But where was it any
different?
Orwell - 1984
Some words, on
the other hand, displayed a frank and contemptuous un-
derstanding of the real nature of Oceanic society. An
example was PROLEFEED, meaning the rubbishy enter-
tainment and spurious news which the Party handed out
to the masses. Other words, again, were ambivalent, hav-
ing the connotation 'good' when applied to the Party and
FreeeBooksatPlaneteBook. com 385
'bad' when applied to its enemies. But in addition there were
great numbers of words which at first sight appeared to be
mere abbreviations and which derived their ideological co-
lour not from their meaning, but from their structure.
So far as it could be contrived, everything that had or
might have political significance of any kind was fitted into
the B vocabulary. The name of every organization, or body
of people, or doctrine, or country, or institution, or public
building, was invariably cut down into the familiar shape;
that is, a single easily pronounced word with the smallest
number of syllables that would preserve the original deri-
vation. In the Ministry of Truth, for example, the Records
Department, in which Winston Smith worked, was called
RECDEP, the Fiction Department was called FICDEP, the
Teleprogrammes Department was called TELEDEP, and so
on. This was not done solely with the object of saving time.
Even in the early decades of the twentieth century, tele-
scoped words and phrases had been one of the characteristic
features of political language; and it had been noticed that
the tendency to use abbreviations of this kind was most
marked in totalitarian countries and totalitarian organi-
zations. Examples were such words as NAZI, GESTAPO,
COMINTERN, INPRECORR, AGITPROP. In the begin-
ning the practice had been adopted as it were instinctively,
but in Newspeak it was used with a conscious purpose. It
was perceived that in thus abbreviating a name one nar-
rowed and subtly altered its meaning, by cutting out most of
the associations that would otherwise cling to it. The words
COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL, for instance, call up
386 1984
a composite picture of universal human brotherhood, red
flags, barricades, Karl Marx, and the Paris Commune. The
word COMINTERN, on the other hand, suggests merely a
tightly-knit organization and a well-defined body of doc-
trine. It refers to something almost as easily recognized,
and as limited in purpose, as a chair or a table. COMIN-
TERN is a word that can be uttered almost without taking
thought, whereas COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL is
a phrase over which one is obliged to linger at least mo-
mentarily. In the same way, the associations called up by a
word like MINITRUE are fewer and more controllable than
those called up by MINISTRY OF TRUTH. This accounted
not only for the habit of abbreviating whenever possible, but
also for the almost exaggerated care that was taken to make
every word easily pronounceable.
In Newspeak, euphony outweighed every consideration
other than exactitude of meaning. Regularity of grammar
was always sacrificed to it when it seemed necessary. And
rightly so, since what was required, above all for political
purposes, was short clipped words of unmistakable mean-
ing which could be uttered rapidly and which roused the
minimum of echoes in the speaker's mind. The words of the
B vocabulary even gained in force from the fact that nearly
all of them were very much alike. Almost invariably these
words— GOODTHINK, MINIPAX, PROLEFEED, SEX-
CRIME, JOYCAMP, INGSOC, BELLYFEEL, THINKPOL,
and countless others — were words of two or three syllables,
with the stress distributed equally between the first syllable
and the last. The use of them encouraged a gabbling style of
FreeeBooksatPlaneteBook. com 387
speech, at once staccato and monotonous. And this was ex-
actly what was aimed at. The intention was to make speech,
and especially speech on any subject not ideologically neu-
tral, as nearly as possible independent of consciousness. For
the purposes of everyday life it was no doubt necessary, or
sometimes necessary, to reflect before speaking, but a Party
member called upon to make a political or ethical judge-
ment should be able to spray forth the correct opinions as
automatically as a machine gun spraying forth bullets. His
training fitted him to do this, the language gave him an al-
most foolproof instrument, and the texture of the words,
with their harsh sound and a certain wilful ugliness which
was in accord with the spirit of Ingsoc, assisted the process
still further.
So did the fact of having very few words to choose from.
Relative to our own, the Newspeak vocabulary was tiny,
and new ways of reducing it were constantly being devised.
Newspeak, indeed, differed from most all other languages
in that its vocabulary grew smaller instead of larger every
year. Each reduction was a gain, since the smaller the area
of choice, the smaller the temptation to take thought. Ulti-
mately it was hoped to make articulate speech issue from
the larynx without involving the higher brain centres at
all. This aim was frankly admitted in the Newspeak word
DUCKSPEAK, meaning 'to quack like a duck'. Like various
other words in the B vocabulary, DUCKSPEAK was ambiv-
alent in meaning. Provided that the opinions which were
quacked out were orthodox ones, it implied nothing but
praise, and when 'The Times' referred to one of the orators
1984
of the Party as a DOUBLEPLUSGOOD DUCKSPEAKER it
was paying a warm and valued compliment.
THE C VOCABULARY. The C vocabulary was supple-
mentary to the others and consisted entirely of scientific
and technical terms. These resembled the scientific terms
in use today, and were constructed from the same roots, but
the usual care was taken to define them rigidly and strip
them of undesirable meanings. They followed the same
grammatical rules as the words in the other two vocabu-
laries. Very few of the C words had any currency either in
everyday speech or in political speech. Any scientific work-
er or technician could find all the words he needed in the
list devoted to his own speciality, but he seldom had more
than a smattering of the words occurring in the other lists.
Only a very few words were common to all lists, and there
was no vocabulary expressing the function of Science as a
habit of mind, or a method of thought, irrespective of its
particular branches. There was, indeed, no word for 'Sci-
ence', any meaning that it could possibly bear being already
sufficiently covered by the word INGSOC.
From the foregoing account it will be seen that in New-
speak the expression of unorthodox opinions, above a very
low level, was well-nigh impossible. It was of course pos-
sible to utter heresies of a very crude kind, a species of
blasphemy. It would have been possible, for example, to say
BIG BROTHER IS UNGOOD. But this statement, which
to an orthodox ear merely conveyed a self-evident absur-
dity, could not have been sustained by reasoned argument,
because the necessary words were not available. Ideas inim-
FreeeBooksatPlaneteBook. com 389
ical to Ingsoc could only be entertained in a vague wordless
form, and could only be named in very broad terms which
lumped together and condemned whole groups of heresies
without defining them in doing so. One could, in fact, only
use Newspeak for unorthodox purposes by illegitimately
translating some of the words back into Oldspeak. For ex-
ample, ALL MANS ARE EQUAL was a possible Newspeak
sentence, but only in the same sense in which ALL MEN
ARE REDHAIRED is a possible Oldspeak sentence. It did
not contain a grammatical error, but it expressed a palpa-
ble untruth — i. e. that all men are of equal size, weight, or
strength. The concept of political equality no longer existed,
and this secondary meaning had accordingly been purged
out of the word EQUAL. In 1984, when Oldspeak was still
the normal means of communication, the danger theo-
retically existed that in using Newspeak words one might
remember their original meanings. In practice it was not
difficult for any person well grounded in DOUBLETHINK
to avoid doing this, but within a couple of generations even
the possibility of such a lapse would have vaished. A per-
son growing up with Newspeak as his sole language would
no more know that EQUAL had once had the second-
ary meaning of 'politically equal', or that FREE had once
meant 'intellectually free', than for instance, a person who
had never heard of chess would be aware of the secondary
meanings attaching to QUEEN and ROOK. There would
be many crimes and errors which it would be beyond his
power to commit, simply because they were nameless and
therefore unimaginable. And it was to be foreseen that with
1984
the passage of time the distinguishing characteristics of
Newspeak would become more and more pronounced — its
words growing fewer and fewer, their meanings more and
more rigid, and the chance of putting them to improper
uses always diminishing.
