On a day best described as cathartic for a generation burdened by overpriced housing, absurd rent, stagnant wages, and the abuse of those who had everything handed to them on a silver platter, history was being revisited.
Worse than the system itself were the boomers - those 21st-century relics often described as grown toddlers demanding everything with minimal effort. Meanwhile, Millennials, Gen Z, Gen Y, and Gen X endured the tyranny of their entitlement.
"So it was," said the teacher, concluding her lecture before a class at a futuristic university.
Professor Alba Nazara, foremost authority on 21st-century history, had written landmark dissertations, conducted excavations, and - thanks to 24th-century medical advancements - had actually lived through the era she studied.
One day, as she packed up her materials, a student approached her. He was an alien creature named Namor Acticus, a fishlike humanoid from the ocean planet Poseidius.
"Professor Alba," he said, holding out a rusted metal sheet preserved in a protective membrane, "my parents found this in their old home. I thought you might be interested."
Alba raised an eyebrow. It was a Homeowner's Association rule placard - yellowed, corroded, yet unmistakable. Not just any HOA, but hers.
Etched in severe block letters:
HOA RULES - COMPLIANCE MANDATORY - By Decree of President Karen Heisler
Despite the damage, several rules remained legible:
No trash bins may be visible between 8:01 AM and 7:59 PM. Color-coded compliance enforced.
Lawns must be maintained at exactly 2.5 inches in height.
No leaf shall remain on driveways longer than 5 minutes.
Pets may not defecate on owner's property.
Holiday decorations require 90-day prior approval. Unauthorized d�cor will be seized and destroyed.
Absence from HOA meetings is punishable by public citation and, at the discretion of the president, corporal correction.
Repeat offenses subject to home inspections, corrective fines, and disciplinary force.
At the bottom, one chilling line had survived:
Order is freedom. Obedience is peace. Resistance is punishable.
Professor Alba sat down, breath caught in her chest. That placard had once hung at the entrance to her neighborhood, a relic of oppression burned after the death of its author.
"Are you alright, Professor?" Namor asked.
"I'm fine," she replied, voice low and heavy. "This sign once threatened to evict my family from our home. We fought so hard for it."
Namor blinked his large, unblinking eyes. "What does HOA stand for?"
"Homeowner's Association," she said, a bitter smile forming. "A form of localized authoritarianism, run mostly by old people - boomers - who, frankly, weren't very kind."
She paused. "We thought buying a house in the 21st century would be freedom. But under an HOA, we traded one form of tyranny for another."
"My father, James Osborn, thought it would be better than renting from our cruel landlord, Mr. Armin. But in hindsight, Armin was the lesser evil."
"At first, things were civil. The HOA offered coffee socials and block parties. But everything changed when Karen Heisler became president."
She poured herself a glass of replicated 21st-century wine as she led Namor into her office, adorned with relics of a long-dead era.
"Karen, I later discovered, was the daughter of a literal Nazi. When Trump passed a law giving HOAs sweeping powers, she turned our neighborhood into a miniature police state. Residents were fined $1,000 for wrong-colored trash bins or single leaves on the driveway."
"She enforced rules with brutality. Missed a meeting due to illness or work? You'd be beaten. Her goons crippled Mr. Herman and his husband for nonattendance. They lost their home - given to Karen's newlywed son - and eventually their lives, after throwing themselves from a nearby bridge. I still place flowers for them when I visit the ruins of our old neighborhood."
Alba's tone darkened, then brightened as she recalled a turning point.
"But one man stood up to her: Mr. Smith. A nearly 100-year-old WWII veteran, his house had been built before the HOA existed. She had no legal claim over him. He ignored her, defied her, and the neighborhood loved him for it."
"Karen tried to break him with fines and pressure. But he was a healer, a hero. He delivered babies - including my sister, now Prime Minister of Canada - and walked my mother through labor when Karen impounded our car."
"When Karen went too far, ordering her enforcers to torch Mr. Smith's home with him inside, we thought hope was lost."
"But Mr. Smith, ever the soldier, appeared in the top-floor window. He smiled at Karen, then detonated a device - destroying her home and killing many of her police. The neighborhood erupted. We hunted the survivors like vermin."
She smirked. "One of them, Karen's brother Zammarman, was captured in a swamp. We applied a method from ancient Persia - thank Mr. Hazan, our neighborhood historian. We fed him candy and iced tea, confined between boats. He suffered weeks of agonizing bloated diarrhea and bee stings - just like in the Nicolas Cage movie."
"Trump tried to retaliate. But uprisings spread. Across America, people burned HOA placards and overthrew their local tyrants. The Affordable Housing Act of 2035 made shelter a basic right."
Later, alone in her office, Alba opened a locked cabinet and removed a blackened skull - Karen Heisler's - and placed it beside the placard.
There was something Namor hadn't been told.
Karen's cruelty wasn't just political. It was personal.
Alba's golden retriever, Puppykins, once innocently relieved herself in their backyard. Under HOA law, that was forbidden. Alba had defied Karen, standing up to her.
"You can take your fascist rules and shove them down your throat," she had said.
The next morning, Puppykins was found poisoned. At the next HOA meeting, Karen unveiled her "trophy": the taxidermied head of Puppykins mounted on a plaque. It was placed to stare directly at Alba - a calculated humiliation.
"I never forgot," Alba whispered to the skull.
She'd promised she'd one day shove those rules down Karen's throat.
And she had.
After the revolution, she recovered the skull from the ashes of Karen's house and buried Puppykins beneath a flowering tree. For over two centuries, she kept the skull and placard - now lodged in Karen's gaping jaw - as a grotesque monument.
