*
Everything is an explosive. Every thought is a sort of explosion inside the head. When you give me your hand I feel as if something is exploding inside you.
— Karel Čapek, “Krakatit”
*
Don’t move.
The LED screens and billboards around the Fuchsia World Mall all say the same thing.
People run, of course.
The parking lot explodes. The mall shakes. Smoke rises from the courtyard at the center, or traps itself dark behind cracked windows.
Eventually, people stop moving. Some have the presence of mind to understand what’s happening, the rest get lucky with shock and concussion, or the inability to move with their new bodies. The border is delineated by horrified bystanders, clean and unharmed, except for the powderized city drifting into the creases of their clothes and lungs.
Lazur drives into the storm of carcinogens, windshield growing grayer.
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