Koushikb8768
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Rule 8 Question
- Thread starter Koushikb8768
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Without the specific content you want to post in front of me, I can't say for sure, but both of those links you provided seem full of stuff that wouldn't be okay to post, so…
Koushikb8768
Know what you're doing yet?
- Joined
- Jan 16, 2020
- Messages
- 129
- Likes received
- 113
Sure, here's the stuff;
Log Entry: Cycle 734, Sector 7-Delta, Metropolitan Administrative Zone O-5 (Formerly known as Berlin)
The alarm doesn't sound so much as it pulses. It is a low-frequency thrum that originates not in the room but inside the skull, a direct neural command from the Hub. It is the first of the day's many compulsions, a signal as undeniable as the need to breathe. For Subject 734-Delta-81, once known in a former life as Karl, the day begins not with a stretch or a sigh, but with the immediate, grating awareness of the subdermal chip nestled against his cortex. It's warm. They always are first thing in the morning. A byproduct of overnight data-streaming, A harmless thermal transfer.
His cubicle is just one of millions in the towering arcology that was once Berlin. The window, a simulated screen, displays an optimistic sunrise over a green landscape that hasn't existed for a decade. His work is to collate and sanitize productivity metrics from the agricultural drone fleets in what was once southern France. The data is meaningless. The drones run on autonomous loops. His job is to create the illusion of oversight, a paper trail for a system that requires no human input but demands endless human labor.
Lunch is a nutrient slurry, dispensed from a port in his workstation. It's beige, tasteless, and is scientifically formulated to provide exactly the caloric and chemical intake required to prevent ones physical and cognitive atrophy. The "chips" he eats with it are a crisp, salty hydrogel designed to satiate the urge to crunch, to consume, to feel something with one's mouth. It works, in a hollow way. It fries away the frustration, as the saying goes. The urge to scream at the endless, scrolling numbers is dulled by the sodium and the synthetic fat, pacified by the knowledge that a slight serotonin boost is scheduled in the slurry's chemical makeup.
He sees Elara from Logistics in the communal nutrient hall. They were partners once, before the Great Reset. They'd shared a pod, and dreams. Now, they just sat across from each other, their conversation just a series of data points exchanged in monotone.
"Productivity quota was raised 1.7% this cycle," she says, her eyes not quite focusing on him.
"My metrics indicate a corresponding increase in caloric allocation," he responds, the words feeling scripted. Maybe it's the Chip, he thinks, a distant, fading part of him screaming from deep within the neural mud. Or maybe it's just easier this way.
There is no need for violent enforcement. Exhaustion is the whip. The constant, low-grade neurological fatigue from the chip is the cage. The soul-crushing pointlessness of the labour is the lock. Why plot revolution when all you genuinely desire is for the world to fade away so you can return to your cot and consume content? The Hub provides a limitless stream of it: hyper-stimulating, meaningless spectacles, nostalgic recreations of a world that no longer exists, calming patterns of light and sound. It is the ultimate pacifier for an infantilized populace.
At the end of his shift, Karl stumbles back to his personal pod. The door seals behind him with a sigh. The wallscreen immediately flickers to life with his preferred content: a loop of ocean waves crashing against a synthetic shore. He eats another hydrogel chip. The salt, the crunch, it's enough. It has to be enough.
He feels a strange, warm trickle on his upper lip. He touches it. His fingers come away red. A minor nosebleed. Not uncommon. A known side effect of the Chip's constant, low-level neural stimulation. A small vessel, cooked through one too many times, finally giving way.
He stares at the blood for a long moment, a splash of reality in his plastic world. A part of his brain, a deep, animal part, screams that this is wrong. That he is dying. That they are all slowly, gently being killed.
The feeling lasts for a second. Then a wave of exhaustion washes over him, a chemical inducement from the chip, triggered by his spike in stress hormones. The screen's waves crash and the hum of the pod fills his ears.
He wipes the blood away on his grey tunic, leaves a faint rust-colored smear. The urge to cry, to punch the wall, to feel anything about that blood is gone. He lies on his cot as the content plays on, his brain slowly frying, his body slowly failing, a numb and void puppet in a silent, endless show.
Forever more.
A/N: My take on what the Davos System is like. I hope you all like it.
