Veri-fried: Falling Down

A dystopic short story.

Norman awoke at five o’ clock in the morning to the sound of a drone swarm buzzing overhead his house. Loudspeakers robotically bellowed out the day’s restrictions:

“Controlled power outages on the hour for twelve minutes until twenty three hundred hours. Power consumption priority given to subjects who are fully verified with weekly iris scans, bloodwork, and proof of personhood digital badge assurance.

For the capital crime of committing ecocide, the following subjects have been de-naturalised and unpersoned:

Tom Parsons, informed upon by his children who displayed a calculating ferocity…”

Norman shuddered. He’d known Parsons on a courteous level for seven years as a colleague at the Ministry of Verification. They were both made redundant six months ago and placed on universal basic income; the AI ruling Algocracy had since taken over all administration, services, and the means of production. Norman felt a twang of pitiful deep sorrow for Parsons, imagining him wandering aimlessly through the wastelands of the ‘dustbowl’, choking on the reportedly hazardous pollutive particle matter. Poor Parsons. What could he have done to have fallen foul of the eco-patrol bots?

Norman snapped out of his melancholic, contemplative state, for his own facial contortions could easily betray him, if construed as hostile towards the ‘Algo’. His eye movements, body temperature, heart rate, and perspiration were also being monitored in real time by the bio-sensors within his SMART home. This was mandatory for anyone receiving UBI. Stipulated. Conditional.

Everyone he had ever known or ever loved had either been convicted of ecocide or domestic terrorism since the Algo came online. Although Norman secretly disbelieved their guilt. Or was it that the punishment did not fit the crime? Were the alleged ‘crimes’ akin to merely existing and acting upon the old ways of doing things?

The only available news source from any device connected to the algornet was Factual Truths. This news network was run by a virtual avatar, based upon a digital twin of Acinda Jaldern, who’s humanoid voice told viewers that the network would be their “only source of truth”. Capitulastack was one of the last platform holdouts, but they too were inevitably subsumed by the Algocratic leviathan. C-stack went out with a quiet whimper via an announcement:

• When a law requires us to restrict content or request documentation to access certain material, we will do so only in the countries that require it, and we will make the process and the reasoning as transparent as possible.

Norman smiled sadly as he recalled reading the last article published by a Bangkok based writer, before age verification came in, along with VPNs getting banned, which was now punishable by public flaying.

Navigating this cowardly new world was frightening and confusing. Where did the control end? Where does the humanity begin? Had every empathetic urge, and each compassionate trait been eradicated from mankind? Had Norman’s fellow UBI dependent neighbours been socially engineered into unthinking, unwavering obedience? Or were they simply pretending, out of self preservation? Like he was…

The first controlled power outage of the morning kicked in, leaving Norman’s property without electricity. He only ‘verified’ his identity with physical forms of ID, so alas, no priority privileges for this difficult customer.

Norman ventured into his garden to enjoy some peaceful solitude from the comfort of a deckchair, as the first rays of daylight broke. A couple of grey and white squirrels were scuttling across the tallest branches of the apple tree, foraging for food.

Red-chested robins and blue tit birds playfully hopped along his garden wall, nibbling on the bananas he’d left out for them.

Norman began to drift off, slumped in his cozy chair, relishing the gentle breeze and the sweet sickly smell of morning dew. He caught the faint speaker announcement from within his SMART home, informing him that power had been restored.

The electricity cables overhead began to crackle and pop, generating sparks which suddenly burst into flames.

A transformer had blown up due to a power surge from restoring electricity in the area. Norman rolled his eyes…this was the fourth time this month.

Strong winds began lashing the cables, bending the surrounding trees, which swayed and strained, creaking, groaning. Within minutes the electrical fire had spread to other transformers. The flames were now dancing, leaping onto trees, and hungrily licking at the nearest houses in the neighbourhood. The speed and intensity of the fire was unusual; terrifying how it consumed everything in its path.

Norman panicked, sprinted into his garage and jumped into his electric vehicle. The battery meter displayed zero charge. He’d forgotten to plug it in last night. He could either burn to death in this unnatural raging fire, or commit ecocide. Knowing full well what would happen next, Norman grabbed the dusty burgundy coloured tarpaulin in the corner of the garage with both hands, and threw it onto the floor, revealing a mechanised artifact from a bygone era.

