Murderclown is old, and Murderclown is tired.

The face in the mirror is lined, the cheeks grown gaunt with age; the years of rubberfaced malevolence have etched themselves into his skin, and without an active energetic hoist there’s a marked tendency toward hangdog droopiness. Murderclown rinses the blood from his hands, slaps himself twice, and forcibly yanks himself back into an approximation of the old cocaine cheer. “Showtime,” he mutters, and grins. avoiding eye contact.

Murderclown has craft, but the ideas don’t come like they used to.

It’s different when you’re young, you’re crammed to the gills with outside concepts, and something like hiding in a sewer or dressing up like a zombie or going undercover as an escort just to stab a guy seems fresh and wild, but after a certain point you start referencing your own long history instead. It’s easier, and if you don’t feel the same wild hit of experimentation that you used to, well, at least people still whisper your name, don’t they?

Murderclown used to be a horror story. He used to be a legend. Mad dog, they still call him, but lately—there’s an affection there. “Stabbed by Murderclown” is a story now for the out of towners to carry back, the ones who survive, anyway, one more tourist requirement, like photos in front of the arch or a walk down the gentrified remains of the red light district.

These days he’s an institution.