The full story so far

1. Rations

I start awake in the night to the sound of shouting down the hall from another room. At first the tone of voice sets me on edge, but I relax as I recognize the sound of the words being shouted.
"I humbly and gratefully accept this meal, provided to me, free of charge, from the Edible Resources Sector! I HUMBLY! AND GRATEFULLY ACCEPT! THIS MEAL..."
I can't help but laugh sometimes, hearing the unnecessary notes of frustration and desperation. You don't have to yell at it, I try to think at them, you have to speak slower, the mic might be covered or dirty... but it goes on for several minutes. And I begin to wonder if it's a genuinely defective unit. It's not the first time I've heard of defective ration units getting past the quality screening .
The yelling stops and I think, oh good, they got it open. But a few moments later I hear an unmistakable thud. They threw it. They threw it on the ground or something. And everyone knows you never do that.
A few minutes later there was a marching of boots in the hallway, a powerful knock at the neighboring door. The door opens. Their voices are quiet but the intense whisper gives away what must be happening. By now part of me wants to try to peek out my door to see what's going on but I have no desire to get involved.
At least one of the cops enters the man's apartment. By now the man's voice has risen back to within audible range. "It wouldn't open!" he says with every ounce of desperation as when he had been yelling at the ration unit. And I couldn't actually hear the cop's reply but I could imagine him saying something like, "well then you should have reported it." he would say in a tone implying the man was as dumb as you could be. And then as if to confirm my suspicions the man could be heard whining, "but the complaints office doesn't open until nine in the morning, and I have to be at work by six, and I haven't eaten in over a day...!" his voice trailing off at the end, in a way that painted a picture of how the cop must be looking at him right now.
"You have thirty seconds." the cop said in a clearly audible, calm, yet menacing bark. "You may now plead your case."
"WHAT?" shrieked the neighbor, now in full panic mode, "You've got to be fucking shitting me, over this? You'd take me down for something this minor??"
"There is nothing minor about the destruction of freely donated goods, sir." he said in a jaded, weary voice. "You have 23 seconds left."
"I... I already told you... it wasn't working, I couldn't open it, ask anyone, they'll tell you, one of my neighbors must've heard me yelling, trying to open the damn--"
"Sir I can personally reassure you that the Resource Sectors are held to the absolute highest quality control standards--"
"God dammit, don't I get a chance here??"
"Sir," said the cop, with an exasperated sigh, "I'm sure you're well aware that in the terms and conditions it clearly states that any deliberate attempt to physically harm, puncture, warp, pry, batter..."
The man let out a wail of dread as the cop finished quoting the ToS.
"...result in the perpetrator's dismissal from the Food Program. You have about 7 seconds left sir."
"God would you stop being such a bootlicking coward for five seconds and just talk to me like a regular person?"
"Your time to plead your case has expired sir. As per the regulations you are found to be within violation of the Destruction of Property Clause of the Provisions Agreement and are Hereby Redacted from the Regular Resources Distribution List. Do not attempt to collect any further meals from the ERS. Any attempt to circumvent this restriction will result in further recalibrations to your living standard. Thank you, Goodnight."
And in the stunned vacuous silence that followed, after the apartment door closed with thoughtful quietness, you could just barely make out the soft, 'kt-tsshh" of the ration opening on the floor.

