Monday, October 26, 2020

A Miserable Pile of Questions

“Can you actually kill him?”
Billy and the Sasquatch arrived at the Fuzon Corporation’s headquarters to find it even more of a ruin than it once was. What remained of the glass doors were scattered across the ground like Legos in a child’s bedroom. Some of the glass was lodged into the corpses scattered with even less meaning. It was clear that most of the action had long since ended and all that remained was the stillness of finality. And yet, they could hear, even from down so low, the upper floors becoming an even larger bloodbath.
One of corpse they saw just outside the entrance was that of a young man. He was dressed in the uniform of a police officer, but he couldn’t have been any older than nine. Last time Billy checked, the police started recruiting at the ripe age of eleven.  Then again, that was years ago. He was a blond child with a green eye and a twisted left arm. His other eye had been dislodged from his body and trampled on by the crowd. His teeth were filled sharp to make them akin to sharks. But their sharpness wasn’t enough to keep them from breaking after a baton was shoved down his throat. His eye looked to have wanted to cry before the end, but nothing came out. (His name was Luke Lucas. When he was a child, he dreamed of the utopias promised to him of moon colonies and robotic servants. He was the son of a computer programmer back when that was a useful skill to have. They had a falling out after Luke told his father that he was applying to work for the police. His father thought the boy too young to join the police. “A twelve year old has no place with those thugs,” he said to his son. They were the last words Lucas ever heard his father say to him. Nine months later, he would die still dreaming of those utopias stolen from him.)
Billy and the Sasquatch entered the building and crept through the wreckage like ghosts in a memory. The secretary had her head caved in. One of the police officers must have mistaken her for a… Whatever the group the other corpses belonged to. (He could tell it was by a police office as a balding redhead with a glabella unibrow was beside her body, his hands around the broken typewriter lying atop her head. He had part of a nameplate shoved through his head, though the name on it was illegible. [I do not know who he was. Police records were lost in a fire and there was no one left alive who knew him.]) There was some hair strewn around the corpse, though Billy couldn’t tell if it was brown or blonde. She looked to be about his age, maybe a year younger… maybe a year older. She had a nameplate a few feet away from her, though it was broken into several pieces, most of which in other people’s bodies. All Billy could see were the letters “Ca” on one and “t” on another, both jutting out of the corpse of a man of 12 years with terror on his face. Billy told himself he didn’t know who she was. (He did know her. They grew up together in an apartment complex that was torn down for complex and frankly petty reasons. Her name was Cate Blackwood-Smith. She applied for work at the Fuzon Corporation three weeks prior to her death. She was starving and they offered to feed her. She was shocked to discover they didn’t want her to work in the factories, but as a receptionist. It seems the previous one died and a replacement was required. She fit the build of being young, blond, and desperate. She never met the man upstairs, the CEO of the company, but there is evidence to suggest she was due to meet him the day after she died. Instead, she died.)
“Have you ever done this before?”
The pair continued moving. What else could they do for the dead? And yet, there was something different about these corpses. In most parts of the City, the dead bodies were akin to a backdrop to the general misfortune of life. Most people simply ignored them after a while. Unless there was something truly special to the corpses, so they’d say. For example, a corpse that was standing up with seemingly no help whatsoever would be something to look at indeed. Or, for that matter, one nailed to the neon lights of a popular bar tends to get a lot of attention from those who frequent it. Or even the corpse of someone who used to be famous gets some attention.
But there was something else to these corpses. Not the corpses themselves, a dead body looks like any other dead body (bar the details the body had in life); nor the sheer magnitude of the corpses, for there were some places where the dead are more numerous than in this building. They weren’t even placed into a pattern some would call “artistic.” They were just strewn about the building like any other massacre. And yet, there was some unnamable essence to this disaster, something in the air that changed it from a mere massacre into… something else. Incomplete might be the right word for it. Then again, this painting wouldn’t be completed until the last body fell.
“What do you want?”
The elevator was broken, as all elevators in the City were. Billy didn’t even know why they tried it. Most people instinctively go for the elevator, as evidenced by the number of corpses lying trampled around the elevator. So Billy and the Sasquatch went up the stairs. The spiraling staircase, fortunately, was large enough to fit the pair of them, and then some. Maybe that’s why less people were trampled on them. Each turn had a square area to turn to the next set of steps. There were fewer bodies there, but some littered the staircase. The remains of a child of three was lying on the foyer of the staircase, perfectly centered and incased by the spiraling steps. Five stories up, they found who could only be the mother. Her jaw was pushed through the metal railings and her hands were reaching out for her child. (Luna Peña’s boyfriend had left her the day she told him she was pregnant. She had few friends within the City, though none who could help her in this regard. Luna moved from building to building until she found herself standing before the headquarters of the Fuzon Corporation. There were other people there; all angry about a tragic incident involving three boys she had never met. She tried to get through the crowd, as her child was hungry and their new home was just two miles away. Sadly, someone shot an empty gun and the crowd swept her away like a black hole. Her child had no name.)
As they were walking up flight after flight after flight of stair, it occurred to Billy that he had no means of actually killing the CEO beyond strangulation. This wouldn’t be a problem, but he didn’t feel strong enough to do such an act. He didn’t think anyone within the City walls was strong enough. One time, Billy watched a fight between two people outside a bar over something he never cared to find out. The two ended up trying to strangle each other to death, but they only ended up passing out from exhaustion. He could only hope for a solution. Maybe a shard of glass will be lodged into someone’s throat or something, he thought.
As they ascended, the pair could hear the screams of the conclusion to this sordid affair. With each step, they grew softer and softer. Thirteen stories above the bottom floor, a couple was lying at the stair’s turn. He was once a bearded man with a sharp nose and balding black hair. She was a brunette with long hair and an eye patch covering her blue right eye. They looked at each other in their final moments with… not love, but something close to it. The feeling one has to someone who they used to love deeply, but now merely care for. (Maria and Juán Jacobson once existed and were married three days before their deaths. That’s all I know.) Billy tried to ignore thoughts of the secretary downstairs.
“Is this how you want to be remembered?”
