Public Domain Science Fiction Writer Arico Chronicles contents Wai Z contents

Many years ago Jumo awoke, he was the founder member of the Light. For him life had always been difficult. From very young he had hated school, not that he hated learning – learning was the meaning of life, but that he saw through what school was and his defiant ego announced that he wasn’t born to be a slave. It wasn’t that he hated teachers, it was just they believed most of what they were doing; some of them tried to help but help what? He wasn’t going to be a slave. They wanted to help him choose a career, but career to him was just a polite word for slavery. There was another problem, using their words he matured young. He didn’t consider himself mature, it was just that from about the age of 11 he knew he didn’t want to be a slave. Always he wanted to learn, the world was so fascinating, Nature provided so much. What was worse he always felt in tune with Nature but he never formalised that thought - to himself or others; when older in retrospect he knew his harmony was far closer to Nature than all around who were sucked into the world of slavery. About the only time he felt in tune with what they wanted was when he read something written by a ruai. Ruai words were always coded (so that other ruai could understand) but they would say things like the only way to get a better life is communes, for everyone to work together in their own interest. Translating this meant that the ruai must be careful of what happens in the communes as they can be potentially damaging to ruai interests. They used code words for government strategies. Conditionality for loans – don’t give them a loan unless they are using the loan in the interest of the ruai. Austerity – the ruai needed to accumulate more of the money, people other than their families were getting too much. These words were words used by government, and presented by the government as if the words were their ideas. But government were puppets – pure and simple – puppets, puppets with high salaries, high paid slaves – foremen who controlled the slaves, making them provide increased wealth for the ruai. He understood the ruai, and when he heard words that he understood and agreed with he knew the ruai agreed. The analysis was the same, it was just their interests which were completely opposite. At 11 his understanding didn’t exist but the feeling was strong. His life was sensual, he felt it was right or not. The teachers they were not right. Sure those that were not beaten down really did care, but they didn’t understand. When older he realised that the ruai did much work to con the teachers. Speaking with one he learned how teachers were fooled, how those with vocation were exploited to sure up a system which had little to do with education, and so much more concerned with increasing the accumulation of the ruai families. The need to turn the people into slaves was integral to their accumulation, but enforced slavery was far too expensive – enforcement or security forces were so expensive – not cost-effective. It was necessary for people to enslave themselves so give them nice words such as careers, make them feel as if they were choosing what they were doing, and there is increased profit, increased accumulation. Again at 11 this was not an understanding, it was just such a strong feeling that it was all wrong; this was a feeling that could not be shaken – such a deep and powerful intuition that no matter what those older said to him he could not believe them. And there was the crunch with the teachers. Their aspect of the slavery was that they were superior, teacher of knowledge so-called – some even used the word wisdom. So when a young person did not accept the status, there was inherent conflict. No matter what Jumo did they could never accept him. The teachers knew he was intelligent but because he never accepted what they said, they would say he was not using his intelligence. So by their yardstick he was not fulfilling what he was supposed to do. And through their government puppets this yardstick had to be met. The longer he was in school the worse it was because the more the teachers were preparing for the world of work – career slavery. And the more this preparation happened, the more Jumo rejected because it felt wrong – he was not going to be a slave. There was an incident – another one of those ruai words; for him it was a life-changing moment. There was one senior teacher who he described as always being on his case. This teacher came out with all the nice ruai euphemisms, work to your full potential, find a career that would benefit society, and all of it he just felt so deeply was wrong. With this teacher he was quiet and careful, Jumo felt he was in danger with this slave. One day he had argued with his parents, he had missed the rotfai, and had to run to school; and who was there to punish him this nemesis of a teacher. Not only that but his first lesson was with the nemesis. And the guy started at him about potential, career and social benefit. “Please sir, I am doing my best,” he began quietly. Now his nemesis had also argued with his wife before reaching school, and he was still seething “Your best. You never do your best, you can do far more.” “Far more of what, this stuff doesn’t help me live. I’m not going to do that job, maybe I will be an artist, write books, or simply go to live in the countryside and feed myself,” he threw back at the nemesis, not knowing where it all came from. Anger took the teacher first, grabbing Jumo’s arm pulling him out of the classroom. “You don’t answer me back,” ranted the system pillar. The grip on Jumo’s arm was agony, he had fallen and there was a deep wound. “Sir, you’re hurting me,” he screamed “please stop.” No response and the pain seared though him, and seemed to give him strength. Relaxing his arm he twisted his body underneath the teacher’s arm. Not expecting this the teacher tried to strengthen his grip on Jumo’s arm, and as the grip strengthened the more the teacher contorted and began to increasingly lose his balance. Once the teacher’s balance was teetering, instinctively Jumo raised his other arm and with all his energy directed a push into the teacher’s side below his armpit. Being off balance the blow’s strength was exaggerated, and rather than a push-away the impact sent the teacher staggering across the room, his foot caught the leg of the chair and he tripped and his right temple landed on the corner of the desk. Falling he lay prostate on the ground with a slow trickle of blood coming from his right temple. Immediately security and the nurse were called, and the man was taken to hospital for minor stitches – and was back to school the next day with nothing but a case of embarrassment – incidental embarrassment. Not surprisingly Jumo was never seen again, and if asked people were told that he had transferred schools. Of course it was right that he could not remain in the school after physically confronting the teacher, Jumo would often reflect, but it was far from an innocent transfer that occurred. He was transferred but to an institution, a nameless place among many that had recently started to grow throughout the realm of the ruai. The puppets of the ruai had learnt how to make good publicity out of adversity and confrontation. There was a kind of two-tier policy – public and private. The public approach was fodder used to enhance control through the illusion that there was choice and that in the end the state was tolerant and just. The private avenue was for the real revolution, people who had seen through the state illusion and determined the level of slavery maintained in this sham of a puppeted democracy. For cases of doubt especially amongst the young there was a place called an assessment centre, and Jumo had been taken there. The purpose of these centres was to assess, and if the existence of these centres came to the attention of media the assessment process was described as determining the most suitable institution for the person – delinquent, criminal – to be placed in. Normally the centre’s spin control would talk of children’s homes or adult care centres as opposed to detention centres for hardened criminals – thieves, perpetrators of violent crime, and such detention was deemed acceptable in a society afraid of poverty and violence. But they never discussed category D, people whose deeply-felt conviction made it impossible to return to the indoctrination that was considered society. There were just some people whose very existence bred resistance to the ruai order. Jumo arrived for assessment, and he was completely apologetic, however much he considered that teacher a sap, a dupe completely conned by the shell that the ruais created as education, he had never wished violence on the man. When he described the incident, the guards at the assessment centre, they called themselves care workers, felt an element of sympathy for Jumo; they accepted that events had conspired and that there was no desire to hurt. But their assessment changed when they examined the footage, what was missing from the description was the distance the teacher had travelled across the room, his speed and the obvious force that Jumo had exerted – and the fact that Jumo was oblivious to the power he had brought forth. It was this force that worried the care workers, and together with the lack of consciousness were signs they had met before, signs of lifelong dissidence – category D.