Power Prison

Author’s Notes:

-There is some foul language. Don’t read if you don’t like it.

-For the man’s detainment, hopefully everyone understands these things are very unlikely to actually occur. It’s taking a creative license to make a point.

-If the torture seems too abrupt or sudden and the man should be more confused, please let me know. It’s kind of a hallucination/stoned recollection. I wish I had gone more into it, but I don’t want to go away from the interrogation too long.

The man had been electrocuted before.

It was after the 2008 presidential election. Obama had conquered and was going to save everyone, McCain was dying a sore loser, and Sarah Palin sent back to Alaska in tears.

Except that wasn’t true.

Obama had just barely won – the liberals at the damn Electoral College let the illegal Kenyan Muslim in—McCain was better than ever, even though it was never thought possible, and Sarah Palin stayed to save the great Nation, the United States of America.

That wasn’t true, either.

Nevertheless, the man picked up the phone, when his campaign manager called and immediately said, “I want you to join the new party movement.”

“The what?” The man was on his personal laptop, on Google. He searched for his bank, clicking on the first link.

“The Tea Party movement. Didn’t you hear about it?” The man could hear his campaign manager eating a sandwich on the line.

“What is it?” He had heard about the group before from Tweedledee and Tweedledum, but it was just an idea then, not an actual living, breathing thing.

“It’s a grassroots movement. Anti-government, anti-deficit, anti-Obama. It’s becoming a big thing right now.”

“It seems too extreme. It wouldn’t appeal to enough voters,” he said. He typed in his bank account password. The page refreshed to a welcome to his haven.

“If you don’t join, you’ll be left in the dark. This is the new demographic of your party, and it is the most powerful, because these fuckers won’t let go of anything, not even if you shoot them in the head with any sort of reason.”

“We can talk more later. I got to go.” He hung up, clicking on his balance on the computer. He wiggled his legs in nervous excitement.

The page refreshed, and saw the eight digit number he was promised from Tweedledee and Tweedledum.

Life was good.

A few hours later, it was night. After phone calls, lunch, dinner, emptying of the bowels three times, and watching an hour of C-Span, he decided to take a walk.  He went from his apartment to outside.

A black van parked across the street was the only unusual thing about the evening. He walked faster, even if he never consciously thought anything paranoid. Nothing was wrong on the outside. But someone knew something.

He only remembered tripping over a newspaper, and what happened next.

He opened his eyes. Drenched in sweat, he sat up, tied down the chair in chainmail. He was now in his undershirt and boxers. He looked around, trying to identify where he was. Everything was foreign; the red and white striped walls covered in propaganda posters from the McCarthy 1950’s, the waxy, navy floor, the dusty gold industrial lighting, the squeals of pigs and women, and worst of all, the smell. The smell of blood and sweat was gag-worthy; one could taste it in the water.

Slam.

Open.

A short man, wearing an Uncle Sam costume, walked in. His belly bounced with his slow, taunting strut. The pig smell grew fouler.

Much fouler.

 “Sir, it has come to my attention that you won’t join the Party….” Uncle Sam pulled out the chair in front of him, and sat down.

“What party?”

Uncle Sam smiled. “The Party. The Party everyone is talking about.”

The memory from the earlier phone conversation reached his consciousness. The man rubbed his lips, searching for an inoffensive answer. “Well, with all due respect sir, that really isn’t my platform—”

Uncle Sam’s eyes widened. “Do you have any idea who I am?”

“No.”

“Well, I am the CEO of Beggen Mobile.” He paused. “So you better listen to me, motherfucker, because I fucking own you. Every part of you is mine. I even own your piss, because in the water you drank or soup you had for dinner, my money was in there somewhere. And that’s what matters.”

The man shook his head, wiggling in his entrapment. “This is ridiculous. Get me out of here.”

Uncle Sam held a wire in his hand. “I control the chair. I would advise you to not let myself indulge in making you human toast.”

“What the hell is that?”

Uncle Sam. taped the wire.

“Woo-ah-oh!” The shock wiped out his consciousness.

He woke up, much later, in the same room. His chair was wet, and the room was darker, but the rest was the same. A man in a tux and a bloody Guy Fawkes mask walked toward him, just like Uncle Sam had done earlier.

“Who are you?” the man asked.

“I am you,” Guy Fawkes said, folding his hands. “I was once you, sitting in that chair, confused. But once Uncle Sam gave me his great wisdom, I went to the Party, and I follow the Party, and soon, you will too.” Guy Fawkes picked up a running chainsaw from behind his back. “You will follow the order of the Party.”

“What is this?” the man shrieked. “Get me out! Get me out!”

“Only if you follow the order of the Party.” He approached the man, getting closer. The roar rang in his ears.

“Fine, fine,” the man said, panting, “Just put that thing down! I’m in, I’m in! Let me go!”

****

The man turned back to the interrogator.  “So, that’s what happened.”

“Just imagine Guantánamo Bay,” the interrogator said. “You would confess before they even started your damn paperwork.”

The man shook his head, chuckling, “It’s funny you mention that. I was part of the group of Senators who signed a bill letting the President waiver case-by-case to transfer restrictions.”

The interrogator nodded, impressed. “But no good deed goes unpunished.”

“Indeed,” the man said softly, “indeed.”