They decided to rest by these former lovers, perhaps to wait for the screaming to stop. It gave Billy some time to think. One thought that crossed his mind was of what the Fuzon Corporation actually made? They were a ubiquitous part of City life, no doubt about that. To say that most people living in the City worked, in one capacity or another, for the Fuzon Corporation would be an understatement. The faded signs plastered around the City claimed they were once some kind of electronic company, something to do with computers. But if that’s the case, why didn’t they fix stuff like the elevators? Why did none of the buildings have electricity? What even is a computer? Is it some sort of writing apparatus or is it a portable theatre? But such questions would have to wait as the screaming finally died down enough for them to continue upwards. Where else could they go?
Up and up and up they went. Past corpses broken beyond recognition; past those who had been murdered for their righteous anger and those for their misfortune; past the young and the old; the sick and the sickly. One corpse had their eyes clawed out while another had her neck snapped. (Mary Smith wanted to be a school teacher when she was a child. Plex Jones wanted to be Plex.) The menagerie of lifelessness filled the stairwell like stars on a cloudy night: what was there wasn’t fully there, but what could be seen was such a sight (a nice way to refer to countless corpses of the innocent and guilty alike strewn across a confined space in all their grotesque grandeur). The Sasquatch would pause at times, seemingly for no reason at all. Did he know any of these people, Billy wondered. Did he pass them by on his travels? Or was he just the sort who thought about corpses? Billy thought himself of the same cloth, but step by agonizing step, he realized how wrong his assumption was simply from the amount of tears welling from the Sasquatch’s eyes. Who could hold such sadness? Who could feel so much?
“Are you ok?” asked the Sasquatch as if he wasn’t crying.
“Y-yeah,” stammered Billy, “Why?”
“Because you’re crying,” smiled the Sasquatch.
“What are you afraid of?”
“I-I I… am?” Billy said while whipping the stream of tears from his face. The Sasquatch didn’t respond. He simply went back to looking at the corpse before them. It was small corpse, probably a midget or one of the rare children flittering through the margins of the City. His teeth were broken, as was his nose, as was the wall half of his face was jammed into. He was wearing a denim jacket with a smiley face button on the left lapel. It was an odd button in that the printer must have made a mistake and given it three eyes. Billy resisted the compulsion to steal the button. (Jonathan P. Wilson was a traveling arsonist. He would go from ruin to ruin burning down the last buildings standing in each of them. Some were easy to do, as wood buildings tend to be easier to burn than stone ones. His last building was to have been the Fuzon Corporation’s headquarters, which he had been scoping for the past month. When he was done scoping, he would burn the building down for reasons that were only known to him. Or maybe he was hoping to get high up the building to see his true target. Jonathan was known for his secrecy in all areas save for his name and his profession.) Inside the jacket was a gun too big for the small man, but big enough for Billy. Inexplicably, the gun was loaded, though only with one bullet. Little guy must not have gotten the chance to use it, Billy thought.
“Have you ever fired a gun before?”
Round and round the stairs they went, passing by accomplished atrocity after concluded cruelty. It became apparent after the sixty-eighth floor that this wasn’t an office building at all. That would require offices for people to work within in the first place. No, this was a hollow shell created solely to lift one room higher than all the rest. A gravestone meant only to show superiority above all the other ones. The elevator probably never worked in the first place; just another broken promise in a City that offered so little.
“Can you live with yourself after it’s done?”
Eventually, the pair reached the top floor, where the remainder of the corpses lay. Two turrets positioned right in front of a steel door where whirling automatically and with nary a bullet within them. They followed them no matter where they went in the room. The turrets were spent on shooting the bodies lying before the two. Of the bodies before them, only one was clinging to life. She was an older woman, probably in her early thirties. She had red hair cut by someone who gave up halfway through a Mohawk and hoped no one would notice. She was large for someone living in the City, nearly 200 pounds. She had a few tattoos scattered across her arms, mostly in the shape of a chain of roses. One was of a cross. Even as her throat was gashed by bullet fire and she gasped her last bloody breaths, there was an infectiousness to her unexpected smile. It was as if even in such a cruel, unfair death, she was able to find something to smile about. Or maybe she just knew when to take a joke… Billy didn’t know either way. (Her name was Henrietta Williamson. This is the third time I’ve rewritten this section. Each time, I find myself at a loss as to what to say about Henrietta. She is, in many ways, the most influential person on this brave new world we find ourselves within. Her life story could fill an entire library from her early days as a child detective to her later years as an angry old woman who wants the best for everyone. And yet, the more I read about her, the more it feels like telling her story as a traditional story would do her an injustice. She was always flittering the margins, be she the Ace Detective you heard about but never read about, the loveable one off character who has an impact on the narrative, or simply the woman who brushes others to the side while she’s running home. Unlike the rest of the people discussed [and indeed, those who weren’t], Henrietta deserves to be in the margins of the narrative. It’s what she would have wanted.)
Beyond the corpse, there stood a set of doors. It took a few minutes for Billy to move the bodies away from the door so it could be opened. There weren’t many bodies in the area, just ten or so. The poor sods, Billy thought, so close yet so far away. As he went to open the door to what he presumed to be the sole room of the building, whilst the turrets continued clicking away as if such sounds could kill, the Sasquatch put his hand onto Billy’s shoulder and asked “Are you sure you want to go in alone?”
In those simple, complex words, Billy could hear all the implicit subtext such a question meant: all the unintended implications and earnest meanings. The unspoken promises between the two were given space to breath in the conscious world. The things they meant to say in their short time together. Things Billy didn’t even realize were questions in need of being asked or answered. Baseless assumptions he made long ago about the implications of the action. Billy didn’t have an answer to the subtexts. Such questions are Historical in nature; they could only be answered in retrospect, when the story has been concluded and all the players away from the stage. And even then, the question may be lost to the minutia of the moment.
Instead of answering, Billy continued opening the door. To his surprise, it was unlocked. Another broken promise, Billy thought with a cynical smirk. He walked through the doors while the Sasquatch descended down into the shadows. He didn’t even look back at the Sasquatch for one last goodbye. He told himself they’d see each other again once the deed had been done. And they’d laugh at the simplicity of it all, missing all the complex sadness buried within. Then again, Billy knew how this story would end. Which is perhaps why, as he stepped through the door and the Sasquatch said, “Fair thee well, Billy…” that Billy replied with “Palmer. Billy Palmer.” Out of all the names he has given, I’m inclined to believe that one to be his. If, for no other reason than I can’t see the con in it. The click of the closing door was disguised by the sound of empty turrets.
“Are you ready to die?”

