The Department of Corrections, Book One

As the rattling elevator plunged deep into the dusty Earth at spaceship velocity, Malyj struggled with the two plainclothes impound detectives, each giant restraining one of his arms with hands like iron fetters. His fraught mind thinking escape, thinking freedom.

“What—what . . . ?!” Malyj began to ask a question—panicking—clucking like a grasped chicken.

The larger of the two armed impound detectives interrupted, his voice like grated metal:

“Shut up, violator! You have been impounded by the State, sentenced to ‘correction.’ Your freedom (his iron hands squeezed, twisted like tourniquets), rights, and citizenship have been terminated. You are now property of the Department of Corrections. You will think, feel, speak, act, and look per State regulations. You will serve the State profitably in accordance with State law. You are no longer an individual, just an expendable, temporary cell in the Karpian System’s immortal, collective organism. You are now Impound Equality 30541.”

What in the world is he talking about? This is madness! I have to escape! Malyj thought terrified, staring at their distorted reflections standing in the elevator’s smudged and battered stainless-steel doors: the muscular impound detectives were chiseled, and cut, as if they had been formed by a 3D laser printer. His empty stomach fluttering in despair; the abused elevator’s speedy descent creating the sensation of free-falling. Muzak played softly, wobbly, adding to the insanity.

A dented panel of flickering numbers, lighted push buttons, havocked the mind; the destination of each neon-orange number, +1 through -7, was displayed in neon-orange on a small, crazed computer monitor: Level PosOne (Surface) - The Department of Corrections, Level NegTwo - Communal Lounge, Level NegThree - Processing, Level NegFour (Dr. Huxwell) - Medical, Level NegFive (Dr. Burgess) - Psychological, Level NegSix - Virology, and Level NegSeven (Dr. Karp) - Corrections/FJK Terminal.

All of this, hidden, deep underneath the congested highway I pedal my rickety bicycle on everyday, deep underneath the community’s crowded strip mall, deep underneath the large grocery store my family and I used to shop at every weekend, deep underneath the DOC. Why hidden? When was this built? What the fuck is this place?! I must escape to the surface, to freedom, to warn the world of this place! Someone had keyed a graffito, the word “HELL” with an arrow pointing down, into the damaged stainless-steel side wall. Overwhelmed mentally, thinking: God, help me! (a silent scream to God like dialing 911)—and acutely nauseous from the warm elevator’s miasma of shorted out electrical wires and industrial-grade cable grease, E30541s perception fell aslant: Malyj had passed out. Slumping lifeless into his captors’ supporting arms, he dropped his precious novel from his right handcuffed hand onto the dirty dimpled-metal floor.

The rattling elevator continued to plunge deeper and deeper and deeper into the dusty Earth, falling down the ancient shaft toward “HELL,” tumbling past Level NegTwo - Communal Lounge.

A strange vibration resonated within the chromium-plated box as a wide beam of THz (a thin, horizontal, neon-orange band of terahertz radiation emitted from an aperture in the metallic ceiling) scanned E30541 from head to toe to head (through his clothing and his body), surveying him for concealed weapons. Finding the unconscious impound weaponless, the wide beam flickered off violently with a loud “Zzzzzzzap!” Its departing scend propelling the plunging elevator’s theory of relativity, a floating pattern of stationary dust particles, into infinite trajectories.

The elevator slowed, then stopped.

A moment later, VIL-EN’s artificial voice interrupted the wobbly Muzak:

“Level NegThree - Processing,” soothed “femininely” from the crackling speakers.

“Ding!” The elevator’s smudged and battered chromium-plated doors struggled to open like an iron curtain, jerkily pulling apart their distorted reflections until the three stood alone. Above their heads, for a short moment, two loose electrical wires touched, creating a fleeting explosion of amber fire, white light, and black smoke whose cascading amber sparks singed hair and skin and clothes. The wobbly Muzak resumed. Two suits dragged one number from the abused elevator: abused by a million numbers past trying to escape their unfair fate.

Equality 30541s handcuffs were removed from swollen, blood-red wrists. The numb arms that had been drawn tautly behind his back, shot forward, releasing billions of painful pins and needles. Four giant hands like iron fetters relinquished the unconscious impound into gravity’s pull. . . .