Torolf Lundqvist is the great-great-great-great-grandson of the infamous Erik Lundqvist, a notorious Viking leader known for his hobbies: violence, mass decapitation (also known as gratuitous violence), and, some say, delicate crochet. 

Though numerous years and generations have passed since the death of his ancestor, Torolf has maintained an affinity for the majority of Erik's interests, and does his best to put them to use in his work as a greenskeeper. Most people don't see the connection, but then again, most people don't know Torolf.

 

The Vikings were known to be master negotiators. (Source)

Torolf's workday should begin at 5:30AM, but it doesn't. Months ago Torolf argued for a religious exemption so he'd have time to properly present offerings to the Sun God at dawn. Larry, Torolf's boss and manager of the Longsprings Golf Course, agreed without much persuasion. 

He didn't want to be sued in some sort of discrimination case, but mostly he just didn't want to say "no" to a seven-foot, two-hundred-and-fifty-pound wannabe Viking. Have we mentioned that Torolf is a bit taller than most people?

Torolf arrives at the course at 6:00AM, his newly agreed-upon arrival time, just at the tail end of the morning meeting. At the meeting the team is assigned their daily tasks, but no one has a problem with allowing Torolf his usual turf. They missed neither his absence nor input. Torolf wouldn't have heard them anyway—his earphones are busy blaring Swedish death metal into his head at an incredible 105 dB.

Torolf head-bangs while waiting for the rest of the greenskeeping staff to man their mowers and drive off to their sections of the course. Usually greenskeepers take whatever equipment is available, but Torolf has his own equipment specifications as well. 

He strapped a massive longhorn skull to the front of the mower he likes best, then surrounded the body of the mower with a few circles of barbed wire. He wanted to paint "The Great Whirling Doom" on its hood, but apparently painting the vehicle is against company policy.

Torolf lifts a massive chainsaw from the maintenance closet and straps it to his back with a wide strap of leather he hand-tanned last year. He mounts his mower and turns on the engine. He howls at the sky like a wolf. He's ready to keep those greens.

 

The aftermath of war is often too gruesome to look at. What? We said "often." (Source)

Tearing out of the maintenance area and onto the back green, Torolf watches the tall grass explode into tiny, fibrous shards behind him. He imagines the lawn as a standing army of thin green creatures attempting to oppose him. The electric guitar floods his ears, the riff keeping perfect time with the loud whirring of spinning blades beneath the mower. He looks back and cackles with delight at the path of devastation snaking behind him.

After a few hours of similar annihilation, Torolf reaches the outer fence, where vines and weeds have ruthlessly invaded his territory (or so he sees it). He growls fiercely at no one in particular, then tears open the rear hatch of his mower. There, he finds his next weapon: doom poison. Or, as Larry would probably call it, low-grade pesticide.

Torolf laughs and laughs as he sprays his foul poison into the roots of his foes. He feels an unnatural joy as they brown and decay over the next few minutes. He could have pulled them and bagged them, but he prefers to let them suffer. Perhaps next time they'll think twice before assaulting his turf.

It's getting late and Torolf is reaching the end of his playlist. Only one job remains undone, and it's the best job of all: brutal dismemberment. He looks at the large leafy hedge before him. Bulbous, slovenly, lazy. Soon, it'll rue the day it allowed itself to sink to such unsightly disrepair.

 

Don't try this at home. Or anywhere else for that matter. (Source)

Torolf unhooks his leather chest strap with one hand while reaching behind his back to grab the chainsaw's pull cord with the other. In an incredible display of strength, agility, and disregard for personal safety, the chainsaw whips around the side of his body as the cord starts the engine. The blades spin to life just as Torolf grasps the handle.

The battle is short. Too short. With his crazed Viking zeal, Torolf has destroyed thirty feet of perfectly good hedge. Larry appears just five minutes later.

Larry seems upset, and despite the raw, seething ecstasy Torolf feels from destroying his opponent so mercilessly, he understands why. He slides out his earphones and turns off the chainsaw.

"Larry," Torolf says, raising a hand above his heart, "please allow me to communicate the abject level of shame and sorrow currently residing within me."

"Wait...huh?" Larry says.

"I do admit there are moments in which aspects of my storied genealogy do take hold of me rather fiercely, and I in no way expect you or your employer, the venerable Longsprings Golf Course, to assume any financial responsibilities for my dreadful activities.

"Now, I understand you must be feeling great anger—and it's assuredly deserved—so I'd ask that before releasing it upon me, you consider that I'm more than willing to provide financial recompense for any damages caused.

"I, uh—

"I want to pay you back for the hedge."

"Oh! Uh, alright. Thank you." Larry seems like he's finally making sense of Torolf's overwrought apology.

"Or, if you'd prefer, I'd agree to perform additional labor—in a far more contained and mature fashion, I assure you—without wages, until the debt is repaid. Your choice."

"We'll work it out, Torolf." And with that, Larry walks off in a stupor.

Torolf waits for Larry to pass beyond the horizon before putting his earphones back on.

"I'll be back for what's left of you tomorrow," he growls as he stomps the remains of the hedge into the ground under the newly risen moon.

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