Okay let’s break it down like a shotgun, folks. You see, there is something very sick and wrong with the way things are today. Not just in the general sense but on a very individual level. Not even just a societal thing, but; you,you,YOU, and; me, me, ME!

It is so easy to point the finger and say no, not me, not me, sir. You are mistaken,you see I read Foucault and I have several bound books on my shelf that I look at longingly. No there is no wool over my eyes. But, you’re wrong. The thing is you have been deceived to believe that that matters. It doesn’t, you’re not beautiful enough and I’m sorry but it’s a problem.

Everything has become so visual and that’s the problem. Before reality was just reality, plain and simple. You walked out side and you saw a drunk at your door, or you’d see one travesty after another and it would be real and you would become desensitized that way. Now nothing is real. Everything that is visually consumed is some sort of magic trick and the magicians are the beautiful people.

People used to be so in tune with each other that there was a communal unspoken language that could be interpreted as telepathy. Now? People have to be overt. There is no more body language, instead just bright colours that we wear obscenely to make ourselves different from the next person. “Oh gosh, Lucy, you wore blue today? Fuck me, Lucy, you stupid bitch today is a pastel yellow day.” Yeah, yeah… I know it all sounds insane, but you know. Deep down inside you know.

We are weeding out ugliness in our ranks. Even now there are legal proceedings to determine if someone is beautiful enough to be right or wrong. Before, the gods could preside over trial by combat, but now that the gods have all been murdered in their sleep there is no real justice. So, people have tried to make themselves beautiful by mutilating their bodies, or tapping into a sub-genre of not-so-ugly so that they too can be loved. But, the devil is in the details. They may pass for a while, but they might have kids and when others realized they have passed themselves off as beautiful they will kill those children. Trust me, it’s already happening.

I would feel bad for those beautiful people if they weren’t fucking things up for our species so much. They have performed the magic trick too well, they have gotten their way. Now, that is all there is to aspire to. You have to be beautiful or else. Maybe not this generation, maybe not the next, but soon, in the grand scheme of things they are going to start culling. They will be praised for it. How could they not? You’ve already seen it happen. The beautiful blonde girl goes to the hovel to help and on a mission of world betterment, but at the end they simply got some pictures and videos of them beside the ugly people. It is proof that their ultimate plans of genocide were benevolent.

Eventually, it will just be the beautiful ones. They will die in opulence with a mirror overhead, but that too will come to an end. They will be brilliant and beautiful and they will have destroyed anything unique about humanity and then once that is gone they will kill each other out of spite. The killing will be barbaric, that’s one thing about ugly folks like me, we are good killers. Beautiful people want everything to be clean, you know, a fell swoop. Well that’s not how it goes when you want to kill your fellow man. Plus, in the pursuit of beauty I am assuming they will have forgotten a lot of important things along the way.

Ha-ha! I can’t help but laugh. It a real fucking tickler, you know? The old adages are true and none truer than beauty being skin deep. You know how I know? Because I have ripped and torn into people. With my bare hands even and let me be the first to tell you what is inside is not pretty at all. Sure, there is a certain aesthetic to it. Indeed, indeed I will be the first to admit that there is something about blood and gore, but you tear a man open and things get messy quick.

Anyway, anyway, you don’t need my life story. You have most of it on camera anyway don’t you? Can you hear me out there? Can you heeeeaaaarrrrr me?

Burn me up…

…let me pretend I was beautiful in the dark.

These last breaths I breathe in defiance of what we have become.

* * * *

“God-fucking-damnit!” A man leans heavily on a desk equipped with a microphone that sits not far from his dry, much chewed, lips.

“What is it? Have you managed to talk to him? The cutters should be through the hull in a minute or two.”

The man’s shoulders hunch and his head drops lower, “No. He’s gone.”

“WHAT?!”

A pause

“The cutters are through… Oh, Christ.” The woman watching the progress of the rescue team covers her mouth. Her eyes are wide with fear and disbelief.

“He killed them.”

“I thought you were communicating with him? We saw the life-signs they were good. He had enough air to last another 10-15 minutes at least. We were going to save him!”

The man shakes his head and looks over at the woman in the command station with him. She is tall and blonde, her lips are perfect and full and despite the ordeal they had been through the last hour trying to rescue the floating ship, she looked delightful.

He stops a moment to consider her and what the lone survivor said.

“I don’t know how to tell you this, Lucy, but that bastard talked himself to death.”