"For me?" "Romi?" "Yes?" "I like your name." "This is for you." "They are very pretty." "Did you know I would come?" "I knew." "I know many things." "Really." "Sit down." "I know almost nothing, not even your name." "Carlos or Luis, it depends." "I have never met anyone with two names." "Only me." "Because I had two mothers." "Should I tell you the story of my two mothers?" "Ok." "Let's go." "I was born in a clinic in Brasil." "A very big clinic with very few patients because it was very expensive and almost nobody could pay for it." "And the same day a baby disappeared right after birth." "They looked for him everywhere but they never found him." "Even though they fired the nurse who lost him, that didn't fix anything." "In the clinic there were two mothers who had a baby the same day, and the only baby in the clinic was me." "So they both spent time with me, taking turns." "One called me Luis and the other called me Carlos." "They both loved me very much and I loved them both in return." "But the day arrived when they left the clinic and each one wanted to take their son home." "They both said I was theirs." "Nobody knew whose son I was." "I knew, but I never told them, and I won't tell you now either." "So then we talked about it and decided they would both be my mothers." "But with one condition that one called me Luis and the other Carlos." "It was necessary to avoid emotional conflicts." "They are dangerous you know?" "Tell me another story." "No, one should never tell two consecutive stories." "One is always worse than the other." "Luis!" "Luis!" "You know, one day they asked me if I was free, and I didn't know what it meant." "But now I love you." "I mean that I feel better with you than with another person." "I feel peaceful." "Very peaceful." "I don't feel my body, do you know what it means not to feel your body?" "Yes, I know." "Is Doug in?" "Here..." "Doug?" "Are you Doug?" "Yes." "I'm Alfonso." "I know." "They killed Jean-Paul." "In Barlenya?" "Yes." "And the Liberxina?" "I don't know" "We have very little news." "Barlenya, is Luis there?" "Yes, but we haven't been able to find him." "I will do it." "Romi!" "Romi!" "Do you know why I am calling you?" "Because if I don't call you I get bored." "What can I do if I don't call you?" "I am a man of action." "Make lunch while I have a bath." "Ok." "I am cooking you a microbiotic meal." "Micro what?" "Microbiotic: small micros of bio life." "It's Greek you know." "Socrates, Aristotle, Plato, Alexander the Great..." "Jacqui Onassis!" "Maybe the Greeks never existed." "It's true, who knows." "The war reconciles an American family." "The marriage between officer Franklin Biggs and his wife Linda was rocky." "Therefore, officer Franklin asked for a divorce and volunteered for a war where some tall, blond men killed some smaller, yellower men." "This was the beginning of a long distance love story that had a happy ending." "The married couple reconciled, taking advantage of the recovery of the happy soldier who thanks to the war had lost his leg but in compensation recovered his wife." "Our soldier, Franklin, after a lot of fighting found peace." "Romi!" "Do you want to to keep reading or do you prefer if I leave?" "Vacum the floor!" "I am leaving!" "I have something important to tell you!" "What?" "The smallest gesture, even just hitting your head on the wall, implies by itself a universal determinism." "For me, that is how it is." "The smallest of my actions affirms that I am right." "Because I am a militant!" "This noise is deafening, insufferable, intolerable, incredible, unacceptable, impossible, incomprehensible." "Give me a kiss!" "As a beginnig or an ending?" "As a beginning." "No way!" "Kiss me." "Not as a beginnig." "Then I will kill you." "Blood stains everything." "So I will drown myself now." "This time I haven't done it." "But if you don't kiss me I will drown myself forever and you will never see me again." "The unknown citizen." "To JS07M378." "This marble monument was erected by the state." "The office of statistic afirmed that there were no official complaints agains him." "And the documents of his behavior confirm that he was, using an old fashion word, a saint." "Everything that he did, was of service to the community." "Except, during the war he worked in a factory until the day that he retired and was never fired." "And always pleased his bosses Pach Motors Inc." "He was no strike breaker, and never had any strange ideas." "Because his syndicate says he paid all his fees." "His syndicate confirms this is true." "And psychologistsÊaffirm that he was popular with his colleagues and that he liked to drink." "The press knew that he bought the newspaper everyday." "And that his response to the advertisements was appropriate." "The policies to his name prove that he was insured." "The health insurance says that he was hospitalized, and left cured." "Both the market and modern life analyses declare that he was very sensitive to the advantages of shopping