“Which is?”
“My real surname is Bodieur.”
“You’re relatives?”
“He’s my uncle. Wait, I’d better put my contacts back on. Cover me, please.”
She pulled out the case and leaned on Helias, whose back was turned to the swimmers.
“Is anybody coming from that direction?”
“No.”
She bent over the open case. He couldn’t resist kissing her hair. She raised her head and smiled at him, with her normal blue eyes.
“Isn’t there a danger that the optometrist will notice?”
“No. They camouflage perfectly. It would take one of ours, who knows what to look for…. Here comes somebody.”
“Kadler? Helias Kadler?”
Helias turned.
“Yes?”
“You know, I can recognize you even from behind…. That unmistakable mane of yours….”
Where had he already heard that irritating voice? And who was this who was addressing him so familiarly?
But of course, the eternal pain in the ass. That person you’d never want to meet again. But instead you’re always running into him, even in the places where you’d least expect it. And above all in the worst possible moments.
Kathia, who ‘felt’ everything, smiled at Helias’s discomfiture.
“Yeah, it’s me. We did our doctorate together, remember? Geremy Stuerz.”
And he put on a disappointed look, since Helias, who wanted nothing more than to pretend he was someone else, looked at him questioningly, his eyebrows raised.
In reality, he was asking himself what sort of curse had befallen him, that such a radiant day should also have to end with such an unwanted encounter.
Kathia watched him maternally, and smiled again.
He glanced at her reproachfully.
“C’mon, you can’t possibly not remember me. We defended our dissertations together….”
He was one of those people who you try to wipe out of your memory. Clearly without success. Because you end up face to face with them again. It wasn’t the guy’s fault. He tried to get people to like him. Tried too hard. He was a phony, a liar. And he had always been a sycophant, with everybody, but especially with the professors. Once Helias had caught him badmouthing him with the director. He’d realized it because they were looking at him from a distance and, as he drew nearer, they fell silent and Geremy had dropped his eyes without even saying hello.
Kathia’s expression sobered, and she turned toward the newcomer.
Helias managed a slightly strangled, and none too cordial, “How’s it going?”
“Hey! But I’ve already seen her too….”
“Yes, she was hanging around there too, toward the end….” answered Helias on her behalf, hoping to spare her an unwelcome involvement.
Unwillingly, he extended his hand, which found itself in a cold and bonelessly limp grip.
Geremy continued to talk, with nobody listening. Helias and Kathia looked at each other. She murmured, “I’ve got to go.”
He thought “Wait another moment. I’ll come with you.”
“I can’t.” she mouthed.
“See you later, I have to go now.” she said to both of them, and walked off.
Then she turned again to look at Helias, with a smile. She waved and blew a kiss. Then she looked at Geremy, whose back was to her, and her face grew serious.
He was about to run after her, the hell with this interloper.
But he wasn’t able to. The other continued blathering at him. And Kathia was already far away.
That’s why he detested him. Because his stupid chatter covered you like a coat of slime. He stuck to you, without even giving you time to react. And you could never shake him off. Like a tick. That you can get rid of only if you do him some damage. And Helias wasn’t cruel enough.
It was one of the worst half hours of his entire life. Geremy also introduced his friends, all pretty much cast in the same mold, who were with him on the beach. At a certain point, he even made some appreciative remarks about the blond girlfriend. And it was all Helias could do not to punch him in the nose. When he was really and truly fed up with nonsense, liberally laced with memories and mentions of the good old days spent together back on Earth, which Helias, in reality and fortunately for him, remembered hardly at all, he cut loose, claiming, lamely, that he had an appointment. Just in time, since they were about to invite him to supper, and there was no way he was going to put up with torture like that.
To avoid other unpleasant encounters, he took his supper up to his room. And he spent the entire evening thinking about Kathia and everything she had told him. And above all, he kept thinking of how she had looked as she walked away, turning and smiling at him and sending him a last kiss, like a promise to meet again soon. Then her face grew serious. And Helias slept.
He dreamt of Martians. Who were going back and forth in time, running in equilibrium along thin elastic cords, stretched nearly to the breaking point and ready to snap at each step. He was a Martian too. And he jumped with the others, higher and higher, ever higher. But he didn’t know where he was going, whether there was a tent atop that circus, that sooner or later would have stopped him, that he could catch hold of. Every jump brought him a little higher, and his fear grew, not on the way down, but when he realized, with each jump, that he had gone higher than the time before. It was the unknown. All the still-unanswered questions.
© Springer International Publishing AG 2017
Massimo VillataThe Dark Arrow of TimeScience and Fictionhttps://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-67486-5_5
5. The Next Morning It Rained
Massimo Villata1
(1)Osservatorio Astrofisico di Torino, INAF, Pino Torinese (TO), Italy
Massimo Villata
Email: [email protected]
The next morning it rained. Poured, in fact. It had started around six, with big isolated drops that spattered sharply against the balcony and windows with a dry rattle that had woken him. Like the edge of a storm, but without thunder and lightning. The low, dark clouds cut the surrounding mountains in half, lopping off the tops. Then the rain intensified, veiling the opposite shore of the lake, and soon hiding everything farther than a few dozen meters away. Now, though, the rain had dropped to a steady drumming and the nearer waters of the lake were visible again, their surface pocked by the falling drops.
