A Simple Man’s Descent

In the beginning, he was unremarkable. Just another face in the endless stream of Gotham’s ambitious dreamers, armed with nothing but determination and a business degree from a middling university. His father, a stern investment banker, had always viewed him with barely concealed disappointment.

When he approached his father for a loan to start his first business venture—a comedy club in the heart of downtown—the old man’s laughter cut deeper than any knife. Yet, surprisingly, the check was written. “Prove me wrong,” his father had said, the words dripping with doubt.

The club enjoyed modest success at first. Enough to keep the lights on, enough to dream bigger. He expanded, opening two more locations across the city. But the timing couldn’t have been worse. A recession hit, and suddenly, people weren’t laughing anymore. One by one, his clubs shuttered, each failure a crack in his increasingly fragile psyche.

He tried again. And again. A chain of novelty shops. A party planning business. An entertainment consulting firm. Each venture started with hope and ended in crushing defeat. With every failure, his father’s smirk grew wider, his comments more cutting. “I knew you’d waste my money,” became a constant refrain at family gatherings.

The resentment festered. In his mind, it wasn’t his fault—it was the system, the elite, the entire world that seemed rigged against him. His once-genuine smile twisted into something harder, something cruel. He began to see humor in destruction, joy in chaos.

When he announced his candidacy for president, everyone laughed. Just like they’d always laughed. But this time, something was different. His message of tearing down the establishment, of burning away the old order, resonated with millions who felt as betrayed as he did. His rallies became circus-like spectacles of controlled chaos, each more outrageous than the last.

And then he won.

As he stood before the nation on inauguration day, that familiar twisted smile played across his lips. His father, sitting in the front row, had finally stopped laughing. The man who had once been a simple failed businessman raised his hands to the thunderous crowd, and in that moment, Alfred Pennyworth’s ancient wisdom echoed through time: Some people just want to watch the world burn.