"Hey, hey, their bodies are

  really old now.  Let's just make it a nice atmosphere (i)for them(i)." 

  Someone had rented the space.  Though on the outside of the building, it looked delapidated, maybe even abandoned.  Some of the neighboring buildings were "crack houses" and overcrowded people boxes.  

  It was one city block in a world grid of megacities and sprawling cities and rundown metropoli that population-wise wasn't really like a city anymore. 

  US Agencies had worked together, at least in a traffic coordination way, to allow the unsettled to go through and the residents to "place up". 

  Some middle agers had teamed up with other "boomers" to transport and keep safe parents and grandparents who needed somewhere to be. 

  Warring had taken a turn.  In the streamlined processes of trying to contain the hot wars, there was a period of blurred lines and a brutality getting the upper hand in the fighting.  Civilians were getting killed.  Some were even being targeted.  The all-hands-on-deck had many people in "bridge positions". 

  A nationwide not yet digital social networking was counterweight to sheer panic and a more blind than "seeing" approach to calming down as a country. 

  "One day at a time," someone kept whispering hoarsely to a vigorous, "but, but, but".  A binder of big picture about drug fiends and having no money in a quicksand environment was passed around.  "It is life and death that everyone in this shelter stay in this shelter until daylight." 

  Limited supplies were shared. 

"I just think you're not seeing

  the bigger picture." 

  "What is all this?" 

  "Why am I on that monitor?" 

  "It's not a monitor it's a TV! Even you dinosaurs know 'bout those." 

  The black and white people were talking and talking and talking and talking on the TV.  "Now watch this.  Your nephew or somebody's nephew condensed all this 'noise' into people talking like Kung Fu fighters and then BAM! (everybody jumped) a key point is given in text." 

  "I just think you're not seeing the bigger picture," flashed onto the screen in a text box while talking, moving lips froze in funny looking poses. 

  "And look at this!" Everyone looked at three more televisions hooked to various tape decks.  "What those people were talking about (i)connects up(i) to this footage!" 

  "Oh my." 

"Because healing was a

  painstaking process for all of the people involved in the so-called culture wars." Nobody had paid the volunteers to say such things.  They were people who'd largely passed through the "like" or "dislike" phase of vetting candidates, and many had also gone through the guts of the standing question (i)what does it mean to be American?(i) 

  There were others "keeping their nuts" behind little tables.  A lot had been deemed "crazy" and "abusive" for speaking their minds.  "There's a lockdown on sanity chica," a passing through bestie of a friend of a friend, but nobody's cousin, high-fived someone else who'd stayed sober through an estrangement process.  "What are they selling over at the tables?" 

  "Not really licensed to sell anything and a lot of them got laid off, but some volunteered to brag on the orgs that survived." 

  A gaggle of crowd straggled through the all-recycled-materials park.  Cooperatively owned by community, mostly local, but with some corporate sponsorship. 

  "Yah, it's all (i)staged(i) for actual political people to bulldoze or (i)TAKE OVER(i)," a hot-headed woman chucked her workbelt into the back of her pick up truck. "I don't think that will happen Lupè." 

  "Don't even turn around here come the invisible masses." When the Human Resource person did turn around, the hot-head drove off.  The scene stayed calm and all kinds of information was exchanged. 

  The typewriter dinged.  The page was carefully pulled from the carriage.  "How much?" 

  "That was a freebie." 

  "Starter resumé?" 

  "We finished up those.  We're on to starter paragraphs of newspaper articles." 

  "What?" A long-lashed, heavily eye make up'd woman in an expensive dress shirt and construction helmet blinked and blinked as the pause after the question was demanded. 

  "Of course there's no guarantee that any of these party papers will run community concerns, but..." 

  "What?" The woman said again. 

  "Lookah, I fill up page.  More?" A person had already block printed the front of the piece of paper.  An assistant to the typist showed the blank back.  The person smiled.  Licked a half a pencil and stuck the pencil behind ear.

