Escape! The Collaboration

Escape! 

There is something oily about translators; like a sticky film that is hard to wash off; an insidious presence; their puffy cheeks; their insistence on their essential necessity, particularly here, in this enclosed claustrophobic space.

I am at this luxurious resort at an international conference, nestled in some mountain foothills. But I am only here as a consort to my wife, who is the main speaker; who is busy, who is busy speaking, listening, arguing, explaining, bringing a little light to an opaque world.

 I am ignored.

 However, she has arranged for me to be supplied with translators, who know exactly what I want, what I need, what I need to hear; how I should spend my time; who are without charm. Whose command of English is limited and breathless. They never leave my side. I am their prisoner. I am unhappy. I am about to explode. 

One morning, after breakfast (eggs, spiced moose meat, caviar on toast, cornflakes, weak tea) I slip away, sneak out through the back, through a sad looking faux-French garden, and into a park-like forest, following paths that wind their way through the woods and up the mountain. The valley is covered with a morning mist, with a hint of the sun rising. 

I do not know where I am going, only that I am walking away from the conference, escaping from the center’s stale air, and those obnoxious, controlling, confining, troublesome translators. I stride towards a freedom I haven’t experienced for several days. The air is crisp, refreshing. There are other people on the paths. I know they are natives; they know I am a foreigner. Our eyes narrow, and we smile tentatively as we pass each other. As I walk higher, there are no other people on these paths as the paths narrow, are steeper, and rocky. The mist dissipates, I am staggered by the beauty of this world as it emerges from the misty shadows. 

The sun rises above the surrounding horizon, slowly revealing what had been in shadow. I can see the mountains and the valleys below. Shades of purple, blue, brown, and sometimes a patch of green. And above those shifting colors, a hint of white, then the bright white of snow on the mountain peaks. Soon I can see a whole life, a wide world, a world of beauty, mystery, and possibilities. 

Here I need no translators. I am alone. I feel free, liberated. 

I continue walking up towards a distant ridge. I am in a state of joy. I am beginning to understand awe. Now the air is thinner, lighter. I am energized as I reach the ridge. I pause, I rest, I allow my lungs to relax, breathe the free air as I drink it all in. 

Ahead of me is another ridge, another vista... 

Behind me, the conference center, where no one knows where I am... 

(by Peter Goodwin) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- While climbing up the path, I slip on a loose rock, lose my balance, and then, I hear the sound of a bullet zinging past my head. I fall to the ground. Good thing I slipped just then. Now, what should I do? Chips of rock and the sound of a bullet ricochet tell me that the bullet that just passed me hit that rock. I still haven’t heard the sound of the gunshot, just the zing and the ricochet. So the shooter is far away, and in the direction away from the rock that got hit. 

I creep on my belly away from the rock that got hit with the bullet, and toward the shooter, but behind a line of boulders. They can’t see me here. At least, the shooter can’t see me here. There could be others following me. If there are, I can’t know until they shoot. I stay flat on the ground. 

I can hide behind this line of boulders. I can go up the slope or down. They’ll expect me to go down. Down is easier. They won’t expect me to go up, not only because up is more difficult, but because up limits my options. 

Sharp shards of rock sprayed all over this area when the bullet hit the rock. One of them is right here. I use it to cut a bit of cloth from my pants and to cut the skin of my thigh just a bit. I leave the cloth where I am and start creeping down the hill behind the rocks. It’s coming in handy that, in my previous life, I was a Navy SEAL and had SERE training, survival, evasion, resistance, and escape. The cut I made in my leg leaves a subtle blood trail for a few dozen meters until the scratch clots off naturally. Then I leave some more evidence of recently moved rocks in the scree until I come to an area of solid rock where turned stones aren’t going to be present. I retrace my path, creeping behind the rocks out of sight of the sniper who took that shot at me and continue in the uphill direction, this time, not leaving a visible path of turned stones in the scree. 

Up the mountain might limit my options, but mountains, especially this one, are large, so there are still options. And being uphill from the pursuer makes observation of pursuers easier. I must choose my path wisely, and I stop briefly to survey the terrain. I attach brush from nearby bushes to my clothing as camouflage. The way to deal with pursuers is to avoid having the outline of a human being and to avoid moving like a human being. The brain can’t store and assess every single detail of a large amount of terrain. The person or people tracking me will look from place to place, focusing on one area and then another. They’ll be looking for human shapes and human-like movements. That’s what I’ll be looking for, too, as I try to see them before they see me. 

Aha. I see the way to go, and I see one person tracking me. That might not be the only one. Wearing a helmet and carrying a rifle. About a kilometer down the hill. In the valley between this hill and the previous one along the route that I traveled. That could be the person who shot at me if he or she had sniper training. Moving quickly, not looking for my trail, but coming toward my last known position. 

