The airship hangs over the city like a blank thought bubble.

I have excellent vision. Better than most spy satellites. I see things extremely clearly. I can see, for instance, the old ropes that strain against the canvas along the length of the vehicle's bulbous outer shell. I can pick out individual strands as they are shredded by the onslaught of the elements. Further down I can make out the dark decay of rust as it spreads over the brushed steel of the cabin's exterior and makes its way downwards towards the frosted glass of the passenger suite. I don't miss a thing. Not the hairline cracks in the starboard propeller. Not the unhealthy cough and splutter of the overworked engine. It comes as no surprise to me when the klaxon begins to blare and the ship lights up crimson. I saw it coming a mile off. Literally.

Forty voices unite in a cry of unbridled panic. They need a saviour.

I don't care.

Three miles away a woman is getting mugged, her attacker has a knife pushed to her throat and he is taking his time, enjoying her fear.

I don't care.

Half way across the world a forest fire has wiped out an entire village and shows no sign of abating.

I.

Don't.

Care.

And why should I? It isn't my problem. I wasn't the one stupid enough to climb aboard a floating death-trap. I wouldn't even think about venturing out late at night if I was too weak to defend myself. Every one has problems, just don't bother me with yours.

(the airship has started to belch out vast quantities of dirty smoke now, the broken outlines of frightened passengers are visible through the frosted glass)

Just because I can bench press a VW Camper Van doesn't mean I have to catch that falling meteor. I'm not your guardian angel. What kind of logic is that? With great power comes great responsibility. Save your platitudes for someone who gives a shit.

That kind of ideological crap may have given Stan Lee a boner in the sixties but it means precisely nothing out here in the real world.

I mean, what do you lot know about great power? I could burst every blood vessel in your fragile little bodies just by clapping my hands together. I may look like one of you, give or take the odd fifty pounds of muscle mass, but I'm as different from you as you are from whatever monkey-fucker first swung down from the trees and strapped a piece of broken rock to a stick.

The human race - racing headlong into oblivion with those big dumb smiles on your faces.

Gee, I know what would be a great fucking idea - let's split apart these tiny atomic particles and see if we can harness the energy released to vaporise shit. That won't leave a giant question mark over our future as a species at all.

Afterwards we can dangle off buildings and bridges and helicopters and mess around with our genetic structure and splice shark DNA with organic supercomputer components.

There's no way any of that could backfire on us horribly. Oh no.

You all deserve it, you know that? Every car-jacking, missile strike, home invasion and alien coup. You walk about with targets painted on your backs and you're too stupid to realise you put them there yourselves. Here's an idea, humanity, stop trying to overreach yourselves. Stop dreaming dreams and reaching for the stars, some of them might get pissed at you and they have GIANT FUCKING LASERS. You're an evolutionary dead end with ideas above your station. You're a virus. Less than nothing. You don't see amoebas trying to perfect time travel do you?