Nobody remembers the old Devil’s Bog, people only see the missile base which swallowed half of it and drained the other half. People say that the bog did not like people meddling in it’s affairs and moved a bit further away, to a place where the current Devil’s Bog is located. Before that, there was a much smaller and younger Heavenmire, and a long narrow strip of forest people called the Shadow Woods. It was mostly called that because it hid the Forbidden Forest from people’s view. The Forbidden Forest was forbidden because the parents were afraid of it, the children were forbidden to go there and nature itself had forbidden people from seeing it. All this was witnessed by people and took only 50 years to happen.

But merely a year after the base was established, a change appeared in the Shadow Woods. Young trees stopped growing and old trees started dying, they lost all their leaves and started rotting. In few short years, the mighty forest collapsed into a bog full of birches and junipers, we see today. There were people who named it Devil’s Bog, but others, who wanted to distinguish it from the Old Devil’s Bog, started calling it Heavenmire instead, claiming that this bog did not yet possess the evil presence so natural to the Devil’s Bog.

The same people said that the Old Devil’s Bog only perished because evil attracts evil. Therefore evil and darkness were the reasons the Old Devil’s Bog turned into a badland, where people could at any moment be mowed down by heavy machine guns installed at the border of the base. But even after the base was closed down and the missiles were taken to a place that was less volatile culturally, geologically and mythologically, the area remained abandoned badlands. The bog never returned there. Again, there are stories that people had ruined the land and by now it had been desecrated to such an extent that not even nature could do anything with it.

Some people still refer to the few dozen meters thick section of forest untouched by the creation of Heavenmire as Shadow Woods. And say that the dying off of the original Shadow Woods was caused by hydrazine leaked from the base. There are others who only dare to look at this section of the forest from the road and say that the Death Fields finally dug their roots into the Shadow Woods.

But both are mistaken. The former by almost 20 years, the latter by more than 30. Reportedly, of this corner of the world, where our country folk have minded their own business for thousands of years, more than a third are bogs. Therefore bogs carry quite a power and have a strong bond with the country folk. Stronger than the regular forest would have. Only the sacred Oakwoods can withstand the will of the bog. As for other forests, the bog will break them much faster and harder than any storm or sickness carried by strange starlight.

Heavenmire wasn’t turned into the New Devil’s Bog by neither the hydrazine poured into the ground when the base was dismantled, nor the Death Fields phenomenon which appeared in the 1970s. The forest easily swallowed all the hydrazine without any suffering with unfamiliar force. While what sacred the people most about the Death Fields was a possibility of the sickness continuing it spread underground. It was already enough when wind carried the poisonous dirt and dust to the cottage cooperative nearby. No, it was blood of the innocent which turned Heavenmire into New Devil’s Bog, spilled when Teet Metsla was active there.

His Kitchen of Hell, a small cluster of junipers, was located away from the old farmlands, right where the territory of the Base, Old Devil’s Bog and Heavenmire met. As the old bog had been drained, all the innocent blood flowed into the Heavenmire, and along with it, the will of Teet Metsla. Thus, when the Heavenmire became poisoned, it only became New Devil’s Bog, because of Teet Metsla. They say that these days, there is no longer much difference, the blood of the killed will flow equally in either direction.

Scientists from the North have even gone there and performed experiments, finding that there is a microscopic difference which direction human blood poured on the stump will take while flowing. The Old Devil’s Bog still retains its evil, despite the fact that the bog no longer exists. And the New Devil’s Bog, has evil within it as well.

*

“This little story about local myths makes a nice introduction to our tonight’s show doesn’t it?” Allan Helde said. “But let’s get down to business.”

Radio host in a dim studio pushed a button on a console in front of him. This started a reel-to-reel tape player in the corner which started to play a recording.

