The Department of Corrections, Book One

E30541, stuck somewhere in-between a dream and consciousness, could hear nebulous voices talking inside of his hazy, drugged mind. He was still under the influence of two powerful narcotics; still strapped vertically onto his stainless-steel chimera like Jesus Christ hanging crucified from the Cross.

“Where did all of the androids go again?” An adult, black-clad, dead-eyed, surgically-corrected male impound asked, childlike.

The IntCell’s camera, a bulging, blown-glass electronic device peeking through the weeping concrete ceiling like a curious eyeball, blinked, whirred, and focused in on the three life forms: its video a direct CCTV feed to Level NegSeven - Corrections, to Dr. Franz Johann Karp’s luxurious office, to the wall-mounted monitor above a large, designer frosted-glass and stainless-steel conference table where the Department of Corrections’ Oligarchy sat in ergonomic chairs, speechless, watching and listening: amazed by E30541.

“For the hundredth time this hour, I’ve told you, the majority have been sold for scrap, replaced by holograms,” said PsychIntTec Dnarnya, frustrated.

“Why?” asking confused, his dead-eyes unblinking.

“Because—because they were outdated, the holograms are technologically and economically superior.” She stared at the CorImp’s disfigured forehead, where a LaserKnife had left a long lobotomy scar.

“Why?” asking again, his surgically/structurally altered brain could only retain complex information for a few seconds.

Ignoring her CorImp (corrected impound). “Dr. Burgess has just wrapped up an important meeting down on Level NegSeven, he wants this E-number prepped for THarv01 (Thought Harvester One) before he returns—returns to loot this E-number’s mind.” She removed the last two, awful, metal, spider-legged contraptions, the ones that had been forcing E30541s eyes wide open, and dropped the two rusted metal clamps into her white lab coat’s right pocket. She replaced the Karpian goggles over his freed eyes, then tightened its strap around his drugged head so tight it almost became a tourniquet to its own propaganda. A neon-orange . . . NO ESCAPE. NO RESCUE. NO LIBERATION. NO HOPE. . . . scrolled across E30541s right lens.

“Pfffpppttt! . . . PFPT!” The CorImp passed lethal gas, loudly—like a thermonuclear blast, then laughed uncontrollably while clapping his out-of-sync hands together. Control of bodily functions, especially ImpKib flatulence, was a major problem for the recently lobotomized.

“Emission violation! Natural biological function! Emission violation!” VIL-EN’s mechanical voice boomed from IntCell A’s rusty ceiling speakers as if she had detected nerve gas. A pair of horrific, alien-faced bio masks fell from the waterlogged concrete ceiling, dangling by long rubber umbilical cords supplying fresh air. Human flatulence had long ago been banned, criminalized, now considered a disgusting bio-terror-hazard. The State’s laws, and Man, still foolishly trying to control the laws of biology, nature, and God. Man’s laws imposed over God’s laws. Regulation overriding common sense.

“Quit farting around and bring me the THarv01, the infiltrator of minds, the latest in thought recognition technology,” said PsychIntTec Dnarnya, repulsed. . . . “The wheely-thing,” she added, noticing her gassy CorImp looked confused.

“O—OK!”

PsychIntTec Dnarnya punched a 6-double-digit code (1:2, 3:5, 2:2, 1:4, 1:5, 3:4) on a small, battered, wall-mounted computer terminal. The hissing bio masks and writhing rubber umbilical cords now retracting back up into a tight slit in the moist concrete ceiling, as if returning to the Mother.

The surgically-corrected CorImp returned pushing a wheeled, dolly-like instrument having a built-in computer CPU, keyboard, mouse, monitor, and printer. A tall, narrow stainless-steel box housing a nuclear-powered electromagnetic coil—and attached to it by frayed wires—a thin metallic bowl having holes punched through it that would be fitted over the subject’s head: something resembling a dented metal colander connected to a tangle of blackened electrical wires that looked like burnt noodles. This perforated, gray-matter-gray, scorched-metal helmet was held in place by a drool-stained leather chinstrap and two, shiny, galvanized temple screws like some high-tech crown of thorns. The red-hot rig smelled of lightning-struck metal and blanched cauliflower brains.