When Oldspeak had been once and for all superseded,
the last link with the past would have been severed. History
had already been rewritten, but fragments of the literature
of the past survived here and there, imperfectly censored,
and so long as one retained one's knowledge of Oldspeak
it was possible to read them. In the future such fragments,
even if they chanced to survive, would be unintelligible
and untranslatable. It was impossible to translate any pas-
sage of Oldspeak into Newspeak unless it either referred to
some technical process or some very simple everyday ac-
tion, or was already orthodox (GOODTHINKFUL would
be the Newspeak expression) in tendency. In practice this
meant that no book written before approximately 1960
could be translated as a whole. Pre-revolutionary literature
could only be subjected to ideological translation — that is,
alteration in sense as well as language. Take for example
the well-known passage from the Declaration of Indepen-
dence:
WE HOLD THESE TRUTHS TO BE SELF-EVIDENT,
THAT ALL MEN ARE CREATED EQUAL, THAT THEY
ARE ENDOWED BY THEIR CREATOR WITH CERTAIN
INALIENABLE RIGHTS, THAT AMONG THESE ARE
LIFE, LIBERTY, AND THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS.
Free eBooks at Planet eBook. com 391
THAT TO SECURE THESE RIGHTS, GOVERNMENTS ARE
INSTITUTED AMONG MEN, DERIVING THEIR POWERS
FROM THE CONSENT OF THE GOVERNED. THAT
WHENEVER ANY FORM OF GOVERNMENT BECOMES
DESTRUCTIVE OF THOSE ENDS, IT IS THE RIGHT OF THE
PEOPLE WALTER OR ABOLISH IT, AND TO INSTITUTE
NEW GOVERNMENT. . .
It would have been quite impossible to render this into
Newspeak while keeping to the sense of the original. The
nearest one could come to doing so would be to swallow the
whole passage up in the single word CRIMETHINK. A full
translation could only be an ideological translation, where-
by Jefferson's words would be changed into a panegyric on
absolute government.
A good deal of the literature of the past was, indeed, al-
ready being transformed in this way. Considerations of
prestige made it desirable to preserve the memory of cer-
tain historical figures, while at the same time bringing
their achievements into line with the philosophy of Ingsoc.
Various writers, such as Shakespeare, Milton, Swift, By-
ron, Dickens, and some others were therefore in process of
translation: when the task had been completed, their orig-
inal writings, with all else that survived of the literature
of the past, would be destroyed. These translations were
a slow and difficult business, and it was not expected that
they would be finished before the first or second decade of
the twenty-first century. There were also large quantities of
merely utilitarian literature — indispensable technical man-
1984
uals, and the like — that had to be treated in the same way. It
was chiefly in order to allow time for the preliminary work
of translation that the final adoption of Newspeak had been
fixed for so late a date as 2050.
Free eBooks at Planet eBook. com
Alexander Merow
Prey World
Citizen 1-564398B-278843
Novel
Parti
Prey World
Chapters
Foreword 5
Citizen 1-564398B-278843 7
Automated Trial 23
Big Eye 31
The Change 49
Outsourced 56
World Peace in Ivas? 82
Rebellion and Fresh Snow 98
Procrastination is the Thief of Time! 116
Aux Champs-Elysees 139
The Lull before the Storm 155
Bomb-happy. . . 171
Red Moon 178
With him 193
Prey World - Citizen 1-564398B-278843
Content
The year 2028. Mankind is in the stranglehold of a
worldwide surveillance state. Frank Kohlhaas, a petty
citizen, lives a cheerless life, working as an agency worker
in a steel plant.
One day, he gets into a conflict with the tyrannical system,
because of an unfortunate accident. An automated trail
convicts him to five years of imprisonment and Frank
disappears in a detention centre, where he suffers under a
cruel system of brainwashing and reeducation.
After eight months of pain, the authorities decide to transfer
him to another prison. On the way there, something
unexpected happens. Suddenly everything changes and the
young man finds himself caught between the fronts. . .
Foreword
This is the English version of the first book of Alexander
Merow's "Prey World" series. The novel was translated by
Thorsten Weber - and the whole procedure entailed a lot of
work. But it was also really funny.
It is not a professional translation and the translator is not a
"native speaker" or English teacher. He is just a guy who
loves science-fiction and dystopias. So try not to laugh at
some of the translated phrases, or the wrath of a real freak
will come over you!
Nevertheless, we thought that would be a good idea to
translate this interesting, courageous and critical novel into
the English language. At the same time it will also enable
English speaking people to join Alexander Merow's growing
audience.
"Prey World" is neither an ordinary book nor light
entertainment. There is already plenty of "light
entertainment" in our times - far too much. On the other
hand, there are not enough books like "Prey World". Books
that make you think about the world we live in. And it is
important that people begin to think.
The author has already found numerous interested readers
all over Germany, and we hope, he will find additional
readers in the English-speaking countries. We would also
be glad, if a "real" mother-tongue speaker were to edit this
English version one day.
Some readers compare "Prey World" with George Orweirs
"1984", the classic among the dystopic novels. Others see
elements of Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451" in it.
However, critical thinkers and friends of so called
"conspiracy theories" will have their fun with "Prey World". Is
Alexander Merow' s vision of the future really realistic at all?
A worldwide surveillance state? A World Government under
the control of a ruthless secret society? We will see!
And always remember. . .
"Only a fool would think that "Prey World" is nothing
but fiction! " (Alexander Merow)
Have fun!
Alexander Merow and Thorsten Weber, Berlin 201 1
E-mail: A. Merow@gmx. de
"Maybe it is nothing but madness and suicide. Maybe it will
not change the world, but this is not important for me.
Nevertheless, it will change something for me!
I have suffered too much to humble myself anymore. They
have told us to humble ourselves - since the kindergarten.
Shut up! Consume! Obey! Endure! Believe everything!
Watch shit! Buy shit! Eat shit! Turn the other cheek!
