Wildfire

"The weak ones are gone."

It's not an insult, it's just a fact, but Sam glances sideways at me nonetheless. Maybe I should have killed her too.

"I don't know if I would say it that way..."

But I do. I did. I meant what I said. They were weak, and now they are dead. I'm supposed to be ashamed of what I did, or at least tactful about it. I ignore those orders. Charles Darwin once said that only the fittest would survive. I carved his inititals into my arm when we left, a reminder. If we are going to succeed, then weakness is a luxury we cannot afford.

Life on Earth had been easy. We were shaped to breathe the air, evolved to absorb the sun's rays. Soon we were sedentary, getting fat off of our big brains and saving the lives of people who had no business living past infancy. It sounds harsh, even to me. But sometimes the truth hurts. Life on Earth was easy, but life in Andromeda is not. If our species is going to survive in even the barest sense of the word, we have to face the facts.

There are creatures out here that would eat us for breakfast. They already have, in some rather gruesome instances. We were soft and sweet after our Milky Way vacation, an exotic treat for our new neighbors. We have to become tough. There have been idiots in the past who have tried this. Eugenics programs on Earth always led to mass genocide, our tendency for megalomania another flaw the needs to be bred out. They came only from some disguised political need to eliminate people who challenged you. This is different.

I'm not some head of a species survival program. Officially, no such thing exists. Our leaders don't have the stomach to do what is necessary. So they turn a blind eye to my cleaning fits, knowing that it has to be done. Knowing that I'll kill them too when the time comes.

I'm not a monster. I'm a wildfire. I consume only the creatures that can't escape my wrath. Eventually, I will burn myself out. But not now. Not yet.

#thevillain #februarychallenge #monthiv