The Karpian State’s Brain Mapping Initiative created this noninvasive-invasive device—the THarv01—for policing human thought. Able to read a subject’s electrical and magnetic brain impulses (physically and remotely), translating known stimuli, sounds and images, thoughts, etc., into recognizable representations; into an alphabet; into translatable words: then reverse engineering the electromagnetic data, allowing the State access into every citizen’s mind: each mind an individual Rosetta stone. The last individual freedom conquered, no human being’s thoughts, awake or asleep, were safe from the collective State. A lifetime of sights, sounds, smells, tastes, touch, words, truths, lies, desires, fears, prayers, curses, unspoken thoughts, memories, dreams, nightmares, hallucinations, the conscious, the unconscious, and the revealing subconscious (sexuality, racism, individualism, etc.) all exposed and displayed as orangish images or neon-orange TT (Thought Text) on a monochrome monitor to be viewed, printed, downloaded, or altered as needed. Our last private frontier, “the human mind,” taken against our will: mind raped by the State; skull fucked by technology; the mind’s eye violated in the name of progress. Like a violent prison initiation leaving you penetrated, bleeding, and sore, there was no kiss on the mouth for being the State’s bitch.

The gassy CorImp stood by, as useful as a gun without bullets. PsychIntTec Dnarnya placed THarv01s perforated helmet on Equality 30541s drugged head, then securing the chinstrap and tightening the temple screws, she activated the nuclear-powered noodle strainer. The electromagnetic coil thundered; the silent, monochrome-orange monitor repeatedly flashed like neon-orange lightning, then E30541s neon-orange Thought Text rained onto the rig’s tiny screen (forming a neon-orange puddle of information):

I am Sasha Malyj . . .

I am Sasha Malyj . . .

I am Sasha Malyj . . .

I must find Sylvia Black . . .

A 3D image of Sylvia Black’s orangish face appeared for a moment, then faded away.

I am Sasha Malyj . . .

I am Sasha Malyj . . .

I am Sasha Malyj . . .

I, I, I, Me, Me, Me, My, My, My, Mine, Mine, Mine, I, I, I . . .

I am Sasha Malyj . . .

I am Sasha Malyj . . .

I am Sasha Malyj . . .

I must find Sylvia Black . . .

A 3D image of Sylvia Black’s orangish face appeared for a moment, then faded away.

I am Sasha Malyj . . .

I am Sasha Malyj . . .

I am Sasha Malyj . . .

Please, Jesus, give me the strength to defeat my enemies, for “they” are stronger

than “I” am. In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

Amen . . .

“Prayer violation! Christianity banned! Prayer violation!” Knowing E30541s thoughts, knowing only the Karpian State may be worshiped, VIL-EN’s mechanical voice boomed from the waterlogged concrete ceiling’s rusty speakers. The soulless machine had interfaced with his outlawed soul, like HIV affixing to a CD4+ T-helper cell, like HIV-related stigma and discrimination affixing to an HIV-positive person.

These short, repetitive thoughts scrolled rapidly up and up and up the battered screen like a neon-orange blur, occasionally changing, revealing E30541 was still in control of the spinning clockworks inside of his drugged mind, still consciously resisting the Karpian State’s technological brainwashing with his self-conditioning and prayers.

“Impressive, impressive, but! every impound has his breaking point.” Dr. Burgess had entered IntCell A unnoticed, startling his two minions. His eyes suddenly burning, watering. Wondering: What isth that oppressive, gas-chamber-like, Zyklon B stench?

Fascinated by the upward scrolling lines of neon-orange Thought Text on THarv01s battered monitor (blurring words stretching up into what looked like long, encrypted, neon-orange bar code), Dr. Burgess stared into the private thoughts (autosuggestion) of Equality 30541s drugged and Karpian goggled/propagandized mind: amazed.

Dr. Burgess highlighted one of E30541s repetitive thoughts: {I am Sasha Malyj . . .}. His manicured fingernail hovering just above THarv01s battered keyboard, ready to redact—[option] key, or subtract—[delete] key, this corrupted data-string of information currently infecting E30541s mind like a dangerous computer virus. His pale, effeminate finger plunged toward the battered keyboard, toward the . . .