2. Showers

I'm awoken and informed of my next shift; a 7:30am burner gig at the Sausage Factory.
I rouse myself, head out the door and down the hall to join the jaunty line for the shower. Other half asleep patrons bump into each other as we try to keep up with the erratic forward movement of the line, in time with the erratic yet somewhat rhythmic pattern of the “ding… ding, ding… … ding-ding…” As I get closer I can smell the running water long before I can hear it.
We slowly make our collective way down the gray & white hallway to the contrastingly gray and yellow shower room. Continuing at an unsteady pace until I reach the front of the line. At the next ding, the floor in front of me lights up a path to the newly available shower stall. I walk past yellow curtains with feet behind them and am guided by the lit up path on the floor to the shower stall I will use this morning.
The shower stalls are well-equipped modular design. There’s ample space behind the yellow curtain to get undressed, there’s an area for your dirty clothes and a wall panel to dispense fresh ones in a separate dry area in front of the shower. Very thoughtful design. Gives everyone the space they need to comfortably undress while maintaining privacy without getting their clothes wet. With the curtain closed behind me I begin the morning ritual.
With the first splash of the water on my skin comes the familiar momentary jolt of awakening, followed by the semi-familiar, half-remembered, half-awake montage of thoughts and feelings. It goes something like this:
What's going on again? Why am I here? Where am I exactly? Why am I doing this? Oh that's right, this is what we do first thing in the morning. To wash off the grogginess of rest. But why does it always feel so weird for a moment?
But the thought is washed away after a moment of feeling it, leaving me not alone with not my thoughts.
I can hear the huge room full of people behind their respective shower curtains, mumbling, thinking aloud to themselves, going through the day's plans. The acoustics of this room turn it into a strangely ominous hum. There's a tense almost rhythmic cadence to the collective sound of their future worry. It runs together into a mumbled, tortured choir, amplified into audible range by the large tiled space. Some of them might have the impression that their voice is quiet enough so as to not contribute to the overall din, but it does. And I can hear well enough to make out some individual words but not enough to eavesdrop.
I let my mind wander, as much as it can, as my body finishes up the routine work of cleaning itself. My watch says I have 2 minutes of water left, right on schedule. The last of my water is trickling out just as I've finally rinsed everything off enough. A good shower, I reflect.
Suddenly as the water stops I feel my attention drift further upward. A part of me seems to “switch on." a part of my mind that usually lays dormant. I suddenly feel myself looking up, suspiciously, as if seeing something for the first time.
The ceiling… It has never occurred to me just how high and far away it is in this room. Instead of the typical hung-tile ceilings that you see basically everywhere, here it’s just a bare metal roof in the distance covered with scaffolding and other industrial fixtures. Almost like a warehouse ceiling but even busier. And yes, I have known that there were cameras everywhere, but for some reason it never really hit me that there are also cameras here. Even with the ceiling so high up and far away it’s easy to spot them when you know how to look for them.
A brief flash of uncontrolled panic echoes painfully through my body for several long fractions of a second before I’m brought back to the present moment by the gentle red flashing light reminding me to keep moving.
Naked. They can see me naked. I hurry up and grab the nice warm dry towel and I’ve never felt so cold and wet in my life.
I use the towel to dry myself trying not to leave myself too exposed for too long while doing so. And it doesn't take me long to realize that this is slightly unusual behavior.
They can see all of us, comes the unbidden thought, but we can’t see each other…
People aren't supposed to care about things like, being seen by the cameras, even when naked. So why do i, all of a sudden? I think about bringing this up at my next alignment check but I decide against it. If they find out they'll find out. And there won't be anything much I can do about that.

3. Debts

I owe about 32 grand for the housing and meal plan I’m on. It’s better than what a lot of people can afford but still only covers housing and meals.
Technically everyone here owes something. You can’t really live in this world without taking on some amount of debt. And you really have no way of knowing for sure if you’ll be able to pay it off in the amount or time they want, so you’re really gambling with your future. But i couldn’t not take the package i got. It was the best thing I could afford that would put me on the path to repaying what I already owed.
If I had paid more upfront i might’ve gotten a nicer sleeping arrangement deal. Maybe even a private room. But it’s hard to know for sure what you’re really gonna get until you sign the repayment agreement so you kinda have to rely on word of mouth to know which packages are really worth it.
I got the “bread and butter” package which doesn’t actually include real butter in the rations except for special occasions. The rich fucks who can afford the “bread and circuses” package, those lucky fuckers get so much butter they could put it in their coffee every morning if they wanted to. I’ve always wondered what that tastes like. And on top of how delicious it apparently is it also makes you bulletproof or something. That’s not real but it’s what they say to describe it…
I take a bite of my margarine enriched bread, which is at least real bread as far as i know.
Sign in to The App on my Phone. First thing it shows you is the stupid flashy “Hello! You owe $number! Would you like to make a payment at this time?” And they really want us to verbally or textually indicate “no” every time even they know goddamn well that nobody has any money to pay them back with until after we finish our shifts here, as per the arrangement we all agreed to to get in this place, so why the hell do they even ask? And once you get past that screen it populates with your daily routines & reminders, new messages if you have any, and last, most importantly, the only piece of information anyone cares about 99% of the time they open the App, Your Next Gig.
All the most important details are there. Where to go and when to arrive, what to bring, and sometimes a brief description of what you’ll be doing. Sometimes. A lot of the time you only have the clues in the title of the gig posting, and even then sometimes the titles are even vague.
All i know is that apparently the algorithm decided that these would be the ideal gigs for me to be assigned to, depending on what’s available and what everyone else is also assigned to. It’s supposed to account for things like your age, different types of energy levels, your mood, interests, passions, hobbies, et cetera… so what does it actually factor in? Good question.
My Wall Screen told me my first gig was at the Sausage Factory, and as I’m about to start reading about what exactly a “burner gig” means in this context, there’s a sound like radio interference, the screen flashes and the contents change. The title of the gig changes to “ADMIN 1ON1” the destination changes to “Mr. E’s office” with the usual “start navigation” button.
I stared at it. It didn’t change again. I hoped it would. I hoped this was some kind of mistake.
This cannot be good.
I’ve never heard of this happening to anyone. That’s got to mean that this is what happens before they… before they…
I don’t want to finish that thought. Especially not now as it’s happening to me. Well, I figure, delaying it will only make things worse… so I push the button. Then my breakfast slides out of the wall slot and I remember that I hadn’t eaten yet. But now Mr. E will be expecting me to arrive, within a certain time frame no doubt. I perform the recitation to open the meal and eat as much of it as I can in one minute as I get my socks and shoes on and head out the door just as the lights on the floor start to blink impatiently.
I follow them down my hall, around a corner, through an open door I’ve never noticed, and up to an elevator. Of course, why had I not expected this? It’s always a goddamned elevator. No matter how many times I’ve expressed the preference to take the stairs, they always lead me to the elevators. And there doesn’t seem to be a nearby staircase. Weird. Not cool.
The elevator doors open and it’s the worst kind. The kind with mirrors on the inside. They think it helps with claustrophobia but really it just replaces the claustrophobia with disorientation. I hesitate. The lights on the floor grid bounce at the opening of the elevator, showing me that they can’t follow me in there and I have to go on without them. It’s strange how attached you get to those lights on the floor. You only really ever notice it when you have to go somewhere they can’t guide you. Somewhere they can’t protect you from uncertainty about where to go.
You step into an elevator. You push the button and the doors close.
Suddenly you feel a sharp downward lurch that continues into a prolonged downward slide.
Even though you were on the ground floor.
Does this building have a basement? You didn’t think so, but you seem to be descending down into it at an alarmingly steady rate.
When you entered the confines of this box your expectation was that it would go…
up.
But instead,
it didn’t.
It wasn’t going to go up.
It went the other way instead.

