Midwest Erosion

Midwest Erosion Sean Tilley

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Chapter Three of

the Die American Series

J

immy lit up a fag. This was not to say that he incinerated a homosexual for his evil acts, that was the Church next door's duty. He took a long drag off his Marlboro Menthol as he slumped on his porch. Off in the distance, dust and smoke filled out the sky as a construction team labored into their fourteenth hour of continuous progress. They're tearing it down, he thought to himself, they're tearing down my childhood. Indeed, he was correct. The Midwest Erosion Corporation was clearing the field he loved to build a strip mall and a golf course. It had been a lengthy struggle for him; Jimmy had petitioned for the past two years to have the field left intact. He had a lineup of defense unimaginable to a 18 year old boy. Archaeologists, historians, storytellers, lawyers, town representatives. The entire town had been behind him at that point. Alas, the tides of change destroyed everything. Those fucking yuppies had moved in, with their condescending style of talking, and their humvees. They had no sense of community, no bond of camaraderie. They had slowly stamped out the town of any sense of the love it once had. The elected their own into office, and the town took a turn for the worse. It was their generation that had brought about The Great Poverty. James sighed. There was nothing he could do about it. This town had been his saving grace from the terrors that made up city life. When his parents had brought him 9 years ago, it was a far better place than his old home. There weren't the shit-nosed kids from Kroger Elementary, no judgment based on the possessions one had or the job one had. It had been paradise, an escape from the rotting cities. No more plastic houses, no more cardboard people living in there. No mindless slaves shelling out to the Conglomerates. And now...nothing. Racists and homophobes dotted the landscape, and signs of corporate poverty were growing. Gone were the fields where he spent his time thinking. Gone was the tree where he had his first kiss. In their places, there were Skin Care centers, fast food joints, airports. Churches had crept back into the landscape, and Traditionalism and Empirialism soon followed. Gone were the days of burning symbols of the British Empire in effigy. The shackles had returned in his life. Concrete sidewalks dotted the countryside. The city was under construction. Defeated, he stood up and flicked the stump of a filter onto the sidewalk. It was nearly five-thirty, a particularly important time in the day for him. He barged into his house, and ran into his dilapidated room. The wallpaper was now slowly running down the walls, parts of it were now the color of the original lumber. A musty smell overcame him. This was his life now. His real father had disappeared years before to pursue whatever half-baked dream he had running in the back of his booze-sodden mind. He had nothing to offer Mother. Not even his surrogate father had much to offer to the whole family. After being recently laid off from the Factory, what all was he good for? Jimmy pulled open his bottom drawer, and dug through his clothes. He procured a small brass key, mostly eroded with rust. This was his life, his secret weapon against his situation. He walked over to the bed, pulled the frame to the side, and jammed the key into a small hole in between the floorboards. A good salesman never tells his clients where he stores his best goods. He pulled out several bags filled with a white substance. Most dealers had only a single dedicated brand. Some preferred reefer. Others were expert traders in opiates. However, Jimmy had a brand that trumped them all. Jimmy dealt in Henry the Horse. He had learned to make it several years ago, and he procured large batches in the sub-basement he had dug under his house. This was the family's main income, roughly equaling 3 shillings an hour. Union workers didn't make that much anymore. People flocked to it like flies to a jar of honey. They drowned themselves in it, consumed themselves in it. This was a brave new venture, an animal world in which survival of the fittest applied by man made chemicals. If you couldn't handle Henry the Horse, you weren't anybody. You might as well be a Loyalist, or be Chaste like the Unspeakables were. Not that it mattered. Here was a substance that separated law from vigilante, from boy and man. It was his power, his pleasure cruise. Of course Mother knew. It was a burden the whole family had felt. It wasn't like rehabilitation would solve anything. Once the holes were “drilled” in from shooting enough Henry the Horse, you were deemed incurable and executed. He had never expected to do this forever. It was only a temporary means, until the Leaders of the world could come up with a better solution. Loudspeakers and radios blared that a Solution was in fact near; waiting for one only seemed to create more complications however. Committees formed new committees to solve deficiencies from the committees formed six years ago for the exact same purpose. It was an exercise on a machine that could never stretch the muscles enough to grow. On the contrary, they only ever withered and

