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The Dreamers and the Penitents - ebook

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1 listopada 2012
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The Dreamers and the Penitents - ebook

The Dreamers and the Penitents is a collection of ten stories whose action takes place in contemporary times. However, the world presented has a duplicitous face, bleak and unknown to most. How can you know that a man you just walked past in a store or on the pedestrian crossing isn’t the one who had invented a time machine and is now planning to go back in time to change humanity’s fate? Or maybe a boy running across from you with a baseball cap rakishly askew isn’t someone completely different than he appears to be? Maybe he hides a terrible secret?



The newest book by Krzysztof Spadlo is a must-read for fans of the paranormal, horror and science-fiction stories.




Krzysztof Spadło

Krótka notka o autorze... z takim zagadnieniem zawsze mam problem. To zdanie poniżej najbardziej mnie charakteryzuje:
Krzysztof Spadło - łowca wrażeń i kolekcjoner miłych wspomnień, któremu pisanie sprawia frajdę.



Strona autorska: www.krzysztofspadlo.com

Kategoria: Science Fiction
Język: Angielski
Zabezpieczenie: Watermark
Watermark
Watermarkowanie polega na znakowaniu plików wewnątrz treści, dzięki czemu możliwe jest rozpoznanie unikatowej licencji transakcyjnej Użytkownika. E-książki zabezpieczone watermarkiem można odczytywać na wszystkich urządzeniach odtwarzających wybrany format (czytniki, tablety, smartfony). Nie ma również ograniczeń liczby licencji oraz istnieje możliwość swobodnego przenoszenia plików między urządzeniami. Pliki z watermarkiem są kompatybilne z popularnymi programami do odczytywania ebooków, jak np. Calibre oraz aplikacjami na urządzenia mobilne na takie platformy jak iOS oraz Android.
ISBN: 978-83-7859-090-3
Rozmiar pliku: 4,1 MB

FRAGMENT KSIĄŻKI

BEAST OF BURDEN

Today’s July morning was the harbinger of a scorching day. The rays from the rising sun cut the air sharply like buoyant golden strings, and over the azure sky one couldn’t spot even a shadow of the slightest cloud. The fiery sphere was climbing higher and higher over the horizon with each minute, and dealing its pleasant warmth, it reached with jaunty blaze the darkest nooks to offer the world a longed for joy of life.

The roofs of houses, the trees’ leaves, bushes and sweeps of grass, showered in the morning dew, were glittering with thousands of tiny specs, giving out the impression of minute movement. One could be tricked into thinking that somebody, in a miraculous, even magical way, sprinkled the whole area with fine, starry glitter.

The forested terrain located on the city’s outskirts was enveloped with thin mist. Milky wisps hovering just above the ground floated unhurriedly, wandering around shrubbery and boughs, as if wanting to hide their mysteries away from the busybodies’ eyes.

Strzelce Opolskie, still immersed in sleep, was wrapped in all-embracing quiet. The only sign of life was the birds’ morning chirp; although sometimes you could also hear the invisible wing carrying into the air the characteristic rattle of a rushed train, somewhere off afar.

Like any day, the church bells sounded at exactly five thirty, calling for the morning mass, and their sonorous peal resonated nobly across the whole environs. The city’s streets were slowly starting to vibrate with life. People hurried along in different directions to their everyday tasks and duties, a whirr of speeding cars gradually amplified an increasing haste.

Routinely at six, the silence of the prison walls was pierced by the scream of the alarm clock, waking up the convicts.

Here, in a hermetical world, each day was like a copy of itself. The pattern engraved by iron regulations created a monotonous reality. The reality of this world.

It was coming on 7.15 am.

On the prison’s parking lot six yellow-green buses, the property of the penitentiary, stood ready to depart. In each, aside from the driver, were six armed guards and twenty eight convicts dressed in steel-gray uniforms. A moment later, an imposing steel entrance, suspended from above and slotted into tracks below, opened with a loud rasp. The noise of the splayed gates startled a flock of pigeons sitting on the nearby roof. Horror-struck birds sprung up in panic and, nervously flapping their wings, they circled the skies and glided towards the city.

The buses, one by one, slowly drove away, leaving behind a wistful fortress of redemption, and smoothly melted into the world across the other side of the wall. Some of the prisoners, as if they were tourists taking part in an exotic excursion, devoured with their eyes a landscape that was gradually changing over the course of the ride. Others, however, with longer “tenure” than their inmates, were watching with calm, impassive eyes, at the bottom of which lurked sadness and a longing for freedom.

The motorcade split up at the next crossroad. The first four vehicles went straight ahead, and the two remaining ones took right, and having disappeared behind the turning, they scudded down the outskirts of Strzelce Opolskie. Heading towards Krapkowice, after a few minutes of driving, the signs marking up the city borders flew by. Now the asphalt ribbon of the highway coiled up against scenic fields and woods, immersed in the July morning sun. Leaving behind a small village, Kalinow, two miles away, the vehicles turned into a forest road. Pushing down a bumpy route leading deep into the woods, they were embraced by quiet and a pleasant coolness. Here you could clearly see how the trails of sunlight were breaking through the trees’ branches, and finding a bit of space here and there, like daggers they sank in the thick undergrowth. The wildlife was still asleep, held at a standstill. The sound of the engines and the stink of fumes struck that natural peace like a rock in an unbroken sheet of water, and all the animals and forest imps scurried away and hid in the green thicket.