4. Down.

A man was trapped in a box.
He had pushed the button but it didn’t go.
It went the other way.
You step within the bounds of an elevator.
You entrust it with the weight of your corporeal mass.
It deceives and betrays you when, instead of doing the thing for which it is named,
it instead begins to slowly do the opposite.
Have you ever been going the wrong way in an elevator? I have.

YOU approached the elevation altering equipment
cautiously
to avoid any misunderstandings.
Unfortunately even though you communicated your intent flawlessly,
the elevator had other plans.
For within this box of up,
there was a shocking secret:
down.
There was too much down in this box. It was weighing down all the up that would’ve otherwise taken us up.
Upon entering this enclosed space, your mind was filled with anticipation of ascension.
Alas, your expectations were thoroughly subverted.
The anticipated upward trajectory did not materialize. In its stead, a downward path was inexorably chosen.
Who could do such a thing? Why is this happening? What’s going to be down there???
The downward motion ceased, mercifully, after what felt like an eternity of uncertainty. The bouncing motion of the stop is a welcome respite from the terrifying endless down, but now it feels like you’re dangling over the edge of a bottomless pit. No way of knowing how much deeper it goes. And the fact that you thought it didn’t exist at all before makes it seem like it* can only be infinitely deep. *

5. Mr. E

The elevator doors open onto a completely ordinary looking office hallway and I all but lunge out of the freshly opened doors, waves of relief and freshly-oriented confusion spilling over me in equal measure, one after another. I catch myself leaning against the wall and breathing like I had just been holding my breath for a long time. Then I reassemble my composure to the best of my ability.
A new stream of light emerges on the floor coming out of the elevator to greet me and congratulate me for making it this far. They then proceed on the way to lead me to the actual office I’ll be dying in.
If it weren’t for those damned lights on the floor I could conceivably get lost on the way there. It was a mercilessly short walk.
As soon as I set foot into his blue carpeted office I hear a high pitched ding, followed by a graceful, mechanical female voice announcing my name, to signal my arrival. ”Maxwell Anthony Carpenter.” Then the chair behind the desk turned around to reveal a man sitting in it.
“Max!” He says with his teeth, in an expression that I read as a smile, and then doubted myself.
“Mister… E?” I respond sheepishly. This man’s sitting behind the desk still wearing a hat and coat, like he’s some kind of detective with not enough time.
“Yes!” He says jovially, the smile in his eyes never wavering. “Please come in, make yourself comfortable. Don’t worry you’re not in trouble,” he adds before I have time to think, “I can see you look rather worried, but you needn’t be.”
I notice the room I’m standing in is different from just about any room I’ve ever been in. Everything in it was made of… wood. It smelled weird. Like old… just old. It just smelled old.
“You can have a seat,” says Mr E gesturing with one hand while holding a small colorful cube in his other hand. He had evidently been playing with it before I came in. I slide one of the chairs back and sit in it. It makes a weird loud noise as I sit, like it’s ripping apart or something, but then I realize it’s just the material of the chair itself. It’s weirdly soft in an uneven way.
“I suppose you’re wondering why you’re here.” He says, and then laughs at himself. “God I’ve always wanted to say that. I’m not sure if you can tell, Max, but today, is a very special day. I’ve been looking forward to this day for, well, about two and a half years now.”
I guess it was when my face didn’t light up that he realized he still hadn’t told me what was going on. And that would be important information if I was going to share his enthusiasm about how special today apparently was.
“Max, I have a question for you.” He said, with the air of getting down to some real business. “The reason I called you here, the reason you had to take that disorienting elevator ride, which, I apologize for that, I remember my first time riding in that glass box… it does things to your head. I told the guys in the building office and they said they put in a petition but haven’t heard anything about it. Anyway. Why you’re here. The question. A very important, significant question, Mr Carpenter.” He used my last name and it felt… respectful. Usually when people use your last name it’s because they want to make you feel small. It’s punitive. But this… it was like he was putting me on a pedestal, the way he said it.
“Are you ready?”
I nodded.
“You and a squirrel, are going around a tree.”
“I… I’m sorry, wait, what?”
“It’s a hypothetical, Mr Carpenter, Please let me ask the whole question before you attempt to engage with it.”
“I… you called me down here to ask about a squirrel?”
“Let me finish. You’ll understand soon.”
I slouch in my chair like an impatient school child because that’s exactly how I feel right now. I cannot believe how ridiculous this is. But I have no choice but to sit and listen so I do.
