#modern dystopia
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Chapter 18: Social Engineering
Lights, Camera, Action!
Lash and Nils go public and dare people to call their bluff. The interview goes slightly off the rails, with good reason.
@baelpenrose, as co-author and beta reader for this chapter, did a great job making sure the reporters were as 'paparazzi' as possible.
I can fake a smile
I can force a laugh
I can dance and play the part
If that's what you ask
Give you all I am
Christina Perri, “Only Human”
Lash
By the time Lucas had returned to the hospital, Mori had pulled herself together and was in full combat general mode. Neither Nils nor I had clued her in to our plan regarding shaming the hospital into covering the cost of care for everyone involved in the fire, and I was grateful that he hadn’t mentioned it in front of her. With her focused on our parents’ care and haranguing doctors and nurses for updates, I could focus on dealing with the reporters who were already descending on the hospital.
Nils was hovering next to me, his hand close to mine. “Important to ask because a whole lot of people are going to ask unimportant shit and we need to be on the same page to avoid idiot drama that will deflect from our goal: we’re a couple or just good friends? It doesn’t matter what our answer is as long as it’s the same one.” He took a breath. “If you don’t have the emotional bandwidth for that, easy way out is ‘we stick to whatever bullshit they feed us until the cameras go away and something else dominates the news cycle’.”
I thought it about for a brief moment. “We’re going to be doing a lot of lying, let’s have one less to keep track of. Stick to the truth: we’re friends who recently went on our first date and you were meeting my parents when everything went down. If someone sticks a camera in my parents’ faces later down the road, they won’t have to think to confirm that.”
He nodded. “That works well enough. Okay, so to clarify our story: The hospital admins - someone even I, with all my familiarity with the hospital staff don’t know by sight - offered this to the people injured in this crisis as a one-time matter because they recognize the extraordinary circumstances involved. They recognize the crisis in the community and have risen to the occasion. We can say some nice things about the doctors that let them share the glory the local news is going to be throwing at us because hey, local news loves a hero. Hospital will be really reluctant to give it back if they can trade for political favors later.”
“Oh, I cannot wait to hear you say nice things about your father. On camera, where everyone can see it,” I teased, trying to bleed off some of my anxiety. Truth be told, any anonymity I had up until now was about to be blasted out the window when we spoke to these reporters. And I would have to use my real name, or my online persona was toast.
The thought immediately made my heart sink, tears prickling my eyes. Toast. The burned out cafe, all those lives wasted… and for what? Because some hateful asshole thought he had the right to -
I didn’t even realize I was speaking out loud until Nils bumped me with his shoulder. “Hey. I’m not going to tell you it’s okay, because it isn’t. But right now, we can honor the dead by taking care of the living. So let’s focus, okay? We can figure out whoever did this and get it back in blood later.” He offered me his hand. “For right now though, let’s go get some debts waived.”
He gave a very subtle gesture towards the window, where to my horror, I could already see news vans outside, prevented from accessing the building. Vultures. I took a deep breath, took his hand, and squeezed it. “We look like burn victims, right?” When he nodded, I nodded back. “Then let’s do this before someone stops us.”
The moment we stepped outside the door, hospital wristbands conspicuously visible, we were swarmed. I played up my shock by turning slightly into Nils, shielding my eyes. Four microphones were shoved in our faces, a female voice demanding “Were you at the fire earlier this evening?”
“Yes,” I answered. “We were inside with my parents when the fire was started.”
“Are you saying the fire was deliberate?” came a male voice from behind the blinding lights on the cameras.
“Absolutely. Someone blocked the exits and threw a burning bottle of something into the cafe.”
Nils took over at that point. “Molotov cocktails. The cafe had been the victim of several attempted arsons prior to this, according to the late owner, Ahmet Yildiz, who had, by the time this last fire claimed his life, given up on getting a proper investigation. He died attempting to help evacuate his customers and community.” His voice was clear, cold, and his words managed to bring across institutional neglect without actually blaming anyone of importance. “He wasn’t the only one.”
“We were lucky,” I choked out through a lump in my throat. “We have minor burns and some smoke inhalation, but right now my parents and many others are in surgery or the ICU. One is in the PICU.” As that last part sank in, some of the reporters and camera people around us gasped. “And we are all the lucky ones. At least three people never made it out, and we don’t know if everyone else is going to make it.”
