With a heroic effort Darren manage to lift up the space-craft and
started to walk. As Darren already, in the previous section, had
said, he couldn't see where he was going. However, the
persons
inside
the space-craft could see out through the windows.
Unfortunately they could just look in the obliquely left-upwards and
right-downwards directions, not ahead or backward or any other useful
direction. Because of all the problems with the vision, and the
unorganized communication between them who looked out and Darren,
Darren's walk fulfilled every single requirement a scientist
could demand to call it a random walk. A characteristic quality of the
random walk is that it takes a very long time to cover a distance that
is significantly longer than the length of one step.
Furthermore, Darren had to stop and rest every
minute because his extremely heavy 'necklace'. So, because of these
circumstances, they were still, after one hour of walking, on almost the
same old spot they had started on. The hope of meeting someone while
wandering about in an apparently uninhabited region seemed negligible
small, but I guess few of you will become surprised when you hear that
they actually met a man. A bald man dressed in an orange-colored toga,
looking like a Buddhist monk. The monk was used to a dull life were
most days were the same, so meeting a headless dragon with a
space-craft on top was something out of the ordinary for the monk.
Jesper was the first to notice the man, since he sat at the window
that was facing the right-downward direction. He eagerly yelled:
"Uh, uh! I see a bald man!"
"Calm down Jesper. It is just a reflection from the window", Olivia
said.
"No, no! I see an intelligent looking bald man!"
"What?!", Olivia, Roberta and Darren screamed.
Olivia rushed to the window were Jesper stood, and looked out:
"He is right! We found a monk!"
"Explain the situation to the monk.", Roberta suggested.
"Considering that he can't see us or hear us, I can see some potential
communication problems.", Olivia replied sarcasticly.
"I know. I can write him a message.", Darren interposed.
"Great! Besides the facts that your feet is as lumbering as the feet
of an elephant, and you have no pen or paper, and your hand-, or
should I say foot-writing is unreadable, I can see no problems with
that."
"I think someone is a bit grumpy today", Darren replied
superciliously and continued, "My hand-writing may be poor, but my
tail-writing is pretty terrific. And it needs no pen or paper, just a
porous ground."
After discussing what Darren should write, they decided that a simple
'Help us out', was enough.
Jesper insisted that they should write 'Would you be a nice monk and
help us investigate the possibility get a welding set to make a hole
in the space-craft to help us out, please', but he was voted down even
if he argued that one should be polite and detailed to a monk.
Darren wrote the message with his tail. The monk looked very carefully
at Darren's action. He frowned in thought and said:
"It looks like the dragon is digging a hole in the ground with his
tail, or maybe he is trying to appease an itching tail.
I wonder if he wants to follow me to the monastery. I certainly hope
so, because else no one will believe me when I tell them what I met."
The monk waved with his hand, as a signal to the peculiar equipage to
follow him. Even though Oliva noticed the monk, and they all wanted to
follow him, this was easier said than done. After several failed
attempts, both the monk and the rest realized that the only way that
would work was if the monk moved really slow and always stayed where
he could be seen from the small window. After a long and adventurous walk the
finally came to a monastery. At the monastery the monk lead them to
their engineering shop. In the engineering shop the monk talked to another monk. A
monk that spent most of his time at the engineering shop. (So, much
time actually, that he often missed the joint prayers.)
The monks realized that someone was probably caught in the strange
thing on top of the other strange thing. Obviously
the monks had a high quality welding set.
One of the monks, the one
who often missed his prayers, cut a hole all around Darren's neck
with his weld. After he was done Darren could lift out his head.
He still had a 'necklace', but now a much lighter one than before.
Then Jesper looked out through the big hole. The recently welding monk,
gave Jesper an intense frightening stare, and said:
"You!?"
"No, it is not me. I am my evil twin brother..", Jesper stuttered out
when he realized that the man in front of him was the notorious Killer
Abdul.
Killer Abdul, or Brother Abdul as he now was known, suddenly changed
his facial expression, from an evil grin to a friendly smile. He said
with an exaggerated friendly tone:
"Oh, Jesper my dear friend. Don't you think I recognize you?
You, who in a dramatic way saved me from my old life.
Before, I lead a wild and dangerous life on the other side of the law,
but now my life is calm and filled with prayers, prayers, and more
prayers. Let me start to repay you by giving you a little advise;
When you pretend to be your twin in front of someone who have met
you but not him, just pretend that you haven't seen
that someone. Futhermore, you can't
be, as you said 'my brother' because the word 'my' actually reveal
that you are yourself!"
Jesper was silent for a moment, obviously thinking. Then he confessed
embarrassed:
"Oh, you are right. I guess I must be Jesper then."
"To further repay you for changing my life, let me show you the
attractions here."
Even as a monk Abdul had something that indicated that
you should not oppose to him. So, Jesper sent out a ladder and
climbed down the space-craft, and walked to Brother Abdul, who said:
"Follow me up to our high tower, and I will show you something
amazing."
"OK.", Jesper said.
They walked to the tower on the other side of the monastery, and up a
long creaking winding staircase, to a small room with a fantastic
view. After gasping for air, after the exhausting stair climbing,
Brother Abdul said to Jesper:
"If you lean out really much through that window, you can actually see
the highest mountain in the world."
"Really? But isn't it kind of dangerous to lean out from a window this
high up.", Jesper wondered.
"Oh, no. Not at all.", Brother Abdul said holding his right hand
behind his back with his middle and index finger crossed.
"If you say so.", Jesper said and walked to the window and begun to
lean out.
"I can't see any high mountains.", Jesper complained.
"You must lean out more.", Brother Abdul explained.
Jesper followed the instructions, but said:
"I still can't see it."
"I'll help you!", Brother Abdul said, and started to walk hasty
towards Jesper with his hand in a position to push.
At that precise moment, Roberta, followed by Olivia, climbed into the
tower-room. Olivia looked at Abdul and said:
"What are you doing?"
"I was just about to save Jesper from falling out of the
window. Jesper, come back in. I just remembered that it wasn't from
this tower you could see it."
When Jesper was safe back in, with both his feet on the floor, Brother
Abdul said:
"What shall we do next? Visit our mad elephant, do some mountain
climbing or play with our collection of poisonous snakes and
spiders?"
"Actually I am too hungry to do anything right now. Do you have
anything to eat here?"
Abdul was silent for a moment. Then he brightened up:
"Yes!! I can make you a fantastic mushroom omelet, made from some
special mushrooms I know of."
"Great. I love mushrooms!", Jesper smiled.
Brother Abdul was also smiling, but his smile was rather evil looking.