"after a post-death-announcement bump, the market finished down a fraction"

victory in the war on terror is the feeling you get immediately before the nausea hits.
the instant when your gorge has not yet risen,
two moments before you go tearing down the hall, salt seeping in under your tongue.
it is the thought you have three beats before you wonder if you'll make it to the toilet.
four beats before you make it. (or don't).

when you win the war on terror, you haven't yet arrived at the moment of reflection, hunched over with your own close sounds bouncing back up at you, wet breaths.

when you can see a little of your own face, and a lot of your own lunch, and the bathroom ceiling, and a single dark, curled hair, by the wall near your left hand.

when you feel spent, wretched and sour. and you wait, knowing you're empty, but knowing the heaving will come again. spitting to clear the taste from your mouth, but the taste is coming from your throat, and trickling down from your sinuses.

you don't feel any of that, at the moment of triumph.
in that moment, you have reached deep into your own imagination, and ripped out the enemy from your nightmares. you are fearless, because you are more powerful than any of the dark things that live in your dreams. you command armies, and the taste of blood is in your mouth.

and you have not yet paused to think that this blood tastes much like all the others.
and the things which have sustained you are already spoiling in your gut.

and later you will scrub your teeth, repeatedly.
and maybe wonder, while swishing another mouthful of listerine, when you began equating the taste of blood and ash with a sense of peace.

but the thought will be fleeting. it has been a very long time, and any other sort of closure would chafe on the new shapes that our bodies have taken.