THE DOWN AND OUTS – SYNOPSIS

It is the late twenty-first century.  Each country of the world has been divided into four Hemispheres and one Non-Hemisphere, separate from each other by labrynths and steel barriers in order to separate the classes due to widespread class riots that erupted at the beginning of the century.  Each citizen has been issued with a ‘disguisive mac’ which he is to wear if ever venturing via the labrynth or electro-train into another quarter, as tension between the classes remains high, and without it he runs the risk of being physically attacked.

Kate Tiberius has been brought up in the affluent Eastern Hemisphere.  She loses her father when she is fifteen, shortly after which she breaks the law by venturing into a nightclub in the Farmlands section of the Southern Hemisphere under the legal age of admittance, and without wearing her disguisive mac.  On her way home she is viciously attacked by a ‘Farmlands’ native.  She is prosecuted by her own quarter, and exiled for life to the Non-Hemisphere of unemployed down and outs, where she lives with her aunt under the new surname of Brannigan.  She is allowed to visit her native Eastern Hemisphere quarter only seven days each year thereafter.

Several years later, she befriends a beautiful teenaged girl call Kathy, who works at weekend as a barmaid in order to pay for a shorthand / typist’s course, as it is her ambition to become a white collar worker in the Northern Hemisphere.  Both Kate and her aunt once had the same ambition, but found they were not accepted as white collar workers because they were not of the Northern Hemisphere class.  Kathy finds she is suffering intermittent bouts of crying.  She visits her doctor, who diagnoses a mild form of anxiety / depression.  Kate reckons she is not happy with her course, and advises her against becoming a white collar worker.

Kate also meets Bruce, originally a sportsman from the Eastern Hemisphere, but now a Northern Hemisphere insurance representative.  He has a Finnish wife and a young daughter, but still wishes to continue seeing Kate.

Kate visits her mother in the Eastern Hemisphere for Christmas.  On her return to the Non-Hemisphere, she finds Kathy is to start a job in a Northern Hemisphere insurance office the following week.  She receives a wedding invitation from Rebecca, her ex-school friend from the Eastern Hemisphere.  That same evening, she meets Kathy who has now been working in the Northern Hemisphere for a month.  Kate invites her back to her aunt’s house, to discover that her mental illness has worsened.  She begins to complain about her job and has aged several years.  Kate advises her to leave the job as she feels it is the cause of Kathy’s illness.  Kathy refuses to do so, swearing revenge on her fellow workers in some way.