A burst of chatter from the back of the reporters, then one of the men in the front asked a question I’d been dreading. “Can I get you two to identify yourselves?”
“My name is Elakshi Botelho. My parents, Sahar and Lorso Botelho, are still undergoing tests and treatment.”
“And mine is Nils Andover. My father is one of the doctors in the hospital, and my mother works as a lawyer.”
“We’ve heard both of your names from other witnesses at the scene, several of whom credit the two of you with a bulk of the rescues, what exactly happened during the evacuation?” Nils’ eyes flicked towards me.
I gave the tiniest of nods and took a deep breath. “The only exit was on fire. Nils was able to open one of the metal gates over the other exits. He, my father, and Uncle - Mr. Yildiz helped carry people out while my mother and I wrapped everyone in whatever cloths we could wet to keep them from getting burned or inhaling smoke. Nils and my father managed to get me and my mother out just before the cafe exploded.” My voice was trembling towards the end, and I let the tears just roll down my cheeks. I was too tired to fight them, and it probably helped our cause anyway.
“Have you spoken with authorities about the attack?” the first woman asked.
“With all due respect, I have been more concerned about my family and my community,” I responded. “We plan to speak to authorities when they reach out.”
Nils gave my hand a small pump, as though communicating silently that I’d said the perfect thing, then responded to the next question. “What went through both your heads when the fire went up?”
“Need to exit, wait, the exit is on fire, hey the windows, wait, the windows are blocked and they’re hot, oh wait, I have a leather jacket that can protect my hands while I open them.” Nils managed to drag his normal sarcasm with a trace of entirely uncharacteristic humility as though that was a chain of thoughts that would have occurred to a normal person to describe it all so dismissively. “Following that, ‘hey, leather jackets are fire resistant, I should probably help get people out,’ and somewhere in there is ‘thank God everyone here is sane, compassionate, and also helping’.”
He took a breath. “Genuinely though, it’s amazing how much everyone came together in the fire, her dad, the cafe owner, her, her mom, everyone just kinda went for it and tried to help as much as possible, evacuate people as fast as possible, tried to help medic as much as possible. The hospital’s risen to the occasion too, in the face of all this: they said they were going to take care of the victims of this attack without charge, and they’ve been giving the victims amazing care.”
The reporters went wild when Nils dropped that bit of ‘news’ on them. One managed to shout above the others a question about whether Nils’ family connection to the hospital had anything to do with that decision. “Both our fathers work for the hospital,” I confirmed when I felt him jerk like he’d been shot. “But the hospital has very much made this decision out of recognition for what can only be called a heinous act of terror committed against a small community.”
“Is it appropriate for you two to apply terrorism charges to an unknown…”
Nils’ voice cut across the question, coldly. “We just walked out of a building that exploded - killing at least three people - because a bunch of people set it on fire because they didn’t like that the owner was from the Middle East, after the building had been graffitied, repeatedly, with anti-Arab racial slurs. Terrorism is ‘violence committed against civilians for political reasons’ - what the FUCK would you call this if not that?”
I noticed that Nils left out the ‘by nonstate actors’ part from the definition of ‘terrorism.’ Regardless, murmurs rippled through the crowd. The point had been gotten across and given them something to chew on for local reports. The first reporter to recover decided to pursue that point. “Is there anything you would like to say to the people who are responsible for the fire?”
By this point, I was shaking with emotion and dying to go back inside and sit down in a quiet place, see my parents breathing. “You burned down a popular shop full of customers who were minding their own business. There are women dying upstairs for drinking tea and gossiping about their grandchildren. My cousin, Imran, is dead because he was picking up pastries for his wife and daughters. My parents are severely injured because they were there to meet the young man I had just gone on a first date with. You attacked people for being people and having lives. You are a coward, and I hope you have every day you deserve for the rest of your life.” In that moment, I couldn’t handle it anymore. I spun, pulling my hand free from Nils’ and storming back into the hospital.
I heard Nils answer one more question in a capacity that barely managed to conceal impatience verging on contempt - though that might have been my familiarity with him, the reporters seemed charmed - before I heard him rushing after me.
“I think we did it, Lash. You alright?”