“Do not try to attempt to adjust your radio receiver. Everything is just fine and tonight I, Allan Helde will join you.” This voice was accompanied by the tape crackling. “As a warning to anybody listening: what you are about to hear now is no fantasy. It is not a forgotten science fiction novel by the Brothers Strugatsky, it is not a radio play. It is not even a poor attempt by the radio host to narrate his own horror stories. What you are about to hear is a true story. A story from the world which surrounds us every day, of the hidden corners within it and of the mysterious events that have happened to your very neighbors, maybe even to you yourself. Welcome to the Nether Lighthouse.”

The tape stopped and was then switched off the air and rewound.

“Today we have in our studio a person many of you have seen every day. Whose thoughts and ideas you have heard. Who herself and whose stories are feared by many, because often they point our attention, perhaps too sharply, to what is happening around us. Today in our studio, the girl in black herself – Mariann. Hello.”

“Hello-hello. Thanks for asking me to be here.”

The studio with walls covered in wooden boards was dim. This was partly down to the lighting, but also because the walls were covered in sound deadening mats and honeycombs mats which swallowed all the echoes. Allan Helde, the host and local expert of mystery and high strangeness, kept the air in his studio conducive to the topics discussed. This meant near darkness. The only light in the studio was emanating from the marker lights on the radio equipment and low power incandescent bulbs which were barely glowing with such low amperage that one could easily make out the illuminated tungsten wire. The large red plastic light under the ceiling was also of no help, indicating only whether the studio was currently on air or not. Allan himself kept the studio at a constant temperature of 15 degrees centigrade, something he himself considered comfortably cool.

The man on the other side of of the table, whose face Mariann could barely make out, continued.

“Honestly, I have been trying for a long time to get you into this studio, but it is surprisingly hard to make contact with you.”

“Is it?” Mariann asked. “That’s a surprise to me. It may be true during daytime. But on evenings I am often in some bar, either in the Nameless Town, Tontla or Valgepalõ, where I am sharing my stories.”

“Speaking of those stories of yours. Many of the people I have met are most certain that you are a witch. Because you have an explanation for every occasion. An explanation which sounds insane but which is also impossible to overturn. An explanation which causes trepidation and makes one judder with cold.”

“I can perfectly understand why such a perspective. But I am also pretty sure I am not a witch. I do not know enough about all the things going on to consider myself a witch or to be a witch. The witch as such is a matter of perspective. The more somebody seems to know than you do, the more their knowledge looks esoteric or like witchery, especially in it’s simplicity. Especially if your knowledge, or rather, understanding of the world does not allow you to figure out how they have attained their knowledge, made their conclusions or how it is possible that suddenly, as if from the moment they uttered their explanation, you feel a wave traveling forwards and backwards in time, by which the world is aligning itself to fit these explanations.”

“You are speaking of mythical thinking, right? Or some explanations by way of magic?”

“Not necessarily. For example, if all your knowledge about chemical reactions or the ways human body works is based on alchemy, then modern chemistry or medicine is pure witchcraft. Your explanation is unclear, magical, while mine allows to predict processes in its simplicity. And that would look like witchery.”

“True. But let’s be honest, this is still the supremacy of the scientific theory over quackery and metaphysics.”

“Did I say anything about science?” Mariann asked. “All unscience was once science. But then our world expanded and one paradigm was cast aside when a newer and better one was found. What if our current science can only explain a very small slice of the world? What if the ‘science’ of the witch is better than ours simply because her world is more expansive than ours?”

Allan Helde fell into thought.

“American science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke once said that every sufficiently developed technology is indistinguishable from magic. I must admit that in a situation where somebody makes me think how a world is suddenly following a strange explanation or theirs and no longer submits to the logic I hold dear, I would suspect being bewitched. Maybe I was not really enlightened about the true order of the world, and instead I was simply merely bedeviled.” Allan said.

“Exactly.” Mariann gave a smile. “It would seem that many of the villagers are facing the same problem. And the situation is in no way helped by the numbers of old American land yachts which are suddenly appearing in town, while only a few years ago most of us could see such things only on pictures. Witchery may mean different things to different people.”