(by Henry Farkas) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I wait, crouched behind a rock, watching as the figure looks down. He—it looks like a man from this angle—sees the blood trail, follows it, sees the disturbed rocks and then—nothing. He bends over, looks around, looks up the hill. His eyes sweep past me. He holds the rifle up to his eye, sights, sweeps the hill again. I hold my breath as the rifle pauses, inching closer to my position, when the shooter and I hear scrabbling on the rocks. A white goat appears fifty meters or so down the hill. Then another, and another. A small herd of them comes into view. 

The shooter puts the rifle down. Now I wish I hadn’t made that blood trail. I see him shoulder the rifle, look from the goats to the rocks, back to where I had been daydreaming before he shot at me. Slowly, he walks back the way he came. 

Out of the corner of my eye, I can see the goats climbing up toward my position. I don’t move a muscle. I don’t want to spook the herd, but I also don’t want them bleating and coming over to see who I am, either. 

I stay crouched behind the rocks, not moving, until the goats have passed along the mountainside and out of sight. Then I stand up slowly, massaging out the cramp in my legs, and try to figure out the best way back. 

In the old days, I’d follow the sniper. But JoAnn is back in the city, tweaking her keynote address and unaware that something more is going on around here than a simple conference. I don’t know what that something is but it’s none of my business, and I just want to get back into the city and be a good, supportive husband. 

There’s a stand of pines a little further up, and I make for their cover. Once among the trees, and their soft, fallen needles that are so good at muffling noise, I speed up a little. All the while, I’m wondering who was shooting at me. It wasn’t just some country boy guarding a field of opium poppies. His bearing was military, and that shot came close to hitting its target—if indeed I was the target. 

The breeze picks up, bringing with it the scent of the pines, and I think of how much JoAnn would love walking here. She’d know what species of pine these are, what birds nest here, what other creatures would make this forest their home. She’d know how many hectares of forest this country has and how it will be affected by global warming. She’d be smiling and listening for birdsong, not footfalls. Sometimes I envy her job. 

(by Patricia Valdata) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Suddenly, I feel a tug at my torn pant leg . Oh no, the goats again ? I think, panicking, and turn my head sharply. I start when I see a small girl in a ragged dress at my side. Her green eyes, framed by dark brows and set in a tanned, heart-shaped face, seem oddly familiar. 

Myiashi? She asks, and touches the drying blood on my trousers. Bhya maita? I shake my head and shrug with my palms held upwards. I hope that this is the universal sign for ignorance, and perhaps it is, for she nods, then takes my hand and leads me down a path I never would have noticed. She moves quickly, quietly, and I follow as best I can; soon the dry brush and sharp stones give way to thick grass and tiny purple flowers. 

I smell the village before I see it, smell the acrid wood smoke, then see it billowing in gray clouds out of the top of each round, rough-skinned hut. The girl drops my hand and skips ahead of me, calling out Clashiata, clashiata! She runs to a rough tripod in the center of the encampment, picks up a rope- wrapped stick and strikes a gong that hangs there. I clap my hands over my ears as the harsh sound rings and reverberates inside my head. An old man with a white beard and a carved cane bursts out of a hut and hobbles over to the girl; he is followed by a half dozen women and girls of all ages. He speaks quickly, angrily; she gestures in my direction, and all of them turn to look. 

None of them seem happy to see me. 

I smile and approach the group slowly, deferentially, bowing my head, babbling placatory phrases in any language I can muster. I see the women draw back from me, muttering, and they spit between their first and second fingers: tuu tuu tuu! I am a stone's throw from them when I feel the girl at my side. Quorha, quorha! She cries to the others, and then points to my face, where a wine dark birthmark, large and ragged, still shows through the beard I have cultivated for decades solely to hide it from view. 

Ahhh, quorha, quorha, the women murmur. 

The elder grimaces, his knuckles tightening on his staff until they turn white, dark skinned as he is. Abruptly, he turns to go back to his hut, but barks a command to the women. They bow, scatter, and then one emerges from the elder's shelter with a clay bowl filled with stew: dark, meaty, unbelievably fragrant. 

I realize how long it's been since the eggs and moose breakfast at the conference center --- what time is it anyway? so hard to tell in these jagged mountain valleys --- and I accept the food gratefully. No spoon is forthcoming, so in a moment I use the fingers of my left hand to taste the stew, and then, ravenous, I gulp it all, and scrape the bottom of the bowl. 

Another woman brings me a hot drink, corn, perhaps? wheat? barley? A deep purple color, thinner than the stew, with a hint of musty sweetness. I drink it down, wipe my lips, hand the cup back to her with a slight bow, and then I abruptly collapse onto the ground. My mind is clear, and I can hear everything that goes on around me, but my body is completely paralyzed.

