Metropolis 2147
Chapter 1 > Introduction
Anon is a 28 year old opium enjoyer living in what can only be described as paradise, lost long ago to humanity’s overwhelmingly corrupt nature. There was once a time where, as legends have it, one’s mere possession of a well curated photo collage of the urban and natural scenery found on this island, along with a story or two, was powerful enough to speak ten thousand words about what kind of person they were. Business deals would be signed, as far away as Bangkok, solely based on just how acquainted one was with this mythical place, exemplified by the stories one was able to tell about here, and the photos one was able to show to back such stories up. Solana, before the fall, was deservingly known as the “island of the sirens”; imagine a place so intriguing, so aesthetic, that you’d be willing to completely overlook it’s sinister underside only to have a taste of what it might have to offer you. Solana, right before the fall, became something of a pilgrimage site for the global community; perhaps unbeknownst to you, dear reader. Was it the one true home of all world citizens? We will never know. After the fall, Solana lost its lustre, and 127 years later, you probably would wish you weren’t here at all.
Xingang today is nothing like the Xingang you once may have known. Today, it’s home to 31 million people from all around the world, some poor climate refugees, some wealthy “cancer proximists”; thoroughly contaminated with radioactive particles (as is the entire world, on roughly the same level as the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone was in the early 21st century, save for a few very remote islands in the South Pacific); and it’s separated from Mainland Solana by a two kilometre wide demilitarized zone.
The metropolis is officially a colony of the World Community, a somewhat mysterious nongovernmental organization based in Indochina that is presumed to have far-removed and very humble Solanese origins as an agency of some sorts; however, it’s been under the totalitarian management of the conglomerate known as Smartcorp since before the start of this century, presumably under licence from the World Community. Little signs of Xingang’s cosmopolitan owners can be found, other than their omnipresent insignia, and their slogan which is plastered all over the city; “self, world, progress”.
Smartcorp’s unofficial modus operandi is “everything goes, so long as you’ve got a license”; and you truly do need a licence for everything, though a license for anything imaginable is available to you from Smartcorp, for a price.
“Cancer proximists” are drawn to Xingang for the relatively opulent standard of living that’s available in the city should you be able to afford it; that, and the fact that Smartcorp’s pharmaceutical subsidiary “Smartmed” hoards the only proven indefinite cancer prophylactic available in the world, and only dispenses such treatment at its countless clinics around the city, for a substantial yet manageable amount of money. As the treatment involves an injection of nanoparticles every two weeks, one would be foolish to live anywhere else; this treatment is effectively not for export. The only other option, unless you want to get cancer, is to live in one of the few uncontaminated places in the world, which are far less practical for a member of the global elite to live in, due to matters that will be touched upon later. It’s thought that small amounts of the prophylactic are indeed sent by Smartcorp to satiate the city’s owners and their inner circle, located far away, though that’s the presumed extent of the overseas trade in this coveted substance.
Climate refugees are a completely different story. They are somewhat akin to the migrant workers that inhabited Dubai in the early 21st century, in contrast to the “cancer proximists” who are more comparable to the western expatriates that once called that same city in the desert home. Saying this, many climate refugees have made a good life for themselves in this city, while many others inhabit the fringes of society.