“Speaking of cars, you are not the only one whose choice in cars is remarked upon. Doctor Sare drives around a white car with fins, the Boys from the North who are guarding the border are driving around black cars with fins. People have seen a group of strange youths who ask about local matters drive around a big black limousine. And you too have something comparable, a gigantic two-door car with tan fabric roof.”

“I am not arguing that people may see it weird. But it is also a very obtuse way of seeing things. Yes, doctor Sare may have received his car from the Boys from the North. But I and many of the local youths have gone to Yurjev or to Pskov to buy their piles of junk. And if your childhood only consisted of seeing cars like Zaporozhetses, Zhigulis and Moskviches then a massive old passenger car is an easy choice for standing out and being noticed.”

“So you think it is merely a coincidence and a stereotype?” Allan asked.

“Yes. But it is also an interesting thing to make note of. That all the people who are interested in finding out what may have happened or what may still be happening, have a similar taste in cars.”

“Okay. But let us get back on the topic of the witch. You said that witchery may mean different things to different people.”

“Yes. For example if one looks at things from my perspective, then I am not doing anything special, I am just taking a more in-depth look at things. I look into history, into places more or less abandoned. I talk to people, I sit in bars, listening to stories about Rops meeting anaks, how one person has a weird dream, the other person has a Wiedergänger. The third one sees apparitions in the forest. In the end I have a set of unconnected stories and flashes of ideas.

“Many of these are never heard by anybody. Some don’t even make it to my own lips. They swim around in my subconscious without a slightest of meanings and then strike me as dreams. And then there’s a small chance that I manage to bring them into a world of language before they leave my mind and fall back into the subconscious.”

“If we return to the analogy you brought up in the beginning, then the information you have gathered and understood, would it be like having read medical literature and also having never treated anybody or operated on anybody?” Allan asked.

“In core meaning, yes. This is why I would not consider myself a witch. In my eyes, a witch would be somebody who at the very least has a fleeting generalized insight of of the matters at hand. Because a generalized insight also affords one some degree of control. An opportunity or an ability to predict what happens next. I do not possess this capacity. I don’t know how events are connected to one another and what is the real history. I don’t know if my inferences are about the present, the future or the past. Considering the past and the special aspects of this region, I don’t think knowing that even matters.”

“So you are not the witch. The witch is somebody who is more knowledgeable than you?”

“Yes.” Mariann said.

“But let’s be honest: they ways you have explained things to the villagers, they are quite nonsensical yet also frightening. Simple words which are very hard to understand until everything suddenly falls into place, as the story continues.”

“Oh, that.” Again there was a small smile on Mariann’s lips. “It is strange, isn’t it? If one uses foreign terms, loanwords, and long sentences that drag on to infinity, then we have become so accustomed to the scientific way of putting things that even if we don’t understand anything, it still sounds earthly, logical and intelligent. However when we try to explain things in the simplest of languages, with the simplest of words and ideas, which play around like poetry, then as long as we do not fully understand them, they are but harmless riddles. But if it explains something new about the world, something we cannot scientifically make sense of, then we’re screwed, because it must be witchery.”

“So, what they are seeing as witchcraft is not about what or how you are speaking, but about how they are gradually understanding it?”

“Yes.”

“But let’s suppose that a daft villager like that meets the witch. How is he to understand that the witch knows more than you, whom he has thus far considered to be the witch?”

“He will understand it perfectly well. He will understand it even if he understands nothing. A witch with a more complete vision of the world will speak in riddles that are much more full of meaning. That’s the difference. Because she knows and sees more, her language to explain things is simpler. Also, her vision of the world may not be more complete into the directions we assume it to be.”

“What does that mean?” Allan asked.

“It means that the witch’s vision of the world and her knowledge may be like that of the Mothman seen in the United States, who saw what a person had hidden in his closed hand. Or what was written on a random page of a closed book sitting in a closed drawer.”

“That is a quite scary perspective.”

“And that’s why the riddles the witch speaks are so full of meaning.”

