WHAM! & THEN… Personality Profile: Maxi the Troll Barber

 

Maxi the troll barber (Dyrney)

Age 22

5’10”

360 lbs

Blue Eyes

Red Hair

Maxi – troll barber on Broadstreet, a friend of Kellen Greenwood and his family. Important member of the Underground.

 

Excerpt from WHAM! :

“Hey Tess!” said Maxi, turning to her with grand outstretched arms. “What my baby girl do be in this neighborhood by her only self?”

“I’m not by myself,” said Tess. “You’re here and nobody’d mess with me with you around.”

“That not was all what, baby girl,” he said, taking down his sunglasses for a dubious squint. “I no did brought you here…”

Suddenly she was in tears. “They took them, Maxi!” she wailed as he grabbed her up in his big arms. “They took my whole family!”

Maxi offered his barber’s chair to her as she talked. The moment she was seated, he knelt in the most respectful troll fashion, slipped off her sandal and licked her foot. When she told him how the police had beaten her mother and father senseless, he shot to his feet thumping his chest with his knuckles. “Ooot! Ooot!” he cried, flinging his arms as he tramped about the room, for her father Kellen had long been a good friend of his.

“So you see why I had to come,” said Tess. “I need your help, Maxi. I don’t have any money, but…”

“Whoa baby girl!” he cried, tramping right up to the chair.  “I be always any help, but when the government took all Dyrney from the Jutwoods and keep us here, I not know enough Dyrney-brutes to get you family back. You father and I scratchy-scratch and scratchy-scratch and scratchy-scratch and scratchy-scratch all both our heads and still not know where be capitol. Not even.”

“I know you would if you could, Maxi. But I’m not asking for that. What I need is a complete make-over, and I know that you can do that like no one else.”

“Make-over? Poop! You pretty pretty pretty thing. You no need.”

“Yeh Maxi. And all the kids at school call me a freak. And the ugly face on the skinny told me that the school turned in Mom and Dad to Children and Family Assistance.”

“They be the freaks with not no any backbone,” he said from under his beetling brow as he drew his hand over his face with a sigh. “Backbone give you extra pretty pretty.  And Dyrney threw gnydy ball and gnydy ball and gnydy ball katoomp katoomp into the echo deep sewer poop. We no have ugly face on the skinny.”

“My! They’d come get anyone who did that.”

“Yeh,” he said. “And we did all once. And daylight people be too many not no backbone freaks. Don’t you try, baby-girl.”

“I promise. All I need is a make-over.”

“You need hug from stead.”

“I can’t pay you, so I suppose I really ought to do it myself, though I’ve never cut it before,” she said with a sigh. “Do you think my dad’s electric razor will do to shave the sides of my head?”

“Cut? Shave? What you want that for? What be wrong with pretty pretty head?”

“Well my hair’s long enough to sit on. No one at school wears it that way. And I think Nia and I were the only ones with naturally green hair.”

“I like long and green,” he said, folding his arms with a decisive nod. “And don’t the daylight people kids have all any kind of color for hair?”

“Yeh. They dye it.”

“You want dye?”

“Nah. I want everything off the sides and the hair that’s left looking artificial…”

“Like some young Dyrney-punk?” he said with a look of astonishment.

“Yeh. With real troll swirls in the fuzz on the scalp on either side.”

 

Maxi the troll continues in THEN…

 

A Day in the Life of an Elf Killer Family

Excerpt from Elf Killers:

Fnarry-irrny was Dyr’s sow, which allowed her to choose the best place in the biggest cave to spread out her things, rear her children and to attend to Dyr’s whims and needs. She chose an airy alcove just inside the mouth of the Hooter Cave, well out of the weather, which allowed her the most convenient access to the fire just outside and the best place to flaunt her wealth of beads, shells and skins to all the envious sows who were forced to pass by her on the way to their respective spots further back in the cave. One troll evening (which is just before dawn), she rolled her bushy red head from side to side, gnawing and tugging on an Elf leg as she watched her family eat.

           “Boof!” cried her eldest son as he spat out a great cud of chewed Elf onto the ground. “Gnydy hee-hee-grabbed my grab-up-squeaker rump. Everytime, I get shin-bone-meat! I eat rump.”

“You think like rump,” said his younger brother. “You snuff-snuff  like rump…”

“Gnydy juicy-champs my rump, Da, and you let him,” said the eldest, as two wolf-dogs squeezed in to bristle at each other and snatch up his cud of Elf. “You be easy-let, Da. Gnydy will head-smash you, then he’ll be Thunder-man. And if Gnydy be Thunder-man, then I’ll no be Thunder-man. I’ll be hoo-hoo-crawl-animal.” He turned to the younger. “But you’d be hum-dee-dumdle with that, Fnana-fnyr. You already be crawl-animal for yuck-champs. Poofy-letter Da grand-showed you…”

“Rump-jaws, Fnanar!” roared Fnana-fnyr as he shot to his feet to run at Fnanar’s head with a furious kick.

Fnanar ducked as the kick flew by his ear, flinging Fnana-fnyr onto his back, the arm of Elf he was eating smeared all up one hip.

Dyr stopped chewing and glowered at his sons from under his bony brows.

“Ooot-ooot! ooot-ooot! ooot-ooot!” cried Fnanar as he flailed his chest with his fists. “That be proud-show rump-trick!” He wheeled ’round to leave the alcove and stepped right into Dyr’s stony fist which put him flat on his back, seeing stars.

Dyr was a-straddle him immediately, furiously strangling him.

“Duda! Nyr-vyr-nirr-trad!” screamed Fnarry-irrny, ropes of beads and greasy breasts flying about as she sprang at Dyr to claw at his gnarly hateful fingers. “No! Stop!”

“He’s begged for-this ever-since he wet-held Fnana-fnyr under the fast-water,” he said, growling spit between his teeth as he gave an extra shove and stood up. He tramped out of the Hooter Cave and past the glowing fires.

Dyr paused to glance at some kids who were poking sticks and giggling at an Elf child who was well beyond utterances of any kind, tethered and trembling uncontrollably as she awaited her turn over the coals. “No be Fnanar and Fnana-fnyr,” he sighed. “Never-once have Fnanar and Fnana-fnyr giggle-romped that well-together. I can’t even hunt with them-together.”

He shook his head and walked out under the stars. A shivering owl called. “One-thing I know-be with all head-nod,” he said. “Fnanar has-had his last greedy-champ in the Hooter Cave. Let him yank-bite squeaker-rump from Gnydy. He got his hairy-face new-name cold-time, cold-time, cold-time, cold-time ago.

“But I have-to slip-let Fnarry-irrny pincher-twist me so Fnanar gets-to stay until he’s giggle-grabbed a sow. But he grabby-wants the biggest milksow. Mudful hollow-head! He drool-dreams the wrong end. Hoof! He has sly-kids in every-other cave but the Hooter Cave and diggy-fingers his nose at me.

“Ooot!” he bellowed into the echoes, silencing the owl. He gave his chest a good three thump drum. “And let Gnydy come at me for a good head-smash. He needs his thunder-stamp, too.”

***

As you can see, the Elf Killers (trolls or Dyrney, as they called themselves) were a primitive, savage race that hunted and ate elves. However, seven hundred years into the future, the Dryney ancestors had evolved into a more civilized culture. In Wham! Maxi the troll is a very popular character with the readers and a very important major supporting character in the story. He is a hairdresser and tattoo artist and a good friend to the Greenwood family, particularly, Tess who seeks him out early in the book to give her a “makeover”.