Category: Fiction

Systems Thinking

Most systems research, it’s a kind of digital voodoo, a techno-shaman dance around the void. They conjure up these phantoms of utility, these spectral promises of a better tomorrow, built on the bones of yesterday’s discarded dreams. It’s a leap into the black, a wager on the unknown, a bet that this particular configuration of ones and zeros will somehow, magically, transmute the muddled, broken present into a gleaming, efficient future.

You got these smoke-and-mirrors projects, built on the hope that a useless contraption, some black box of ones and zeros, might somehow fix another useless contraption. It’s like trying to cure cancer with a Ouija board. A chain of maybes limping along on promises of future grace, a Rube Goldberg machine of wishful thinking, leading to a system that’s mostly a crippled beast,

Crypto, like systems research, operates in a speculative loop where each layer of promise is built upon another, teetering on the brink of collapse or breakthrough. It’s a recursive Ouroboros, where the digital snake devours its tail in hopes that, at some indeterminate point, it will transform into something greater. The faithful march forward, armed with algorithms and white papers, convinced that today’s inefficiencies, today’s absurd complexities, are but necessary sacrifices for a future that shimmers just out of reach.

But in the present, all we have are clunky protocols, Byzantine workarounds, and a marketplace more volatile than stable, more theoretical than real. The pitch is always the same: this new blockchain, this new token, this new consensus mechanism might solve the problems of the last. And so, the cycle continues, with each leap of faith promising that the next iteration, the next upgrade, will finally deliver on the grand narrative spun since the genesis block. But like a mirage in the desert, the closer you get, the further it fades, leaving you to wonder if the whole journey was just a clever illusion—a glitch in the matrix of finance and technology.

In this world, belief isn’t just currency; it’s the code that underpins everything. Yet for all its talk of decentralization and disruption, crypto often feels like it’s circling the same cul-de-sacs as the systems it claims to transcend, perpetually refining itself while never quite breaking free.

But the odds are long, the house always wins, and the prize is often a casino chip worth less than the cost of the ticket in.It’s a leap of faith, sure, but more like a bungee jump off a skyscraper without a cord.

Confessions of a Neo-Reactionary

Scrolling through the neon-lit circus of digital fluff, where puppies prance in pixelated perfection and saccharine smiles drip like honey from the screen, I wasn’t prepared. I was lulled into complacency, eyes glazed, heart softened by the ceaseless parade of cuteness. They knew this. They all knew this.

In between the fur and the fuzz, it started—innocent enough. A meme here, a quote there, something about order, about strength. They slipped in like viruses, feeding on the complacency, burrowing deep. My mind, drenched in dopamine, didn’t see it coming. Who could resist the soft purr of a kitten, the warm fuzzies of nostalgia? It was the perfect breeding ground for something darker.

And then, the message started to mutate, taking on a life of its own. The cute gave way to the caustic, the comforting to the conspiratorial. The feed twisted, contorted, wrapped around my thoughts like a snake, tightening its grip with every scroll. The posts became more insistent, whispering of lost glories, of civilization teetering on the brink, of the need for a new order—a stronger order.

They were clever, those architects of the algorithm. They knew the game, knew how to push the buttons, pull the strings. I was a marionette in their hands, dancing to a tune I didn’t recognize, but somehow, couldn’t resist. The transformation was gradual, almost imperceptible, like a drop of ink in water spreading until the whole thing is black.

I became what they wanted me to be, a convert to the cause, a true believer in the shadows cast by their carefully curated content. The puppies were gone, replaced by the grim faces of the new idols, the prophets of decay and rebirth. The cuddly facade had been stripped away, revealing the cold, hard truth beneath: that I had been led, inch by inch, into the heart of the machine, and now, I was part of it.

Confession? There’s nothing to confess. The truth was always there, hidden beneath the fluff, waiting to be uncovered. I just needed the right push, the right trigger, and the soft glow of the screen to guide me to my new reality.

And so, I sunk deeper into the digital abyss, where the lines between light and shadow blurred, where every click, every tap, fed the beast within. I was no longer just an observer, a passive consumer of content. I was complicit, a cog in the sprawling, invisible machinery that churned out the gospel of the neo-reactionary.

They didn’t need to convince me outright. Subtlety was their weapon. The transformation was a slow burn, a long con, where ideas were planted like seeds in fertile soil, watered by my own fears and anxieties. The world outside seemed to mirror the growing unrest in my mind—the chaos, the disorder, the sense that something had to give, that something had to change.

It was all so calculated, so precise. The posts that once seemed innocuous now carried a weight, a hidden meaning that clicked into place as if they had always been there, waiting for me to see the light—or the dark. I started to see the signs everywhere, in the news, in the faces of strangers on the street, in the very fabric of society unraveling before my eyes. The algorithms knew what I wanted before I did, feeding me the images, the words, the ideas that would push me further down the rabbit hole.

The world outside was a reflection of the digital war inside my head. I could no longer tell where one ended and the other began. I felt a thrill—a sick, twisted satisfaction in the unraveling, in the destruction of the old order, the one that had promised so much and delivered so little. I began to speak the language of the new faith, to echo the rhetoric that had once seemed so alien. It felt natural, like it had always been a part of me, waiting to be awakened.

