Red Dust (Gods & Assassins Book 1) by Frank Kennedy

Author:Frank Kennedy [Kennedy, Frank]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-07-21T23:00:00+00:00

14

T WO CONSTANTS EMERGED when I hopped and skipped across the nine universes: Stars and humans. Too damn many of both, for my taste, but only one group was capable of sticking around to the end of time. A self-perpetuating furnace didn’t overthink things. Just burn. Humans, on the other hand, had the great misfortune of being well-educated, emotional, and beholden to concepts such as liberty, personal branding, and the pursuit of shiny things.

Admittedly, I fell prey to these weaknesses during my brief sojourn as a human. I ran away from home at sixteen, lived in the sewers for a while, sported long braids the color of a rainbow, and worked hard to fit in with friends and lovers who happened to be terrorists. My chest was tattooed with a green sun sprouting red rays. My guns were small and sleek, befitting a man who brought an up close and personal touch to each assassination.

My young friends came from every rung on the social ladder but shared a deep aversion for the standards of “proper society.” Normies labeled us as disaffected, malcontented, ill-mannered, ungrateful, misinformed, hypocritical, sociopathic, xenophobic, and countless other terms which missed the point entirely. You see, they never called us audacious, courageous, or righteous because they would have exposed their own insecurities. Deep down, in the private spaces they shared with nobody, the normies wanted to be like us. They wanted to throw off the constraints that held them back.

Regulations. Laws. Social protocols.

What they would’ve given for a tiny dose of anarchy.

That’s always been the struggle for humans: What they’re taught vs. what they crave. That fight will never end until they’re swept away and nothing’s left but those damn stars.

To tell the truth, I dread it. What will a pair of lonely fallen gods do when humans die off? Sit around and wait for galaxies to collide? Eh. Sweet special effects, but kind of a slow burn.

Humans brought spice to an otherwise dull party. Hence the people of Desperido, as fine a collection of weirdos, anarchists, and disaffected loners as a fella could meet.

These were the folks you might find in tattoo parlors, cyberhead conventions, nomad caravans, desert music festivals, hillside caves, or libraries. Nothing about these people screamed “proper society.” They dressed light and practical, although I suspected they rarely changed clothes or paid attention to proper grooming and diet. Having said that, none I encountered on my return visit produced a disagreeable odor.

Outside, they wore wide-brimmed hats and dark glasses, accounting for the no-doubt considerable portion of their lives spent underground. One might expect to find a rugged and hardy population living amidst a wasteland. One would be wrong. If anything, these Aztecans leaned toward the pasty.

Those qualities did not diminish my opinion of them or reduce my confidence in the future soon to disrupt their lives. For all their peculiarities, the people of Desperido were an educated lot. Their first reaction to Bart and subsequent conversations proved they would be damn useful.

They eyed

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