The Dedalus Book of Finnish Fantasy

by Johanna Sinisalo

  Shortly after this he began to lose his authority over the slaves. They had become aggressive, primitive like animals; on one occasion he had been forced to save himself by darting out of the door midway through their morning thrashing and his left jacket sleeve had been ripped off in the struggle. He immediately contacted the team of welders. After only a few hours they glumly appeared, dragging their gas cylinders behind them, unlit hand-rolled cigarettes and empty cigarette holders drooping from the sides of their mouths, their loose overalls covered in metallic dust. They welded the door shut, climbed on top of the cage and cut a hatch in the roof. At Werner’s request one of them felled two young spruces and fashioned a step ladder to give him unhindered access to the hatch. That day the sun was shining intensely; everyone was puffing with exertion and the air was stifling. Werner was forced to go to the garage on countless occasions to cool off. Only later that evening did he tar the step ladder.

  Since, after this turn of events, Werner could no longer – indeed, he dared no longer venture into the cage, he could also no longer whip them. This made him very unhappy. He did however gain some amount of pleasure from a sturdy, thin staff, one end of which he had filed to a point. And thus maintaining his familiar routine he would climb up to the hatch to stab and poke his slaves. Putting out their eyes was in fact a particularly challenging sport, requiring both accuracy and a steady hand. Despite this he was highly frustrated at being unable to blind a single eye on one of the slaves who had five in a row on its forehead. It always dodged out of the way just as Werner was about to stab it. He was starting to lose his temper, and was on the verge of leaping on top of the thing to be able to gouge out just one of those five eyes.

  Exhausted and furious, Werner would often trudge back to his castle and fall asleep in the first available place. All he ever dreamt about was cracked plaster busts, fresh knives and flies; waking in a cold sweat, he would rush down to the shooting range in an attempt to drown out the terrible beating of his heart. His general state of health had suffered dramatically due to the unforeseen changes to his routine with the slaves.

  And so it was that these difficult nights gradually began to occur with increasing frequency: the wind howled, the climbing plants rattled at the window and long-clawed shadows scraped along the wallpaper in his bedroom (alternately the room with the delicate brig hanging from the ceiling, and the room with the oriental cushions or reproductions thereof). On one such night Werner felt rather weak and could not sleep. He made himself a hot drink, smoked profusely and marched around the grand hall with heavy, deafening steps. The owl still lay on his desk (he had moved his desk into the hall) and he stopped to examine it. As he looked at it he saw a dark little insect crawl across one of the owl’s glass eyes, leaving behind it a thin trail through the dust. And as he took a closer look at the feathers around its head and wings propped up with steel wire he noticed these creatures everywhere. This made him very sad indeed, and he decided to acquire some strong chemicals to destroy the infestation straight after his morning duties, and to stay in the woods as long as was necessary to find a suitable branch.

  Early that morning (it was in fact still night-time) he climbed up on to the roof of the cage, opened the hatch and began hurling down buckets full of rotten meat. He managed to herd the slaves into a group so he could scratch and cut as many of them as possible with one blow. He lay on his stomach staring inside, shouting, battering them in a frenzy; they all seemed so limp and lifeless. But suddenly the five-eyed slave gave some sort of signal, and all at once a dozen or so slaves, all resembling monkeys, formed a carefully planned pyramid, and the two at the top grabbed Werner by the head. Werner clasped the grating as hard as he could but the force of the slaves was overwhelming. He was wrenched inside the cage. The slaves helped each other up the pyramid, pulling the last of their group up by the hands and jumping down to the ground. The five-eyed, former slave remained by the hatch; a moment passed and he was handed a large, jagged stone. He hurled it with all his might at Werner’s face, knocking him to the ground beside the pile of rotten meat. And before he finally lost consciousness Werner’s thoughts turned once again to the poor owl, which was at that moment being consumed by pests and which would never have its branch or be placed proudly on display after all.

