It had dawned on K that he was going to have to use a Macintosh computer to typeset his essay, and that such computers were to be found in a remote part of the university known only as the "CS." Accordingly, the next morning he made his way to that labyrinthian area called the New Museums Site. Vast buildings towered above him, remote and inaccessible, bearing unintelligible names such as "Heycock Theatre," "Mond Room" and "David Hartley memorial Bike sheds." K was bewildered by the complexity of the area and so, seizing on a word he recognised, "Museum," he staggered into a subterranean complex containing the bones of animals and students that had passed that way before.
"We're not open," commented a wizened old man, who turned his back and immediately began to polish a nightmare arrangement of bones, labelled "Eagle" with a flourish that did nothing but rearrange it into a yet more improbable configuration.
"Where's the c-computer?" gasped K, husky as a result of his desperate wanderings from building to building.
"This isn't the computer. It's bones. And we're shut," replied the man without any sign of interest.
"Yes, but where's the computer?" repeated K.
"I can't tell you that. Security, you know. You're asking some very suspicious questions," the old man added. By now he was shouting at K's departing back, for K had staggered out into the wilderness once more.
After wandering for a few further minutes, K came across a sign saying "Computing Service, Phoenix Building" indicating a dark and ugly fortress that stretched high above him. Apart from distant sounds of hysterics it seemed to be utterly silent. K made his way up the stairs, and soon came across a fairly young man, who was sitting at a table in an office and sobbing over a large sheet of printed paper.
"Oh, where's the bug, where's the bug, aaaagh, where's the bug?" moaned the man, tearing his hair in anguish. "I have to find it today or I'm out."
"Excuse me," asked K, more in hope than in expectation. "Where's the computer? The Macintosh?"
"The Macintosh? Hahahahahaha," screamed the man hysterically. "Ohhhhh, if only life were that simple. The Director saw me sneezing this morning. If he thinks I'm ill, he'll liquidate me like the others."
"Please," said K. "All I want is to use a Macintosh. Where do I go?"
The man sobbed directions at K, who made his way through interminable wanderings to the outside of a door bearing the legend "Macintosh Sweat Shop -- no admission except by Entacard."
Appreciating that, without an Entacard, his hopes of ever using a Macintosh were remote, K sought directions from a passer-by and, after much wandering through featureless corridors, he found himself at the User Interrogation Commission, a room full of dusty files and computers. One bored-looking member of staff was reading a large report that, as K could see without difficulty, was entitled "Elimination of all Users -- stage 12," whilst another casually put aside a glass of wine that she was sipping and started poring over a dusty printout.
"How do I get to use the Macintoshes?" asked K.
"What do you mean, use them?" asked the first clerk. "Who told you that they were there to be used? May I see your Entacard?"
"I don't have an Entacard," said K.
The first clerk looked stern as he said: "You shouldn't even be here without an Entacard. You must go and get 24 passport photos and bring them back to my colleague here with a fee of 20 pounds. The Director does not permit users to talk to staff without explicit authorization. The Syndicate would be horrified."
K returned the next day with 24 passport photos and some money. The first clerk was not present, and the second clerk was sitting at a computer editing a file that appeared to consist of names of exotic wines. K coughed. She took no notice of K for ten minutes, but then she remarked, without turning to look at him:
"It's no use being impatient you know. My colleague isn't here today."
"But yesterday he told me to see you," said K, waving his photos at the clerk. "I want to use the Macintoshes."
"Oh you don't appreciate the system," said the clerk. "My colleague should have booked you an appointment to see me. If you would just show me your Entacard I'll arrange for you to see him some time next week and you can discuss it with him then."
"But I don't have an Entacard," said K wildly. "Look, I've bought 24 photos so that I can apply for an Entacard."
The clerk looked at the photos carefully. "Those photographs are no use," she said. "They all have a blue background. Seven of them should be blue, seven red, seven orange, two should have green-and-mauve stripes, and one should be a photo of you sitting at a Macintosh. They should also be arranged in a 5-by-5 rectangle with one of the squares missing: for applications today it should be the square diagonally next to the top left hand one. It's a Syndicate regulation. Life would be very simple if people only followed the Syndicate regulations. "
"Where can I find these regulations?" asked K hopefully, feeling that at last he had come across something tangible. "Are they written down somewhere?"
"Written down, eh? That's a neat idea," said the clerk with the first appearance of mild enthusiasm that K had seen. Then: "No, it wouldn't work," she decided.
"So where can I find the regulations?" demanded K.
"Oh, I think there's a man on the Syndicate who knows most of them. I don't think we've ever tried writing them all down. No time you know." She turned over a few papers and then busily opened and shut a drawer, with a consequent rattling of glassware.
At that moment a person whom K had never seen before pushed into the room without so much as a knock. "Have you added some jokes to my report yet?" he began, then halted a moment and said "What's this?"
"It's a user, sir," said the second clerk subserviently.
"A user, eh? I didn't realise we had any left. What does he want?"
"Excuse me, sir," said K humbly. "I don't suppose you could let me use the Macintoshes, could you?"
"Oh no, my staff handle all these things," said the important personage grandly. "I think we have a system for dealing with requests. Ah yes, that reminds me, the dustman comes tomorrow, doesn't he? Do you think he'll take away that heap of junk in the machine room? I tripped over it and grazed my leg. It's got '3084' written on it. I wonder what it is."
The two officials now engaged in a deep technical conversation and ignored K entirely. Feeling that this was not the time to make a formal application, K. turned and prepared to leave. As he did so, a third person entered and met him in the doorway.
"And what are you doing on CS property, may I ask?" said the new arrival heatedly. "Let me see your Entacard."
"I don't have one," said K. "I came here to get one."
"This is serious, my boy, very serious," said the important personage. "We should clamp down on security loopholes like this one, otherwise we shall never hear the last of it. We have an intruder."
"Yes, the man's an obvious trouble-maker," said the clerk. "He's been pestering me all week."
"I don't know what the world is coming to," commented the personage with the air of one who had found a new and striking aphorism.
And so, protesting vigorously, K was led away down one of the dark and twisting corridors, to a room which bore the legend "Death Room." "Oh well," he said philosophically to himself. "This is the first place that I have been actually welcome to visit."
Jonathan Partington, November 1990