Locals, in other words, the old stock Solanese living in the city (who ostentatiously, prefer to refer to themselves as “world citizens” rather than anything else), and their sherpas are perhaps the strangest demographic duo of all. Almost every local was gestated in vitro and “genetically optimized”, due to the relative availability of such procedures in today’s Xingang (compared with the rest of the world, due to export controls imposed by Smartcorp), as well as the fact that feminist undercurrents in the local society have made the prospect of pregnancy seem repulsive to almost all local women. Sherpas are also gestated in vitro, though they serve as a servant class, to both the locals, and of course, to Smartcorp. Members of this peculiar auxiliary demographic to the locals come in all physical varieties imaginable, though what makes them unique is that due to genetic programming, they are the most unquestioning and loyal servants to their masters imaginable; be such local individuals, or the countless managers of Smartcorp, many of whom are also sherpas, inevitably reporting to locals up the chain of command. Locals are akin to the Emiratis in our former example, a small minority of the population, but without any doubt, the dominant social group. Sherpas, by comparison, are the single largest demographic group behind the climate refugees. Perhaps interesting to the reader is the fact that even the locals are not in any way native to Solana, which was once a desolate uninhabited island prior to its colonization; no, the locals (at least the ones that you’ll see in Xingang today) are effectively the unabated descendants of a bunch of colonizers from England that play the part far better, and far more unapologetically, than their contemporaries in London or what remains of Sydney in this scorched world. Forget not, the locals of Xingang were, in recent history, more often than not the same people who fled Tamyo for Xingang during the nationalist revolution on the mainland in the early 21st century, if they weren’t in Xingang already.
The undisputed epicentre of local society is Jinshan Village, the exclusive waterfront district home to the 813 metre tall World Trade Centre in the heart of the city; that building being the headquarters of Smartcorp, among countless other organizations of local and global significance.
Mainlanders are the other group of old stock Solanese present in the city; similar in numbers to the notoriously snobbish locals. Their recent homeland across the DMZ is effectively a failed state (imagine an alcoholic version of Somalia, but with an airline, and some decent architecture). During over a century of inept nationalist governance, many mainlanders have chosen to emigrate to Xingang, however only the ones who haven’t assimilated into local society, double meaning intended, are referred to as “mainlanders”, and our protagonist is one of them. This group has a reputation of being prone to crime, in much the same way that Mainland Solana today is a haven for criminals, outcasts, and other misfits from this region and the world over.
Some people love this city of beaches, neon, degeneracy, and skyscrapers; others don’t. Saying this, if you’re looking for the closest micro-analogue to Coruscant, itself found in a galaxy far far away, here on Earth; in Xingang, you’ll find it.
Such is the story of Anon, in Xingang, 2147 AD.
Chapter 2 > Babylon
Anon woke up at one in the morning, in a vaporwave-decor room on the 72nd floor of the Asia-Pacific Complex, essentially, the world’s tallest brothel, overlooking the lights of the fishing boats out at sea, far below, from the floor-to-ceiling window. In the room was a Roman bust on a pillar, a dim pink light, a king size bed of satin, and Ella, a sherpa who looked about 20 years old, with asymmetrical platinum blonde hair, very long on one side, shoulder length on the other side. There was even music playing in the room, essentially, a mangled, chopped, and slowed down version of the very old song “Dream Getaway” by Maximum Love. Ella woke up Anon with a kiss, saying “don’t you want to sing some karaoke?”.
This wasn’t just any brothel, this was pure luxury. From the decor, to the building itself (resembling “the Shard” in London), to the over 20 different go-go bars, karaoke lounges, and other amenities in the complex, to the fact that the sherpas there were not only gestated specifically for their job, but that they were vaccinated twice weekly against all possible STDs, making transmission all but impossible, sans condom. You couldn’t imagine the absolute degree of sterility associated with this whorehouse, it’s cleaner than the waiting room of a Botox clinic in Apgujeong. The sherpas there are so clean that you could eat sashimi off their ass as they lay on your pristine bed overlooking the skyline, without a second thought, and for a price, you could arrange exactly that.
The motto of the complex even had a certain otherworldly aesthetic to it “go where you’re treated best”.
Anon put on his clothes and, holding hands with Ella, walked down to the karaoke lounge where the two would sing the night away, accompanied by a bottle of soju, imported from the hinterlands of Neo-Seoul. The hostess of the lounge had the exact same haircut and overall look to Ella, as did the other sherpas walking around; to a tee.
