Moxyland

Kendra

Is it perverse to feel liberated? Not just ditching that asshole, just another Jonathan, but the grounding of being disconnect that separates me from the swirl of the city around me. The dissociation is real for once, not artificially imposed and filtered through my camera. I’m a stranger among the commuters and people opening up the storefronts. It’s beautiful. And totally impractical, the squeeze in my stomach reminds me.

I realise I’m not so far from District Six, but without my SIM ID, the front door to Mr. Muller’s subterr doesn’t recognise me. It takes a long time for him to answer the intercom.

‘Who’s that?’

‘It’s me, Mr. Muller. Kendra.’

‘Kendra! Why don’t you just come down, my girl?’

‘It’s my phone, Mr. Muller. It’s…’ My voice cracks. There is a brittle pause. I haven’t seen him since the exhibition. I should have called, just to see if he was okay, but I’ve been preoccupied.

‘Come down. I’ll put on the ultra.’

By the time I get down, it’s just starting to infuse. And he has food. A slightly stale bagel with peanut butter. But no Ghost. I wonder if I can convince him to get me one from the building’s café, when he points to the news footage, which he has maximised so that it’s playing all over the walls, tuned to different channels.

‘Did you see this? The bombing?’

I haven’t.

The footage focuses on the wall of the old city library, where a mural of a soccer ball and two hands forming a heart shape with the fingers has been painted. The words UBUNTU appear above it, spangled with glitter – no, lightbulbs, LEDs forming lightshow patterns. The soccer ball becomes a globe, a skull, a heart. And then the bulbs suddenly all pop, not exactly co-ordinated, with a noise like firecrackers, spraying twinkles of glass, so that people below cringe and duck.

A few of them sort of run away, hands up above their heads before they catch themselves and look back. The bulbs crackle and snap for another few seconds and then a thin drift of chemical-coloured smoke peels off, leaving the wall cratered and pitted.

‘If they had an agenda, I might be able to understand, but this nihilism… Six dead, nineteen wounded. What are they protesting, anyway? Capitalism? As if there’s an alternative. Where do they think their fancy technology comes from?’ Mr. Muller is in full rant mode.

I’m not really paying attention. Most of the channels are playing footage from what looks like a warzone. Rubble, people screaming, broken glass and blood, a torn-apart car – like the truck in Mr. Muller’s photograph.

‘And don’t get me started on the fantasy of economic equality,’ he says. ‘Society has always been structured by privilege. This is the best we’ve had it. You work hard, you put your back into it, you get to claim the rewards. Freedom is a state of mind, Kendra. How old are you? Too young to remember what it was like.’

The footage plays back in slow-mo. A line of people, with the desperate look of refugees or Rural, wait outside a glass box marked Casualty. There is a twist of tar leading up into the parkade, like a loll of grey tongue in a butcher’s window, an ambulance parked outside. A soccer ball floats surreally towards the building and, more surreal, the doors slide open to let it in. A woman smiles, delighted and points. And then the building turns itself inside out. I sit down heavily on the couch. It’s too much.

‘Compared to living in fear, terrorised by criminals, the hijackings and shootings and the tik junkies ready to kill you, shoot you, stab you, for a watch or a camera, I’ll take those modified dogs and the whaddayacallit, the cellphone electrocutions, any day. But these people don’t understand what they’re trying to achieve.’

Every channel comes back to it, on constant repeat. Like the chorus of a terrible song.

‘Anarchy? Undermining our way of life? And what’s that going to prove? More to the point, what’s it going to change? This is only going to lead to more severe controls. But we need them, Kendra, I’m telling you, humanity is innately damaged. It’s a flaw in the design code. We’re weak. We’re fallible. We need to be told what to do, to be kept in line.’

He notes me shrinking deeper into the couch.

‘Forgive me, I’m ranting. You know what happens when I get started. What’s this about your phone?’ The sudden generosity of all his attention makes me want to weep with gratitude, so I fumble over my words.

‘It’s dead. They blew out everyone’s phones. I don’t know what to do.’

His voice takes on a sharp note of query. ‘When was this?’

‘Last night. The station. There was a protest. I guess it dropped off the scanner in light of… this.’ I wave my hand at the overwhelming visuals cramming into the lounge.

Mr. Muller’s face solidifies around his jaw. ‘You can’t stay here. You have to get to a, whatsit, immune centre. You’re sick.’ The word strikes me like an accusation. It’s not only the associations of the superdemic; it feels like a personal attack on my genetic potential, the dark rotting tumour waiting to flower in my gut, like my father.

‘But I’m not. The nano…’ but suddenly it feels like too much to explain. And can I really explain?

‘Are you part of this? Are you associated with those terrorists? I know what art school is like. And my God, that thing at your exhibition. You are part of this. If you don’t leave my house immediately, I will call the authorities. There’s a number. On TV. I’ll call them. I won’t be an accessory, Kendra. I’m an old man.’

‘Mr. Muller, please,’ I laugh, despite myself, at the quaver in his voice, at the absurdity. ‘Look, whatever they said on the news, it’s not the full story. Did they say it was a complete over-reaction to a peaceful protest?’

‘Those kids had weapons. They showed it. Hacking up the dogs. People were next.’

‘You talk about controls, but this wasn’t control. This was a…’ I cast around for the right word, and as soon as it’s out, I know it’s a mistake, the end of our rational discussion: ‘A holocaust.’

He takes out his phone and starts hitting the keypad, his hand shaking so hard I’m sure he’s going to drop it. ‘I’m calling them, Kendra. I’m calling.’

It’s more pity than fear that incites me to leave.