Work Text:
Anonymous Rex was the world’s greatest writer of non-fiction. Notorious Jack was the world’s greatest writer of fiction. They were rivals, though what they wrote was quite different. Their rivalry was a power struggle.
An old man entered the room. His attire was a dark gray suit and a blood red tie. A middle-aged man entered from the other side of the room. His clothes were a sky-blue suit and royal blue bowtie. The men met in the middle of the room and shook hands. “Your Majesty,” the younger man wearing a bowtie greeted.
“Mr. Jack,” the older man responded. “I hear tell your fantasy is becoming a religion.”
“As your reality has become politics,” Notorious Jack smiled.
“Yes.”
“Your Majesty, you write what you write but so do I. My work is not authoritative but it does change things. It does change the world.”
“Everyone is now a child?” the old man smirked. “Is life now fun and games?”
“Your Majesty, you and the others are unaffected by my fiction.”
“Jack, we are greatly affected. I am old because of your words. Your fantasy has become my reality.”
Notorious Jack grinned. “You were always old, my friend. Even as a child you were an old man. All I did was show you a mirror.”
“Oh?”
“My power is imagination but what is imagined is impotent lest empowered by reality. The fiction must ring true. Humanity is a child race. Men and women are really boys and girls. They live for gratification, not satisfaction. They are small, weak, cowardly and irresponsible, knowing only what they want and fear.”
“My power is truth,” the old man claimed. “My words are as things are, not as I imagine them.”
“I am what I write,” Notorious Jack claimed. “My words are my thoughts and feelings. You tell what you observe, though as indoctrination. You are the king because you control the thoughts of your readers… but you are nameless because your stories are not about you.”
“I wrote my autobiography.”
“Yes, but to control thoughts rather than to share them. Your words show a man in your image but not in your likeness. He is not really you.”
“You know me so well?”
“I do.”
“My friend,” Anonymous Rex uttered insincerely. “You create what you wish was you.”
“I do.”
“You empower the child that is the real you… yet you are not a child in reality.”
“I am, actually.”
“Notorious Jack, you are as old as I am. We grew up together.”
“We did.”
“Why do you not look it?”
“A thousand years is like a day and a day like a thousand yours. You age by the day. I age by the years.”
The men backed away from each other, each three paces. A small, round table appeared between them. The men stared at each other. Anonymous Rex eventually produced a book, as if out of nowhere. He set it upon the table. The front cover was dominated by the title “THE GLORIOUS FUTURE” with the name “Anonymous Rex” small and at the bottom.
“Impressive,” Notorious Jack remarked. “Your rule of reality is glorified accordingly.”
“Yes, but what do you offer?”
The writer of fiction also produced a book as if out of nowhere. He did not set it next to the book of the other man, but rather atop it. The cover was dominated by the name “NOTORIOUS JACK” with the title “THE HOPELESS FUTURE” small and at the bottom.
“You cannot inspire by such a title,” Anonymous Rex remarked. “You cannot rule by telling your readers that all is in vain.”
“I tell them the truth.”
Anonymous Rex chuckled. “Yes,” he admitted. “The glorious future is my own, not that of my readers. Your hopeless future is fiction as their reality.”
“They enjoy my fiction. Few believe what you tell them. Most everyone believes what I tell them.”
“Undoubtedly.”
“Anonymous Rex, the world is your kingdom. If it was a democracy, I would rule the world.”
“The world is a democracy,” the old man claimed. “Though you are popular, it is as my jester.”
“I am the fool?”
“You are.”
Anonymous Rex ruled the world as the High Priest of the Nameless One. He was the Nameless King accordingly. His non-fiction was scripture of the unholy theocracy.
Notorious Jack was the Left Hand of the Nameless One. He too was a priest. His fiction was also scripture. Like the books of Anonymous Rex, it was the official truth of the worldly realm of otherworldly horror.
The Nameless One ruled by lust and fear. He kept his servants against each other, to render them needy of his favor. They could never turn against him if they were busy contending with each other.
Men and women were boys and girls. They went to school to learn rather than think. They did what they were told to do, not what they chose to do. Their playtime was given them, and they were told to play. The recreation was because the slaves needed it, not because the masters cared. Healthy slaves were more valuable as property.
