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The protest outside beset the walls of the reading room, but the contents of the book assailed the sensibilities of a man who would have anything at all to say about the situation. R thought only this much as he slammed the volume shut. So what about its arguments? Evidently unworthy of any mark on his memory. His gaze wandered from spine to spine of those books on the shelf, and then those on the stack before him. These disciplines prided themselves in backing up the same suggestions that in every sincere attempt to implement them had amounted to nothing. That embroidered rug hung on the wall struck him as uninspired - the concentric layout of patterns came off as sterile. The glass of tap water was just asking to be lumped in with them all. All things within his reach were by all characterizations of their functions as immobile as possible, and yet they made a point about being stagnant. There was much ado about “fixing the country”, “fixing the ways to fix the country”, and so on, a framing that was itself displeasingly insufficient. Their errors and pitfalls were so clear to him, yet he could not help but worry that his legacy would just be yet another book left to collect dust in libraries like this. The country’s history did have a record of that, and many who thought like him would be left deterred by the prospects. And on the other hand, every serious and rational appraisal of the concrete facts facing him and what he supported could come to no conclusions besides that this time it was different.
It was not as if action could be found in the march itself, among those bobbing heads - M could indeed tell, braving the stench of those he had to call his fellow students and activists more offensive to the spirit than the tear gas the police would deploy at the toss of a coin. He had, for some time, abandoned attempts to look at the faces of those around him to any degree of detail. Language, too, lost all meaning as slogans precessed past one another. All that mattered, when he did feel more worldly, was the repertoire of university organization positions and even more impressive accumulation of renown among other institutions he held, but again in the footsteps of less admirable people, at least by his own measurements. He was well-positioned to reform the lethargy of this scene, which was infuriatingly the only thing Mabifia managed to flawlessly Eucleanize in. But every time a fellow young visionary opened his mouth, he decided to withdraw an additional bonus from the council budgets for his game collection. The crowd he marched at the front rows of spilled past corner after corner, following an exact routine but never quite possessing a will of its own. Often they seemed intent on acknowledging their own futility. Then they would meet the police, all sorts of equipment ready in hand, but who in turn would never get to use it as the crowd dispersed on the firing of the first demonstrative canister. They were a gentle tide, washing over the even less noteworthy debris of the streets but never leaving any lasting mark. It was uncomfortable to be moving with them, but never quite hazardously so.
Opposite of them, about a hundred meters down just one of Ouagedji’s many great avenues, was the rapid response unit which S was serving in, ranks closed and riot gear tightly fitted. Through the hazy visor he could make out M at the lead of the march, but all things considered it was only because he could be expected to be there. That stout familiar of his was not distinctive in appearance, and even less so behind improvised protective gear, but he did have an aura, which somehow managed to separate him from the human wave he was so helplessly carried by. Against S’s own beliefs that nothing needed to be known of a person beyond his photograph it was hard to justify, but he accepted the recognitions he used to grasp his place in this network as his less intelligent or thoughtful but more sly and ambitious colleagues would with the kinds of things analytical editorials wrote about in an affected tone of concern. In any case, S had personally smashed skulls with everything from cinder blocks to baseball bats, but never standard-issue equipment; and if he was to deliver justice, it would not ever be in uniform.
G’s public appearance today seemed to be at a panelist discussion on another supposedly influential nationwide network, but really he was speaking from a digital billboard overlooking the avenue, and to the men and women huddled below. He chose only the most pompous register of Gaullican, and between his choices of diction it was as if the existence of non-Euclean vocabulary could not even approach possibility in his mind. Against the supposed wisdom of the majority of the people he emulated, the impression given was generally much more popular with the interested Mabifian. And he would not fill this position without acquiring some of the guile stereotypes of his archetype tended to confer, but really perhaps it’s just fortune or nature that messages addressed to close friends can rake in support from those totally not considered for the dividends when broadcast in public as if they were all recipients. Often he may be questioned, and not a few times on those screens which his persona lived, about the sincerity of that “populist language” or some other allegation intended to invoke moral compunctions; but no sincerity stood behind those inquiries themselves, and the ideas behind them would ultimately need better champions to find good ground in Mabifia. For now working merely for himself G spoke as he saw fit. And despite the declared partisan positions of the students, they were at all times only steps away from prostrating and declaring him their lord as the old hourege system would have it.
