King Con

I'd never seen a town so dead. It started with the old man leaning on his cane on the way out of town as I was on my way in. His stooped back stopped me in my tracks. He was slow and deliberate but steadfast and determined as if the hounds of hell were on his heels. I looked behind him but the road was empty.

He passed by me, noticing me as no more than an insignificant roadside shrub. That's when I heard his words: "The lies always win. The lies always win." The bent, grey man was possessed by those words, saying them to everyone and yet to no one. In his voice I heard the story of his life. I don't think anyone had listened to him in decades - it had taken his mind.

The rest of the citizens weren't much better. Half were living right on the edge, another good chunk were living well but losing ground and the last group bloated fatter and fatter like a giant mosquito sucking the life out of the rest of them. I studied them with a curious eye, wondering why no one smacked down the mosquito who caused such hopeless misery. In fact, they rebelled not at all, seeing their self-imposed bondage as the stairway to heaven.

That's when I knew there had to be a king. Suckers like these always need a god to fulfill their fantasies. You can smell it a mile away - you just can't say anything. Attack another man's god and he will strike you down just prove his god holy. So I'm trapped in silence by the cons I see. For me, they're always easy to spot: I'm a con man too.

I heard them grumble about the king, complain about him, moan about him and wail about him. But never ever deny his right to be. That's what happens when everyone wants to be king. I watched a woman outraged with the death of her child by virtue of the king's edicts come storming into the streets with the limp body in her arms. She demanded the king must go. But she was quickly hushed up as "a threat to the common good".

I had no problem letting these people die. They wanted a king to do their thinking, run their lives for them and then conveniently take the blame. But when the bill comes due they always bitch about the payment. Seen it a million times before. No saving sheep like that. If I'd had any doubt, the hanging revealed them for the civilized savages they were.

The townspeople hated him, seething and boiling over in anger. You'd think their very eyes were being clawed out the venom was so strong. I asked what the victim's crime was: He continually paid his rent in full. This so jeopardized the villagers married to their cheating ways he'd made their lies impossible to live with. After the hanging they found out it only made life harder.

Yes, I read their stories of pathetic hardship born of their ill-gotten ways and I was moved not. And since I don't usually move in on another man's con - not unless one wants full scale war - I was more than happy to see that town die as it so stubbornly claimed to be on the path to life. Good riddance!

But one free thinking group wanted to live. They came marching down the street chanting, "Liberté! Liberté!" They wanted no king to rule them, no rules to bind them, no bindings to enslave them. Let go and trust nature's order, they said, the universe was designed for life. That only provoked their fellow citizens who threw rocks and chastising comments. "You're just trying to get us killed! We have to have a king!"

Now usually my cons are for my benefit only as I slide by on the vices of others. But I got to thinking. What if I could turn this town on its ear? I never had any respect for these sort of institutionalized con men who ingratiated themselves into positions of trust, feeding off the internal fears of the populace. Oh sure, they were skilled liars and all that, but they had no daring, no liberal thought. Just dead men looking for a place to die.

"Why don't I give it to them?" I smirked to myself. Always good to try something new.

I asked a child - in order to get an unvarnished answer - what method the king used to control their godforsaken lives, what was it they denied themselves.

"It's the water, sir. We only get a few drops a day. They say there's not enough to go around and we don't deserve no more and shouldn't drink none anyway. They wouldn't say that if it wasn't true would they, mister?" I couldn't resist asking him if he'd seen the oversized swimming pools of the royal court. "But he's the king!" parroted the brainwashed boy. Yup, these folks were in deep, children infected in an Old Testament way. The game was afoot!

I put in ad asking for "honest and god fearing folks only!" These ads bring out the worst types. Thinking it will con me, I had them share their water with me to "prove" their holiness. They were only too happy to oblige and have me think well of them. But I knew they only did it to set me up for a later betrayal. I thanked them and drank every last drop out of view. I knew it would be a long time before I drank again.

I joined the Liberté marchers, energizing them as I spoke to the crowds. "Listen to me! Each and every one of you deserves all the water you need. Your suffering does not have to be. Don't believe the evil lies that you 'deserve' so little water. A full measure is owed to each and every person by virtue of birth. Let us celebrate the truth at last!"

You could see the claws falling out of their hearts, wishing to believe but afraid to dare do so. Fearmongers rose up, accusing me of spreading fear. Warmongers rose up accusing me of divisiveness. Hatemongers rose up accusing me of undermining the future. I asked them if their mother knew what they were doing and they spat at me and ran off. I knew that would not be the last of them.

We actually did gain a few converts but most feared their hearts knowing the damage their lies had already done. Who had the nerve to go back on what they had told their children? For them, the truth could wait another day. So be it. I am no man's savior, salvation comes from within - which is why they kept looking for it from without. Regardless, I continued my behavior until I could see I was wearing out my welcome as my insistence was clearly forcing a decision. That's when the king's men struck back.

"The man is a liar and a fraud! Have you not heard him preach of the goodness of full water rations? Have you not heard him say to drink water to attain life? And yet this man drinks none!" The crowd gasped in horrified shock. I yawned. "He is one of the great deceivers the Good King Who Hoards All Water warned you about. He is tricking you into destruction for his own selfish gain! We have proof! Not a drop drank since he's been here! You can read it on the internet!"

I shrugged in resignation. "If it's on the internet it must be true."

Someone made a plastic Moses!
Now we know he's a liar!

I was promptly run out of town and the Liberté movement was discredited by townspeople emboldened with a newfound sense of sanctioned righteousness. The decision had been made at last: no more water for them! Even as they died they slapped each other on the back, congratulating one another on "doing right" and "showing that fraud what's what". Yup, they showed me alright - right into the grave. When it was all over the only people left were the water hoarders and the Liberté group who mutinously continued drinking regardless of what anyone else thought.

They confronted the king who yelled for his dead army to rise. But they had been good soldiers and given their lives away in dehydration as well. Finding himself suddenly useless but gripped by pride, the king and the hoarders wandered bitter streets the rest of their lives as the Free Thinkers moved on, sharing water for all and teaching the vital need for understanding the truth of life. Yes, a most satisfying con.

The free thinkers invited me to live among them but a con man has no place among the likes of their shiny and open lives. The king's men were right all along: I'm a royal hypocrite in my dark and dastardly deeds. But the truth is available to anyone.