Alyona Gryoz - Mark Makkfein and the Find

– This is the Flower of the Moon. Or just a lunocvet, said Bruno because of my back. – My wife adores them. She says they take the nightmares out at night, and the broth of the fallen leaves makes the hair shine. At night, they open up, and they exude radiant pollen, and they illuminate the whole yard. You’ll see for yourself at night. My wife Leland got tired of insomnia and decided to plant these flowers, and she’s been sleeping like a baby ever since.

I can’t describe all the wonderful things we saw when we came in. Like kids on rides, Christina and I opened our mouths with surprise. We walked along the winding corridors of the house. However, some things were quite familiar: carpets, tables, rocking chairs. Everywhere you could see different pillows of different sizes, they were used instead of chairs. There were no sharp corners, all the furniture was round. The pillows in the various shapes on which they were sitting were covered with material reminiscent of white satin, making them look like the house outside.

Bruno brought us to the dining room. In the dining room around the huge white round table, there were the same huge pillows, only the already gentle blue shade and the beige. Conveniently arranged on pillows, Christina and I began to look at the spacious dining room. On the rounded windows (or rather behind them, because the curtains were outside) there were clear curtains, like wings of a dragonfly. There was a big, soft blue carpet on the floor with an intricate white pattern, like frost on the windows in the morning. The walls are covered with matter, but no longer satin, but suede into a blue strip. The dining room was more like a bedroom, but it’s only by our Earth standards.

Christina and I didn’t even notice Bruno leaving the dining room. When he came back, he told us that all the children of this house would be eating here soon. Twenty of them. So we’d better move to his office, or we won’t be able to talk about anything serious.

Once again, we walked through all these wonderful corridors with fluffy carpets of blue, yellow, pink. There was also a rounded, beige-shaped table in the study. The whole room was kept in light sand tones. I sat in one of the big chairs, Christina – on the contrary… she looked strange. When did she change her appearance?! Bruno noticed my astonishment, followed my gaze and smiled. Christina couldn’t help but notice my not-so-adequate surprise.

– Is something wrong with me? – She asked.

Christina's hair acquired its natural color, a light wheat shade, and became very lush, long, as if they had never known all the abuses of perhydrol to which their owner subjected them.

The vulgar makeup in acid tones disappeared, and the face became quite nice, even you could consider it beautiful. But Christina herself froze in horror when she pulled a mirror from her purse.

– Nothing surprising, Bruno said. – Nothing to be surprised. It happens to everyone, especially the women who are on the planet Mertsella. Yeah, all the artificial paint in the hair and makeup was gone. Good thing the clothes didn’t dissolve, so was that. Mertsella likes to take a man in his original form, like nature made him. There’s paint on Mertsella if you need to fix it.

– What a horror, give more of those colors! – Christina screamed in a panic.

– And not a horror, I said. – That’s better. Why, did you have lenses? Your eyes became grey.

– Are you kidding me! – Is it better? – Squinting, asking Christina, – You just want to mock! Bruno, he thinks I’m ugly!

– You’re like children, – Bruno sighs.

– I didn’t say anything like that at all, – I did. – Quite the opposite! Without a huge layer of makeup, it’s better.

– And you, Bruno! Why are you wearing makeup?! – threw an angry look at poor Bruno Christina.

– It’s not makeup, it’s what we do when we go out and take a few magical maneuvers – coloring ourselves with clays of different shades, but it has nothing to do with women. The women are getting prettier since the first day on Mertsella, so they don’t have to do such nonsense as coloring their face if they don’t have to do some magical thing.

Christina was devastated, how she’ll live without her lipstick and powder. Bruno sat at the table on the sofa, and we decided to start our conversation.

– Get to the point, said Bruno.

We were brought a large cup of drink, which here beautifully called «Farbinosto», but it was very similar to coffee.

– So, – said Bruno. – You’re on this planet for a reason, but you, Mark…

– What, my visit was scheduled? I thought it was a wild accident, – I interrupted Bruno.

– Yes, Mark, it was a planned surprise, Bruno smiled, but my plan almost failed, you didn’t want to take the satellite with your hands. And the only way to fly with it is to take it with your bare hands, not with a handkerchief.

– I was very afraid of burning or passing out my fingers, I said. – I’m not a fool to take things with my bare hands, especially since this balloon has a very strange shine like a star.

– So I helped you! – Christina said it cheerfully.

– Well, yes, grabbing things with your bare hands, and other people’s things, and when not asked for – big help – I sarcastically noticed. Christina got offended and turned her back. I continued. – And why would you want me?

– You’re right for us, Bruno said. – Don’t worry, you’re not the great-grandson of the great wizards. It’s just that sometimes I go out on Earth streets and look at new faces. This time I had the goal of taking the new Guardian for the Hidden Agency. I really liked your face, Mark. I can tell by the face of the right person. You’re real, alive. I’m not going to tell you that you don’t have to take those words literally and what they mean. Ever since I found you, you’ve been assigned to be a conscript, but the amazing coincidence is that you’ve already been listed in the Mertsella Agency database as an asset to our planet. The conscripted people are the chosen people to live on Mertsella, who come from different planets.

The meaning of his words did not quite reach my mind. I did not understand what was expected of me. Bruno continued:

– Besides, you fit the bill on every level: young, smart, orphaned, not yet married… And besides, you really don’t need all of these characteristics, just because I chose you… I have, as it were, this kind of facial recognition, which is the kind of gift I’ve had since I was a kid, which is why I work for the Chief Hidden Mertsella Agency, which is what we took you into.

– Bruno, I, too, have some strange abilities like yours. I can read from the face, I said, when I saw Christine come out to wash her hands. – It’s my too-innate insight. I can see what a man is hiding, whose manner he is copying, who he really is and who he wants to be. I don’t know how, but when I see a man, his facial expressions, his gestures, all of a sudden I know all about him. It’s like a movie in front of my eyes, it’s like a scene in this man’s life. At first I thought it was just my imagination, but then my «imagination» became 100% likely to coincide with the actual facts. Sometimes I stay away from the person I know about. But more often I get shunned. A lot of people don’t like things to be clear about them, and when their secret thoughts are known to outsiders. Besides, I don’t know how to hide anything, so I make it clear to the person that I know everything about him. I’ve been called a sociopath many times, and I don’t notice when I’m hurting people. It’s not on purpose, it’s on the contrary. I want everyone to be good, I want to be peaceful with everyone, I don’t even want to see the most secret thing about a person, it comes automatically. But it is worth saying something wrong – and I am on the list of enemies. Seeing the hidden life of people, I know nothing about human relations. The same goes for my personal life. It doesn’t sound like anything, but suddenly you realize it’s not your person, or that you’re being silently hated. It’s my cross, and I’ve come to terms with that – being an eternally guilty villain in the eyes of others. So I have never really close friends.