me for the next chapter.