Brushing tears from my cheeks, I laughed bitterly. “I am the furthest thing from alright. I want to see Mama and Baba, and I want Baba’s beard to scratch my cheek when he hugs me, even though I know his face is burned and his beard is gone. I want Mama to be nosy and pat my cheek and her bracelets clatter and her rings to bump my cheekbone like they do. I want Mori to be here to visit, not to help make sure my parents are going to survive. I want to go get coffee and have Uncle wink at me when he sneaks me extra baklava, and I can’t have any of it.” Without even thinking, I turned and buried my face in his chest, charred leather smell be damned.
“We’ll stay here for them, okay? We’ll be the first thing they see when they wake up. Promise. Your mom isn’t going to be long - it’ll be longer for your dad. But your mom should be coming out within an hour or two at this point.” Nils hugged me then, as though on impulse. His chin fit exactly on top of my head, and he was patient enough to let me ugly cry on him until all I was left with were sniffles and hiccups.
He said nothing about what I must look like after all that, only steadying me. “I think you need your sister right now. Let’s go find her. She reminds me of your mom, so she probably knows exactly what to do.”
#original fiction#nihilus rex#traumatized characters#original writing#modern dystopia#afterverse#writeblr#the miys#arcadian inquisition#science fiction#original science fiction#original sci fi#my writing#friend’s writing
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Swimming against the current and swept together by circumstance, these six strange bedfellows have everything to lose.
(But does one of them count as a main character?)
The Butterfly Koi will be a free serial novel starting September 12. Sign up now to read from the beginning at https://syphoncontinuity.substack.com!
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Corporate Dystopia
It’s maddening, absolutely maddening the way companies are these days. Software features in cars behind a paywall subscription. Previously standard purchases now being a subscription model. Phones losing functionality. Phones and Laptops being made difficult or impossible to repair. Apple making their phones lose functionality if a replacement part, genuine or not doesnt have the right serial number. Companies not offering physical media for their shows in order to push a subscription service. The list goes on, that’s before we get into all the ways that companies just suck up data from us like we are cattle to sell to advertisers. I hate corporations so much.
#modern dystopia#apple#disney#disney plus#mcu#adobe#photoshop#samsung#phones#blu ray#fandom#bmw#tesla#cars#doge#meme#politics
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kinda messed up that you cant just go get rocks or wood out of the forest anymore. It's like stealing/desecrating a park or something. Like... I have to pay $50 if I want rocks to put in the bottom of my flowerpots for drainage. If I owned land I would just go out into the backyard with a shovel. Where do people even get these rocks? They buy land, take the rocks, ship em out??
I once saw a post about how foraging was made illegal to prevent newly freed slaves from fending for themselves and thats how that happened and i just gotta say its ruining everyones lives still, we should make foraging legal again. Let people take unwanted plants/rocks/sticks off other peoples property it's not like anyone is missing the stuff on that 60 acres of land thats been for sale for 10 years
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yaknow what we need more of? modern dystopia stories, but light dystopia. underground resistance that lives normal lives most of the time, a regime that is corrupt and awful but more so overbearing with strict, but not purely unreasonable, rules. less pure destruction and tyranny, more "life fucking sucks but its not so horrible that you cant live a simple peaceful life so long as you follow the rules"
dystopian adjacent, not full war zone but definitely step carefully. most people live relatively normal, if a bit depressing, lives. rugged around the edges but not fighting for your life every day
#story#idea#idk how the fuck to tag this#assist please#dystopia#dystopian society#dystopian fiction#modern dystopia
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The Nightmare Of This Capitalist Dystopia Can Always Get Worse
Days like today make me wonder, less and less rhetorically with each day, why I even bother with this writing. Why I put in the effort when no one else seems to care whether something is written well by a human or slapped together by a plagiarism machine.
Every so often, some horrible shit happens and I have to interrupt my blog writing and posting cycle to insert something relevant while it’s still relevant. Today is another such day, even if it feels much smaller in the grand scheme of things. Honestly, I’m only interrupting my schedule because this actually impacts my blog as a whole, so it would be incredibly remiss of me to wait a week to…
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Preventing people or businesses from buying their way out of dealing with social dysfunction would get so much of US society fixed in like a few election cycles.
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Metodi Hristov Drops ‘Modern Dystopia’ on Set About
Following a string of internationally celebrated releases on the likes of Awesome Soundwave (Carl Cox), Filth on Acid (Reinier Zonneveld), Senso Sounds (Oliver Huntemann) and his very own Set About imprint, Bulgarian techno icon Metodi Hristov, now returns to his Sofia-based label once more, for the release of his latest hard-hitting single, Modern Dystopia.