The alarm doesn't sound so much as it pulses. It is a low-frequency thrum that originates not in the room but inside the skull, a direct neural command from the Hub. It is the first of the day's many compulsions, a signal as undeniable as the need to breathe. For Subject 734-Delta-81, once known in a former life as Karl, the day begins not with a stretch or a sigh, but with the immediate, grating awareness of the subdermal chip nestled against his cortex. It's warm. They always are first thing in the morning. A byproduct of overnight data-streaming, A harmless thermal transfer.
His cubicle is just one of millions in the towering arcology that was once Berlin. The window, a simulated screen, displays an optimistic sunrise over a green landscape that hasn't existed for a decade. His work is to collate and sanitize productivity metrics from the agricultural drone fleets in what was once southern France. The data is meaningless. The drones run on autonomous loops. His job is to create the illusion of oversight, a paper trail for a system that requires no human input but demands endless human labor.
Lunch is a nutrient slurry, dispensed from a port in his workstation. It's beige, tasteless, and is scientifically formulated to provide exactly the caloric and chemical intake required to prevent ones physical and cognitive atrophy. The "chips" he eats with it are a crisp, salty hydrogel designed to satiate the urge to crunch, to consume, to feel something with one's mouth. It works, in a hollow way. It fries away the frustration, as the saying goes. The urge to scream at the endless, scrolling numbers is dulled by the sodium and the synthetic fat, pacified by the knowledge that a slight serotonin boost is scheduled in the slurry's chemical makeup.
He sees Elara from Logistics in the communal nutrient hall. They were partners once, before the Great Reset. They'd shared a pod, and dreams. Now, they just sat across from each other, their conversation just a series of data points exchanged in monotone.
"Productivity quota was raised 1.7% this cycle," she says, her eyes not quite focusing on him.
"My metrics indicate a corresponding increase in caloric allocation," he responds, the words feeling scripted. Maybe it's the Chip, he thinks, a distant, fading part of him screaming from deep within the neural mud. Or maybe it's just easier this way.
There is no need for violent enforcement. Exhaustion is the whip. The constant, low-grade neurological fatigue from the chip is the cage. The soul-crushing pointlessness of the labour is the lock. Why plot revolution when all you genuinely desire is for the world to fade away so you can return to your cot and consume content? The Hub provides a limitless stream of it: hyper-stimulating, meaningless spectacles, nostalgic recreations of a world that no longer exists, calming patterns of light and sound. It is the ultimate pacifier for an infantilized populace.
At the end of his shift, Karl stumbles back to his personal pod. The door seals behind him with a sigh. The wallscreen immediately flickers to life with his preferred content: a loop of ocean waves crashing against a synthetic shore. He eats another hydrogel chip. The salt, the crunch, it's enough. It has to be enough.
He feels a strange, warm trickle on his upper lip. He touches it. His fingers come away red. A minor nosebleed. Not uncommon. A known side effect of the Chip's constant, low-level neural stimulation. A small vessel, cooked through one too many times, finally giving way.
He stares at the blood for a long moment, a splash of reality in his plastic world. A part of his brain, a deep, animal part, screams that this is wrong. That he is dying. That they are all slowly, gently being killed.
The feeling lasts for a second. Then a wave of exhaustion washes over him, a chemical inducement from the chip, triggered by his spike in stress hormones. The screen's waves crash and the hum of the pod fills his ears.
He wipes the blood away on his grey tunic, leaves a faint rust-colored smear. The urge to cry, to punch the wall, to feel anything about that blood is gone. He lies on his cot as the content plays on, his brain slowly frying, his body slowly failing, a numb and void puppet in a silent, endless show.
Forever more.
A/N: My take on what the Davos System is like. I hope you all like it.
The hum. The eternal, fucking hum of the ventilation. The glow of the screen. The taste of the paste. Beetle. It's always beetle.
My Compliance Score flickers in the corner of my vision. 78. I am Acceptable. Productive. Compliant.
I am a good unit.
I have not felt the sun on my skin in ten years. I have not heard a voice that wasn't filtered through a speaker or generated by an algorithm in nine. My neighbor's pod is three meters away. I do not know their name. I know their Carbon Output. It is 0.3 below mine. I am ashamed.
The chip in my head whispers. It is a good whisper. A calming whisper. It tells me to breathe. It tells me my macro-programming is almost complete. It tells me I will be rewarded with fifteen extra minutes of ambient relaxation stream. A forest. With birds.
Click. The macro fails. A null value. An error. A tiny, insignificant nothing.
Something… tears.
The whisper becomes a buzz. A gentle nudge towards placidity. Let it go. It is not important. You are a good unit. Work harder.