Back at his room, staring out the window overlooking the sea, with Ella giving him a particularly detache blowjob, Anon started to wonder what the purpose of living in such a city was. He had already made his fortune a few years ago, on a scam operation he set up with a partner selling fake carbon offsets from a boiler room he operated in the dilapidated shithole known as Tamyo. What was he doing in Babylon, the underground leftist resistance’s name for this city of Lysol-sanitized degeneracy, hyper-commodified cocaine capitalism, and effective moral bankruptcy (at least from their perspective)? Anon asked himself: “Maybe Xingang has got to me, maybe I need to escape this sad place; a task far easier said than done, considering all I’ve got to lose if I fuck up.”
Chapter 3 > Skyway
“Airspeeders”, as they’re commonly known in Xingang, are cool. Essentially, they are eVTOLs capable of seating one person, sometimes two; imagine basically a narrow cockpit, with two small drone-like propellers at the front, two at the back, and you have the general idea. While Anon’s model is capable of speeds up to 300 km/h and can travel up to 1400 km on a single charge, actually doing anything with the device in practice other than skipping the traffic of the city below is somewhat fanciful. Like everything in the city, airspeeders are monitored and controlled by Smartcorp. From the cockpit, an augmented reality system highlights in red areas you cannot fly, and truly, it’s not possible to fly there; the airspeeder’s internal computer won’t allow you to. In the city, you are limited to various “skyways” if you want to go above 50 km/h, and leaving the city in an airspeeder isn’t something Smartcorp exactly likes. You can only fly to various “green zones” in Mainland Solana with an airspeeder, and you must not stop along the way (actually, you can’t; your airspeeder will be on autopilot between leaving Xingang and entering a green zone).
What’s a “green zone”? Essentially, various areas of the mainland that are de-facto controlled by Smartcorp in some form or the next, and thus are considered as “safe places” for a world citizen to travel. An example of some green zones would be Hyehwa and St. Theresa, two ski resorts high up in the mountains, as well as parts of the Victoria coast on the opposite side of the Gulf of Xingang. In such areas, generally, the dysfunctional mainland regime and Smartcorp have agreed that Smartcorp is allowed extraterritorial jurisdiction over world citizens present there, and non-world citizens are only allowed to enter should they agree to what amounts to a waiver, giving Smartcorp temporary jurisdiction over them too; imagine Kaesong or Mount Kumgang, but more user-friendly. Tamyo allows the existence of these green zones as they are paid for the privilege by Smartcorp, and because nowadays, the last thing they want is a hot war with the World Community.
Anon left the APC at around 4 am, flying his airspeeder from the sky garage opposite to the building he was just in, towards his apartment, in a different part of town known as “New Bondi”. Xingang from the skyway above at night looks like a maze of bright lights, juxtaposed with the dark ocean surrounding the somewhat triangular peninsula it sits on. New Bondi is on the opposite side of the peninsula from Jinshan Village, facing towards the gulf, rather than the open sea. It got its name from the fact that the neighbourhood became a popular place for Australians to settle in the wake of climate change making most of their country a very difficult place to live. There were also the political changes to contend with in Australia; to this day, it’s still a “tier three” country (meaning it’s neither a partner nor member of the World Community, and certainly not a direct colony), like Mainland Solana, and it’s generally seen as a horribly repressive place to live. Near to his apartment, he parked his airspeeder at the sky garage, took the elevator down, and decided to have a bowl of noodles at one of the many noodle bars on his street before getting some sleep. Sitting outside in the cool and foggy January air, so late that it’s early, eating a bowl of cheap noodles on the side of the neon-lit narrow street, and watching the occasional green haired exotic looking woman walk by can give one a very good impression for what Xingang in 2147 is all about. Some might be drawn to it, but Anon was decreasingly so, for one reason or the next.
Anon’s two-story apartment is on the 18th floor of a skinny glass building, home to only one unit per two storeys. His apartment has a rooftop terrace, with a jacuzzi on it, and a very minimalist overall decor. It would be a shame to leave such a place behind forever, and certainly not without trying to sell the apartment first (if he wasn’t underwater on his mortgage), but Smartcorp, ostensibly running Xingang as a tax haven, has some very sneaky ways of raising revenue. Considering what Anon is thinking of doing, he will be lucky to get out alive, let alone turn a profit on his apartment.
