The Uprising

I take a look at the the clock.  Seven hours till I go home, Sixty years till I retire. I thought.  The canning factory was a horrible place for me to work.  Grab a can put in peaches, set it on a conveyor belt and watch it roll away.  The nauseating stench of sweat and soon-to-be-canned-peaches stung my nose.  Fourteen hour workdays, six days a week, and no pay.  It was a grueling process.  “The government takes care of us.” people said.

The government did, but we were puppets in the hands of our masters. They give us food, clothing, and shelter. Then we have to produce goods in this sad excuse for a workplace. Wake, clock in, clock out, eat, sleep.  The operation then repeated itself day after day.  No, free will or play time. If you questioned you were killed or jailed.   You started working at eight years old you ended at eighty.  The younger people challenged the rules more than older.

I have noticed that for people older than me the daily exercise has become total habit.  No, not habit, second nature.  After a time, their sad old minds have been crushed to a pulp of structuralized insanity.  No thought after an order was given. At age nineteen I can already feel myself starting to fade.

I have many times thought about what it would be like to escape this endless cycle.  I know everyone has.  I’m just not stupid enough to break the rules.  There has been a rebellion here or there, but they were soon after squashed by the government’s machine gunners.  That just gave the government an excuse to get a tighter grasp on its people.  More laws passed, more cameras made, more armed enforcers lining the streets and waiting for someone to step out of line.

Ding Ding The clock sounded for six o’clock.

One more hour  The minutes trudged by slowly, Hacking away at the time me and my sister could eat dinner.

I thought about how her day was, I wondered how many times she had accidentally stabbed her finger with a sewing needle. Her sewing shop was no better than my factory. Trilly would often come home with a bloody thumb and pointer finger.  Her finger would be bandaged with stuff thinner than our cheap toilet paper.  We would have to cut shreds from our old clothes to dress the wound properly.  The scars on Trilly’s thumb reminded me of Swiss cheese.

Riiiiiiing

The home bell rang sending everybody into a boisterous frenzy “Seven o’clock, everyone home!”  said a commanding voice to my right.  The floor rumbled as hundreds of tired men streamed out of the building.  I knew better than to be caught up in this stampede.  It would be pointless to end getting trampled to death by a horde of ignorant men like my neighbor.  There’s an easier route.  I took the latter up to the top of the building.

Sitting above the highest platform is an emergency escape hatch that leads to the roof.  I learned to wriggle my way across the ceiling beams to reach the it.  I’m halfway across the ceiling when I let go of the beam and drop on to the platform.  Thud

I walk to across the deck.  My eyes trail to the large red handled lever.  Above me sits the escape hatch.  I clasp The lever with both hands, and yank downwards.

The hatch opens with a metallic click.  I pull myself through the opening and on to the roof.  There is a light breeze, it feels good on my body.  Almost as if I’m shedding a sweaty, miasmic skin.  It’s nice to get out a of that foul factory. I’m so high up, I feel like I can see the whole continent of Quora.  There is a large looming building in the east.  Likely dictator Light’s Manor.

Balthasar Light has been dictator for as long as I can remember.