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The room was quiet except for a small hum. It was the hum of a fluorescent lightbulb. It was not odd that fluorescent lightbulbs produced a faint hum. What was odd was that it was three o’clock in the morning. What was odd was that the lights were on, and LS was sleeping in a dusty unkept office.
This was not the life that LS had dreamed of when he left his part-time job as a camp counselor to work for the government. In fact, he was not sure either that he could have imagined being named as a minister. Sure, being called a minister was only a formality so that he could do his job without congressional approval, but he had imagined also that people at work would call him by his name.
Because Minister LS’ work however wasn’t very popular, he went by an alias. The employees of the Redundancy Accounting and Waste Department were all given new names to protect their identities. Unfortunately, LS was not able to choose the alias, instead a colleague who found his old Yahoo Mail account decided to give him that name, and it stuck. This is how most aliases were chosen, the only exception being Harry Balsewitz, who was given a nickname instead.
It was 3:03 am in the Department of Social Security, and minister LS was having trouble falling asleep. The next day would be long. He turned over on his cot and pulled his jacket over his shoulder while a poster caught his eye. LS squinted at the poster and saw a picture of a small kitten holding onto a branch. Beneath the kitten in aggressive white letters was a phrase: “Hang in there.” LS took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and dreamt of falling.
Right before he hit the bottom, a door slammed open.
"Get up dickheads! It's time for war and this is D-Day!"
​
It was his boss, Adrian. “GO! GO! GO!” Adrian’s shouts echoed across the acoustics of an office built for silent individual work. “Hairy Balls, you start cracking into the database! Try an SQL injection on the Active Directory.”
LS wanted to interject, but he knew now was not the time to ask his boss what he meant. LS learned from his father at an early age that you cannot correct people who always think they’re right. Another shout rang out from Adrian, who had lost his balance as he was clutching his stomach.
“I bet these Social Security Dongs,” he said through gritted teeth as he stumbled, “are hiding some kind of password somewhere. Eagle 5, you’re on desk duty. Don’t stop until you find as many passwords on Post-It notes as girls I’ve knocked up! Oh wait, they can’t produce that many! Anyway, you know the drill, scamp.”
And then came a task which felt like a punishment lobbed onto Job if only for his belief.
“MINISTER LONG SCHLONG! I’ve been expecting you! Welcome to the department. Here we have a ritual for new recruits: we call it Tinder. You’re on fire duty today–now go weed out some waste!”
Adrian sometimes felt like two people, or at a minimum seventeen, if you took his social media burners into account. This morning, he was especially riled up because of the unfair protests against his small and innocent private company. Adrian tried to grab a coffee cup on the desk next to him, but fumbled and pushed it off the desk.
The cup shattered, but this didn’t derail him in the slightest. “Chop chop boys! Schlong, grab that list we got from HR, go through it head by head, and get rid of everyone that cries.”
LS didn’t like to be called Long Schlong. Of course, the joke was funny when he was fourteen. At the mature age of nineteen though, he did not feel like he should be too concerned with such juvenile antics. In fact, LS was a minister now, albeit only on paper. LS felt that someone at his ripe old age should be more concerned with buying a house, and having an opinion on the yield curve, whatever that was. His boss seemed to be more fascinated with the code names than anything else. Sometimes working for the Redundancy Accounting and Waste Department felt like returning to the playground. Despite the jungle rules of the playground, LS took solace in the fact that at least he and his boss were on equal footing regarding the yield curve.
“Hang in there,” LS thought to himself.
He thought also of his older brother. Correction, he thought also of his weak older brother. So weak, in fact, that this year he was able to catch up to his brother in age. It has been three years already. LS didn’t often think of his brother. The thought only crept out in tough situations. It was mostly one singular scene with his brother he remembered clearly. The thought emerged like a lump you didn’t expect when you scratch yourself: possibly there for some time, yet quiet about its disconcerting presence.
LS and his brother were at school, and it was recess. His brother was tall and lanky, towering over most kids, but never physically imposing. LS imagined that his brother could pick other kids up and throw them like dodgeballs if he wanted, but unlike LS, this thought never crossed his brother’s mind. His brother often had a hard time in school.
LS scratched and found that lump again. It was recess right before spring break and his brother was very proud of a small clay egg that he painted in art class. It had a colorful zig-zag pattern of red, yellow, and white lines. LS’ brother was showing his friends the painted egg, proud of the precise lines which looked almost machine painted. It must have taken a lot of focus to make each single line, and even more patience to handle the egg so as not to smudge any of the glaze. This was when another kid, half the side of LS’s brother came and started poking him in the stomach.
“Nice egg you got there, did you lay it yourself?” the bully inquired.