What has become of us? Why have we become sheep?
Why do we endure this all without doing something? Why
has nobody the guts to act?
Thorsten's books were a real eye-opener to me! Now, I
know who they are and what they plan for us all. And I can't
forget what they have done to me. They call us "cattle".
Okay, then I will be the black sheep in the flock. And the
black sheep will fight back now! And it does not fear the
butcher anymore, because even a butcher can be killed.
Franky, the little black sheep, will make them pay now! And
I hope that the flock of white sheep will wake up some day. "
P. S. : If I don't come back, please give this book to Julia. . .
Diary entry of Frank Kohlhaas, 17. 02. 2029
Citizen 1-564398B-278843
Frank Kohlhaas, who was called citizen 1-564398B-278843
in his everyday life, because this was his official
administrative code, was already dreaming of the
unpleasant smell in the hall of his flat, reminding him of
rotten eggs. In his mind, shortly before 5. 00 o'clock in the
morning - soon the dream would be terminated by the
alarm - Frank was on a walk through a sunny valley. But
even at this beautiful place, the moldy smell was still
pervasive, so that Frank wondered, how such a beautiful
valley could smell so repulsive.
When the alarm-clock rang, it quickly became clear that the
sunny valley was just fantasy, although the smell was real.
The noise was shrill and Frank awoke swearing. Now he
had to get up, put on his clothes, have a hasty breakfast
and walk to the production complex 42-B.
„Damn! ", hissed the unshaven man as he moved his not
excessively tall, but amazingly strong body from his cheaply
produced bed.
„Hmmmhaaa! ", yawned Frank, shuffling through his still dark
apartment to the next room, where a dirty kitchen was
waiting for him. The citizen tore open the refrigerator door
and chocked down a cheese sandwich, the meager left-
overs from yesterday's supper.
The water kettle was started with a loud whoosh and, after a
few minustes, supplied hot water for a cup of instant coffee.
„Nnnhhaa! ", uttered the young man, a statement, that could
be interpreted in many ways at this early hour, and could
have referred to his life situation in general. At 5. 27 o'clock,
Frank closed the battered door behind himself and walked
listlessly down the dark corridor on his way to descend the
even darker stairway. The source of that foul stench, that
had been torturing Frank's nose for days, was somewhere
here. Perhaps one of the other tenants, damn idiot, had left
his garbage in the corridor.
J don't know. . . ", he muttered.
Each morning it was the same old story: „Rising, eating,
walking, slogging away. . . ", as Kohlhaas always said.
In the past years, he had learned to hate his life. He was 25
years old now, living in a more than shabby flat on the
outskirts of the former FRG capital, Berlin, working for
modest wages as a temporary help in a steel plant. In
former times, he had wanted to study, but this issue was
over - for reasons that Frank never mentioned.
Actually, he was not dumb, but, according to his own words,
he couldn't hack it yet. However, the job at the steel plant
was better than nothing, because it gave him the chance to
earn some money and to survive - an advantage that was
not enjoyed by millions of Germans in the year 2027.
As he now groped along again on this particular morning,
step by step towards the plant, he passed demolished
houses in the twilight and crowds of homeless people lying
in masses in the dark corners of the streets.
„What would be, if I simply didn't care about the
consequences and went home again, got back into my bed
and just slept until tomorrow? ", he thought sometimes.
„What would it be like if I just packed my bags and
disappeared from this rotten city, this scruffy country? ", he
asked himself occasionally.
But where was it any different? He should enjoy, what he
had - he'd got a job and didn't go hungry. That was at least
something, thought Frank.
After the worker had gone through a very long and dark
underpass without giving a Globe coin to the drunken
beggar there, the production complex came into Frank's
vision. It was 5. 53 in the morning and the workers for the
early shift stood there waiting, smoking, jawing.
When the factory gates finally opened at 6 o'clock, about
200 workers poured through them like a viscous mash. Most
of them were not in any rush to begin their work, but it had
to be, there was no other way.
"No alternative! ", as Frank always said.
After ten hours, they went back home again. All were dirty
and tired, but happy that the work was over for the day.
Frank crept through the corridor on his floor, which was still
dim even by day, and unlocked the door of his apartment.
There were no new messages on the Scanchip and that
was good, because it were usually only calculations:
electricity, water and such things. Frank had placed the
television in his bedroom the day before, so if he couldn't
fall asleep, he could turn it on. The program did not interest
him, but with the sound of anyone talking, he didn't feel so
alone in this dark block of flats.
Kohlhaas just knew his neighbours from brief encounters.
Many of them only left their apartments to go to work and
some of them had become serious boozers in recent years.
From time to time someone would bawl from his balcony or
accosted people, passing "his block" - but after a while,
everyone was sleeping.
Citizen 1-564398B-278843 watched television till 22. 37
o'clock: the news („War of the global armed forces against
dangerous terrorists in Iran"), talk shows, easy
entertainment on all fronts, warnings of the second dog flu
epidemic and the necessity for the immediate compulsory
inoculation. Then he fell asleep, although meanwhile the
foul smell from outside seemed to have lodged itself in his
pillow. . . .
Next day. . .
10
„Good morning, Frank! ", muttered Dirk Weber, one of the
foremen. „Good morning, Dirk! ", answered Frank listlessly. It
was 6. 03 o'clock, the morning shift began. A-341, this was
the designation of the young man as worker and temporary
help in the steel plant, gave his helping hands for many
operational steps till the clock indicated 10. 30.
Now it was time for a short lunch, and when Frank
unwraped his only bun which was covered with a piece of
salami, he did not suspect, that an unpleasant stroke of fate
would wait for him in the following minutes.
Since approximately half a year, the production complex'
administration had arranged the singing of the "One-World-
Song", due to a new international regulation, before every
lunch time in each production complex - for the increase of
work moral and to strengthen the international doctrine of
„peace, freedom, prosperity and equality" that was
propagated by the World Government since 2018. The
official of the "Ministry for Production Supervision", stationed
in this enterprise, Mr. Gert Sasse, who was mostly in his
office above the factory building, had conscientiously come
down to the workers to sing the "One-World-Song" with
them. It was always the same.
. . Workers, now is lunch time! But we will sing first! ", he
shouted through the hall and the steel workers formed to a
bored line, in order to enjoy the short break after the
singing:
"We are the children of One-World and we are all equal!
We love our One-World, the great realm of peace!
We don't know any classes, we don't know any races. . . "
Frank heard ever more rarely on the text in the last weeks,
didn't move his lips and stared at the ceiling of the dirty
production hall. . . Hurry up! ", he thought and boredly scraped
11
with his left foot over the dusty ground. Then the singing
was over.
„Gosh! This stupid song is really getting on my nerves! ",
said the labourer very quietly to himself.