“So speaking with the witch is like speaking with somebody who can read your thoughts? Ow who can see 30 minutes into the future?”

“It is a good simile although I suspect that the witch’s ability is far more mundane, which makes it look even more like witchcraft.”

“But turning back to the thought experiment that the some villager goes to the witch. How would he know that the witch is more knowledgeable than you. That the one he is visiting is indeed a witch?” Allan asked.

“That depends on what kind of questions or intentions he visits her. If he goes to ask about something he has a previous experiential knowledge then the riddles the witch speaks are meaningful to him. If he goes to ask about something he has no knowledge of then it is possible that the riddles of the witch have no meaning for him.”

“That is an interesting way to see things.” Allan remarked.

“Yes. But there is a hidden problem concerning this nobody has yet noticed. If I am right and the witch indeed speaks in riddles, then it is very important to know the difference between asking an answer to a question or an explanation for something. The Mayor said he would be going to ask for advice. This is not one or the other, and that makes me worried.”

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“Do these two really have such a great difference?”

“Indeed they do. If the witch did not speak in riddles, the problem would be much smaller. But the witch only speaks as much as somebody asks of her, not more, possibly less. Let’s suppose I go with a clearly defined question. The witch finds that she can answer it. And she does. But she answers it in riddles. What I will do with that answer, how I interpret it or understand it is all up to me.”

“I am not arguing against that.” Allan said.

“But things are different if I go to the witch with a wish that she explained something to me. If it is something she can answer, then it is her duty to make it understandable to me. She will have to climb down the levels of speaking riddles to a level that I can either understand or barely understand. Now, if I go asking for advice, which of the two is it? I may think I am asking for explanation because if I don’t understand the advice it is of no use to me. If I don’t understand it then I don’t know what I should do, right?

“But from the perspective of the witch, giving advice is answering a clearly defined question, they can give me advice in such a way that I myself have to interpret what it means. Never mind the chance that my interpretation of her advice does not agree with the answer I was expecting from her. Do I follow it or not? That’s why asking for advice is a bad question to approach the witch with.”

“So you think invocating the witch and going to see her is a bad idea at this junction?”

“Yes.” Mariann said. “In the past, people went to the witch in times of great trouble. War, plague, famine, an undying serial killer hunting children. In short, a defined problem. When there was nothing left to be done and all solutions more or less rational had not provided a satisfactory result. But now people go to the witch because..? A lake has moved? The phone lines with the external world do not function? There are strange weather phenomena, paranormal phenomena, a strange organization has taken over the local institution of higher education? Sure, all those things require looking into independently, but what is there to ask a witch about, I cannot understand. I also cannot understand what kind of useful thing the witch could answer about them. The witch does not have unlimited time to explain all the mysteries of the world to the mortal and the ignorant.”

“What about the various stories you have told people. For a start, let me ask you, do you have some sort of internal account about what you have told whom, or how a story would change when something becomes clearer concerning one story or another?”

“There is a kind of. But honestly, it is not required nor advised. My stories are nothing that should be or could be put in writing. It’s like an oral tradition of a culture. If it is written down, it dies, petrifies in signs and means of data storage which are used to note it down. Also, I would then also have to keep track of when a certain fact or an aspect changed and why it changed.”

“Okay. My question stemmed from you mentioning several times that the world we live in is spatially or temporally twisted into a knot. That one might take old military maps and draw a whole pile of mysterious locations on them, like the Substation, the Center Station, the Weather Station, the Linusk, and the Antenna Field. All of them once built by the Russians but none of them still accessible to fix anything, either because of some contamination with human origins or some fault in spatial dimensions. You have also said that these location are connected with both the weird weather and paranormal phenomena as well as the stuff happening in the institute. Could you expand on that so all our listeners would understand?”