A high-quality stream of all of this, with the usual news ticker, was playing on one of the screens in W’s setup, which had spanned its elements across the cozy air-conditioned bedroom. Another monitor played footage of fighting in Makania, which had seen massive assaults by the CPSNM seize towns in gains unprecedented in years. Or so it was said. W would take them at face value, happily, but it was because his focus was ultimately elsewhere; at the very least, it was a reasonable approach to stock charts and quotes, even if he had the privilege or ability of doing so. Failing that, he could always turn to insider tips of obscure provenance, so far with equal credulity. He had a mindset for following the rules, perhaps only saved in the eyes of less scrupulous commentators by the coincidences that stretched out the limits and framings of those rules. The array of poses and gestures he cycled through within a period of thirty minutes in his custom-tailored suit for the exclusive pleasure of the hypothesized blackmailer who has access to his webcam was a statement on his luck that ran both ways. It was quite probable that the traditional monarchy he had a hereditary claim to (thank the jurists of the 18th century for introducing patrilineality before the Gaullicans) but which he did not even know the name or location of worked its way with the spirits of the land (or for a more iconoclastic Sotirian figures indistinguishable in character from the present authorities), but likewise there was no certainty on that. He was duly grateful to all the possible benefactors and explanations of his portfolio, but more than that, totally trustful of the bank clerk’s assurances on that exorbitant transfer to some recipient in Arbolada.
L had nothing better to do than to come to this meeting. He spent most of his days idling at bus stations, where he could find plenty of company. He was just told to. What others thought of this way of life did not and could not ever concern him. From what he could remember of a contemptuous comment by R, human society could no longer assemble the forces and will necessary to change his behavior. But what of his involvement in anything? Maybe he was different for possessing thoughts he most certainly heard elsewhere. Maybe it was just fortunate they had a person that managed to meaningfully speak to him. In any case he did not have much to worry about, or with. He stood besides the Dewal masters, those clean-shaven elegantly-featured men clad in white three-piece suits, sitting cross-legged in repose. He cast a gaze of neither respect nor confusion, but total emptiness. They were in a state more advanced than enlightenment and more solemn than meditation, if only because they could speak to and hear him. What could be more wondrous for him? “Be joyous, o child, see that your world shall soon bloom,” that verbiage was new too. “But not for work nor striving, but for the arrival of what was long due…”
Next to them was a photography crew, whose lenses were carefully capturing how the sitting masters were arranged in a radial pattern around a circular rug in the middle. Camera flashes brought some kind of ecstatic, otherworldly feel to the scene one would expect of those spiritualist trends Dewal swam alongside, but only for those who needed that kind of symbolic aid to come to their own conclusions; supposed exposés of these rituals would be printed and spread in hysterical tabloids far and wide, and out of their own pocket. The masters put on a show only for those who sought reasons to reject them; the pose was a formalism precisely because they were confident they were beyond it. As truly free minds it would not matter what appearance they put up. The world was merely theirs to play with.
Indeed, at the center, the grand master was speaking through a wireless headset, the crown jewel of the photographic composition.
“Well, of course the situation will develop indefinitely. And of course there’s a threshold. But we passed it long ago. It’s been doing all this for four years. But for this time, just have some initiative,” he uttered blankly, and patiently sat through the reply.
“A free man has no taste for being honored by others.”
“Well, I suppose everything comes in order naturally. We will move those mountains and seas, those men, of course, as you ask.”
Some of the masters turned reflexively towards the center at this.
“But… they will find their provisions and lodgings…somewhere.” the grand master smirked, as he lifted his hand to end the call. Nudging the microphone away from his lips, he intoned, “And never where one wants.”