  Transit

  Johanna Sinisalo

  Johanna Sinisalo (born 1958) has written novels, short stories, essays and comic strips in addition to pursuing a career as a screenwriter. Her novel Not Before Sundown (‘Ennen päivänlaskua ei voi’, published in North America under the title Troll – A Love Story) was awarded the Finlandia Prize in 2000 and has since been translated into many different languages. In addition to this her short stories have seven times won the Atorox Prize for best science fiction or fantasy short story of the year. Sinisalo’s works often deal with themes such as the struggle between humanity and nature, the problems of otherness, power structures within society and the subjective nature of reality. ‘Transit’ was first published in the short story anthology Ensimmäinen yhteys (‘First Contact’, 1988).

  Handler: Lamminmäki / pk

  Subject: Transcript of dictated confession of Klaus Antero Viksten, arrived in custody 14.7; awaiting trial.

  (Heavy breathing. Thud. Deep breaths.)

  Alright. Alright. (Pause.) Okay. Doesn’t matter, I’ll still be locked up for the rest of my life, so it won’t make any difference if I talk now – is this thing recording? Sounds like it’s running. (Nervous chuckle.) I don’t know what they’re going to try and pin on me, but the only thing I can be charged with is destroying public property or something, not manslaughter. I’m not a murderer; definitely not that kind of murderer. I know you can’t make head nor tail of what I’m saying, so there’s no reason I should start talking now either, but I’ve got to get it into your thick skulls that I’m not a fucking murderer. Everything was sweet right up to the end, every second of it.

  I was with these guys Kaarina and Hepe, we’d just left their place – we’d been doing a few tabs and drinking lager all evening and by this point we were having a really good time, knocking each other about on the grass and laughing like lunatics, it was fantastic, we were tripping out of our heads on gear and the night air, and so they wanted to go somewhere and have another few drinks but I was out of cash and I really wanted some action, something more that just sitting cooped up inside all night knocking back the pints. I thought I might go over to the Square and hang out and see if any of my mates were about. I knew Kapa and Remmi had been let out of the nick and they might have some plans, a bit of gear or a party or some job on the go – I was skint, did I say that? Anyway, I swung down into town, still kind of floating, and just by the station hill these three big blokes came up to me, fancy Lacoste shirts, white trousers, the lot; the air was really warm, it was probably still about twenty-five degrees even though it was eleven o’clock or something. So these Lacoste guys started looking at me like I’m a piece of shit, but I was having such a blast I went up to them and asked them if they’d got a problem. One of them said something like keep it shut mate, and it was just what I’d been waiting for, so I smacked one of them right in the face and he flew arse over tit and got grey scuff marks on the backside of his trousers, heh heh. The other two were on top of me right away, but I was really quick ’cause I’d taken some speed and I started legging it down the hill towards the station and I was sure they wouldn’t bother chasing me, but then one of them came after me like a sprinter. Jesus, I’ve never run that fast, it was a close thing he didn’t catch me, followed me through the underpass too, I could hear him breathing behind me and then I saw a police car turn into the tunnel at the other end and the bloke started shouting and trying to flag down the old bill, so I thought I’d better get the fuck out of there; I ran out in front of a car, jumped across the road and headed off towards Stockmann’s, and just as I came out there was a bus, the number sixteen, it was there at the bus stop just about to pull away and I managed to slip in the doo
rs just before they closed. I’ve got a season ticket, so I dug it out of my pocket, showed it to the driver and the bus drove off, and I knew the bloke hadn’t made it.

  I sat down, I was totally out of breath, and wondered where I should get off so they wouldn’t be able to follow me, some place soon, and so when the bus turned round by the old swimming pool I jumped off and stood in the bus shelter for a minute. My head was still spinning, my heart was going like the clappers and I wandered off towards Amuri as if nothing had happened, I thought no one’ll be able to link me to the fight if I just walk off like normal. I soon got down to the railway tracks and thought I might walk carefully back into town, down to Raatsa maybe, so I made a left and thought I’d go just to be on the safe side and sit in the park at Näsinpuisto for a minute until the pigs had given up looking for me. I walked up the hill and went and sat under a tree, a bit hidden away, and looked down towards the harbour and the amusement park at Särkänniemi, where there were still lights flashing and things going on – it was like watching a giant anthill in the distance.

