This is part one of three of a serial fiction piece by Jack Vening, with accompanying illustrations by Mike Baylis.

1. Advice

Your first great mistake is not realising that you’re always fighting for your life.

For example: we are taught as children to fear slime in all its forms. TV teaches us this; scary books do, and campfire stories about ghouls. But when it comes down to it the human body produces nothing but slime one way or another, and so we are being taught to fear ourselves.

At the height of my career I was, even to cynical observers, uncomfortably good at punching trained men into comas. I was so proficient in quantum-level violence that my presence in any given city usually resulted in its hospitals’ brain-health departments going bankrupt. This was a grim economy to be part of. I could have been killed at any moment, but the rewards were many. I never had to pay admission into a water-park ever again, for example, unless I wanted some kind of deluxe package where I could bring my girlfriend’s family, but even then there was usually a generous discount.

But with all this glory, could I punch the loathing present in my human soul? First I had a transition to make, one that began with learning to love all the slimes of the body equally: black bile, white bile, eye juice, blood goop, brain jelly, oestrogen and sweat/spit.

We need to revel in what makes us human in the same way the birds celebrate being birds: by flying around and burping up worms. Take a ride on a hovercraft! Start a fire using powerful chemicals! Do you think a gibbon feels guilty for zooming through the jungle on its long arms? A gibbon celebrates its power and so should we.

Consider applying for a car-loan to experience the wonder of modern economic process; make a large purchase with money credited to you by men and women you’ve never met. We are the only animals known to make machines that can clean gum from the sidewalk by blasting it with hot water at indescribable pressures. We are the only animals known to employ former prison inmates to operate these machines. And we are the only animals known to feel guilty for loving the wrong things, even though we spend our entire lives doing it.

There are no fights greater than self-acceptance. There is no ring more important than the slimy human heart.