After fifteen minutes’ driving the buses stopped on a small clearing, just before a railway embankment that ran along the forest. The vehicles’ tires splashed with dew shimmered with steel-black shine.

For a few weeks a cheap labor force had been brought to this place. The convicts had been doing toilsome, monotonous work at the renovation of the local railway route. The work itself wasn’t so hard, besides the space, the forest, the immense sky... breathing freely, you could almost smell the scent of longed-for freedom.

The convicts got out slowly, without haste, and arranged themselves in two lines in front of the cars. The guard of the highest rank got onto the embankment, stood astride, glanced at his watch, spat racily and said in a loud voice:

– Alright, bad-asses, it’s eight. We’ll have a break around noon. A short one, true, but we’ll have a break, the hell. Unless you won’t deserve one – he stopped talking for second, and a bitter grimace crawled on his unpleasant face, a grimace that was probably trying to be a smile. With irony in his voice he finished: – So don’t let me go on and on, you know what you’re to do! As for myself, while wishing you gentlemen a nice, pleasant and fruitful work, as always I’m appealing to what remains of your degenerated minds and ask you, let me stress it again – ask! – that you behave nicely and decently, as befits good hillbillies. Amen.

The jailer, clearly amused and proud of his short speech, turned energetically on his heel and added over his shoulder:

– Forward!

The men in prison dungarees moved ahead sluggishly, without rhyme or reason.

The guards standing in a group, a little farther away to the right, were listening earnestly to a story and suddenly burst out laughing sonorously. Chaos, disarray, lack of vigilance, just that allowed a short moment of general disorientation. An opportunity. A one in a million chance. How long could it last? A few seconds? Maybe less? How long? The reaction of one of the convicts walking in the second row wasn’t planned at all. Spontaneity. A primitive sense got the upper hand over the reason. An instinct. The man slowed down slightly, squatted down, judged the situation with a quick glance and darted in a swift motion back towards the closest vehicle. When falling to the ground, he helped his body take a turn and hid behind an inner part of a wheel. An instinct, again. While hiding, he tensely watched the guards starting to form a sprawling line and drawing a slight semicircle, they closed this pathetic procession. Gray gravel dumped on the embankment rustled peculiarly under the walkers’ feet.

His heart was pounding like crazy, he couldn’t control his hastened breath and felt a cold sweat covering his body, inside his skull a thousand exploding thoughts. He dug his fingers deeply into the ground, clenched his jaws until he felt pain, his neck and shoulders seized by a burning cramp. One, two, he made it! He took a breath! He took a few deep breaths and out of the blue, all tension went away on a dime. He had an overwhelming feeling that what he could see now was happening in an unnatural slow motion. The picture reaching his brain reminded him of action shots moving sluggishly. The figures were pacing slowly and it felt to him like ages before they disappeared behind a wall of trees.

He was still motionless. Subconsciously, he waited to see panicked guards coming back within seconds. He imagined he’d hear their furious screams, patter, he’d see faces lusting for blood, blood and humility. He listened. Nothing. Silence. Only the pleasant murmur of the forest.

He crawled unhurriedly towards a free space between the buses. Gingerly, he lifted himself onto his feet and froze like a rock. He held his breath and pricked up his ears. Still nothing. Silence.

“What to do?! What to do?! – scurried through his mind. “Fuck, what to do?! What have I done?! Fuck me! What now?! What now?! No, I have to come back! I have no chance! I’m coming back and that’s it! Fuck! God, I hope it works! I hope it works...”.

Silently, he immersed himself into the green thicket. Now there was no coming back. It’s done! He bet his fate on one card. He was treading cautiously, watchful not to step on some rotten branches or twigs. Slowly, foot by foot/yard by yard, he was moving deep into the forest. He halted. Looked behind. The cars were vanishing behind the leafage. He stood. Stood and listened to any noises that could be a sign of his disappearance being noticed. Nothing. Silence and the woods. He took a deep breath, turned on his heel and sprinted ahead, moving his legs as fast as he could. The crack of breaking twigs under his feet wasn’t leaving him. He used his hands to clear his way across thick shrubs and brambles, which were smacking him like whips across the face and torso. Racing as hard as he could, like a rock sprung from a slingshot, he tore across the wilderness. He ran in zigzags between trees, with long leaps he skipped natural obstacles, not minding the blackberry shrubs tearing his calves – despite him wearing long pants – they were ploughing his flesh. He ran.

The forest undergrowth was changing with each moment. Thick scrubs disappeared, looming behind, so as to come back like a drawn curtain three hundred feet away. Like a wild animal, the man sprinted at a murderous pace and, like a precisely shot bullet, he was flying through green barricades of bushes. He chased mercilessly in pursuit of imaginary freedom. Each breath, each step was like a grand song of liberty. Previous thoughts and doubts were left somewhere behind. “Farther! Farther from here! Forward! Run!”– was all he could hear and all he could believe now. The rest didn’t exist.