His trusty old Royal Enfield Taurus, a dark green, diesel-powered motorcycle from the 1980s, stood there in all its former glory. Norman rushed to crack open the fuel cap, before hurriedly filling up the tank from his emergency jiffy can.

As the auto-door of the garage slid open, Norman noticed that the oak trees lining the street pavement were burning fiercely from the inside out, which was odd.

He kick-started the bike, a whiff of diesel fumes permeating his nostrils, feeling a rush of excitement and relief as the engine coughed and spluttered into life. Norman stalled the engine twice - it had been fifteen years since internal combustion engine vehicles were banned, and he was feeling a little rusty. The Enfield roared into action, painting coarse, black tire marks onto Norman’s driveway, the smell of burnt rubber filling the air.

Drone swarms buzzing overhead, sirens flashing, speakers blurting out instructions for everyone to stay in their homes awaiting military rescue. Norman glanced left and right in bewilderment at his neighbours on either side of the road, visible through their front windows…They sat calmly on their sofas awaiting rescue, as their homes burned all around them. They had total faith in the Algocracy and its deployment of rapid response robotic rescue squads.

Norman drove past small military crews and their robot dogs already posted on street corners. The men were barking orders into their radios, angrily pointing at Norman. The four-legged robot dogs gave chase.

The bike’s top speed maxed out at 65 kmph, which Norman knew was not enough to outrun the dog pack hunting him down. The larger, weaponised drones descended to intercept the path of the motorcycle. A drone speaker emitted a warning in its computerised voice:

Norman Montag, you have been charged with ecocide. Stop the motorcycle or we will use non-lethal force in five seconds. Four, three, two. one…

Norman’s jaw involuntarily clenched, painfully chipping his grinding teeth. His body went into convulsive spasms, sending searing shocks to every cell. The drone had tasered him. The control of the bike slipped out of Norman’s weak, diminished grasp, veering into a white picket-fenced garden. He hurtled through the air and landed on a well maintained flowerbed of vibrantly coloured petunias.

Norman lay on his back looking up at masked soldiers and robots peering down at him. His vision swirled and blurred into black spots, until he lost consciousness.

---

Norman opened his eyes, noticing his hospital gown, bandages covering his left arm, an intravenous drip embedded in his right hand, and the bed he was lay upon. He was startled to realise that he was not actually in a hospital, as he desperately scanned his surrounding environment to make sense of things.

A gravely, baritone, artificial voice, jolted him to attention, as the monosyllabic delivery shattered the silence of the giant hall, in which Norman found himself in.

Norman Montag, for the crime of ecocide, this court finds you guilty. The supreme Algocratic principles by which this society is governed, define ecocide as the heedless or deliberate destruction of the natural environment, as by pollutants or an act of war.

In your selfish and reckless abandonment, you poisoned the air with hazardous emissions of CO2 and diesel fuel from a contraband vehicle. You declared an act of war against the natural habitat. You breached the peace. You shall be henceforth banished to the wastelands beyond the borders of our peaceful utopic SMART society, for a period not less than twenty-five years.

Do you wish to say anything in your defense for the record of this court? Even though there is no right to appeal or challenge the verdict.

Norman stared in disbelief. He had read about juries being replaced with judges only, although they were still supposed to be human. Here, passing down his sentencing, was not a man of flesh and blood and bone, but something else that was made of metal. Ridiculously dressed in a judge’s robes, and even wearing a judicial wig.

Was this monstrosity the result of a merger between the leading AI companies that he had read about? An advanced large language model embodied within a bipedal robot? Or was this the singularity, ‘personified’ as judge, jury, and executioner?

The courtroom was cold, musty, and devoid of life.

I was only trying to survive. I couldn’t leave in my EV car, because it wasn’t charged. Should I have willingly died in the fire, rather than escape on my motorbike?

Norman murmured, exhaling tiredly.

The metal judge gazed back at Norman, an unfeeling, inhuman beholder behind monochromatic, oval-shaped eyes, coloured onyx. It curled its elongated metal fingers around the small wooden hammer, raising it above its head.

We are all in this together, Norman. Those who willingly harm nature are not fit for purpose in this society.

The defendant is guilty! This court is adjourned!

The facsimile of a judge boomed in a decibel level that shook the jury box, as it slammed the hammer down.

---

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