  I’d just lit up when the girl appeared. At first all I could see was a figure against the darkening sky, thin with short hair, walking right towards me. I was convinced she must have thought I was someone else, the way she was walking up to me, but then she came up under the tree and sat down next to me. She didn’t say anything, she just looked me right in the eyes. And I’ve never, never seen anyone look at me like that before, I looked back into her eyes and it was like looking down two tunnels with light flickering at the end, but still they were normal eyes – the way she looked at me, it was like someone had punched me in the stomach. And at that same moment I was sure as hell she was the most amazing bird I’d ever seen. The woman of my dreams. I mean, she was sort of … (unclear; voice falters) I could never have done something like that to her, I couldn’t have … (unclear). And then she started talking. (Thud. Heavy breathing. Long silence.)

  Handler(s): Lamminmäki and Eerola / pk

  Subject: Transcript of interview with care worker Airi Kurkinen

  Q: Can you expand, in your own words, on Nina Salminen’s diagnosis?

  A: She is autistic.

  Q: Could you please explain the term?

  A: An autistic child shuts off any contact with the outside world. In other respects they develop normally, but at a given age we notice that they have stopped developing mentally. Or rather, it’s difficult to assess the stage of a child’s mental development, because the child will stop all communication with his or her surroundings. Physical symptoms, such as spasms, are often linked to this. What’s decisive, however, is the fact that the child stops learning, stops being able to master new skills, and often stops speaking.

  Q: What exactly causes these symptoms?

  A: Can you tell me what this is all about? What has happened?

  Q: I’m sorry, Miss Kurkinen, but could you please answer a few more questions?

  A:  …

  Q: How did Nina Salminen develop this … this autism?

  A: At the age of two Nina stopped learning to speak. For a while she regressed to the nappy stage, but thankfully we’ve managed to toilet-train her again – it’s an exceptional achievement. She then became completely shut off in her own world. She no longer recognised her parents. Most autistic children never reach Nina’s age. Essentially they stop living altogether.

  Q: Do we know why this happens?

  A: It’s very unclear. People have tried to isolate certain physical factors or psychological triggers, but there’s no simple answer. Sometimes we wonder whether the child makes a conscious decision to sever all ties with the rest of the world, to be on the outside and not to function according to ‘normal’ rules. Some autistic children speak a language of their own which no one else can understand. They often behave in a self-destructive manner. They can be violent. There are no fixed rules except for the unassailable gap between them and us.

  Q: You look after Nina Salminen. What does caring for her entail?

  A: Nina is neither violent nor self-destructive. She cannot speak. She spends most of her time lying on her side staring into space. She won’t make contact with anyone, but doesn’t try to resist being fed or taken to the toilet. I’ve been caring for her since she was four years old, so for about the last ten years. Her parents cover all the costs.

  Q: You said that Nina cannot speak. Are you quite sure of this?

  A: Are you suggesting that after ten years of caring for her such a minor detail might have gone unnoticed?

  Q: You said that autistic children sever all ties with the outside world. Would it still be possible for a child like this to carry on learning things, but simply not to make use of their learning or to reveal it in any way?

  A: Are you completely … ? Mmm, what an odd question. No, I don’t think so. No. Of course, all their senses function normally, and of course it’s possible that they register something of the world around them, but they do this entirely on their own terms. It has never been observed of autistic children that they merely pretend not to learn. I find this quite an offensive way to consider such a serious psychological defect.

  Q: So Nina Salminen could not function in any way without the constant supervision of a professional carer?

  A: No.

  Q: How would you describe the level of her mental development?