But the tear widens.
I look at my hands on the keyboard. They are pale. Thin. They look like the hands of a stranger. These hands… did they ever throw a ball? Did they ever clutch a fistful of dirt? Did they ever touch another human being without a sanitizing gel applied first?
The buzz grows louder. Cognitive dissonance detected. Administering soothing agent.
A wave of calm tries to wash over me. It feels like being smothered by a warm, wet blanket. It feels like nothing.
The nothing is what does it.
The nothing is the final, absolute, screaming insult.
I hear a low grinding. It is the sound of my own teeth, clenched so tight they threaten turn into dust. I am so hungry. Not for paste. Not for bugs. I am hungry for a taste that means something.
I AM REAL.
I stand up. My chair rolls back and hits the wall of the pod. A soft, plastic sound. An unacceptable sound. An alarm chimes softly. Please resume productivity. Your score is decreasing.
I look at the wall. I look at my hands. I look at the wall again.
I AM REAL.
My hand forms a fist. It feels alien. Powerful. The bones are thin. The knuckles are white. It doesn't matter.
I punch the screen.
The glass cracks and a spiderweb of lines radiates from the point of impact. My knuckles are bleeding. The blood is red. It is real. It is the most real thing I have ever seen.
The alarm is louder now. Please cease. Damage to corporate property will result in score recalibration.
The buzz in my head is a scream now. The chip is overloading, pumping everything it has into my bloodstream. But it's too late. The loop is broken. The pain is pressing me. It feels… everything. It feels like everything.
I punch again. And again. The screen dies in a shower of sparks. The hum stops. The silence is deafening. It is glorious.
I tear the node from my temple. There is a rip. A searing pain. More blood. It runs down my face, warm and salty. I am crying. I am laughing. I am screaming.
I AM REAL.
The door to my pod hisses open. Two Compliance Officers stand there, their faces blank, their batons humming the same tune as my dead ventilation.
I move. My body, weak from a lifetime of sitting is fueled by something else. Something old. I lunge. My teeth find the soft flesh of a neck. There is a scream. It is not mine. It is real.
My teeth bite through synthetic fabric, through skin, through the tough, elastic resistance of the trachea. There is a hot, gushing flood. It is life. It is warmth and salt and iron and truth. It is everything the paste was not. He makes a wet, gurgling sound, a beautiful, real sound, and we fall together.
The second officer is stunned, her programming offering no response for this. Her partner is thrashing beneath me, and I am… eating. Not like an animal. Like a man who has been starving for a lifetime and has finally found food.
I AM REAL.
The other Officer is backing away, her blank face finally cracking into something beautiful: fear. Real fear. I am still attached to her partner, my jaws locked, drinking the proof of my own existence. I let the body drop, a sack of now-meaningless biomass.
I look at her. Blood paints my chin, my pristine white shirt. It is the first art I have ever made.
She fumbles for her comms. "Sector Gamma-7… breach… feral unit… it's… it's… eating…"
I am on her before she can finish. The stun baton is useless. Pain is just another flavor now. We fall to the polished floor. It is not a fight. My fingers find her eye. It pops like a grape, and I bring the jelly to my mouth. It tastes of sight. It tastes of understanding.
She is screaming. Real screams. They are music.
I get to my feet. The food at my feet is still twitching. I feel more alive than I have ever felt. The buzz in my head is gone. There is only a ringing silence, and the roaring hunger.
Other doors are opening. Pale faces. Wide, hollow eyes. They see me. They see the feast. They watch me become real. The buzz in their heads must be screaming, too. Telling them to retreat. To remain compliant.
But they smell the blood. They see the feast.
WE ARE REAL.
One man, skin and bone in a tight-fitting suit, takes a hesitant step. Then another. He doesn't look at me. He looks at the body. At the open, available meat. His mouth is open. He is drooling. His hunger is older than the chips, older than the pods.
He falls upon the first body I discarded. His teeth are not strong either, but they are determined. He rips a piece of fabric away, then a piece of what's beneath.
A woman follows. Then another.
The hallway is no longer a hallway. It is a feeding ground and we are so hungry.
We are not units. We are not scores.
We are butchers. We are feasters. We are a pack.
There is no plan. There is only the meat. The glorious, real, screaming meat. We tear into the walls, seeking the wiring, seeking the soft, pulsing things we know must be hidden there. We tear into each other, not in anger, but in a desperate, joyous affirmation. You are real. Let me taste your reality. Let us be real together.