died, like the starving rats trying to bore their way through the woodwork of Jimmy's house. He stocked up, and headed up. His first client was Roland, a frail man of 80. He carried with him all the memories of the Old Revolution, and how he had scalped over 100 English Centaurions with nothing but a meat cleaver. When Jimmy asked why the Revolution was lost if Roland had such exceptional skills, Roland would always shrug it off. He remembered the good old days. He stood there beaming as Jimmy came to give a fresh shipment of Horse. Roland's body resembled that of an old railroad. Bones poked his taught skin like iron beams curving like that of a junction. His watery eyes bugged out slightly in his smallish head with huge ears, and his scraggly beard went down to his chest. If Jimmy didn't know better, he would've guessed that Roland was a hippie, or at the very least one of those old UNIX developers. "Ah, m'boy" the old coot exclaimed, "How goes things?" "Bad," James muttered, "They're still tearing down that field." The old man nodded, understanding the loss the town had taken from it. He looked up at James. "So, did you bring our old friend Henry the Horse along?" That old man never missed a beat. James pulled out a bag, and Roland in turn presented him with a fistful of Royals. "Very funny, Roland. You're 30 Royals short. Pay up, I've got a family to feed." The old man relectuantly paid the remainder. It was nothing personal, if anything Roland probably barely had any finances left after the hefty taxes he had paid to keep Edith, his Adultress wife. Now that he thought of it, he could see thin rivets bending inwards on Roland's stomach. The poor man was starving to death, and we was reaping the sole benefit. Death was the only thing any two people had in common in New England. He looked at his watch. Peering through the cracked faceplate, he could make out the small hands interconnecting with the gears. He had never been particularly good at reading Imperial clocks, but it appeared to be noon in his opinion. Good enough. He thanked Roland for his contribution, and headed out to the Diner. It had been a bleak Thursday, and the bored residents of Angel Falls had nothing better to do than contribute to social interaction at its most basic: eating overpriced food whilst discussing overrated telescreen programs at The Stuffed Pig. Occasionally political discussions permeated the air inside, but ultimately it mattered very little. Politicians had so little to offer to those in power, with the exception of doing possible grunt work. James walked up to the bar. "I'm looking for Claw." he said. "Claw don't work here no more," the bartender said "Poor fucker couldn't take it anymore. Hung himself." James cursed under his breath. Claw had been a huge buyer from him, and the list of potential customers was growing constantly shorter. If he wanted to help his family pay for their next meal, he would have to up the ante. Still, something wasn't adding up. For all the insane batshit things that had happened to Claw, he would never have considered offing himself? The telescreen blared the latest news updates over the bar. He was never keen on listening for too long, usually it was just depressing drivel on crushed uprising attempts. No matter, he would bide his time before fleeting to his next delivery. "This is Alice Candall, reporting for The Hound. Today's date is April 23rd, 1938. Weather is 26 Degrees Celsius, cloudy skies for the mid-Dysis area. Today, it seems a miracle has taken place in St. Clement's General Hospital. Icarus Lanbourne, age 29, has awakened after a 20-year coma..." So, a life ended today, and another life was just beginning. Such was life. He got up and shuffled out. With a limited amount of buyers, he had to ensure that they remained loyal to him. As he walked past the town square, James heard shouts amongst several angry parties. He looked over, and saw a man standing with a megaphone. The audience appeared cross. Fucking yuppies, as it was. "We need to do something about the world around us! Take a look around! We're dominated by the British Isles, and receive none of the benefits received by those that tax us! Look at the crumbling cities, the politicians, the companies that run our lives. The world is eroding from the middle!" The audience pelted him with a multitude of things. Rotten food, feces, raw sewage. They demonstrated their hatred against him with not just action, but words.

"FUCKING LIAR!", a woman screamed, her face screwed up in disgust. "Abomination!" a priest shouted. "God save the Crown!" a businessman screeched. When the chaos had passed, James made his way up to the man with the megaphone. He was laying on the soapbox, light tears streaming down his face. In his hand, he clutched a battered piece of paper. The untidy scrawl of "Declar" were visible. Next to his trembling body, a single sign lay. It read: " DIE AMERICAN! NOT A SLAVE, NOT A COMMONWEALTH, NOT A SERVANT OF KINGS OR GODS OF MEN, BUT A HUMAN BEING!" James extended his hand to assist this bold man. He looked up at James, and in the smallest on f voices, he managed to whimper out a "Thank you." He followed James as they walked. "Who are you?" James inquired. "You can call me Ferris Wheeler." he said coyly. “It's my alternative name.” And with that, the two of them were reminded of something. Even in this horrible rotting world, hope existed. Even in the midst of the Erosion, there was a source of life. In the face of enemies, there was friendship. In the world of need, there was a solution. * * * * * * * * * * * * * To Be Continued * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

About the Author Sean Tilley is a very atypical 19 year old. He lives in Illinois, has a passion for the UNIX operating system, microkernels, and hardware design. Sean is currently a college student at ICC, is a Gay Rights advocate, and like a lot of people is dealing with expressing his own displeasure in the economic and social systems.

Oh yeah, Sean's the one on the right....

His blog can be read here: http://lastguyonearth.lostsignalweb.com For other collected works, check here: http://www.lastguyonearth.lostsignalweb.com/writing/ Die American and other works by Sean Tilley are written using OpenOffice.org on Ubuntu, and more recently, PC-BSD.

Email: [email protected]