“You, and a squirrel,” he repeats, pedantically, “are each going, around a tree. At no point do you see the squirrel, nor does the squirrel see you. The tree stays between you at all times. When you move, the squirrel moves opposite you, so that you move in perfect, opposite sync. Now, here is the question. As you go around the tree, Mr Carpenter, are you also going around the squirrel?” He pronounced the last part as if it were an ancient invocation of a powerful magic spell.
”Yes, obviously”
“Okay, why?”
“What do you mean? Isn’t it obvious?”
“No, not really. What if I told you that about half of people say “no?”
“What? You’re joking. That’s ridiculous. How could anyone think you don’t also go around the squirrel?”
“Why do you think that you do?”
I sigh, frustrated that this is even a question I have to deal with. “Because my around the tree is bigger than the squirrel’s. Because I’m not on the tree. So when I walk around the tree I’m also going around the squirrel because the squirrel is attached to the tree. Wait, you did say that, right? You said the squirrel is on the other side of the tree, right? So that means it’s like, on, the tree, right? Not just walking around on the other side of the tree.”
Mr E’s smile, having faded during the invocation, had gradually returned and spread back from his eyes to his mouth. “Very interesting. You’re doing very well so far.” That makes me feel weird, but I don’t have time to process it. “Now, what if I told you that, no, I actually failed to specify the distance of the squirrel to the tree in this iteration of the scenario. I forget whether that was part of it originally, but that’s honestly beside the point.”
“There are many reasons that people give for both yes and no.” he continues explaining and I find myself drawn in. “This question is useful for many reasons. It can reveal a lot about a person based on how they reason through the question. But now here’s the important part. Can you understand both sides? Can you see how someone would answer ‘no,’ that you aren’t also going around the squirrel?”
I think about this for a few seconds which feel really long in this unfamiliar room with the ticking of the unfamiliar wall clock.
“I think so…” I say, “if they’re sort of viewing the hypothetical from more of a first person view, they could say that since you’re not seeing the squirrel at all, that you can’t really be said to be ‘going around’ it, since you might not even know it’s there at all.”
Mr. E stood up from his desk and held his arms up in the air. “Max! That is the most creative answer I have ever heard to that part of the question! That seals it, you are absolutely perfect for this role. We’re going to get you started right away, just as soon as we fill out the forms—“
“Wait, What??” Says me, with a big confuse.
“Oh, oh of course I couldn’t mention until now but yes, this was the beginning of a new screening process for a new experimental position that I’m in charge of filling, it’s all very hush-hush and ‘move fast and break things’ so we’re in fresh territory with this one Max, or do you prefer Maxwell? Mr Carpenter? Please do let me know if you have any preference, oh wait you need my contact information~”
He had started scurrying around his office excitedly looking through drawers and looking for something or gathering some things, it was too fast to tell. Then he had materialized a business card that literally just said, “Mr. E” on it, with a QR code to add his actual contact info straight to my phone. I guess that’s somehow safer than just printing the info on the card. Must be encrypted or something.
“In the meantime,” he says, as he sits back down at his desk with a small stack of papers and a pen, checking off boxes for clauses and amendments. “Just, basically, go about your day as normal.” he says, waving his free hand around in a It'll all make sense soon, I promise kind of way. “Your gigs will be, eh, a little different.”
“Because I answered a hypothetical question?”
“No, Max, because you engaged with it.” He continues making marks on paperwork half-automatically, as if doing it purely by muscle memory. “You actually spent the mental effort to genuinely consider and think about the problem from multiple angles. That is why. Remember how I told you about half the people I’ve asked have said yes and half have said no? Well, believe it or not my man, you are the first person I’ve asked, who, after seeing it one way, could also see it the other way. Most people would outright refuse to engage with it beyond their chosen answer. Most people just double down on their chosen answer, and usually get even more irritated with me, haha, if I poked them further.”
He makes his way through a work excuse form, a general administrative action form, a duty slip, a waste waiver, (very thoughtful of him I must say) and a general shift change form. Now that is throwing your bureaucratic weight around.
“It’s like people are afraid to change their minds, Max. Or maybe, afraid to admit they already have. Or maybe, like they told me, people really just don’t have the mental capacity, once they see something one way, it’s just impossible for people to flip their perspective. But I knew better. And hence,” he gestures with his arms indicate, this. This meeting we’re having.