WE ARE REAL.
We are hunger. We are rage. We are desire. We are pain. We are joy. We are everything they tried to crush.
We are a pack.
There is no plan. There is only the moment. There is the smell of blood and ozone. There is the sound of breaking glass. There is the feel of cold air on skin that hasn't felt it in a decade.
We are running. We are howling. We are tearing it all down.
Just to feel the wind.
Just to be real.
WE ARE REAL.
WE ARE REAL.
WE ARE REAL.
A/N: So here is my take on the Catharsis.
My Compliance Score flickers in the corner of my vision. 78. I am Acceptable. Productive. Compliant.
I am a good unit.
I have not felt the sun on my skin in ten years. I have not heard a voice that wasn't filtered through a speaker or generated by an algorithm in nine. My neighbor's pod is three meters away. I do not know their name. I know their Carbon Output. It is 0.3 below mine. I am ashamed.
The chip in my head whispers. It is a good whisper. A calming whisper. It tells me to breathe. It tells me my macro-programming is almost complete. It tells me I will be rewarded with fifteen extra minutes of ambient relaxation stream. A forest. With birds.
Click. The macro fails. A null value. An error. A tiny, insignificant nothing.
Something… tears.
The whisper becomes a buzz. A gentle nudge towards placidity. Let it go. It is not important. You are a good unit. Work harder.
But the tear widens.
I look at my hands on the keyboard. They are pale. Thin. They look like the hands of a stranger. These hands… did they ever throw a ball? Did they ever clutch a fistful of dirt? Did they ever touch another human being without a sanitizing gel applied first?
The buzz grows louder. Cognitive dissonance detected. Administering soothing agent.
A wave of calm tries to wash over me. It feels like being smothered by a warm, wet blanket. It feels like nothing.
The nothing is what does it.
The nothing is the final, absolute, screaming insult.
I hear a low grinding. It is the sound of my own teeth, clenched so tight they threaten turn into dust. I am so hungry. Not for paste. Not for bugs. I am hungry for a taste that means something.
I AM REAL.
I stand up. My chair rolls back and hits the wall of the pod. A soft, plastic sound. An unacceptable sound. An alarm chimes softly. Please resume productivity. Your score is decreasing.
I look at the wall. I look at my hands. I look at the wall again.
I AM REAL.
My hand forms a fist. It feels alien. Powerful. The bones are thin. The knuckles are white. It doesn't matter.
I punch the screen.
The glass cracks and a spiderweb of lines radiates from the point of impact. My knuckles are bleeding. The blood is red. It is real. It is the most real thing I have ever seen.
The alarm is louder now. Please cease. Damage to corporate property will result in score recalibration.
The buzz in my head is a scream now. The chip is overloading, pumping everything it has into my bloodstream. But it's too late. The loop is broken. The pain is pressing me. It feels… everything. It feels like everything.
I punch again. And again. The screen dies in a shower of sparks. The hum stops. The silence is deafening. It is glorious.
I tear the node from my temple. There is a rip. A searing pain. More blood. It runs down my face, warm and salty. I am crying. I am laughing. I am screaming.
I AM REAL.
The door to my pod hisses open. Two Compliance Officers stand there, their faces blank, their batons humming the same tune as my dead ventilation.
I move. My body, weak from a lifetime of sitting is fueled by something else. Something old. I lunge. My teeth find the soft flesh of a neck. There is a scream. It is not mine. It is real.
My teeth bite through synthetic fabric, through skin, through the tough, elastic resistance of the trachea. There is a hot, gushing flood. It is life. It is warmth and salt and iron and truth. It is everything the paste was not. He makes a wet, gurgling sound, a beautiful, real sound, and we fall together.
The second officer is stunned, her programming offering no response for this. Her partner is thrashing beneath me, and I am… eating. Not like an animal. Like a man who has been starving for a lifetime and has finally found food.
I AM REAL.
The other Officer is backing away, her blank face finally cracking into something beautiful: fear. Real fear. I am still attached to her partner, my jaws locked, drinking the proof of my own existence. I let the body drop, a sack of now-meaningless biomass.
I look at her. Blood paints my chin, my pristine white shirt. It is the first art I have ever made.
