I have destroyed so many lives. The people who are unfortunate enough to cross my path, should they live, come to regret it. So, can they just stop bringing it up?? It makes me feel bad!
I am fully aware that I have wreaked havoc and struck terror in the hearts of many. I do not need the constant guilt-tripping that follows.
Yes, I cause catastrophe wherever I happen to find myself. Yes, I do have a malevolent streak where I indulge in casual ultraviolence. And yes, when the dust settles, I don’t have any regrets until someone calls me out. But I have come to see my face plastered on the front pages of every news outlet reminding me of my heinous acts. I think that needs to stop. Now! I may be a destructive, shape-shifting supervillain, but this is too far.
There is a common misconception about me. I am believed to be an unfeeling sociopath bringing a wide range of sorrow to everyone I meet, providing pain in all forms. Innocents murdered, parking tickets unpaid, faces disfigured and pedestrians tripped. These may all be things that I have done but that does not mean for an instance that I do not feel bad about it. Do I have regrets? No. Most of these things benefitted me in some way. But people keep calling me names and I do not like that. Not one bit.
Can you imagine the mental toll it takes when society in one collective voice calls you ‘Psycho Dickhead’? It is exhausting. It almost makes me want to stop ruining people’s lives. This bullying needs to end.
As for the so-called ‘real victims’ – as the media dubs them. More often than not, they were murdered either by me or the debris I created. So, between me and them, I am the only one capable of feeling any guilt. Even my lighter misdemeanors result in such burning scorn towards me. In one instance I got a waiter fired for an expression he may or may not have made. The weeks passed by till he somehow found me. Obviously, he was not aware of the wicked powers I possessed. This was evident in his bold approach towards me. Fearing a preemptive assault, I swiftly elbowed him in the face. As he recovered, he dropped an envelope that was addressed to me.
Once in my safe haven or ‘lair’, I read the letter. It went in detail on how my actions had affected him. Knowing that it was at my hand that all this transpired, moved me. To another town. I did not like the hateful rhetoric that had been levelled against me. A document detailing all the bad things I have done, if it ever found its way to the public, could incite people to act out against me. It also served as a reminder. Why must I constantly be reminded that the people I hurt continue to be hurt after I have left the scene? Object permanence was a mistake. Once I imbue myself with God-like powers, I am doing away with that feature in humanity.
What people do not understand is that when I destroy someone, I am the one who will later receive hate mail. No one ever sends death threats and insults to those who I have dropped a tractor on. The double standard is appalling. On one side people call me a bully because I hurt people. Then they turn around and start bullying me? By again, recounting what I did back to me.
When other people lie in hospital beds, they can at least take comfort in knowing they are not at fault. I am not allowed to forget that all the wanton destruction that was unfurled on an unsuspecting public is always my doing. For others, their conscious is as clear as this one diamond I stole from an elderly woman.
She told me a tale of how she had gone years stranded on an island with her grandmother and a group of wily survivors. Subsisting on berries for nearly a decade, they found salvation in the form of a large raft. But even that moment of celebration soon turned into hell when a storm unleashed itself on their inadequate vessel. Her grandmother was knocked overboard. She had heard her attempts to thrash for safety and though her eyes could not actually see through the torrential rain and wicked wind, her mind had told her that she was enveloped by the black sea. When the tempest finally calmed, she mourned. With her ship battered and chances of rescue slim, that is all she had to do.
Then a diamond popped up in the water. At first, she took that to mean the worst but some distance away, there was another diamond. They seemed to be flowing towards her. And as she scanned further away, she found something akin to a trail of bread left to guide oneself home. She swam to the source and found her grandmother bruised, shaken but alive on a different, previously unchartered island.
On the safer and far less noteworthy travel home the two of them joked about how a fake diamonds necklace had been of far more value than real ones. To others it meant nothing. To her it meant her life.
Anyway, I took it home.
Not on purpose. I had just finished robbing a bank. After only taking a few dozens of lives in collateral damage, I needed a hideout and this old woman provided. She recounted her tale and handed me the very same fake diamonds from the story. I bolted away a few seconds later when the cops came knocking. Unbeknownst to me, the non-precious heirlooms were still on my person. When she called and asked, as someone under the pressure of having committed numerous crimes and leaving several bodies in my wake, I responded a tad too strong. Upon realizing that I did have it, it was far too late to return it. This old crone decided to go on national television to personally insult me!
I am a cannonball speeding through the lives of others. Can’t people just let that happen? Why does everyone have to be so fussy all the time. Have they not once thought about how that makes me feel? If anything, I am the real victim in all of this.
The Ipe Collection 