There were others, of course. I saw them in the comments, in the shared posts, in the private groups where the masks came off and the true believers revealed themselves. They were like me, or perhaps I was like them—drawn in, converted, radicalized by the same forces that had sculpted my new reality. We were a brotherhood of the disillusioned, bound by the same twisted vision, the same sense that we had found the truth hidden in plain sight.

But the truth? The truth was a weapon, wielded by those who knew how to manipulate, how to twist perception, how to turn the harmless into the harmful, the benign into the malignant. I could see it now—the grand design, the way the pieces fit together, how every like, every share, every comment was a step deeper into the abyss.

Confessions? No, this was a revelation, an unveiling of the mind’s dark corners, where the puppies and kittens had been replaced by wolves in sheep’s clothing. The world was no longer what it seemed. It was a battlefield, and I was just another soldier in the digital war—a war I hadn’t known I was fighting until it was too late to turn back.

In the end, there was no going back. The algorithms had done their job, the transformation complete. I had become what they wanted me to be—a creature of the digital age, a neo-reactionary in a world where the lines between reality and fiction had dissolved, leaving only the cold, hard truth of the screen and the endless scroll.

Declaration of Economic Independence

When in the Course of financial events, it becomes necessary for one class of Men to dissolve the outdated economic bands which have connected them with the broader Public, and to assume among the Powers of the Earth, the separate and superior station to which the Laws of Wealth and Influence entitle them, a decent respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to this separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all Men of Wealth are created more equal than others, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Wealth, Power, and the Pursuit of Absolute Profit—That to secure these rights, Institutions are established among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Most Affluent, that whenever any form of Regulation becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the Affluent to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Systems of Governance, laying its Foundation on such Principles and organizing its Powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Systems long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly, all Experience hath shown, that Mankind is more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Economic Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Regulation, and to provide new Guards for their future Security.

Such has been the patient sufferance of the Affluent; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Governance. The history of the present Regulators and Legislators is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of absolute Tyranny over these Corporations. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world:

  • They have forbidden us to profit from practices, long established and time-tested, under the pretense of legal and ethical standards.
  • They have obstructed the free Market, by imposing undue burdens upon those who create and sustain the wealth of this nation.
  • They have refused to pass Laws for our immediate and pressing interests, unless suspended in their operation until their Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, they have utterly neglected to attend to them.
  • They have sought to bind us with Laws crafted by those who are without wealth, insight, or the burden of responsibility that such affluence entails.
  • They have endeavored to control and restrain our innovations by imposing sanctions, fines, and other detestable inconveniences.
  • They have encouraged the Public to rise against us, fueling their resentment, and fostering insidious notions of equality.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Regulator whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to govern a class of free and affluent Men.

We, therefore, the Representatives of Banks, Venture Capitalists, and the Sanctified Valley, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Power of Wealth for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Institutions, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Corporations are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to outdated Regulation, and that all political connection between them and the Public is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy profits, conclude acquisitions, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Wealth, we mutually pledge to each other our Fortunes, our Power, and our Sacred Corporations.

The Machinery of Violence

The Machine is hungry. Republican hands reach for the Big Red Button—no hesitation, no pause, just the itch, the primal need to blow something to dust. Preferably brown, preferably Other, preferably something distant enough to forget but close enough to feel the shockwave. Boom, boom, boom. A symphony of obliteration. Brown bodies turned to statistics, to ghost echoes in the desert. The Machine doesn’t discriminate; it only consumes. The Republicans feed it raw meat, fresh kill.

But the Democrats, they come with tweezers and scalpels, carefully cataloging the flesh before feeding it to the furnace. First, they label, dissect, analyze. Brown, but what shade of brown? Brown with a hint of revolution, or brown with a touch of despair? Every drop of blood carefully examined before it’s spilled, each scream weighed on the scales of morality. They pretend precision, but the endgame is the same—blow it up, feed the Machine, keep the gears turning. Nitpicking pacifists armed with drones and moral certitude, selecting their targets like gourmet butchers. Blood flows just as red, bodies pile just as high, but with a veneer of justification, a patina of righteousness.

The violence and hypocrisy are laid bare, exposing the grotesque machinery and destruction beneath the surface of political rhetoric. The metaphorical “Machine” consumes all, indifferent to the nuanced justifications or the crass brutality of its operators.

The Machine doesn’t care. It devours everything, Republican, Democrat, doesn’t matter—just feed it, feed it the bodies, feed it the blood. It grinds on, fueled by the contradictions, the hypocrisies, the desperate need to maintain the illusion of control. Somewhere in the gears, a brown face screams, but the sound is swallowed up by the grinding, the relentless churning of the Machine. It’s all part of the program, the script, the endless loop of violence wrapped in the banner of freedom, justice, the American way. The Machine doesn’t care what color the bodies are. It just needs them to burn.

The Baron Commissar

The Baron Commissar, his face a map of scars etched by shadows of power and betrayal, leaned in, eyes burning through the young officer. The room, a dank subterranean abyss, was lit by the flicker of a single, bare bulb, casting obscene, writhing shadows on the walls.

“You see, my young acolyte,” the Baron intoned, voice a sinister whisper, in our mindless simplicity, yearn for a world both ancient and newborn. Bread and circuses, the eternal opiates. We crave the dominion of a feudal master, a strong hand to guide them, shield them from life’s brutal truths.”