Minutes piled onto more minutes. He was already far away. Safely away. He lost a track of time and space, but most importantly, he still had strength left.

He ran. Ceaselessly. He had to run.

From time to time, when he’d have a feeling that fatigue was bursting his lungs and knocking him off his feet – he’d slow down. He’d move then in a slow jog to regenerate at least a bit of his lost strength, to gather up some energy and again launch ahead. Rest was out of the question, a moment of weakness could cost him a lot. He had to struggle with his own might.

The sun was already high up. The forest’s structure had changed drastically. The shrubs appeared only in very small clusters, and the sprawling area was covered with pinewood, scarce tufts of grass and moss and conifer needles, which made running so much easier. Ahead the terrain was turning slightly into soft hills. Running them up, each couple of feet the man was losing his strength and dexterity. However, what an amazing feeling when he reached the top, and then hurtled down with impetus. Still, all that cost him a lot of effort.

Streams of sweat were coloring his prison dungarees with wet stains.

When he was running down again, his feet suddenly got entangled in a web of shrubs. He collapsed face down. The power of the impact bounced his body off the ground, the fall was so abrupt and unexpected that he didn’t have time to react and he tumbled down perilously. At some point he felt his right leg smacking inertly against the hard bough of a tree with great force. He heard the sound of tearing fabric and simultaneously he felt a shooting pain right below his knee.

Ignoring it, he pulled up his leg and clutched the hurting spot with both his hands, as if counting on their miraculous effect, he lay motionless like a stone. He didn’t even budge. With effort, he stifled a scream awakening in his throat, he clenched his jaws and panted furiously to fight off this terrible feeling. Then he fingered something sticky, glanced down and saw a sprawling blood stain. A throbbing pain was jerking his right leg. Only after a few minutes he tried to get up. Slowly, he heaved his body up. Took a few steps. Halted. Pain. He looked around. The terrain was open, he had to hide. Wherever. On his right side, some three hundred feet away, a curtain of leafy trees and bushes spread. Limping, he aimed in that direction.

He tore through the bushes. A little clearing was covered in dry, sun burnt grass. He sat in a shade, leaning against an ancient birch.MORPHEUS’ STAIN

January 4 (Saturday)

It’s hard to believe the new year’s begun. The sounds of the New Year’s party are still echoing in my ears. It’s good that at least once in awhile a man can forget about everything. Tomorrow’s the last short day of sweet laziness, and from Monday – back to work!

I can only cherish the hope that this year will actually be better than the previous one, and that finally something will change in my gray, monotonous life. Truth be told, if I had a dash of resolution and courage, I wouldn’t count on fate’s whim, but grab life by the horns.

January 6 (Monday)

I’ve taken the same bus route to work for years and every morning I’ve hummed in my mind the lyrics of Janerka’s old hit: “to get up and work, and have, can’t really do it, don’t really want it”. Out of pure curiosity, I watched people’s faces today, and unfortunately, I didn’t see anyone that appeared happy. Grim faces, noses red from the morning cold and dejected looks, in a word: despair. And I, another perfect element, fitting this cheap jigsaw puzzle.

When I think that tomorrow I’ll stand again between the counter and the shelves full of car parts, I want to crawl out of my skin. I’m wasting my life in this mercantile business, if that store were mine at least…Or if I ran some sort of business, maybe then my existence would have some spark. It’s maddening. Everything is contained in a microcircle – work, home, sleep, work, home, sleep, non stop.

I used to have ambitions and will, but for the past dozen years, since I tied the knot, all the plans have faded away, then started smoldering and eventually burned out for good. I’m not a rabble-rouser, I’ve always taken the path of least resistance and have been afraid to take a risk. Well, I guess I believed too much in things that turned out to be evanescent. I thought that family married life, kids and so on would give a man some sort of grand satisfaction, but actually that’s bullshit. It’s just a treadmill. Family life is overrated.

I got snared in my own trap.

I know perfectly that there is no such thing as a dead end. Every problem has its solution. For instance, Adam – he ditched everything and started over. Now the guy’s somewhere far away, leading quite a peaceful life, and I think he’s not going to make the same mistake again. Was it a good decision? It’s not for me to judge his choices. He left a wife, two teenage kids, a large apartment, all his life’s savings and cut loose, just carrying a bag of his own clothes and a sweet sense of carelessness. I guess I envy him the courage.

January 10 (Friday)

Today after work I hit the bar as usual. My spouse doesn’t like when I come back home reeking of hops. As a matter of fact, I don’t give a fuck what she likes or doesn’t like, I have long stopped caring about what pleases her. I am, after all, a thirty-nine year old man, goddamn it, and no one will lead me by the nose like a schoolboy. If I feel like something, I’ll do it and that’s that. The worst part is that she makes such a huge deal out of it. She gets in her babble mode and acts like her whole world has fallen apart. Sometimes I wonder if other guys have similar problems, or is it just me wading in this shit.

A man spends ten hours working his ass off, toils like an ox to earn a dime and he can’t even spend it?! Maybe it would be different if I came back home totally wasted, behaved like a savage, kept everyone under my thumb – but I only had two beers! I’ve never gone there, but it seems like I should put her in her place every now and then. Maybe then she’d behave like a woman should.

