A_N_0_N

WE ARE IN THE BUSINESS OF LYING TO PEOPLE

WE VALUE PROFIT ABOVE ALL

WE BUILD OVER THE DEAD AND TIRED

I’ll never forget the day I saw those three lines for the first time in my entire pointless existence. Those three evil lines plastered onto the plain whitewashed wall, laughing maniacally at me and at the rest of the goddamned world – ominously looming over the furious swirling clouds, patiently waiting to be uttered unto hapless oblivion…

           … To destroy life as we all know it once and for all.

[Recording stops]

___

I remembered that they were embellished on the main auditorium of the Trade School. Depending on where your seat was, the floating concrete letters would always show directly above the white projector sheet hanging by a few sturdy steel threads. The Edicts were artfully lettered in such a way that made them look subtly dangerous and yet… ludicrously harmless.

           By themselves, words were incapable of much maligned intent at the root level of semantics, but supposed that they would clash and collide violently with one another, or if each of them were to link together in any number of dangerous ways, then the nondescript line between imagination and reality blurs itself out into the unknown realm of one’s own blind judgement – like a senseless bloody gladiator fight in the Flavian Amphitheater. Words turn into thoughts, thoughts turn into actions, actions turn into consequences, and consequences turn into experiences – and from those different experiences we derived our own interpretations, whether they be meaningful or meaningless. Unfortunately, to the harlequins in high places – to the ones in absolute, god-like power – the meaning one might deduce a priori from these mad ramblings is as relative as we make them out to be. The meaning changes everywhere it travels and questionable loopholes are twisted far beyond recognition and commonly taken advantage of (look no further than the USSR, the promised land of weaponized communism!) The Corporation had purposefully made an apropos tercet that was imposing and threatening enough for two simple reasons: in order to strike fear into the hearts and minds of common plebeians and the mildly-Marxist proletariat, and to control every aspect of societies on the verge of nearing collapse.

           What more shall I have to say to all of you out there?

           They’ve really done it.

[Oh, good god, I’m getting more and more off topic by the second… What was I supposed to be talking about again? Oh, right… Let me just…]

[Momentary pause]

           I entered Trade School at the tender age of 17. In fact, everyone was supposed to be around that age when they first attended Trade School. Instead of the ancient ideals of (the now defunct) University, we were all required to attend this monstrous hall of learning upon the Corporation’s harsh and blunt orders (and that was after having previously endured a separate twelve, soul-crushing years of intellectual spoon-feeding and regurgitated bullshit lessons at the Understudy, which was a supposedly premium substitute for the K-12). By all means unfortunate, there were no other choices available here: you either had to comply, or risk being branded as a Useless… and nobody – absolutely nobody – wanted to be branded a Useless. If you were a Useless, then you might as well end your petty suffering because your life wouldn’t make any more difference to Society.

           Evidently, in this modern day and age, what everybody kept giving a damn about most was exponentially advancing their own standing in Society. In a sense, whoever had the most impressive accolades in any given field immediately won outright without any prior contest, or whoever brought home the most dates on a cold Friday night for many restless weeks in a row won instant respect from all kinds of lonely and desperate strangers, or whoever had the most achievements in a single lifetime mattered more than all the lowly untouchables and distant social outcasts, just to highlight a few reasons why.

           But if you had money, oh boy… that would be a whole other story in of itself.

           If you had money, everyone – and I mean everyone – would be crawling all over you. I’m talking old money kingpins making headlines on The New York Times, techno-start-up billionaires and Fortune 500 CEOs, pissant deadbeats banking on Sallie Mae and 401k, crazy rich Asians, Middle Eastern oil moguls, evangelical figureheads and European royalty…

           Name it all, and they’d be crawling all over you like red ants going willy-nilly on a mountain of white cane sugar.

[Nervous and uncontrollable table-rapping]

[Gloomily whistling Marche Funèbre]

           Yes, sir… money made the world go round, as they always say time and time again. But the thing is, if you have it right then and there – like say, a Titanic full of greenbacks or a gold mound enough for a million Federal Reserves – then the Corporation will stop at nothing to get their grubby little hands on the fat stacks that you have accumulated after decades of pointless physical labor, even if it meant never letting go…

           The sheer absurdity of it all is just simply mind-boggling.

[Heavy breathing]

           They’re on to me.

           Shit!

           I can feel it.

           Here’s the catch – I don’t have much time left.

           I found an unmarked stash of buried gold bars and confidential files from a source called [REDACTED]. For several weeks, I made several trips to retrieve the precious cargo, studying them, making unobvious daily Bank deposits, always making sure that I left no obvious traces of my visits… but for some reason, I saw a sketch appear on the telescreen one night – a sketch that closely resembled my face…

           … Shit, who knows? … I might have been spotted by a hidden camera or tripped a wire or activated a silent alarm or left a strand of DNA… Oh god, oh god, oh shit, oh fuck… I’m dead… I’m fucking dead…

           … It’s only a matter of time before the Corporation finds out exactly where I live…

           They might have already tailed me on my way home… The jig is up… They might kick down the door or they might break through the windowpanes or they might get out from under the toilet seat. There’s too much at stake here – too goddamn much…

           … I was careful, dammit!

[Intense sobbing]

[Head banging]

[I’m screwed, I’m screwed, I’m fucking screwed…]

[More intense sobbing]

[Hyperventilating]

…

[Okay, man… keep it together… You’re still alive…]

…

[Sniffling]

…

           So, please… all of you… I only ask that you listen to what I have to say…

            The Corporation is not what you think it is! It’s all a big confounding conspiracy for crying out loud! Whatever you hear on the tabloids or the news or the radios, don’t believe them! The Man… The Corporation… they’ve been lying to our faces for decades!

           If we don’t act now, we’ll never be able to fight for our rights!

           If we don’t fight back, we’ll never –

[Door breaks]

[Glass shatters]

…

[(NAME REDACTED), you are to be executed for grand larceny, terrorism, espionage, high treason, and conspiracy against The Corporation.]

…

[… Please –]

…

[Goodbye.]

…

[No, wait, please… no, please, don’t –]

[Gunshot]

…

[Audible thud]

…

[Static]