Freedom Surrendered: Sleepwalking into an Anticlock Disaster
It was our own fault. We sleepwalked into disaster. How could we have been so stupid? They were smart operators of course. But that’s no excuse and there’s no point in whining about it now. They tricked us with their lies and promises and we’ve no one to blame but ourselves. Freedom surrendered can rarely be regained.
It should have been obvious from the outset really. After all, the mere name the `Anticlockwise Empire’ should have started a few 
alarm bells ringing. But they seemed so friendly and accommodating. So we didn’t notice. We were just too gullible. They kept telling us that we’d be better off on our own, that the Safronika Confederation had stolen our birth-right from us and that it would be a good idea to abandon clockwise thinking and opt for an anticlockwise life.
They made it sound so perfectly logical – an endless stream of promises that they never had any intention of keeping. They made fools of us. Looking back it’s obvious but at the time it wasn’t like that. It all sounded reasonable enough to suggest that collaborating with the Faraway Galaxy would be much better than continuing our relationship with the Safronikans. After all, the Safronikans couldn’t even speak our language could they? Safronika was a disorganised tower of Babel, an incomprehensible patchwork of conflicting languages collectively termed `Multiglott’. Multiglott, they assured us, would lead to catastrophe. And in any case Guttural, the language of Anticlockwise, was spoken by most people in the universe, especially those in the Faraway Galaxy.
Over time though, it started dawning on us that they weren’t who they said they were. And now that they’ve taken over in earnest and changed everything forever, they don’t even bother to pretend to be nice. Why should they? They’re in charge after all. They’ve stolen our identity, force fed us their inanities and given us no option but to turn ourselves into narrow-minded and inward-looking clones of themselves. To put it bluntly, freedom surrendered means freedom surrendered. You lose everything once you’ve given up the right to decide for yourself.
I’ve no idea who I am any more. My new `name’ is AC937/X8. Not much of a label is it? AntiClockwise937/X8: X because I’m male; 8 because I have strange yellow colour hair. The colour of my hair has always been different from anyone else’s. I don’t know why. I’m classified as an 8 because that’s the miscellaneous category they put people in who don’t fit into any of the normal tick boxes.
Anyway, the Anticlocks are keen on getting everyone into neat administrative categories. They don’t approve of any deviation from the norm you see. They especially don’t like any display of personality. Reducing a human being to letters and numbers strengthens their control. I did have a proper name once but I can barely remember what it was. It’s so long since anyone called me by it.
You can call me Solitanu: Zeb Solitanu. That’s not my real name either of course. But who cares? One name’s as good as another don’t you think? I’m just using it to protect myself from prying eyes. We all use aliases round here. You never know who might be reading this blog. If the Snoops discovered who I really was, I’d be banged up in a flash.
You’re always looking over your shoulder in Anticlockwise. There are Snoops everywhere: Snoops, that’s what we call the State Security Operatives who keep us under surveillance. 
They’re constantly sending reports back to the Globopolis City police chief about what we’re getting up to. I’d be in serious trouble if they heard me complaining about being called AC937/X8.
Names are just the tip of the iceberg. In six months they’ve transformed everything. They’ve cut back on the power supply to the city of Globopolis. So everything’s much darker. The Anticlockwise Empire likes to operate in the shadows. Most of the cinemas, theatres and restaurants have closed. No one’s allowed out at night anymore. The neighbourhood around Infinity Gateway where I live and work is now a ghost town after 8pm: no cars, no buses, not a soul to be seen. Just squads of Snoops patrolling the streets looking for an excuse to arrest someone, anyone who’s fallen foul of the curfew.
And that’s just external appearances. Worse is their systematic attempt to change the way we think, to get us to swallow the drivel they spew out on their media channels. I won’t bore you with what they’re saying. It’s too puerile for words. But it’s effective. If you don’t conform, the Snoops pay you a visit to correct your errors.
Nothing’s straightforward any more. I wish that I could turn the clock back like you can in science fiction movies. But life’s not like that is it?
Zeb Solitanu sketch by Jill
Anticlockwise Journal – a compilation of Solitanu’s Blog posts – is on sale at Amazon
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