Things Fall Apart

1. The Waste Lord

When aged sixteen, Gerard decided he would not live past thirty.

Thirty was not old, not young. A diable-viable age. And he knew life wouldn’t get any better.

As a result, he started propelling himself in the most dangerous situations he could think of, hoping he would die by a fortunate turn of events, because he was not brave enough to take his own life away. Not brave enough to live it either.

Now he was twenty-two and sitting in the translucent monorail travelling over the city. He turned his music up in order for it to overwhelm dark thoughts wandering hopelessly into his brain, and the Smashing Pumpkins blasted in his headphones, drawing disapproving looks from the other travellers.

He could guess their thoughts just by watching their faces. Because listening to your music too loud was one of the many things Better Living Industries would forbid, if ever they got elected at the head of the government.

Gerard annoyingly gazed at their advertisements flashing by through the monorail’s window: a happy-looking black face on a plain white background, simply stating “VOTE BETTER LIVING INDUSTRIES” in bold capital letters, and just under their motto “To create a better world and a better future which is void of negative emotions”.

He wasn’t so sure it was a good idea. After all, “Negative emotions” as they called them, still helped the world move forward.

And what they exactly meant by negative emotions, they did not say.

Today would be the first day of three years of apocalyptic war that would eventually lead to Better Living Industries taking over the world.

But Gerard didn’t know that yet, as he walked out of the crowded public transportation towards his art school which would not stand for long: Better Living Industries didn’t like any form of protest, especially not art.
Because Art was the Weapon.

A story has to start somewhere. It always has to have a clear beginning and an end, because anything issued from a human-being has to be finite. It could start from the birth of a character, focus on his life and end when he dies, but it still wouldn’t be an accurate representation of reality, as many exterior factors can be taken into account for shaping a story. Many factors coming from different people with different stories eternity wouldn’t be long enough to tell. Some dating back to the beginning of the world, even before History started, when the very first human beings decided to settle down the laws of life. The laws that stated how life ought to be lived.

However, for purely practical purposes in a purely practical world, it can be considered that it all started exactly 2 hours and 38 minutes after the Smashing Pumpkins blasted into a young man’s headphones, sitting in a monorail, ignoring the angry looks from the other travellers; at the exact moment when the fire alarm went off in the art school of this same city.

Gerard rushed out of his class along with every other student. In that moment they were all supposing it was yet another training in case of a real emergency. They had no clue on the fact that a civil war had just started. They had no clue that at the same moment, every other art school and museum in every other city were similarly burning.

But when they got out of the building and saw the smoke, they partly understood. It was all clearly explained to them a few minutes later, when the screens of all the electronic devices in the country turned black, then white, eventually displaying the strict and regular face of an Asian lady. All the students looked up at the nearest advertisement screen, only a few feet away.

“Salutations, citizens.” She said, in a melodious voice.

“Allow me to introduce myself. I am at the head of the Better Living Industries. From now on, we will be your Government.”