Hannes switched back to mental standby. Suddenly the living room door opened and Ibby came in. She had put on a T-shirt for a change and had a glass in her hand in which a green liquid was sloshing. Hannes sat down so that Ibby could sit next to him. She noticed that Hannes looked at the glass and held it out to him, he smelled it: "A kind of smoothie, it smelled like vegetables, but had a sharp and sour undertone. Certainly very healthy. There was a straw in the glass. Ibby sat down with Hannes, too close, actually. He moved a bit to the side. Ibby noticed this, looked at Hannes, but stayed in her seat.
Hannes drank beer and Ibby sipped her drink from the straw. The two sat on the sofa, Hannes in mental standby and Ibby straight as a die and attentive. The professor's voice from the television mixed with Ibby's slurping to create a sound mélange that made Hannes tired. Ibby placed the glass on the living room table and now leaned back, still following the show attentively. Hannes closed his eyes.
He suddenly woke up from a loud whistle and several strange clicks Ibby made. It took him a moment to orient himself, then he saw Ibby, sitting as straight as a candle on the edge of the sofa, looking almost stunned at the TV screen, a photo was faded in that had been taken by the Hubble Space Telescope, and the professor stood in front of the big photo and told. When Ibby realized that Hannes was awake again, she grabbed his arm, pressed it very tightly, so Hannes was very quickly awake and alert, and sat straight down; and Ibby pointed to a corner of the screen, to a corner of the photo, kept looking at Hannes and then at the screen, making clattering and clicking sounds, and when the photo was faded out again, Ibby let go of Hannes, relaxed, crooked her back, slapped her hands in front of her face, and started crying.
The crying and sobbing sounded horribly human to Hannes. He didn't know what to think of this performance. On the one hand, he felt embarrassed, looked at Ibby crying, but a voice in his head warned him that this could also be some kind of spectacle. The warning voice became louder and louder. Ibby makes a scene, he thought, it can't be that she recognized something in the photo that makes her cry. And why can she even cry?
But once again he felt he had to take care of Ibby, that he had to comfort her, perhaps just to stop the crying. He moved up to her and put her arm around her shoulders a little lefty. So, they both sat on the sofa for a while and Ibby calmed down slowly.
With one last breath, Ibby straightened up again and looked at him. Strangely enough, her face seemed swollen, especially around the eyes, and he saw that her eyes, her black, almond-shaped eyes, floated in tears without irises. This caused Hannes to have such a massive feeling of strangeness and disagreement that he let go of Ibby and moved away from her in one sentence. Ibby looked at him and started crying again.
Hannes had the feeling of being torn apart, as a massive separation between what he saw and what he interpreted. He felt helpless. As the feeling passed, he sat down with Ibby again and took her in his arms. Ibby replied to the hug and howled at Hannes at the chest.
After Ibby calmed down and stared at the TV again, Hannes got another beer with a strange feeling in his throat. The program now showed a kind of competition in which one of two groups had to paint terms on a digital device and the other had to guess what was drawn there.
There were a big hello and noise in the show, this was hardly noticed by Hannes, who had to fight against the tiredness, not by Ibby either, who watched attentively and then bumped Hannes with one hand. Hannes stood up scared. Ibby pointed to the show and made the gesture as if she was painting something. Hannes understood, went to the living room cupboard and rummaged for a while in drawers, then came back with a notebook and a few pens. Ibby turned on the living room lights and turned off the TV.
She sat next to Hannes, put the notebook on the table and began to draw. When she was done, she showed Hannes the drawing. It was the sketch from the detail of the photo she had pointed to. An arrow pointed to a star. Ibby pointed to himself and then to the star. Hannes looked at the drawing with a frowned forehead; he had no idea where it could be and how far away it could be. He was thinking. From his knowledge gained from television broadcasts, he knew that the speed of light was the maximum speed in space. He thought hard about it. So, if there are a space-traveling species, he thought, then it should be aware of this limitation of speed. What's the best way to say that? With Einstein's formula. So, he wrote E=mc2. Ibby saw this and stroked it through resolutely. All right. Kill Einstein's great legacy in one fell swoop. Hannes looked at her. She underlined the "E," thought about it briefly, and then she painted a large circle on a new sheet, a small circle at a distance. Between the two circles, she drew a double arrow, pointed to the living room light and wrote something about the arrow. The writing could not be deciphered, it reminded, Hannes found, rather of a cuneiform writing or angular Arabic writing. She pointed to the small circle and then to the ground, but Hannes had already grasped earth - sun.
