They laugh and talk and ignore you, other than the odd glance or remark focused on your foreignness, which always fosters comments to prove they are superior. They delude themselves with silly thoughts that suggest supremacy. It is their weakness, and will be their downfall.
“Have you been to Piccadilly?” the wife ventures.
You stare into her faded eyes, a bold gesture, and watch as conflicting emotions dance within her— she is trapped by your gaze. Attraction and repulsion vie for position. Paralysis is the outcome.
The man instinctively feels this threat and takes her elbow, which causes her to look away. Her cheeks redden with embarrassment.
“Well then,” the man says. “We shall be off. The children want to ride the carousel, you know. And we would hate to impinge.”
You feel a twinge of respect for him now. At least he has the sense to recognize peril in one regard.
He tips his hat, and you return the gesture, glancing at him, bowing slightly to his wife, who seems afraid to look at you again, and that causes you to smile. The distracted children are like barely ripe plums, not ready yet for the brandy maker. But the woman…
The family turns by rote at the cue of the man and begins to wander toward the carousel. You watch them stop at the cotton candy vendor. The children receive a cone each of pink sugar fluff. The wife surreptitiously glances back in your direction.
“Yes, my lovely,” you whisper. “I could easily shatter the walls of your prison and you would belong to me as you so long to.”
A delicious look of lust and dread flickers through her eyes, and she turns away abruptly.
You laugh, drawing stares from the crowd.
So many warm-bloods! Their numbers spiral to infinity, like drops of water in the ocean, stars in the sky. They bask in the sunshine, light which has, over half a millennium, become increasingly abhorrent to you. It would not surprise you if soon you can no longer tolerate these fiery rays and prefer to sequester yourself entirely in the indirect light of the moon. You are so unlike these mortals, who believe the light beneficent. Who have recently created sunlight in small globes of glass and this, like their other inventions, leads them to believe they are conquering nature. All in an attempt to master death. But it is you who are the Master of Death. And you have done this by adhering to your true essence, something these peasants cannot imagine.
That they should envision themselves greater than nature, that they believe they can control eventualities with their industries, both amazes and amuses you, the latter in a grim way. You survey the skyline of London, blotted with inky smoke from their factories, fumes that choke the air, and you wonder: are they insane?
They cannot breathe. They die of illnesses brought about by their own wicked habits, and yet they place such childish faith in science—even now, they believe they can replace the blood in the veins that you have drained, blood that calls to you as the lark calls to her mate. Oh, these straight-backed fools! The strict and serious men arrayed in silly top hats, the prim parasol-carrying women who believe themselves better than one another, their rosy-cheeked children skipping across the lawns as if they will never age. As if their blood will never cease flowing through their veins… and into yours.
You cannot even pity them. Are they not less worthy of compassion than these caged animals you approach? The mortals ignore their carnal instincts while you indulge yours. They are to you as the beasts are to them—inferior. It is your right by virtue of your superiority to take them. They will become your eternal storehouse at which you will sate your hungers.
They call this park the London Zoological Gardens. To either side are structures the living have built to amuse themselves. Such romantic, pastel buildings, with domed roofs and arched wrought iron gates. There! Close up. The electrical carousel, the painted ponies dipping and lifting to the music, in imitation of the horses you once rode into battle. It amazes you that barely more than a decade ago, in your part of the world, a clever inventor generated electrical power for the first time and it is that which drives this frivolous machinery. This is yet one more indication of the inevitable downfall of this century.
At least there are the remnants of nature. The flora, though cultivated, inspires you. Color splashes the lawns, the flowers still as the dead, their brilliance enhanced to your eyes by the growing darkness as the sky following you becomes overcast.
Ahead, an abomination! You are assaulted by sounds and smells. Caged wildlife! A horrifying concept. You see one animal familiar to you. You reach back into your memory where this furry humped spitter emerges from a time long ago when your father offered you and your handsome brother to your mortal enemies, the Turkish Ottomans. He betrayed you to save himself, abandoning you in a foreign land with strange customs and intense cruelties. You learned a lesson well at a vulnerable age, one you have carried with you all of your long existence—none are trustworthy!
A pachyderm from India is chained to a spike. This enormous beast you have read of, have seen sketches of, yet have never before experienced. Dusty grey flesh, pig-like eyes, ears that could be wings, a snout functioning independent of the rest of its body.
And the scent! Sharper than that of the camel. This beast emits a strong mix of the hay it consumes and the natural result of that consumption. It bays, but not like a horse, more like a horn. This giant of a creature even now recognizes you in the crowd, turns towards you, rearing back on legs like tree trunks, then kneels before you…
You pass by quickly. There are other, stranger sights here, and you have a mission.
Birds of all sizes and colors flutter in the aviary. And the lion, ruler supreme of the jungles of the world, roars in your direction, shaking its mane, bowing, prepared to relinquish his reign to one supreme.
These wild beasts that once roamed free on the earth are now caged in spaces far too small for such majestic life. If you were capable of pity, you would pity them. Where Homo sapiens invade, the extinction of a species follows.
This is the natural extension of Darwin’s theory. He is an Englishman, one of their own, and yet you know they have not paid heed to his work. But you have. The origin of the species is linked with natural selection. These feral creatures are doomed. Only the strongest survive, and you know in your heart that you prevail absolute over humanity, even as they rule the beasts.
The animals are fearful. They sense you. Sense the danger. Their muscles lock in terror, their eyes bulge. The felines pace with tension and the airborne take frantic flight. These reactions alone make them superior to the stunned men surrounding them.
Your acute hearing identifies a sound you heard but moments ago, so familiar. It is the reason you have ventured so far into the land of the living on this sun-drenched day. The low panting emanates from the far end of a row of hideous metal cages. He is confined, the area cramped for one of his proud nature. You have command over all animals, including this kindred spirit—he will do your bidding.
The wolf pauses, sensing your approach. He turns to face you. His nostrils flare. He recognizes a species akin to his own, but not of his pack. Indeed, he has no pack, no mate. Like you, he is far from home soil. He is alone.