Clearly Stated

I will state this again, more clearly this time; I am not watching you.

Who are you watching, then?

No one.

That's not what it looks like.

What does it look like?

Like you are watching someone.

How does a person look like they are watching someone?

It's in your eyes.

Now you're just talking nonsense.

Don't try to change the subject.

It's not the subject I'm trying to change.

Have you any idea how many cameras there are in this city, just surveilling our everyday lives?

No. How many are there?

Three for every single person. By my calculations, that is approximately 3.5 million. Cameras!

That's not that many. There are more than that in China.

But we're not in China, are we?

No. It was just a comparison, for conversation's sake.

I, for one, never wanted this kind of surveillance.

Oh, that's a good one.

What do you mean?

You have no choice whether you are surveilled or not.

I know. That's the problem.

The state is only looking out for us.

Looking to put us in prison, you mean.

If you don't do anything wrong, what do you have to worry about?

Oh, let me see: mistaken identity, identity theft, misconstrued fabrications.

What's to misconstrue? You never go anywhere.

I would if there were less surveillance.

You seriously have not left your pod for three solid years, and I doubt it's because of the cameras.

Why haven't I left then?

You tell me.

That's not likely to happen. The last time I told you something about yourself that you didn't want to hear, you shut yourself in a closet for a week.

There were no cameras in the closet.

Are you sure?

Well, now that you mention it, no, I'm not sure.

My point precisely. That's the thing about surveillance. They don't want you to know it's happening, so they hide the cameras from view.

So how do you know how many cameras there are in relation to people?

Because I read, that's how.

What are you reading?

Surveillance quarterly.

There's a magazine about state surveillance?

Yes. Everyone knows that.

Not everyone. I didn't know that.

Well, then, you're not paying attention.

I feel like I'm paying attention.

Not to the right things. Can you see that camera across the street?

Yes, next to the bodega?

No. The one next to the guy passed out in the doorway of the eyeglass place.

I don't see it.

Trust me. It's there. And it's watching us right now.

How can you tell?

Can't you see the red light?

No. I don't have my glasses on.

You really should put them on.

Ok. They're on. But I still don't see the light.

It went out. But there's another one.

Where?

Coming from your glasses.

There is not?

Yes, there is.

How come I never noticed that before?

Probably because you didn't have your glasses on.

I don't think this is funny. Why are you making light of a very serious situation?

What other choice do I have? If I don't make light of it, I could be arrested again.

I didn't know you'd been arrested before. For what offense?

Turning off a camera.

You didn't?

Yes, I did. I was a kid, mind you, and I didn't know that what I was doing was wrong. It was an accident.

And they threw you in jail?

Yes, for eight years.

That seems like a long time for turning off one camera.

Actually, I turned off cameras for the entire city.

That's impossible. How did you do it?

I threw a ball for my dog and overcalculated where it needed to land. It hit a transformer at just the right angle, and all of the cameras in the city shut down.

I remember that. I had no idea that was you.

That's why I'm no longer legally allowed to throw balls.

Can they regulate that?

They can regulate anything they want.

How do they know if you are going to throw a ball?

They placed a chip in both of my arms. If I make a move that looks like I'm throwing a ball, an alarm goes off somewhere, and I get a warning shock.

A shock?

Yes. Surely you've received shocks before?

No, I haven't. I've heard stories about people receiving them, but I've never actually met someone who has gotten them. What are they like?

They hurt like hell.

Where do you feel it?

All over my entire body sometimes.

How long do they last?

Only a second, but it feels like forever. I don't recommend it. The camera in your eyeglasses just shut off.

Oh, thank goodness.

It will come back on. It's probably just rebooting.

Do you ever think it's weird that we live in these conditions?

I used to. Now I'm accustomed to it. It's been this way for a very long time.

I'm not used to it yet. How long does it take to get used to it?

It's different for everyone. You may never truly be comfortable with it. There's nothing we can do about it, anyway.

Why not?

Because there just isn't. You don't want to get shocked, do you??

No.

Then you had better get used to it.

Is that man on the corner staring at us?

Yes, probably. He is on that corner every day in the same spot. He's a spotter.

What is a spotter?

It's just as it sounds. He spots things.

What sorts of things?

Abnormalities.

Like what?

Things that don't appear normal is what I believe abnormalities means.

Do we appear normal?

I like to think so, but you never know.

I think he has been watching us the whole time.

He's listening too.

Listening? To what?

Our conversation.

How does he do that?

Spotters have, amongst other things, superhuman hearing.

So he can hear everything we say right now?

Yes.

Great. Just when I thought we had a little privacy.

Don't say that word.

What, privac—

Shhhh. I told you not to say it.

It's a trigger word.

What's that?

There is a master list of trigger words that no one is allowed to say. That P word is one of them.

What happens if you utter a trigger word?

For god's sake, man, how long have you been in this sector that you have never heard of trigger words?

I've only been here two months.

Trigger words are kept on a list in a server at the head of surveillance at the Office of Observation. Ever heard of it?

No.

That's what I thought. The office oversees every piece of written dialogue and every uttered word. You can't say or think anything they don't know about. This should have been explained to you at intake.

It may have been, but I was unconscious for a while.

How long?

I can't say. I can't say, not because I don't remember, because I do. I can't say because they made me swear I would not say.

I don't see your swear stamp. Did you get one?

Yes, but it's the infrared kind, so no one can tell I have one.

I have one too, but it's not infrared. Do you want to watch a game show?

Do they still have those on TV?

I'm not sure what a TV is, but they still have them at the Commons.

What's the Commons?

This is going to be a long day.