„AH right, men! That could be done - halfway! Enjoy your
meal! ", called the official of the "Ministry for Production
Supervision" and A-341 looked forward to a hungry bite in
his softened roll.
But while his teeth eagerly crushed the salty piece of
salami, he was hit by an angry look of Mr. Sasse. The
supervisor narrowed his eyes to slits and looked like an
aggressive bulldog.
„A-341! Yes, you! Come to me! Hurry! ", he roared at the top
of his lungs.
This got Frank's adrenalin flowing. He didn't need quarrel at
work anymore.
„Come on, A-341! ", yelled Mr. Sasse, waving the worker
nearer. Kohlhaas followed the order immediately.
„l am just a fool for you, isn't it? ", hissed the man.
„Eh. . . no! Of course not, Sir. . . eh. . . Mr. Sasse! ", stammered
Frank.
J fail to see what you mean. . . ", he added stumbling.
„How I mean this, you idiot? ", screamed the official with a
look which gave the young man the biggest possible
uneasiness. A malicious silence prevailed for several
oppressive seconds. Meanwhile, the eyes of the superior
threateningly became smaller and bushy, black eyebrows
were pushed over them.
A second later, Frank saw a fist with fatty fingers fly towards
his face. It suddenly hurt and his nasal bone reacted with a
cracking on the punch. While some blood threads flowed
down from his nose, A-341 heard a growl: „How I mean that,
you numbskull? "
12
„lf I give the instruction that the „One-World-Song" has to be
sung, you have to sing it too. This was an order! ",
completed Mr. Sasse his powerful argument.
His intonation varied now between satisfaction and
rampantly growing meanness. In the meantime, Kohlhaas
had gone to the ground. This punch had been really hard
and Sasse gave him another kick in the ribs now.
„Do you understand, idiot? You probably think, that you
have a special status here, isn't it? ", he roared.
The other workers googled at him and hid their faces behind
their rolls. Meanwhile, Kohlhaas felt like a kicked dog,
humiliated in front of the rest of his colleagues - what was
very close to reality. Without considering his action, he
jumped up and positioned himself in front of the official of
the "Ministry for Production Supervision".
"You can be glad, that you are my superior, otherwise I
would break you every bone! ", screamed Frank with boiling
fury. Gert Sasse was baffled. A-341 obstinately wiped off
the blood from his lip.
One hour later, the worker still waited in front of the door of
the production complex leader. Sasse was in his office and
Frank heard him swearing and ranting. This was no good
sign.
„A-341, come in! ", resounded the voice of the highest boss
of this work plant over the brightly illuminated corridor. The
young man started moving and took a seat on the chair in
the middle of the office room. A short silence followed, then
it began.
J took a look on your Scanchip, A-341! ", reported Mr.
Reimers, the production complex leader. „ln the ten years of
your activity here, you had come too late three times. Apart
from that, this is not the first time that you make a spectacle
13
of yourself. You are already occured to me, because of
subversive statements at work which can probably also be
confirmed by your colleagues. We have even marked you
with a blue code 67-Beta, if you didn't know it yet, A-341!
We will examine the video tapes of your working days in this
complex in the next days, with our new "Voice-Analysis-
System", and Tim sure that we will find some more
subversive statements.
But what you have done today, is a real scandal!
Threatening an official of the highest authority of production
supervision. Is there just air in your head, boy? If I don't
take drastic measures in a case like this, my superiors will
make me a lot of problems.
I must dismiss you, A-341! Further, I am correctly obligated,
to react on such an unbelievable incident with a message to
the responsible administration. Disappear now from this
production complex, and never come back, A-341! "
Frank Kohlhaas, the just dismissed worker, was struck
dumb with horror. His vocal chords seemed to be rusted, his
throat was tied and his courage was put on ice somewhere.
He went out, just went out, pale as death, with a roaring
head, without answering. Frank had lost his job, his source
for subsistence. And this was no fun in these joyless days.
Like in trance, the young man went into the changing room
of the production complex and absently opened the baggy
sheet door of his spint. . . Dismissal" - this word sounded like
the cut of a razor in the ear of each listener in this time. It
was related to the word . . liquidation", because it was the
destruction of the social existence. Being dismissed meant
to get no more Globes, as the international currency was
called since the year 2018. If Frank would not find a new
employment as soon as possible, he could lose his
apartment, his food and finally also his life. Any social
14
security, warranted by the state, had completely been
abolished since the total collapse of world economy in
winter 2012/13. And it was more than difficult, to find work in
a time, in which the industrial production in old Central and
Western Europe had mostly been outsourced to the Third
World. Therefore, millions of Europeans tried to survive by
doing extremly bad paid jobs in this dark present. They had
nothing to lose, so they were glad about every breadline
wage they could get. Those, who were not able to find a
possibility to earn some money in any way, ended as
beggars and homeless people, hanging around under
bridges or in vacant house ruins.
On the next day, Frank was not awaked by the shrill sound
of his alarm, after an sorrowful and restless night, but by the
disgusting stench which came from the stairway. The smell
had not been liquidated by anyone - against the spirit of the
age.
Only in the early morning hours, he had been able to sleep
for a while, because of his constant brooding and the
unpleasant thoughts that had tortured him during the night.
As first thought of the new grey day, the face of Mr. Sasse
appeared in his head and the face of citizen 1-564398B-
278843 changed to a hateful grimace, when he mused
about killing the official with an iron rod.
„This damn hybrid! If my life goes down the drain, because
of that guy, then I will smash the skull of this bastard before
I go to hell! ", hissed Frank, erupting in anger.
He finally crept out of his bed and stared down at the dirty
street in front of his apartement block.
„Damn! What shall I do now? ", he thought. J must find a
new job, otherwise they will close the account on my
Scanchip, because I can't pay the fucking calculations any
longer. "
15
After a further hour of useless musing, he left his dwelling,
tried not to inhale too deeply on the corridor, and walked the
dark stairs down to the ground floor.
The elevator was defective since months and nobody
seemed to waste a thought about repairing it. The only one,
Frank could imagine as a potential employer in this
hardship, was Stefan Meise, the junkdealer, an old
schoolmate.
Meise' s scrapyard was about half an hour foot march
distant from Frank's apartment block. He hit the road,
walked down the ugly street, which was covered with
garbage, and finally reached his goal - a place full of rusty
cars and all kinds of metal debris.
Nevertheless, Stefan Meise was not difficult to find between
the mountains of scrap iron. He was very tall, thick, bearded
and looked hardly differed from what he collected and sold.
„Hello Stefan! How are you? ", welcomed him Frank quietly,
trying to smile.
