music to go with the story: Search & Destroy
As reported here a year ago, in the foreseeable future the rich will have their drone supported reality games to deal with surplus poor people, simultaneously enjoying opportunities to quench their thirst for avenging forty years of uplifting the working man. Down with the proletariat, away with the middle classes and their petty achievements. One can only be rich if the rest of you lot most definitely are not.
But what about those none rich? How are they supposed to cope with the increasingly grim realities of every day life under the bankers revolution? During the first years of the money grab governments and media outlets wanted us to believe that destroying civil society would eventually be to everybody’s benefit. The more people got kicked out of perfectly viable jobs, the less income security governments were willing to offer, the longer the queues for medical assistance and assorted social services, the better off we all would be. Now that even the most ardent followers of authoritarianism have stopped believing this fantasy, and the anxiety and anger people carry inside them have risen to dangerous levels, new tactics are needed to keep steering society in the desired direction – desired by the few, that is.
A promising development in this respect constitutes the re-invention of holographic gaming, or virtual reality as it was once called, available in the suddenly ubiquitous rage rooms. The egg-shaped cabins in every conceivable colour which can be found on most squares and beaches, in parks and along avenues, and which have become known in popular speech as “ease offs”, advertise themselves with such promising lines as: always wanted to kill your mother-in-law? Here’s your lucky chance. After which follows reassuringly: it never truly happened, yet it felt so real.
Rage rooms having become quite the in place to visit in a short period of time, the subterranean traveller thought he might dig into the phenomenon. He chose a Friday evening and paid twenty-five for a two-hour experience. While waiting for his turn, the traveller used his mobile phone to download some photos from the web, to be transformed into his enemies of choice. These would then appear before him in a variety of rhythms from easy to frantic and disorderly bust-ups, or so said the leaflet handed out to him by the automated ticket machine. You had different sets of weapons to choose from, different types of killers to play. The subterranean had no idea what would come of it.
The traveller uploaded his pictures and then had to wait an additional ten minutes, after which he was called inside his egg of choice and invited to embed himself in sensitive pillows able to register the weakest sign of distress in his body. His head was protected by a hemisphere helmet with round screen experience on the inside. He was now ready to meet his adversaries.
First out was Dolores de Cospedal, dressed in some horse riding gear with a wicked whip hanging from her well-shaped hip. The subterranean had been given a fairly large gun for his weapon, knowing at the time he would not be able to use it. Not against this admittedly thoroughly detestable woman. Not yet. Not the first time round.
He did want to feel the hate growing on him, though.
When after five minutes the machine inquired whether he was going to come into action, the subterranean responded the unseen voice with a plea. Can’t they come simultaneously, he asked, and without understanding how he'd got there he was entering a press conference by three cabinet ministers. They were Soraya, as always, flanked by Guindos and Montoro. Though Montoro was dangerous in his ignorance, the traveller wasn't ready to go killing him for just that. Guindos was a likelier catch in this respect, the likeliest he should say. Guindos represented the bankers’ interest and had never done much effort to hide that fact. He was always going to be the first symbol to fall.
The subterranean traveller, this time committed to acting immediately, made his way through the press room inadvertedly. When people finally started noticing him and someone yelled out, he simply hastened his pace while at the same time pulling out a hefty cock which he then pointed at Guindos’ forehead. Jumping onto the stage he was careful not to lose him and as soon as he was in reach the subterranean stuck the gun’s mouth behind the minister’s ear. Anybody move and I shoot Guindos.
The initial screaming soon wore off. He waited until everybody were looking up at him and then he did shoot the economics minister. It was strangely easy and he had already pointed out Montoro when fresh screams were only beginning. A bit of a noisy game, this, the subterranean thought. After Montoro was done with he still couldn’t shoot Soraya. Go feed your baby, he said, leave your people in peace. The next moment he was seized by a heavily armed police squad and swiftly transported away. Instantly the game was over. They weren’t going to kill him of course. You were supposed to be the killer for a day, remember?
The traveller asked could he save the next hour for tomorrow morning and the egg said okay and so he went home to digest the experience. With the first deaths behind him he reckoned he might as well go for the big assault. It gets easier as you go along, they say. He managed to collect good pictures of almost all of them and he enjoyed leaving that night’s casualties out of the guest list. He was an early riser next morning and once inside his egg he went wherever it was he was going. He climbed the roof of the bunker they apparently were gathered in and then quite expertly began squeezing himself through a ventilation hole. His virtual abilities wouldn’t cease to amaze the subterranean.
Without too much effort the traveller ended up on the skylight of a dome shaped conference room, overlooking a well-filled inner circle. He saw them all, the ministers, the heads of state, assorted functionaries, the whole European congregation. This is where class war is executed, he thought, this is where the enslavement of the once free European worker is carried out - and it scared him. It scared him so much it made him angry with fear. Why don't you go kill them, the egg suggested, they're all there for the taking.
It must have been the tone in the egg’s voice, because suddenly the traveller felt a hot rush running through his brain - yes, why wouldn’t he - and he got to thinking ways for culling the highest number. He imagined himself falling from the sky on a wire rope and then starting to unload rounds in equal quantities - he needed a machinegun for that.
He was handed a handsome shooter with enough ammunition for a full minute spray and the rope already lay tightened round his waist. Here you go, the traveller thought, go kill them for the good of mankind. Away with the stupid, arrogant bunch. It’s you or them, remember? And then he jumped and pulled the trigger.
The subterranean wasn’t quite sure he was enjoying the action, yet he continued firing until his gun stopped working, thinking us or them all the time. They were falling by the tens, many prominent ones among them, and he could see tomorrow’s newspaper headlines before him. Lone killer taking scores in EU HQ attack. There was no escaping, says lucky survivor. And in the special bulletins painful questions were asked. How could security have failed so dramatically? Is this the end of austerity? His name of course wasn’t mentioned, his identity never established. It had, after all, been nothing but a disturbing dream.