in installments." "He owned everything associated with a modern man: record player, a car, a radio and a Fridgidaire." "The researchers of public opinion declared that he always held the correct opinion." "During time of peace he was for peace, when there was a war, he joined in." "He got married and added five kids to the population." "The eugenicists indicate that is the correct number of children for parents in this generation." "And his teachers manifest that he never interfered in his education." "Was he free, was he happy?" "The question is absurd." "If something had gone wrong, naturally we would have known it." "In his last speech the president Sigmundus , referring to the TV, said:" "Do you think we can speak honestly about the TV, about our TV like something that makes us brutes?" "Isn't the TV, like any tool invested by men, a technique whose function will depend on the function men give it?" "The function that we give it?" "Couldn't the TV be the most neutral and perfect instrument of education, information and conformism of mankind?" "Why should it be wrong that we like this or the other program?" "If you like watching TV for a while after dinner?" "Are we going to allow these eternally disatisfied, bitter people to ruin our lives, getting in the way of our desires?" "Doesn't TV make social comunication easier?" "Doesn't it allow us to reach you?" "Political news from Barlenya" "It is forbbiden to speak politics" "Here!" "This one is better." "Then I will read about last press conference of president Sigmundus." "Lights, flashes, microphones, portraits, flags with the logo of the globe, writing pads, cigarettes." "Journalist:" "Mr. president can you establish the character of the minority?" "Sigmundus:" "I was expecting that question, that is why I brought with me one of them." "You can judge for yourselves." "In front of the cameras appears a minority." "Get this!" "Journalist: do you believe in the immortality of the soul?" "Minority:" "No less than the immortality of the body." "Journalist:" "Do you see hope for the future of humanity?" "Minority:" "Not with more hope than the past." "Journalist:" "Do you feel solidarity with others like you?" "Minority: only with others like me." "Does this suppose that you confess your incapacity to accommodate your behavior to our principals?" "And your incapacity to live in our society with the satisfaction of having fullfilled your obligations?" "Minority: to not suppose this would be to suppose a lot." "Given the severity of his response the journalists who had the legit authority decided to apply the minority 100 volts for interrupting the social harmony." "An almost incredible event happened tonight in our city." "A man of around 35 years of age was arrested while he was trying to break all the TVs of a centrally located business." "When he was interrogated by the forces of order, he assured them that the only reason he broke all those TVs was to inform a friend of his, whereabouts unknown, of his arrival in town." "The strange person was taken to the mental hospital of Barlenya." "It is Doug." "Who is Doug?" "Romi is Romi, Luis is Carlos and Doug is Doug." "In the same way Jean Paul, that the man you saw in the beach, was Jean Paul." "Questions are banal when they are obvious." "Smiled in class as a teacher was explaining something." "The teacher called attention to it, but she kept smiling." "Recoverable." "Neurovegetative alterations." "Room A." "He was found next to statue of Helios throwing soap bubbles at the police." "He said that his bubbles relieved remorse for bad actions and also gave happiness." "He didn't resist arrest." "Recoverable." "Temporal mental disturbance." "Room B." "He was arrested in the middle of the street as he was shooting people." "Did he kill anyone?" "Just wounded." "Does he have a gun permit?" "Yes." "Benign." "Transitory hallucination." "Room A" "He remained at his work station and he refused to make even the smallest movement." "He affirmed that work doesn't dignify men." "Very serious." "Personality excision." "Room C." "He broke a shop's window display and destroyed all the TVs within his reach." "What explanation does he give?" "He says that he wanted to notify a friend, whereabouts unknown, that he had arrived to town." "Recoverable." "Disproportion between goals and methods." "Volitive disorder." "Room B." "He refuses to state his name and he destroyed his identity card." "Look, that is Doug." "This is Romi." "A word can not replace an image." "An image can replace a word." "A real object can replace a word." "Any given form, can replace a word." "A word can replace an object." "Can an object or an image be designated a name other than its own?" "Yes, it is a metaphor." "Is anyone following us?" "Were you able to speak with Sandra?" "Yes, she is waiting for us in Romi's house." "You haven't changed." "Neither have you." "I have come because I was longing to see you." "But now..." "This time we are talking about something