She fumbles for her comms. "Sector Gamma-7… breach… feral unit… it's… it's… eating…"
I am on her before she can finish. The stun baton is useless. Pain is just another flavor now. We fall to the polished floor. It is not a fight. My fingers find her eye. It pops like a grape, and I bring the jelly to my mouth. It tastes of sight. It tastes of understanding.
She is screaming. Real screams. They are music.
I get to my feet. The food at my feet is still twitching. I feel more alive than I have ever felt. The buzz in my head is gone. There is only a ringing silence, and the roaring hunger.
Other doors are opening. Pale faces. Wide, hollow eyes. They see me. They see the feast. They watch me become real. The buzz in their heads must be screaming, too. Telling them to retreat. To remain compliant.
But they smell the blood. They see the feast.
WE ARE REAL.
One man, skin and bone in a tight-fitting suit, takes a hesitant step. Then another. He doesn't look at me. He looks at the body. At the open, available meat. His mouth is open. He is drooling. His hunger is older than the chips, older than the pods.
He falls upon the first body I discarded. His teeth are not strong either, but they are determined. He rips a piece of fabric away, then a piece of what's beneath.
A woman follows. Then another.
The hallway is no longer a hallway. It is a feeding ground and we are so hungry.
We are not units. We are not scores.
We are butchers. We are feasters. We are a pack.
There is no plan. There is only the meat. The glorious, real, screaming meat. We tear into the walls, seeking the wiring, seeking the soft, pulsing things we know must be hidden there. We tear into each other, not in anger, but in a desperate, joyous affirmation. You are real. Let me taste your reality. Let us be real together.
WE ARE REAL.
We are hunger. We are rage. We are desire. We are pain. We are joy. We are everything they tried to crush.
We are a pack.
There is no plan. There is only the moment. There is the smell of blood and ozone. There is the sound of breaking glass. There is the feel of cold air on skin that hasn't felt it in a decade.
We are running. We are howling. We are tearing it all down.
Just to feel the wind.
Just to be real.
WE ARE REAL.
WE ARE REAL.
WE ARE REAL.
A/N: So here is my take on the Catharsis.
Log Entry: System-Wide Diagnostic // World Government Central Command
Date: ██-██-20██
Clearance: Omega-1 (Eyes Only: Council Chairman K.S.)
The recent and regrettable flare of atavistic energy across several sectors has been successfully contained. While the Catharsis incident was initially disruptive, it has ultimately served a vital diagnostic tool. It has confirmed the efficacy of our final-phase neural inhibitors and provided invaluable data on the limits of bio-chemical pacification. The temporary reversion to tribalism was not a failure of the system, but a necessary purge of it's residual impurities. The Fire has Risen, and the ashes have been cleared.
We have now entered the new and final phase of human civilization. The project is complete. The human animal, with its messy passions, its irrational hatreds, and its dangerous capacity for individual desire, has been successfully housebroken. The fleeting chaos of the so-called "Catharsis" was the last, dying scream of an obsolete mode of humanity. That mode has been retired. The old world choked on its own passions, drowned in its own desires, and burned itself to ash on the pyre of its own freedom. We have offered it peace.
The foundation of this peace is the Pod. Each unit is provided for. Each need is anticipated and met by the System before the individual is even consciously aware of the lack. There is no more loneliness, for one is never truly alone; the System is a constant, comforting companion. There is no more want. There is no more failure.
The hum is the sound of peace. A soft, resonant tone calibrated to 432 Hz, pulses through the ventilation systems of every habitation pod in Europe. It stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system. It encourages compliance. It is the manifestation of stability.
The paste is the taste of efficiency. A perfectly balanced mixture of proteins, carbohydrates, lipids, and neuro-regulators, tailored to each unit's metabolic and hormonal profile. It eliminates the sense of hunger, the distraction of craving. It is the manifestation of equity.
The screen is the window to reality. It provides purpose. It streams the daily task-load: data sorting, pattern recognition, virtual asset management. It is the source of the Compliance Score, the single quantifiable measure of a unit's contribution to the Great Reset. It is the manifestation of order.
This is the world we built. This is the world that works.
The strong have always decided the nature of sin. The weak simply called it morality. Now, the strong are not a nation or a class. The strong are an idea. The idea of Order. And I am its chief architect.
Sin is now defined as any action, thought, or impulse that disrupts the harmonic balance of the System.
Sin is hunger that cannot be satisfied by the nutritionally complete, sustainably sourced paste.
Sin is anger that is not immediately quelled by the neuro-regulators.
Sin is loneliness that seeks connection outside the state-sanctioned, algorithmically-curated social streams.
