I foolishly wanted to press my case with humans, so they knew what we had suffered. My story was stolen by a writer who couldn’t get anything of his own published. Then, since neither he nor the publisher knew better, or did and didn’t care, two covers were produced:

France

Italy

THESE ARE NOT ROACHES.  THEY ARE BEETLES.

“Sorry for your loss…whoever you are and whatever it was.”

Give your average human being a place to live, a mate, a job, a pat on the back, and he will plod through the same routine for his entire overlong life. Humans are simple.

But if someone lifts off his feedbag and sticks a book in front of him, anything is possible. A few words about god and infidel and country and threat and right and wrong, and he is aflame. Hand him a weapon and watch the fun.

Business as usual:

A cockroach, on the other hand, is peaceful, accommodating. He is happy to schedule his life around yours. He leaves no footprints, carbon, or, say, in your butter. Words make him laugh, but always with charity. He understands.

However, my mother never trusted the kitchen, and calamitously dropped her egg sack in a bookcase.  My 37 sibs and I suckled on the library paste that bound the volumes. With it we absorbed the words, a poison for which there was no antidote.  Deprived of our common sense, we were helpless. All died at the business end of a can of poison. Except for me.

I wish I could get on with my life, as roaches do. But I grew up in the Bible–my name comes from the Book of Numbers.

That is why vengeance consumes me. That is why I am here.