Wednesday 25 May 2011

Discovery

The library finally received a couple of guests today, consisting of a decrepit couple and a random teenager, wanting to use one of the library's computers. The couple, or more specifically the old man, requested to borrow a book that had to be around his own age, saying that he had been unable to find it in its usual spot. Always the diligent and trustworthy clerk, Alice immediately (it wasn't like she had anything better to do) went in search for the book in an area where they put away the literature that seldom got borrowed or even looked at. Usually the books that were placed here were put on tables near the entrance and sold cheaply after a while, but the ones that lay on the messy shelf today were to be thrown away or possibly saved by some sentimental staff member. The old man's book was there. It was thick with loose pages, and as Alice picked it up something fell out of it and drifted down onto the floor.

At first she thought it had been a couple of pages from the book itself, but the paper was much too small. Picking it up she noticed that it was notes of some sort written, sloppily, by hand and in old Swedish. Though it started abruptly, it wasn't too hard to read, even if it was evident that the person who had written it had been under stress judging by a few misspellings and crossed out words. Why the pages had been tucked into the book Alice didn't know, it was as if someone had wanted her to find them, it was all planned.
The book itself had nothing to do with the pages, as it seemed to be a book about botany. Alice went back to the couple, handing the book to the old man while telling him that he'd been lucky as the book would have been thrown out soon.



[...] om det fanns något så skulle de icke ha återvänt, så det hvar blott en illusion, en vålnad som deras trötta hufvuden, deras stackars sinnen, hade skapat. Hvarför är det då så, att mina och deras dagar ter sig så långa, så fyllda med fruktan, detta på grund af något som ej finnes till?
Men jag känner att jag tvingas skrifva ner detta, därför att det finnes tecken att Han finnes på riktigt. Jag tillkännagifver detta endast för att vi, mig och mannarna, hava haft liknande drömmar – alla unika, bortsett från ett par detaljer, dessa detaljer som får oss att vandra omkring med spända muskler. Han har ett vitt, blankt ansikte, helt utan ögon eller mun eller näsa. Flera meter lång. Mer än två. Tre, fyra, fem... ibland tio. Ibland med fler än två armar, ibland med vad en af männen beskriver som ”tentakler”. Han bär alltid svarta kläder. Men äfven bortom drömmarna har Han visat sig.
Till mig kom Han med en svart cylinder på sitt skalliga hufvud. Jag gick på stigen på väg till byn efter att ha tagit en kort promenad, och där stod Han på toppen utaf kullen. Äfven om Hans ansikte var naket, så kunde jag urskilja att Han tittade ut öfver skogen. Han hade märkt mig, men det tog ett tag innan Han kunde skänka mig en blick (jag har just beskrivit hur Han inte hade några ögon, men hur annars skall jag beskriva det...?), och när Han väl gjorde det hann jag önska att Han hade fortsatt stirra ut öfver skogen då jag föll baklänges medan världen blev svart. Hela tiden hörde jag ett ringande i mina öron.
Tids nog vaknade jag upp i mitt hem. Min morbror hade kommit gåendes på vägen – jag frågade honom aldrig om han hade sett samma man på kullen, han vet ingenting om det här, och jag kommer att hålla han och så många andra som möjligt utanför det här – då han såg mig ligga utslagen på gruset. Han sade att han hade tagit sig en titt på mig, för att se så att jag inte vart skadad, men enligt honom så vart jag frisk som en nötkärna. Jag gav honom en dålig ursäkt, sade att jag hade jobbat för mycket nyligen, och han gick på det.
Men alla har inte lika stor tur som jag. En utav oss har mist sitt lif, två är försvunna. Innan de försvann, så började Erik långsamt förlora sin skrifvförmåga och började istället skrifva ner koder, över allt annat föredrog han att kommunicera via morse. Han skrefv ner koderna eller knackade i vad helst han hade att knacka i. Jag kommer fortfarande ihåg vad han sade en dag då jag satt på uthuset. ”Träden kommer, träden kommer, träd, träd, de kommer, träd kommer.” Han höll på med detta i flera minuter, och jag vart tvungen att skynda mig för att hindra honom från att slå sin näfve blodig mot väggen.
Karl säger mig att koderna är det enda sätt de kan kommunicera på. Jag undrade hvarför, och han sade att de hade blivit galna. Det förstår jag, det förstår vi alla.
Ändock är jag förvirrad.

2 comments:

  1. ((I took the liberty of running this through Google Translate. I hope for your sake that this is not a warning for you, but for someone else.))


    if there was anything they would not have returned, so that every merely an illusion, a ghost that their weary heads, their poor minds, had created. Why is it so, to my and their days seem so long, so filled with fear, is this because of something that does not exist?
    But I feel I have to write this down, because there is evidence that He exists for real. I am announcing this only because we, me and the men, have had similar dreams - all unique, apart from a couple of details, those details that make us walk around with tight muscles. He has a white, shiny face, without eyes or mouth or nose. Several feet long. More than two. Three, four, five ... sometimes ten. Sometimes with more than two arms, sometimes with one of the men describe as "tentacles". He always wears black clothes. But even beyond the dreams he has proved.
    He came to me with a black cylinder on his bald head. I walked down the path on the way to the village after taking a short walk, and there he was on top utaf litter. Even if his face was bare, so I could make out that he looked out over the forest. He had noticed me, but it took a while before he could give me a look (I have just described how he had no eyes, but how else should I describe it ...?), and when he did so I had time wish that he had continued to stare out over the forest when I fell backwards while the world went black. The whole time I heard a ringing in my ears.
    Soon enough, I woke up in my home. My uncle had come walkin 'down the road - I never asked him if he had seen the same man on the mound, he knows nothing about this, and I will keep him and so many others as possible out of this - when he saw me lying knocked out on the gravel. He said he had taken one look at me, to see so that I can not every hurt, but according to him, so where I fit as a fiddle. I gave him a poor excuse, said I had been working too much lately, and he went at it.
    But all was not as lucky as me. One of us has lost his life, two are missing. Before they disappeared, so Eric began to slowly lose its skrifvförmåga and started to write down the codes, above all else, he preferred to communicate through the morning. He cleft down the code, or knocked in whatever he had to tap in. I still remember what he said one day I was sitting in the shed. "The trees will, the trees will, trees, trees, they will, the tree will." He was doing this for several minutes, and I each had to hurry to keep him from beating his fist against the bloody wall.
    Karl tells me that the codes are the only way they can communicate. I wondered why, and he said they had gone mad. I understand this, we understand that all.
    Yet I am confused.

    ((Be cautious))

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  2. I'm afraid to say that translation doesn't make much sense, at least not all of it. But it is something to be weary of, Alice.
    It is curious though, why on earth these papers would just be found in an old book? I wish you could answer these questions Alice, without going into your narration every time. I wish I understood what to do.

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