Chapter 4 > Layering
After getting his biweekly anti-cancer jab at the clinic roughly a five minute walk from his apartment, Anon stopped at a park to consider how he might plan on “layering” his escape from the city so that Smartcorp doesn’t know that he’s absconded from the city without paying his capital gains tax on the anti-pollution tokens that he bought with the proceeds from his old hustle on the mainland.
Cryptocurrency, as an asset class, is the only currency used in Xingang and across most of the world today; the exception being in certain tier three countries and territories (such as Mainland Solana outside the green zones), where cash is more or less king. There are various types of coins and tokens in use: Xin is the official coin of Smartcorp, and it’s remarkable for its zero transaction fees, near-instantaneous settlement, and high thoroughput; Ecochain, where Anon stores his fortune, is a token that derives value from the crowdsourced pollution capturing projects around the world in which it helps monetize (the well certified kind, not the dodgy kind); and Bitcoin, after all these years, is still in use, as something of a digital gold equivalent. Privacy regarding crypto today is effectively zero, with Smartcorp and other World Community associates making the compromise that they wouldn’t block any transactions, so long as they’re able to see and analyze all transactions happening in real time, without obscurification. Privacy coins, such as Monero, are completely blocked, and should one manage to evade this, they’re even illegal to possess (a law which is heavily enforced by Smartcorp).
Anon has heard about “Point Nemo”, an anarcho-communist island community far to the southeast of Solana, somewhat near the actual Pacific point of inaccessibility, hence its name. Rapa Nui, the island their community sits on, is free of the radioactive contamination found pretty much everywhere else in the world; it’s not needed to take the cancer jab there, if you want to live past the age of 65, that is. In order for one to become a member of the community today, one needs to make a large deposit of cash, gold, or crypto. Why? In the community, everything is included, for life. Deposits are mixed and invested by the community’s finance team in some form or the next around the world, and the yields are used to pay for everything that is needed by each resident of the community. Essentially, Point Nemo is an example of partially automated luxury island communism. Of course, Point Nemo is not associated with the World Community; “self, world, progress” not to be found.
While Anon wants to move there, of course, physically getting there is no easy feat. It can be reached by plane from Mainland Solana (Tamyo Capital Airport, as well as the rest of that city, is in the red zone, obviously), but that requires crossing the DMZ by foot or bicycle at Checkpoint Zulu (even cars aren’t allowed to be driven through, without a special permit). For the record, Smartcorp makes its money in three ways: though it’s subsidiaries (ie. Smartmed, the APC, etc.), through the sale of licenses (pretty much everything imaginable requires one, as you might already know), and of course through capital gains tax (ie. upon the sale of one’s non-virtual assets located within their territory, such as real estate and company shares, and upon one’s physical exit from the territory in terms of their virtual assets, based on value differential, regardless of sale). When you enter Xingang (or a green zone on the mainland) from somewhere not under the control of Smartcorp (ie. a red zone on the mainland, or somewhere overseas), your virtual assets (ie. crypto holdings) are automatically recorded. Due to the extent of surveillance undertaken, no declarations are necessary; Smartcorp knows exactly how much you have in virtual assets at the time of entry, regardless of who you are. Smartcorp knows where you are, Smartcorp knows what you have, and Smartcorp knows what you owe them. As an anti-evasion measure, Smartcorp doesn’t allow any cash or bullion to go through the border, cash and bullion is forbidden within the city without a special permit, and predictive analytics are used to track down potential runners before they run. If you leave Xingang without having paid the necessary amount of CGT on your virtual assets (the amount is calculated at 50% of your capital gains on all virtual assets you own, though the first 辛100k in gains, roughly enough to buy a decent suit from a local tailor in Xingang, is tax free), goons employed by Smartcorp are known to hunt you down and make you pay whatever you owe them. Usually they will be polite about it and reasonably accommodating, but there’s no way you’re getting away without paying them; so long as you have money and are within their reach.