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Monday, October 19, 2020

(Three Brothers

TW: Police Brutality

The protests surrounding the headquarters of the Fuzon Corporation began a few weeks before Billy found the body. But first, we must discuss the events surrounding another event that occurred a fortnight before the protests began. We must, after all, understand the motives before seeing their consequences. It began when a group of young men were walking down the streets of the City. They had just been out scavenging for some food for their apartment complex to eat. Their names were Gabriel Lee [17], Tony Samson [16], and Johnny Willis [15].

Gabriel met the two men he would die with amid the streets of the ruin they called a City, as many people do. The vines and greenery hadn’t fully consumed the City at the time; indeed some of the buildings were still largely intact. But to call the City anything but a ruin would be a lie. It was raining when Gabriel [14] tried to steal a loaf of bread. It wasn’t a hard rain, all things considered, but it was certainly the kind of rain that ends up killing people dumb enough to sing in it. Gabriel had been living on the streets for nearly his entire life. His parents had “disappeared” and left him alone in a cruel world, a common story in the City. The loaf of bread belonged to one of an increasingly dwindling number of landlords of the City. Even for a landlord he was inexplicably well fed. The loaf was lying on a table whilst he was busy talking on a broken phone about a contract to house police officers, intentionally ignoring the few “unsavory” members of the community standing right in front of him. It wasn’t too hard to steal the loaf unnoticed.
Which is why it should have come as no surprise to Gabriel that two other people had the exact same idea. [If anything, it was more surprising that more people weren’t stealing bread.] And yet, Gabriel was perplexed by the other two young lads holding the exact same piece of bread as he was. Some have speculated that this was because the man had a semi-solipsistic worldview at the time that didn’t so much view himself as the only being that mattered, merely the only one suffering. Purely subconsciously, but it was still an assumption he made when he was that young. Others simply noted that City life invokes a solitary mindset that causes many to forget other people even exist. Whereas one boring person with a limited imagination and a penchant for being wrong about absolutely everything pointed out that when someone is starving, their environmental awareness tends to dull.
Regardless of the reason for not noticing them, the first thing Gabriel did when he felt the pull of the other two sets of hands on the bread was consider pulling out a knife. He dissuaded that idea since A. If he let go of the bread, one of them might be able to nick it and run away in the time it take out the knife, B. Given that the other two probably had knives, it would be a better idea to wait until they pull theirs out, and then he could run off with the bread, and C. He didn’t have a knife. Didn’t even know what a knife looked like, but he assumed it was big. Like, the size of a leg.
But before the three could show off their knives, the landlord noticed their attempts at thievery and said, “Excuse me, but I believe that’s mine” while aiming an unloaded gun at them. He cocked the hammer and the lads fled, barely able to hold onto the bread. The landlord would later claim he let them go on purpose out of a benign generosity. Sides, he’d claim, he could always kill them if they tried again. To his relief, they never did. [To his chagrin, he was killed before they even could.]
As for the, for lack of a better term, companions, Gabriel was still hesitant as to whether or not he should trust these people. They were, after all, armed with knives they could surely use against him. Best not to trust them, or they’ll slit his wrists while he slept. Then they’d have the bread he worked so hard to get. They’d probably kill each other first, leaving the bread for the rats to eat. And he couldn’t allow that to happen. But what could he do? Perhaps he could find a steel rod and-
“Uhm, excuse me,” said the younger of the two, no older than 10 by Gabriel’s reckoning, “But neither one of you seems to be armed.” Gabriel looked at the other lad trying to give a reassuring glance that he actually was armed and this poor sod was being an idiot if he thought he could trick them into thinking he wasn’t armed. He then noticed that his relatively middle aged counterpart was giving him the exact same look. He was also trying to suppress a nervous twitch, which Gabriel figured he could use to his advantage at some point.
“Erm,” stalled the other person, “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m totally armed.”
“Y-Yeah!” echoed Gabriel, “My knife is as long as my leg.” The other person gave Gabriel a puzzled look.
“Ok, he’s definitely not armed. But I am.”
“Ok then, show me,” smiled the young lad. To Gabriel, he oozed the arrogance of youth and yet was somehow able to evoke the sincerity only old people could have.
“…But then you’ll run off with the bread.”