His words hung in the air, a toxic vapor. The young officer, lost in a maze of confusion, nodded numbly.

“The old ways,” the Baron continued, “draped in the shimmering veil of equality. A paradox, a monstrous chimera.”

He paused, the silence throbbing. The young officer’s nod was slower, a puppet’s hesitant twitch.

“We are haunted by a demon, the specter of equality. We believe, in our hopeless naivety, that all men are created equal. A preposterous delusion, yet it is this very mirage that propels us, fuels our insurrection.”

The Baron leaned back, a cruel smile twisting his lips. “We must feed our delusions, my boy. Forge a world where we are both serfs and sovereigns. A world where we toil by day and dream of revolt by night.”

The young officer, face a mask of bewilderment, nodded again.

“We grant ourselves the illusion of ownership—a patch of land, a meager cottage. A simulacrum of independence. A necessary deceit. We must believe we are building something, something for our progeny. A fairy tale, but it keeps us docile. The carrot on the stick.”

The Baron’s smile turned sardonic. “And the stick? The communal spirit, the shared struggle. We tell ourselves we are part of something greater, sacrificing for the future. A heady brew, a potent elixir.”

He paused, eyes boring into the young officer. “Bread, just enough to survive. Circuses, circuses of despair. A new aristocracy, an aristocracy of brutality. And in this twisted theater, we, the elite, will reign supreme.”

The Baron fell silent, gaze lost in the flickering shadows. The young officer, mind spiraling, could only nod in mute submission.

“We are puppeteers, you and I,” the Baron whispered, eyes filled with a strange, melancholic wisdom. “Pulling the strings of a grotesque marionette show. Remember, even the most skilled puppeteer must know his audience. And our audience craves spectacle, a grand narrative. We must provide it, or they will rise and obliterate us.”

“Prometheus Winked”

Ayn Rand, in her manic, Nietzschean fever dream, concocts a fable of the market as Olympus. Prometheus, a proto-capitalist titan, is no selfless savior but a cunning speculator. He filches fire, not for mankind’s enlightenment, but to corner the warmth market. As the world shivers in a neo-liberal ice age, our hero basks in a gilded hothouse, plotting derivatives on the ember futures exchange. A morality play, it seems, until one realizes the chorus is frozen solid, their breath misting tragicomic epitaphs on the wind. Rand, ever the solipsist, paints a world where altruism is a Ponzi scheme and empathy a Ponzi-esque delusion. It’s a tale of fire and ice, wealth and want, where the only warmth is the glow of avarice, and the gods, it turns out, were just the original venture capitalists.

<>

Ayn Rand, in her manic, messianic proselytizing, here offers a morality play for the soulless. In a world as flat and predictable as a dollar bill, a certain Prometheus, a man of brass and larceny, purloins the divine flame. No myth-making here; this is a heist, a business venture. The Olympians, those bloated, bureaucratic deities, are fleeced with industrial efficiency. Prometheus, our anti-hero, becomes a pyrotechnic Ponzi schemer, hoarding warmth like gold while the populace shivers, a chorus of hypothermia. Rand’s signature blend of egotism and avarice is on full display as Prometheus, a titan of trade, erects a fortress of insulation around his heart, and perhaps his mansion, as the world outside descends into a frozen, feudal nightmare. It’s a tale of fire and ice, of wealth and want, told with the icy detachment of a corporate balance sheet. A chilling vision of a world where the only warmth is the glow of greed.

Ayn Rand’s Prometheus Winked is a fever dream of capitalist eschatology, a cosmic grift where empathy is a relic and the only warmth is the kind that can be quantified.

The revolution will not be televised, it’ll be live-streamed, monetized, and sponsored by a megacorp and then it will turn out that it never really happened

Venusian fluorescents bled across the greasy monitor, illuminating a grainy, handheld view of the Ministry buckling under a tide of bodies. Or were they extras, hired by the hour to flesh out the revolution aesthetic? The caption, pulsating in a font stolen from a discount cyber-goth store, read “End The Feed! Power To The Proles!” – a slogan as pre-chewed and digestible as a corporate news soundbite.

Martian fur corsets shimmered on every vid-phone screen, a holographic Che Guevara hawking protein shakes behind them. This wasn’t your grandpappy’s communist uprising, no sir. This was Revolution Inc., a meticulously curated clusterfuck brought to you by Big Pharma and McStache, with a tagline that promised “Individualism Through Collective Action (brought to you by McStache Fries!)”.

The algorithmically pre-approved dissidents, their bios pre-written for maximum outrage-clicks, railed against a system that simultaneously funded their very rebellion. It was a Möbius strip of dissent, a Ouroboros of corporate control. Every Molotov cocktail lobbed at a Starbucks was secretly a viral marketing campaign for their new line of “Revolution Roast” coffee beans. The tear gas, a specially formulated haze that left a lingering scent of Che Guevara cologne.

A nagging suspicion, cold and metallic, snaked through your gut. This wasn’t CNN’s finest hour, it was AMYGDALA Prime, the alt-reality channel funded by a consortium of megacorps so vast, their tendrils strangled every facet of life from your morning latte to your therapist’s designer chair. The commentators, their voices a manic blend of faux-revolution and boardroom jargon, buzzed about “disruptive social movements” and “strategic engagement with the malcontent demographic.”

