The Great Citywide Raffle

Chapter 2

After the official’s lengthy stay it became very apparent that he was going to be burdened with insurmountable debt. Contemplating how he was going to raise the money to pay for his bills, the official decided to levy a tax upon the people. The official sold the idea by mentioning that the tax was only a miniscule 1% of 1%. The townsmen agreed seeing that for every hundred dollars they earned only one penny went towards the tax. What the official failed to mention in the fine print of the law was that prior to the tax calculations the amount of wages reported per person were to be multiplied by 10,000. Under this setup a person earning a hundred dollars now owed a hundred dollars in tax. This idea did not go over well with the inhabitants of the city and they demanded the tax be repealed. The official explained it could not be repealed but could be replaced by a great city wide raffle or a lottery of sorts.

A crowd of about four thousand people assembled at the heart of the city. The people of this city hardly ever took notice of all the political decisions that were made by the officials and the council of representatives. Laws and bill were passed daily, but ordinary life had been the same for years. However, this was a special day; the air was thick with enthusiasm and anticipation. It was a very large crowd. People riding on their elephants marched up the streets. Amongst all the human cheers and elephant noises was a wooden podium on a large stage. Standing behind the podium was stout man who was wearing a beige colored suit. His face was round with a moderate sized gray-brown moustache with a matching colored comb over. He chuckled as he waved to the crowd with a big grin. He took his favorite metal spoon and gently tapped the side of a wine glass as a request for everyone in the crowd to pay attention to his important announcement. The crowd eagerly complied. The people were familiar with this man; he was the city’s local activity organizer. Anytime there was an election, a lottery, or sports competition, he was the one who made it all possible. His name was synonymous with fun and enjoyment. He spoke and the crowd listened.

“Fellow citizens! For the first time in two weeks, we will be having a citywide raffle!”

The crowd cheered and applauded.

“There is a special undisclosed prize for whoever buys the winning raffle ticket.”

“How much are the tickets?” someone shouted.

“Only 10 dollars!” the activity organizer exclaimed.

The crowd’s merriment was at an all time high. The activity organizer fed off their excitement, he proceeded to walk off to the side of the podium a bit and performed a little tap dance. The crowd took benefit from every second of his modest act.

“What is the money going to?” a smooth voice said seriously. It was the girl who had given the gift of cinnamon to the official months ago. She fiddled with her glasses as her black hair feathered in the breeze.

The crowd went silent for a moment, not in interest to her question, but by the fact she killed the moment with such a seemingly insignificant query. Who cared what the money went to? This was a major recreational activity that could be enjoyed by the thousands.

However it was law that all political figures must answer the questions of any law abiding citizen.

“Well, miss…” the activity organizer paused; obviously he wanted to avoid this subject at all costs. He continued, “The official of this sector, has suffered some severe injuries and has had many difficult and expensive surgeries.”

“What has happened to him?” she said, seemingly innocent, but the organizer detected she knew of the official’s bumbling foolishness.

“He, uh…grabbed a rare toxic flower that he thought was the one he planted when he was young.” The organizer said somewhat quickly.

Before she could ask another question the organizer changed the subject. “How ‘bout that raffle?” he shouted while continuing his tap dance.

The crowd cheered.

A line soon formed as everyone eagerly waited to receive their ticket that they would cherish until the raffle itself ended.

The official laughed to himself as he watched the thousands of people buying the tickets outside his hospital window. He figured at this rate, he would end up receiving over 40,000 dollars when everything was said and done. For once he felt proud to be the blundering idiot that everyone in the entire city knew him as. He felt even prouder to soon be the richest person in the whole city.

After he was done laughing, he took a large bite out of an apple pie he received from one of the countless medics who came to see him. But he immediately had to spit the pie out after he realized that the crust was coated with a layer of cinnamon. His entire mouth began to burn sensationally, and he ordered the cadet to aid him, but he was unfortunately not there due to the fact that his shift ended five seconds ago. So the official now had to deal with the excruciating pain that was coming from his mouth.

A medic walked into the room holding a newspaper, he sat down waiting for the official to calm down a bit. This medic was different from the majority of them; he seemed tranquil, indifferent to the official’s plight. He opened the newspaper and began to read.

“This is quite some scheme you got going here.” He said slowly.

“It was a stroke of brilliance I must say.” The official said coughing due to his mouth still burning, “What’s it to you?”

The medic held out the paper into front of the official, on the inside page was the second primary article, below the front page raffle story. It was located in the opinion column.

The headline read “Local citizen questions raffle’s economic benefit.”