Out now, Modern Dystopia is another…
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Going back to what you said before about the country that PAFL takes place in being the worst of the USSR and modern federal Russia mixed together, ¿in that case does that imply that it's kinda like a dystopia? ¿Or just a developing country?
Real life federal russia IS a dystopia lmao
#But I'm not trying to create a dystopia specifically#Just a contemporary sort of USSR with the quirks of modern systems that have failed to free themselves of Russia's control#asks#blog#parties are for losers#deepest lore
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Nihilus Rex, Ch. 16: "...and Tragedy"
Pretty sure that title says it all, so I apologize in advance. Please don't kill me!
Co-written and beta-read by @baelpenrose, so he's partially to blame. But he did pick out the song lyrics!
Warnings for racism, hate crimes, off screen deaths of minor characters.
Save yourself a penny for the ferryman
Save yourself and let them suffer
In hope, in love
Mankind works in mysterious ways
Nightwish, “Planet Hell”
Lash
Despite Nils’ earlier errors, the conversation with my parents was going surprisingly well. At some point, Nils had let slip that he didn’t get along with his father, and Baba just let the floodgates open on how hard it was to deal with man. Apparently, Mr. - sorry, DOCTOR - Andover was a complete and utter bastard, even by Baba’s very forgiving standards.
To say Nils and Baba got along was a huge understatement. “Oh no, sir, I’m not offended, everyone knows that he’s a great surgeon and an amazingly mean person. I think there’s a running gag somewhere about not letting him near the patients until after they’ve gone under?”
Baba chuckled - practically a roaring laugh for him - and nodded, knocking one hand on the table. “Yes! The nurses are the only people who are not intimidated, and seeing them physically drag your father away from a patient is often the highlight of my day.”
“It’s probably the highlight of the patient’s day too, they just don’t know it. Trust me, waking up to that frowny, disappointed-Catholic face when you’re already in pain…not ideal.” Nils grinned.
Mama started to say something, but I didn’t hear her as the sound of broken glass made Nils’ head jerk over to one side. “Nils, it’s a cafe. Glasses break all the - “
“Something is burning,” he cut me off. “Chemical burning, not food burning.”
Just as he said that, another crash led to one of the aunties we had been watching earlier jumping up with a scream, beating at the hem of her skirt. Another auntie threw the contents of the nearest cup on it, steam pouring from what had been a burning piece of fabric. Nils stood, yanking me to my feet by my arm. “Start getting everyone out of here,” he demanded. “If you smell gas, find another exit.”
I grabbed my parents first. “Someone is setting the cafe on fire,” I explained. “We need to go. Find an exit that isn’t on fire, and go through there.”
They took off, grabbing people as they went. Usually, Uncle’s shop was wide open, with doors that rolled up rather than windows, but tonight was especially chilly, so most were closed and locked down. Each one I touched was scalding hot, and the only option was one that wasn’t on fire yet but reeked of gasoline. “Lift your skirts!” I shouted, heaving the door up and gesturing people through. “Don’t drag it in the gas!”
Another wash of heat from behind, and I heard Nils shouting something, along with Baba and Mama. Both my parents were determined to help get as many people out as possible: Mama hurling any available liquid on clothes as they caught, Baba carrying older women out and rushing back in for another. Nils had pulled his leather jacket’s sleeves down over his hands and wrenched open one of the latches on the rolling window shutters before shoving it up. Flames roared on the other side, and I saw my father pick someone up and rush through, shielding them from the heat with his own body.
Mama and I took the hint and started yanking cloths from tables and shoving them in a sink full of dirty water, ignoring complaints as we wrapped them around people who could not get out fast enough under their own power. Each one, Baba or Nils would lift and carry out while we found the next, dunking whatever cloth we could in any water we could find. “UNCLE!” I screamed. “You have to get out! UNCLE!”
I couldn’t see him anywhere. “Did Uncle get out!?” I shouted at Baba.
“He is not on the outside,” came the response as a young mother and her baby were wrapped and ushered through the flaming exits.
Smoke started filling my throat, and I dropped to the floor, coughing for cleaner air. Someone pulled at my arm, and I yanked it back without looking. “UNCLE!” I screamed again before another coughing fit.
“We have to get out of here!” Mama was pulling me, Nils was pulling. A blast of fire came from the kitchen as shocking cold, stinking water poured over my head. “NOW, Elakshi!”
