Chapter 1
Old noisy recordings.
Narrator
-Delirium of greatness.
Patient Brut
- My profession is pretty serious. I make torpedoes for submarines, but in fact I have not worked a day in that job, and God bless the Earth I have not!
Doctor 1
- Why are you saying that, Brut?
Patient Brut
- I do not want to make weapons.
Doctor 1
- I see. Thus, you are not doing it now. Then, what are you really doing?
Patient Brut
- In reality, I do everything.
Doctor 1
- For example?
Patient Brut
- I am making the future!
Doctor 1
-Can you be more precise? What is making the future?
Patient Brut
- Making the future? It is planning, optimization, building local networks and manufacturing predefined processes that will be relevant in the future. It is simple.
Doctor 1
- I cannot get it. Can you…
Patient Brut
- Simplify? Ok, do you have a dream? I have to make it true.
Doctor 2
- And you have this power?
Patient Brut
- Yes, I do.
Doctor 2
- Please tell me about your powers.
Patient Brut
- Oh, I can do anything! I am the man that can do anything! Just ask me to do something and I will do it.
Doctor 2
- It is easier for you to tell what you can do.
Patient Brut
- I can make weapons and can defend anyone with it.
Doctor 1
- Why are you here, Brut?
Narrator
- Hebephrenia
Doctor 1
-What is your education, Ashton?
Patient Ashton
- I have none
Doctor 1
- Have you ever attended a school?
Patient Ashton
- Not really
Doctor 2
- Can you count? 8*10?
Patient Ashton
- 80
Doctor 2
-8 multiplied by 5?
Patient Ashton
- I do not know.
Doctor 2
- Try to think. You attended a school, you must know this
Patient Ashton
- 8 multiplied by 5 is 5 multiplied by 8!
Doctor 2
- So, you cannot multiply? Have you read books?
Patient Ashton
- Only obscene literature
Doctor 2
- No, we cannot discuss these books here
Doctor 1
- Have you read classics? Maybe Shakespeare or Dumas?
Patient Ashton
-No, only The Book of Eros
Doctor 2
- We won’t discuss eros here! So you are very interested in girls, I see. How long have you been sick?
Narrator
-Acute delirium
Doctor 1
- Now tell me what do you know about the big land?
Patient Silvester
-I was there! That night I reached the beacon and a submarine took me to the big land. There were underground transportation systems and Ferris wheels buried deep in the ground. Glass buildings, underground tunnels for cars, aerostats, and endless googlemarkets. People used internal phones. Please..
Doctor 2
- Look, the world has been destroyed many years ago. We sent unmanned carriers to the big land and we saw its ruins.
Patient Silvester
- Just go there, reach the beacon and you will see it with your own eyes.
Doctor 1
- We did it already. We sent an expedition to the beacon. It was just a light on the sea. We do not know who set it there and why, but probably it just fell from a ship during the great colonization.
Patient Silvester
- You all are in mortal danger. Mortal danger! Please, let me out! Let me out!!!
Black screen. The sound of the closing door.
Doctor 1
- I have heard all this before. De ja vu.
Doctor 2
- You are right. This patient is in touch with Ash Eldim.
Doctor 1
- We have no other choice. Put Ash in an isolated cell. We need to start the therapy immediately.
Ash sitting in a round convex glass window. It is raining. Rain is strong and sometimes it hits the window so hard that it is impossible to see anything through it. Beep sound.
Ash
-Get out from the door! Turn around! Do not look!
A man comes in and puts handcuffs on Ash, then he puts a meal on the floor.
Ash
- Please, do not do it! I cannot endure it anymore! Please!!
The man starts hitting Ash with a baton stick for a very long time. When he finishes, he sits on a chair in the cell and lights up a cigarette. His sweat drips on the cigarette. After a while, Ash takes a meal from the floor and starts eating with his hands in handcuffs.
Guard Robenson
-Ash, there are patients who believe your delirium. You reprogrammed their weak souls. They want to rebel and get to the Elderwings with you as you promised them. You are causing us trouble.
Ash
-I just….
Guard Robenson
- Ash, let me be honest with you. I do not have to beat you up. I do it voluntarily. Your grandfather is a monster that killed my whole family! You deserve this!
