77 Shadow Street

One

In your wisdom, you once observed: “What need have we of gods if we become gods ourselves?”

I am sure, however, that you will come to understand that a world populated by gods would be as disordered as a world crowded with ordinary human beings in all their mad variety. The Greeks imagined a panoply of gods and demigods; consider the jealousies and rivalries that ensued among those residents of Mount Olympus. Men as gods would make of the world one vast Olympus, in a constant turmoil of supernatural events.

I am the One. I have no need for either humankind or godkind. In destroying the former, I destroy the latter.

Consider the one who kills for a living and who murdered his brother, as Cain murdered Abel. He allows for no god who will condemn him. He says that sensation is everything, that it is the only thing, and he is correct. He understands the truth of life better than do any of the other residents of the Pendleton. If there were a human being to whom I might grant a measure of mercy, it would be he. But mercy is a concept embraced by the weak, and I am not weak.

Tremors rumble under the building, then and now.

The current crop of Pendleton residents will soon stand before me like stalks of wheat waiting for the scythe. If blood ran in my veins, I might thrill to the prospect of this impending harvest, but I am bloodless and not subject to blood passions.

I will inflict pain upon them, I will lead them into despair, I will administer death unto them without the ecstasy that the hit man might experience when he murders, but with an efficiency and a prudent self-interest that ensures I will become and will remain the One until the sun dies and the world goes dark.