Mama and I were ushered out by Nils and his singed leather coat, Baba on the other side. I fell into the cold night air, gasping thirstily for it, as Baba ran back in one last time, shouting something I couldn’t understand. My vision swam as I tried to look around and count faces, desperate to find all of them.
I was still frantically looking for a handful of people - Imran, Uncle, one of the aunties who constantly tittered at me and Nils - when I was shoved to the ground by an unearthly noise. I shoved myself from the ground, hands cutting on the asphalt, to see Mama hit the ground coughing, Nils barely standing and holding up Baba.
“Lash, help!” Nils was coughing. “Press your hand down, here,” He planted a point on my father’s thigh. “Broken glass hit him. Hold it down no matter how much he yells. I have to get a belt off and make a tourniquet or he’s gonna die.”
Hot tears streaked down my face as I did what he told me. Baba groaned, and I pressed down like I was trying to crush his leg into the pavement. Nils ripped Baba’s belt off and tightened it around his leg, hard, twisted it, pinned it there with a pen, hard enough to make Baba shout. “Sorry, hold it here. DO NOT TAKE THIS OFF until the doctors look at it. Please.” His eyes were blazing.
“Check on Mama!” I begged, cranking the tourniquet as tightly as I could, slamming my shoulder into Baba’s chest to both keep him from moving and hide my sobs. “She can’t breathe.”
Nils sprinted over and I couldn’t see what he did, but he seemed to be giving Mama an airway check, then water, and pulled her over towards me, slowly sitting her down away from the fire. “Your dad got the worst of it. Your mom needs oxygen when the medics get here, best I can do is keep her from overexerting in the meantime. Keep her calm. I’ll keep an eye on your dad.”
Frantically, I ran my hands over my mother, checking her for any hidden injuries. I took several slaps to the arms and two directly to the face, but kept checking. When I was satisfied, I turned to Nils and Baba, where Nils was doing the same I had done - pinning Baba to the ground with one shoulder while cranking the tension as tight as possible on the belt around his leg. A smaller explosion within the cafe snapped my head up, and I started running. “UNCLE!” I screamed, still not having seen his face outside the now-burning shop.
A hand darted out and yanked an ankle out from under me, just in time for a lanky, leather-clad leg to pin me down. “I have two horribly burned and wounded Botelhos right now. I do not need a third. You can’t help him. Your mother starts,” he coughed, then finished in a snarl, “screaming she’s gonna die. Her lungs can’t handle that right now. Keep her calm.” Nils' voice was furious, and panicked, but as driven as I’d ever heard it.
I nodded numbly, going to reassure Mama while glancing around frantically. The young mother Baba had practically carried out was bouncing her screaming baby, and my nerves unexpectedly started calming. I don’t know that I had ever been so happy to hear a baby scream so hard in my life, but it was the reality check I needed in that moment. Those of us out here were still alive, by inches or miles, and we had to stay that way to keep the bastards who had done this from winning.
I pulled Mama to a sitting position. “We need to keep everyone calm,” I told her, well aware of what drove her more than anything else. I saw Nils mouth something that could only mean ‘tell her not to start shouting’. “I am going to prop you up where you can keep an eye on Baba, and I am going to bring people who are upset but not hurt. Can you help me keep them calm?”
This woman - my magnificent monument of a mother - looked at me like I had deeply offended her and all my ancestors. “Set me right there,” she gestured to a spot close but in clear line of sight to Baba and Nils, “and bring them to me.”
I did exactly what she asked. As neighbors came down to bring water and blankets, Mama commanded them like a general with her armies so that I could focus on those who were injured and needed more. Even then, Nils would shout what people needed, and Mama would command if someone didn’t listen. Someone would start wailing, looking for a family member who was unaccounted for, and after Mama started coughing, I did my best impression of her.
“It is the living who need us now. We will attend the rest when these are in the hospital.”
Baba was the first to go in an ambulance, with Nils shouting down his objections. “You may have waited too long to save the leg already and I don’t want you throwing a clot. GO!”
Every argument of “damn the leg” was met with an aggressive “you could still die, and then who will make sure the babies stay still for an x-ray”, until Baba surrendered under a murderous glare from the three of us. After that, it was the elderly, burn victims, smoke inhalation victims - a whole new argument from Mama, one which required sedation - and finally those of us who were part of the walking wounded were left to lick our wounds in peace.
