The Iron Cage

It's 1988 (western, Christian timeframe). The world has changed irrevocably. And it keeps changing.

 It may not look that way. After the storm, there's calm. Ronald Reagan is still president of the United States. The United States and other important power centers remain. Everything looks the same. People shrug and tell themselves that nothing will ever truly change. But an unrest is brewing. Since the nineteen-sixties there have been urban guerilla groups fighting those power centers, in Europe, and also, sporadically in the United States and Japan, and other places besides.

 The current world is a cage, he thinks, an iron grip strangling the Human Being, destroying everything making life worth living.

 He's had enough. He has been preparing for years, and now is the time to strike, to strike back at the oppressors, with impunity. People gather around him. They've done so for years, as they gather around others.

 So vulnerable, he thinks. They're all so vulnerable. Ted, Liz, Eric, Frank, June, Ethel, Nick, Carla and the rest. They don't know what to do with the world, with themselves, but I do, and I'm gonna show them, show them beyond doubt what must be done.

 He's exploding during those few, critical spring moons, and the world is exploding with him. The stage is set, and this time the world is truly changed forever.