January 15 (Wednesday)

I can’t remember exactly who came up with the out-fucking-standing nickname for our boss, but Lardy fits him like a square peg in a round hole. The guy is barely a hundred and thirty pounds and overall he looks like a beanpole. He’s so slight and dried out that even if I (not exactly Sylvester S. or Arnold S.) took a good swing and boxed him once, I’d probably kill him.

Probably one day I will do it, when I stop giving a crap about anything.

Today Lardy took it to the next level, I realize he is my boss and he pays me, and not the other way round, but there are boundaries. He really pushed my buttons today. The gawk knows well I won’t quit this job, because it’s hard to find anything else these days, so he really rode my ass. Such a wimp, a bonehead, only with a vocational school diploma, who managed to hit it big when miracles were on the agenda in this country. A waste of breath.

Maybe I should have a look around after all? Get an easy-breezy gig and come home laid-back after eight hours? Not think about how, the moment I open the door and the kids jump all over me, there should be a quiet doorbell and a refined butler on the doorstep. He’d hold a silver platter in his hands, on top of which there would be a small metal item, an automatic, preferably thirty-eight caliber, with an extra magazine next to it. Bang, bang and silence. My wifey would get some, too, I wouldn’t grudge her a few ounces of lead. Oh, Lardy, Lardy, you old goon.

January 17 (Friday)

I love days full of peace, when my little flock, the three of them go away to my mother-in-law’s.

Thank God, we don’t get along, at least then I can catch a second wind. They’re scrambling tomorrow and aren’t coming back until Sunday evening.

I have everything planned. Saturday afternoon I’m spending with my buddies in The Drunken Bear. I love this lousy joint. The hubbub, clouds of cigarette smoke, stink of urine coming from the forever gaping toilet door – life’s nectar. Even beer tastes here like a goat’s sweat. The dive has its own ambiance.

I have one tiny dream: if I hit the jackpot, I’d throw the bash of the century there! Each regular of that fine diner would be welcome and could drink unlimited amount of drinks footed by me. Only one thing would have to be different for the time of the party – the bar woman. I can’t stand looking at her greasy hair, pudgy fingers tipped with chipped polish, cheap lipstick, two rows of putrid grill. I can’t stand looking at her at all. She’s wild. One time I wondered what her loverman looks like, I’d like to see the champ pounding her.

I’ll spend Sunday reading, listening to music, picking my nose and watching TV. It probably won’t be terribly titillating but at least I’ll have some rest!

January 19 (Sunday)

I rarely can afford to open my diary before ten p.m. I suspect Jolka would gladly leer at those pages. I know that she sometimes writhes in curiosity and asks herself: “What the hell can he be doodling there?”.

No chance. Only I have the key to my metal casket. I remember a few years ago we had an argument about my secrets. Good God, she’s so primitive at times! She finds it impossible to comprehend that everyone has their own, intimate things, which they don’t want to talk about. Probably it would devastate her if I opened the doors of my confessional to her. I’m not ashamed of my thoughts, I don’t disapprove of the words I express them with. Those written pages are a testimony to my soul and I don’t feel that anyone should be browsing through them, even my wife. Especially her!

I’ve been doing this for… hmmm… well, next year it’ll have been nineteen years of refining my joyous output. However you look at it, it’s donkey’s years! Not bad.

Maybe when I grow old and senile, and I’m spending most of my day on the bench by the block of flats, killing time idly, I’ll happily go back to the world of written memories. Only then will I learn how much I’ve lost in life, what mistakes impacted my fate. I already know I’m among the losers, but everything can turn round. For example, one day I’ll follow Adas’s steps, my ex-neighbor from seventeen, and I’ll bet everything on one card, too. Only, besides the clothes, I’ll take my metal box, too.

If someone asked me what I really want, the answer would be simple and exhausted by one word – happiness. I have no idea what is necessary for that but I do know what isn’t.

January 23 (Thursday)

This afternoon we had quite a treat – a priest visiting with a blessing. What a farce. The blackcoat has a serious defect in the headquarters. Of course, Jolka almost had an orgasm. The usual…

Tomek is only five and is the total opposite of Mateusz, who’s twice as old. He’s lively, always bounces off the walls, would happily spend his day playing pranks. A real scamp.

When we were waiting for the clergyman, I showed the little one how to drive away vampires and demons by means of a cross. After that he grabbed the crucifix and running up and down the house, he stopped in every nook, fooling around. Finally he earned a spanking from his mother, and I got an earful on what an idiot I am.

Still, the both of us had a lot of fun.

Before the padre’s visit, the altar boys showed up and crooned Silent Night, like rock stars. It’s a shame I didn’t record their performance. That clip on YouTube would have been a hit. When batman introduced himself, I almost burst out laughing, I thought it was a younger copy of the Father Director. I guess he must have noticed that (evidently, an intelligent one) and said once more: “Waldemar Ryzik” – accentuating his last name. Jolanta’s face turned cardinal’s scarlet.