The guy had made himself look as scary as possible.

  Kept creeping out of the treeline and snagging left behind items from a series of "conferences" that were, more or less, on the tail end of a rubberband shotputted at administrative people tasked with explaining (i)budget, no budget(i). 

  Orgs the world over were suddenly and for truly like the emperor with no clothes. 

  The guy grabbed a broken waisted corn husk hula skirt.  He shook it.  "Why are you shaking it?  What's the meaning?" A small and tidy Asian woman asked.  Before he answered, "I like the sound," he debated tying the response into the trend of rebirthing our mythology. 

  "My daughter (whom he'd been spying on) wants to marry a white man.  Think I could convince her to go with this as the wedding dress?" 

  "It's hard to understand you with the fangs in your mouth." His woman friend had been filling the car tire with a can of air when he emerged from the crop of woods around the open air "conference center".  "And you owe me twelve dollars." 

  "For the air? I could've done it myself!" 

  "Coulda, shouldah, woulda." She looked at a long string of spit between the guy's mouth and the fangs in hand.  Shook her head at the sad state of the world.  Stood up and said, "For ruining my eye makeup puttin' it on your face like that." 

Pens like javelins and poison darts.

  Of course there are crocodiles in the doorways and at desks. 

  There are orbits on horns and sharp angles. 

  There are representations of fragmented institutions, memories of iterations, there's recall of what was, and real unknowing of what will be. 

  "Not going to mourn."

  Sort of a soldier's stand I guess. 

  Tinged also with the ocean current of deeming and being deemed (i)savage(i). 

  Fire or ice, there's transformation either way.  And for some that is what to (i)war for(i).  What to (i)rage and rail(i) against. 

  This is why (i)loyalty(i) and degrees of dying for willingness and so much confusion about standing for something. 

  Troubles.

"It's a mix of disenfranchised and..." One man

  looked at the ground searching for the words.  "I'm not really a spokesperson here." 

  "Looonahticks." Another man finished the sentence.  "I'm not an expert but that group is just not right in the head." 

  People considered the mechanics of what was being said. 

  "We've seen this sort of thing from time to time," said a woman in a drab suit.  "Often it's a scare tactic used to disguise something else going on." 

  "Like what?" Somebody loudly snapped chewing gum and asked. 

  "Like drugs.  Sex trafficking.  Other sordid activities." 

  "Besides," somebody else spoke up, "If they really are Satanists they don't really have a political shot." 

  "It's not really a political thing." 

  "Is it a Manson thing?" 

  "They'll be looking into that.  Sometimes cults get displaced or are evolving around an unsub not well known yet." 

  A car arrived.  A woman got out of the backseat.  Some people went towards her.  "I have the photographs, but I'm not the spokesperson." 

"What's he freakin' out about?"

  The acting class people fell quiet. 

  The man with his hair squished by a helmet and spiked by hair goo stomp-paced. 

  Others on the higher-up level of working found him.  But he was pacing furious.  Just as most people started talking low and eager again the man exploded. 

  "The Satanists put a big fucking rock in MY territory and nobody bothered to tell me????!!!!!" 

  People disappeared. 

  Guy's "buddies" from various disciplines straggled into the area. 

  One, in total body armor and loaded with guns including an Uzi, practically skid to a stop and roared, "Where'd they put it?" 

  Another patted a spot on a log.  "You can't let them get in your head.  Or under your skin.  Or too close.  So tell the rest of us where they put it." 

  The man turned scarlet purple.  "Not used to working with any of you." 

  "We're good people." 

  "Probably." 

  "Finest and totally dedicated." 

  "Opposing the Ten Commandments rock." 

  "Okay.  Good." 

  "Is that your van?" 

  The man started out saying (i)no(i) and shaking his head (i)no(i), but between the log patter asking (i)why be mysterious now(i) and some others throwing comments like "I can just call it in," the man put his hand under his chin and the hand nodded his head (i)yes(i).  He'd collected a bunch of candles and bloody stuff as he'd followed a growing group through the woods off the Interstate. 

