Compliance

All I can see is a bright, angry red. “Why is it that when I set my central heater at 72° from a scorching 75° that after mere minutes It just gets so goddamn unbearably cold that My dumbass gets up again shivering, and turns it back up to 75°? Why is it that that trivial 3° of difference is so noticeably vast that the minute change literally sends my temperature and state of mind spiraling into a hyperthermic psychosis? Why are we such fragile, frail, fucked mammals that we have a livable window of variance of only 2°-3° to be barely able to fucking flaccidly function without losing our goddamn minds? Humans are these fickle, failing, sensitive,  self-absorbed, sensory-driven merryweather cunts of minutiae that could have only migrated from some desolate, desiccated, dystopia shell of a trashed home to this unsuspecting, pristine, paradise planet just to rape and destroy it from within like a cancer or like a burrowing wasp that takes control of the body of another insect until it’s ready to lay its eggs of misery inside the unassuming host bug that’ll eventually have baby shithawks bursting out of its abdominal cavity like that scene from Alien. Then, to add insult to injury, we get to top it all off with the maraschino cherry of leaving our toxic fuck-knuckle corpses strewn about all willy-nilly as if we ever had any right to be here interloping on this victimized planet anyway. It’s fucking trite, it’s bleak, it’s depressing, and consequentially it’s fucking laughable. But the thing that really makes me audibly guffaw across entire astronomical units, is that we don’t even live our best fuckin’ lives! We’re not truly happy (because “happy” is a packaged and sold unattainable ideal we all strive for endlessly), and we don’t even give enough of a fuck to care for each other! Why the fuck do we even bother perpetuating our existence when we’re all just a bunch of low brow sociopaths trouncing about in masks looking out for our best interests-damn the consequences; yet if we were asked we couldn’t even fucking express what our best interests are because we don’t have a mere modicum of self-consciousness. Would it really be the end of the goddamn world if we were all just like; I don’t know-10%—NAH FUCK IT LETS AIM HIGH- 20% nicer to each other in an effort to attenuate our collective disdain for our existence, or does our own self-loathing and self-pity disallow us such a grace? Like what in the actual fuck is our problem? Are we all in so much fucking pain that it’s our imperative function to indiscriminately spread our misery like a motley crew of craven, depraved sluts at an ultraviolence orgy brimming with highly contagious STDs that begin in our pathetic crotches and spread into our flailing minds and finally our dirty souls- the only thing about us that was never an inherent waste of time and space? For fucks sake let’s do ourselves a kindness. EVERYBODY-LOOK UNDER YOUR CHAIRS. ITS OPRAH’S CHEMICAL CASTRATION GIVEAWAY! YOU GET CASTRATED, YOU GET CASTRATED, EVERYBODY IS GETTING A FREE CASTRATION! WHY THE FUCK NOT? ANYONE WHO THINKS WE NEED MORE GENERATIONS OF SENTIENT GARBAGE BIOLOGICLESS DOING A FANTASTICALLY TERRIBLE JOB OF ATTEMPTING TO RIDE OUT THIS PLANET’S INDUCED AND INESCAPABLE 6TH EXTINCTION EVENT CAN BE FIRST IN LINE FOR THE SUICIDE BOOTH. NOW OFFERING A BUY NOW PAY LATER FEATURE!”

“Sir, I only asked if you would like paper or plastic?”

“Oh… I’ve brought my own bag…”

I hand over my reusable bag and stand there at the grocery store checkout all red in the face and wonder if I actually said any of that or if I just had a bout of psychotic internalization and depersonalization. Oh god, this all still looks surreal. That peacekeeper 9000 is looking at me. What do I do? Should I bolt? Can those things hear my thoughts? What will that thing do to me if I just made a scene in front of all of these lovely people just trying to live their best lives and get some groceries on this quiet Sunday afternoon? 

“Your total is $39.21, sir.”

I continue to eye that law enforcement automaton as it continues to scan me for any potential threats 

“Sir?”

“Yes! I’m sorry,”

“Your total is $39.21”

I swipe my arm over the chip reader and collect my bag of groceries

“Thank you, have a nice day!”

As I turn for the exit, I nearly run into the same police-tron as it has come within a foot of where I was standing with absolutely no sound. I look back at the cashier and see a flash of red come from the corner of her eye. “Pssssssstttt!” Feels like a wasp had just stung me in my neck. Did pig-droid just fucking drug me? What did that fuck just inject into my neck? I turn around to face the 5-0 unit again. It announces, “citizen rendered compliant.” I see the smell of coffee and I taste the color purple, I feel the rush of all of my thoughts and emotions draining from my body and I collapse to the ground.