He didn’t stop there. “Hey dork, tell me what came first." The bully snatched the egg and pushed the gentle giant down. “The chicken”–the bully leaned back with a flexed bicep in the hand he held the egg,–“or,” the bully bent his legs–“the,” and took a coiled position like a shotput thrower– “egg,” and the bully sprang open, tossing the egg over the heads of the other apathetic children too occupied with their own games.
The egg smashed against a wall. LS’s brother stood paralyzed and in tears. The bully wore a triumphant, contemptuous sneer. “Sorry bud looks like it was the chicken. Don’t worry though, that was meant to happen. It’s called e-vo-lu-shun.”
LS could never respect his brother after that. The tall boy, if he were able to stand up for himself, could have grabbed the bully by his foot and smashed him like that egg against a wall, painting it with teeth, hair and blood. “Why didn’t he defend himself?” LS often asked himself.
Although he never quite knew the answer, he had inherited one from his father. Always critical of him and his brother, LS’ father wasn’t weak like his mother. While his father was tall and wide-chested in every situation, his mother often shrank and looked like she too, had something she dearly loved destroyed before her eyes.
It wasn’t a shock three years ago when they found LS’ brother. He knew what his father thought, even if he never said it: “weak”, “pitiful”, “no son of mine.” These were all the things LS aspired never to be. “Hang in there,” thought LS now, as he was walking to the breakroom of the Department of Social Security which his own Department commandeered.
The morning passed rather quickly. The majority of those who worked in Social Security had mind-numbingly dull jobs. LS spent his time musing about programming problems. He could afford to let his mind wander, because he had at his fingertips had a list of questions he’d generated with ChatGPT. LS didn’t know what any of the questions meant, and frankly, the people he interviewed probably didn’t either. The rule was simple: Some people are just better than others. Go through the list of people, frustrate them, make them want to leave, keep them there, and poke and prod them with harder and harder questions. Fire anyone who you can break in the interview. Sometimes LS felt like it was a difficult job, but this morning it felt easy. Even the job at the sleepaway camp where LS was a counsellor was harder.
​
Protecting, guarding, nurturing: these were the things he was taught to do at that job. All bullshit. Throw people at the wall and see if they crack: this was the way to build character. Don’t make it your problem that others can’t handle the heat. “Ah!” thought LS. “That’s why his colleagues called this Tinder.”
The morning passed rather quickly. The majority of those who worked in Social Security had mind-numbingly dull jobs. LS spent his time musing about programming problems. He could afford to let his mind wander, because he had at his fingertips, a list of questions he’d generated with an AI Chatbot. LS didn’t know what any of the questions meant, and frankly, the people he interviewed probably didn’t either.
The rule was simple: Some people are just better than others. Go through the list of people, frustrate them, make them want to leave, keep them there, and poke and prod them with harder and harder questions. Fire anyone who you can break in the interview. Sometimes LS felt like it was a difficult job, but this morning it felt easy. Even the job at the sleepaway camp where LS was a counselor was harder.
Protecting, guarding, nurturing: these were the things he was taught to do at that job. All bullshit. Throw people at the wall and see if they crack: this was the way to build character. Don’t make it your problem that others can’t handle the heat. “Ah!” thought LS. “That’s why his colleagues called this Tinder duty.”
LS liked to see people cry on the job. He sent his colleagues memes on their signal chat. #LiberalTears was the group his department used. Sometimes they sent each other GIFs of things being thrown into woodchippers. “How could these useless people have kept their jobs for so long,” LS thought to himself. “They are so self-righteous, but they break down if you ask them a few silly questions.” LS fired thirty-three career administrators that morning. It was five minutes to noon, and he had just one more interview before his lunch break.
He was growing impatient with his newfound responsibility. Not even the buxom blond anime avatar mask on the AI Chatbot could make him feel better. Sure, she told him that nobody else had the iron will to do this most serious work, and that not even the Son of God himself could have done such a great job at saving his country. Still, something inside of him had felt left wide open. As if a great wind, blowing through the windows of an enormous house, long ago had blown out all the lights inside, and volleyed for years alone against the walls.
LS drew a long breath, and the door in front of him slammed shut. In front of that door was a man. A large man. Six and a half feet tall. Although he was large, the man did not seem imposing or intimidating. Gentle might be the word used to describe him, by pussies, who needed words like gentle. The man walked over to LS and took the seat in front of his desk. He sat down, leaned back in the chair, took a water bottle out of his coat pocket and placed it on the desk in front of him, crossed his legs and said, “You had wanted to see me, Minister?”
“Yes,” LS said, looking at his list. “Appointment with Mr. Number 235.”