“HOW? This guy,” pointing at Gabriel, “is twice my height!” Indeed, at that precise moment, Gabriel realized he was not only taller than the probably 10 year old, but he was also a good foot taller than the definitely 13 year old next to him. As such, he thrust the bread towards him and tried to flee. Unfortunately, being malnourished tends to deplete one’s strength and, regardless of height, Gabriel was unable to steal the bread.
In the end, the trio [upon the two admitting that they were not, in fact, armed] agreed to split the bread. Whilst eating, they decided that it might be a good idea to stick together since Tony, the middle aged of the three, pointed out that thieves tend to end up better off when working together rather than having to deal with competition. Johnny, the youngest, agreed with the sentiment, but it took Gabriel the rest of the night to be convinced. Even when in a bad place, some people would prefer to stay there than try something new…

It was a cold night, inexplicable for the City at that time of year. The coldness of most nights was more akin to the hole left behind by an absentee parent than literal coldness, but this night was different. It was actually cold. As such, the three young men raised their hoodies to cover their faces. They were a few blocks from the abandoned building they called home when the only car in the City pulled over right in front of them. It was a police car.

“Thank you so much for your help,” said Mrs. Williamson to Tony [14] while he carried the toolbox up the stairs. The trio had been living in an abandoned apartment complex for well over a month. As with most people living in the City who had this idea, they didn’t do much to change the complex beyond putting whatever clothing they could steal on the ground to use as padding [collectively, enough for one person]. 
That was, until Mrs. Williamson moved in. She was a rather large old woman, the kind typically seen from the thigh down in a memory of a Tom and Jerry cartoon. She was extremely sweet, with an infectious smile that could make even the most bitter of curmudgeons swoon in affection. Tony found that her falsetto tone had no hints of age despite being an ancient woman of 31. Her short red hair was cut so the left side was nearly bald while the right was a pixie cut. Tony thought the hairstyle made her look extremely cool, even though he didn’t think anyone else could actually pull it off. She was a lot stronger than one would think on first glance, both in spirit and in physicality.
But the main thing that Tony saw Mrs. Williamson bring to the complex was a sense of community. Certainly, Tony believed, he met the other residents. He was sure he talked to Dr. Oliver Adams, a man of Irish and German descent, at least once or twice and took a piss next to a Native American man whose name loosely translates to “Happy Rock Who Sees,” but he didn’t know who they were beyond those brief encounters. But when Mrs. Williamson arrived, suddenly he was playing cards with them every Thursday night. [Though not with Happy Rock, as that bastard had a lucky streak that no one would dare try to beat. He does talk with him for a good couple of hours over gardening and magic.] Johnny, bless the poor sod, was teaching a group of girls his age how to do some odd dance involving a scarecrow named Joe who had an eye made out of cotton. Though each time he tried, Johnny ended up tripping, which the girls assumed was part of the dance.
As for Gabriel, he was having yet another heated discussion with a lad of 13 by the name of Fredrick Kent. It was clear to Tony that the two fancied one another. Sure there was an age gap that might be a problem, but, for many couples living in the City, there were worse things to have keeping people apart. Would they have ever met if Mrs. Williamson didn’t live there, Tony wondered. Sure, Fredrick moved into the building a week after Mrs. Williamson, but the pair had met during one of her parties [which started out as Mrs. Williamson singing to herself while people slowly wandered into her room to listen and evolved into communal showings of talents]. Would Gabriel have even noticed him if she didn’t have that party?
Tony found Fredrick to be a good influence on Gabriel. Before, Gabriel would get lost in his thoughts, believing that everyone was out to ruin his already shit life. There was sadness such isolation brought to those who lived it. One that was unseen from the cruel glances Gabriel used to give his “friends.” Since meeting Fredrick though, Tony saw a melting of the ice Gabriel called a heart. He talked to Johnny about it once, but all he would return was the gleeful smile of someone assuming you’re in on their joke.
The sense of community also provided a need to make the building a little better to live in. Which is why Tony found himself carrying a set of tools up the stairs: Mrs. Williamson had the bright idea to fix one of the bathrooms so the toilets actually flushed. Tony was happy to oblige since she was an awfully nice woman who needed his help. And he felt an odd sensation within him. One that said that he should help her out. Plus, if he was being completely honest, he never did like the smell of shit. Besides, he thought, it’s a toilet. How hard could it be?
Tony didn’t like the answer to that question…

