The Bureaucracy

Dedicated to the "ever expanding bureaucracy", especially hospitals.

A man, dressed in navy blue clothing, work pants and long-sleeved shirt, together with a funny looking dirty tie and a set of black Oxford shoes, walked aimlessly through a world of paper and darkness where no signs of light or intelligence were visible, except his of course.

While looking, not exactly knowing for what, he stumbled upon a peculiar being, a bizarre combination of an owl and a lizard, feathers and scales everywhere, with giant eyes that looked all over the place except at the desk in which two little hands, out of several protuberances coming out of its body, that continuously wrote over papers on the desk, perched on a tall chair.

“Excuse me?” The man asked, he was surprised, disgusted and incredulous at what he was seeing and he became scared when the “thing” looked at him.

“Buro” Asked the being which turned its head in every possible direction but without missing sight of the man with both eyes “Buro?”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“Buro, Buro, Bu, Buro, Bu, Buro” The man was terrified now, he was not sure that disturbing such a creature was such a good idea and to top it off he could not understand a single word coming out of his mouth except for the continuous canticle.

“Do you know where the office for hypothetical proposals and derivates is?”

“Buro” The creature pointed towards the door from whence the man had arrived from and then pointed at his desk. “Buro, Bu”

“So… this is the office I’m looking for”

“Buro” The strange creature made his head circle a couple of times and when it stopped he delivered a set of papers to the man. “Bu, Buro, Bu, Bu, Buro”

“More forms, why, what are they for” He examined them as he asked the creature and delivered himself into a land of confusion, annoyance and probable death, there was nothing in the papers that made an ounce of sense and were about to deliver him into madness. “What are these!?”

“Bu!” One of the hands reached for a small plaque on the desk then delivered it onto the man which on closer inspection read the following: ‘The bureaucracy is expanding to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy –Oscar Wilde’

“This is stupid, why must I deal--” As he spoke in anger he turned to the creature again and found it had grown tremendously in size, at least twenty times, and had turned itself into a pulsating red sphere of hatred with evil yellow eyes and wings that flapped continuously, producing a piercing wind that chilled to the bones.

“YOU DARE DEFY THE BUREAUCRACY!”

“I’M SORRY, PLEASE DON’T KILL ME!”

“THEN FILL THE FORMS!” The man dropped everything and ran away; screaming and drooling like a mad man until he reached the outside world where others like him awaited his return. The creature turned back to his former self, shrugged slightly and continued his task again pretty undisturbed