The Watchman Protocol

Sulfur Editions team makes a commercial

Not all tradition is reaffirming or heartwarming.

War is a tradition. Or at least it is seen as the traditional answer when diplomacy fails or intentions can no longer be hidden. Temperature at the boiling point, whether manufactured or real. Tradition can also be used as an excuse not to overthrow a dictator. “Let’s allow our institutions to handle the problem,” we’ll say. We’ve been doing it that way for years. We’ll do it again - even if those institutions have already been usurped away from us.

Tradition is what we revert to because we’ve always done it that way. Mostly for the good, sometimes with indifference, but other times for the bad.

The mechanism of tradition can also be a form of tyranny, when we find people going through the motions, doing what we’ve always done, almost like robots on a held down command button. Now it is time to do this. Later it will be time to do that. There’s no need to ask why when the tradition is pleasant and comforting. But what if no one asked why when that tradition seems almost senseless and cruel? Those times when, and if, tradition becomes tyranny and ritual oppressive.

This is the question.

The House Matron waits for the end of the world promised by the prophet clown. The Courier is sent on an impossible mission. The Watchman may be the most powerful person in the land, but he must maintain the hierarchy or lose his life on a technicality. Then there is the squatter suddenly elevated to the most exalted position if he is willing to surrender his freedom.

This is the answer.

And this is the announcement from Sulfur Editions. English release in April. French and Arabic to follow.