Chapter Three
I was back at the palace again. I couldn’t remember why I had to sneak away on my previous journeys; this time I just left my apartment after dinner. I went upstairs again and continued along the hallway at the top only to reach a dead end. On my way back, I observed the doors more closely. They were wooden instead of metal, and the spaces between each one was wildly inconsistent. These weren’t apartments. I tried to open a door, but it was locked. I charged against it, and upon hitting the door and after eliciting a loud thump realised I couldn’t continue. I crouched down and waited. Nothing. I was safe. I hadn’t woken anybody. I knew there was something important behind these doors; they weren’t locked for no reason, but this was not the time to find out. I went back downstairs, to the bookshelves again. I picked up a book called The Trial. It was short and interesting at a glance, so I took it back to the apartment and it was the book that I read for the proceeding weeks.
The Trial was a story about a person named Joseph K, trapped in a confusing world which he doesn’t understand and no-one will explain to him. He is in trouble for some unknown reason and must go to a variety of places in an attempt to seek help. However, he never receives help and everything gets worse and worse for him until in the end, he is taken away and murdered. This book was quite similar to 1984, telling the story of another world where the main character is slowly destroyed. And so, Joseph K’s situation was also similar to mine. His enemies were inaccessible but still able to manipulate and ultimately end his life, much like the controllers in my world. Despite this, I didn’t understand his character at all. Why didn’t he try to fight back? He seemed to just accept his fate at every turn, passive and submissive. I knew that I would’ve acted different. I would’ve been angry. I would’ve resisted the executioners. I wouldn’t have turned over like a dog.
Having read through the two books, I felt something change in me, in my mind. The stories were stories of defeat. The protagonists failed and they were crushed by their oppressive government. But in their journey, in their worlds, I realised there was a capacity in me to fight for change. It was my mission to do something against the powers that controlled. The genesis of these thoughts occurred while I began to feel very fatigued. Perhaps I shouldn’t’ve read for hours into the night, night after night. My energy during the day was almost non-existent, and it was difficult just to get through the basic lessons in the classroom. I was still always thinking about my world, trying to gain an understanding of its framework from the limited information I had, but this was very difficult as I was consistently tired and uninspired. I had no energy to think, let alone be disillusioned or angry. This continued for weeks, and even as I intellectualised the desperate importance of my new cause, I did not have the will to do anything. It was a month or so until I had finally caught up with my sleep and recovered my drive. Then, it was straight to the palace to continue my quest for more information.
In the back corner of the library there was a book resting in a glass case on a low pedestal. I had not noticed it before, and now that I had seen it, it seemed strange that I had missed it on my previous two trips. Perhaps someone had only recently put it there, but that would be even stranger. The book was open at the middle, revealing letters in complex typography that looked impractical, but delightful. I read the open page of the book, and instantly knew that I needed to read the rest. It seemed that an explanation of my world sat in its pages. It was my Theory and Practise of Oligarchical Collectivism. As such, I began working at removing the book from its case. I tried to lift the case, to shake it, to find some opening through the pedestal. Nothing. It seemed I had to shatter it. I swung at it from the top with my elbow. Intact glass and a numbing pain that seared through me alerted me to the fact that this was not the right tactic. Eventually, and ingeniously, I found that I could run my thumbnail along the right-angle intersection of two pieces of glass and slowly cut through the adhesive binding the glass together. I proceeded to work my way along the top in this manner until the top piece was no longer attached and then I lifted it up. I pulled it out, turned the pages until I found the beginning and began to read.