Oubaitori Society

Oubaitori: A beautiful Japanese concept that encourages people to focus on their own unique strengths and traits, rather than comparing themselves to others. It comes from the kanji for four trees that bloom in spring: cherry blossoms, plums, peaches, and apricots, and serves as a reminder to value our own individuality and live our lives to the fullest.

It’s twenty fifty, and people are sick of the government watching them. 1984 was supposed to be a warning, not a prediction.

But the citizens were able to handle daily government invasions of privacy by forming secret societies hell-bent on evading all of the governments new tech.

I am A, head of the Oubaitori Society. I had a compound in the Mojave, far away from any structures the government could use to spy on us.

I had used the concept of Oubaitori to bring people to my temple.

I was teaching people to focus on themselves, this part was true.

But in return, they usually made a small but significant contribution to the Oubaitori Temple, all while managing to avoid government intrusions.

I was always honest with my members, letting the wealthy ones know they needed to contribute financially in some way in order for the Oubaitori temple to continue to function.

Some of my members were wealthy business owners who contributed large sums of cash, and these members were the only ones allowed the special privelage to leave every day. We trusted the wealthy to avoid government detection since most of the governments politicians were on the payroll anyway from times long before the government had been monitoring everyone.

The middle class has to run their businesses from inside the compound, where we monitored everything they did, said, ate and drank to make sure the government wasn’t doing the same. It was for their own good.

The poor helped the Oubaitori Temple in other ways. They helped us with our own business, crop growing, which made us self sufficient and powerful. Not like a lot of those other society’s that had been created to avoid government observation. They had no idea how to run a proper business or a secret society.

Frederick Rickerson drove down the road in his new jet Black Rolls Royce and stopped when he saw me. He rolled down his window.

“Master A, it’s an honor to see you today,” Frederick said.

“You too, Master Rickerson. Hope your vertical chicken farm does well today,” I said and smiled.

“It will if I have anything to say about it,” Frederick said and drove off.

Our membership grew bigger every day, and more people were always contributing to our underground tunnels.

The secret to our rapid expansion was our brain voiding device. Of course it would be wrong to use this on everyone, we’d be as bad as the government we were trying to avoid. So we only used this device to void the brain of the other society leaders, then persuaded them to tell their members to join with our society.

Master Rickerson Returned later that day to tell me of a spy on his payroll who infiltrated the Ouroboros Society. They had found a new weapon they could use strong enough to take over the world. Those snakes! I wouldn’t stand for this.

It was time to take action.

******

My name is Mal. I was second in command of the Ouroboros Society. We were a rapidly expanding medium sized secret society hell bent on avoiding government detection.

I worked for Master Gray. He made me his second because I was the only one he trusted to protect him at any cost.

I was also his chief archeologist.

I had gotten permission to look for antiquities in the Mojave buried by a people more ancient then god himself. But what I found was far greater.

It was a device that had been used by ancient aliens to manipulate and control the weather. This device had the power to not only bring down the government and permanently put an end to their ceaseless spying, but also keep all the other society’s in check. Master Gray would be pleased.

I called Jim back home at the compound and told him to send a large team with the biggest truck we had to help dig up and transport something special I had found, and to hurry. They had gotten here in just under an hour. The Ouroboros Society would finally have an edge.

We had dug up the device and quickly packed it into the truck, despite the fact that it was slightly too large. We punctured a large hole through the trucks roof.

I was following the truck in my car when halfway back home, our truck was hit my another large truck and knocked over.

“What the hell?” I shouted. I grabbed my plasma rifle and got out but we were quickly surrounded by people I recognized as members of a much larger and much more powerful secret society, The Oubaitori Society. I put my hands up in surrender.

“What the hell do you guys want?” I groaned.

“We want unification,” one of the members said.

“Yah, don’t we all,” I said and spat on the ground.

“We know about your device,” the member said.

“Good for you. Are you here to steal it?” I asked.

“No,” the member said.

“Then what…” I started to say and they shot my team down, leaving me the only one standing.

“I thought you guys didn’t kill people, or whatever bullshit you assholes preach,” I said.

“Oh, they’re not dead, just sleeping. We use chemical bullets to knock our targets out,” the member said.

“You missed me, jackass,” I said.

“Because you’re going to take the weapon to Master Gray,” another member said.

“Sorry, what?” I asked.

The member approached me. He took off his hood and stood right in front of my face.

“Hello, Master A. I’ve heard a lot of things about you,” I said.

“All positive, I hope. Now get in the truck with the weapon,” he said, a sinister smile crossed his face.

“Or what, you’ll knock me out too? I’m so…” Master A took out a knife and rammed it against my throat.

“We can do this the easy way, or the hard way,” Master A said. He then took out another device I recognized as the brain voiding device. My society has been trying to steal one of those for years. Oh the secrets we could learn, the members we could recruit.

“Ok, ok, no need to empty my brain. I’ll get in the truck,” I said.

Master A got in with me.

“So what’s your plan, exactly? Brainwash Master Gray then steal our weapon and society members, like you’ve done so many times before?” I asked.

Master A said nothing but his Sinister smile was back.

“That’s what I thought,” I said.

“You are mistaken, nobody is ever stolen. Everyone consents who joins the Oubaitori Society,” Master A said.

“And all you do is brainwash their leader,” I said.

He said nothing again, his sinister smile only getting more sickening and never fading. It was silence for the rest of the way back to our compound.

Master A made me get out of the truck first, where I was greeted by Master Gray.

“Master Gray, you have to leave. We have unwanted company…” I said. Before he could respond, Master A walked out of the truck.

“Ah, Master A. What an unexpected and unpleasant surprise this is,” Master Gray said.

“You really know how to make someone feel welcome,” Master A said.

“If you try to brainwash me into…” before Master Gray could finish speaking there was a quick flash and Master A was already putting away his brain voiding device when I turned to look at him.

“We will be more than happy to form an alliance with you,” Master Gray said.

Crap, I thought.

“Master A, you bastard. You have no right to void our leaders brain,” I shouted at him.

Master Gray put his hand on my shoulder.

“It’s ok, Mal. We will join them. Both our societies will thrive. It will be wonderful. It will be better this way,” Master Gray said.

I said nothing. I stood still and angrily stared at Master A.

“You don’t have to join us if you don’t want to Mal. But it seems like all the other members of your society are already on board with us,” he said with his usual sinister smile.

I looked around and the staring people didn’t know what to do now that their leader of over forty years had been brainwashed.

“I’ll come, but only because someone has to protect Master Gray from your treachery,” I said and grumbled a few swear words.

I got back inside the truck with Master Gray.

We sat down, and without fully thinking out a plan, I pressed a button and activated the alien weather device. It started glowing, and heavy rain clouds formed outside. Lighting crackled and hit the truck and caused the engine to explode.

Master A and his members he was with scrambled outside.

While Master A and his crew were distracted trying to get the fire out and protect the weapon, I grabbed the brain voiding device from his pocket.

I didn’t know how to reverse the effect on Master Gray, but I watched Master A use the device on Master Gray.

I was still behind Master A and coughed loudly to get his attention. When he turned around, he started to tell me to get out of the way when his eyes went wide.

He saw the device in my hand, and before he could grab it back from me, I flashed him.

“How can I help you, today?” Master A asked.

“First things first. Call me Master Mal. I’m in charge now,” I said.

My smile now looked just as sinister as Master A’s had just a short while ago.