He knew that the distance earth-sun can also be measured in minutes of light. So, he wrote under the double arrow "8 minutes - 8 min".
He went to the clock that was hanging on the wall, got it and put it on the table. When the second hand had crossed the 12 and continued running, Hannes pointed to the 12, then he waited a minute and painted on the paper the minute sign as a simple line, he then completed his explanation with "8' ". Ibby nodded.
Hannes went on and wrote on the paper: "1h = 3600' ". Ibby nodded impatiently. Hannes wrote further: "1d = 1.440'", including "1d = 24h". Ibby made him understand that she had understood, and he wrote "1y = 34557600'".
Ibby looked at him smiling. He continued to write and wondered whether she would understand this in his language with his signs and his writing. He pointed to the living room light and then wrote, "1LY = 9.46 * 1015". Hannes started to make this fun. He pointed to the two circles and then wrote under the double arrow "1 AE". Then "1LY = 63241,077 AU"
Ibby laughed, then wrote slowly with awkward and shaky writing under Hannes remarks: "63241,0770844266280269".
Ibby dropped the pin and looked at Hannes with a look that was no other than triumphant. Hannes was perplexed. He pinched his eyes together and painted a circle on a new sheet of paper, then pointed to himself, wrote "Hannes" on the circle, then painted another circle in a corner, pointed to Ibby, wrote "Ibby" on the paper. Then he drew a double arrow between the two circles and looked at Ibby, handed her the pen. She took the pencil, looked at the paper for a long time, then painted "12LY."
She looked at the paper for a long time, dropped the pencil and rolled thick tears down her cheeks again. Twelve light-years away was her home system, if he had understood that correctly and Ibby had understood his remarks correctly. Twelve light-years, that was already a house number, he found. He went into the kitchen, took two saucers out of the closet, went back to Ibby. He nudged her and when she looked at him, he pointed to Ibby's circle, then to his, superimposed the two saucers so that they looked like a UFO, then moved the UFO in exaggerated trajectories from their circle to his. Finally, he let the UFO land, pointed at her and made a questioning facial expression. He had probably surprised Ibby, because in her crying she mixed her cooing laughter, but again with her hand in front of her. She shook her head and painted a large rectangular spaceship on the paper, with many small windows on the side, with propulsion at the stern and large windows at the bow. Then she made the gesture of baby swinging in her arm, then she stood up and imitated the walk of an old man, being. When Hannes nodded, she painted a circle in the air, then several, with a sweeping arm movement. Hannes had realized A big spaceship, a generation spaceship. Impressed Hannes nodded and Ibby sat down again.
The question of why she was here was too complicated for Hannes, but more importantly, the question of whether she would fly back to her homeland. He pointed to Ibby on the saucer, then to the circle that was to represent Ibby's homeland. Ibby looked at him with big eyes and shook his head slowly. Never back, never home. Hannes threw the pen on the table, leaned back and thought.
&n
bsp; He could understand the sadness and homesickness that Ibby felt but wondered why she was here and why she didn't fly back. She couldn't? Was there no connection to her "people" anymore? Were there any technical difficulties? Or was she in trouble? Maybe their planet, their star system no longer existed? Question after question, Hannes thought, and no solution in sight. Not that he wanted Ibby to "call home" right away, no, if she wanted to, maybe she could stay a little longer until she ... yeah, what? Until what? Frightened, he noticed that the thought that Ibby would fly away again triggered a clear feeling of unease in him.
Hannes stared into space. He didn't want Ibby to fly, leave him. He had not only become accustomed to her, despite the strange circumstances; he would miss her.