very different, something that could change everything." "Something has happened in the last few months that has made us transition from a passive to an active phase." "Luis has to show you something." "Do you remember him?" "Right after he left your party, he discovered the Liberxina." "Its possible effects we all know." "News agencies have taken care of that." "What nobody knows is that he created only twenty doses before he died." "You are looking at some of the people who tried to finish the project." "These people and more, died before reaching their goal." "Our last oportunity, the last dose, was in Jean Paul's hands." "Is he...?" "Yes" "He is the one you saw in the beach." "Then eveything is over." "No, before he died he gave it to Romi." "I still don't know why I kept it." "I don't know anything." "Nothing." "Now I understand why you called me." "Yes." "The Liberxina has to be thrown in the city's gas deposits." "You, with your position, know perfectly the interior of the factory." "We need information and you can give it to us." "You don't need to continue." "There will not be well being as long as masses of neurotic people exist." "A scientifically rational examination of life demands the democracy of collective action." "This can only happen if the masses become psychically independent." "Capable to assume the sole responsibility of their social existence and determine their own lives." "With the Liberxina we can destroy, temporally, social neurosis." "What happens afterwards?" "Afterwards, it would all return to being like it has always been." "As if we hadn't intervened." "Taking advantage of the vacuum, during this thirty days, you want to created a state of irreversible subversion." "That is an abberration." "An absurd utopia." "It is not a utopia." "And you know it." "The dose that Jean Paul gave Romi, if thrown in the gas supply and inhaled by all the inhabitants of this city," "means a radical change in the personality of fifteen million." "And fifteen million free humans, willing to do anything, mean a worldwide revolution." "You are forgetting centuries of human history" "Your stupid history doesn't interest me at all." "And you don't interest me." "Did you hurt yourself?" "No, it is nothing." "Come with me." "Finish it yourself." "Good morning." "I come to check the gas meter." "Again?" "Someone was already here last week." "Yes, but my partner made a mistake." "Come in." "I will show you where the meters are." "Thanks." "You were talking about history." "But centuries of history and civilization have not changed the fact that humans are wolves." "The development of social forces and of new technologies have created new forms of alienation." "Even your socialism has ceased to be the radical negation of capitalism, as it was supposed to be, in theory." "We haven't advanced even one step towards the total liberation of mankind." "What was supposed to be revolutionary forces have become bureaucratized masses void of freedom and imagination." "For me, your rebellion is sterile." "Only the revolt of a bourgeoisie against the class that he finds himself locked in." "A functional, pure rebellion." "Any group that calls itself revolutionary without being deeply tied to the masses, will fall into adventurism and is destined to failure." "In the present state of inertia and self-satisfaction to speak of masses makes no sense." "Its only function is to empty Coca-Cola bottles and fill football stadiums." "When I talk about masses I refer to aware proletarians." "And organized according to a scientific understanding of society and the world, and equipped with an authentic revolutionary theory." "A theory can be useful to understand the world but not to transform it." "For that you need direct and concrete methods for action and yours are not useful anymore." "You speak of the proletariat as if it was a box full of revolutionary values." "And I think that the proletariat is just a man fighting to rise from his class." "Not as a member of his class, but an individual" "And deep down the revolution is as uncomfortable for him as it could be for the bourgeoisie." "Why do you laugh?" "I am laughing at you." "I laugh at your idealism, at your metaphysics that allows you to use anything to transform an isolated temporal event to your taste." "Into an absolue truth." "I am going to remind you two or three simple but useful points." "One: a revolution is not an anaemic state, much less an aesthetic necessity." "Two: a revolution is a situation with or without violence by which one class replaces another." "Three: there is an order, an historic evolution that can not be gratuitously ignored." "Organize, coordinate, regulate, hierarchize, prohibit, negate, remove, stop, slow down, forbid, discipline." "Who is there?" "It must be the man who came to check the gas meter." "He is an agent, what do we do with him?" "There was no other choice." "Tell Mike to come with you to Back 27, you have to take someone