From slavery to servitude 1: the apathy of steel

A cacophony of gears and steam clogs a worker's ears, filling them. Pipes continually hiss over and around him, sometimes on him. The only protection he is afforded in this case is the standard leather mask given to all employees of the steam plant.

It is a massive tower of pipes and cogs, steam and boiling air. Almost as hot as the liquid flowing across said pipes like the veins and blood of a mechanical organism. George and those surrounding him were the blood cells keeping this structure well-maintained while it churns out the metal it is known for.

Sturdy, reliable, and diligent.

Numerous, expendable, and easily replaced.

As per the times of their living, accidents are common in the Steel Moratorium. George is simply too accustomed to the effect of hot liquid on the human flesh. Seeing many colleagues being escorted out on gurneys from searing wounds were enough for him to witness the danger to this place, the one building where all walks of life were accepted into employment. Where only the poor and desperate willingly walked into.

George tolls on a segment of pipes, his tools on the side, his hands on a bolt. Heavy leather gloves fill his hands, slick with the sweat of his palms. He works in an ever precarious way as his eyes constantly dart at the faintest hissing of a nearby pipe.

The mask he was given for 'protection' is far too low to fulfill its duty. Too thin, too loose, indecent, especially when his eyes are the ones at the risk of catching a breach of steam spilling into them. And the pipes didn't help with how much they rattle. Many of them look worn, on the constant verge of breaking down with the sheer volume of liquid that passes inside them, earning a tired remark from the man "These pipes are way too small for the amount of stuff traveling them, honestly."

The bolt is inserted, promising to hold the pipeline for at least a week before it would start fizzling out on its own. Hissing on a good day. Or, threatening to burst out on a bad day. It was the last one on this particular part until next week. Another called to him, reverberating all the same.

His entire shift is like this. Fixing overworn pipelines on the verge of breaking down at any time. For the entire shift of nine hours, no less. From Monday to Saturday and the last day to rest and little more.

Every end brings about the waning sunlight, a glaucous orange washing the sky in its natural whistle. Every end brings George's weary bones to rest, free to weigh down his shoulders in their exhaustion. Every end of the day pulls his mind out of the grind into the pain he might have ignored from a bad movement, a slight burn, or anything else. It is far from his first time in accidental contact with burning metal. Not that he'd happily count the numbers of 'danger close'.

Every end of a shift sees him stumbling through the many levels of the Steel Moratorium like the rest. Men reasonably fit that shamble and limp like they just walked out of a campaign. Some of them have visible but scoffed-off wounds, barely enough to earn medical attention, but searing enough not to be ignored. Cuts, burnt spots, blunt trauma from accidents, they were the scars of labor that they paid for one more day of work, and more one pay to live through.

The more insidious wounds festering inside many more are those of the mind, struggling to cope with the slog of industrial progress. Aching thoughts that pound inside their heads. They see the metal they labor for. Beautiful crafts of artisanry. Weapons fit for the greatest heroes. Armors made for the most brilliant commanders. Artifacts for the high and wealthy. Metal ingots of purity never seen before. Their beauty, waged by the aching of their bones and emptiness of stomachs. Their minds weep and wail for the fact that they will never get so close as to cuddle such items, forever out of their impoverished hands. Surviving is their only long term goal and they barely manage.

This is the fate of the poor seeking work here, dead-end labor in a manufacturing plant that treats them like the cogs that make up its internal system. Worthless, rusting cogs. The wounds of the mind ache much more than the physical ones as George came to confess internally. Stories of suicides and attempted self-murders are frequent here. Enough that he could sense someone with the 'look' in their eyes. The beaten, tired, and exhausted glare in their lightless eyes, thinking about 'escaping' this pointless grind.

'Perhaps death isn't so bad', he'd read in their expression, eyes scowling down, hidden by the shadow of their headwears. They'd think they're hiding it, the melancholy tearing their visages apart, the poisonous thoughts planted inside them by the apathy of the industry.

George was lucky to suffer only physical wounds. An accident here, a mishap there, nothing more. Though, dry as he was inside, it was a wonder whether he truly was spared the thoughts every evening. Not that anyone cared enough to ponder.

He limps his way back to a corner familiar to him at every end of a shift. A place densely populated by people like him with nowhere to go. Small rooms for one individual to live in. Space, far removed from the concept of comfortable living. His key of rust and grimes still allows him access through his rotting lock. Though the thumping he does every time he wants in is a telling sign of a long-neglected knob.

He sighs, throwing his hat and key to the table of his kitchen doubling as his bedroom and bathroom. Hunger cries from the depth of his stomach, neglected all day, as always.

The only food it can devour is a loaf of bread that he munches and a glass of water he gulps before waddling to bed. His body makes him feel the strain that aches from the accumulative grind of past days including this one. He never can fully, if ever ignore it. And he wanted to sleep it away, longing for the Sunday coming. Let the dream numb his pain.

He slumps over, sitting on the edge of the creaking springs that bear his bed. His eyes glaze over the mapping sky dotted in white-hot stars. They sing in their brightness, offering a scarce amount of light to the dark of the streets. They are the lights in the blank canvas of his life. A set of pure colors to paint the gray and ashen that he continually sees.

"Huh?" The colors were as illuminating as ever. Even in their stagnating hot white in the distance, the stars seemed to dance for him, pull him away from the aching of his bones and the suffering of his skin. The exhaustion and sleepiness also seemingly were purged from his body as intruders, leaving a solace of peace and relief. A sight to dream to, as he often did.

Only, tonight, in the celestial landscape, a strange shade appeared. Beyond the trees that dress the distance, a purple, glamorous lilac vapor wavered atop the leaves. It is barely visible, almost disguised in the cover of the night. If he was not so transfixed with the decor of nature, so captivated by the lack of dull shades, he might have missed it. So many here have lost interest in simple things and kind sights, beaten by the grind of labor.

"Either the sky is giving way to some new colors, or something's happening in the distance". His sleepy, tired eyes look on. They catch every second of the distant undulating smoke that weaves afar, catching...shapes?

George's ears catch the definite rattle of heavy boots stomping on stone. Their clanking snaps his look to the source of the noise. He is met with the shineless armors of bodies sprinting and shouting between each other, mostly by another at the front. One of them is different. His armor is lustrous, embedded with metallic engravers that swirl in artisanal shapes, a tapestry on which an artist lets his imagination flow, scripting silver metal as he paints over it in the might and grace of a lion. One on each of his shoulders. One at the head of his chest plate. And one as his protecting helm.

He was screaming the most, constantly gesturing to the river of steel and pikes trailing after him while waving his rapier ahead, the thing, caught in a dim sense of enchantment. Their wave is endless, noisy, pacing with hurried determination.

"I wonder what could have the garrison so panicked", George ponders, watching from his window as they stream ever forward in the direction of the exotic veil that caught his eye. It turns back to it, becoming the augur of his passage to dreamland. He slumps deliberately on the frame of the window, slowly closing his eyes under the heaviness of the night encroaching. His heartbeat slows, opening the door to a night's rest, one that he'll need...