Naturally, from out of such a car stepped a police officer. The blindingly bright light of the car, which he left on for such an effect, obfuscated his features. From what they could gleam from the man, he looked as if he was always static, like a statue made from nothing. Which made the way he aimed his gun at the three and the sly grin on his mouth all the more disconcerting.

“OH FUCK! OH FUCK! OH FUCK!” screamed Johnny [14] while a herd of deer chased after him. 
“WHY DID YOU ANTAGONIZE THE DEER!?!?!?” howled Tony close behind him.
“I thought I could sneak past them and get the-“
“YOU CAN’T SNEAK PAST DEER! DEER SEE EVERYTHING!!!” bellowed Gabriel, as if Johnny didn’t know this. The real reason why Johnny thought he could get away with stealing something from the deer was because of a story he had heard on his way back from nicking some food for the complex to eat. A pair of Spiders was drinking outside of q, a bar that had kicked them out for talking too loudly. One told the other the story of a bird that ruled the land with an iron fist. One day, a mouse sought advice from the god of grass, but they held no sway on the bird’s dominion. The god said that if she could steal a feather from the crown of the deer lords, the deer would give her a boon. She was able to do so by tricking the bird into trying to steal it himself. For while the deer were trampling the bird who had dared to believe itself better than them, the mouse stole the feather and asked for a bit more rain every now and then. The moral of the story [when told in its unabridged form] was of the inevitability of the downfall of kings due to their hubris, but Johnny only heard the surface of having one person distract the deer while the other stole the feathers. He was sure the death part was optional.
Unfortunately, the feather crown was an embellishment on the part of the storyteller, as no such crown existed. So Johnny was stuck in the rather unfortunate position of having to flee with his brothers. He mentally paused for a moment when the word “brothers” came into his mind. They weren’t related by blood [Johnny knew that much], and they only knew one another for a few years. And yet, he considered them to be his brothers. They were kind people, or at the very least willing to help when he asked, even what it was for something that was clearly stupid. They cared for one another and wanted only the best for them. If that’s not brotherhood, then Johnny didn’t know what was. Then again, he supposed, they’d probably share blood in a few moments. Deer were rarely known for their mercy. 
Fortunately for the three, the deer found a more useful target in the form of a group of slaves being forced to clean the weeds of the City. There was also a master who believed himself better than those “beneath” him. And so the deer went after them instead. Inexplicably, the deer were more… compassionate with the prisoners than they would have been with the three. [Pity might be a better word for what the deer felt for them though. It’s hard to read such beings, that they could have felt an emotion alien to human understanding towards the prisoners.] Regardless, the brothers returned to their apartment complex with Johnny clutching a single rose. It was a back up present for a lad he was dating named Frank Billingsworth, in case he couldn’t get the feather crown and give Frank a wish. He liked the rose all the same. Such is the way with the world…

Within moments, the three were dead.