Whoever is letting this man do this stuff is either pulling some serious strings behind the scenes, or…
What if this is some kind of trap
The thought comes screaming from my gut and reactivates my sweat glands. Suddenly it feels really hot and stuffy in this room. And that thing he just said about no one else being able to see the question both ways? That is total bullshit. There is just no way.
What if this is what they tell people before they get disappeared like in 1984
“Max?”
The room is starting to spin. I have no idea what to say right now.
“Max, good lord, what’s the matter, do you need a drink of water?”
don’t drink the water
“Look, Max, I swear to you you’re not in trouble right now alright? Far from it, hahah. If it makes you feel any better, we already know that you know you’re being watched, we know you’re curious about certain things and we know that you know you shouldn’t be. Okay?” Suddenly standing beside me he pats me on the back in a fatherly way that makes my skin crawl even more than what he just said. They know? So this IS my execution trial. And as if he could read my thoughts, Mr E laughs aloud.
“We’re not going to execute you, if that’s what you’re thinking,” and he goes back to laughing as if that really was just a complete guess on his part. “Trust me, there’s no grand conspiracy. We don’t kill people who can’t help but be curious. True, we discourage curiosity among the general public because it can get messy when people find things they don’t understand.”
“But our civilization needs curiosity, Max. Just as much as it needs obedience and uniformity. I’m offering you a promotion, Mr Carpenter. If you accept, today you’ll start on a sort of, alternative gig lineup. Instead of the regular algorithm you’ll be shifted into a special subset of, what could loosely still be called, gigs. And of course, you will receive compensation for your work, you’ll be upgraded to a special customized secret elite tier of living conditions… if you choose to accept of course…”
“What kind of ‘alternative’ gigs?” Is all I can think to ask.
“Oh it’s hard to say really, I wasn’t on the committee who retrained a version of the algorithm for the project,” he says with genuine interest, “but from what I understand, it won’t be difficult work like you’re used to. It might be challenging in other unexpected ways, though. But I doubt they’d even be able to make it give you something you couldn’t handle, even if that was their intention.”
“So let me get this straight.”
“Uh-huh?” the smile again.
“You want me to decide right now, yes or no, would I take an increase in living standards for an unknown change to my work?”
His face lights up again. “There you have it Max, I couldn’t have said it better myself.” Then he snaps his fingers, remembering something, “Oh! I remember the eggheads saying they were trying to find the balance between, um what did they say exactly… a job interview and a vacation. Yeah. They said they were trying to make it feel like the midpoint between those two things.”
“That doesn’t sound fun,” I said, and then I noticed that I was actually smirking back at him.
“That’s the spirit, see, I knew you would get it.”
A small mechanical ringing started and got Mr E’s attention. “Oh drat that means we’re out of time Mr Carpenter, it was a pleasure to meet you but unfortunately it seems it’s time for both of us to be off to our next gigs.” He stands up from the desk and offers to shake my hand. I decline.
As I start to walk away without saying anything, he calls behind me. “You- you’ll take the change, right? You’ll do it?” And there’s a strange hint of desperation in his voice. As if this is actually personally important to him.
I turn around to look at him at his desk from the doorway but I find he’s right behind me, also exiting the room. It was curiously disarming. If he had still been sitting at the desk with that face, that had been so jolly this whole time, now looked pinched and anguished. As if something he had been totally certain of was suddenly in question.
I don’t know what it was—pity? Fear? A weird sense of destiny?—but I nodded.
“I… ugh… yeah. Sure. Okay, fine. Yeah. I’ll do it.”
I would rather not say yes. But I didn’t want to say no either. I don't understand why I didn’t want to. An increase in living standards is basically what everyone wants, including me. But, I don’t know, there was just something that felt like “free money click here” about that whole thing. Too easy. I guess now the gigs will just be different and that’ll be that.
Still on our way out of the office together, this man actually did an excited little jump and cheered quietly. “Yes! Oh, thank you Max,” he says, and starts shaking my hand a bit aggressively, but it honestly makes me feel good about myself. “Thank you so much, oh I promise you won’t regret this, I know it seems strange right now but don’t you worry.” He says, still shaking my hand vigorously and beaming brightly at me, “You’re going to make so many people so proud, I can just sense it now. You have no idea, Max. But you will soon. Bye-bye!” He says, having abruptly broken off the handshake, and starts hurrying down the hall, “I have to hand deliver these to the respective KGT offices but you’ll hear from us soon!” he shouts as he disappears off around the other corner.

