Firebreak

by Nicole Kornher-Stace

“You’ve got issues, my friend,” she says matter-of-factly, and it is, of course, as it is of all of us, true.

I am a catastrophe of a person who should be put out of the misery of everyone within a mile radius,

He looks at me, and his eyes are asking me something his voice, for whatever reason, cannot say. I can’t make out the detail of its outline, but its general shape looks, horrifyingly, like please.

You can’t go where you want if you don’t have rights. Which you don’t if you’re not human. Or if someone has convinced the rest of the world that you aren’t.

Is there an answer here? Or has this, all of this, gone on too long for anyone to even be able to conceptualize an alternative?

Now I have a real vague memory from some story my mom read to me as a kid that one thing you do not want to do in strange woods is step off paths. You pretty much up your risk of getting ganked by monsters or fairies or whatever by, like, several orders of magnitude.

Which is worse: To take your shot and miss, like 06 did? Or to hesitate too long, like 22, and miss your chance to take the shot at all?

He doesn’t look like a person waiting for a punchline, but I’ve got one chambered anyway.

I wrote this book in solidarity with all who struggle against oppression, corruption, fuckery, and greed, whatever face it wears. Let’s never stop fighting for a better world.