The night before the three died was a rare night for the City. The sky was lit aflame with meteors dancing across the dark ballroom with not a care in the universe. It was late at night, and so many weren’t able to see such a majestic sight. Johnny [15] was sleeping at that time, dreaming of fighting some demonic horde with the help of his brothers. They were armed with magical weapons they earned when they helped a fairy from the fifth dimension that wanted nothing more than to free hir kind from the dreaded Demon Magician. It was a happy dream that didn’t seem to end.
Tony [16], meanwhile, was having far less pleasant dreams. The deer had caught up with them. In their anger for what the three did, the deer said in their alien language [which sounded slightly like English, but the syllables were off] that only one of them would be allowed to live. They didn’t try to kill one another at first, but the deer gave them an inquisitive look seen primarily in the bowels of the Fuzon Corporation’s factory. Tony had never felt such a powerful shiver down his spine, so he was the first one to throw a punch. By the end of it, Tony was the unlucky one to survive the bloodshed.
Gabriel [17] was the only one looking at the night sky, remembering the last night he saw stars. He was with his father, back when he was still alive. He must have been nine or maybe ten. When he was younger, he would make up fantastical stories out of the stars: tales of adventure and glory and whatnot. Since then, he had grown out of such stories. And yet, that night, of all nights, he felt the urge to look up and make a story up. The story the void of stars told that night was of a land that had grown sick of its populace and wanted to end it all. Its family and friends were long dead, and all that was left was a people who had nothing but contempt for everything it stood for. They built cruel towers of banal excess, destroyed what little patches of nature were left, and hated one another even more than the land. Death was surely preferable to existence, so the story told. But then, the meteors fell and only slightly changed the meaning, but it was enough to have a new story entirely. Gabriel looked at this story and thought it was a better one than the one he’d been imagining previously.
Gabriel then thought of Fredrick, and of the question he was going to ask. He wanted to ask him that night, but he hadn’t returned. Not that that was unexpected, but he was hoping he’d return a day early so he could ask him the question. He didn’t have a ring, but he was sure the symbolism of the question would be enough. He couldn’t wait to see what tomorrow would bring…

The protests didn’t start immediately; news travels slowly within City walls. But when the story reached the ears of the people who many thought were too broken to do a thing, the protesters flooded the City with angry intent. It wasn’t like this was the first time someone in the City was unjustly shot by the police. But it was, if not the last straw that broke the camel’s back, then certainly the last “last straw that broke the camel’s back.”
They circled around the headquarters of the Fuzon Corporation [everyone knew where the real power behind the police force was. None wondered where the actual government was, only presuming its existence like one does with the sun or time when one lacks a watch at night]. They were armed with solely an angry disposition. Most didn’t know the lads personally, but they stood together with those that did regardless. Such things build in the background without anyone ever noticing. The guards of the building were armed with unloaded guns meant for show. Usually, such protests ended within a few days, so the police paid them no mind at first. But even at the beginning, there was an air of finality to the affair. As if it was the final chapter on the experiment humanity called “cities,” and one that would be ultimately deemed a failure. On the second week of the protests, the chief herself walked in front of the mob with promises of body cameras to be added to the uniform of the police. But, she added, there would have to be a compromise. Mainly, the body cameras were never to be allowed to be turned on and the people were not allowed to know the name of the officer who killed the boys.
When she awoke from the coma a week after someone threw a shoe, of all things, at her, she ordered the police to dissuade the populous by force. Looking towards history for answers, they found using a water hose to be untenable since water was too expensive to be usable, they didn’t have tear gas, and the last of their bullets was used on the three lads [hence why, despite finding his reasoning to be sympathetic {“his wife did leave him a week ago after all,” they’d argue, “and she took the kids too; that’d mess anyone up; besides, those thugs were threatening him with a gun”}, the police officer who did it was quietly banished from the City]. Which left mere theatrical fear.
A group of guards pulled a random old woman from the crowd and threatened to shoot her if the crowd didn’t disperse. Her name was Henrietta Williamson and she had known the boys for a couple of years. They weren’t always the best of people, certainly. They had the awful penchant of leaving doors open that ought to be closed. But they helped her and the rest of the apartment complex she lived in whenever they could be it cleaning up a hallway or stealing a bottle of water from the last landlord. They didn’t always succeed in their help [most notably when they tried to get the toilet to work and ended up flooding the basement instead], but there was a puckishness to their efforts; a sympathetic look that tried to learn from their mistakes, even if they didn’t always understand them.
So when this officer of the “law” pulled a gun on her with the threat to end her life if she didn’t stand down from being there for these poor lads, she pulled the trigger for him. When bullets didn’t cut her brainstem in half, the area got a whole lot bloodier, as revolutions tend to do.)

