PRL Serials

“Honestly, I didn’t think any of it was real,” Steph explained as he walked next to Azalaan. “Why would anyone want to be called an idiot?” 

“You’re pronouncing it wrong,” Azalaan interjected, “it’s actually Idiot, capital I. There’s an important distinction.”

“And what do you know about the proper Idiots, your godliness?”

In truth, Azalaan only knew as much as Marlo had told him. Before his coma, he would have objected to being called an idiot, Idiot, or even an Idiot God, but his encounter at the center of all things made him realize that the word had been corrupted from its Greek origins that described a common person without a trade. At the center of it all, every possibility existed and the God that occupied that center was none of it, but capable of donning any possibility expressed. That God was the chaos of creation, the source of all things born from the hectic start. The Idiot is Chaos, and all things spring from Chaos.

“That you’re my minions,” Azalaan said casually. “As the Idiot God, self-identifying Idiots pledge themselves to me, no?”

“Monday rights the way,” Steph said, parroting words he had said before. “She reminds us that Sunday is our leader, but he is not our mission. We can only achieve our objective together. Sunday isn’t really a God, I know that, but he brought us all together and will see us through to the end.”

“And that means ending this country, this world as we know it so that I have nothing to rule?”

Steph snorted a laugh at Azalaan.

“What do you have to do with anything? I only know you because the previous Thursday, who we had to cancel for failing to show robust support for adolescent hormone treatments, said Sunday mentioned you. Thursday recognized you from your editorial column. Most people within our movement don’t know you, we cancelled you a while ago for your blase attitude toward pay equity.”

“I mean, I’m not the one being shortchanged,” Azalaan said, “and there’s only so much money, I want it all for myself. But hold on a second, you cancelled me?”

“Very funny, pretend like you don’t know. Of course we cancelled you. The allies of gender equality did a hunger strike on this very campus, someone burned an effigy.”

“Must have slipped my notice,” Azalaan admitted. “I doubt the people who read and appreciate my column care what the gender allies think.”

“You underestimate the Brigade, it’s about more than just gender. The black community here calls you an Uncle Tom, the queer community says you’re a sellout…”

“Why is the queer community weighing in?” Azalaan asked. 

“You’re one of the highest profile gay men on campus…”

“Why does everyone think I’m gay? Suck one dick and that’s all people remember. Do you know how many vaginas I’ve had in my mouth? Countless, like I can’t count because it’s been so many.”

“It’s ok to enjoy sucking dicks…”

“One time! And sure it is if you’re a female or a closeted conservative politician with a lot of money. I’m not dick sucking rich! But one day.”

“You keep striving for that,” Steph said. “But yeah, we cancelled you like a year ago.”

“You do know that I still have my column. It’s more popular than ever. I’m making steady appearances on shows and stuff.”

“Yeah, within your echo chamber, but not outside of it. Good luck getting that dick sucking money while you’re black listed.”

“I don’t think you guys have the sway you think you have.”

Steph stopped walking. “You’re not the first to underestimate us, but you’ll see.”

“Why are you taking me to this thing? Aren’t I your enemy? Won’t they recognize me and cancel you for being seen with me?”

“If you are really what you say you are,” Steph said, “then Sunday won’t be around for much longer, and I want you to witness my rise. Not everyone in the Woke Brigade is an Idiot, but they serve the Idiot aim. The only way to make society more just for everyone is to tear it all down and rebuild, and we are all dedicated to that mission. I want you to see that despite our general difference of opinion, I am the greatest Idiot, the best agent of Chaos that has ever been. And they won’t recognize you with a decent costume.”

“So you think that I am challenging Sunday and you’re being nice…”

“In the event that you achieve your goals, yes.”

Azalaan nodded as they continued on their way. They went to a building that he knew was a dormitory and Azalaan followed Steph inside. They took the elevator to the sixth floor and Steph invited Azalaan inside his dorm room.

“So this Woke Brigrade is led by a college student who lives on campus? Is it a student organization?”

Steph laughed. “You really have no respect for the movement do you? The Brigade is nationwide. We mostly connect through the internet, that is the source of our power, our ability to organize and coordinate efforts to cancel people who deserve it. Put these on.”

Steph tossed Azalaan a wig and a dress and Azalaan stared at it skeptically and chuckled.

“You want me to dress like a woman?” 

Steph smiled at him. “You don’t have to come, but I know that you will because you don’t believe any of this. You think it’s some elaborate ruse that Sunday created to get close to you. But this is all real; Sunday, his Proudest Idiots, the Woke Brigade, and I’ll be its leader, Thursday, by day’s end. If you talked to Sunday, tell me what he looks like.”

Azalaan did think that Steph intended to take him into some trap that Sunday had made for him, and he was willing to walk into it out of sheer curiosity. He’d witnessed Marlo Charles’s possession by Sunday, he was sitting with her at a bar when her whole mood changed and someone else puppeted her body. He knew that it was Sunday and he declared himself Azalaan’s enemy. This display occured after Marlo had told him that when she met the man named Kurt Graham, he seemed to have no face and he named himself Sunday. He wanted to see Sunday again, to know if he actually had a face, or if he was some entity that took the bodies of others like Doro from Octavia Butler’s books. But he hadn’t anticipated wearing a dress and a wig to make it happen.

“Why does it matter if I’ve talked to Sunday? We’re here because you want to prove to me that you are one of the fabled Idiots organizing to end American life as it exists, and a leader to boot.”

Steph eyed him for a few seconds. “So, are you gonna play dress up or not? If you are, I’ll take you to the voting ceremony tonight on the condition that you never speak a word of any of this to anyone. If someone should ask what you were doing tonight, make up something. If someone asks if you’ve ever met a trans man called Steph, you deny it. Do I have your word?”

Azalaan hesitated, but he knew that he would wear the dress.

“You have mine if I have yours,” Azalaan replied.

“Oh, you want me to deny ever meeting you?”

“I assume that if you want me to deny you, then I don’t have to ask the same in return. No, I would like for you to keep a secret for me, since you have laid your dealings out so clearly for me. I’m flexing, really, it’s one of my biggest flaws, the need to demonstrate my power, my unknowability. Agree to keep my secret and I will keep yours, and tell you mine.”

“Deal,” Steph said without hesitation. “What is your secret?”

“Everyone knows me as Azalaan, the Idiot God, or as the Pretender, and those things are true, one more so than the other but it’s a matter of perspective. One thing that is undeniably true, is that I am your enemy, Stephen. You want to end American life as it exists, but I, the Ruler of the Outer Gods, Daemon Sultan, Azalaan, like the world just the way that it is. And if you have designs on ending it, then I will end your mission and that of your compatriots.”

Steph laughed out loud. “You can’t stop the inevitable. Now I’m glad that we met, so that I can show you the futility of your resistance. Nothing can stop us. What are you, a narc? Undercover police officer?”

“Something like that,” Azalaan said with a nod. “So, where can I change? I assume you’ll do my makeup.”