6. Water

I check the app after the meeting and it turns out I have a good few minutes before the next period starts. That’s when I realize how thirsty I’ve become, and get myself navigated to the nearest hydration station. Fortunately when I get there there’s only one person already waiting. Unfortunately it turns out to be Ray.
Ray is the kind of angular-looking guy that makes you wonder how he’s able to walk around without poking people painfully. He wears his hair like a weapon. He wears clothes that look like weapons. No not armor, not covers in weapons, I mean he chooses clothes that, themselves, look like they could be used to kill you or someone you know.
Fortunately though when you approach him from behind he’s almost always completely oblivious because he’s got his earbuds playing death metal loud enough you can hear it from a few feet away.
He looks down at his forming water-bubble and bristles with frustration. He pulls out his phone and catches sight of me in the reflection and turns around. “Hey, Max!”
ugh.
“Hey Ray.”
“Bruh d'ygiT'thtThNg'aSenTchA?”
I sigh heavily.
As a matter of fact I had gotten the thing he had sent me, but didn’t have time to look at it yet. Because of my weird morning meeting.
That’s when it hits me, Mr E said he was working for the KGT. I’m not sure I can tell anyone about what just happened. Or, to be more specific, I think I’m not allowed to let anyone figure out that it happened. The only thing anyone really knows about the KGT is that they “maintain world stability” and “keep people from turning against each other” whatever those things really mean. I used to wonder if they would have to teach us those slogans in school if it were really true. But I—
“Hey, Maxie!”
Ray, still standing in front of me, waving his hand in front of me like I’m the stupid one.
“No, not yet, I was busy.” I say, even though I wanted to say a bit more, and nod towards his now full and ready water pellet. He turns back around and grabs it, yanks on it with just the right amount of force. It pops off the dispenser and wobbles in his hand. He puts the whole thing in his mouth and immediately swallows, grimacing and pounding his chest like he just did something manly.
I wonder if he knows you’re supposed to pop the lining in your mouth before you swallow it or if he just chooses to do it wrong that way. I wonder if he enjoys putting himself through that small bit of unnecessary pain. Or if he just does it to feel macho.
“So I was thinkinabout takin a trip to Guatemala!” He blurts out before stepping aside to let me go next. “You what?” I ask, despite myself, knowing better but momentarily distracted. I step forward, the machine registers my presence, scans my ID and begins to dispense another water orb.
“Guatemala! Y’know, bananas, diamonds, paradise…! My girlfriend’s from there,” he says, then chuckles and does the surfer-dude augh noise, “ha-hawh, yeah her family invited us to come visit sometime, so yeah I think we’re gonna go!”
“Did you even know about that place before you heard about it from her?” I feel myself get sucked in while waiting for the machine to form the thin layer of organic material to dispense the water in.
“Pshh shut up don’t be rude!” He says with a smirk, expressing the perfect blend of playful irony and actual hurt feelings, to make it extra hard to know if I actually crossed a line for him or not. “Besides, you ain’t met her but she’s fire bro. I’d do anything for this girl, man, you feel me?”
I’m spared from having to respond by the machine finally blowing the actual water bubble, sealing the end of it, and blinking for me to take it. I roll the ball sideways in my hand to break it off. It’s the most reliable method. It’s the one they tell us to use. Some people yank on it, like Ray, some people twist it. Those are the functionally right ways I know of.
I also know several wrong ways. If you squeeze it too hard, if you support its weight unevenly, if you move too quickly at the wrong time, it can rip before you get it in your mouth. And at that point you’re either fast enough or you’ve wasted some of your hydration allotment. Fortunately for me I learned what they meant when they gave us those weird vaguely worded instructions for how the material is designed to be handled. So I picked up on it at an early age.
Some people never learned the muscle movement to do the official method. They end up having to perfect a more difficult motor skill. Yanking on it is by far the riskiest method. If it doesn’t work then the hydration orb basically becomes a water balloon in your face. Adding insult to injury.
So in a way, yeah, Ray is more of a badass than me. He lives on the edge. Like someone who would ride a bicycle on the freeway. Not to prove he’s a badass, just to be one.

