The Showdown

It is not uncommon for gangs to form in Vekllei, especially among immigrant communities otherwise marginalised by a complex logographic language and rigid belief system.

In fact, in a country of plenty, there is not much to otherwise identify with. Class is irrelevant in utopia, and the basic ideas of manhood and womanhood are being destroyed in hand with the abolishment of industry. Racial identifiers certainly exist — the population is descended almost entirely from Scandinavian settlers (with notably fair hair) and those of mixed Inuit-Scandinavian ancestry, whom carry Caucasian features but have dark, often black, hair. There are also many Vekllei of immigrant heritage, largely from Eastern and Southern Europe after the First Atomic War. It is along these racial lines that bullying occurs in schools and atomised communities form.

In Montre, a university city of Northern Vekllei, it is not uncommon for these prejudices to fester. The capital may be cosmopolitan, but cities like Montre and Adouisneh are largely homogenous. Decades on from the First Atomic War, arguments between native Vekllei and children of Greek heritage continue to play out, usually in stupid and meaningless ways.

Cast against the racialised violence of the U.S. in the 2070s, and the Apartheid regime in South Africa, Vekllei’s ethnic tensions would be incomprehensible. On the small, arctic island, however, they will slowly be buried as generations cycle on and the pleasures of common Vekllei life realise themselves. There is no room in Vekllei for anything but Vekllei ambitions, regardless of heritage.