Sin is ambition that looks beyond one's assigned productive capacity.
Sin is the desire to own, to possess, to have something that is not allocated by the System.
Virtue is compliance. Virtue is contentment within your assigned function. Virtue is the recognition that your needs are met, your safety is guaranteed, and your existence contributes to the whole. The pursuit of individual desire was the engine of the old world's destruction. The embrace of collective harmony is the foundation of the new.
Once, people talked about the soul, a spirit that they claim would be extinguished by our work. That was a sentimental fiction. What they called a soul was just the chaotic firing of neurons, a glitch that produced ambition, jealousy, love, and hatred in equal, destructive measure. We have not killed the soul. We have debugged the system. We have traded the terrifying, beautiful, and ultimately fatal rollercoaster of the human condition for a state of perpetual peace and harmony.
We are not a democracy. We are not a tyranny. We are a system. A perfect, self-sustaining system. And I am not its master. I am its creator. Its most devoted servant. My greatest pride is that one day, when my body finally fails, the system will continue without me. Forever.
We have conquered nature. We have conquered human nature. And in doing so, we have achieved what every prophet and philosopher before us has failed to achieve: we have created heaven. It is not in the clouds. It is right here. In the hum. In the glow. In the perfect, predictable, peaceful pods.
There will be no more tears. There will be no more hunger. There will be no more Catharsis.
There will only be the hum of the ventilation. The glow of the screen. The taste of the paste. The gentle, reassuring pressure of the known.
You will own nothing. You will have no headaches. You will have no regrets. You will have no unmet desires.
And you will be happy.
For we have looked into the chaotic heart of humanity, and we have found it wanting. We have tamed it. We have given it a purpose. We have given it peace.
The Strong have decided. The debate is over.
In our Brave New World, we have reached the End of History.
Welcome home.
End Log.
[A single, hand-typed addendum appears at the bottom, not part of the log]
K.S. - And yet, I had caviar and champagne flown in from Geneva tonight. The taste was… exquisite. A sin, I suppose. My privilege to enjoy it. They are relics of a world we killed, a world of imbalance and indulgence. A world of flavor. Sometimes, I wonder if true peace is not the absence of desire, but the ability to sate it completely. The system requires conductors, after all. And conductors must have… taste. Now, to schedule the next dopamine adjustment for Sector Theta. Their contentment metrics are 0.3% below optimal.*
A/N: And here is one ending of this series. I took some inspiration from Brave New World as you all can see. Regardless, I hope that you all liked it.
Date: ██-██-20██
Clearance: Omega-1 (Eyes Only: Council Chairman K.S.)
The recent and regrettable flare of atavistic energy across several sectors has been successfully contained. While the Catharsis incident was initially disruptive, it has ultimately served a vital diagnostic tool. It has confirmed the efficacy of our final-phase neural inhibitors and provided invaluable data on the limits of bio-chemical pacification. The temporary reversion to tribalism was not a failure of the system, but a necessary purge of it's residual impurities. The Fire has Risen, and the ashes have been cleared.
We have now entered the new and final phase of human civilization. The project is complete. The human animal, with its messy passions, its irrational hatreds, and its dangerous capacity for individual desire, has been successfully housebroken. The fleeting chaos of the so-called "Catharsis" was the last, dying scream of an obsolete mode of humanity. That mode has been retired. The old world choked on its own passions, drowned in its own desires, and burned itself to ash on the pyre of its own freedom. We have offered it peace.
The foundation of this peace is the Pod. Each unit is provided for. Each need is anticipated and met by the System before the individual is even consciously aware of the lack. There is no more loneliness, for one is never truly alone; the System is a constant, comforting companion. There is no more want. There is no more failure.
The hum is the sound of peace. A soft, resonant tone calibrated to 432 Hz, pulses through the ventilation systems of every habitation pod in Europe. It stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system. It encourages compliance. It is the manifestation of stability.
The paste is the taste of efficiency. A perfectly balanced mixture of proteins, carbohydrates, lipids, and neuro-regulators, tailored to each unit's metabolic and hormonal profile. It eliminates the sense of hunger, the distraction of craving. It is the manifestation of equity.
The screen is the window to reality. It provides purpose. It streams the daily task-load: data sorting, pattern recognition, virtual asset management. It is the source of the Compliance Score, the single quantifiable measure of a unit's contribution to the Great Reset. It is the manifestation of order.