There was her picture, the official immediately recognized the girl, the one who gave him cinnamon so many months ago.

“She’s a political dissident! She’s a nonconformist!” The official growled.

The medic pulled the paper away. “Yeah.” was all he said before leaving the room. The official sat there, angry. How could anyone object to something as fun as a raffle? The public’s opinion was overwhelmingly positive, but it’d be a shame if anyone actually listened to this oddball.

Meanwhile, the crowds scurried all around, looking for ticket vendors, elephants stampeded in the streets. Despite all the disorder, people were enjoying themselves like never before; the thought of being the prize winner motivated the public. They played leap frog and hopscotch. They sung folk songs at the concerts in the parks. There were games and concession stands. It was a real festival.

Then it happened.

Two men were standing on the sidewalk. The one asked the other;

“Hey, how about you let me look at your raffle ticket for a moment?”

The other man grimaced and said “How about I bop you one right in the kisser?”

“Just for a moment, let me look at it!” the first man replied.

“No.” the second man said sternly and dragged his fist across the other man’s face. He stumbled backwards into the street, the oncoming elephant rider steered his large grey behemoth to the side to avoid the man, just missing him. Although by doing this, his elephant fell right over into another. Both of them came crashing down, both letting out a mighty elephant call. The one elephant, by falling slammed into the fire hydrant, releasing a geyser of water which soaked a concession stand selling grease fire burgers. The stand went up in flames and people ran. The firefighters came rushing on their elephants and they blasted the fire with a high pressure spray of water from their trunks, to no avail. Aviation crafts flew over, releasing extremely cold foam from their attached buckets. The wet street froze solid. People and elephants alike slid all over in every direction. It was complete and utter mayhem.

It was towards the end of the day and there was but only one raffle ticket left that wasn’t bought. This gave the official a marvelous idea. He thought to himself, “Instead of just getting a measly 10 dollars on the final raffle ticket, I shall hold an auction so people will end up paying even more money on it!” So the next day an auction was prepared for the final raffle ticket. This would be a day the official would never forget.

A small crowd gathered in the town hall, talking amongst themselves. Then the auctioneer walked up to the podium on the stage in the hall. He said, “Alright everyone. As you all know, we are holding an auction for the final raffle ticket, and the bidding will begin now. Shall we start the bids at 10 dollars?” Right away someone in the crowd bid 12 dollars for the ticket. Then another bid 15. And soon more and more people began to bid higher and higher, making sure that they had the top bid. Soon the highest bid was 50 dollars, then 100, then 250. The official walked in the hall and laughed with satisfaction. And then, at that very second, he hatched an even more diabolical and mischievous plan. He watched his next cadet walk in, ready for their shift. He pondered for a moment, and then he grinned.

He knew that the cadets followed any order he told them to do, and they would do anything that he said. This thought made him even more excited. He made his move.

He told the cadet to bid 20,000 dollars on the final raffle ticket, and to do nothing but that. The plan was completely fool-proof. He watched the cadet take a seat in the back of the hall. He was so thrilled that he could barely contain himself. But all of a sudden just as the cadet was about to bid the outrageous amount on the ticket, he looked at his watch, then got up and walked out of the hall.

The official was mystified.

“WHAT WAS THAT!? WHY DID THAT IDIOT LEAVE!!?” the official screamed. But once the official looked down at his watch, it all made sense. The cadet’s shift had ended.

The official’s once blue face was now red with anger. He was so furious that he could just about scream. Meanwhile, the bids were getting pretty high, and the auctioneer was almost ready to close the auction and sell the ticket to the highest bidder

“Alright, the highest bid is 2,000. Do I hear 3,000?” said the auctioneer.

“4,000.” Someone said in the crowd.

“Okay I got 4,000. Do I hear 5,000?” said the auctioneer. And then, jokingly, the auctioneer said, “50,000?”

Just then, a scream was heard from the back of the room. It was the official. He was still so angry at the dim cadet that he waved his fists in the air and began to shout to the top of his lungs, unaware of what the auctioneer had just said.

“Wow. It looks like we have someone in the back willing to pay 50,000 dollars!!” cheered the auctioneer. The official was stilling shouting and making a big scene, and also, still unaware of what he was doing.

“Okay then. Sold for 50,000 to the man in the back!” yelled the excited auctioneer.

Then the official finally realized what he had just done. He tried to flee the hall, but it was just too late.

Suddenly, the crowd cheered and applauded for the dim-witted official, who had now unwillingly agreed to pay 50,000 dollars for his own auction.

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