away." "No, everything is over" "Stop here!" "Where should we meet?" "We will be in my house" "Luis, we have to speak." "Yes." "Sometimes I think that everything we do is pointless." "That it is like trying to break a wall with your head." "You are stupid, Luis." "I tell myself sometimes." "You will never accomplish it." "But then..." "But then I stop to look at the wall and I see the crack that opens up." "And then I hit my head against it again!" "Maybe the crack disappears again." "But during a few moments I have seen it and that is enough for me to continue." "Of course, now you are here and I love you." "That makes things more complicated." "If I close my eyes I still see the crack." "I open them and I see you." "I would like to open and close them so fast that it would all mix, like snow falling from the sky." "What do you think Romi?" "I don't know, everything is too new for me." "Everything has been too fast." "I still can see that dead man." "But I still love you Luis." "Wait for me." "OK, hurry up, you have to come with me." "The lady too?" "Yes." "Is this an invitation or a threat?" "An invitation, for now." "But if you force me..." "And you couldn't tell me why you want me to go with you?" "This is not my busines." "I see... it is very clear." "Come" "Wait for me in the upstairs corner." "I am going to try to get in from the back." "When Doug arrives, tell him to enter through the track door." "Hello?" "Sandra?" "Yes?" "Is Doug there?" "Yes." "I need to speak with him." "Yes." "It is Luis." "He wants to talk to you." "Luis." "You have to go to Bill's house." "You and Sandra." "OK." "Bill's house." "Did something happen?" "I will explain later, nothing serious." "But things have increased speed." "Yes, I am coming." "Something is wrong." "Luis says that he is waiting for us in the Museum of Romanesque Art." "Hurry up, you also have to come." "Why?" "Luis calls:" "Museum of Romanesque Art." "And everything starts again." "Without any breaks, until the end." "Like a curse." "What are you talking about?" "I am a small thing." "Did you know that?" "I don't know what you think I am." "Even I am afraid to think about it." "I only know that sometimes I feel very, very tired." "And that I can keep going from one place to the other." "You know?" "Sometimes I need a little silence." "Sometimes, only one word." "Sandra, please." "One word, do you understand?" "One word that gave me a little warmth." "And that allowed me to close my eyes and dream a little." "And empty out my head of all the other words that are inside." "To feel." "To find a body lying next to mine." "A little bit of love." "This is not the time to talk about this." "It is late." "We have to go." "I know." "It is always too late for us." "But do you know how much time normal people waste talking about these things?" "I can't take this any longer, Doug." "I am falling apart." "Sandra..." "I know, you don't have to continue." "We have no right to talk like this." "We have to be different." "And if we start talking like this we are finished." "That there is no room for us between the others or between each other." "The only thing we can do is continue." "Luis is waiting for you inside." "Through the left side door." "What has happened?" "The disaparence of the inspector alerted them." "They tried to arrest us." "They have searched Romi's house." "And the Liberxina?" "They didn't find it." "I have it." "We can't wait anymore." "We need to do it in the morning." "Laura doesn't arrive until next week." "And it is impossible to warn her." "Yes, I know." "But here is Sandra, she can do it better than anyone!" "I don't believe in your methods." "Sandra doesn't believe in our methods." "And she can't execute an action that is against her own principles." "Isn't that right, Sandra?" "First she would have to consult it with the Central Committee." "And what would happen?" "They will think she has gone mad." "They could tell her it is not the right moment." "To accelerate events in objectively unfavorable conditions is self-suicide." "Anyway, there will always be the next meeting, where the problem can always be reintroduced." "I think the opposite." "I think that there are moments when it is necessary to adopt a personal responsibility." "Stand by your own conduct, all the way." "Imagine that you are right." "That we are wrong." "That we are irresponsible, individualistic adventure seekers." "Like you were saying earlier." "OK, let's forget about the Liberxina." "We don't use it and nothing happens." "But..." "And if you are not right?" "If we manage to insert the Liberxina and we are wrong." "Nothing permanent happens." "Only for us." "For the others, only a period of abnormality." "And then things return to the way they were." "To their normal state." "And you will have all the time in the world, to apply your slow program of action." "And then you will be able to call us crazy, and anything else you want." "Maybe I could convince you." "But there is no time." "I also