My faith has nothing to do with the disrespect I feel for the Church deputies. I believe in God, afterlife, that a person has a soul, in the Judgment Day and heaven, but I’ll never believe in a priest. He’s no authority to me. The fact that I don’t attend mass doesn’t lessen my faith. I can pray and I do it when I have the need, sometimes at night I talk to God inside my head and I know that it makes more sense than pricking up your ears with the whole crowd to the Gospel or sermon. Or let’s take confession for a second, a total nonsense! How can you think that a guy is going to listen to your wrongdoings and divulgences, then as penance he’ll give you three Hail Mary’s and everything is supposed to be groovy?

Doesn’t make sense.IN THY NAME

In Stefan Bremel’s original plans the addition was to serve as a garage, but thirteen years ago, exactly a year after it’d been build, a tragedy happened. Actually, maybe it was better that way? Marianna Bremel had been ill for many, many years, life hadn’t skimped her anguish and instead of joy offered suffering. Finally, they both knew that sooner or later it would have to happen. A malignant tumor slowly devoured Mrs. Bremel’s body from the inside, who every evening probably prayed ardently to God to take her soul painlessly away. Death came suddenly one October night. It sneaked into their house like a thief and kidnapped into its arms Stefan’s fifty-year-old life partner. Things seemed pointless since then, and the garage – even more so.

It was odd, but you didn’t even think what a sacrifice it was to consciously devote yourself to work. Bremel realized that but it was too late. How many times did his late spouse wait for him with a warm lunch, while he was engrossed in his turbines and all that junk at the power plant? How many unrealized vacations, weekends at work were there in his life? How many free afternoons did he spend bent over some written sheets of paper trying to figure out a problem that had nothing to do with his private life? So much had escaped them because of his work. Work that also fulfilled him and was his passion.

The first couple of years after her death were really tough. He couldn’t handle the loneliness, couldn’t take care of himself, he ate poorly and overworked himself. Actually, he wasn’t interested in anything but work and a few hours of sleep. That was all he needed.

His health started to deteriorate and problems came right after he reached the retirement age. He knew it meant a definite end to his professional career, the end of work. Retirement was like an invisible thorn thrust right into his ailing heart.

What was supposed to be a well-deserved rest, an award for all the years devoted to work, was basically nothing more but vast emptiness. He couldn’t comprehend how you could sit idly and wait for God knows what. It was then that he adapted the addition, which was supposed to be a garage, into his workshop. Right now he didn’t know yet what he’d be doing, but he had to do something. Anything. When day after day was dreadfully gray, and each morning and dusk tasted of harsh bitterness, you had to do something so as not to go insane.

*

After a few weeks of retirement stagnation, he finally made a decision. At first the idea seemed utterly crazy, but on the other hand, he actually had nothing to lose. Nothing but time and money. As for the cash, he couldn’t make good use out of it anyway, as his needs were downright minimal. Besides, he concluded that a continuation of the research, which during his professional work remained in the sphere of idle discussions and empty lab chatter, would make a pretty good occupation for such an old maniac as himself. Well, it was true that having at your disposal professional equipment and the help of a couple of sharp heads were completely different than a small, empty space and a lot of zeal.

It was a weird thing, conspiracy theory enthusiasts would surely find some more or less rational explanation, but the same day when he decided to seriously get down to curbing the energy, he was given a partner. Maybe he didn’t have some great college diploma but he was someone who could staunchly wait for effects, and with time he started understanding perfectly what was being said to him. He was a dog. A small, tanned mutt with a friendly snout, short paws and hair. Stefan got him as a gift from his neighbor living on the other side of the street. It was hard to say if it really was a gift or a way of getting rid of an inconvenient problem. Michal’s own female dog whose only job was to guard the household during her owners’ absence had seven puppies out of the blue. Maybe it really was a present. The neighbors knew after all that Stefan Bremel had lived alone for years, and giving him a puppy seemed like a nice thing to do. Yes, that was nice, there was no doubt about it. Maybe at first he was a little surprised, but he was happy. It turned out that he could take better care of the creature than himself. Fido, as this was the pet’s name, had his own bowl, a nook to sleep in, and the best food that a dog could dream of. At least the best food an ordinary, tanned mutt could dream of.

Thanks to Fido’s antics and clumsiness, their days gained some spark. A heart-felt smile appeared on Bremel’s face more and more often. Though the dog did make quite a mess from time time to time, when he got entangled in a web of wires crawling like worms across the extension house’s floor or when he got a ball, and pretending to bark menacingly, he chased after it all over the place. Although he knocked over all kinds of equipment he encountered, he never got rebuked by his owner.

*

A light coming from a two-hundred watt light bulb, loosely hanging from a thick cable in the middle of the room, revealed the curvature of the yellowed walls. It was still light out, but the day only reached the garage workshop through a narrow row of panes set at the top of a wide, wooden door. The door that couldn’t be opened anyway, as a large, rectangular chest upholstered with lead sheets stood in front of them from the inside. On the right, there was a long table, covered up with a heap of some peculiar devices and objects, and bundles of twisted wires meandered everywhere.

– That’s right, Fido – said Bremel who sitting by a table focusedly soldered two little parts together. – We’re going to make it today. Both of us, you and I. Do you realize what sort of a breakthrough it’s going to be for the history of science?