7. Car Bay

I don’t know where I’m going yet but I’m fairly certain I’ll be taking a car to get there. I’m pretty sure I know how to get there from down here but I put on the navigation just to make sure. And yup, back up the same elevator. The one that betrayed me. But this time when I push the one and only button inside the elevator, the one that tells the elevator, “I’m inside, go.” It takes me up. Like it goddamn should’ve before. I still can’t believe I’ve never known the habitation buildings had subfloors. That should’ve been the kind of thing they taught us in school. Or maybe they keep it quiet on purpose. Maybe too many people knowing about it would be, “destabilizing.”
I step out on the ground floor and follow my glowing, color coded navigation line. I’m navigated past and around several other walking people, all of us getting carefully coordinated around each other by our respective adventure lines. I’m directed to stop and wait, by the line curling up into a square and pulsating gently. An elderly woman, wearing a handkerchief like a shawl, walks around the corner, makes brief eye contact and then quickly returns her gaze to her path.
After she gets around the corner I’m directed to go down the path she was coming from.
The door at the end of this hall leads me to this building’s car bay.

The door opens onto the cavernous and eerie bay corridor. Basically a hallway along a section of road, for the cars to pull up and drive away. When it’s not busy, a long row of cars sit waiting, passively charging inductively through the panels in the ground, and maintaining their climate control temperatures to within two decimal points. The cars only make a sound when someone opens or closes the doors, or in the rare case when they’re moving near pedestrians. They don’t have to make any sound, but the engineers figured that, even as the car knows damn well enough not to run people over, pedestrians found it uncomfortable to be stalked by the perfectly silent cars.
At either end of the car bay there’s a tunnel. That’s how the cars get into and out of the road network. They plan out the roads so the cars always come in one way and out the other. To keep things flowing and orderly.
I seem to have just missed rush hour because it’s already been a whole thirty seconds and I’ve scanned all the zones multiple times and I’m not missing it, there just isn’t a single car here. And another one hasn’t come out the tunnel this whole time either. I wonder what could—
A car pops out of the tunnel on my right and gracefully pulls into the first zone. Doing a perfect parallel parking job, as if it had practiced doing it four hundred trillion times in this one spot, which it basically had during its pre-training. The car rolled up and I stood, politely rooted in place, patiently waiting for any occupants to emerge when the door opened. But none did.
It’s not the weirdest thing I’ve ever seen. Empty cars sometimes get pulled aside for off-schedule maintenance or cleaning, but you still hear stories. People say it’s because the last person who rode in the car died. And it’s their soul getting out of the car for the last time.
But I don’t go for that kinda shit. I walk towards the empty car and sit down on the bench seat.
“Good morning, Maxwell Carpenter.” says the car, “Please verbally or digitally confirm your identity before we embark.”
“Yes.” I say, because I don’t feel like taking my phone back out of my pocket.
“Thank you.” The car says, just as the door is closing.
The car begins to move backwards for a brief moment, then forward a bit, then backward a little more, and then when it starts moving forward again it’s onto the arterial road. A sense of unease creeps over me as I realize I haven’t actually been assigned a next gig yet. I got in the car without thinking about it. I don’t know what’s going to happen now. When it’s recreation time the car just asks— “Please select your destination.” I jump. Yeah, that’s what I was gonna say. It just asks you where you want to go…
They put me on… rec time? By… myself? Why?? There was a time when something like this would’ve made me excited as hell, but that part of me…
As the car is slowly but lazily picking up speed, trying to conserve energy while staying in the flow, with the nav screen cycling through options, that’s when my phone pings. My Next Gig, finally, the suspense has been broken. But it’s at… 7… PM,… and it’s… a concert? At a hotel?
What the actual fuck! This is so irritating! Why in god’s name would they pull some bullshit like this?? I’m probably going to get in so much trouble for this. This was sabotage. Nobody is getting paid for me to show up at a goddamn stage show. This makes zero, no, less than zero, this makes negative sense. Nothing in my rational mind can account for this.
The car rolls on, oblivious to my confused irritation. And in that moment for just a second I feel myself looking at my immediate situation differently.
I’m sitting in a car with one long bench row seat. It’s roomy and comfortable but also a bit empty. In front of me is a window, and below that, a wide screen that shows a map of The entire Ridge, and all the regional zones. The blinking dot shows me, currently crawling out of the Hannibal Towers East Bay. The map is overlaid with a procession of images showing options for recreational activities. Some of the images make sense to me; theaters, hookah bars, golf courses and driving ranges and putt-putt… museums and water parks and more different theaters with weird unique arrangements and they just keep coming and coming…
I’m seeing all of them, I realize, they’re letting me see everything that’s out there. Not just what the algorithm thinks i'd like. then I correct myself. what the algorithm lets me see.