“Actually there is nothing complicated or mystical here.” Mariann said. “The Soviet Union had a whole slew of closed towns. Towns with military importance, production centers for nuclear weapons and reactor technology, uranium enrichment facilities, mining towns and scientific towns. Many know that there were two closed towns in Estonia: Sillamäe where uranium was mined and enriched, and Paldiski with 2 submarine training reactors. But there was also a third closed town. To be fair, nobody has determined how big or small in area a closed town has to be. Neither has anybody determined how much or a town a closed town has to be.

“This allowed the Russians to shove a whole county under the guise of a closed town. This area we are in. As closed towns were often known to the public only as mailing addresses of the closest biggest town, this place was also known as Pskov-14.”

“But why close up this region?” Allan asked.

“Now that’s a much better a question. If we look at history, even before World War I, the Russians realized that this corner of the world was special. There was something here. What exactly was it, of that there is no information. But there were plenty of stories back to the beginning of written records how people have been seeing weird things here. Here, people act strange, life and death act strange, the nature itself acts strange. At first the Russians and Estonians may have had a common interest in researching this region, but as soon as World War II started, and Hitler and Stalin decided how to divvy up Europe, Stalin found that for the good of the Soviet People all of this must be made use of.

“And then it started. At first, the railway was built which connected all the bigger villages, but also military bases, excavation sites and everything else that was of interest. The Train Yard was built which allowed carts and locomotives to be turned around and trains to be composed. The railway was the first thing to ruin the landscape. Fields were cut in half, even the old cemetery was cut in half. Railroad was was built into the bog without even attempting to properly drain it, concrete piles were driven into the ground until the went no deeper. Somewhere in the South a mysterious object was being excavated. For the officers, their families and other workers, the cottage district was built. And everybody should already know how big that is.

“Air defense bases were built, a nuclear missile base. Underground bases for mechanized infantry and armored cavalry as well as helicopters. After that research bases and laboratories were built to research phenomena of various kinds. When the Russians had to left in the beginning of the 1990s they left behind everything they considered without value. All their junk and contamination. Radioactive, chemical and physical waste, results of failed experiments. All of which required effort to be cleaned up.

“Although I said that they left in 1991, before the armed forces, the real winding down started during perestroika, in the 80s. Flow of money was cut off. The scientists left, higher officers left. The importance fell and only non-essential personnel remained whose duty was no longer performing experiments and discovering new science but instead keeping things running. And then in 1991, they too were recalled. The few research bases still accessible were closed down, devices used for experiments that had thus far been keeping the world stable were turned off, uninstalled and removed before the damage done started to manifest.”

Allan started to laugh.

“Mariann. I asked you to explain your stories and what you speak in them. You have told us a long story, but it seems like you haven’t really said anything. What devices? What keeping the world stable?”

“That’s exactly what I meant. Russians did not use this place to only experiment with chemistry and physics, but also with time and space. This required massive amounts of energy. But some experiments broke out of the confines they were set in, and started to affect the world outside these limits. This effect grew stronger when the influence of devices which had to stabilize and filter space for experiments was decreased. When the machinery was turned up, the space-time stood in its proper place. However when they were permanently turned off, it twisted out of it’s limits and it has kept twisting to this day. This in turn has allowed us to peek behind the fabric of the world and see all the mechanics that keep the world turning.”

“This is getting us nowhere.” Allan sighed. “Do you have any examples of such experiments or their consequences?”

“I have several. The Irradiating Woods for example. The black forest North of the Nameless town, so contaminated with chemical and radioactive materials that an hour long walk will result in death.”

“That is true. I too have seen confused animals on the border of the forest and the bodies of animals who have gotten lost there and have been too late to find their way out.” Allan said.

“Yes. But the mystery lies in the fact that none of the animals have made it to town. All of them go missing in the town or die in the deep ditch on the border of the forest. Nome make it across the ditch into town to irradiate or contaminate people or items.”

“This is something we should ask the local hunters about. It is interesting. But it is not connected with time or space in any way.”

