1958
Prequel to 1984
It was a bright, warmish day in April, and all around London, clocks were tolling one o' clock. Douglas O'Brien walked to his filthy apartment complex, head bowed. To attract attention here was unwise. There was no specific law forbidding one from walking forth with dignity, but Douglas was not a stupid man. The martial law that had been so feared at the end of the Second World War now did precious little to protect one from being mugged.
Douglas entered the drab, faded structure and paused, as he always did, between the lift and the stairs. He stepped gingerly, as he always did, into the lift. The machine tottered, and Douglas withdrew quickly from it, opting the stairs. It was always a tiring affair to scale seven flights on the rickety stairs, but Douglas valued his life too much to risk the elevator.
The door to Douglas's room was unlocked. The lock on it had long been broken. Everyone's lock in the apartment had either been worn away by old age or broken down by the soldiers that prowled the streets on their irregular raids. None of the locks had been replaced. The capitalist system sucked all the money and souls out of the people, and they held neither the monetary nor emotional resources to seek new locks. After all, few held belongings worth keeping. The soldiers' raids had stripped down any signs of wealth.
The petit room unfolded before Douglas, and the powerful smell of whiskey overcame him. Strong, British whiskey - one of the few possessions of which the martial government had not stripped its citizens. The room was unlit, but the streaming sunlight displayed a small desk, on which Douglas had piled two bottles of whiskey, each drained but for one swig, and beneath them, a medley of papers bearing Douglas's untidy scrawl. The military regime had supposedly ensured that all citizens would have the bare minimum of education... The bare minimum was essentially what Douglas possessed.
Douglas took a whiskey bottle in each hand and inhaled strongly. The vapors assaulted his nostrils, a force that could have stunned a weaker man, but which that Douglas welcomed, needed. He set them back down. He would save the draughts for tomorrow.
A bump in Douglas's pocket reminded him that his pen was there. He'd stolen the pen from, of all places, a government building. He winced at the thought, but he pushed it to the side as he lay pen to paper.
From downstairs, Douglas heard a distinct crack. A terrified scream rang up the stairs and faded out very quickly, followed by the sound of flesh hitting earth. Douglas angled his head a little. So the lift had claimed another victim. No sympathy came from Douglas's heart, no pity or compassion. The only visible reaction came from the trembling hand on the page.
These are my people.
Douglas controlled the trembling and looked outside. The room in the apartment across from him menaced the eyes. The glass window had been shattered spectacularly; the remnants formed a formidably toothed entrance to a dark, invisible interior. Douglas wrote absentmindedly, eyes glued to the immovable beast that was the window of the opposing room. With an ungodly effort, he wrenched his eyes from the jaws and looked at what he had written.
There will be no darkness
Douglas reread it and, after a pause to consider it, continued.
There will be no darkness, for I will have the power to abolish it.
Douglas closed his eyes, envisioning light even through shut eyelids. The idea of England with no darkness was certainly surreal, but he would have the power to make it happen.
Suddenly the teeth closed around his Achilles tendon. He let out a cry, hand jerking on the paper, and snapped his eyes open. A rat had sunk its teeth into Douglas's leg. Its tail had been trapped under Douglas's heel. Douglas lashed out with his other foot and snapped the rat's neck, freeing his bleeding foot, and turned his head to the paper. Douglas again examined his print.
But there will be pain.
Douglas stared at what he had written, uncertainly at first, but the conviction grew within him. After all, why shouldn't there be pain? Pain was required for all things. Never would Douglas have begun to plot the overthrow this afternoon without pain to motivate him.
With no further though, he drained both bottles and ran down the stairs. It would begin today.
The clock tolled 6:00, and Douglas and one other man sat in the Chestnut Tree cafe. The meetings had originated purely as experiment. Douglas had happened to meet with them once by accident, and their conversation had appealed strongly to Douglas's revolutionary mind.
The first meeting had felt rebellious and conspicuous. The other man had largely non-descript facial features in comparison with the robust, round face of Douglas. The duo had drawn a long stare from the posted soldiers. There was no privacy, Douglas knew, but besides the awkward glares, no action was taken to prevent the meeting.
The second meeting had been scheduled for three weeks later, and the guards had been replaced, perhaps killed. The patrolling soldiers held precious little clout in recent years, and street riots were becoming more and more frequent. The were pointless, of course; the military government had an endless supply of soldiers to replace those lost in riots. In any case, the second meeting was not at all monitored, and Douglas adored the fierce denouncing of the government in which the pair indulged, and rendezvous at the cafe became a weekly occurrence.
"O'Brien," said the other, "Today is the day. Today, the people will be liberated from this festering wasteland."
"Yes," agreed Douglas. "Today, a new era begins, in which we will seize the power. Today is Monday."
They stood and peered out at the street, where the hungry peasant masses were moving slowly home. Soldiers stood at fixed intervals, firearms dutifully shouldered. Douglas's companion pulled open the window and sang out. "Here comes a chopper to chop off your head!"
As he spoke, he hurled a small explosive into the street. It sailed in a beautiful arc and landed right in the middle of the street. There was a moment of silence, and then the fantastic noise.
The bomb killed several people outright. Maimed body parts, bloodied countenances, massacred masses appeared in the wake of the explosion, and the screaming began. Chaos erupted; not a man was at ease ... except, Douglas saw, for one. Douglas watched impassively as a man moved quickly into position and took advantage of a panicking soldier. He snapped the rifle from the guard and discharged a bullet into the guard's chest, before firing wildly at the other soldiers on the street. The opened fire roused the crowd even more, if possible, as the planted man dropped the implicating weapon from his hands and exited the fray.
The cafe's patrons had all evacuated the place to join the melee outside. See how stupid they are, thought Douglas, the senseless violence that is so easy to evoke from the poor and hungry. The Revolution, both Douglas and his co-conspirator had decided, would ensue absolutely. Neither questioned this fact: The roused people would revolt as never before.
"Soon, they will have freedom," said Douglas's companion.
Douglas smirked. His friend, for all his revolutionary words, was a humanitarian at heart. He did not relish the prospect of control, the ability to inflict pain. For now, Douglas had to entertain him, but already his words were proving him a threat.
"Yes, Goldstein," said Douglas, in his most sincere voice, "We will soon have the power to give it to them."
SD
May 29, '06
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