„Oh, Frank Kohlhaas! What's up, man? ", answered the thick
junkdealer. "You haven't been here for ages! "
"I just thought, I could visit you. Does the scrap metal trade
still run, Stefan? ", asked Frank. „You have here. . . eh. . . a lot
of rusty stuff. . . Where do you find so much junk?
the other hand, displayed a frank and contemptuous un-
derstanding of the real nature of Oceanic society. An
example was PROLEFEED, meaning the rubbishy enter-
tainment and spurious news which the Party handed out
to the masses. Other words, again, were ambivalent, hav-
ing the connotation 'good' when applied to the Party and
FreeeBooksatPlaneteBook. com 385
'bad' when applied to its enemies. But in addition there were
great numbers of words which at first sight appeared to be
mere abbreviations and which derived their ideological co-
lour not from their meaning, but from their structure.
So far as it could be contrived, everything that had or
might have political significance of any kind was fitted into
the B vocabulary. The name of every organization, or body
of people, or doctrine, or country, or institution, or public
building, was invariably cut down into the familiar shape;
that is, a single easily pronounced word with the smallest
number of syllables that would preserve the original deri-
vation. In the Ministry of Truth, for example, the Records
Department, in which Winston Smith worked, was called
RECDEP, the Fiction Department was called FICDEP, the
Teleprogrammes Department was called TELEDEP, and so
on. This was not done solely with the object of saving time.
Even in the early decades of the twentieth century, tele-
scoped words and phrases had been one of the characteristic
features of political language; and it had been noticed that
the tendency to use abbreviations of this kind was most
marked in totalitarian countries and totalitarian organi-
zations. Examples were such words as NAZI, GESTAPO,
COMINTERN, INPRECORR, AGITPROP. In the begin-
ning the practice had been adopted as it were instinctively,
but in Newspeak it was used with a conscious purpose. It
was perceived that in thus abbreviating a name one nar-
rowed and subtly altered its meaning, by cutting out most of
the associations that would otherwise cling to it. The words
COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL, for instance, call up
386 1984
a composite picture of universal human brotherhood, red
flags, barricades, Karl Marx, and the Paris Commune. The
word COMINTERN, on the other hand, suggests merely a
tightly-knit organization and a well-defined body of doc-
trine. It refers to something almost as easily recognized,
and as limited in purpose, as a chair or a table. COMIN-
TERN is a word that can be uttered almost without taking
thought, whereas COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL is
a phrase over which one is obliged to linger at least mo-
mentarily. In the same way, the associations called up by a
word like MINITRUE are fewer and more controllable than
those called up by MINISTRY OF TRUTH. This accounted
not only for the habit of abbreviating whenever possible, but
also for the almost exaggerated care that was taken to make
every word easily pronounceable.
In Newspeak, euphony outweighed every consideration
other than exactitude of meaning. Regularity of grammar
was always sacrificed to it when it seemed necessary. And
rightly so, since what was required, above all for political
purposes, was short clipped words of unmistakable mean-
ing which could be uttered rapidly and which roused the
minimum of echoes in the speaker's mind. The words of the
B vocabulary even gained in force from the fact that nearly
all of them were very much alike. Almost invariably these
words— GOODTHINK, MINIPAX, PROLEFEED, SEX-
CRIME, JOYCAMP, INGSOC, BELLYFEEL, THINKPOL,
and countless others — were words of two or three syllables,
with the stress distributed equally between the first syllable
and the last. The use of them encouraged a gabbling style of
FreeeBooksatPlaneteBook. com 387
speech, at once staccato and monotonous. And this was ex-
actly what was aimed at. The intention was to make speech,
and especially speech on any subject not ideologically neu-
tral, as nearly as possible independent of consciousness. For
the purposes of everyday life it was no doubt necessary, or
sometimes necessary, to reflect before speaking, but a Party
member called upon to make a political or ethical judge-
ment should be able to spray forth the correct opinions as
automatically as a machine gun spraying forth bullets. His
training fitted him to do this, the language gave him an al-
most foolproof instrument, and the texture of the words,
with their harsh sound and a certain wilful ugliness which
was in accord with the spirit of Ingsoc, assisted the process
still further.
So did the fact of having very few words to choose from.
Relative to our own, the Newspeak vocabulary was tiny,
and new ways of reducing it were constantly being devised.
Newspeak, indeed, differed from most all other languages
in that its vocabulary grew smaller instead of larger every
year. Each reduction was a gain, since the smaller the area
of choice, the smaller the temptation to take thought. Ulti-
mately it was hoped to make articulate speech issue from
the larynx without involving the higher brain centres at
all. This aim was frankly admitted in the Newspeak word
DUCKSPEAK, meaning 'to quack like a duck'. Like various
other words in the B vocabulary, DUCKSPEAK was ambiv-
alent in meaning. Provided that the opinions which were
quacked out were orthodox ones, it implied nothing but
praise, and when 'The Times' referred to one of the orators
1984
of the Party as a DOUBLEPLUSGOOD DUCKSPEAKER it
was paying a warm and valued compliment.
THE C VOCABULARY. The C vocabulary was supple-
mentary to the others and consisted entirely of scientific
and technical terms. These resembled the scientific terms
in use today, and were constructed from the same roots, but
the usual care was taken to define them rigidly and strip
them of undesirable meanings. They followed the same
grammatical rules as the words in the other two vocabu-
laries. Very few of the C words had any currency either in
everyday speech or in political speech. Any scientific work-
er or technician could find all the words he needed in the
list devoted to his own speciality, but he seldom had more
than a smattering of the words occurring in the other lists.
Only a very few words were common to all lists, and there
was no vocabulary expressing the function of Science as a
habit of mind, or a method of thought, irrespective of its
particular branches. There was, indeed, no word for 'Sci-
ence', any meaning that it could possibly bear being already
sufficiently covered by the word INGSOC.
From the foregoing account it will be seen that in New-
speak the expression of unorthodox opinions, above a very
low level, was well-nigh impossible. It was of course pos-
sible to utter heresies of a very crude kind, a species of
blasphemy. It would have been possible, for example, to say
BIG BROTHER IS UNGOOD. But this statement, which
to an orthodox ear merely conveyed a self-evident absur-
dity, could not have been sustained by reasoned argument,
because the necessary words were not available. Ideas inim-
FreeeBooksatPlaneteBook. com 389
ical to Ingsoc could only be entertained in a vague wordless
form, and could only be named in very broad terms which
lumped together and condemned whole groups of heresies
without defining them in doing so. One could, in fact, only
use Newspeak for unorthodox purposes by illegitimately
translating some of the words back into Oldspeak. For ex-
ample, ALL MANS ARE EQUAL was a possible Newspeak
sentence, but only in the same sense in which ALL MEN
ARE REDHAIRED is a possible Oldspeak sentence. It did
not contain a grammatical error, but it expressed a palpa-
ble untruth — i. e. that all men are of equal size, weight, or
strength. The concept of political equality no longer existed,
and this secondary meaning had accordingly been purged
out of the word EQUAL. In 1984, when Oldspeak was still
the normal means of communication, the danger theo-
retically existed that in using Newspeak words one might
remember their original meanings. In practice it was not
difficult for any person well grounded in DOUBLETHINK
to avoid doing this, but within a couple of generations even
the possibility of such a lapse would have vaished. A per-
son growing up with Newspeak as his sole language would
no more know that EQUAL had once had the second-
ary meaning of 'politically equal', or that FREE had once
meant 'intellectually free', than for instance, a person who
had never heard of chess would be aware of the secondary
meanings attaching to QUEEN and ROOK. There would
be many crimes and errors which it would be beyond his
power to commit, simply because they were nameless and
therefore unimaginable. And it was to be foreseen that with
1984
the passage of time the distinguishing characteristics of
Newspeak would become more and more pronounced — its
words growing fewer and fewer, their meanings more and
more rigid, and the chance of putting them to improper
uses always diminishing.
