At Last They Truly See Me

The fire eats the world behind me.

The sky is a wound, bleeding black smoke and orange fury.

My lungs claw at the air, my legs hammer the ground. I run, not from death, but toward my rightful survival.

The others—the ones I placated by calling “brothers,” the students, the faithful fools—stay behind.

Their bodies stacked, trembling, burning—the ladder to my freedom.

They were always meant to serve. Meant to burn. Clearly, or why else would they have done so. Stupid people are like cattle. Useful at times, for a genius, such as myself, but generally just a waste of time, and effort and space.

They actually believed the universe whispered in numbers, that purity could be tasted in a mouthful of beans, that I—I—was its voice. Hahaha! Silly cattle!

So when the mob set fire to the building, my beasts took on their burden. They offered their bodies as forfeit—built their ladder to heaven.

And I climbed it, escaping, nearly undetected in the cover of night.