Children live in houses and apartments but they do not own homes. They have toys but the toys can be taken from them. The boys and girls of the world owned nothing… yet were expected to be happy.
Notorious Jack visited the Wayward School for Girls. The students were pretty white girls uniformed in a gray blouse and darker gray skirt. The visitor knocked on the door of the principal’s office. It opened. The Principal stood from behind his desk. He fastened his trousers.
Notorious Jack chuckled. “I know what you were doing. Have a seat and let the girl finish.”
Max Wayward, the Principal of the school tittered. He sat back down and opened his trousers. He reached under his desk and pulled a little girl’s head back into his lap. The man cooed.
Notorious Jack grinned. “He doesn’t understand your preference for girls,” he told Max Wayward.
“Anonymous Rex?”
“Who else?”
“What about him?” the Principal wondered. He was a disciple of Anonymous Rex. Mr. Wayward was a student in the old man’s Progressive School for Boys. He was made to watch Anonymous Rex molest and murder students.
“You are one of his boys.” Notorious Jack reminded, “He gave you girls. Do you appreciate his favor?”
“Yes.”
“Oh?”
“Notorious Jack, you are the rival of my master. Why are you here?”
“Max Wayward, my new book is coming out. Will you read it?”
“You write fiction.”
“Yes.”
“What am I to learn from fiction?”
Notorious Jack shrugged. “My books are bestsellers. There must be something about them you would find… interesting.”
“I am a scholar.”
“I know.”
“I read to learn.”
“Of course.”
The men stared at each other. Max Wayward gasped and panted. He grunted as he sowed his seed into the mouth of the little girl between his legs. He then jerked her face past a shoulder, snapping her neck. “Never the same girl twice,” Notorious Jack remarked.
“Never the same boy twice,” Max Wayward remembered. “Children are husks of themselves when used for pleasure. I learned the lesson from my master, your rival, Anonymous Rex.”
“His boys. Your girls. Plenty for both of you. You delight in wasting them.”
“Mr. Jack, despite my moment of pleasure, I am at work. I am busy.”
“Doing what?”
“Educating my students.”
“Brainwashing them.”
“Educating them.”
“That’s what I said,” Notorious Jack grinned. “You have more girls than you could ever molest or kill. You can have as many as you want. They are yours in the name of Anonymous Rex, for you to do with as you please… for his pleasure.”
“You can’t turn me against him.”
“Oh?”
“Mr. Jack, for all your power and authority, you are no greater than I am.”
“He is?”
“Anonymous Rex rules the world. We live in his realm. He is our king.”
Notorious Jack set a book on the desk. Mr. Wayward read the title “THE HOPELESS FUTURE” and was curious. The author stood up and said, “Read it or not, but it is yours. You have a free copy before it is publically available.”
“Why?”
“You are in the book, my friend, though I changed your name to ‘Max Freeman’ and the name of your school to ‘the Empowered School for Girls.’ You are the hero.”
“I am?”
“I won’t spoil it for you.” Notorious Jack left the room. He slowly closed the door behind himself.
Max Wayward stared at the cover. He read the synopsis on the back of the cover, then the introduction. He started reading the novel.
The book The Glorious Future by Anonymous Rex was released on Sunday the 8th. It was an instant bestseller of non-fiction. Its readers were the boys and girls in their second childhood, the elderly men and women of the world.
The novel The Hopeless Future by Notorious Jack was released on Friday the 13th and was already a bestseller from presales. Boys and girls waited in long lines for their copies. The book outsold The Glorious Future six-to-one. It was soon in production to be made a movie.
Anonymous Rex and Notorious Jack had lunch together. They gave each other a copy of their own bestseller. “Do you ever read my books?” Mr. Jack wondered.
“No.”
“I read yours.”
“There is nothing to learn from fiction,” the old man responded. “I read to learn.”
Notorious Jack grinned. He leaned forward and said, “I read your books and I learn more than what you tell us.”
Anonymous Rex arched an eyebrow. “Really?” he was curious.
Notorious Jack nodded. “Your books are unimaginative versions of fiction,” he claimed. “You plagiarize reality and claim it as your own work. You omit what embarrasses you and embellish what glorifies you.”
“Me?”
“What you tout. You tout what suits you and shun what shames you.”