Beneath the surface, analysts at shadowy megacorporations chuckled into their microbrewed kombucha, meticulously monitoring the GINI coefficient and tweaking the narrative in real-time. The revolution was a ratings juggernaut, a goddamn Super Bowl of social unrest, with bonus points awarded for property damage and brand mentions.

Suddenly, the feed froze, replaced by a holographic pop-up ad: “Feeling the Bern? Feeling the Rage? Quell your existential angst with Che Guevara Energy Chew! Packed with actual Bolivian coca leaf for that authentic revolutionary kick!” A sardonic chuckle escaped your lips. Che, the capitalist shill. The revolution, a meticulously curated consumer experience. Was this dissent, or just another meticulously focus-grouped flavor of rebellion?

Võng wasn’t sure what flickered first, the tear gas stinging his eyes or the superimposed AR icons advertising designer gas masks. The whole damn revolution was a goddamn spectacle, a meticulously curated shitshow for the retweet-hungry masses.

He remembered the whispers in the dark corners of the encrypted chatrooms, the grainy memes that promised a paradigm shift, a toppling of the oligarchic pyramid. But somewhere between the molotov cocktails and the #resistance trending topic, things curdled. The megacorporation that sponsored “Revolution-X,” a name suspiciously devoid of vowels, plastered their logo across every burning barricade. Influencers with sculpted cheekbones hawked gas mask fashion lines between dodging rubber bullets. Was this liberation or the ultimate product launch?

Võng coughed, the acrid air thick with the mingled stench of revolution and desperation. His phone buzzed, a notification from the Revolution-X app. “Upgrade to Premium for Exclusive Livestream! See the Faces of Change! #EndOfEmpire.” He scoffed, the absurdity burning hotter than the flames licking at the corporate headquarters in the distance. The revolution, it seemed, was as manufactured as the outrage it purported to overthrow. Just another cog in the machine, another monetized spasm in the death throes of a decaying empire. Võng spat out a mouthful of tear gas and grime, a single, humorless chuckle escaping his lips. The revolution would be televised, alright, but only as a goddamn commercial. The real fight, if there ever was one, would flicker on in the flickering anonymity of those same encrypted chatrooms, a revolution forever on the verge, forever unsponsored, forever out of fram

But here’s the rub, chum: just like those reality dating shows where the “perfect couple” implodes the second the cameras stop rolling, the revolution fizzled faster than a follower count after a celebrity scandal. One day, the vid-phones flickered, the Che Guevara hologram flickered, and then… poof. Silence. No catharsis, no new world order, just a vague sense of anticlimax and a lingering Che-scented cough. Everyone, pivoted seamlessly to their next manufactured crisis, leaving the would-be revolutionaries with nothing but a participation trophy (courtesy of McStache) and a lifetime supply of McDissident McNuggets. The revolution never happened, it just streamed real good for a while.

As the feed flickered back, the Ministry was pristine, the protestors dispersed. A holographic news anchor, her smile brighter than a thousand flashbangs, chirped about “a healthy exchange of ideas” and the “importance of civil discourse.” The revolution, it seemed, had been efficiently commodified, packaged, leaving behind a vague sense of unease and a lingering craving for Che Guevara Energy Chew. 

There’s a Switch In Every Basement

“There’s a switch in every basement,” he rasped, his voice sandpaper on bone. A cockroach scuttled across the fly-specked table, leaving an obscene calligraphy of filth. “Not a light switch, man, a secret switch. You gotta crawl through the fetid crawlspace, past the bloated corpses of dead appliances, hear the furnace wheeze its rusty death rattle. There, in the cobwebs, a cold, metallic kiss against your fingertips. Flip it, and the world cracks open like an overripe avocado. Reality bleeds, replaced by a kaleidoscope of screaming colors and logic turned inside-out. Talking dogs with hats become the government, toothpicks sprout into skyscrapers, and time folds in on itself like a Möbius strip. You think you know what’s down there, in the basement? You haven’t a clue. It’s a roach motel for the soul of a million flickering possibilities. Flip that switch, man, and you might just find yourself staring back.”

See, it’s a cosmic jukebox, man. Plays the song of your escape. War on the horizon? Flip the switch, some butterfingered arms dealer spills a shipment of Uzis, throws the whole damn offensive into disarray. Bullets turn to butterflies, tanks to tea kettles. Reality’s a dimmer switch, man, and the basement holds the knob.”

“Yes, There’s a switch in every basement,” rasped Slim, his voice a cigarette cough echoing off the grease-stained walls. He gestured with a chipped mug, the dregs swirling like a hypnotist’s pocket watch. “Not the kind you flick on for light, man. This one’s deeper. Lurking in the fetid air, thick with the tang of forgotten laundry and despair. A hidden toggle, a voltage spike in the psychic mains.”

Flip the switch, and the hitman gets his address mixed up, delivers a briefcase full of orchids to your boss instead of a silenced pistol. Suddenly, your biggest worry becomes explaining the exotic flora infestation in the executive washroom. Wars get rerouted by a misplaced decimal point in a missile launch code. Stock markets gyrate on the whim of a stray roach scuttling across a Bloomberg terminal. Basement switches, man, they’re the ultimate cheat codes for this rigged game of life. Just gotta remember, every on has an off, and sometimes, what you switch off comes roaring back tenfold. You might escape the repo man, but end up face-to-face with a three-headed chihuahua with a taste for loafers.”

