15. STALIN’S DAGGER AND CAFÉ CENTRAL

I like magic! Early next morning I was dreaming. That is I believed I was dreaming. As on the previous days, some early morning birds were chirping so I am not sure. When I turned around in bed, the small box was there once again. Nothing rattled inside. I opened the box. There were some sheets of paper. I wanted to read chapter 15.

15. STALIN’S DAGGER AND CAFÉ CENTRAL

Inside Café Central in Herrengasse cigar smoke was drifting over the tables. Jill and John stood in the doorway. The time traveller appeared behind them.

-          Sshh! the time traveller said. – We are not allowed to be here. We have been here before, so you should know about this. Just look around, but say nothing. Do you recognize some of the customers?

-          Isn’t it Sigmund Freud sitting there sipping to a cup of coffee, Jill whispered.

-          He is one of the regulars, together with Victor Adler. There is a story from Café Central that Adler objected to Count Berchtold, the foreign minister of Austria-Hungary that war would provoke revolution in Russia. - Who will lead this revolution, Berchtold asked. - Perhaps Mr. Bronstein sitting over there, Adler answered.

-          What time is this, John said.

-          We are in January 1913. Take care.

-          That shabby person in the corner sitting together with the pockmarked man. I could swear it was a younger version of Adolf Hitler, Jill asked.

The cigar smoke grew thicker, and very soon, Café Central was only a shimmering mirage enveloped in the fabric of time.

A radiant sun made the colours of flowers, leaves, and nature more vivid than the three of them had ever seen.

-          Where are we? What time is it, Jill wondered.

-          Café Central and its guests, and the millennia after are long gone.

-          What happened?

-          You remember the café was full of smoke? I managed to get my hands on Stalin’s dagger and made it very blunt. Disasters followed, but not as bad as expected. In the aftermath of the Second World War, fear started to rule the minds of people, and it never stopped. Contagious viral and bacterial diseases were uses by fearmongering factions. The bubonic plague around 1350 could happen once again. As for weather anomalies, which were normal before, science explained that a devastating climate change was approaching. None of this was true. The average temperature on earth was a tad warmer, leading to more rain and snow. Due to more snow, glaciers were growing. Thousands of years later the land and sea at high latitudes were as white and cold as during past ice ages. More than hundred thousand years later, we are here. The air is clear and fragrant. In the night, thousands of stars are visible in the sky.

-          What about Stalin’s dagger, Jill and John wanted to know.

-          It disappeared, and has never since been found. The glaciers pushed forward and annihilated or made uninhabitable many of the urban areas in the northern and far southern hemisphere. More land was covered by ice than during the ice age preceding the last one.

-          What was the fate of all the millions who had to move because of the big freeze?

-          Nobody knows for sure. Physics made leaps forward at the time the glaciers started growing. Scientists said that the future for humanity was in space, but the problem was how to travel through the enormous distances. Eventually antimatter was controlled and used as propellant in space vehicles. This made it possible to travel with the speed of light. For many hundred years, there was an exodus in all directions. Where those expeditions are now, is unknown. There has been no contact. However, that was what science expected due to the enormous distances in space.

-          I am sure everybody did not leave, but where are they?

John looked at the time traveller.

-          No, quite a few millions stayed behind. Somehow, they cooperated and formed the nation of Middle Earth. They are still here after the glaciers melted back. First plants, insects and animals followed the ice. Then people. The main goal of Middle Earth is to learn from the errors of past times.

A cold wind from the north brought grey mist, which covered everything.

-          We have been sleeping, Jill exclaimed. – Did you have the same dream as me about Middle Earth?

John nodded and splashed some water from a nearby stream in his face.

End of chapter 15. To be continued in chapter 16.