Michael is thirty-nine and gay. Like his little niece, Kim, who has a learning disability, he is considered a non-citizen under the draconian Normalcy Laws. Kim’s parents quietly arrange to flee to New Zealand, where the Normalcy Laws haven’t been implemented. As Michael has a good job and has been careful to hide his homosexuality, he doesn’t consider going with them. Instead, he remains behind and goes about his business as normal until one morning when he is confronted by two Black Guards. Hooded, Michael is taken to what he assumes is the Department of Law. Once people are taken there, they never see the light of day again. Elimination is the only punishment in the New World Order. There he is interrogated by The Man, a handsome officer of the Black Guards. In a desperately hopeless situation, is there any hope of surviving elimination? No one ever has in the past, but Michael discovers something about The Man that hints at his situation not being as bleak as it appears. Can he dare to hope there is a way out? Or is he so delusional that his fantasies of freedom have clouded his judgment? Under the oppressive Normalcy Laws, nothing is certain.

Forbidden

In person, Al was friendlier. He was also a Maori, a big man with a gentle voice, and tattoos on his face as was the tradition of his people. He sat down and shouted an order for a flat white coffee across the café to the waitress behind the counter. The conversation was casual and only after they had exchanged quite a bit of small talk about the weather, the food in the café, and the increase in the cost of living, did they get around to the business at hand.


“I do two packages,” said Al. “The basic, which is identification card and tax file number. That’s all ya really need to get started. Then there’s the deluxe, which is identification card, tax file number, passport, and driver’s license. And before yous make up ya mind, let me tell ya that ya gonna need three pieces of identification to open a bank account.”


Michael couldn’t help smirking at Al’s business aplomb.


“Okay,” said Bevan, “So how much is the deluxe?”


Chapter 35