“You should go, Lash. Your family’s hurt.”
“I need to call Mori,” I responded before adding lamely, “My sister. In case you didn’t pick up on that. She… she’ll want to know.”
“I can drive if you need. Call on the way.” he paused, then added, “Since the hospital is on the other end of town, it’s…probably better if someone drives you anyway.”
I felt myself falling into my mother’s role, unexpectedly and out of a habit I hadn’t realized I had until now. “The apartment needs to be locked up. I need to do that. And I need to let Uncle’s widow know… she shouldn’t have to hear about this from strangers. Baba and Mama will ask, so I can’t go to them without doing those things.”
Nils looked at me. “Lash. If you don’t want to go yet, if you can’t face it, I won’t make you. But your sister can lock up if she lives with you. Since you’re calling her. And Uncle’s widow is another call you can make. It’s a bit of a drive, it’s on the other end of the city.”
“No,” I cut in. “Mori lives an hour away, with her family. And I don’t know how it works for your family, but I do not want Uncle’s wife hearing this from a stranger. I can - and have - faced what is happening to my parents. But, when they wake up, they will ask these things, and I have lied once today. I will not lie about something so important.” I drew myself as tall as possible and sniffed back a sob. “You may escort me, if you wish, and then drive me to the hospital. Baba is in surgery, and Mama is in triage, so I can do nothing for them right now. But I can do the right thing for other people.”
Nils looked at me for a long moment, then he nodded. “Come on, then. Call your sister on the way to meeting with Uncle’s widow. We’ll tell her first.”
His phone started ringing, and he glanced at it and hung up. I only barely made out that his father had called him. “Come on. Let’s make sure you tell who you need to tell.”
#nihilus rex#afterverse#prequel#traumatized characters#the miys#arcadian inquisition#original fiction#science fiction#original writing#original science fiction#writeblr#modern dystopia
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This week: A few threats and an investigation. Kenji has fun with one and not the other.
Also, we talk about the challenges of writing a book during interesting times. Read the serial novel for free at syphoncontinuity.substack.com!
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In Ancient Greece and Rome, depictions of genitalia or sexual acts in art, jewelry, and gestures were used to ward against evil (often specifically by blinding the evil eye) and to invite protection to the wearer or gesturer, as evil was thought to be scandalized and repelled by explicit references to sexuality. Fast-forward to today, where advertisers and social media platforms have waged an extensive war against images of nudity and sexuality in order to claim online spaces as 'safe' for advertising products. In this essay I will
#this post brought to you by the following:#Meli was reading me an article from ars technica (chronicle of modern dystopia) about marketers listening in on consumer convos#and I held out first the bird then the mano fica to repel the evil depicted in the article#then i went wait... hold up... advertisers *are* repelled by 'obscenity'... MUCH LIKE OTHER FORMS OF EVIL#if you read this far thanks! go disable the microphone in your devices never use voice assist and don't buy a ring/alexa/etc
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#cityscape#urban#neon#cybercore#neon lights#downtown#city lights#cyberpunk#buildings#streets#town#future#futuristic#night#nighttime#street lights#modern#contemporary#cyber aesthetic#dystopia#art
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I miss sincere storytelling. I miss it when writers wanted you to care about their characters, about their world. I miss when writer would take pains to show you the light of humanity even in the most dire of worlds. I miss it when writers.... Actually seemed to like the stories they wrote. I hate modern story telling. Making a mockery of the audience when they care about a character, about a world. When the people are depraved, vain, and selfish no matter their station. I wish the worlds of modern stories were worth saving. I wish I was allowed to care about characters, about the people and their struggles with out being talked down to. I want to love, I do not wish to despair.
#No matter how good A Song of Ice and Fire was I will always resent it's popularity#it is the root of all of this#people want what it had but they don't get why it worked#People aren't making A Song of Ice and Fire#they're making Game of Thrones Season 8#I hate it I hate it I hate it I hate it#I want to care#I want a world worth saving#characters worth loving#Why save the world if the world is awful for everyone involved#you have no motive beyond tradtion#beyond the trope of a hero who save the world#Modern Hero you have nothing to save#God even the average YA dystopia felt like there was something worth fighting for#never did I think I would yern for the days of Hunger Games knock offs
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Imagine being enough of a npc to not realize "anti-racism" and tolerance of crime in cities is just a subsidy to landlords/developers.
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