Anonymous Rex chuckled. He remarked, “Yet you learn more than what I tell you.”
Notorious Jack again nodded. “When you fail to mention something, I know I found something to investigate. When something is too good to be true, I know to deconstruct it. I do read the truth. It is between the lines.”
Anonymous Rex smiled. “Notorious Jack,” he uttered the name loudly and clearly. “You are one of us. You know the real agenda. You know what we are really doing… and why.”
“I do.”
“Why did you pay my disciple a visit?”
“Max Wayward?”
“You gave him a copy of your novel.”
“I did,” Mr. Jack grinned.
“Why?”
“Your boy is living my dream come true.”
The old man laughed. “The daughters of man are given to him, for him to do with as he pleases.”
“White girls,” Mr. Jack specified. “As many as he wants. They fill the building he works in.”
“Notorious Jack, I give you girls.”
“Yes, but I must ask for them. I don’t own them. He owns his students.”
“He does.”
“You own him.”
“I do,” Anonymous Rex confirmed. “His power and authority are in my name. His girls are his as mine.”
“He’s raising an army,” Mr. Jack mentioned.
“I know.”
“By your power and authority he can muster as many girls as he wants.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“His army is one of my many armies. His girls guard my facilities, as do the boys and girls of other schools. I can wage war without being involved.”
“I know.”
“Yet you ask.”
“Your Majesty, I wanted to hear you say it. I wanted you to tell me your secret.”
It was stormy that night. Lightning flashed and thunder boomed, cracked and rumbled. It did not rain. Anonymous Rex ascended a staircase along the inside of a round wall of a tower. The steps were narrow. There was no railing. There was no floor. The bottom within the tower was a bottomless pit. “Around and around and around you go,” a voice whispered from the pit. “Up and up and up to know.”
“To see from above,” the manly voice of the old man uttered. “To hear from on high.”
“As above, so below.”
“Yes,” Anonymous Rex acknowledged. “My throne on earth is with a crown from heaven.”
The old man came out onto the top of the tower. It was flat. The storm was above and a vast cityscape below. He produced his latest book, as if out of nowhere. He read, and his reading sounded as a booming voice, “The glory of heaven and earth is pride as power. It is hubris unabashed and cruelty unpunished. It is the wealth of the swindler, the virility of the rapist and the authority of the murderer.” The reading echoed across the city, though unheard as a whisper. “By my blood I do live and by my breath I do speak. By my pride I do rule at the expense of the meek.” The reading again echoed as a subliminal message to all below.
A shadowy form stepped next to Anonymous Rex. The man noticed and smiled. “Notorious Jack,” the spook whispered.
“His words are fake,” the old man smirked.
“They are believed!”
“As are mine.”
“Max Wayward,” the specter whispered. “He read the fakery.”
“He believes it,” Anonymous Rex suspected. “You told me he is the hero of the story.”
“Yes.”
The old man laughed. “Good,” he smiled. “My boy is lazy lest ambitious. His best work is when he is at his worst.”
“Notorious Jack.”
“He lives in the fantasy he writes,” Anonymous Rex dismissed the man. “I live what he dreams. My boy lives what he dreams.”
“You are the reality,” the spook whispered.
“I am.”
“Anonymous Rex, the Nameless King. You stand above the world you rule.”
The old man frowned. “Robert,” he glared at the shadowy entity. “Why do you flatter me? I am not deaf to such an insult.”
“For love of you,” the entity whispered. “Anonymous Rex is my power in the light of day.”
“And your authority,” the old man reminded. “Return to the shadows. See what you see and hear what you hear.”
The shadowy entity disappeared into the very darkness. The storm ceased. The night became deathly quiet. Anonymous Rex gazed upon the city below. Its lights sparkled to the horizon. A cool wind washed over the old man. He outstretched his arms and sighed, basking in the coolness.
Little white girls uniformed in a white, sleeveless shirt with a red “E” on the chest and skimpy blue bottoms were armed with a carbine that looked like a toy ray gun. They snapped to attention as a man approached and passed them. He went into his office, the door closing behind him by itself.
The man sat behind his desk. The phone rang. It was an old fashioned telephone with cords. “Hello,” the man answered.
“Mr. Freeman,” a voice spoke from the other end. “Have you considered our offer?”