“We also have the case of the Death Fields. When some experimental war chemical escaped into nature in1970s and poisoned all potatoes. The plants became so poisonous that even being nearby them could kill in minutes or even seconds. And not just people, but all animals. Even insects. In the end men in protective suits used flamethrowers to burn away the potatoes and other vegetables of that year. And never since has this event repeated, as if it never happened.”

“That too is not connected with time or space.” Allan said.

“I may be connected with time and space. There are almost no poisons which would be safe for plants but deadly to animals within seconds. Not even radioactivity nor organophosphates. And considering that it only occurred on a single year without a single sign of it later, it is possible that this poisonous compound was neither natural nor earthly.”

“What was it then if not earthly?” Allan asked. “Created by the ufos?!”

“That which is not earthly is unearthly.” Mariann said, not minding the radio host. “Something being unearthly means that it is not from our world. It being not of our world does not mean that ufos have brought it. It may mean that that it is from some future world, or some parallel world where the rules of the order of the world and scientific constants are somewhat different.

But OK, you want a concrete plain as day example, right? Have you been to the Park of the Edge in Tontla?”

“I know that a small park like that exists, but I have never been knowingly.” Allan said.

“The Park of the Edge in Tontla.” Mariann began. “Tontla itself is strange. If the Nameless Town is located in a valley then Tontla is almost atop a cliff, or a taivaskota. From the Park of the Edge in Tontla, one has a wonderful birdseye view on the Nameless Town, a few miles away as the crow flies. But it is interesting that from under the cliff, be it near or far, one cannot tell where the Park of the Edge lies. Also during the same hours of the same day, the weather in Tontla and the Nameless Town may be completely different.”

“This should be explainable by the fact that one sits atop a cliff. These few dozen meters of height difference might have sufficient influence or air pressures.” Allan said.

“Let us suppose it so. But for years people have attempted to signal one another with one of the parties being in the park and the order under the cliff or in the Nameless Town. They have tried flashlights, powerful port lights which can illuminate even clouds. Even signal flares which should have a night time visibility of at least 20 miles. No attempt has ever yielded a positive result. During nighttime, one cannot see the Park of the Edge or any lights or flares sent from there from anywhere under the cliff, including the Nameless town.

“But many times, villagers visiting the park have seen strange things. In Nameless Town, during daytime, somebody keeps flashing powerful searchlights, they also keep shooting signal flares of various colors and even fireworks. At the same time, similar strange activity has been seen above Tontla, not not from the direction of the Nameless Town or anywhere under the cliff but from the direction of the bog and the forest. People have made several attempts to catch these thoughtless criminals wasting the resources of emergency services like this. And there have often been articles on radio and in newspapers that red signal flares should only be used for real emergencies. But the activity continues.”

“And in your opinion, the fact that these experiments to signal one another fail, is a sign that the space-time between Tontla and the Nameless Town is not contiguous and invariant. That there must be a crack or a disjoint?” Allan asked.

“Exactly. And if that is not enough to convince you… have you ever heard of the Paraplaner Incident?”

“The Paraplaner Incident?”

“It happened several years ago in that same Park of the Edge. I am actually surprised you have not yet turned it into one of your radio shows. Anyway, a paraplane enthusiast came here for a vacation and brought along his machine. In Tontla he discovered that the widest footpath in the park which cuts straight through it, is just long enough for his parachute to catch wind before the edge of the cliff which would allow him to take off.

Well, he set up his flying machine, and by the time he was ready to take off, a few hundred locals had come to witness his endeavor of using the park as a runway. The local paper even published a long article and series of photos how the man set up his paraplane. When ready, he started down the footpath, the chute caught wind and he drove over the edge.”

“You mean to tell he drove his flying machine over the edge of the cliff and fell to his death?”

“Nope.” Mariann smiled.

“He took flight then?”

“Not that either. If it was one or the other, I would have no reason to talk about it.”

It took Mariann a few seconds to get her words in order.

