Daily story, February 11, 2025

This is how they do it. They arrest you on a 72-hour security hold. While you’re in the cell, they put up a speaker that plays state secrets on a loop. Knowing state secrets is a strict liability offence, so as soon as the hold is up, they give you the recognition test. You fail, and they bundle you off to the hole for the rest of your life, which is brief. The test results are published, and everyone applauds what a good job the security services did of dealing with you.

To beat them, you have to keep your mind far enough out of the room that the knowledge doesn’t go in. I had been practicing, so I knew I could do it. Let all that noise pass me by in a blur. At last, a use for sitting through all those literature lectures. So after 72 hours plus the long wait at the testing facility, they let me go. When I got home, there was a letter waiting on the mat, informing me that my name had been classified as a state secret.