{"id":10857,"date":"2022-07-25T05:54:00","date_gmt":"2022-07-25T12:54:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/?p=10857"},"modified":"2022-07-24T17:58:22","modified_gmt":"2022-07-25T00:58:22","slug":"a-bullet-your-own","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/?p=10857","title":{"rendered":"A Bullet Your Own"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/960px-Prato_graffito_evoluzione_view_2.jpeg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"960\" height=\"720\" src=\"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/960px-Prato_graffito_evoluzione_view_2.jpeg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-10858\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/960px-Prato_graffito_evoluzione_view_2.jpeg 960w, http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/960px-Prato_graffito_evoluzione_view_2-300x225.jpeg 300w, http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/960px-Prato_graffito_evoluzione_view_2-768x576.jpeg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/a><figcaption>Photo by I, Sailko, CC BY 2.5, https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/w\/index.php?curid=3614837<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Michelle Muenzler<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<pre class=\"wp-block-preformatted\"><font face=\"Arial\">\nIt's not really a gun unless it's loaded, your father said\nwhich doesn't make much sense the more you think about it\nwhat with the silent zzzt of your rifle\nwhining in your ear, battery charger dangerously low\nand your opponents\nthose octopodal bear-backed who-knows-whats\nslinging shells from tubes that increase in speed the further they fly\nas though inertia has no meaning\nand maybe for them it doesn't\nbecause where is the meaning when it's just you and them\nand their closest galactic ally\nsome species you have yet to even identify\nbut mostly reminds you of a bathtub gone to rust\nand trundling about on five legs, towing behind it\na half-ton rod\nand if the rod intersects space and time, disconnects\nand when it reconnects evaporates your companion beside you who was only\nclinging as best he could to the laws he knew\nto the weapons of familiarity\nthen yes, if said rod should break physics as well\nand then reappear all handwavium aback that awkward creature once more\nthen is it not also a gun?\nDid it not speed its target to an unlikely end\nthere and gone in a flash of powder as the dust of your mate collapses behind the bulkhead\nMaybe it did and maybe it\ndidn't\nit's hard to say in the chaos of combat\nbut if it did then maybe you can too\nsimply appear like a bullet, lodged in the soft appendages you think might be\nyour enemies' hearts or whatever is most important to them\nyour fist a precision rifle, death reloaded, 18 plasma charges a minute\nmelting your opponents and turning them into so much slick paste\nrunning down your fingertips\nAnd maybe you're all guns here on the battlefield\nwhether loaded or not\nor maybe, like your father's words\nnone of this really matters because the battle is now\nyour aim is poised\nand the intent to kill is etched against your finger\na bullet of its own\n<\/font><\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Michelle Muenzler It&#8217;s not really a gun unless it&#8217;s loaded, your father said which doesn&#8217;t make much sense the more you think about it what with the silent zzzt of your rifle whining in your ear, battery charger dangerously low and your opponents those octopodal bear-backed who-knows-whats slinging shells from tubes that increase in speed [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10857","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poem"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10857","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10857"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10857\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10859,"href":"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10857\/revisions\/10859"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10857"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10857"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.polutexni.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10857"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}