The narrow corridor was dimly lit and Duncan counted his steps in a half conscious way. He couldn’t help his natural inclination to attempt to walk into the four turns that made up his trip with perfect arcs, accounting exactly for the fastest way to enter and exit his turns. He had always been a deep thinker and reasonably analytical. Simple things like perfecting his walk from the gym back to his apartment were trivial yet natural for him to do. His mind whirred with his brief encounter with Layla but he made an effort to push her to the back of his thoughts. He needed real coffee and food that didn’t taste like ashes. He needed to focus on getting some work done today, not rehashing a brief encounter with a girl. He slowed into the last corner and accelerated out, walking the last few steps to his door quickly. His Halo band touched the sensor by the plain brown wooden door and it swung open with a perfectly cheery tone that grated his nerves. He was greeted by Sandy pontificating to the audience about something or other. ‘Jerk’ Duncan muttered and muted the audio before waking up his workstation.

He spent several hours cutting together people’s feeds until he came across a particularly vitriolic speech from a 40 year old man with an SP of 14. That was his highest user for the month. The man’s monologue was more of the standard shock intended half ended statements. Throw away lines about how ‘these individuals are soaking up the sympathy of the masses and trading in for free SP.’ The cynical part of Duncan explored this idea. It wouldn’t be so hard to believe that some might be doing that. He wondered aloud, ‘I mean how many. Is there a reasonable expectation that a small percentage were cashing in on the unfortunate situation? By what percentage? Is it unreasonable for them to do so? These are people in a country that isn’t well loved by the SP system. Shouldn’t they do all they can.’ He felt his words enter the empty air of his home and wondered about their content. He finished watching the man’s video and cut it together. He blinked at the unappetising nutritional cube and smiled suddenly. His SP was ranked at 7, wasn’t he just as hungry? With a sudden influx of energy, Duncan called up his own cam and opened the angle wide. No users did this. They stayed in tight on their faces to give the illusion that the uniform drab apartments that the vast majority of users had wasn’t there. He took a deep breath and began.

‘I am a Cutman. Those of you who are family and friends that see my feed will already know this but in the unlikely this goes wider and you don’t know, my job is to cut together footage that you want on your StarPower feeds. I see you at your best and worst and all the parts in between. I know your struggles and experience your pain with you. I celebrate your joys and lament your losses. I do this for the same reason you post what you do. Its our occupation. Its our way of life. Today I cut together footage of several local reactions and postings about the earthquake in Venezuela. To be fair, most of my work has been regarding your feelings towards Roy and Amelia’s announcement but I don’t want to talk to you about that. Unsurprisingly, the reactions to Venezuela have been of two types. Shock and awe disregard and callow quasi-racism and overtures of immense grief and consolation. I’d like to give a partisan reaction to both. I’d like to make it simple as say to both you, “Fuck you”, but that seems a bit simple and maybe even unfair. Some of the outpours of sadness were without doubt genuine. But what you don’t realise is what I cut is still seen by me. After extolling your virtuous expressions of grief, I saw you turn your lips in distaste. I saw your nonchalance as you exited the recording. I saw how little you truly cared by and large. To the others, I watched a man with an SP14 just now spit absolute caustic abuse regarding what he claimed was obvious cashing in on a situation. No expression of sympathy from this man who most of you would likely regard with envy for his higher SP. What you wont see when that goes to his 1400 followers is that this man cried solidly after he had finished his hate filled monologue. He turned to watch the coverage from Venezuela and wept then realised his cam was still on and shut it down. I did what this man wanted, what his followers wanted and what this system demanded. I cut that footage down to the speech alone and deleted his self-hate filled tears of genuine remorse. I thought a lot about whether any of it was right. Where was the authentic from either side of these common reactions. That cut speech will win this man applause and SP and he will eat better, dress better and he might even feel that strange elation we all get as we recognise that something we did won accolades from others. Yet he was absolutely horrified at what he had to do to get it. I am a Cutman and I see what you are. You are good and bad people. You are sad and disinterested. What we all are is disingenuous. I am an Cutman and I will be honest. I will be honest for all of you.”

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Duncan posted his video, abusing his privileges as a Content Producer to not pare it down in the slightest and did something he hadn’t done in a long time. He took out a book and whiled away the hours of his day and went to bed. He didn’t look at this workstation or his screen. He went to sleep, woke, ate and showered the next day.He did think about Layla and as he left his apartment into the slate hallway, he didn’t see the icon on his mainscreen showing a flashing personal SP16.