The man nodded. “My name is Connor. Connor Robinson. You can call me Connor, you can call me C, or Mr. Robinson. Call me anything, even ‘fuckface’ but please use a name, and not some number on a list. Please Minister, would you please let me know your name?”
LS was annoyed and tried, poorly, not to show this. “Yes, Connor, I have a name, but for reasons of security, I am to be called Long Schlong.”
“I’m not going to call you that kid. What’s your name? Your real name.”
LS really did not want to let his real name go. In fact, LS was afraid of letting his name be known. He had learned from his father that you meet everyone in your life twice, and it was not your choosing whether the second time would be at church or being cornered in a dark alley.
Still, he looked at the man before him he was supposed to fire. He couldn’t stand his cockiness–no not cockiness, comfort. His ease with things, and the world. “Fucking transcendental Buddhist types,” LS thought to himself. “The guy should have just become a high school guidance counsellor or something. He should have gotten a job where he could make a real difference, not stealing money from the President.”
Still LS wanted to get things over with, and something in him felt more at ease. He relented, even though he wasn’t supposed to give his name.
“You can call me Luke, sir.”
“Please,” said the man, “no need for the sir. We are just two men here. Trying to do our jobs the best we can.”
A gesture of kindness. LS was unsure how to respond.
He gave a brief artificial cough. “Do you know why you are here today, Connor?”
“I am the Chief of Operations of the Social Security Administration of the United States of America. Based on the trail of crying employees on the way to this room, I assume you have made the decision to fire me, just like my staff.”
LS didn’t respond directly. He had learned from Adrian to hold steady, not take the bait of confirming or denying anyone’s accusations, but instead to continue with whatever script was prepared for the day.
“I have a list of questions that I would like answered.” LS continued dispassionately. “This is in order to clear out fraud and waste from the Social Security Department in an effort to reduce government waste and redundancy.” LS’ words chilled his teeth as they came out of his mouth. He could feel chills on the tip of his tongue when he spoke of waste and redundancy.
“I know what you are here for, Luke. And I know your questions. They are a distraction written by someone who thinks they can understand space travel because they can build a giant metal cone. But working here, this is Rocket Science, an art form, and for millions of people, this is life or death.”
“Life or death,” scoffed LS. He took the bait. “What is life or death about this? It is a bloated behemoth which has had too much to eat and is full of shit that needs to be removed.”
The tall man spoke. “We operate efficiently at a margin of error so slim, it would give a normal CEO a heart attack. We have never missed a payment in the existence of this organization. We feed those who are hungry, we see to it that the sick can get their prescriptions. We keep Grandpa warm in the winter. We keep people included in society despite physical or mental disabilities. We help people hang in there.”
LS responded, with venom in his voice. “You keep your pockets lined with money that isn’t yours. You keep your books balanced on lies.” LS practically spat out lies.
The man suddenly looked distraught but tried to maintain his composure. LS knew he had caught him. The man leaned forward and grabbed the water bottle and help it tightly in a shaking hand.
“You need to take a step back,” the man said. “You need to see what you are doing here.” The man looked like he was holding back tears. “We are here for people who have nothing, and we do everything we can so that parents can raise healthy children in the face of being forgotten by society. So that the vulnerable, at least the ones we can protect, do not die on the streets."
LS stood up and leaned across the desk. “You are criminals, scum, thieves who take what is not yours and waste it on those who don’t deserve it. We are the good guys. We are the ones making the sacrifice here.” LS let a phrase slip that he didn’t mean. “We are the ones who need protecting”. LS didn’t know what he meant by that. He needed a moment to sort his thoughts out. He didn’t want to look stupid. He didn’t want to look like a stupid, stupid fool. He didn’t want his father to be right about him. He didn’t want the taunts of the children from summer camp to return to his dreams. He needed a moment to hang in there.
The man understood. He took a deep breath, his hand still shaking around his water bottle. He looked at LS, at Luke, in the eyes. He unscrewed the water bottle. Suddenly a putrid stench filled the room. LS’ nostrils furled up. The man lifted the bottle as if he were about to drink the nasty liquid. But the man missed his mouth. The liquid fell over his neat shirt and pants. It had started soaking his clothes. He took out a small box from his pocket. Flicked it open and took out a thin toothpick.
He looked LS deeply once more in the eyes. “Luke, listen to me. It is not too late for you.” The toothpick hit against the box. In just one second the whole room popped with light. LS jumped back behind his desk. Smoke started engulfing the room. There were no smoke detectors or sprinklers anymore. Their batteries had been used for walkie talkies, and the water for the sprinklers was diverted to California to fight the wildfires.