Ash
- I have nothing to do with this.
Guard Robenson
- Bullshit!
The guard enrages and starts hitting Ash again.
Ash
- I will destroy you, Robenson, I swear! I will bring you to the end you deserve.
Another punch. Ash is lying motionless.
Guard Robenson *turning back to Ash and watching the night sky*
Ash, you know, when my family chose to join the expedition, I was devastated much more than you are now. You never knew the bitterness of loss and grief. We all know you waited for your grandfather to die. We all know how cruel he was to you. I bet you hated him with all your heart. I lost my wife and son in that expedition.
Maybe you see no human being in me anymore, but I still will share something with you. This something helped me survive. I watch stars and the longer I watch, the more understanding comes to me. We can see them, but there is no chance we are seen to them. They are so far. Our problems are so shallow for them. When I think about it, I feel better.
Suddenly, you appear on the island again. I thank the stars for that.
Another punch. Black screen.
Chapter 2
Ash is in the office of the chief doctor.
Chef Doctor
-Ash, you got a visitor.
Then, the door opened and a man in a wheelchair rolled in.
Grandfather of Ash
- Ashie are you ok? I was worried about you. Do you recognize me?
Ash
-Hello. Tell me about the droplet-like device?
Grandfather of Ash looks confused
Grandfather of Ash
- I do not know about this device, boy. Tell me about it.
Ash
- I want to go to my room now.
Grandfather of Ash
-Ashie, I love you, everything will be alright!
Ash
- I want to go to my room now.
Ash runs away out of the cabinet. Doctor and male nurses rush to catch him.
Ash is in a dark room with a round window. He wakes up and finds the door opened. His tattoo on the wrist is pulsating and shining red. He hears loud voices downstairs. People are screaming. There is panic. He runs to the door leading to the roof. On his way he sees a few guards neutralized. The roof door is opened. On the roof, Ash’s arm starts to pulsate stronger. He goes followed by it. Then he finds a package. Ash unpacks it and finds a T-suit. He wears it. It has black rods of different lengths coming from it. There are massive carbon nozzles on the back. The rods seem to live their own lives. He is trying to remember how to use it.
When it is done, he goes to investigate what was happening downstairs. He, after wearing the suit, goes downstairs. He sees people wearing opaque metal full motorcycle helmets standing in the lobby. They are holding purple-smoking guns. There is a tall man with an enormous braided black beard and a helmet like others. He has a hump.
The helmets got this symbol:
Some patients, including Ashton, are standing beside him. That yesterday’s pathetic fool stands straight now. His eyes show intelligence.
There are many guards including his old friend Robenson lying motionless. There is no a single blood drop around. Ash prepares to attack.
When they see Ash descending, they turn their heads to him. Ash creates spherical lightning in front of him. The rods synchronically turn. Ash sends the sphere to the black-bearded man and one of his men stands on the way of the ball. The man lets out a wild scream and evaporates immediately; the helmet falls on the floor. Everyone in the room aim at Ash. The patients take steel arms. Ash turns on the passive mode on the suit.
The Black Beard
- Run. This is your last chance.
A moment of hesitation, then Ash leaves the building and the doors close behind him. Then he pushes buttons on his T-suit, many lightning balls appear at his back and he flies up. He can see that the island is on fire. Many buildings soaring smoke into the air.
Ash reaches his old home. A black tower with a supermarket on the ground floor with a roof that fits the landing of a helicopter. Ash lands on the roof of the supermarket and then goes into the house through the window melting the wall with spherical lightning. The building is empty and dark. He uses an elevator to reach the 14th floor where he finds his grandfather sitting on a chair in complete darkness.
Grandfather of Ash
- Hello, Ashie.
His grandfather smiles. He seems to be friendly. Ash comes closer to him, takes a pencil from the table, and stabs his grandfather to his eye. The body did not react. Then he stabs another eye and continues stabbing him until the body is motionless. The building starts to shake. An earthquake. It stops in a few seconds. Ash looks closer at his grandfather and then smirks. He then pushes some buttons on his wrist.