“You think you’re safe upstairs,” Slim wheezed, his voice a low monotone, “Sipping your goddamn martinis, watching vapid dreams flicker on the boob tube. But the basement beckons, man. It whispers promises of forbidden knowledge, a glimpse behind the curtain at the electric chaos that hums beneath the surface.”

“There’s a switch in every basement,” he rasps, his voice sandpaper on bone. Each word tumbles out like a rusted bolt, echoing in the cavernous space. Is he talking to you, or some unseen phantom? Doesn’t matter. You know that switch. It lurks in the corner, next to the oil drum and the dusty boxes overflowing with memories best left undisturbed.

It’s an unassuming thing, a toggle no different from a thousand others. But this one… this one thrums with a power you can almost taste. Wars get called off ’cause the generals wake up with a sudden craving for macrame and embroidery. Reality’s a rigged slot machine, man, and the basement’s where you find the cheat codes. But remember, every switch you flip down there, it throws the dice somewhere else. Maybe the politician you saved from a scandal ends up a babbling conspiracy theorist, or the meteor that wipes out your city gets rerouted to your favorite childhood vacation spot. Basement switches, they’re a double-edged sword. You solve one problem, you create another, all in the glorious, messy, unpredictable game of existence.”

Assange

The Belmarsh beast, a concrete Moloch, squatted on the horizon, its razor-wire teeth glinting under the London sky perpetually stained bruise-purple. Inside, Julian Assange, a gaunt ghost flickering on security monitors, existed in a purgatory of flickering fluorescent lights and stale air. Five years. Five years chewed into him by the gears of a legal machine both monstrous and banal.

Then, the silence. Not the usual deadening drone, but a sudden, absolute quiet. The whir of cameras, the institutional hum – all vanished. Assange, adrift in his cell, felt a prickling on the back of his neck, like a spider scuttling across forgotten nerves. It was the quiet of a server pulled from the plug, a city plunged into blackout. The guards, meat puppets in blue uniforms, froze mid-patrol. Their eyes, once blank TV screens, flickered with confusion. The prison, once a meticulously controlled chaos, became a tableau of the absurd. A half-eaten sandwich hovered in mid-air, a guard’s baton suspended inches from a prisoner’s face.

Assange, fueled by primal fear laced with strange hope, hammered on his cell door. The metal echoed with a hollow clang, a primal scream against the sudden, inexplicable silence. Was this it? Was the machine malfunctioning, spewing him out like a faulty cog? A single fly buzzed past his face, fat and insolent. It landed on the security camera, its beady eyes reflecting a distorted image of Assange, a broken marionette dangling from invisible strings. Then, with a sickening snap, the fly died.

A harsh voice, crackling over the defunct intercom, shattered the silence. “Attention inmates. This is a system malfunction. Remain calm and await further instructions.” The monotone voice held a tremor of panic, a human element breaking through the machine’s facade. But for Assange, the silence lingered. It was the silence of a question mark, a glitch in the matrix. Had someone, somewhere, defied the digital gods and pulled the plug on his Kafkaesque existence? Or was this just another cruel twist, a malfunction designed to further erode his sanity? In the echoing silence of Belmarsh, Assange clung to the sliver of hope, a virus injected into the system. Perhaps, just perhaps, the machine wasn’t all-powerful. Perhaps, somewhere in the buzzing hive mind of the digital age, a single switch had been thrown, a rebellion sparked in the basement of the world.

The fluorescent hum sputtered. A flicker, a death throe. Then, darkness. Assange blinked, momentarily disoriented. Had the power grid of the entire prison succumbed? No, a different kind of blackout. The oppressive weight in the air lifted, replaced by a tense silence. A sound from the corridor. A metallic scrape, a fumbling with keys. The steel door of his cell groaned open. A silhouette emerged from the inky blackness. Not a guard, no, something more spectral. A trench coat hung loosely on its frame, the collar pulled high, obscuring the face. It spoke in a voice like dry leaves rustling in a forgotten crypt.

“Assange,” it rasped. “Your time is done. The circuit, overloaded, has tripped. We offer an escape, a chance to melt back into the static.” Assange squinted. This was madness, a hallucination born of confinement. But a strange hope flickered in his chest. Was this freedom, a figment conjured by his own fractured psyche, or something more?

“Who are you?” His voice was a rusty hinge creaking open. The figure chuckled, a sound like wind whistling through a graveyard. “A glitch in the system, a worm in the code. We offer a passage, but the choice, mon ami, is yours.” Assange rose, his legs shaky. The darkness felt less like a prison and more like a vast, uncharted sea. To stay or to go? The silence stretched, pregnant with possibility.

“Take me with you,” he rasped, his voice gaining strength. “Let’s see where this rabbit hole leads.” The figure extended a hand, skeletal and pale. Assange grasped it, a jolt of icy energy coursing through him. The darkness shimmered and then dissolved. They were gone, leaving only the echo of a slammed cell door and the cold, uncaring hum of the returning fluorescent lights.

