[Disclaimer: This is a political commentary piece and contains language and descriptions that are harmful and offensive. These inclusions intend to portray the hate rooted in the harmful stereotypes, language, and depictions of marginalized groups. Reader discretion is advised.]
My buddy Mark convinced me to join S.A.F.E. with him right out of junior year. Social Assimilation Failsafe Enforcement: We’ll make you S.A.F.E.! That’s what all the recruitment posters said, big bold letters stamped across The Institutional Man, the head of the program. He grinned at you with his pearly white teeth, perfect golden waves, and gleaming blue eyes.
I thought it all looked and sounded patriotic. Serve my country, clean up the streets. I joined without a second thought, following Mark’s lead and his proud slap on my back. “You made the right call, Steph. They’ll make an American man of you yet.”
So that’s how I ended up here, at The Institution, enlisted as one of S.A.F.E.’s ground agents. I figured I’d make a better grunt than someone who worked in the Paper Department or the Medical Department. No medical knowledge, and no desire to spend countless hours scouring documents for minor contradictions or forgery regarding immigration or gender markers and names. There were multiple courses we had to take during our time, all in preparation for “confronting the enemy,” as fellow recruits explained, since we were the only department that came “face-to-face.” Today was our last day of instruction before the “real work” began.
–
“Recruits, please open your copy of Taxonomy of Deviants to page 126.” Pages flutter throughout the room, and I open my copy to the page ordered. In neatly outlined squares, depictions of labeled “Deviants” fill the page. The text explains that each box contains a diagram of a “person of interest,” and that the following figures are meant to serve as images for our profiling once out in the field. Mark’s been talking about it all week, practically bouncing off the walls.
“Let us begin with Figure One. Promptly compose your notes. Don’t be negligent of any minute detail.” I look at Figure 1, which contains a drawing of a man with very little clothing, his hair long, covered in feathers and beads, war paint under his eyes. I move my attention to the next box: Figure 2: The Hispanic Woman. My chest tightens as I look at the drawing, and my knee begins to bounce. I look over more boxes, spanning page after page: Figure 9: The Transgender Woman, Figure 16: The Muslim, Figure 27: The African American. Another figure catches my eye, and I frown, throat closing. Figure 30: The Homosexual Man. The drawing depicts a man with a full face of makeup, outrageous clothes, and tight shorts in a frozen prance. My stomach churns and my ears buzz. But–, I think to myself, stunned, but I look nothing like that. I turn to Mark, mouth dry.
“Isn’t this stuff just great?” Mark says, scratching furiously with his pencil into his notebook. I turn to look back at the page, ears ringing, vision swimming.
The rest of the training day blurs. The drawings spin around and around in my head, like some sick carousel, penciled smiles and scowls turning into screams and paint bleeding down melting faces, turning into a horrible mess of fear, panic—
“Steph! Man, you do not look well. What’s gotten into you?” I snap from my daze, heart hammering.
“I’m sorry?” I stammer. We are in the hall outside of our patrol’s quarters. Mark is standing down the hall a bit from me, with a half smile on his face as he does a little wave at me. It’s dark outside, and the halls are empty. Only the buzz from the occasional overhead light persists. The poster eyes of The Institutional Man watch us, his gleaming face and slogan pasted along the walls in strides’ intervals.
“I said you’ve been out of it all day. Don’t tell me you’re worrying about tomorrow. Nothing will happen to us. We’ve been preparing for a few years now. We’re ready.” I shake my head, steeling myself, trying to shake the nausea.
“No–no–it’s not that. I’m fine, just got dizzy, is all.” I try to walk past him, but he grabs my shoulder.
“You don’t have to worry about them figuring it out. It was Figure Thirty, right? You’ll be fine. You blend in.”
But then why depict it like that? I think to myself.
“Plus, you’re S.A.F.E. now. This place has got plenty of programs to fix people up. And the new program they started for homosexual detainees should fix you up in no time if you don’t grow out of it.” I stare at the floor, jaw clenched tight. He pats me twice and walks down the hall.
“Mark, do you hear yourself?” I bark, anger coiling in my shoulders. I hear his footsteps stop, but I don’t look up from the tiles, clenching and unclenching my fists. “Doesn’t that sit wrong with you? That to be safe, you need to hide?” He scoffs.