Ash
- Dear fellows. I am Ash Eldim, the grandson of your leader, Duran Eldim, known as Greyheir. The man that said he was Greyheir was a bot. Look at it yourself. You all are in mortal danger. A fanatic is threatening to destroy the island. You must trust me. I was there. There is a land of the future. Technologies and other wonders are there. I have been there and now I am going back. Follow me now fearlessly. I will protect you. The time has come, my friends. Go to the western… or south-western docks and join the colonists to the new land or stay and become puppets of the doom.
The building collapses. Black screen.
Chapter 3
Ash sails a hand-made raft to an unknown, from his motherland where he used to live his whole life. Suddenly, waves get stronger. The ocean behind him is lightened up. Underwater projectors cover everything here from the people on the island. Then he hears lights one by one is turned on making a clicking sound. He sails under a plank with the light on it. The whole construction looks like an oil refinery. From the bright light or a long voyage, Ash faints on his boat.
Ash wakes up in a small room with an illuminator showing a dark ocean. Thunderstorms light up the ocean. Suddenly, Ash reaches his leg. There is a drop-like device tightened to his leg. It shines bright purple. Ash looks at it. Mate display of the device turns black. Text appears on the display.
Well done, wet pants. You managed to do it! Do not ask me why I keep calling you that. I love you, Ash, and I know you hated this name, ahahah.. Do you remember that fairy tale I used to read for you? Well, I was delighted that you so liked the story because… it was real!
A young person standing in front of Ash’s bed. He wears a dark violet coat without buttons, but also without a single seam. There is a pair of goggles on his eyes. They zoom in on Ash's face from time to time. In his hand, there is a thin electronic device.
Goggles-boy
-Welcome…. WAS IT GREYHEIR?
Ash stood from his bed, hiding the device on his leg.
Ash
-Who are you?
Goggles-boy
-Ash, I am Nicolas Orange. I work at the beacon. Now we are sailing to Elderwings!
Ash
-Where is Kerrigan?
Goggles-boy
-Kerrigan reached the beacon and decided to move to the civilized world.
Ash
-What world?
Goggles-boy
- You were living a primitive life, Ash Eldim. Your ancestors chose this. They were ready to fight for it, but they chose it because we gave them a choice. To join or go away. We also offered help to rebuild your society and provided technologies, but your fathers refused. Thus we set a beacon here so everyone who wishes to know the truth can reach it and have a choice themselves as others had a long time ago. Kerrigan chose to give it a try.
Ash
-I want to talk to Kerrigan now. Where can I find her?
Goggles-boy
-In Elderwings, the capital of the civilized world, as I said, you can find her.
Ash
-If this is true, why do you care about us so much? We were banished. What do you have for us?
Goggles-boy
- We do not care about your kind, at least about all of you. We are neutral to you. No hard feelings. Just you were led by a man of a great power who changed the world once and for all. Then he decided to leave. We must have protected him since we still need his wisdom.
Ash
-Greyheir? are you talking about him?
Goggles-boy
-Yes.
Ash
-What is so important about him?
Goggles-boy
-First of all, you do not know him. How about a fact that he is nearly 300 years old now?
Ash
-So, I just need to believe you, a guy, sitting in a beacon instead of all that I learnt about this world?
Goggles-boy
-Well, we are not a danger to you. I guess you already figured it out. You are also not that important to us. In other words, we just do our job. We protect the island from intruders and help people who reach our positions to go to the civilized world… Now, take a rest. My colleague will bring food to you soon. Do you like rice?… The truth won’t hurt you, Ash. Just give it some time. You will meet your Kerrigan and will experience a wonderland beyond your imagination. I promise. We will talk again in a few days. Soon, you will need to watch introductory videos. It is mandatory. You need to fit the society and know its rules.
Ash
-What if I do not want to go with you?
Goggles-boy
-You are free to go
Impressum
Verlag: BookRix GmbH & Co. KG
Texte: Mick P
Bildmaterialien: Mick P
Cover: Mick P
Lektorat: Mick P
Korrektorat: Mick P
Übersetzung: Mick P
Satz: Mick P
Tag der Veröffentlichung: 09.09.2021
ISBN: 978-3-7487-9395-3
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