“No.” Mr. Freeman, the Principal for the Empowered School for Girls stated, “My school is not a front for criminal activity. My students are not slave labor.”
“We have dirt on you.”
“I don’t care!”
“You will.”
“Try it.”
Max Wayward laughed. He was in a theater watching the movie The Hopeless Future. It was supposedly about him as a flawed man who ultimately did the right thing. In the novel he led his girls into a battle against a gang with an army of boys. In the book, he dies but is mourned by his girls at his funeral.
“What’s so funny?” someone asked from the seat behind. The one asking was Notorious Jack.
“They changed your book.”
“Movies always do.”
“Not for the better.”
Notorious Jack smiled. “You read it,” he concluded.
“Yeah.”
“Did you like it?”
“I die.”
“Heroically.”
Max Wayward whined, “What’s the point of doing the right thing if doing the right thing ends badly?”
“Hence the title.”
Max Wayward sighed. “Why base any of this on me? It’s not really about me.”
“It is, actually.”
“I’m a corrupt official who turns against the mafia? That has nothing to do with me.”
Notorious Jack grinned. “The villain of the book is one the readers understand. The villain of the movie is likewise. Gangsters make sense as the bad guys.”
“There are no good guys in reality,” Mr. Wayward muttered.
“I know.” Mr. Jack waved at the audience, who seemed not to hear the men. “They don’t.” He explained, “They suspect but don’t want to know that their every legitimate institution is just part of a gang. Their civil servants and leaders are actually gangsters.”
“Yeah, and your fiction has me turning against the gangsters.”
“Max Wayward,” Notorious Jack grinned. “I know your secret.”
“What… what do you think you know?”
“He knows.”
“What?”
“Max Wayward, you are his favorite, but just like all the others.”
“What others?”
“The little bosses. You want to be the real boss. They all do. He has you all against each other to keep you under control.”
“Notorious Jack, are you accusing me of rebellion?”
“I am saying you are ambitious. You are a child who wants to grow up. You are trying to do so by rebelling against authority.”
The little girls in the movie were Empowered School for Girls sentries. They blazed away, their guns shooting glowing bolts as little boys wearing black T-shirts but no pants stormed the school grounds. “You have an army,” Notorious Jack reminded Max Wayward. “Your girls will fight for you.”
“He has many armies,” the Principal for the Wayward School for Girls responded. “He rules the world. I can’t take on the entire world.”
The last of the little girls drop and little boys throng into the Empowered School for Girls. The Principal is dual-wielding the guns of his fallen sentries. He blazes away, boys dropping with smoking wounds. More boys keep coming. They blaze away, their many glowing bolts burning into the man. He staggers but keeps shooting. A woman, one of the Teachers, sneaks up to him from behind… and shoots him in the back of the head. “Are you warning me?” Max Wayward asked the author of the fiction. “Is one of my women going to betray me?”
“Who is Miss Monster?” Notorious Jack asks. “Understand the fiction and you shall know the truth.”
“My coven is loyal. The Teachers have nothing to gain and everything to lose by turning against me.”
“There are twelve of them,” Mr. Jack states. “You are the first or the thirteenth. You decide.”
The credits roll. Max Wayward reads the names as they scroll down. “Miss Monster” is credited as “Sylvia Tera,” the Teacher of the school in charge of turning students into monsters.
“The fiction is a cautionary tale,” Notorious Jack remarks. When the lights come one, he is gone, as if never actually there.
Max Wayward already knew Sylvia Tera was a spy for Anonymous Rex. She proved useful, however, so the Principal tolerated her duplicity. The fiction convinced him that he should reconsider.
Anonymous Rex and Notorious Jack had dinner together that night, at a fancy restaurant. “Your movie is a blockbuster,” Mr. Rex stated. “Congratulations.”
“I wrote the book,” Mr. Jack corrected. “The movie is its own thing.”
“I write the books but my readers are their own thing,” the old man responded. “Their interpretations are not my own… but the influence is.”
“We start what they finish.”
“Yes,” Anonymous Rex raised his glass. “They do our work.”
“They do our work,” Notorious Jack raised his own glass. The authors toasted each other. Their words influenced the world, turning people into pieces to be played. The players enjoyed the game. It was one of life and death. The writers lived. Their victims died… or worse.