When Oldspeak had been once and for all superseded,
the last link with the past would have been severed. History
had already been rewritten, but fragments of the literature
of the past survived here and there, imperfectly censored,
and so long as one retained one's knowledge of Oldspeak
it was possible to read them. In the future such fragments,
even if they chanced to survive, would be unintelligible
and untranslatable. It was impossible to translate any pas-
sage of Oldspeak into Newspeak unless it either referred to
some technical process or some very simple everyday ac-
tion, or was already orthodox (GOODTHINKFUL would
be the Newspeak expression) in tendency. In practice this
meant that no book written before approximately 1960
could be translated as a whole. Pre-revolutionary literature
could only be subjected to ideological translation — that is,
alteration in sense as well as language. Take for example
the well-known passage from the Declaration of Indepen-
dence:
WE HOLD THESE TRUTHS TO BE SELF-EVIDENT,
THAT ALL MEN ARE CREATED EQUAL, THAT THEY
ARE ENDOWED BY THEIR CREATOR WITH CERTAIN
INALIENABLE RIGHTS, THAT AMONG THESE ARE
LIFE, LIBERTY, AND THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS.
Free eBooks at Planet eBook. com 391
THAT TO SECURE THESE RIGHTS, GOVERNMENTS ARE
INSTITUTED AMONG MEN, DERIVING THEIR POWERS
FROM THE CONSENT OF THE GOVERNED. THAT
WHENEVER ANY FORM OF GOVERNMENT BECOMES
DESTRUCTIVE OF THOSE ENDS, IT IS THE RIGHT OF THE
PEOPLE WALTER OR ABOLISH IT, AND TO INSTITUTE
NEW GOVERNMENT. . .
It would have been quite impossible to render this into
Newspeak while keeping to the sense of the original. The
nearest one could come to doing so would be to swallow the
whole passage up in the single word CRIMETHINK. A full
translation could only be an ideological translation, where-
by Jefferson's words would be changed into a panegyric on
absolute government.
A good deal of the literature of the past was, indeed, al-
ready being transformed in this way. Considerations of
prestige made it desirable to preserve the memory of cer-
tain historical figures, while at the same time bringing
their achievements into line with the philosophy of Ingsoc.
Various writers, such as Shakespeare, Milton, Swift, By-
ron, Dickens, and some others were therefore in process of
translation: when the task had been completed, their orig-
inal writings, with all else that survived of the literature
of the past, would be destroyed. These translations were
a slow and difficult business, and it was not expected that
they would be finished before the first or second decade of
the twenty-first century. There were also large quantities of
merely utilitarian literature — indispensable technical man-
1984
uals, and the like — that had to be treated in the same way. It
was chiefly in order to allow time for the preliminary work
of translation that the final adoption of Newspeak had been
fixed for so late a date as 2050.
Free eBooks at Planet eBook. com
Alexander Merow
Prey World
Citizen 1-564398B-278843
Novel
Parti
Prey World
Chapters
Foreword 5
Citizen 1-564398B-278843 7
Automated Trial 23
Big Eye 31
The Change 49
Outsourced 56
World Peace in Ivas? 82
Rebellion and Fresh Snow 98
Procrastination is the Thief of Time! 116
Aux Champs-Elysees 139
The Lull before the Storm 155
Bomb-happy. . . 171
Red Moon 178
With him 193
Prey World - Citizen 1-564398B-278843
Content
The year 2028. Mankind is in the stranglehold of a
worldwide surveillance state. Frank Kohlhaas, a petty
citizen, lives a cheerless life, working as an agency worker
in a steel plant.
One day, he gets into a conflict with the tyrannical system,
because of an unfortunate accident. An automated trail
convicts him to five years of imprisonment and Frank
disappears in a detention centre, where he suffers under a
cruel system of brainwashing and reeducation.
After eight months of pain, the authorities decide to transfer
him to another prison. On the way there, something
unexpected happens. Suddenly everything changes and the
young man finds himself caught between the fronts. . .
Foreword
This is the English version of the first book of Alexander
Merow's "Prey World" series. The novel was translated by
Thorsten Weber - and the whole procedure entailed a lot of
work. But it was also really funny.
It is not a professional translation and the translator is not a
"native speaker" or English teacher. He is just a guy who
loves science-fiction and dystopias. So try not to laugh at
some of the translated phrases, or the wrath of a real freak
will come over you!
Nevertheless, we thought that would be a good idea to
translate this interesting, courageous and critical novel into
the English language. At the same time it will also enable
English speaking people to join Alexander Merow's growing
audience.
"Prey World" is neither an ordinary book nor light
entertainment. There is already plenty of "light
entertainment" in our times - far too much. On the other
hand, there are not enough books like "Prey World". Books
that make you think about the world we live in. And it is
important that people begin to think.
The author has already found numerous interested readers
all over Germany, and we hope, he will find additional
readers in the English-speaking countries. We would also
be glad, if a "real" mother-tongue speaker were to edit this
English version one day.
Some readers compare "Prey World" with George Orweirs
"1984", the classic among the dystopic novels. Others see
elements of Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451" in it.
However, critical thinkers and friends of so called
"conspiracy theories" will have their fun with "Prey World". Is
Alexander Merow' s vision of the future really realistic at all?
A worldwide surveillance state? A World Government under
the control of a ruthless secret society? We will see!
And always remember. . .
"Only a fool would think that "Prey World" is nothing
but fiction! " (Alexander Merow)
Have fun!
Alexander Merow and Thorsten Weber, Berlin 201 1
E-mail: A. Merow@gmx. de
"Maybe it is nothing but madness and suicide. Maybe it will
not change the world, but this is not important for me.
Nevertheless, it will change something for me!
I have suffered too much to humble myself anymore. They
have told us to humble ourselves - since the kindergarten.
Shut up! Consume! Obey! Endure! Believe everything!
Watch shit! Buy shit! Eat shit! Turn the other cheek!
What has become of us? Why have we become sheep?