LS passed out, but before he did, he watched everything. He saw the man calmly sitting in front of him. The man engrossed by flames. His skin fusing with his clothing, and his eyes closed, peaceful and resigned to his fate. The man had decided this is what he had to do. LS couldn’t understand it. Why did this man burn. Why did this man have to burn. He only needed to be fired. Instead, he had died in front of him.
LS passed out. The fumes of burned flesh had mixed with the carbon created by the reaction of the fire. Although unconscious LS could feel the oxygen thinning in the air. He had tried his best to remember his dream from that morning. The glow of the cold florescent lightbulbs replaced now with the warm orange of flames. The flames were waiting for LS at the bottom of the pit he would never reach. LS and his whole body remained falling towards that large flaming hole in his dream.
Somehow though, he started losing momentum. His fall was slowing down, the winds which have echoed inside of him became subdued. Now there were no winds, but instead a subtle updraft of rising heat. He felt the warmth of the fire pushing him upwards.
He woke up, and coughed and spit, and vomited at the smell of smoke mixed with burnt flesh. He stayed close to the ground and tried to hold his breath crawling out from under the desk, trying to make it to the door of the small office room. He rose up and grabbed the doorhandle. He screamed at the touch: the metal had heated in the fire. But it was enough. He butted against the now-ajar door to push it open completely and fell with his head and upper torso bouncing on the floor outside of the room. The smoke followed him, and everything went black.
Time had passed; how much, he could not say. A single eye opened, and then the other. The smell of smoke and burned flesh still clung to his clothes and nostrils. That putrid smell had burrowed itself into the walls of his nose, and crevasses of his brain.
When he had finally awoken, LS had noticed that he was sitting upright, in a burned chair. Some inches away from his knees there was a desk. On the desk there was a laptop, and behind the laptop was a familiar face.
“Harry,” said Long Schlong weakly. “How have you been?”
“The use of names is not permitted for the safety of the RAW Doggers.” a stern Mr. Balsewitz replied. “You are to refer to me only by my alias.”
“My apologies Mr. Hairy Balls,” said Long Schlong, now in a much colder tone.
Probably his colleague had a long day, thought LS to himself. Probably Harry had also caused a death and was dealing with these heavy feelings too. God knows LS didn’t quite know how to deal with what he just saw. And poor Harry, who was two years younger... probably he too just needed some help. LS’ thoughts were interrupted by hairy questions.
“Please, could you tell me the last thing that you have been working on lately?”
LS, who needed a moment to recollect, opened his mouth.
“Hurry up, barked HB. “We don’t have all day”
“I.. I was, I was....”
“You were sleeping on the job obviously. Next question. Could you describe the last impact you have created in your position of employment?”
“Well…” LS hesitated. He wasn’t quite sure, “I had helped the US taxpayer reclaim valuable wasted money.”
HB snorted. “What? Did you cut the checks yourself? I haven’t found any money you saved the taxpayer.”
“What has gotten into you, Hairy!” jumped LS.
“Mr. Schlong,” his colleague interjected, “please maintain decorum. These are just harmless questions… That is… unless you have something to hide.”
LS still did not get what was happening. From one moment he had witnessed a man burn himself alive for. For? For what exactly? Frustration? Terrorism? Principle? And now he, sitting in the same cleared out chair which hasn’t even been wiped down, was being questioned himself. Harry should know. Harry must know that LS isn’t the enemy. It was the bureaucrats. It was those un-American people haters. Those cannibals who left people like him and his family not even a hair of meat from the roadkill in the system. And now, everything LS had ever done to serve his country was brought into question by some kid.
“Please respond to the next question honestly. How much money have you wasted the American taxpayer. Which part of that two trillion dollars do you have buried in your backyard?”
LS could not believe it. After all this time. After those sleepless nights under the florescent lightbulbs that have burned out the insides of his eyes. After all that time fighting those criminals in the system. This is how he was being treated, and by his own colleague. LS had known HB for months. They ate lunch together every Tuesday. Together they opened that dam in California for the forest fires, and now this. Now LS was on the pyre tied to the stake.
“Harry… Harry” said LS, almost choking on his words. “You can’t be like this. You see me here? You got to believe me. I’ve done nothing but my job. We are on the same team. We have the same mission. We both want a better world. Why are you doing this to me?”
“To you?” retorted HB. “You have done this to yourself with your criminal actions. Your wasteful actions. I’m sorry, but you are a redundancy at the Redundancy Accounting and Waste Department. Your time is up. Pack up your things, leave, never come back, and please send the next person in line in.”
LS could barely hold back his tears. It was a good thing that he had no belongings to clean up. He stood up, wiped some snot on his sleeve and walked out. But before he did, he sent Adrian into the room as Harry Balls had requested.
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