The Small Hours

It was a dark, cold morning in March and the clocks were striking three. Rob, John and JB sat motionless in the small hours, surrounded by the complete darkness of an almost featureless room. They had not moved in several hours and in the insignificant illumination of the starless night, their bright-red ocular-protectors seemed as colourless and monotone as their party issue coveralls and Wellington boots. The Party was under their skin and nails – oozing an intangible grime over everything. They had lived their lives in habit and instinct—assuming that every sound they made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every movement scrutinized.
They sat waiting, willing the internal-teleconnect to ping its usual chirp of sober misery; but today they knew the sound would feel different somehow. The message would be from Edward, and it would signify a new day - the start of something unprecedented and the beginning of change.
Momentarily the wall mounted Electronic-Speaking-Device sparked to life with a shudder of blips and bloops. With a start, John leaned forward engaging the receive function on the machine so that the digitally altered voice of Edward could be heard over the unremitting external hum of factories working through the night; the eternal production of machines that would fill these very factories and replace the common workers. A self-perpetuating and destructive loop of convenience and frugality versus basic human survival. A not so wonderful world.
“We’re from the future” the voice began with a choked cough of digital drop-out. “Loose lips sink ships, so don’t worry about that wicked girl – she’s a glass actress singing hate songs to herself.”
Edward’s distorted voice was even and uniform, yet though the static a shade of excitement carried in his coded message. John turned to Rob and JB, and across the early morning grey he saw the up-turned corners of muted smiles, betraying their stifled emotions. He leaned forward and initiated the ESD’s reply procedure;
“Who would have thought crime would pay? We’ll take a walk and think of something as fast as we can.”
The cryptic response had been sent, and so it had begun: A new fight by the people, for the people - a revolution of the common man and the retaking of rational human thought.
The Battle of Airstrip One.



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