They meet every morning at the same hour, in the same room, under the same indifferent light. The room is not large. It does not need to be. A small government does not require marble to be cruel. A table. Three chairs. A window that looks out on nothing in particular. Paper stacked with a kind of moral neatness. A glass of water that is never finished. On the wall, a clock that keeps time like a tax collector. The Chair is always taken first. The Chair belongs to Discipline. Discipline arrives early, because Discipline must be seen arriving early. He sits with his back straight as if posture were a philosophy. He lays out the day in a ledger, line by line, as if the day were a budget and the only sin were waste. Across from him sits Shame. Shame does not arrive; Shame is already there. Shame has no need to make an entrance. He is seated in the shadowed side of the room, as if light itself were an accusation. He watches with his hands folded, patient in the way of predators who know you will return. The third chair is never claimed with confidence. Ambition circles it. Ambition has the restless look of someone who can’t decide whether to rule or to flee. Ambition is dressed well, always slightly overdressed for the room, because Ambition imagines a bigger room and lives as if it were already true. And then, late—always late—Addiction slips in. Addiction does not sit. Addiction paces along the wall, as if the wall were a shoreline and he were waiting for the tide. He speaks softly, friendly, a confidant who makes you feel understood the way a lock understands a key. Discipline clears his throat. The sound is official. “Call to order,” Discipline says. “We have an agenda.” He taps the ledger. The pages are full of small handwriting, tidy enough to be mistaken for virtue. Ambition leans forward. “Finally.” Shame smiles without baring teeth. Addiction looks out the window as if bored, as if he has all day. Discipline reads. “Wake time: achieved. Movement: partial. Nutrition: acceptable. Work block one: started, interrupted. Work block two: avoided. Social contact: delayed. Self-care: postponed. Sleep: unknown.” Ambition clicks his tongue. “Unknown. Always unknown. We’re drifting.” Addiction turns, cheerful. “We’re surviving.” Shame says nothing. Shame doesn’t have to. Silence is his policy. Discipline flips a page. “Item one: the phone. Item two: the project. Item three: the… recurring pattern.” Ambition shifts. “We should talk about the project first.” Discipline doesn’t look up. “No. We talk about the phone first.” Addiction smiles wider. “Oh, come on. The phone is a tool.” “A tool,” Discipline repeats, writing the word down as if it were evidence. “It’s connection,” Addiction says. “It’s information. It’s relief. It’s—” “A slot machine,” Discipline says, still not looking up. “A dispenser of tiny permissions.” Ambition nods reluctantly. “It is a distraction.” Addiction spreads his hands. “It’s a break. People take breaks. You can’t run a kingdom on punishments.” Shame’s voice is soft, almost kind. “You can run it on fear.” Ambition flinches. Discipline stiffens, as if Shame has violated decorum. Addiction laughs. “Fear is inefficient. Fear burns fuel. I offer comfort.” “Comfort,” Shame repeats, tasting the word like poison. “You offer numbness, and then you charge interest.” Addiction steps closer to the table. “And you offer what, exactly?” Shame doesn’t answer. He only tilts his head slightly, like a judge listening to testimony he already knows is false. Discipline interjects. “We are not here to argue definitions. We are here to set policy.” Ambition leans in. “Yes. Policy. We need output.” “Output,” Discipline echoes, and underlines it twice. “The day must produce.” Addiction rolls his eyes. “The day must also be tolerable.” Discipline points his pen at Addiction like a weapon that has been socially sanitized. “Tolerable is not an objective.” “It should be,” Addiction says. “Otherwise, you get rebellion.” Shame finally speaks directly to Discipline. “You already have rebellion. You call it ‘lack of discipline’ to avoid calling it what it is.” Discipline’s jaw tightens. “Speak plainly.” Shame’s smile returns. “It’s despair.” Ambition stands abruptly. The chair scrapes. “No. It’s not despair. Don’t dramatize it.” Shame turns to Ambition with a certain tender contempt. “You are the one who dramatizes. You turn every delay into destiny. You whisper ‘wasted life’ into his ear and call it motivation.” Ambition’s voice hardens. “Fear of wasting life is rational.” “It is,” Shame agrees. “That’s why it works.” Addiction claps once, softly, as if enjoying the theater. “We’re getting somewhere.” Discipline raises his hand, palm out. “Order.” They pretend, for a moment, that order is possible. Discipline looks at Ambition. “State your proposal.” Ambition straightens his shirt. “We focus on the project. Two hours. No phone. No interruptions. We build momentum, and momentum changes everything.” Shame’s eyes narrow, almost approvingly. “And if the two hours don’t happen?” Ambition looks away. “Then—” “Then you’ll punish him,” Shame finishes. “You’ll call him weak. You’ll draft a new identity: ‘the kind of person who can’t.’ You’ll make him smaller, and then you’ll demand he be big.” Ambition’s face reddens. “I demand excellence.” “You demand salvation,” Shame says. Addiction leans on the table like a friend at a bar. “I have an alternative plan.” Discipline doesn’t hide his disdain. “Of course you do.” Addiction speaks gently, as if addressing a frightened child. “We do a little. Not two hours. Ten minutes. Start the project, then reward. A taste. A scroll. A snack. A small kindness. Then another ten minutes. Gentle. Sustainable.” Ambition scoffs. “That’s bribery.” Addiction shrugs. “That’s behavior shaping.” Shame laughs quietly. “Listen to you. You speak like a therapist. You’re a dealer in comfortable chains.” Addiction’s expression sharpens for the first time. “And you’re what? A torturer with poetry?” Shame does not deny it. Shame never denies. Discipline looks down at the ledger, as if the ledger can tell him what to do. In the silence, a fourth presence shifts in the doorway. It is not a person, exactly. It is the citizenry. It is the body. It is the exhausted part that carries them all and never gets a vote. It stands there, half-in, half-out, as if deciding whether to submit to governance or collapse on the floor. Discipline’s voice softens by a degree. “You may speak.” The citizenry doesn’t speak in words. It speaks in weight. In heaviness behind the eyes. In the ache of wanting to lie down. In the quiet terror of another day being the same.