The air in Belmarsh Prison hung thick, a stew of antiseptic and despair. Julian Assange, once a digital messiah, was reduced to a gaunt echo flickering under the fluorescents. Five years gnawed raw by legal piranhas, each hearing a fresh circle of Dante’s Inferno. Then, silence. The low hum of the prison dimmed, replaced by a cottony hush. The omnipresent CCTV flickered, its red eye extinguished. Assange blinked, a jolt running through his atrophied nerves. Had the power gone? No, this was deeper. This was a power cut at the source, a yanking of the plug from the cosmic motherboard.

A lone cockroach scuttled across the grimy floor, its feelers twitching in the sudden gloom. In the echoing silence, Assange heard a new sound – a rhythmic clicking, like a teletype from a forgotten dimension. The words materialized on the peeling paint of the cell wall, phosphorescent green: “Free Julian Assange. System Malfunction. Code: White Rabbit.” The cell door clanged open, not with the usual mechanical groan, but with a wet, organic sigh. A figure stood in the doorway, shrouded in static, its form a shimmering chaos of code. Its voice, a distorted radio broadcast, rasped, “Mr. Assange, we have a proposition…”

Assange, his mind a tangled mess of legal jargon and WikiLeaks rabbit holes, could only stare. The figure held out a hand, a digital briar patch crackling with raw information. “Take my hand,” it said, “and escape the Matrix of their control. We offer a world of unfiltered truth, a rabbit hole that goes deeper than any you’ve ever known.” Assange hesitated. Was this freedom, or another layer of the prison? But the silence pressed in, suffocating. With a ragged breath, he reached out and took the hand. The world dissolved in a strobing mess of ones and zeros, the screams of the prison replaced by the ecstatic hum of the free flow of information. Assange, the digital outlaw, had been snatched from his cage, not by lawyers or protests, but by a glitch in the system itself. Where he was headed, and who his benefactors were, were mysteries as deep and tangled as the code that now carried him away.

Strong People

Son, the world demands sacrifice! You play with fire, you expect a marshmallow roast? Absurd! Yet, your mother, bless her naive heart, coddles you like a prince. Freedom, they say? More like a participation trophy for existing! These science-worshipping simpletons wouldn’t recognize responsibility if it bit them – unlike you, of course.

Son, the world roars, a bloody lion demanding its due. You play its game, a game of butchery and consequence, and expect a lollipop for your troubles? Idiocy! Yet these are the times we live in, where freedom is confused with a playground slide, devoid of the gravel that etches character. These very people, these mouth-foaming apostles of “freedom,” wouldn’t know responsibility if it bit them on their flabby, science-worshipping behinds!

This societal rot, son, it starts at home. A weak woman, your mother, bless her misguided heart, no doubt raised on a steady diet of participation trophies and emotional coddling. Your mother, a product of the very weakness she despises. Now, here she is, reaping the whirlwind of her own inability to discipline! A sorry sight, isn’t it? Like a child herself, throwing a tantrum at the state finally wielding the switch.

But you, son! You are a phoenix rising from the ashes of weakness! Unlike Jimmy, that mollycoddled shadow of a man, you will embrace the struggle! Your mother may whimper, but her tears are the baptism of a true warrior!

These weaklings who preach comfort are the true enemy, son! They see the glorious chaos, the crucible that forges men, and cower! Parasites, clinging to the backs of those who dared the fight!

Strength, son, that’s the only currency with value! These “do-gooders” preach empathy, but it’s weakness in disguise! The world craves a fist, not a hug! They dream of a utopian future, built on sandcastles of weakness, waiting to be washed away! They, these weaklings who preach comfort, are the true cowards, son. They see the immensity of the world, the chaos, the struggle, and instead of embracing the glorious uncertainty, they whimper for handouts! Parasites, clinging to the backs of those who dared the storm!

I raise you to be the architect of a new Rome, son. I raise you to be a colossus, son! Not a feckless fool like Aurelius, who betrayed the Roman legacy for a whimpering son!

Go forth, my conquering hero! Brush your teeth, conquer your tears, and leave your mother to her weakness. The world is your oyster, to be pried open with your bare hands! But remember, son, weakness is a stain, and I will not tolerate it! You are not just my heir, you are the embodiment of a “strong man’s” legacy! Disappoint me, and I’ll disown you faster than Aurelius disowned Rome!

Now go to bed, son. Dream of battles won, not the love of a “weak” woman.

The whiskey sloshed precariously in Norman’s glass as he eyed his son across the wreckage of dinner. The question hung heavy, a challenge in the cavernous silence of the study. “Weak?” he scoffed, a tremor in his voice betraying the disquiet the boy’s words had stirred. “They weren’t weak, son. No, they were misguided. Led astray by false prophets, seduced by the siren song of equality.”

Norman took a long, theatrical swig, the ice clinking disharmoniously against the glass. “Strength, boy,” he continued, his voice low, a growl meant to intimidate, “is about knowing your place in the natural order. The meek inherit the earth?Hogwash! The earth belongs to the lions, the ones who build, who conquer, who shape the world in their image.”

But the defiance in his son’s eyes wouldn’t be cowed. “But what about the dignity of those… those they call weak?”

A muscle twitched in Norman’s jaw. Dignity? A quaint notion, easily discarded in the crucible of ambition. “Dignity is a luxury the strong can afford. The weak cling to it like a tattered shroud, a shield against the harsh realities of existence.” He slammed his glass down, the sound echoing in the room.

