Soul Bound

1        Soul Bound
1.3      Making a Splash
1.3.3    An Unrequited Love
1.3.3.29 A call to action

Kafana: "Tonight we face a decision and I've been picked to say a few words about why we're facing it and what's at stake. There's a lot I'd like to say about workers being treated unfairly by their bosses, and about the establishment - the people and practices - that support them. However every minute we spend here is dangerous, so I'll be brief."

A muffled snigger came from near the back of the crowd, that sounded suspiciously familiar. Fair. Fair. She amended her words in a self-depreciating tone.

Kafana: "Well, as brief as I can manage. Sorry. Those who've known me for a while might just be a little sceptical about my brevity when it comes to voicing my opinion on topics I feel strongly about. For those who don't know me, I should start by telling you who I am and why I'm the one bringing you up to speed."

Kafana: "My name is Kafana. I've never been hired to make stuff using my hands - I sing, I cast magic; mainly I heal. I'm honoured that so many people from Basso have accepted me as one of them, but I'm not from here; or even from Covob - I'm a questing spirit, one of those 'adventurers' you may have heard about. Yet I'm the one they picked to open this meeting. Weird, huh?"

Kafana: "Mainly it's because chance placed me in a position to know more than most about the events and decisions that took place today. But maybe, in part, it is also for a second reason: people on other worlds have been in similar situations to ours and, as a Questing Spirit, I can share with you that larger perspective. I'll try. There are some things the deities forbid me from discussing with you."

She mimed looking upwards and holding her breath, waiting to find out if she'd get smited. About half of her audience laughed, if a little nervously. That was more than enough for her to count it as a win. Reassured she wasn't losing them, she continued.

Kafana: "The Red Death left its mark on every district of Torello this Summer. But only Basso was wounded deeply enough to create more orphans than the city's nobility were willing to feed. My friends and I visited that orphanage and we got to know some of the orphans quite well. One girl, Goffa, I met just over a week ago when we helped them put on an event to raise money and awareness of their problems. She tried hard to remain cheerful, even volunteering as a waitress that day, though like most of the orphans, she faced leaving the orphanage without prospects to fend for herself within months. So when I saw her again, while visiting foundries owned by a company named 'Tridella, Gimet and Mazoni', I was overjoyed to see her running along a rail-less walkway high above the cauldrons of molten metal and meshed cogs taller than she was - because it meant she'd been taken on as an apprentice: she had a future."

Kafana: "That was this morning. A few hours later, she was dead; her body torn to shreds - killed by the machine."

She let some of her anger and frustration enter her voice.

Kafana: "It was so unnecessary! How much does a guard rail cost? A few silver coins? Tridella, Gimet and Mazoni make fixings for ships. They probably sell guard rails by the dozen; maybe even make them in the same building that Goffa died in. What kind of stupid inhuman sadist decided their own workers were less worthy of protection than their customers? Than their own family members?"

Kafana shook her head, more in rejection and recrimination than in sadness.

Kafana: "In the heyday of family businesses, the person who owned a workshop was a master crafter who also lived and worked there. They weren't all thoughtful, generous and kind, but at least they knew the faces of all their workers, and would see the sorrow and hardship caused by their decisions. They couldn't avoid blame, because there was a single individual that was, ultimately, responsible for every choice, policy and personnel issue. And everybody there knew who that individual was."

Kafana: "But The Azioni changed everything.  Now, when a beadle refuses guard rails to 'save money,' even as walkways climb higher, who bears the blame? Is it the beadle who's just following a rule, the founder who wrote the rule, or the nobles who bought shares from the founder? Is it the crafter hired by those share owners to run the foundry on their behalf, who'd like to change the rule but doesn't dare to because Torello's laws say his first duty is to the profits of the share owners? Is it the guards who enforce that law, the merchant who supported writing that law because they were afraid of scammers, or is it something else? Maybe the law itself?"

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She paused for a moment, giving people time to realise the question didn't have a single obviously correct answer.