“Steph, I think you’re tired. Go to sleep, we’ve got a big day ahead of us.” I look up at the posters on the wall. The Institutional Man’s smile becomes all teeth, his finger pointing at me, demanding, pressured. We’ll Make You S.A.F.E.!
I shiver, quickly walking down the hall to my bunk. I crawl under the covers and fall into a fitful sleep.
–
I dreamed I was back in the hall, the eyes of The Institutional Man following me everywhere I went. I begin to run, fear jolting me forward on trembling limbs. He knows! He’s found me out!
The sound of paper tearing makes me turn to glance over my shoulder. I stumble and trip on the rug, falling flat on my face.
“And where do you think you’re going?” A deep, gravely voice demands. I’m flipped onto my back, and a large paper finger presses down onto my chest. My ribs groan under the pressure, and I begin to squirm. The Institutional Man lumbers over me like a giant spider, multiple arms protruding from his back, rummaging through the pockets of his coat.
“We are just going to run a few tests, Steph. This should be painless, really.” I wiggle harder, trying to get out from under his finger pressing down on my chest.
“No, please,” I gasp. “I’ve done nothing wrong.” He tsks at me and brings up a fabric measuring tape to my face. He unfurls it down the long hall, flashes of colors blurring past my face. As it stretches out before me, I notice it isn’t numbers on the tape, but color tones. He stops near the lighter end, another pair of hands marking a note on paper inside a manila folder. Another set of hands takes a sharp scalpel and cuts around the top of my head, removing my brain and placing it onto a scale, using a ruler to take down dimensions. Another pair of hands lifts my shirt and traces along the bottom of my chest, while another pair unzips my pants, and the Institutional Man inspects both keenly.
“No scars, I see. Mark down that he isn’t one of the body-swappers. Let’s take a look here. The measuring tape places you a little below Caucasian, but that may just be from the sun. Say, Steph, what are your thoughts on God?”
His finger crushes me, my ribs crack, my skin crawls from where hands poke and prod. I struggle harder, my chest burning from the lack of air.
“Please,” I choke. “You’re killing me.” He smiles, rows of teeth.
“Whether it is through skin, dress, documents, feelings, I will find you, fix you, make you safe. You will be neutralized. You can run, but you can’t hide.”
I bolt upright in bed, drenched in sweat, heart hammering.
“Steph?” I whip around. Mark is standing next to my bunk. “You ready to go? We’re deploying in five.”
—
The sun is brutal today. It’s hot inside the vans, in the protective gear, all the bodies of recruits packed in. We’ve been parked out front of the school for hours, and nothing had happened.
“How come we’ve not been able to find any of these Deviants?” One of the enforcers snaps, breaking the stuffy tension that has been brewing. “You’d think with the outrageousness of how they look that we’d have grabbed some by now.” I shift uncomfortably, the events of my dream still not quite forgotten.
“Maybe we should just call it a day?” I answer, coughing before I continue as people turn to look at me. “I mean, we’ve been sitting outside here long enough. Nobody here is who we’re looking for.” Mark, who is sitting across from me, pulls down his mask.
“We were told to meet a quota,” he retorts. “We can’t just go back empty-handed.” Another recruit next to him nods.
“Yeah, he’s right. I heard from the Paper Department that their patrols were able to bring in a handful of people. We can’t let those bastards get the upper hand on our squad. We’re out here doing the real work anyway.”
More recruits begin nodding and agreeing. I hear the school bell ring faintly through the van’s walls, and shivers erupt across my shoulders, palms sweating. I freeze, hoping that no one else has heard, my heart racing in my chest, that sick feeling rolling over me in waves. I close my eyes, trying to steady my breathing.
“Hey!” One recruit shouts above the chatter. My stomach drops. “Lucky break for us, here they come.” My peers all turn to look out the tiny back door windows, watching the flood of children emerge from the school to meet their parents. Mark stands and runs to the back of the van.
“Grab anyone who looks remotely like our textbook. Look for the obvious: darker skin, religious clothing, all of it. If you suspect even a hint of deviance, you nab them. Don’t let anyone get in your way.” He throws open the doors, and all the enforcers barge out. I hear one of the enforcers yell, “You can run, but you can’t hide!” I can’t move. I can’t breathe. Horror courses through me as I watch the chaos ensue as children and parents scream. No one is safe.