It wasn’t very likely that Fido knew what he was talking about. He lay in a corner, propping his canine muzzle on his outstretched paws and stared ahead.

– Six years, brother, six long years and now we’re at heaven’s gate – he continued. – You’ll be the first one to taste what I guess is the most amazing feeling. We’re going to make it, Fido, we are. Well, here it is! – the man turned around in his chair, looked towards the dog and said affectionately: – Come here, you goofball, let me give you a hug!

Fido got up, stretched out lazily arching his back, and jumped in his owner’s lap. He bellowed with delight in his eyes when Bremel grabbed him by the cheeks and started pulling at them gently. There was no doubt, the dog liked fondling.

– But for that growth on the side of your nose, you’d be perfect. We could make a casting of your profile and sell plaster figurines as a decoration to Silesian backyards.

That was true, Fido had something on the left side of his nose. A light brown, wrinkled callus, the size of a cent, that appeared there almost two years before and actually wasn’t anything harmful. Applying ointments didn’t bring any results, the vet said that he could remove it surgically, though he himself didn’t see any point in that, if, aside from the fact that he had a weird spot, the dog was in a great shape.

– Trust me, my friend, there’s nothing to worry about. Everything will go smoothly.

Bremel came up to the chest and opened a hydraulic manhole. He reached out and moved the lever to the position 0. A quiet murmur reverberated in that same moment, greatly resembling the sound of burning fluorescent lamps. Suddenly a few transparent, rectangular containers lying in a row on the table, filled in with something fluid, but not a liquid, something connoting a colorful, luminescent light. Plastic pipes came out from the top of each container and ran towards the chest, while on the side they were all connected to wires converted into one mutual sheaf whose end was stuck into a metal plug just underneath the manhole. Fido, as if hypnotized, stared at the colorful containers.

Bremel examined once more the spot he’d been soldering a few minutes before, smiled under his breath and whispered:

– No worries, everything will go smoothly.

He got in through the manhole. There wasn’t too much space for an adult. He stuck a brass end of a wire which came out on the right side of a lever into a small, spherical hole. For a longer while he stared at the inside of the prototype, as if he wanted to remember its appearance.

“It’ll be fine, all’s fine” – went through his mind. When he came out, he felt that drops of sweat watered his forehead and temples. The excitement started to increase. One more moment.

– Well, Fido, time to go. It’s only a shame you won’t be able to tell me what it was like.

He took the dog in his arms, tousled his snout, kissed the tip of his moist nose and put the pet into the chest.

– See you… in the future.

Before the manhole clung tightly to the lead sides, Bremel could still hear a nervous barking of his pooch, which clearly got scared of the darkness prevailing inside the chest.

He approached the table and activated a narrow, oblong keyboard, whose design resembled a high-tech calculator. It only had one row of keys which showed digits from zero to nine, a little switch sticking out and a backlit screen along the keys. Bremel didn’t really have to check with his notepad to type in the coordinates, which he had inserted so many times before, but today was different. The likelihood of any error had to be ruled out. The slightest mistake would have disastrous effects. Bremel thumbed through the pages of his notebook and typed in the main data. He glanced at his watch – it was coming on 5.15 pm. He felt an urge to increase the time, of what he called, energizing, but why tempt fate?

Ten minutes. That’s what he’d assumed before and he stuck with it.

An array of digits glistened with a yellow light against the black background. He took out a stopwatch. The other lever located under the table remained like a guard adamantly at the position 0. He leaned over. He released the stopwatch with one hand, with the other, he lowered the stick to position E. It was on!

A grim murmur resounded and a hum of generators vibrated, the fluorescent marvel boiled in the transparent containers. “Go, go! Yes!” – he shouted in his mind. He stood motionless like in a narcotic trance. He felt the shirt sticking to his moist back. The stopwatch’s second hand was making a fluent circle. The energy expansion should last exactly three minutes. Everything was on the right track. He glanced at the stopper, two minutes and fifty seconds. He turned on his heel and was about to run out of the house when he heard a quiet crack and noticed a smudge of blue smoke rising above the keyboard. The yellow digits went out! The menacing murmur went silent with a drawn-out sigh. Everything halted instantaneously. A panic and a sense of defeat snatched him abruptly and pierced his body with an ice cold shiver. His heart was pounding like a crazed bell. The pulse in his temples seemed to be blasting his skull. Completely immobilized, he froze, staring into the space with an astounded gaze. It was short seven whole seconds!

Hurriedly, he opened the flap of the energizer’s chest. All he saw was the whiteness of the walls paved with polyurethane foam and could feel a slight metallic taste. It was empty! Fido, unaware of his fate, was now crossing the oceans of space-time.A BOY WITH A CAP

It’s Friday today. That atrocity happened on Wednesday, and since then I haven’t been able to control the shivering of my hands. Last night I was haunted by nightmares. What insanity, something like that has happened to me for the first time in my forty-year life. I can’t explain this to myself, if I tried telling my wife what I’ve experienced, she’d look at me with disbelief and conclude furiously that I was either trying to scare her or I was taking some stuff, and going crazy.

I won’t tell anyone.