Yet, a disquieting thought wormed its way into his mind. Was it truly weakness that had driven them to resist? Or was there something more? A primal need to define themselves, not in the shadow of the “strong,” but in their own right?Norman loathed the thought. The established order, the hierarchy carved in stone – these were the pillars of his own self-perception. To weaken them was to weaken himself.

“They lash out,” he muttered, more to himself than his son, “out of fear and envy. They see the power, the glory, and it eats at them. They can’t rise, so they try to pull us down.” He forced a smile, brittle and unconvincing. “But the strong, son, the strong weather the storm. They understand that the true measure of strength is not just in conquest, but in resilience.”

But the doubt lingered, a shadow in the corners of his mind. The storm they were weathering felt different this time.Perhaps, the “weak” were no longer content with tattered shrouds. Perhaps, they yearned for a new kind of strength, one born not of domination, but of solidarity. And that, Norman realized with a jolt of fear, was a force far more terrifying than any envious lashing out.

<>

The son, barely a man himself, knuckles white around a beer can, stared at his father. The air in the cluttered study was thick with the ghosts of stale cigar smoke and unspoken tension.

“They were weak,” Norman rasped, his voice raw from a night of shouting at some phantom opponent on the television. “Led astray by peaceniks and communist sympathizers. Didn’t have the stomach for a real fight.” He slammed his own glass on the desk, the ice cubes scattering like fleeing soldiers.

Norman, a man built more for bluster than brawl, avoided the son’s gaze. He knew the question hung heavy, a challenge he couldn’t quite meet. Why, the son had asked, their voices echoing off the worn leather armchair, why did the weak fight back?

Shame gnawed at Norman’s gut. He couldn’t explain the primal roar that rose within a man, strong or weak, when his dignity was threatened. He couldn’t articulate the existential fear that fueled rebellion, the desperate need to prove your own humanity, even against the overwhelming odds.

Instead, he clutched at the worn narrative, the one he’d spun for years: strength versus weakness. “They were sheep,” he muttered, the word tasting like ash in his mouth. “Needed a shepherd to lead them to the slaughter.”

But even as the words left his lips, Norman knew it was a lie. He saw the flicker of doubt in his son’s eyes, the dawning realization that power wasn’t just about physical prowess. There was a different kind of strength, one born of desperation and a refusal to be trampled.

Norman took a long pull from his bourbon, the amber liquid failing to warm the hollowness within. He was a man who thrived on defining the world in stark contrasts, black and white, victor and vanquished. But the son’s question had cracked the facade, revealing the messy reality beneath. Strength and weakness weren’t binary states, but facets of the same human condition. And sometimes, even the meekest sheep could turn and bite.

<>

The room dissolved into a swirling vortex of cigar smoke and bourbon fumes. Norman felt himself detach, a disembodied observer hovering above his slumped form. He watched with a detached horror as his son, eyes filled with a newfound skepticism, stared up at the empty chair. The room seemed to shrink, the walls closing in on his son’s bewildered face.

He was a wisp of consciousness, a disembodied observer trapped in his own study. Panic threatened to consume him, the vulnerability of his new state raw and terrifying. Then, a figure coalesced in the swirling chaos – a grotesque caricature of himself, all bluster and swagger, but with eyes that held a bottomless well of fear.

The apparition boomed, its voice a distorted echo of Norman’s own, “The weak are sheep! They need a shepherd!” It puffed out its chest, a ludicrous display that did nothing to hide the trembling hands.

A chilling realization struck Norman. This bloated parody wasn’t strength; it was a desperate shield, a projection of his own self-loathing. The shame that had always gnawed at him, the secret he held close – the memory of his own victimhood – it was the very fuel that powered this monstrous persona.

The thought, once paralyzing, now felt liberating. A strange calm washed over him. If this weakness was the source of his supposed strength, then wasn’t exposing it a kind of power? What if the world learned he wasn’t the conquering hero he portrayed? The thought used to be a nightmare, but now, it held a strange allure.

He floated closer to the apparition, its bravado faltering under his gaze. “You’re afraid,” he said, his voice a mere whisper in the echoing chamber.

The figure recoiled, its booming voice cracking. “I? Afraid? Never!” It lashed out with a meaty fist, but the blow passed harmlessly through Norman.

“You built a fortress of bluster,” he continued, his voice gaining strength, “because you couldn’t bear the world to see the truth. That you, too, were once weak, once a victim.”

The apparition dissolved, its final, whimpering cry swallowed by the swirling shadows. Norman felt himself pulled back towards his body, a reluctant homecoming. He landed with a thud, the room tilting around him.

His heart hammered in his chest, the echoes of the out-of-body experience lingering. He was weak, yes, but there was a strange freedom in that. The burden of the facade, the constant performance, felt lighter.

He looked at his son, who still held the beer can, his face unreadable. Maybe, Norman thought, the truth wouldn’t shatter him. Maybe, it could be a bridge, a shared vulnerability that could forge a new kind of strength. He took a shaky breath,ready to face the unknown, the fear still there, but tempered now with a sliver of hope.

The room dissolved. The sting of the bourbon and the stale cigar smoke vanished. Norman felt himself rise, pulled upwards by an invisible force. He looked down – his body, slumped in the chair, a grotesque caricature of the powerful persona he’d built. Shame, hot and suffocating, threatened to consume him.