Kafana: "It's complex, isn't it? And that lets the ones in charge evade blame for bad decisions, while the workers pay the price. The true answer is 'all of the above' and, more, the entire system by which they interacting with each other to produce a decision. We have many different names for it, where I come from: The Establishment, The Man, The Machine. Giving this system a name helps workers recognise it, but don't be fooled - it isn't a person. It doesn't think, doesn't learn and can't be reasoned with. It just keeps rolling forwards and, on its current heading, it will sooner or later crush us all; unless we oppose it."

Kafana: "How do you oppose something you can't talk with? Are 'kill or be killed' the only possible outcomes?" She paused, eyes scanning the crowd as they thought about that. Then her voice softened, and she continued. "Would we even survive an all-out war against Torello's merchants, nobles, and all the mercenaries they could hire?"

She paused only for a beat this time, then gave a wide smile and put as much positive energy into her voice as she could.

Kafana: "Well, I've got good news for you. There is a third option, and that's what this meeting is for: we can win, and we don't need to go to war in order to do it!"

Kafana: "If a flooding river is threatening your village, you can oppose it without having to destroy the whole river. All you need to do is push back a little: fill a few grain sacks with sand and use them to build a wall. It doesn't have to be a big wall, either - just tall enough to make flowing around the village instead of through it be the easier path."

A few of the audience were nodding, but not enough of them. She tried again.

Kafana: "Or better yet, imagine a village is being threatened by a line of marching ants. You can't threaten ants, can't ask them for mercy, but you can send them a message if you know what motivates them. Water flows downhill, merchants flow towards profits, ants flow towards the scent of food. So find them something else to eat, like fruit in a nearby wild orchard. Then take a jar of honey and use it to lay a trail leading from the orchard to somewhere close enough for the ants to smell the sticky drips. Once you understand them, it's easy. Only a fool would take a sharpened kitchen skewer and spend the next year having sword fights with every ant they find inside the village."

Laughter rippled through the crowd. Good!

Kafana: "You understand? The village is our workplace, and the prize the merchants can scent is the fruit of our labour - the profits they can be make by working us to the bone. She let her anger creep into her voice as she spoke "As they worked Goffa to death only this morning." Pausing, she took a breath to calm herself, talking to persuade, rather than incite. "The first step in beating The System is to build a wall - an obstruction that pushes back, that makes raiding our village less profitable for them. The second step is to find an orchard - somewhere that's easier for them to profit from. The final step is to send them a message, let them know where their best interests now lie, to reduce the time they spend butting heads with us before discovering the new path for themselves."

Kafana: "That's a bit abstract, isn't it? What does it mean in practice for us here, tonight? How does it help us reach dawn without having our throats slit by Pazzi's thugs?"

She held out a hand with three fingers raised, and ticked off the steps, one by one.

Kafana: "The first step is already being taken. Though we're not using sandbags - we're using guilds. The more guilds that endorse the Charter of Worker Rights, the fewer opportunities there will be for companies to bolster profits by abusing their employees."

Kafana: "The second step will happen when it is expected that respectable companies uphold the Charter, because that's the normal thing to do. At that point, it will get harder and harder for non-compliant companies to find trustworthy partners willing to trade with them. And that's going to create profitable opportunities."

Kafana: "Lastly, to send a message, we need a messenger that Pazzi will be willing to listen to. Not because of their personal status or eloquence, but because of the weight standing behind them. Someone he'll take seriously because they are an authorised representative of a power to be reckoned with."

She raised the now clenched fist above her head, letting the force of her words build up.

Kafana: "To negotiate with guild leaders, to work within the system, to become that power... we need to do more than stand together. We need to do so formally, by voting to form the organisation whose articles of association you all saw written on the board by the stairs as you entered."

She finally reached the call to action, crying out the words with the full strength of her voice.

Kafana: "All those who are willing to be counted as founder members of the Lawful Fraternity of Chartist Campaigners for Equitable Employment..."

Her fist slammed into the palm of her other hand.

Kafana: "...say 'aye' !"