know I have no right to ask you that." "But it doesn't matter." "Too many deaths, to now accept them as worthless." "It all depends on you, Sandra." "If you don't accept, it is the end." "Soon they will put an end to us." "If you accept, we still have a chance." "Sometimes it is better if the solution destroys you, than to continue living in doubt." "It is that one, next to the gate." "If needed, it will help us escape." "There is something I don't quite understand." "What?" "Why did you agree to do it?" "That doesn't matter anymore." "Now it is decided." "One doesn't always do what one believes is fair." "Maybe." "Do you know Romi?" "Man at the beginning was so young that he went to school and learned to name all the things in the world." "To not get discouraged, and keep learning, he started with the easiest things." "From the two and two equals four, he went to name fish to animals with scales." "And birds to animals with wings." "And trees to the green swings where birds stop to rest." "Man was happy and thought that the world was a house with hallways." "With many rooms to the sides, and everything in order." "He believed this for a while and he seemed happy." "But everything turned out to be a trick from the alphabet: it had more letters than it seemed." "The hallway and the room expanded until it became a funnel where man went up and down, slipping down the walls, hurting his hands." "It was a big spiral, it a labyrinthic shape, where a man with a vision for business installed a booth and a doorman charged an entrance and exit fee." "That man suggested to the others with reasoning that seemed convincing continuous movement." "And the people started to go in circles and to pay continously the price for the journey." "It was a pitiful sight." "Sometimes they stopped because of tiredness and injuries." "But the man with business vision" "Told them that he had found a solution for them." "They had to get from their mouth a spot of saliva." "And with it make an adhesive tape." "that would always show them the way and direction to follow." "With the remaining part, they could make a shell to protect them from future falls." "They followed his advice." "And they even got saliva left to make a small ball that got stuck in the throat." "Then, when they seemed happy and resigned, they seemed even more pitiful." "Because by being locked in a shell, like a snail, they forgot desire and dreams." "But it reappeared in tales, like an evil ghost, or a neurotic sleeping beauty." "Seeing that desire was forgotten, the man who gave the suggestions breathed deeply." "And told himself: it has been hard worki, but now I can be in peace." "But what he doesn't know is that one day we will vomit the ball of saliva, and we will break the shell." "And we will not be afraid of getting tired any longer." "That day we have to scream until the river goes up the mountain and the ocean breaks in two." "Why all of this?" "Your best friends have died and nothing has changed." "They will also kill you." "And everything will be the same." "Nothing will have changed." "Nothing." "I don't know how all of this will end." "But I want to show you something that may help you understand." "Come." "Do you understand, Romi?" "Nobody is free if those around you aren't." "The freedom of others instead of conditioning mine, it is the necessary consequence and confirmation of mine." "It has not been the last time, right?" "In the last moment, she changed her mind, and ran away." "The police killed her in the road, next to the quarry." "She forced them to do it." "It was, it was suicide." "What can be done?" "It has to be done now." "Tonight." "Romi." "If she manages to pass the first check point" "With Sandra's ID" "And in the darkness." "It wouldn't be difficult to reach the central tower." "The second control is not a problem." "Cross the concrete columns and you will see the train tracks." "Right above is the first check point." "It is very difficult for them to locate you at night." "You will find a wire fence that surrounds the whole area." "Follow it until you find an irrigation canal." "Cross it." "In front of you you will see the second check point's office." "Just show Sandra's ID." "Crossing the offices you will find the central plant." "Another passage will take you to the metallic stairs that lead you to the top level." "There you find the combustion furnaces." "You know the rest" "Repeat." "I cross some concrete columns." "I will find the train track." "Right on top is the first check point." "I will see a fence that protects the whole area." "I follow it until I see an irrigation canal." "I cross it." "In front of me will be the second check point." "I will show Sandra's ID." "I will cross a hallway." "I will see the central plant." "A metallic passage will take me to the stairway that connects with the top level." "There I will find the combustion furnaces where I should throw the Liberxina." "Luis is waiting for us." "Let's go" "Good luck Romi."