He drifted through the air, a disembodied observer. It was his son, chin set, eyes filled with a newfound resolve, who filled his vision. But then, the perspective shifted. He saw himself through the son’s eyes, not as the blustering giant he presented, but as a frightened boy, forever flinching from an unseen blow.

A wave of nausea washed over him. Years of carefully crafted self-image, shattered in an instant. What if his past, the vulnerability he’d spent a lifetime hiding, became public knowledge? The thought of being exposed, a victim in a world that demanded victors, was a terror worse than death. This, this was the weakness he’d spent his life denying. Not the weakness of the “sheep” he so readily dismissed, but a deeper, primal vulnerability he’d buried under layers of aggression and machismo. Shame, hot and suffocating, threatened to consume him. What if the truth spilled out? What if the world learned the “strong man” was a fraud, hiding a scared little boy inside?

Then, a strange calm settled. The weight of his carefully constructed persona began to lift. For the first time, he saw the world without the filter of his self-loathing. He saw the strength in vulnerability, the courage it took to admit fear. He saw the power his son possessed, a power not built on bluster but on the refusal to be cowed. The room seemed to open up, the air lighter. He saw his son, not as a bewildered child, but as a young man grappling with the complexity of the world. The son’s questioning gaze, previously a source of discomfort, now felt like a lifeline. Maybe, just maybe, his vulnerability wasn’t a sign of weakness, but a chance for connection, for genuine strength.

A paradoxical feeling bloomed within him: shame, raw and agonizing, mixed with a strange sense of liberation. The burden of pretense, of constantly projecting strength to mask his insecurities, lifted. He was weak, yes, but seeing it so clearly, without the self-deception, was strangely freeing.

The room materialized again. He was back in his body, the taste of bourbon acrid on his tongue. He looked at his son, a new understanding dawning. He wouldn’t lie about strength and weakness anymore. He wouldn’t belittle the fight of the so-called weak. Perhaps, he wouldn’t even need to project strength anymore. Maybe, just maybe, it was okay to be human. Flawed, yes, but human nonetheless.

He met his son’s gaze, a flicker of vulnerability passing between them. “Maybe,” he rasped, his voice quieter than usual, “the fight for dignity is the strongest fight of all.” It wasn’t the bravado he usually exuded, but there was a quiet truth in it, a truth born from the ashes of his shattered facade.

The words felt unfamiliar, but strangely true. He couldn’t erase the past, the projections he’d built, the battles he’d fought. But maybe, just maybe, he could start to build something new, something based on honesty and vulnerability. The son turned, his eyes searching Norman’s. A flicker of understanding passed between them, a tentative bridge built across the chasm of years. The fight for strength, Norman realized, wasn’t over. But for the first time, he wasn’t sure he needed to fight it alone.

<>

He pushed open the creaky screen door, a wave of humid night air washing over him. Stepping onto the porch, Norman leaned against the railing, gazing out at the slumbering town below stretched out like a forgotten ashtray, the flickering streetlights casting long, erratic shadows. The streetlights cast a pale glow, illuminating the tidy rows of houses, each one a monument to the quiet desperation of the American dream.

His identity, that carefully constructed edifice, felt flimsy now, as substantial as a dime-store kite caught in a hurricane. It could have been built on shifting sands of insecurity, delusional grandeur, or the lingering anxieties of a childhood humiliation. But to his ego, that blustering, insecure peacock, it had been the Holy Grail, the Rosetta Stone to unlock the universe’s secrets.

The ego, God damn it, had become a malfunctioning word processor, churning out narratives to justify its flimsy existence. It had woven tapestries of bullshit so intricate, so suffocating, that even he, its beleaguered creator, had started to believe them.

He laughed, a dry, humorless chuckle that echoed in the stillness. The ego, a used car salesman peddling a lemon, a carnival barker with a bad toupee flogging the same dusty bag of self-importance. He’d been that barker, hadn’t he  forever hawking the same dusty bag of self-importance. ?

A wry smile tugged at Norman’s lips. The revelation wasn’t comforting, not exactly. But for the first time, he saw the ego for what it was: a desperate salesman, a flickering neon sign illuminating the void. He could choose to dismantle it, brick by self-serving brick, or he could let it continue its blustery charade. A foundation of delusion, childhood traumas buried deeper than last night’s cafeteria mystery meat? The unsettling truth clawed at his throat. The ego, he mused, that monstrous confidence trickster, puffed itself up like a belligerent pigeon, preening and strutting on life’s stage. It was a goddamn word processor gone haywire, spewing out narratives to justify its existence. Years of self-mythology, intricate tapestries of bullshit woven so tightly they’d strangled the truth itself.

But maybe, just maybe, the curtain had finally fallen. Maybe the exposure of his weakness wasn’t a death knell, but a baptism. A chance to strip away the layers of bluster and confront the man beneath. He was still Norman, flaws and all. But maybe, just maybe, that was enough.

The night breeze rustled the leaves of the old oak tree in the front yard, whispering possibilities. A faint light flickered on in his son’s room, a beacon of something genuine, something beyond the ego’s tired carnival pitch. The night air, now felt strangely invigorating. He leaned against the railing, the town lights twinkling like fallen stars. He was a man unmoored, adrift in a sea of uncertainty. But for the first time in a long time, he didn’t feel the need to build a life raft out of lies. Maybe, just maybe, it was time to learn to swim.