After breakfast, Helias looked at the weather forecasts on his brand-new computer. He discovered that the weather there, at least in that period of the year, was highly variable, and that you could expect a downpour at any moment, even when the sky seemed clear. He wondered if that was the reason there had been so little going on around the lake the day before. He went to look at the recreation and leisure page, and found that there were a number of rooms offering various opportunities for sports and entertainment in the castle, including a pool and two gyms, in addition to the sports ground on the south side that he had already seen. Also, on one out of every two holidays a plane holding one hundred and fifty passengers took off for the capital at seven in the morning, returning at ten the following night. People who chose this opportunity for a break in the routine waived their rights to the next holiday, or in other words took two out of ten days off rather than one out of every five. This is what had happened the previous day, and explained, at least to some extent, why there had been so few excursionists, as well as the poor turnout for breakfast that ‘Monday’ morning.
It was almost nine thirty by now. Helias had no idea what time Kathia had her appointment with the optometrist. He looked at the timetables: from nine to twelve. He glanced at the index of the material he had to study, but had absolutely no desire to plunge back into work, after everything that had happened the previous day, and especially in this brief period before meeting Kathia again. At nine forty-two, he hooked the cell to his ear, something he never did, not even on Earth, and went out. Kathia had said she’d get in touch, but she hadn’t said ho
w. Doubtless, as an archivist, she had access almost everywhere, even to e-mail addresses and cell codes.
He wandered down to the optometrist’s office, to see what was going on. There were two people in the waiting room. Maybe Kathia was inside. No, the office door opened and a big boy with a cheerful face came out.
He got an umbrella from the porters and went to walk along the lakeshore, to have a closer look at the evanescent bubbles busting from the surface as the heavy drops pounded the water. At ten twenty-one, after making sure his cell was working, he went back inside. He passed by the optometrist’s office again. There was nobody left in the waiting room, no voices audible through the half-closed door. Before returning to his room, he turned into Kathia’s corridor and stopped in front of her door, undecided whether to knock. No, better to call later, he didn’t want to harass her, or look too anxious. But listened at the door: silence.
Back in his room, he checked his e-mails. Just a couple of not very interesting announcements. At a quarter to eleven he decided to call: no answer. Maybe some urgent work had arrived that she had to get done right away, or last night’s meeting had forced her to change her plans for the day. But why not let him know? She could easily imagine how concerned he was. Concern that was turning into outright worry. But he didn’t want to be anxious. His ex-girlfriend used to upbraid him for exactly that: “But I never told you what time it would be! And anyway if I couldn’t, I couldn’t. Don’t breath down my neck all the time….”.
Okay, okay, no panic. He was just too prone to worry, okay. It seemed to be his karma, having to wait for people. Who maybe then went away. Or, simply, didn’t come back.
“Mail.” said the computer’s aseptic voice.
“Yes?”
“Mail from anonymous sender. Second attempt. Do you want to receive it?”
“Tell me more.”
“First attempt at ten eighteen. Anonymous mail cannot be received without your permission.”
“Okay, permission granted.”
The message was written, no recorded sound.
“Don’t try to contact me, please. See you soon, I hope.”
It wasn’t signed. No sender’s name and no sound. Programmed to self-delete after ten seconds, leaving no trace. A few words. Written in a hurry, perhaps hidden from prying eyes. Two attempts, spaced around half an hour apart. Why not closer? Where was she? Why wasn’t he supposed to look for her? Was she in danger? Why? Why all this mystery? Why didn’t she tell him more, wherever she was?
He wrote the exact words on a piece of paper, which he then folded and put in his pocket. He paused while writing the last sentence: a wish and a hope. The same things he felt himself. Once again, he pictured her turning, smiling, and blowing one last kiss while she walked away. A kind of promise. Which now was reduced to a wish. A hope.
“See you soon.” he repeated to himself, hoping she could read his thoughts.
He really couldn’t bear to just stay there, twiddling his thumbs and waiting for who knew what. He went out, still with the cell hooked to his ear. He returned to her corridor and listened at her door. Nothing. No, a small sharp sound, followed by a sort of rustling. He came closer. Nothing else, silence. He tried to turn the door handle quietly. Nothing, it wouldn’t open. Maybe his ears had deceived him. No, again a small dull noise. He went to wait just around the corner, at the intersection of the two corridors, where he had hidden two days earlier, when he had seen Kathia arriving. And once again, a face appeared suddenly from around the corner, certain of finding him there. Startled, he jumped back. It was Mattheus who, after looking over his shoulder and all around, whispered “Don’t follow me. Stay well away. I’ll get in touch myself. Go now.”. His face was drawn, his look even more serious than usual. He had spoken almost without moving his lips, with a strange accent, worried.
So firmly had Mattheus issued his order that obeying came spontaneously for Helias. Who after a few steps cursed himself for being an idiot, for going away like that, without even asking for an explanation. But Mattheus’s glance, as usual, brooked no quibbling. And so obey it was, without objection.