Never.

All I want is to forget one thing – about a boy with a cap.

It was a late Wednesday afternoon. The October sun leaned towards the west, a bloody glow painted across the sky, and, as usual at this time, the center swelled with congestion.

I’m not a short-tempered guy, it’s hard to phase me, but there are certain situations when quite groundlessly, I experience an inner frenzy. One of them is exactly driving through traffic. When I wade imprisoned in a line of vehicles, which painfully push ahead according to the lights’ cycle, I’m starting to rave.

That’s what happened on Wednesday.

I know that my impatient tapping against the steering wheel won’t change anything, that glancing ahead and wondering: “why, the hell, aren’t they moving?!” is futile, that all those swearwords said in a half-whisper won’t work like miraculous spells letting me dash freely ahead.

You have to do your waiting.

So I was stuck in that nightmarish line, some music seeped from the loudspeakers, and my thoughts glided. I was trying to focus on something more sublime and forget that I was moving at the pace of a funeral procession. The setting sun reflected in the rear-view mirrors, at times, when I tilted my head too much to the left, the light’s reflexes burned my pupils with a scarlet ardor.

I scanned all those sad buildings, billboards devoid of character, weary faces of the passersby on the sidewalk. Some people seemed as if only their bodies had remained there, in this disheartening world. They resembled moving shells, mannequins deprived of awareness and abandoned by souls.

I like watching people, sometimes you can notice many striking things.

A green Golf right in front of me rolled ahead slowly. Instantaneously, I shifted to the first gear and followed it. I don’t know how much we’d managed to cover – maybe twenty yards? Not more.

At least that.

We crawled ahead in stop-and-go.

After awhile, I managed to pick up a reasonable speed. Fewer stopovers, more driving. The lights before the overpass were already within my sight. I was doing OK.

The red digits of the electronic clock on the dashboard showed 5:53 pm.

By 5:58 it was already perfect. The pedestrian crossing, the lights above the road and only a few cars in front of me.

Great!

A pleasant feeling when you regain good spirits.

I looked to the left. I had to glance over as a vivid green light of a large ad in the shape of glasses was screaming for attention. It was located exactly on the corner of the building where the optician’s was.

“Let’s get going.

It’s about time!”.

I peeped to the right. There was a boy on the sidewalk. He was wearing dark jeans, a purple fleece zipped to his chin, and a baseball cap pushed almost over his eyes. He couldn’t have been more than eleven. Slight, thin, stooped and hunched, as if he were cold. His hands deep in his pockets, and that peculiar cap. Cherry-red with some emblem in the center. Probably a little too big. At least it seemed that way.

That youngster drew my attention for a short while.

He intrigued me.

I even know why. It’s not how he was dressed, there wasn’t anything unusual in his clothes, anyway, he looked like a million kids his age. He struck me because I have a son who could have been his peer. For a second, I wondered if such a kid should be roaming the streets on his own. Maybe I am oversensitive but I believe that eleven-year-olds are still featherbrained, besides today the lonely wanders of such striplings can’t be safe. Anyway, you hear all that terrible news. For a fraction of a second I thought the boy was looking at me in the corner of his eye. He made a slight gesture, as if shaking his head, he didn’t even slow down, walking in steady paces ahead.

We were both going in the same direction.

Suddenly, I heard a loud sound of the horn behind me, a driver of a burgundy truck almost riding my taillights was even more in a hurry than I was. He rushed me by flickering his lights.

It was true, I stared off, it had already turned green. To apologize, I flickered my emergency lights back and with a light spurt, I bolted ahead.

The street was slightly dropping here, hiding in a short but very dark tunnel under a railway bridge.

Over twenty yards away there was a crossroads and another traffic light. I switched on the turn signal and started curving to the right.

A sharp turn, exactly ninety degrees.

You needed to be extra careful here, a lot of accidents had happened on that bend. It was a sort of danger zone in our city.

I was doing a safe speed. There was a crowd of people ready to rush to the other side of the road. When I was passing them, I thought I saw the boy there whom I had noticed some three hundred yards before! At that moment I realized it was not possible. Even if he had sprinted there, it would have been implausible for him to cover that distance. I couldn’t look back to check it. Anyway, what would I have to prove to myself? That it was an illusion? That I confused the kid with someone else? I grumbled something under my breath and focused on driving the car.

I still drove in a line of cars, at least now everyone rolled ahead at a decent pace.

Another turn, this time to the left, then a straight shot ahead.

I reached for a cigarette. Exhaling a cloud of smoke from my lungs, I rolled down the window a little bit. I have no idea what I was thinking about, probably what was going on at home, what was for lunch, what I’d be doing that night, what movie I’d watch.

