There's a strange country where everyone walks from morning to night. They don't even know where they're going, why they're walking so much. “If you don't walk – you don't eat,” the saying goes. (You must also be walking to be worthy of the attention of healers – the apparent contradiction going noticed but unacknowledged.)
A citizen's greatest hope is to live long enough to earn the right to be carried on the backs of the procession. However – because child rearing is difficult in a society that demands so much walking – some have noticed a disturbing trend. Every year there are more people old or broken from their walk and fewer to carry them.
(Not to be worried for their leaders have a plan; a great human pyramid must be constructed so that many carry a few who carry still fewer, and so on. In this way the top tranches are well insulated from the stumbles of those at the bottom, and everyone has something to look up to.)
The entire society moves together, though they do not know where they're going or why. If some walk faster; all must keep up. A few brave souls ask, why not slow down? Why not stop and spend some time in one place? Perhaps then even the old and infirm might not need to be carried, because they would not be left behind.