Why do we endure this all without doing something? Why
has nobody the guts to act?
Thorsten's books were a real eye-opener to me! Now, I
know who they are and what they plan for us all. And I can't
forget what they have done to me. They call us "cattle".
Okay, then I will be the black sheep in the flock. And the
black sheep will fight back now! And it does not fear the
butcher anymore, because even a butcher can be killed.
Franky, the little black sheep, will make them pay now! And
I hope that the flock of white sheep will wake up some day. "
P. S. : If I don't come back, please give this book to Julia. . .
Diary entry of Frank Kohlhaas, 17. 02. 2029
Citizen 1-564398B-278843
Frank Kohlhaas, who was called citizen 1-564398B-278843
in his everyday life, because this was his official
administrative code, was already dreaming of the
unpleasant smell in the hall of his flat, reminding him of
rotten eggs. In his mind, shortly before 5. 00 o'clock in the
morning - soon the dream would be terminated by the
alarm - Frank was on a walk through a sunny valley. But
even at this beautiful place, the moldy smell was still
pervasive, so that Frank wondered, how such a beautiful
valley could smell so repulsive.
When the alarm-clock rang, it quickly became clear that the
sunny valley was just fantasy, although the smell was real.
The noise was shrill and Frank awoke swearing. Now he
had to get up, put on his clothes, have a hasty breakfast
and walk to the production complex 42-B.
„Damn! ", hissed the unshaven man as he moved his not
excessively tall, but amazingly strong body from his cheaply
produced bed.
„Hmmmhaaa! ", yawned Frank, shuffling through his still dark
apartment to the next room, where a dirty kitchen was
waiting for him. The citizen tore open the refrigerator door
and chocked down a cheese sandwich, the meager left-
overs from yesterday's supper.
The water kettle was started with a loud whoosh and, after a
few minustes, supplied hot water for a cup of instant coffee.
„Nnnhhaa! ", uttered the young man, a statement, that could
be interpreted in many ways at this early hour, and could
have referred to his life situation in general. At 5. 27 o'clock,
Frank closed the battered door behind himself and walked
listlessly down the dark corridor on his way to descend the
even darker stairway. The source of that foul stench, that
had been torturing Frank's nose for days, was somewhere
here. Perhaps one of the other tenants, damn idiot, had left
his garbage in the corridor.
J don't know. . . ", he muttered.
Each morning it was the same old story: „Rising, eating,
walking, slogging away. . . ", as Kohlhaas always said.
In the past years, he had learned to hate his life. He was 25
years old now, living in a more than shabby flat on the
outskirts of the former FRG capital, Berlin, working for
modest wages as a temporary help in a steel plant. In
former times, he had wanted to study, but this issue was
over - for reasons that Frank never mentioned.
Actually, he was not dumb, but, according to his own words,
he couldn't hack it yet. However, the job at the steel plant
was better than nothing, because it gave him the chance to
earn some money and to survive - an advantage that was
not enjoyed by millions of Germans in the year 2027.
As he now groped along again on this particular morning,
step by step towards the plant, he passed demolished
houses in the twilight and crowds of homeless people lying
in masses in the dark corners of the streets.
„What would be, if I simply didn't care about the
consequences and went home again, got back into my bed
and just slept until tomorrow? ", he thought sometimes.
„What would it be like if I just packed my bags and
disappeared from this rotten city, this scruffy country? ", he
asked himself occasionally.
But where was it any different? He should enjoy, what he
had - he'd got a job and didn't go hungry. That was at least
something, thought Frank.
After the worker had gone through a very long and dark
underpass without giving a Globe coin to the drunken
beggar there, the production complex came into Frank's
vision. It was 5. 53 in the morning and the workers for the
early shift stood there waiting, smoking, jawing.
When the factory gates finally opened at 6 o'clock, about
200 workers poured through them like a viscous mash. Most
of them were not in any rush to begin their work, but it had
to be, there was no other way.
"No alternative! ", as Frank always said.
After ten hours, they went back home again. All were dirty
and tired, but happy that the work was over for the day.
Frank crept through the corridor on his floor, which was still
dim even by day, and unlocked the door of his apartment.
There were no new messages on the Scanchip and that
was good, because it were usually only calculations:
electricity, water and such things. Frank had placed the
television in his bedroom the day before, so if he couldn't
fall asleep, he could turn it on. The program did not interest
him, but with the sound of anyone talking, he didn't feel so
alone in this dark block of flats.
Kohlhaas just knew his neighbours from brief encounters.
Many of them only left their apartments to go to work and
some of them had become serious boozers in recent years.
From time to time someone would bawl from his balcony or
accosted people, passing "his block" - but after a while,
everyone was sleeping.
Citizen 1-564398B-278843 watched television till 22. 37
o'clock: the news („War of the global armed forces against
dangerous terrorists in Iran"), talk shows, easy
entertainment on all fronts, warnings of the second dog flu
epidemic and the necessity for the immediate compulsory
inoculation. Then he fell asleep, although meanwhile the
foul smell from outside seemed to have lodged itself in his
pillow. . . .
Next day. . .
10
„Good morning, Frank! ", muttered Dirk Weber, one of the
foremen. „Good morning, Dirk! ", answered Frank listlessly. It
was 6. 03 o'clock, the morning shift began. A-341, this was
the designation of the young man as worker and temporary
help in the steel plant, gave his helping hands for many
operational steps till the clock indicated 10. 30.
Now it was time for a short lunch, and when Frank
unwraped his only bun which was covered with a piece of
salami, he did not suspect, that an unpleasant stroke of fate
would wait for him in the following minutes.
Since approximately half a year, the production complex'
administration had arranged the singing of the "One-World-
Song", due to a new international regulation, before every
lunch time in each production complex - for the increase of
work moral and to strengthen the international doctrine of
„peace, freedom, prosperity and equality" that was
propagated by the World Government since 2018. The
official of the "Ministry for Production Supervision", stationed
in this enterprise, Mr. Gert Sasse, who was mostly in his
office above the factory building, had conscientiously come
down to the workers to sing the "One-World-Song" with
them. It was always the same.
. . Workers, now is lunch time! But we will sing first! ", he
shouted through the hall and the steel workers formed to a
bored line, in order to enjoy the short break after the
singing:
"We are the children of One-World and we are all equal!
We love our One-World, the great realm of peace!
We don't know any classes, we don't know any races. . . "
Frank heard ever more rarely on the text in the last weeks,
didn't move his lips and stared at the ceiling of the dirty
production hall. . . Hurry up! ", he thought and boredly scraped
11
with his left foot over the dusty ground. Then the singing
was over.
„Gosh! This stupid song is really getting on my nerves! ",
said the labourer very quietly to himself.
„AH right, men! That could be done - halfway! Enjoy your
meal! ", called the official of the "Ministry for Production
Supervision" and A-341 looked forward to a hungry bite in
his softened roll.