Ibby was still sitting bent over the paper at the table. Hannes leaned forward and put her arm around her shoulders. He wanted to give a comforting kiss to her forehead or temple when she stood up a little bit. But Ibby, perhaps torn from her thoughts, or intentionally, turned her head at that moment, raised it slightly and Hannes kissed her on the mouth. Surprised Hannes jerked back, he didn't really want that, but he realized that it wasn't so bad and kissed her again.
A little embarrassed he then looked into her face, stood up, didn't really know what to do now, wished her a good night and went to the bathroom. He got ready for bed and lay down. He waited a while to see if anything would happen, but Ibby wanted to sleep in the living room, he heard her in the bathroom for a while and then not anymore. He thought that before he fell asleep if she had been angry or found it inappropriate, he would have felt the claws in her face or back. So, she slept in the living room ...
But Ibby couldn't sleep. Not because she was sick with homesickness, or because she was angry with Hannes, she couldn't sleep because she had a strange feeling in her digestive organs. She lay down on the sofa, then got up again, went to the window, looked out, lay down again, got up again, cleaned up the living room table, lay down again, got up again, went to the window and looked out, lost in thought, until she was tired enough to sleep.
The strange feeling didn't go away.
Christmas market
Hannes woke up early at seven. He stayed in bed for a while, then got up and went to the bathroom. When he was done, he had an enormous thirst for coffee. He went into the kitchen, yawning, made himself a cup and stepped with his cup to the window. It had not snowed, but the hoarfrost was everywhere on the trees, on the cars, and on the roofs. The sun had already risen over the roofs of the houses, the sky was cloudless. It would be a beautiful day, cold and clear. He sat down at the table, looking at the advertising newspaper he had carelessly put away yesterday. He noticed that since the time Ibby had lived here, he hadn't looked at a single newspaper (except for the hasty research about what happened in the brewery cellar) and hadn't seen any news on TV.
Recently, with everything that had happened, Hannes, as he admitted, had thrown himself into a kind of time bubble, perhaps space-time bubble. He became aware of the bizarreness of the situation when he sat alone in the kitchen drinking his coffee. Ibby wasn't there. He looked around. Ibby wasn't there? He got up. Normally, Ibby was always awake from him.
He stopped in amazement. Was she sick? Or was she pissed because he gave her a kiss? For a moment he thought of Sabine's fate, but he felt quite well and saw no signs of beginning madness in himself. He went to the living room door and opened it quietly. Ibby lay on the sofa, contrary to her habit of only covering herself with a light blanket, she had rolled herself up tightly in Hannes' duvet, which he used in the living room for three weeks. He grinned and listened, whether she was snoring or something else was to be heard, but there was silence. Slowly he went to the sofa, wondering if he should wake her. He stopped in front of her. If he woke her, it could be, he thought she'd get scared. She could extend her claws, then throw herself around and he would make acquaintance with them. An unpleasant thought.
He squatted in front of the sofa, hesitated for a moment and then touched her shoulders, whispering "Hello, Ibby, get up. "late risers..." Ibby turned around in a flash, pulled her arms out of the ceiling, looked at Hannes and then, before Hannes knew what was happening to him, wrapped her arms around him and pulled him in. Hannes didn't fight back and so they both stayed for a while, Hannes squatting in front of the sofa, cheek to cheek with Ibby still lying on the sofa.
Mike had woken up a lot earlier. He had been up since four o'clock, had called room service, had breakfast and had set off to walk around the waking city a little and get a clear head. The morning was clear and cold, frost was everywhere. Mike decided to go to the Rhine. He walked past the TU towards the ‘Deutzer Bridge’, then turned onto ‘Siegburger Street’ and went through the small green area to the river. Lost in thought he stared at the Rhine, which glittered in the darkness. He looked at the lights of the city, then looked at the Rhine again. Thickly wrapped up in his coat, he then walked a bit upstream, discovered a stone staircase, sat down.
