“I think,” says Rachel, “people are only happy when they’re dead. Then they’re finally at peace. They don’t want anything anymore. Nothing pinches or pulls, and nobody disapproves of them or rejects them. They all want to die.” For a few seconds all the youths look toward the windows, only to turn back, as if choreographed, to their devices. Rachel has secretly sent an application to MI5; they’re looking for talented analysts there. Ben has once again begun to find security vulnerabilities in companies; the others weigh their options.

The options available to dedicated youths.

“Hello there, and good morning.

We’re the

YOUTH.

Who grew up with the knowledge that without conforming, one will not possibly survive. We’re the so-called ADHD generation, which means that we’re multitasking, if by that you mean we take in new information by the second and then forget it again. Good morning, we’re largely apolitical, because we learned that being political didn’t do our parents any good at all. All the protesting, demonstrating, chaining themselves up to some shit or other, had no effect. Where are they now, the political people? In shitty little flats with a basic income, you might as well call it charity, that ensures that there are noodles. Our parents are hideously aged. They’re fifty now, they wear hoodies, they marvel when they see other fifty-year-olds and think: Jesus, they’re old. They’re users, they wear fitness trackers. They’re in job fields that are no longer needed. We’re the youth. We believe in capitalism, which sounds tired, but that’s the way it is. It’s a fact. We want to shop, we want competition, we behave ourselves, and when the parents jabber about there being no freaks anymore, no subculture, and that we’re neoliberal squares, then we look at your generation, which consisted of gray mice, of conforming, fearful idiots who voted for Brexit because they’re too stupid to code. You talk of the disappearance of nature and of animals, but there are animals in the zoo, and there’s an ocean surrounding us, that’s nature. Plenty boring. We skate at indoor parks. That’s more clever than getting wet in the Highlands in order to watch a couple idiots throwing cabers. Or we’re the others, the burnouts, the forgotten, the zombie children. Who’ve become criminal youths or quitters. Because our parents were low performers. Were. Most of them are now over fifty and dead. Or in homes where they can find themselves. We’ve learned to despise the system, to mistrust it, we get by. We believe in nothing. We trust nobody. We know what counts. Only ourselves. We see the older generation and think:

See ya.”

THE NEW ADMINISTRATION

Says: “Indeed. See you later.