Back in his room, Helias tried to make some modicum of sense of the whole mysterious business. Above all, he tried to connect the latest events with what Kathia had told him the day before. He was looking for a link, a reason. Uselessly. He had too little to go on. There must be an enormous mass of things he didn’t know, information he didn’t have. To begin with, he was utterly in the dark about his own role in this thing. But maybe that’s where the answer was. They were in trouble and needed him in some way, God only knows why. And this trouble had suddenly got worse, blowing all their plans sky-high. No, he was just trying to guess. In reality, he knew nothing, absolutely nothing. Not yet. He just had a feeling of danger, especially for Kathia, and maybe even seen in Mattheus’s worried look. Or in the few, hurried words in her message. And yet, right up to yesterday, nothing looked like giving cause for alarm, not immediately, anyway…. Suddenly a chill passed through Helias. As if a photo, a single frame, had flashed by, vanishing in an instant. A subliminal message, something you are not consciously aware of, but that triggers an instinctive response. Something had happened. There had been a moment, an image, that correlated with this feeling of danger. But he couldn’t remember what. And he knew that no amount of effort would bring it back to mind. Like those things that, the more you reach out for them, the faster they elude your grasp.
He went to eat. Not hungry. He saw Mattheus, at the end of the room, in the corner. From his position, he seemed able to keep watch over everything and everybody. They looked at each other. Helias saw an empty table, not far from Mattheus. He went up to the buffet. When he turned, Mattheus was still looking at him. Helias indicated the free table with his eyes. Mattheus blinked, slowly. Understood. Helias sat, trying to understand the other’s intentions and noting that he had almost finished eating. Mattheus soon rose with his tray and passed close to Helias’s table. A quick, almost imperceptible movement, and a fork fell at Helias’s feet. Helias leaned over to pick it up, and held it out to the serious man, who thanked him. He found himself holding a tiny roll of paper that had been caught between the tines.
Not daring to put it in his pocket, he kept the roll between his fingers, his hand half-closed, until the end of the meal. He put it in his pocket when he took the ticket for coffee. Plenty of sugar. He needed it. The minute he got back to his room, he unrolled the paper and read it.
“At 14:15. Look out the window. If I look at you as I come in, take my umbrella. Otherwise follow me at a distance.”
It was hand written, in tiny but clear letters. There wasn’t room for another word. For the last words, he had to use a magnifying glass.
At ten past two he went to the window. It was still raining, and the sky was even darker. When he saw Mattheus arrive, Helias hit the clear button on the window, so he could be seen from outside. Mattheus, on the lakeshore, was strolling innocently with his umbrella. When he drew even with the window, he turned toward Helias, for a couple of seconds, and then returned the way he had come, slowly. Helias understood and hurried for the lobby. He arrived just as Mattheus was coming in. There were people around, and Mattheus didn’t look at him. He left the umbrella and went down the corridor on his left, still without looking at him. Helias checked that no one was watching, and then followed him at a distance. Once around the corner, Mattheus had disappeared. But an elevator was going up, and stopped at the second floor. Immediately afterwards it started down again, and stopped in front of him. The doors opened. It was empty. Not quite. There was a memory card in the middle of the floor. Helias took it and stole away, like a thief.
There was writing on the card: “The password is time axis. Read offline.”.
It was she! And in fact, the handwriting was different from that on the roll of paper.
To be safer, Helias used his ‘old’ portable. The card was compatible. He typed in ‘branch’.
“Incorrect passwo
rd. Make sure that your Caps Lock key is turned off and try again. You have two more attempts before the message is deleted.”
It wasn’t the Caps Lock. What had she called them? Twigs? No.
“stick”
Okay.
“Second password: ‘Though much more evolved, has the same problems.’”
Helias was puzzled for a moment. Then he smiled. And blushed. It was definitely she.
“bottom”
Again, the message was written. No video, no sound.
“Between the strips of light you will know what you seek. Where what sees is transformed you will find it. With that you would not want to use.”
“The message will be deleted in ten seconds. Nine. Eight….”
Helias had read it carefully. He wrote it down and reread it many times. And he committed it to memory. Then he threw all three messages in the toilet and flushed them down.
They didn’t trust e-mail. Or the phone, or web. Or anything that could be intercepted or tapped. They knew they were being watched. Or at least that there was a probability that they were. But by whom? And why? What had happened? Why was Kathia hiding? Had they found her out?
The first message seemed intended to keep him from being involved. Or rather, to ‘isolate’ him from Kathia, who was probably being watched. To the point where she had to go under cover. Mattheus, on the other hand, was still in circulation, but was trying to limit interaction with him to the bare minimum. But he, Helias, still had to do his part, as this last message explained. Isolated from the others. He had to do his part without anyone being able to imagine that he was in on the game. The message was written so that only he could understand it. If, heaven forfend, it were to fall into the wrong hands. And so he had to decipher it on the basis of what only he, together with Kathia, could know. Or in other words, on the basis of what they had said to each other, or what had passed between them. Like for the passwords, easy for him, unthinkable for anyone else.
The Dark Arrow of Time Page 6