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Monday, October 12, 2020

Sauntering the Psychogeography

“So why do you want to kill him,” asked the Sasquatch. They were lying on the only natural tree left in the City. It was crooked like a finger bent both forwards and back yet strong like a brick encased in a tomb of cement. There was a hole in the center of it that, local legends claimed, was caused by time itself cursing the City for some decadence or hubris, it varied from telling to telling. On the other hand, those that believed such stories also thought that whatever was wrong with the City could only be solved by filling that hole as opposed to confronting the City’s several social and structural problems head on. As if material social progress is done by magic and not through the blood, sweat, and tears of normal people sick of the world they live in. (Many had tried to fix the hole, but each cork or filling simply slipped out.)
One could just see the tower of the Fuzon Corporation headquarters through the branches of the barren tree. It was the panopticon of the City. The tower was bland and dull and grey and boring and cruel and stiff and banal and tired, more so than the rest of the City. It was as if all the color of the City had been sucked out by the tower and sent to the outside world. At this point, it was almost supernatural how the vines and roots, which had consumed the rest of the City like lemmings at the bottom of a cliff, avoided the tower like a discolored strand in a nearly perfect blanket. The only significance of the tower in and of itself was its size. The shadow they called a building loomed over the City like a vulture atop a cliff. There were no windows bar the penthouse where the CEO lived in luxury unseen outside of white-collar prisons. Of course, it was too high up to actually be see what it looks like. Some claimed they could see the room’s sole occupant from time to time, though all they could say of it was that it was merely a speck looking out the window with envious eyes. Perhaps, some of the paranoid residents considered, he was slowly, but surely, drawing his plans against the world.
Billy had never been in the building before in his life. Every time he looked at the slab of unnatural brutalism, he thought it looked like the gravestone of the City waiting for it to die so its epitaph could be written. “Here lies The City,” Billy joked in that moment (without realizing he was saying this aloud), “For two hundred and forty nine years, you have kept us safe from the collapse of the world outside. You have been our angel, our love, and our hope. In your incompleteness, we have found ourselves fulfilled. Your kiss may have been deadly, your vice, which drenched the streets, inherent, and your neon women demonic, but this inland empire that you once were was a place where even Heaven itself can wait. We love you oh beautiful City. We love you and all your-“
“So why do you want to kill him,” asked the Sasquatch. Billy turned to the Sasquatch. There was a glazed look in his eyes; that of someone trapped in a cage called thought. They weren’t looking at the Sasquatch, not even beyond him. No, Billy’s eyes were looking at himself through the reflection within the eyes of the Sasquatch. The Sasquatch didn’t see this, more invested in the answer than anything else. He knew what the answer could be based on what little he saw of Billy, but he wasn’t completely sure what it actually was. To the Sasquatch, Billy tended to be a bit too guarded at times, obfuscating himself with lies and jokes to the point where it seemed that even he didn’t know what he was like. Besides that, it was hard to talk about the answer to such a question as murder. There was so much distastefulness to it, so much sadness. But then, even the most justified of deaths have a twinge of sadness to them. A love lost, a friendship destroyed, an innocent ruined, a world ended. To say that ending a life, even one as despicable as that of a billionaire who runs a company that utilizes dehumanizing tactics to keep their wage slaves from doing anything but obey and die, lacks some small modicum of sadness is to believe that it will never stop raining.
“You walk down Elm Street lately?” Billy finally replied after getting up from the tree and dragging himself towards the tower.
“No, not really,” replied the Sasquatch.
“Well, there’s a body there, about a few blocks away from the police station.”
“There are loads of bodies a few blocks away from the police station.”
“This one’s different. She’s standing up.”
“…How do you think that happened?” asked the Sasquatch whilst feigning ignorance. He knew the answer; he had seen those works of art from time to time in the City to know what it was. The Sasquatch assumed Billy did not know the answer. He merely deduced what had happened based on looking at the body for roughly five or ten minutes. (It probably would have been fifteen if Jonathan hadn’t interrupted.) No doubt, the Sasquatch thought, Billy was about to spin him a yarn about how this was all some sort of conspiracy by the CEO to take over the world. conspiracy theories had long gone past their expiration date in the Sasquatch’s book and it was a pity Billy fell down one.
“Some asshole probably shaped the body to stand up.” Billy was right in the sense that a car turns on because someone turns a key. There are details that are glossed over in that assessment, such as the existence of engines, the motivation of the act and how it relates to the nature of sentience within the City’s symbolic ideaspace that mystically willed the body into that form (as it did with all art within City limits), but that’s generally what happened. “Anyways, that’s not the point.”
“Oh,” said the Sasquatch somewhat surprised, “Then what is the point?”
“…The point is that she’s dead.” Billy said as if he was talking to someone who was being willfully stupid. “She died and it’s his fault.” He pointed up towards the tower in all its banal glory. Billy then went into detail about what specifically he meant by that statement, almost bursting into tears out of rage and sadness. It was the first time the Sasquatch felt like he actually saw who Billy was and not a performance to some invisible audience. He was silent for a short time.
“Did you know her?” asked the Sasquatch. Billy didn’t speak for a while. There were things he didn’t consider when making the decision to kill the CEO; thoughts that only danced within the subconscious of the mind like a devil on the tip of a sword. Each time the thought’s flesh was cut by the sword, more and more implications would dawn on Billy’s thought process. Would the City die because of this, Billy thought? The Sasquatch did say that billionaires did more harm than good, but this one held all the chains. His singular vision shaped the City into what it is now and kept it from falling apart. He was the Great Man of this City’s History. He then looked at what was being held like Atlas did the globe moments before shrugging and dooming humanity to the pit of space. In the end, Billy supposed that he should tell the Sasquatch the truth. What harm could it do?