(MaggieCreshkoff)---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

The village women pick me up and move me into a nearby tent. Although I still can’t understand their language, it appears that they intend me no harm. They cover me with several thick goatskins and leave me alone, except for one guard/sentry. Exhausted beyond belief, I fall into a fitful sleep, anxious about the effects of the paralyzing agent(s) they put into the food. 

I am awakened by the bright morning sun. Up here near the top of the mountain, sunlight pours into every crevice and doorway. My paralysis has finally run it’s course and I am eager to return to my wife who probably thinks I’m dead or terribly lost. Since my cell phone is back at the conference location, only my physical presence will be enough to soothe her anxiety and worst fears. 

As I head down the mountain, the villagers all wave goodbye; I am comforted by such a simple and warming sight. Reaching mid mountain in my descent, my internal radar for danger clicks on once more, as I stop and go to listen to the forest sounds every 200 feet or so. Whoever shot at or near me may be awaiting my return; I have no desire to give him or her any more chances to improve their marksmanship. 

Just as I reach the conference center, my wife comes running; she embraces me and we kiss for longer than usual. A whole crowd of people is watching at this moment; I whisper into my darling’s ear” Let’s talk in our room” and we run hurriedly to the elevators to get to our suite on the 5th floor. So many images, words and sounds are running across my mind that I can barely stand the silence during our quick ride upstairs. But I don’t know where I should begin all that has happened to me in the last 36 hours. Thank goodness, my wife is the first one to speak.

JohnGuertin------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

"Ah, Miss Mumblemaw— oh, okay then, Mary Ellen, thank you for stopping by. Fortunately your father was in possession of his billfold when he was found, enabling us to track you down. I'm doctor Annabella Shrinkwrapper, the chief psychotherapist here and we are hoping to enlist your help in dealing with your dad. 

"Yes, we have had him here under observation for the past five days, ever since he was found wandering aimlessly in a stone quarry beating on a trashcan lid with a stick. 

"No, we are not certain how he got there or what he was attempting to do, and was only discovered after the owner's granddaughter, exercising their three white poodles, stumbled upon him after hearing the noise. He appeared to have been out there at least overnight in that he was quite soiled; ragged if you will. 

"No, he appears to be in good physical condition. He does have a cut on his left thigh that he claims was self-inflicted in an effort to escape his pursuer(s), whatever that means, but that was of no real consequence. He also had what we initially thought was a burn on the side of his face but on closer inspection turned out to be ink-berry stains that he apparently rubbed on himself considering the stains on his fingers; why, who knows. We are having some difficulty in getting him to eat. He refuses our normal fare insisting on eggs, caviar (which is well beyond our budget) and mousse. We have been serving him the eggs and mousse, mostly chocolate and lemon, but a man his age should not be on such a high cholesterol diet for very long.

"It is his mental state we are really concerned with; he appears to be totally befuddled and the story he has related is incoherent at best and preposterous at worst . 

"He continually mumbles about needing to get to some conference center where his wife Jo Ann is a key speaker but we have had no luck in finding out where this is taking place. Does this ring a bell with you? 

"It does? Oh, good, so your mother's name is Jo Ann. Would she be available for— oh, she is no longer with you. I am so sorry, when did she pass? Oh, she didn't? 

"I don't mean to pry into your family's history but in that your father keeps bringing this up, if you could give me some insight as to what might of happened at this conference it could help in treating him. 

"When and where did this conference take place? A year ago this week in Ulaanbaatar Mongolia? I see, and your father accompanied your mother— Go on... 

"Okay, so as I understand this, your father went up into the mountains to commune with nature while your mother attended this conference about the "Body Beautiful", and after giving her address on the finer aspects of plucking nasal hairs she met and ran off with a Viagra salesman, not to be seen again to this day, leaving your father stranded among the rocks and scree; ergo the quarry and gravel. 

"Well, Miss Mumblemaw— I'm sorry, Mary Ellen, this is all starting to make sense; the mountains and the quarry; the goats and the poodles; the yurts and the quarry equipment sheds; even the assassin and the Viagra salesman trying to shoot a hole in your father's marriage and all this coming on the anniversary of the event. Fundamentally he appears to be reliving the entire unhappy circumstance not unlike Poe's Ulalume. Ah, Ulalume, you know, the poem, where... well, never mind. 

"We now have a treatment course to follow, but I won't bore you with the psycho-babble. 

"Yes, you may certainly see him now. There is one issue you can help us with if you will, possibly to convince him he is not a seal. That in itself is not a problem however we lack the personnel to have someone standby all daylong to throw him a fish every time he claps his fins, I'm sorry, hands together."

 byWilliamStuckey--------------------------------------------------------------------- 

Total words = 3,142