[the phantom]

YOUNG TURIN SLAYS GARDEN SLUG

Hurin’s heir, Turin, is off to a magnificent start on his road to manhood according to friends and family. “The boy’s only three years old, and he already has a great killer instinct,” boasted Morwen, Turin’s mother. “The way he handled that slug- I really think it’s a sign of greater things to come.”

Woodcutter Sador agreed. “He didn’t show any fear at all. Most of the kids around here think big slugs are gross and don’t want to get anywhere near them, but Turin is never afraid to stand his ground and look an enemy in the eye.”

King Fingon, who happened to be in the neighborhood for a conference, said that Turin has all the makings of a great general. “Oh, yes, his father told me all about the slug incident. I can’t tell you how impressed I was by the planning that Turin put into the deed. It was sheer genius, what he did with that board.”

According to witnesses of the event, which took place last Saturday, Turin used a small carving knife to cut a trench across a board, and then set the board in the slug’s path. The slug crawled onto the board, and when it reached Turin’s cut, it attempted to stretch across to the other side, exposing its vulnerable belly. And that’s when Turin struck.

“Fantastic strategy!” gushed Hurin. “He got the slug to stretch out over the notch, then he slid his knife down into the notch and slashed up at the slug’s underside. The slug never had a chance.”

“It’s incredible that he already has an understanding of combat strategy,” observed Huor, Turin’s uncle. “Surprising a foe from an unexpected angle and using the landscape to exploit an enemy’s weakness are tactics that can be used throughout life against all sorts of opponents.”

But young Turin is not without critics. Melkor and members of his Angband staff have long held that the House of Hador is "totally weak", and say that Turin’s latest achievement changes nothing. Glaurung, Melkor’s head dragon, was particularly critical during a press conference yesterday. “Frankly, I’m amazed it worked. He was lucky the slug crawled onto the board in the first place, and even luckier that it didn’t just go around the trench. That’s certainly what I would’ve done.”

Melkor seconded Glaurung’s words, calling Turin’s strategy “ridiculous” and "infantile", and insisted that such an approach was useless on a larger scale. “Even if it is a good slug-killing maneuver, what does that matter? It’s not as if he could kill a dragon like that.”

When informed of Melkor's words, young Turin fired back, calling Melkor a "big meanie" and "poo-poo head". When asked about Glaurung, the three-year old boldly declared he would, upon reaching manhood, "stab him in the eyeball". Turin's family applauded the boy's words- all except his Aunt Aerin. "I don't like all this warlike talk," Aerin told reporters this morning. "He's only three! Yet he's already killing things, boasting, getting into verbal fights with dragons, and being called a warrior by his family. With a childhood like this, he can only expect to have a short, violent, and tragic life."

Whose words will prove true? We here at the Downer can't wait to find out.