Let’s say for example you, as a world citizen or otherwise, entered Xingang a year ago, stayed for a year, and then left. During that time, if your crypto portfolio went from 辛10m to 辛14m in value; you’d have taxable capital gains of 辛3.9m, and you’d have to pay 辛1.95m in CGT to Smartcorp. Anon’s situation is like this, but much more drastic.
In 2145, he left his hustle on the mainland with about 辛3m worth of Solanese currency in cash, and he basically yoloed on Ecochain, having purchased the tokens from an underground dealer in Tamyo before entering Xingang, thinking that maybe Smartcorp might not be able to trace the wallet back to him; they knew. By the next year, his portfolio was worth roughly 辛140m, having seen the value of Ecochain explode, and it’s been more or less stable ever since. He used 辛15m as the down payment on his apartment (which is now worth less than what he paid, and he’s underwater on his mortgage), and spent another 辛20m since then. The thing is, the deposit to become a member of Point Nemo is 辛100m, and he just has enough as of today. Technically, he would owe about 辛70m to Smartcorp as of today, leaving him with nowhere near enough to pay for the deposit in Point Nemo, if Smartcorp managed to collect the money from him.
Evading taxes in Xingang is very difficult. If you have a lot of untaxed capital gains and you’re flagged as a flight risk, Smartcorp can demand that you put enough money in escrow, on the spot, to cover your estimated virtual assets CGT bill on the spot, prior to your departure.
Furthermore, if you are planning on going anywhere using Xingang Airport, Checkpoint Zulu, the port, or otherwise; you won’t be issued clearance to leave unless you’ve placed in a crypto-based escrow account enough money to cover your CGT owing (assuming you do in fact owe CGT), plus a bit extra to account for possible fluctuations. Once Smartcorp processes your exit, the actual tax owing will be deducted from the escrow account, and the remainder is returned to you. Some interesting stories have happened with this system: a few years back, an 18 year old tourist from Quebec only stayed in Xingang for three days, his small crypto portfolio mooned during the time without him knowing, and upon trying to use the e-gate at the airport to board his flight out, he wasn’t allowed through. The tourist was made to sell some of holdings on the spot and place 辛200k in escrow, 辛190k of which was charged in tax, with the other 辛10k returned to him a few minutes later. For that amount, he could have spent a week at the notorious Asia-Pacific, all inclusive.
In Xingang, pretty much every move you take is recorded by facial recognition enabled cameras (mounted, on micro-drones, through the background use of the cameras on other people’s smartphones, and so on), anything you say or read over the internet is monitored (and VPNs are verboten), and certainly, every transaction you make is monitored. Obviously, this sprawling surveillance system employed by Smartcorp isn’t just to prevent tax evasion, it’s also used to find out which people are untrustworthy (in the eyes of Smartcorp), catch criminals and prevent crimes before they even happen, crack down on adverse political activism, and prevent license evasion. With all this in mind, it’s very hard to get out of the city undetected.
All told, these measures make Xingang a very safe place, and Smartcorp isn’t known for its petty rules, or for a particularly oppressive tax regime; after all, there is no income or profit tax, nor are there any import tariffs or duties.
One method to abscond from the city involves “layering”, or creating a false trail, then effectively smuggling yourself to somewhere outside of Smartcorp’s reach.