He was sorry about the cell man thing. He had lost control, but it had been important that the cell phone man talked. He hadn't talked much, but the information Mike had received was at least a start. Mike hadn't heard from the cell phone man since their paths had separated before the Sünner, Mike had used the opportunity to block Target One's account, and his aide, a nimble fellow, had arranged in a brief conversation with the head of Target One that Target One was now without work. Means: No money, no work, maybe, Mike hoped, there would be some kind of group frenzy; Target One might realize who or better what he had brought into the house and above all: That it wasn't good for him to house Target Two. Unfortunately, thoughts of the forthcoming meeting with the representative of the greats in Mike's brain now crept up.
He didn't want to think about it. Mike had learned a lot about people in the long years of his service. He was nervous about this meeting; not because he would meet that representative, no, because even the cell phone man was nervous. This was rare, no Mike corrected himself, this had never happened before. But now the cell man was nervous. This nervousness was well concealed by the cell phone man so that nobody noticed anything, but Mike recognized the small, subtle signs of nervousness, perhaps a little fear. In a strange way, this reassured Mike. Even the cell man was nervous. Mike smiled. Today, he thought, was Friday, and there was time until Tuesday. The two targets could not do much; if Target One still had cash reserves, it would have to be extremely economical, so they could not go out, can’t do anything, would basically be shut down. Mike assumed that the two were stuck in their apartment and that maybe they were really getting on each other's nerves.
Mike decided that the two were under control and decided to work all day today as usual; there were other things he had to take care of and tonight, he thought, he could go to the Christmas market that opened today and maybe take a woman from the escort with him, of course at "company expense", and have a good time with a few cups of mulled wine. Mike went back to the hotel, changed his clothes so that he was back in uniform and went to the police headquarters at six o'clock to his office, which was specially provided for him. He sat down in his chair, asked his secretary for a pot of coffee, started his computer and begun working.
When Mike paused shortly after eight, got up, went to the window and looked out at the city, he imagined that the two targets were going out of the way, but this didn't work out and he imagined that Target One was losing patience and Target Two was just going to go outside. Mike imagined that Target Two would not comply with this wish and become aggressive, maybe even Target One would tear open his chest and throw his heart in front of his feet. Mike thought that satisfied would solve a big problem.
At that moment Ibby loosened her grip around Hannes so that he could stand up a little and kissed Hannes as she had kissed the blonde woman. He got a little dizzy, but nothing else happened. No heart attack, no stroke, no incipient delusions or strange thoughts. Hannes got up and sat down next to Ibby on the sofa. Ibby also seemed unsure what should happen n
ow, exactly like Hannes, and both agreed that nothing should happen. Ibby had closed his eyes and lay on the sofa, Hannes looked out of the window into the void. Sometime Ibby felt for Hannes's hand and held it.
Ibby got up after all. She dashed into the bathroom, Hannes heard her take a shower and he himself went into the kitchen, waiting for Ibby. His gaze fell on the newspaper again, he took it and leafed through it thoughtlessly. The announcement that the Christmas market on the hay market would open today caught his eye. Hannes looked up and looked out the window. He was already in public with Ibby and nobody was interested in them. In the dark, Ibby would stand out through her sunglasses, but otherwise? Sunglasses in winter? Why not? Why not? Under certain circumstances, it would be possible to have glasses with mirrored lenses ... No, that would be too conspicuous. You could perhaps go to the Christmas market later in the evening if the alcohol level among the visitors had risen exponentially ... Also, no way who knows what would happen then. Hannes, at a normal time, decided to go to the "Angels' Market" with Ibby at about seven o'clock p.m., perhaps a few mulled wines, certainly a few Koelsch, a bratwurst, hot from the grill, then something else tasty. The only problem was how to get Ibby to go to the Christmas market tonight.
But the problem didn't arise. Ibby came out of the bathroom, naked again this time, with still-wet hair. She sat down and looked at him. Hannes looked back, with a strange feeling in his stomach. Not because they had approached each other so easily and as a matter of course, it wasn't, it was strangeness. Her face, which in its shape differed only slightly from the normal human face, the nose, which was only slightly differently shaped. He closed his eyes and imagined Ibby with blue or brown eyes, with eyebrows instead of the bone structure above his eyes. He imagined that Ibby could talk and that he would talk to her.
E.B.E. 21- the Hunt Page 17