“No. I didn’t.”
“Then why do it? Why kill him? Surely someone else could kill him. Mayhaps even someone she knew. You don’t have to kill every monster you see.”
“If I don’t kill him, no one else will. How long have you been in the City?”
“About a week.”
“And in that time, how many protests have you seen? How many howls at the expense of those who cause harm have you heard? What of the fists raised to combat those who wish to make others suffer for their own amusement? None. Nadda. Zilch! And yet, there are so many monsters in the world, so much cruelty, hatred, sickness-- I mean, you’ve seen the bodies, right? There are so many corpses on the streets that you could practically sleep on them. And yet, no one gives enough of a damn to bury them! No one cares to find out who they were or why they died. We all just act as if it’s normal, but it’s not! It’s not normal; it’s evil! No one could sensibly argue that evil is subtle in the face of that. And we do nothing in the face of it! Let alone something as obvious as those who are responsible of the death of some nameless girl who could only be identified by a fucking barcode.” Billy took a moment to catch his breath. “If I don’t kill him, no one else will. It probably won’t change anything either…”
The pair walked in silence for a long time. Not an uncomfortable silence or that of mere banality. It was the silence of thoughts and implications, filled to the brim with empathy and consideration. The wind blew cold and loud. The sun was covered by ash colored clouds. Their bodies still rank of smoke and death. In many ways by talking about his motivations, there was a pit of pessimism and despair Billy had stumbled himself into without even realizing. The wind blew harder as they continued onwards.
“Do you know how old I am?” the Sasquatch asked, seemingly non-sequiturially.
“Uh… 500?”
“5,295. I’m older than this City. I’m older than what most people knew of the United States. I might even be older than many of the people who lived in the United States before it was the United States. And from that… experience, I know people. You’re an odd sort, all believing that you’re the only lead in the story of your life because you see everything that happens to you and no one else. The truth is… there’s a lot you haven’t seen.
The screams of protest aren’t that different from the screams of suffering. There are those in power who benefit from making people like you think protests no longer happen… those that punish you for looking. Some, like you, look at the narrative those in power give you and conclude that only you can save the world. But the world doesn’t need to be saved. It’ll go on with or without your help. But at the same time, people need help: the poor, the sick, the unwashed masses. We all need each other. When walking to the building, how many homeless did you see? Did you see the blind man with pale blue eyes? Or the woman lying to herself that her baby is still alive? Or the kid who hasn’t eaten in over a week? No, I don’t think you have seen them. You’re right in that there are no subtle evils. What you call a subtle evil, I would call an ignorable one. We all have blinders to such things and it takes work to see. I don’t think those homeless would be able to see each other either. They’re too focused on their own suffering, and understandably so. They might care about the others, but that doesn’t mean they focus on them over their own situation akin to having their arms shoved into a wood chipper. Empathy does not negate blinders, even if the reasons are understandable.
And there are more who need help. While we walked to the tree, we saw a building burning brightly with flames of everlasting colors. It was too big for any one person to put out. The flames danced across each window to the tune of a discordant tango. The flames… their beauty and their terror mesmerized you. It was too big for any one person to comprehend or comprehend or even contemplate. So many lives lost to the fire. Why didn’t anyone do anything to stop it, you must’ve thought.
And yet, I saw people leap into the flames: people who knew no one in that building, people who were saved by others at the last possible minute by some freak pillar falling down. People who died just so some small kid, some old man, some bitter adolescent child who thinks the world is less than it actually is could live. They jumped into the flames not because they thought they were the only ones who would help; they did it because those people needed help.
That’s humanity at its heart. Not cruelty or love or any of the other things you claim are more important than that. At the end of the day, you just want to help. Sure, from time to time you misunderstand what will help the world due to your biases (be it seeing love between two people of the same gender as a sign of wickedness or those who believe in the “Wrong God” as needing to be corrected to help them to the “right” path). But your species still tries to help.
It may not be exclusive to your species, but it “defines” yours in the sense that isolation “defines” mine or marginality “defines” the Jabberwockies or uncanniness “defines” the deer. It may not be defining of an individual or even a group of individuals, but it alludes to the fundamental nature of our respective species. There are many deer and Sasquatches and other such beings that want to help. But for you humans, you have to help.
All we can do is help one another out. And I’m not saying killing the last billionaire will do no good. It’ll probably do a lot of good. But you can’t act as if you’re the only one who cares. There are more people in this world, more stories being told, than can ever fit within your philosophy. So go ahead, kill him. Shoot his brains out or bash his skull in. But don’t ever tell yourself that no one else wants to help.”
As if solely to support the Sasquatch’s rejoinder, the pair suddenly heard the sound of an explosion of anger and suffering. Someone was calling for help. Someone else was just crying. So Billy did what humans are wont to do. Sadly, they were too far away to prevent this story from being a truly happy one.

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Monday, October 5, 2020

Memory

Every time I try to remember the past, more of my memories
Are lost to me. I can’t remember the sound of my
Grandfather or that of my father’s voice. I can’t remember
My mother’s maiden name or my cousin’s first. I
Don’t recall who I first kissed or who
I met when I should have met
With him for our anniversary. But
I do remember who ran
Him over after he
Found out about
My infidelity.
He

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