Chapter 5 > Escape Plan
Anon’s plan was anything but simple, he would have to convince an old colleague of his (from the operation in Tamyo that he used to be a part of) to meet him at an opium den in one of the rougher neighbourhoods of Xingang, near to the DMZ. Anon would pay the boss of the opium den to keep his old colleague locked up in the den for a week; by then anon hopefully will have made it to Point Nemo. Once his colleague was locked up, he would use a (totally illegal, but nonetheless effective) holographic necklace to evade facial recognition cameras (Anon would program the necklace to trick facial recognition cameras into thinking that he was his colleague) and make his way to an abandoned warehouse in the industrial area near the opium den. On the roof of the warehouse would be a paramotor, which he would fly from there across the DMZ into Mainland Solana. From there, he would take a taxi to the airport in Tamyo and board a flight to Point Nemo.
There were, however, a few issues.
First, Anon would have to make a pattern of going to that opium den, so that his movement wouldn’t be flagged as suspicious (travelling to an area near the DMZ out of the blue, without a prior pattern of going there, might attract suspicion on the part of the authorities, given the fact that his colleague from the mainland will be going there as well at the same time).
Second, he would have to procure and program the necklace without leaving a data trail; something rather difficult to do in hyper-digitized Xingang.
Third, the paramotor would have to be sourced and put in place at the abandoned warehouse; again, without leaving a data trail, or without the paramotor being seen by authorities in such a suspicious location. Paramotors were absolutely not legal to operate in the city (though possession of one, in and of itself, is fine), for obvious reasons. They are legal in the green zones, but trying to escape from a green zone would be more difficult, as that’s how most escape attempts are made, and authorities are far more suspicious of what goes on inside the green zones. Today, the DMZ is loosely guarded outside the checkpoints, and has become more of a green belt than anything else.
Once he makes it to the mainland, he’ll need to sell some of his crypto for cash (to get to the airport, and to buy his ticket), though that could easily be arranged in any given town there. Likewise, it’s unlikely that the Solanese authorities will give him shit over his illegal entry, at worst, maybe he’d have to pay a small fine. The place is basically Cambodia these days, is it not?
Chapter 6 > Preparation
In New Bondi, near Anon’s apartment, there is a bicycle sales and repair shop run by two Australian men who moved to Xingang roughly a decade ago. Since Anon is an avid cyclist, he’s frequented that shop many times before; not only for bike-related matters, but also because the guys at the shop sell fantastic homemade Aussie-style meat pies, as well as certain goods in the back room that are, let’s just say, difficult to find openly advertised in Xingang (such as holographic necklaces, and vintage laptops that aren’t cloud-enabled by default). Paying for these goods in theory might be an issue, due to transaction monitoring, but the bike shop has a perfect loophole; the guys there should be able sell Anon the goods, but invoice him for a new bicycle at the same cost figure from a catalogue that will be “ordered from Denmark”. A bicycle will in fact, be ordered from Denmark, but it’s a 10cm long toy bicycle that actually costs the bike shop 1/50th of the invoice amount, and upon arrival, will be put in a pile of other toy bicycles to be given out to kids and their parents at promotional events around town, alongside a business card for the bicycle shop.
Anon brings an empty briefcase with him, gets the goods from the shop, puts them in the briefcase, and leaves. As soon as he walks out the door, one of the shop owners runs after him and says “I might have something you’ll also be interested in”. Anon goes back into the shop, and the guy says, quietly, that he also has Australian dollars, in cash, available for purchase. Anon buys the “collector’s set of Australian notes”, per the same process as above, sticks it in his briefcase, and he’s gone. The Australian dollars surely would be accepted in Mainland Solana, aiding his plan.
Sourcing the paramotor, by comparison, wouldn’t be too difficult, but it would be costly. Anon would have Ella, who’s business card he got while at the APC “in case he needs any services at home” come to his apartment, and buy a paramotor under her name; Anon would buy a “long time” service from Ella, but let her leave early, to make Ella willing to go through with the plan. Anon would tell Ella that “the paramotor is a birthday gift for my brother, an accountant, who is currently working on my account as a favour; I don’t want to ruin the surprise for him”. Of course, Anon didn’t want to risk buying the paramotor under his own name, for obvious reasons; and most of his friends were probably on one watchlist or the next already. Anon would have Ella take delivery of the paramotor at her address, which happens to be in the same neighbourhood as the opium den. A friend of Anon living on that side of the city would come and get the paramotor once delivered, telling Ella that “I’m picking it up as Anon doesn’t have a van capable of fitting the paramotor inside, but I do”, and the night of the escape, Anon’s friend would place the paramotor on the roof of the abandoned warehouse.