  "See, I'm glad you told me that, so I don't get afraid of you." 

  The man began to weep.

Precedent

  "Does it mean the first of something?" 

  The person giving the course on Legalese 101 wrote down the guess on a whiteboard.  Others pitched in suggestions too. 

  The end of the "class time" was a window for discussion.  People were reluctant to bring up personal issues.  Somebody awkwardly brought up religion. 

  "So if a legal precedent is set about faith, say, does it mean all faiths?" 

  The question was written on the whiteboard.  The Instructor gave the floor to the Students to ponder the question.  This would generate a weekly think-on assignment.

  "What'd ya think?" 

  "You did excellent.  This is such a great space for learning." 

  "I'll show you around." 

"That's not really activism, as

  much as it is getting things factual.  Just saying." 

"You there. What's your angle on this

  unfortunate little experience?" 

  Most everybody froze in place.  But had been sculpted like bronze pieces on the outside, so not revealing emotions and stress and exhausted and fear.  Controlling disgust and anger and doubts and every human characteristic inside image of success and power. 

  "People are grieving.  I don't have (i)an angle(i) just yet." 

  "There's no time for that." 

  "I know what it should be." 

  "What is it then?" 

  "How fake and awful you are and how that kind of evil is making all of life worse." 

  "What did you just say?" 

  "Why don't you go back to TV land?!" Someone standing near a shot dead body said. 

"Fuckin' A," said a really young man with part

  of his face drooping.  

  "Did he..." 

  "We're not saying that word," a hand on a forearm pressed firmly.  "None of us has health insurance." 

  "How did the string of us wind up here?" 

  "Where is this?" 

  "Be quiet.  They're coming back." 

  More hands reached to still. 

  "And apparently, they consider this a real war and that they can kill journalists." 

  "No one's allowed to kill anybody in our country." 

  "Well, that's a theory." 

  Really old school sneakers and black shoes.  Three pairs of legs.  All black clothing. 

  "Which one of you insulted (i)my people(i)?" A female voice asked in the dimming light of the stalls and hay.  "Who are your people?" Someone asked back. 

  Hands gestured (i)don't answer(i) and (i)spread out(i). 

 

  "Want me to page my paper?" 

  "You guys have a statement or demands or something?" 

  A hand lifting a nonspeaking person by the hair off the floor. 

  "Last I knew none of these were legit." 

  Stifled hyperventilating.

  A horse crop smushed into a chest. 

  "You should know I've liberated your friend." 

  "Ma, mah, my friend?" Eyebrows up forcing eyes to stay open. 

  "We'll let you know more tomorrow." 

  "It's already tomorrow," said a guy with a badly split lip. 

  Total quiet but for some breathing.  

  A dim glint.  "Get over there," the glint indicating an opposing stall wall.  "Why?" 

  "You have a gun?" 

  "Oh my 

  "You glow in the dark." 

  "Gawd." 

  "I'm not that white, but okay, okay." 

  "When did this get so freaking serious?" 

  "Gee, mightah been when the black flags blocked the ice, or 

  "We were in Minnesota, so maybe 

  "Or when people were smuggling people between buses 

  "Could this be Nebraska?" 

  "Look, it wasn't a black flag! It was somebody's butt." 

  "Somebody's butt?" 

  "Somebody's (i)people(i) have been hanging those things from D.C. to Hawaii, and charging riot police with them and you expect me, all of us, to believe it was somebody's butt?" 

  "It was.  It was." 

  "How was that so?" 

  "My cameraman.  Too close to live fire." 

  "You were that close?" 

  "Too close.  Where the lines met and there was spillover, then somebody getting killed, so 

  "People got killed?" 

  "The guy turned the camera into somebody's butt like a fade-to-black.  We didn't want to contribute to that other stuff going on." 

  "Damb."