ERIC VINCENT

PASS

Site: http://ericvincent.no-ip.org/

© Eric Vincent 2007. All rights reserved. All resemblance with situations or characters having existed, existing or to come, would be fortuitous.

One by one, the names, first names and specialties of all students scroll on the huge

university screen. No mention, no sort, nor notation: only "pass" or "failed." Two terms to sanction a ten years degree course for superior studies. Joy screams exploded, some tears spring: the traditional scenes perpetuate themselves from year to year. Some nerve crises punctuate visual information and some young people are convulsing under the impassive eyes of the campus authorities. The results display begins for the students whose patronymic starts by "M." Julien Mouret swings between tetany and unconsciousness. His life depends on a word, just one. Pass or failed. Mélanie Maria, a medicine studient, bounds like a kangaroo, displaying an indecent taste of victory. She is out of trouble. The scroll doesn't stop: Mimaud, Mirot, Monnier, Mouret. Pass. Julien collapses, shattered. "Shit… Pass! " Along this last decade, he tried everything to fail. First, arduous marketing studies whereas his genetic codes predestined him to become an eminent musician, a genius's composer. During these seasons, he didn't stop intoxicating himself to curl the ethylic coma. He swallowed cargos of medicines, drugs, while hoping to erase the knowledge injected by electrodes in his neurons. But his dirty synaptic network resisted all treatments that he inflicted himself, from caustic sodium carbonate poured in his auditory ducts to home-made shock treatment while biting boldly electric cables. His memory swallowed programs like a goose crammed by force to get fat. The marketing rules anchored in him as bloodsuckers nailed to an incision. During every mid-year exam, he exploded his visage against a wall and hoped that the repeated shocks would annihilate a few thousands of essential neurons, destroy parcels of knowledge. Nothing availed. Impossible to cheat! The candidate is tied up to an armchair, a helmet is affixed on his skull, some needles transfix his flesh and the data are pulled and regurgitated by the foul machine to a terrific computer, the only judge and exams corrector. According to what it swallows, it only regurgitates two words: “pass” or “failed”. Julien passed. His job contract binding him to the unique world business company is now effective. The thought hunts the prostration. He must flee, escape from the campus and refuse this insane life that the totalitarian capitalist system proposes. He must join the “failed” under the Earth, those that know an existence deprived of constraints, free to think, to love, to enjoy and to live. Which way can he chose? His eyes scan the horizon, his senses combine their strengths and his thought power must be used now. Damned! Sixty thousand policemen warn the least escaped and these zealous agents paid on commission will fight to grasp and to drive him into his next office. A crowd forms itself close to an exit, the ranks enlarge, a movement of crowd, some blind stampings: it’s the solution! He screams deeply: - All “pass” with me!

As accomplished leader, he recruits with strength; he harangues the indecisive, those doubting about their future conditions, those stay unbelievers facing the rumors. He runs, attracts, stirs and scorches the campus. A group of students blocks his road. Not even fixed on their fate or failed. If some “pass” escape, the computer will calculate again the averages, will fix new scales and will get its quotas. Julien stumbles, he is on the ground. Score of feet tread him: he will perish. Death is better than his drawn fate. The strokes rain down, shootings explode, bullets gush, gases burn, hand grasp him firmly and send him to his "fatal" destiny. He faints. *** - Welcome in the world business company, employee MOUR9857864! Julien opens the eyes. His body is only pains; his skull barks his ration of anti-pain. His mind comes back. He is at work. A chair, an office, a computer, no window, non identified lighting, impersonal walls, armored door. Four cameras cover the least squared centimeter, including the chemical WC and the sink. The work space is not huge: the firm built its profits while trimming on the least dose of human comfort of its employees. - Your standard 20 hours work day is starting now. Your performances will be judged permanently and the suitable measures will immediately punish them. You will take your 6 hours rest periods in another part of the firm. You will eat in your office. Enjoy the present day. A machine voice! Julien inspects the drawers lodged under his desk. Caffeine, codeine, scores of astounding and doping, in seals, in spray and even in intravenous. Syringes, break-open phials and everything to wake up a regiment of living deaths or to plunge him in the most demonic trances. Gifts from the firm. He taps on the touch panel. His objective: to conceive an marketing launch for a new shaving cream. He can’t care less: he would have preferred to spit his venom on the way to wipe out the government and the firm. He rises and starts turning in circle. He will wait, he will see after. A grinding, no, a kind of scrape attracts his attention. The wall… He would have sworn to see it moving! He affixes his hands on the frozen partition. Minute vibrations browse it. He stretches the ear. Characteristic sizzling of a motor. New scrape. The wall touches his shoes whereas they were unless a centimeter. "Your performances will be judged permanently and the suitable measures will immediately punish them" The electronic voice resounds in his mind. He understands: - No! If… if… I… no… - A proof of your intelligence, employee MOUR9857864. If your results disappoint us, your working space will be reduced and reassigned. A clamor without end tears his neighborhood. The voice comments: - A very mediocre employee, a place to conquer. Rush yourself… An idea, quick an idea! The baffles nibble a bit of space, precious millimeters. A migraine deprives him of his faculties. For a campaign of launching, it is necessary to innovate, to be delirious, to produce the hundreds of ideas to keep the best only, the one that will

make buy the product even though the consumer doesn't have any utility of it. He opens the office drawer, seizes the small bottles and deciphers the labels. He must dope himself if he doesn't want to end crushed. To kill not to be killed. To enter in the system or to perish. Heroine, syringe, latex, tourniquet, injection, relaxation, trip, visions, production, productivity. The walls move away. Good employee…