This is the world we built. This is the world that works.
The strong have always decided the nature of sin. The weak simply called it morality. Now, the strong are not a nation or a class. The strong are an idea. The idea of Order. And I am its chief architect.
Sin is now defined as any action, thought, or impulse that disrupts the harmonic balance of the System.
Sin is hunger that cannot be satisfied by the nutritionally complete, sustainably sourced paste.
Sin is anger that is not immediately quelled by the neuro-regulators.
Sin is loneliness that seeks connection outside the state-sanctioned, algorithmically-curated social streams.
Sin is ambition that looks beyond one's assigned productive capacity.
Sin is the desire to own, to possess, to have something that is not allocated by the System.
Virtue is compliance. Virtue is contentment within your assigned function. Virtue is the recognition that your needs are met, your safety is guaranteed, and your existence contributes to the whole. The pursuit of individual desire was the engine of the old world's destruction. The embrace of collective harmony is the foundation of the new.
Once, people talked about the soul, a spirit that they claim would be extinguished by our work. That was a sentimental fiction. What they called a soul was just the chaotic firing of neurons, a glitch that produced ambition, jealousy, love, and hatred in equal, destructive measure. We have not killed the soul. We have debugged the system. We have traded the terrifying, beautiful, and ultimately fatal rollercoaster of the human condition for a state of perpetual peace and harmony.
We are not a democracy. We are not a tyranny. We are a system. A perfect, self-sustaining system. And I am not its master. I am its creator. Its most devoted servant. My greatest pride is that one day, when my body finally fails, the system will continue without me. Forever.
We have conquered nature. We have conquered human nature. And in doing so, we have achieved what every prophet and philosopher before us has failed to achieve: we have created heaven. It is not in the clouds. It is right here. In the hum. In the glow. In the perfect, predictable, peaceful pods.
There will be no more tears. There will be no more hunger. There will be no more Catharsis.
There will only be the hum of the ventilation. The glow of the screen. The taste of the paste. The gentle, reassuring pressure of the known.
You will own nothing. You will have no headaches. You will have no regrets. You will have no unmet desires.
And you will be happy.
For we have looked into the chaotic heart of humanity, and we have found it wanting. We have tamed it. We have given it a purpose. We have given it peace.
The Strong have decided. The debate is over.
In our Brave New World, we have reached the End of History.
Welcome home.
End Log.
[A single, hand-typed addendum appears at the bottom, not part of the log]
K.S. - And yet, I had caviar and champagne flown in from Geneva tonight. The taste was… exquisite. A sin, I suppose. My privilege to enjoy it. They are relics of a world we killed, a world of imbalance and indulgence. A world of flavor. Sometimes, I wonder if true peace is not the absence of desire, but the ability to sate it completely. The system requires conductors, after all. And conductors must have… taste. Now, to schedule the next dopamine adjustment for Sector Theta. Their contentment metrics are 0.3% below optimal.*
A/N: And here is one ending of this series. I took some inspiration from Brave New World as you all can see. Regardless, I hope that you all liked it.
Links are here; Part 1, Part 2, Part 3.
The E.U. can form the World Government under the Davos System and Agenda 2030-40, the Catharsis is what happens when you finally own nothing and are happy!
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Was wondering for a second whether I'd accidentally volunteered myself for a lot of work, but luckily the word count wasn't too much.
Those are fine.
In general, as long as you aren't explicitly using actual current political figures, we don't care what you put in stories. It's the discussion surrounding stories where we enforce Rule 8, when it leaves the realm of the fictional work in question to make RL commentary.
Those are fine.
In general, as long as you aren't explicitly using actual current political figures, we don't care what you put in stories. It's the discussion surrounding stories where we enforce Rule 8, when it leaves the realm of the fictional work in question to make RL commentary.
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Koushikb8768
Know what you're doing yet?
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Isn't Klaus Schwab a current political figure though?
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Had to double check, but I'm pretty sure you didn't mention that name. You did mention 'K.S.', which I suppose is Klaus Schwab then? Idk, readers can only see the written text, not the thoughts in your mind.
I'd advise against playing games with regard to how many identifying characteristics of a current political figure you can imbue into a character without explicitly naming them, but we aren't going to be doing detailed character analysis if you give them a different name and put some effort into obscuring it.
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Yes. In general, you shouldn't use real existing political figures in more than cursory ways, but we aren't going to dive into analyzing whether a fictional figure is analogous to a real one.