This Machine Belongs To
This Machine Belongs To details the journal entries of those that toil away at the machine. Be careful dear listener, or you may find yourself under it's same compulsion. (Produced by Halfwit Podcasts)
This Machine Belongs To
Vernon Wright - November 9th, 2008
We are going back to the basics and it honestly feels right.
=== Credits ===
Produced by Halfwit Podcasts ( https://www.HalfwitPodcasts.com ).
Written by Matt Spaziani ( https://vocal.media/authors/matt-spaziani ).
Vernon Wright is voiced by Jonathan Swenson ( https://www.jgswenson.com ).
Based on the journal role-playing game "The Machine" by Adira & Fen Slattery ( https://adira.itch.io/the-machine ).
Music and sound effects used with Zapsplat Gold, and Ghosthack Music licenses.
Vernon Wright - November 9th, 2008
There’s a memory I have from the Before, back when I had not yet heard the Music. I was with my childhood friends - all inconsequential, all out of my life long before the Machine came into it - and we were exploring the woods behind my house and found loose boards with some nails in them. We had no hammers but tried to make a fort, stacking the boards and using rocks to slam them together. It was a short time before the structure came crashing down, and while I may have forgotten his name, I’ll never forget the sound of a friend screaming as three jagged, rusty nails pierced his stomach. We ran home, his blood leaking through his shirt as his tears stained his collar. My parents punished me and then told me that I have to build things properly, and had me help with projects that summer.
It’s why I went into engineering. It’s why I was able to bring the Machine to a functioning state. And thus it is fitting that the Machine will be completed in a forest just like that, for I have now lost my home.
It was a matter of time, I suppose. Not as inevitable as the Music, but close. My dad used to say the only things you can’t escape are death and taxes. He could never have predicted some of the things that I now know are inescapable, but perhaps he could have added eviction to the list.
I missed the rent payment on Friday, which I knew was going to happen. Landlord isn’t a bad person, but he’s just like the rest. He needs his money.
No. Wrong. He wants his money. He has no fucking clue what he needs.
I didn’t bother to write a check like I was expected to. It wouldn’t have cleared anyway, so why waste the time? I needed to tune, to adjust and shift and position and crank, most of all to crank, to direct the pulleys and twine and wood and metal and the Machine, to turn the Machine and produce the Music! Will a few numbers on a piece of paper sing the way the Machine sings? Why should I play by these rules when they no longer matter?
Unfortunately, some still believe in the illusion of control. And the landlord exercised his today. He wanted his money, and he came to collect. And I didn’t have it.
And he saw the rats.
He gave me fifteen minutes to gather my things and get out. Minutes. Not a day, not even a few hours. He called the place a “waste dump”. Does he have any idea what happened in those drab rooms? What was born in them?
It’s his loss, that’s for sure. He’ll never come close to power like that again.
I grabbed my things. Packed up the Machine as carefully as I could. Left that mediocrity behind. And upon leaving, I had an epiphany. The Machine and I are now inextricably linked. I know that now. I breathed life into it and tuned its brash screams into the Music. Other people, though…they’ve done nothing but interfere. Dennis. My landlord. My parents. All the others who uphold this pointless system of money and power, the system that requires me to slave away instead of doing something important.
It all leads to a single conclusion. In order to truly do something important, those people need to be far away.
Well, they are away now. And all it took was a short walk to the nearby forest. Enough people live close to here that they come to walk through these trees, but I am far from the trails. I can stay here until the work is completed and the Music sings through every tree branch in the city.
It will take some time to bring the Machine back to where it was in that building. The crank system I had built around it was finely tuned and while I was as careful as I could be, it came down in a hurry.
But now…now I have nothing but time. Everything I need is right here. I have clothes. I grabbed some food from the pantry before I left. I can brush up some leaves to make a bed. Nigel and his friends came with me, so I have all the company I could want. Company that doesn’t demand, or ask questions, or worry. I have no electricity, but that’s okay. Soon my cell phone will die, and then the only sound I will hear is the Music.
"This Machine Belongs to" is a production of Halfwit Podcasts. This episode was written by Matt Spaziani. Vernon Wright is voiced by Jonathan Swenson. Based on the journaling game "The Machine" by Adira and Fen Slattery.
If you'd like to support our endless toil with the machine or listen to our other podcasts, visit HalfwitPodcasts.com, or find specific links in the show notes of each episode.
Lastly, the most efficient way to build The Machine is by telling friends of its importance in our once meaningless lives. Some day, This Machine could belong to you.