“He went over the edge of the cliff with his flying machine. At least a hundred people witnessed it. What happened next, nobody knows. He did not fall and nobody saw him take flight. For half an hour people were trying to spot him in the sky both by naked eye and by binoculars. After that, people began to consider the option that he might have crashed and the rest of the day, a few hundred people combed the underside of the cliff. Hoping to find if not a living person then at least signs where the flying machine might have crashed.”

“And they never found anything?”

“Nope. No man, no wreckage of the flying machine, no chute. Disappeared like smoke into water. The local constable or rather the militsiya lieutenant at Valgepalõ was still active at the time. It took him less than half an hour to arrive and he started questioning the witnesses. Since the lieutenant was used to the parish secretary doing all the typing for him, he had a habit of recording all his questionings and interrogations on reel to reel tapes. These should still exist.”

“This matter does require further investigation.” Allan said. “Especially the aspect that the disjoint in space-time starts from the edge of the park, right on the edge of the cliff.”

“But the story gets even weirder. In the evening, when they stopped the searching as darkness fell, they did indeed find the flying machine itself. The car of the airman was still there. And the paraplane was still tied down on the trailer. As if nobody had even touched it.”

“And the airman never surfaced?”

“Nope. His car and the trailer with the paraplane stood there for a few months until it was decided that nobody was likely to collect it and Peeter the Villager dragged it to his pick-a-part yard to wait for it’s new owner. It might still be there if it hasn’t been cut into spare parts and scrap by now.”

“Very interesting. But let us return to the witch. What strikes me as especially interesting is that the witch speaks in riddles. Does this not mean that the riddles the witch speaks in might as well be speaking tongues or glossolalia. Or a form of aphasia when a person cannot recall the proper names for things, creatures of phenomena and he instead uses words that are similar or close by by some virtue?”

“There are a couple of things wrong with this. First, the riddles the witch speaks are only riddles to the listener, especially for the listener who does not understand the prevailing terminology. Like a doctor talking to a layman whose understanding of medicine is on the same level as of the country folk of the ancient time. For the witch herself, her words are clear as day. It cannot be said any clearer that it is already being said.

“However, the problem of the human animal is that he thinks himself to be measure and standard of all things. That things can only be considered and understood in ways that he considers them and all alternative means and paths are deviations from the norm and are in need of correcting towards the norm. When a witch speaks riddles to us, we naturally try to figure out why we cannot understand. And since our own way of thinking seems reasonable to us, then the fault must obviously lie with her. That she cannot express herself properly, be the reason a disease of the mind or the body.

“To think that the flaw lies with myself, that the witch might be more sane and more intelligent than me and that is the reason I do not understand seems as preposterous an idea as considering that there might be an error in the function of my mind and my rationality. Man is stupid, his first reaction is to think in absolutes. To think that the witch’s rationality and the world perspective might be more complete than mine and yet it does not necessarily invalidate my own rationality and world perspective, as there is no absolute is not a way of thinking that comes naturally.

“Such a widened rationality can also accept things that at first glace seem to oppose all common sense. Like space-time twisted into a pretzel and that in some circumstances, one can be in two separate places at the same time.”

“Now that is an interesting topic.” Allan said. “Especially in light of the Paraplaner Incident. How can it be that a man falls off the cliff with his flying machine and yet the same flying machine sits on the trailer with nobody having touched it. Does this mean that the man never actually tried to take flight with it?”

“That might be interesting but not exactly what I was thinking of. Since time and space are no longer in their proper shapes, it is possible that events that are not concurrent seems to take place concurrently. And also the reverse is true – events that are supposed to be concurrent, seem to take place divergently.

“For example, it is possible that at the same time as we are sitting here in the studio in a live show, some other versions of us are somewhere else doing something completely different and maybe even listening to this live.”

“How would that be possible? Since you are here. And I am here. And this is live.” Allan wondered.

“How exactly this might be possible, I don’t know. Like you said in the beginning, sometimes my ideas direct maybe too much of our attention to what’s going on around us so that other people who otherwise live their lives, start to notice that as well. My intention has never been to give conclusive answers. I only explain how things seem to me based on all the fragments of information I have found in abandoned houses and derelict bases. Sometimes my theories even scare myself.”