8. Car ride

Out of all the options the water park was the one that called out to me in that moment for whatever reason. I just want to see it.
Then immediately I regret my choice. I had momentarily forgotten that I have been to a water park once, a long time ago, and it was both boring and scary somehow at the same time. Maybe it won’t be like that this time. This doesn’t look like the same place. But still.
They used to think it was so funny to make fun of me in particular for some reason. I never figured out why. And that field trip to the water park was just…
The car begins to pick up speed since I had selected a destination. Usually the car would’ve zoomed through this tunnel and into the main flow, but I was basically at the end of the tunnel already so before it picked up speed I had a good slow look out the window.
It’s crazy how big everything is. You’re usually already going pretty fast by this point, so you move through it in a way that makes the space feel almost compressed. Like you just don’t have time to conceive of it. It makes everything feel closer together. Smaller. But at this speed you can actually appreciate the scale of the billboards and sign towers. For a moment they loom strangely huge over me.
People’s Bank: We Care About You.™
That’s the biggest one, the one that holds my attention by being so monolithically huge. But once the car speeds up it starts to look like a regular size billboard.
I settle into the seat as I’m pulled back into it by the acceleration. That’s when I remember Mr E’s business card which I had better scan into my phone asap. I pull them both of my pocket, open the camera app, position them both just right to scan the code, and my phone goes voop and opens a link in the browser to a little website that shows his picture and a “download vCard” button. I tap it and the file downloads to my phone and I add it to my contacts.
I feel a slight vibration in my left hand holding the card, almost as if the card itself clicked or something. I look at it again. Nothing seems to have happened for a moment, but then I notice the ink on the card is actually disappearing. And not lazily either. Now that I’m watching it, the QR code is actively vanishing from the paper. So is Mr E’s name. In about ten seconds the card is completely blank. And then even the card itself begins to disintegrate in my hand. It feels weird. Like the paper got wet and soggy and fell apart in a time lapse, but it happened right in my hand. I wonder how much R&D went into this material. It’s not even sticking to my fingers like I thought for a second it might. But it’s just a tiny pile of ash on the floor now, where it won’t be for long.
I sit and watch the ash pile shrink. The ocean of bright oranges and pinks of the advertisements buzz past in my peripheral vision.
My phone voops again. It’s a message from Mr. E. Already. He must’ve been notified when I scanned his contact in.
“Thanks again for doing this Max :)” showing his age using the old-school unicode symbols face. Throwing me for a loop again, acting like this isn’t serious. I ask the question that’s burning me the most. “A concert? Really?”
“Ooh, who’s performing??”
Ugh. Seriously dude who the fuck is this guy that he knows probably exactly where I am but he doesn’t know the details of my gigs that he put me on?
I can’t help but go look in the app to see if it says. And yeah there’s even a picture of a rock band with six members on a stage covered in lights. The Wizard Twins is what it says. Twins? Six of them?
I type, “It’s the ‘wizard twins’” and hit send. God what the fuck am I doing? Acting like I know this band when I’ve never even listened to rock music.
“Oh brilliant! Their sound really fills a room. I think you’re going to enjoy that.”
“What is this?” -send, “Why is my first day an unsanctioned leisure day?” -send. He reads it, or rather, it says on the screen that he read it, and a few long seconds later he starts typing a reply.
“Like I said I didn’t write your fork of the algorithm but they did want it to feel like a break from your usual toil” he sends, and keeps writing. “Also if I’m not mistaken they made an adjustment to your destination filter which you may find very interesting...”
“I’m already in the car” I hastily type, “What’s up with all the choices?”
After a longer pause his reply comes. “Oh Max that was a very keen choice. I can’t say too much here but I think you will find Cascade Cove very fascinating.”
“Isn’t it just a water park?”
He starts typing and starts over three times, then types for a long time before sending, “Yes.”
The car starts to slow down and I feel myself sink into the seat as it leans back to cushion the deceleration. There’s a high pitched ding followed by the car’s sterile female voice. “Arriving in two minutes.”
I fire off a quick “Ok I’m almost there touch base later” which he replies to with a thumbs up and sunglasses emoji. So he does know how to use emojis.
The car screen is showing pictures of the place. It’s all giant sky-blue seashells and beach paraphernalia. Insipid. Utterly childish looking. Then the pictures scroll more and the other areas are… less awful looking actually. Turns out the first picture was of the “KidZ ZonE.” and that gets a chuckle out of me. The rest of the place is also themed after giant blue, are they seashells or some other organic shape? But it looks nice actually.
The little countdown in the bottom right of the screen is passing 30 seconds now until the car comes to a complete stop, at which time I’ll be asked to swiftly and safely exit the car.

more to come...