Lifting her glass to her lips, Alba whispered:
"For Puppykins. For every child who suffered under monsters. May you rot in every era."
Worse than the system itself were the boomers - those 21st-century relics often described as grown toddlers demanding everything with minimal effort. Meanwhile, Millennials, Gen Z, Gen Y, and Gen X endured the tyranny of their entitlement.
"So it was," said the teacher, concluding her lecture before a class at a futuristic university.
Professor Alba Nazara, foremost authority on 21st-century history, had written landmark dissertations, conducted excavations, and - thanks to 24th-century medical advancements - had actually lived through the era she studied.
One day, as she packed up her materials, a student approached her. He was an alien creature named Namor Acticus, a fishlike humanoid from the ocean planet Poseidius.
"Professor Alba," he said, holding out a rusted metal sheet preserved in a protective membrane, "my parents found this in their old home. I thought you might be interested."
Alba raised an eyebrow. It was a Homeowner's Association rule placard - yellowed, corroded, yet unmistakable. Not just any HOA, but hers.
Etched in severe block letters:
HOA RULES - COMPLIANCE MANDATORY - By Decree of President Karen Heisler
Despite the damage, several rules remained legible:
No trash bins may be visible between 8:01 AM and 7:59 PM. Color-coded compliance enforced.
Lawns must be maintained at exactly 2.5 inches in height.
No leaf shall remain on driveways longer than 5 minutes.
Pets may not defecate on owner's property.
Holiday decorations require 90-day prior approval. Unauthorized d�cor will be seized and destroyed.
Absence from HOA meetings is punishable by public citation and, at the discretion of the president, corporal correction.
Repeat offenses subject to home inspections, corrective fines, and disciplinary force.
At the bottom, one chilling line had survived:
Order is freedom. Obedience is peace. Resistance is punishable.
Professor Alba sat down, breath caught in her chest. That placard had once hung at the entrance to her neighborhood, a relic of oppression burned after the death of its author.
"Are you alright, Professor?" Namor asked.
"I'm fine," she replied, voice low and heavy. "This sign once threatened to evict my family from our home. We fought so hard for it."
Namor blinked his large, unblinking eyes. "What does HOA stand for?"
"Homeowner's Association," she said, a bitter smile forming. "A form of localized authoritarianism, run mostly by old people - boomers - who, frankly, weren't very kind."
She paused. "We thought buying a house in the 21st century would be freedom. But under an HOA, we traded one form of tyranny for another."
"My father, James Osborn, thought it would be better than renting from our cruel landlord, Mr. Armin. But in hindsight, Armin was the lesser evil."
"At first, things were civil. The HOA offered coffee socials and block parties. But everything changed when Karen Heisler became president."
She poured herself a glass of replicated 21st-century wine as she led Namor into her office, adorned with relics of a long-dead era.
"Karen, I later discovered, was the daughter of a literal Nazi. When Trump passed a law giving HOAs sweeping powers, she turned our neighborhood into a miniature police state. Residents were fined $1,000 for wrong-colored trash bins or single leaves on the driveway."
"She enforced rules with brutality. Missed a meeting due to illness or work? You'd be beaten. Her goons crippled Mr. Herman and his husband for nonattendance. They lost their home - given to Karen's newlywed son - and eventually their lives, after throwing themselves from a nearby bridge. I still place flowers for them when I visit the ruins of our old neighborhood."
Alba's tone darkened, then brightened as she recalled a turning point.
"But one man stood up to her: Mr. Smith. A nearly 100-year-old WWII veteran, his house had been built before the HOA existed. She had no legal claim over him. He ignored her, defied her, and the neighborhood loved him for it."
"Karen tried to break him with fines and pressure. But he was a healer, a hero. He delivered babies - including my sister, now Prime Minister of Canada - and walked my mother through labor when Karen impounded our car."
"When Karen went too far, ordering her enforcers to torch Mr. Smith's home with him inside, we thought hope was lost."
"But Mr. Smith, ever the soldier, appeared in the top-floor window. He smiled at Karen, then detonated a device - destroying her home and killing many of her police. The neighborhood erupted. We hunted the survivors like vermin."
She smirked. "One of them, Karen's brother Zammarman, was captured in a swamp. We applied a method from ancient Persia - thank Mr. Hazan, our neighborhood historian. We fed him candy and iced tea, confined between boats. He suffered weeks of agonizing bloated diarrhea and bee stings - just like in the Nicolas Cage movie."
"Trump tried to retaliate. But uprisings spread. Across America, people burned HOA placards and overthrew their local tyrants. The Affordable Housing Act of 2035 made shelter a basic right."
Later, alone in her office, Alba opened a locked cabinet and removed a blackened skull - Karen Heisler's - and placed it beside the placard.
There was something Namor hadn't been told.
Karen's cruelty wasn't just political. It was personal.
Alba's golden retriever, Puppykins, once innocently relieved herself in their backyard. Under HOA law, that was forbidden. Alba had defied Karen, standing up to her.
"You can take your fascist rules and shove them down your throat," she had said.
The next morning, Puppykins was found poisoned. At the next HOA meeting, Karen unveiled her "trophy": the taxidermied head of Puppykins mounted on a plaque. It was placed to stare directly at Alba - a calculated humiliation.
"I never forgot," Alba whispered to the skull.
She'd promised she'd one day shove those rules down Karen's throat.
And she had.
After the revolution, she recovered the skull from the ashes of Karen's house and buried Puppykins beneath a flowering tree. For over two centuries, she kept the skull and placard - now lodged in Karen's gaping jaw - as a grotesque monument.
Lifting her glass to her lips, Alba whispered:
"For Puppykins. For every child who suffered under monsters. May you rot in every era."
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