Он уехал на край света с одной целью: раз и навсегда разобраться в себе. Он не ошибся — на всё про всё ушел месяц. Первую неделю он просто наслаждался безделием. Часами бродил в изумрудных рощах у озера или поднимался по тропинкам в горы. Валился под вечер с ног, забываясь легким беззаботным сном. А потом взялся за дело.
Новозеландская сказка
Вы, конечно, помните старину Крэка — дряхлого черепаха, вечно перемотанного скотчем, как посылка со скороваркой в девяносто втором году? С тех пор как по осенней распутице его переехал бульдозер, душка-Крэк уже никогда не расставался с мотком липкой ленты, то и дело пришлепывая новые полоски на якобы расползающийся по швам панцирь.
Африканская сказка
Ночью мальчик Акамба никак не мог заснуть. В дожде было что-то тревожное, но он не мог понять, что. Потом он нашел на своей левой лопатке пиявку — Акамба знал, что во время дождя пиявки могут ходить по земле и даже проникать в хижину. Он намазал ее разжеванной травой кииааратуха, и та умерла.
Еврейская сказка
Однажды некий ойберхухем (см. примечания) из Хелемского уезда решил испытать мудрость своего ребе и пришел к нему с вопросом, который слышал еще от отца.
— Почтенный ребе, — обратился он с мольбой, — я ужасно беден. Мои жена и шестеро детей ютятся в одной комнатке. Жизнь невыносима. Что мне делать?
— Купи козу, — недолго думая, ответил ребе.
Chapter Twenty Six
‘Probably, we need to discover a new world,’ Ashley smiled pensively.
‘Oh, we’ve already tried to do that,’ Thaler snorted. ‘Do you remember all that madness with Mars colonisation a couple of decades ago?’
‘I’m afraid, I don’t,’ Ashley giggled. ‘In those times I was building sandcastles with my dad.’
Chapter Twenty Four
The demons’ nest had been destroyed but Ashley and Thaler still had a long way to go or, to be more precise, to run. The hospital where Irwin was stranded in a no man’s land between life and death stood ten miles away from their current location. Somehow, they had to make their way there. Communications were dead and electric transport had been halted, so the only means of conveyance they could rely on was their own feet. They started running along the street but were soon slowed down and had to claw their way through a crowd.
Chapter Twenty Two
The notorious lord was a tall skinny old man dressed in an elegant black dinner jacket. He had a narrow face that was perched on a long wrinkled neck and featured a massive hooked nose, thin bloodless lips and the deep-set piercing eyes of a vulture with a proud gaze but also an appetite for carrion. His sparse yellowish hair was slicked back neatly along the skull.
Chapter Twenty
‘It was a weird conversation.’ Thaler, clumsily, tried to pick up a bunch of noodles with a pair of chopsticks, ‘We didn’t tell each other what we thought, and what we did say we didn’t actually think. But, I’ve got the instructions and a very helpful gadget to make our hopeless mission a little bit more cheerful.’ He put the sticks aside. ‘I think I’ll ask for a fork.’
Chapter Eighteen
Ashley stood near the stove, all her attention focused on her phone screen.
‘I just talked to my mother,’ she said in a strained voice. ‘Dad is in hospital. He fell into a coma. She said the doctors are checking him.’ She gazed at Thaler. ‘Do you think he was safe?’
Chapter Sixteen
Pain — it was the first thing Thaler felt; it was nauseating, piercing, excruciating. It pulsed in his temples and ached in his back. He couldn’t feel his arms or his legs. A ridiculous image of a blind, limbless, cave-dwelling reptile tumbled into his mind. But he thought, therefore he was; and so was his pain. They both existed.
Chapter Thirteen
Irvin was right — he couldn’t miss her. Her red mane was like a beacon in the colourless multitude thronging around the arrival area. Dressed in a dark-blue sports jacket, with a beaming smile on her face, she was looking for him in the wrong direction. A new wave of passengers gushed out of the arrivals gate and dispersed across the hall, looking for their welcome parties — excited loved ones, apathetic drivers with nameplates and optimistic lawyers clutching thick briefcases.
Chapter Eleven
The pilot rest cabin was small but comfortable. There was a berth straight in front of him, a tiny table and a cosy armchair on his right and a narrow door that led into a small bathroom on his left.
Lizzy was standing in the middle of the cabin with her bare feet on a shaggy beige carpet. She wore the same uniform but in a much more relaxed manner. The upper buttons of her jacket were undone, revealing a considerable portion of her cleavage. Her skirt had lost as much as half its length and her stockings had evaporated. Her high-heeled shoes had been tossed in the corner.
Chapter Eight
In a flash, all eyes, cameras and phones in the building were directed at a group of uniformed people walking briskly down the hall.
The Magnificent Seven — the two pilots and five stewardesses who made up the Glambird team — were pacing the shiny floor in perfect formation. They were tall, fit and good-looking. The girls wore tight blue jackets and skirts, stylish field caps, and red neckerchiefs. They walked confidently on sky-high heels with beaming smiles as they waved at the adoring crowd. The pilots marched slightly ahead of the ladies. They were dressed in peaked caps with crisp dark-blue suits and looked stern but friendly. Their passage through the hall looked more like a top fashion event rather than a routine pre-boarding procedure. All the members of the team seemed pleased to have the public’s attention, all of them, except one.
Chapter Six
‘I need lots of booze to wash this nightmare from my memory,’ said Irvin after a big gulp of beer. ‘But a promise is a promise: no more than two pints in one sitting.’ He banged his pint pot on the table and stared at Thaler. His companion was hunched silently over a thin and pale — like himself — glass of lager. Having got no response, Irvin turned his eyes upon the crowd.
Chapter Four
‘Well done, Sergeant! See you at the office.’ Irvin bid a hasty goodbye to the overzealous junior, who had been tailing him all around the building, and then rushed down the wide stairway to the ground floor. The massive front door, which was covered in cracks, had been flung far into the building and was lying at the foot of the stairway. Stone fragments were scattered all over the place, and a few cops armed with headcams and flashlights were snooping around in the dark hallway. Irvin strode hastily across the rubble and headed to the gaping breach where the door had once stood.