But while his teeth eagerly crushed the salty piece of
salami, he was hit by an angry look of Mr. Sasse. The
supervisor narrowed his eyes to slits and looked like an
aggressive bulldog.
„A-341! Yes, you! Come to me! Hurry! ", he roared at the top
of his lungs.
This got Frank's adrenalin flowing. He didn't need quarrel at
work anymore.
„Come on, A-341! ", yelled Mr. Sasse, waving the worker
nearer. Kohlhaas followed the order immediately.
„l am just a fool for you, isn't it? ", hissed the man.
„Eh. . . no! Of course not, Sir. . . eh. . . Mr. Sasse! ", stammered
Frank.
J fail to see what you mean. . . ", he added stumbling.
„How I mean this, you idiot? ", screamed the official with a
look which gave the young man the biggest possible
uneasiness. A malicious silence prevailed for several
oppressive seconds. Meanwhile, the eyes of the superior
threateningly became smaller and bushy, black eyebrows
were pushed over them.
A second later, Frank saw a fist with fatty fingers fly towards
his face. It suddenly hurt and his nasal bone reacted with a
cracking on the punch. While some blood threads flowed
down from his nose, A-341 heard a growl: „How I mean that,
you numbskull? "
12
„lf I give the instruction that the „One-World-Song" has to be
sung, you have to sing it too. This was an order! ",
completed Mr. Sasse his powerful argument.
His intonation varied now between satisfaction and
rampantly growing meanness. In the meantime, Kohlhaas
had gone to the ground. This punch had been really hard
and Sasse gave him another kick in the ribs now.
„Do you understand, idiot? You probably think, that you
have a special status here, isn't it? ", he roared.
The other workers googled at him and hid their faces behind
their rolls. Meanwhile, Kohlhaas felt like a kicked dog,
humiliated in front of the rest of his colleagues - what was
very close to reality. Without considering his action, he
jumped up and positioned himself in front of the official of
the "Ministry for Production Supervision".
"You can be glad, that you are my superior, otherwise I
would break you every bone! ", screamed Frank with boiling
fury. Gert Sasse was baffled. A-341 obstinately wiped off
the blood from his lip.
One hour later, the worker still waited in front of the door of
the production complex leader. Sasse was in his office and
Frank heard him swearing and ranting. This was no good
sign.
„A-341, come in! ", resounded the voice of the highest boss
of this work plant over the brightly illuminated corridor. The
young man started moving and took a seat on the chair in
the middle of the office room. A short silence followed, then
it began.
J took a look on your Scanchip, A-341! ", reported Mr.
Reimers, the production complex leader. „ln the ten years of
your activity here, you had come too late three times. Apart
from that, this is not the first time that you make a spectacle
13
of yourself. You are already occured to me, because of
subversive statements at work which can probably also be
confirmed by your colleagues. We have even marked you
with a blue code 67-Beta, if you didn't know it yet, A-341!
We will examine the video tapes of your working days in this
complex in the next days, with our new "Voice-Analysis-
System", and Tim sure that we will find some more
subversive statements.
But what you have done today, is a real scandal!
Threatening an official of the highest authority of production
supervision. Is there just air in your head, boy? If I don't
take drastic measures in a case like this, my superiors will
make me a lot of problems.
I must dismiss you, A-341! Further, I am correctly obligated,
to react on such an unbelievable incident with a message to
the responsible administration. Disappear now from this
production complex, and never come back, A-341! "
Frank Kohlhaas, the just dismissed worker, was struck
dumb with horror. His vocal chords seemed to be rusted, his
throat was tied and his courage was put on ice somewhere.
He went out, just went out, pale as death, with a roaring
head, without answering. Frank had lost his job, his source
for subsistence. And this was no fun in these joyless days.
Like in trance, the young man went into the changing room
of the production complex and absently opened the baggy
sheet door of his spint. . . Dismissal" - this word sounded like
the cut of a razor in the ear of each listener in this time. It
was related to the word . . liquidation", because it was the
destruction of the social existence. Being dismissed meant
to get no more Globes, as the international currency was
called since the year 2018. If Frank would not find a new
employment as soon as possible, he could lose his
apartment, his food and finally also his life. Any social
14
security, warranted by the state, had completely been
abolished since the total collapse of world economy in
winter 2012/13. And it was more than difficult, to find work in
a time, in which the industrial production in old Central and
Western Europe had mostly been outsourced to the Third
World. Therefore, millions of Europeans tried to survive by
doing extremly bad paid jobs in this dark present. They had
nothing to lose, so they were glad about every breadline
wage they could get. Those, who were not able to find a
possibility to earn some money in any way, ended as
beggars and homeless people, hanging around under
bridges or in vacant house ruins.
On the next day, Frank was not awaked by the shrill sound
of his alarm, after an sorrowful and restless night, but by the
disgusting stench which came from the stairway. The smell
had not been liquidated by anyone - against the spirit of the
age.
Only in the early morning hours, he had been able to sleep
for a while, because of his constant brooding and the
unpleasant thoughts that had tortured him during the night.
As first thought of the new grey day, the face of Mr. Sasse
appeared in his head and the face of citizen 1-564398B-
278843 changed to a hateful grimace, when he mused
about killing the official with an iron rod.
„This damn hybrid! If my life goes down the drain, because
of that guy, then I will smash the skull of this bastard before
I go to hell! ", hissed Frank, erupting in anger.
He finally crept out of his bed and stared down at the dirty
street in front of his apartement block.
„Damn! What shall I do now? ", he thought. J must find a
new job, otherwise they will close the account on my
Scanchip, because I can't pay the fucking calculations any
longer. "
15
After a further hour of useless musing, he left his dwelling,
tried not to inhale too deeply on the corridor, and walked the
dark stairs down to the ground floor.
The elevator was defective since months and nobody
seemed to waste a thought about repairing it. The only one,
Frank could imagine as a potential employer in this
hardship, was Stefan Meise, the junkdealer, an old
schoolmate.
Meise' s scrapyard was about half an hour foot march
distant from Frank's apartment block. He hit the road,
walked down the ugly street, which was covered with
garbage, and finally reached his goal - a place full of rusty
cars and all kinds of metal debris.
Nevertheless, Stefan Meise was not difficult to find between
the mountains of scrap iron. He was very tall, thick, bearded
and looked hardly differed from what he collected and sold.
„Hello Stefan! How are you? ", welcomed him Frank quietly,
trying to smile.
„Oh, Frank Kohlhaas! What's up, man? ", answered the thick
junkdealer. "You haven't been here for ages! "
"I just thought, I could visit you. Does the scrap metal trade
still run, Stefan? ", asked Frank. „You have here. . . eh. . . a lot
of rusty stuff. . . Where do you find so much junk?