“This must be one such theory.”

“Not necessarily. As long as I don’t run into myself, I consider everything going just fine. What really scares me is the chance that words might have power.”

“They say that the limit of our world lies at the limit of our language to describe and understand it. For example, in the film Dead Mountaineer’s Hotel, there is a character Hinckus who tries to explain how “me tied up me.” He did not have the language to express that there was something or somebody that looked like him but was not him.

“Sometimes I find myself upon a thought that the clarity I possess, the way I put things. The way I describe this mysterious and strange world, that I am not simply giving opinions on how things are, but instead my words are actively creating this world, they are changing it, affecting how things really are. That would be witchery.”

“That would be God.” Allan said.

“God or witchcraft, same difference. As we already know, the country folk has little belief in God.”

“But let’s say it is possible.” Allan continued. “What would you do if the door to the studio were to open right now and you would see yourself walking in?”

“I think it isn’t possible. The world would not let it happen. Either I would manage to leave before I steps in, or I would step into an empty studio and you would ask, surprised, how did I manage to get from the desk to the door so fast. Or the me steps in and asks about the live show which just ended, while your clock says that it ended 2 hours ago. There are many possibilities. I think that there would be something very, very wrong going on if the world lets two mes or two yous meet one another.”

“Very fascinating. Anyway. It seems that our time today is over. Thank you for coming to my studio, Mariann. Thank you for having this talk with me and opening up about how you are seeing the world that surrounds us. Although we did not get to everything I wanted to talk about, there is always next time.”

“Most certainly. It was quite pleasant.” Mariann said.

“And now some music to contemplate everything you just heard.”

Allan switched the vinyl to the input. Mariann removed her headphones with a microphone and got up.

“Hey, next time maybe we can use the second half of the show for you to tell stories about the strange things that has happened to you. Or maybe interesting tidbits of history you have found. I think our listeners would very much like it.”

“We’ll see.” Mariann said. “Good night.”

She left, closing the door to the studio behind her.

Not a minute passed when the door opened again. And there again stood Mariann, but something was different. It took a few moments for Allan to notice that she was soaking wet from head to toe and breathing heavily, as if she had run through pouring rain.

“Was there something else?” He asked, turning off the music and switching on the studio mike.

“You just finished a live show?” Mariann asked.

“Yes.”

Suddenly Allan felt strange. There was something in the girl in front of her that did not suit him.

“You were here, weren’t you?”

“That was not me who was here.” The girl in black replied.

Despite her heavy breathing she was calm. As if there was nothing new in the possibility that her doppelgänger was walking around the town.

“I just rushed here from Tontla. I started coming before the show ended.”

“You. From Tontla?” Allan asked, dumbfounded.

“Yes. I cane to see what’s going on, because the show I was hearing from the radio was not exactly the show we recorded.”

“That’s some kind of joke, right?” Allan asked. “We have never before met or hosted a show together. Tonight was the first time.”

“Very interesting.” Mariann smiled. “In that case I apologize, I have come too soon. We have not really met yet.”

“What?!”

Allan indeed was disturbed. Mariann who had just burst into the studio was not the same girl who had just left. And she also mentioned an interview and a meeting which had never happened.

Suddenly, Mariann noticed the red light on the wall of the studio.

“We’re live right now, aren’t we?” She asked.

“What? Yes. Yes, we are.”

“Well, that’s gonna be really interesting to the Mariann who is still sitting in a bar in Tontla.”

With these last words, the girl in black stepped out of the room and closed the door.

Allan was left sitting in the studio, still dumbfounded. He sat for a few more seconds before jumping up from his seat and rushing out of the studio. He ran to the front door following the wet footsteps and stepped into a warm dry night. No downpour, not even clouds. Clear black sky full of stars. An empty street with not a soul in sight.