Shout and Silence: Rioters

CASUAL BAR SOUNDS AND SMOOTH UNCHARTABLE MUSIC. A TELEVISION NEWS CHANNEL IS HEARD IN A MUFFLED TONE. SHOUT COUGHS LOUDLY. A DOOR IS SLOWLY OPENED. ERRATIC FOOTPRINTS FROM SILENCE INCREASE IN VOLUME.

S: Fuckin’ hell, you actually showed up. I’m surprised you aren’t hanging from the lampposts, coming back the way you did.

S: (Snarki) Nice to see you too. And it’s not bad in the city centre. Just a few stragglers on the main road. If you take the alleys on Jeffers Road, you don’t see a thing. It least it’s quiet here.

S: The way the news is banging on, you’d think every corner had barricades lined up. It looks like Les Misérables up there.

S: You really shouldn’t just watch the news. It’s sensationalist. They know you’re bored just knowing what’s going on. They just want you to feel.

S: Feel?

S: Scared, angry, hateful. You know, emotional.

S: So, you’re saying there aren’t big riots going on on the street out there?

S: I didn’t say that. I said they’re just finding the most violent things to film.

S: Well, if that’s the case, why are the journalists moaning about getting shot? They know what they’re in for, don’t they?

S: I suppose it’s the dangers of the job. Yeah, can I get a [LOW-ALCOHOL BEER SPONSOR], please?

S: (AFTER A PAUSE TO ACQUIRE BEVERAGES) So, how fucked are we?

S: Well, that’s a loaded question. How many beers did it take to ask that?

S: Well, it’s probably good to know, isn’t it?

S: Well, define it, then. What’s the limit? Not of the beers, either. The end of all hope?

S: You mean, how fucked is actually fucked to me?

S: Yeah. Is it martial law? A city suffers a nuclear holocaust? Total climate collapse that results in the happy few living in underground bunkers?

S: Wow, that’s a bit fucking bleak, isn’t it?

S: You asked. Anyway, if those are the hypothetical notches on the “human race extinction” scale, then we’re definitely crawling pathetically to the next level.

S: You know what I reckon?

S: I don’t until you tell me. And I never want to, frankly.

S: I reckon they know we’re fucked, and they’re just making things interesting.

S: They?

S: You know. The government. And the one percent.

S: Well, I’d like to think they’d have better things to do.

S: Why would they? They’ve got more money than anyone would ever need. But you can’t breathe money. You can’t bribe the sun and greenhouse gases. Might as well throw a few coals onto the fire while it burns.

S: I don’t like to think about what they’re doing. It never makes any sense. They live in a different world.

S: No, they don’t! They live in ours! Look at them, there. (SOUNDS OF A HAUGHTY RUCKUS ON TELEVISION) They’re acting like they’re solving a problem but they’re probably enjoying the chaos.

S: They’re the opposition, not the government.

S: Exactly! They’re probably in on it!

S: And yet they’re arresting each other and threatening each other’s careers.

S: Name a politician that actually loses their career these days. Short of getting a bullet-shaped pink slip.

S: (AFTER A CALCULATED PAUSE, AS THE TELEVISION SWITCHES TO SPORT NEWS) Do you think we’ve seen the worst of it now?

S: For now, yeah. Doubt it’ll be the last one, of course.

S: We better just do what we can here.

S: To make sure we’re ready for when it comes?

S: Or to make sure it doesn’t happen here? After all, we’re not thinking like they are. That violence is the answer.

S: Aye, let’s keep thinking that, then. After all, what else can you do?

(THE SPORTING NEWS CONTINUES AS THE SOUND FADES)