To lure his (opium addicted) colleague from Tamyo to the opium den, Anon would phone him and ask him to come there to “meet up like old times, and discuss possibilities for another hustle like before”. This wouldn’t be much of an issue.
Everything went according to plan.
In the weeks leading up to the escape, Anon visited the opium den multiple times, and said to the den boss that on the night of his colleague arriving, prior to him getting there, he’d pay 辛500k for the boss to keep his colleague locked up for a week (but treated as a fine guest, with a large amount of opium to be given to his colleague upon departure, as a take-home present, to keep him quiet). As opium was legal in both Mainland Solana and Xingang, technically, there wouldn’t be an issue with any of this, including his colleague taking his opium with him back across the DMZ. The boss agreed.
Chapter 7 > Escape
Anon arrived at the den at 8 pm on the day of the escape and paid the boss the 辛500k, with his colleague planning to arrive later, at 10 pm. His colleague got there, and the boss escorted him to a private room where Anon was present. Anon told his colleague about the plan, and that he’d have to stay there for the next week, but that he’d be rewarded. Surprisingly, his colleague agreed, but of course, the boss would be enforcing his lock up.
Anon put the necklace on, which he had programmed earlier that day, and walked out of the opium den. He made his way on foot to the abandoned warehouse, climbed up the stairs to the rooftop, and sure enough, the paramotor was there.
He quickly strapped in, started up the engine, and took off. Within a few minutes, he was in Solanese airspace, having successfully cleared the DMZ. As paramotoring is legal in Mainland Solana, he decided to fly to a place he’d visited years prior and where he had a contact; the Arbutus Pyramid Winery, which was on the top of a hill shrouded by arbutus trees, in the Songhills, Solana’s most famed wine region. The third generation proprietor of the winery was a trustworthy guy, and surely, he’d be willing to store the paramotor (for his friend to retrieve, and later sell, in exchange for his involvement) call a taxi for Anon that would take Australian dollars, and perhaps, give him a drink or two of fantastic wine to calm his nerves. Two hours of flight later, he made it to the winery just after midnight, and landed on the winery’s lawn.
The proprietor appeared happy to see Anon, and he poured him a glass of wine out on the winery’s balcony. After Anon started drinking, the owner started asking Anon some suspicious questions, like “where did you fly from”, “why did you come here?” Anon answered that he was simply “on vacation in the area”, and such. Then things got somewhat hairy.
The proprietor went to answer a phone call on the landline inside the pyramid, then came back out, and asked Anon “why are you planning on going to Rapa Nui?”
Chapter 8 > Down the Rabbit Hole
Anon was stunned by the question, and took a minute to answer, trying to wrap his head around what exactly was going on. Eventually, he said “I wasn’t planning on going there, you must be mistaken.”
The proprietor said: “No, I’m not mistaken. I just got off the phone with my associates, we know all about your plans; in fact, we know the full picture.”
Anon asked if he was under arrest, and the proprietor said: “No, but you better get to the airport in Tamyo, and you better get on that flight to Rapa Nui, my partners have already booked you your ticket.”
Anon asked: “Who do you work for?”
The proprietor said: “That’s none of your business, but I certainly don’t work for Smartcorp or for that matter, the mainland government.”
Anon, very confused, asked what will happen to him if he chooses not to go.
The proprietor replied: “Well, in that case, my partners would be happy to have you arrested for tax evasion. You wouldn’t want to spend the next year in jail would you, and lose your 辛70m on top of it?”
Anon said: “Of course not, I guess I’ll take the flight then.”
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