The third crossing was me. I took my foot off the gas pedal and turned on the right indicator. I was getting ready for the bend. For whatever reason my eyes glided along the left side of the road. I know, it sounds absurd, but there was the boy in a cap leaning against the corner of the building, gazing at me. The same boy I passed miles away! I felt my hands grip the wheel in astonishment, crumpling the cigarette’s filter tip, tensing my hand muscles, not even knowing why! I was lucky not to have slammed on the gas pedal! I managed to finish the turn, though my arms turned into hard logs. I fixed my eyes on the rear-view mirror. The kid was still there, looking at me. I know he was staring at me, I sensed it, I could feel that look. I pulled over to the edge of the road, stopped the car, turned on the emergency lights, switched the gear to neutral and pulled the handbrake. The engine was working in a stead rhythm. The boy’s silhouette reflected in the mirror. There was something hypnotizing about him, and I felt my back getting moist with sweat. An insane pulse was throbbing in my temples, a heat wave ran through me from head to toe, I couldn’t control the shivering of my knees and I don’t know what would have happened if the cigarette flame hadn’t burned my fingers. That painful stimulus made me look away from the mirror. I put out the stub in the ashtray as soon as I could and twisted my head backward.

I scanned the place.

He was gone.

I cracked the window and took a few deep breaths, after which, not turning the engine off, I got out of the car.

It was warm out, almost summery. The October wind gently frolicked in colorful leaves. Its breaths enveloped my body; I seemed to be cooling off. I investigated the landscape for awhile, absurd thoughts galloped through my head and I’m not sure what I counted on. I ogled in all directions, the city’s noise was reaching my ears. The street where I was parked was a quiet one, there was little traffic there, it was more probable to encounter a passerby rather than a driving car.

I can’t say how long I stuck around there.

I sat behind the wheel and lit another cigarette.

I felt like an idiot.

I tossed the butt through the cracked window and look ahead. The asphalt road was straight all the way. It looked like a tunnel between majestic tree crowns growing on each side. Some faceless passersby walked down the sidewalk, unhurriedly, a woman pushing a baby carriage, a couple of teenagers holding hands, on the other side two elderly ladies, a girl with a white plastic bag behind them, and a little farther a man walking his dog on a leash... An ordinary and common view.

I was trying to get a grip. A paranoiac situation.

Just to make sure, I glanced in the rear-view mirror again. The building’s corner was where it used to be. No one leaning against it.

I took another deep breath and started slowly ahead.

I’m not the kind of person who can’t pay attention on the road. I follow all the regulations, mandatory and prohibitory signs, of course, like anyone else, I can make a mistake, but I observe the speed limits on the city’s streets.

I was dashing down an empty street. The clutch, the next gear. I was already thinking of being home. I saw trees’ leaves jigging in the wind, far ahead a person was crossing the road. And then it happened! He showed up out of nowhere – the boy – just materialized!

Not farther than a yard away from the bumper of my car!

Just the two of us.

I jerked my body, pushing against the back of the seat with all my might, at the same time slamming on the brake. I clearly saw his face; it was devoid of any expression, his eyes hidden in the shade of the cherry-red cap, his mouth didn’t even twitch. I know it all took no more than a few seconds, but to me it seemed like forever, the world took a halt, time stood still. I shut my eyelids in terror, my arms were stiffly clutching the wheel and I only waited for the characteristic thud to happen, when speeding steel meets human flesh. But instead, I felt the vehicle stopping instantly, afterward there was just a hollow cough of the engine and one deep yank. The engine choked and died. When I opened my eyes, I saw something... uncanny! The boy stood right in front of my windshield, looking at me. He was integrated in the car’s hood.

The laws of physics exploded into fine dust.

All the theories about matter turned out to be a lie.

The boy was sunk to his crotch in my car’s body!

Maybe it’s just a minute detail, but I did see a part of his body casting a shadow on the hood, and his figure itself reflecting in the shiny surface of the graphite paint! I realized that what I was seeing couldn’t have been an illusion!

I remained in the same position in which I was braking. I still pressed my right foot in the floor, my knee was almost bending in the opposite direction, the fingers clutched the rim of the wheel, my arms were straightened to my elbows, and my back thrust in the seat. I must have looked like a live wire. What’s more, I couldn’t move. As if each muscle of my body had frozen in a tense cramp. I gaped for breath, there was a humming in my ears drowning all the other sounds. The boy looked into my horrified eyes. He took his hands from the pockets of his fleece, raised them to the level of my face and started approaching the windshield which separated us. He was closer and closer, near enough that a milky disc of breath should have appeared on the window pane but nothing like that materialized on it. I wanted to flee from the car, but I couldn’t move, I couldn’t even budge. Besides my brain, which registered all the condensed sensations of fear, and my eyes that kept watching, the rest of my body was completely paralyzed. Dead.

I felt like a creature devoid of its outer sheath, I was a phenomenon robbed of its own existence.

I saw it, I did, the boy’s face deprived of any expression and two almost childlike hands touching the pane. They were nearly leaning against it but the glass wasn’t really an obstacle. He started pervading it, and then what happened was just as unreal as the figure rising from the car’s hood.

His fingertips touched the glass layer, and then sank in it as if it were an unruffled sheet of water. I know he had a body. I saw it. But when the transparent barrier stopped being an obstacle, so did his body. Parts of his hands that peeped inside the cab looked like a glued mass of gray smoke and mist. Long, taloned fingers seemed as if the slightest gust of wind could have made them disappear, vanish, scatter in the air... The rest of his hands, though, which stayed out, looked quite normal. Human.

A horrific scream tore out in my brain.

mniej..

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