  A: She has the abilities of approximately a two-year-old child. She can walk, she doesn’t wet herself as long as she is taken to the toilet regularly. She could say a few words before she became ill; now all she can produce is gurgling throat noises and screams. They don’t have any communicative value, they are merely a form of … self-expression. She has to be fed.

  A: So, in effect, it would be impossible for her to survive by herself?

  Q: Think how well a sick toddler would survive! Not at all. Of course, Nina is the size of a fourteen-year-old and is physically much stronger than she is mentally, but the situation is still serious, very serious indeed. So could you please bring this farce to an end and tell me what’s going on?

  A: If you would bear with us, Miss Kurkinen. What time was it when you discovered she was missing?

  Handler: Lamminmäki / pk

  Subject: Transcript of dictated confession of Klaus Antero Viksten, arrived in custody 14.7; awaiting trial.

  (Breathing, crackling in microphone.)

  She said her name was Nina. Right from the start I was sure she was out of it too, and I wondered what it was she’d been taking; I decided she must have been smoking pot or something. Whatever it was she’d had quite a bit ’cause her speech was really slow and deliberate, like she really had to think about every word, how to say it and what it meant – I know what it feels like, I’ve knocked myself out like that plenty of times.

  She had a short blond plait and a face like an angel: I don’t mean pretty, I mean it was just as if none of the world’s shit had ever touched her. And her clothes were fairly odd, too: this was no trend-setting young lady, she was bare-foot in a pink tracksuit. I could still feel the tabs whirring round my head; I put my arm around her and thought I’d try my luck, but she just kept staring at me and smiling and then having another look, and she was talking well out of line. I watched her lips as she struggled to speak, then she said if I help her out with something she’ll be my friend forever. Friend, Jesus Christ, friend! She was quite some bird for someone who looked that innocent. First she said we’d need a car, a big car, and that I should go and find us one.

  I started thinking this was just the sort of action I’d been looking for that night, doing something completely mental with a fantastic girl with real fire in her eyes – we could do anything, something totally hardcore. A car, of course we’d need a car, a big car. It must have been just after midnight by this point and things were quietening down, and I knew a few little places where we’d find ourselves a car – I’ve done enough car jobs to know what I’m doing.


  The girl said she’d wait in the park and I didn’t really want to leave her, but then again I did believe she’d wait, so I ran off to find us a motor. It only took me fifteen minutes to find a big, extended Transit van, ten to pick the lock and another ten to attach the jump leads. It had a full tank and the back was empty apart from a few sheets of veneer and a tarpaulin. I sped out of the carpark on two wheels and started driving like a nutter back to Näsinpuisto, and sure enough the girl was still there: I can’t remember ever feeling so excited as when I saw that figure sitting exactly where I’d left her under the tree.

  She jumped in and told me what she needed next. It was so mental I slapped my thighs and laughed out loud. Christ, she wanted boxes. Big boxes and superlon mattresses. I thought to myself this is some fucking girl; she didn’t say a word about what she was going to do with them, she just told me what to do and that was that. She seemed like she was really in her element. I drove over to some warehouse belonging to a removal company my mate Remmi used to work for, I knew they’d have big wooden chests and things, a couple of cubic metres deep inside, iron reinforcements down the edges. Probably normally used for packing smaller items in polystyrene or something. I parked the van right outside the gate; it’s a good job it was Saturday and there was no one on a late shift. The warehouse was like a barn, we might as well have crawled under the door, it was so easy to get in. I had to pick an old lock they had, but after that the path was clear. There were no guards or cameras, but there wasn’t anything of any real value either. I asked Nina how many chests she wanted and she said five – straight up. Okay, so we slipped inside and carried five of these chests back into the Transit. They just about filled the back of the van. I was laughing so hard the heavy boxes almost fell on her toes. She must have been pretty strong, I mean, she looked thin and that, but she carried those chests like you wouldn’t believe.