Kids

Rain pattered softly against the edge of the windowsill. The chill and darkness that reigned that evening were menacing and gripping. It was one of those evenings when you feel the harmony of the world is breaking down, and that at any moment something could emerge from some corner. Tomek, too, wasn't satisfied with his parents being home, with no monsters in the world, or with the simple fact that the horror story he'd just read was capturing his imagination. He still didn't feel familiar with this house after his recent move. But something was wrong. Floorboards creaked, and the skeletons of leafless trees came alive, infused with some inhuman life. The boy's dark eyes flashed with panic, but a moment later he was laughing at his own foolishness, even as a chuckle pierced the dead silence like the screech of a train braking.

"Damn, what am I talking about? That book was too realistic, I shouldn't read stuff like that," he said to himself, then decided to go downstairs to see what his parents were doing.

Descending the stairs, he heard tragic screams coming from the television. His parents were sitting on the couch, their backs to him, staring fixedly at a film that, surprisingly, was of themselves. The image was as if reflected in a mirror, with one difference. Tomek's heart sank, he literally felt his bones sinking into the floor. Instead of his mother and father's normal faces, there were skeletons covered in disgusting worms, mud, and decayed flesh. A red light glowed in their empty eye sockets...

"Son, what's wrong with you?" his mother asked, looking at him worriedly.

Tomek breathed a sigh of relief at seeing his parents were normal. He wanted to show them what he meant, pointing to the television, but some primitive TV show was playing.

"Nothing, nothing, Mom, I think I'll go to bed.

" "Goodnight!"

The boy ran a trembling hand through his black hair and climbed the stairs sleepwalkingly. Now he was torn by feelings of anger, impatience, and rage. He was outraged by his own fantasy, so he quickly and forcefully began changing into his pajamas. He looked at the place where he had just thrown his clothes, but he didn't see them there. Irritated by another joke of circumstances, he threw himself on the bed and crawled under the covers. Suddenly, he felt a slimy, gel-like cold on his body and a searing stench! He quickly jumped out of bed and turned on the light. The couch was dripping with blood, flowing from the horrible human remains. Tomek began to run as far as he could, driven by fear and panic. On the way, he tripped and crashed into his father.

"Are you okay, Tomasz?"

"No, no..."

But he fell silent. His father bared his fangs in a terrible grin, letting out screeching sounds and groans. He quickly pulled away, and afterward, he no longer remembered what had happened, remembering only the terrible darkness. The boy woke up drenched in sweat, awakened by the doorbell. He went down to answer the door and saw a policeman. "

Good morning. Are your parents here?"

Later, it turned out they were investigating a case. The man who lived in the house before them confessed to a murder. The investigative committee finally found the missing children. Their bodies were bricked up in the wall. Scratches on the plaster suggested they had been buried alive.

New idea

Night fell over the city. The moon, hidden behind clouds, couldn't illuminate the alleyways where nightlife continued its grim routine. Groups of scoundrels emerged from basements, stairwells, parks, and trash bins where they hid during the day from the contemptuous gaze of the city's working-class residents. Shamefully hidden during the day, at night they could begin their brief reign. This was their time...

Zbychu, known to others as "Dykta," could once again begin to divide and conquer. He proudly gazed at his companions standing before him, possessed of the purple liquid, delightfully warming their stomachs. This was his army. These few grim-looking individuals, unable to string together a grammatical sentence, yet oh-so-obedient to his will. Who could blame them? After all, before he reached his current position, he had been the CEO of a leading national company. Unfortunately, his overly frank approach to people and his unprecedented honesty had pushed him to the margins of society. He couldn't bribe others like others, nor treat his employees like garbage. He was too honest for the market economy.

Therefore, after a few years at the top, he was stripped of his honors and privileges. He even had a chance to return to his rightful place. He didn't want to. He decided he wouldn't break the principles he was loyal to, nor conform to the demands of the market and the people who governed them. He decided to follow his own path and found solace among these simple drunks from under the dumpster. He found that the principles that guided their paths, even though primitive, most closely matched his expectations. For them, the most important thing was a specific understanding of honor and loyalty to oneself. And that was also the most important thing for him. He quickly earned the respect and esteem of these people.

They knew he had once been someone in that world, incomprehensible to them, and now, by choice, he had chosen to stay with them. This impressed them greatly. Unconsciously, they recognized him as a leader and always began their nocturnal debates with his opinion. This was no different this time. The ten of them stood in the courtyard of a ruined tenement building slated for demolition. Thanks to this, no one and nothing could disturb them from making long-term plans. And that was precisely the plan "Dykt" intended to unfold before them. For now, he waited until the bottle of purple liquid made its rounds among the standing men. When it returned to his hands, he raised his hand to speak. Silence fell:

"Comrades, listen to what I have to say."

I'm thinking, looking at the mess in our country, that we can clean it up. Yeah. Don't look at me like I'm crazy. That divine purple liquid hasn't weakened my head. Look for yourselves who's gaining power in this country. There are peasants from the barricades, why can't we? Who's stopping us? We'll form a party, develop a program, and seize power. No one will be able to challenge us then. Under the slogan "methylated spirits for all," we'll enter political circles. We'll revolutionize this entire union. We'll rule. I'm telling you...

They looked at him silently and with admiration. His words, hazy with purple fumes, barely registered. But when they did, they created a picture of pure enthusiasm. Yes. He's right. There's democracy, whatever it's called. Anyone can run for power. Why not them? A team will be assembled from every garbage dump in the country, every cage park. Everyone will vote for them. Why not? How are they worse than those currently in power? Do they have worse ideas? Probably not, after all, those in power don't have any vision anyway. And they'll always have one. If they drink a few more bottles, their vision will be so clear that they'll prepare a program that will convince everyone. And then no one will challenge them. They'll win one election, the next, and they'll never run out of dictum. And they'll find something to snack on

Leszek

"Life is bad. You never get what you want.

And even if you do, it's usually accompanied by something absolutely hopeless."

...every morning, as Leszek drove to work, his thoughts went more or less along these lines. Leszek was a powerful, muscular, bald man with the face of a murderer of Russian gangsters and a sadist who ripped dolls from children's hands and arms from their bodies. His heart, however, was filled with the ideals of humanism and love for every creature that contained protein. Leszek loved the entire world and expressed this in his countless poems, written passionately under the covers by candlelight. Leszek loved everything and everyone, except one thing: his job. He was a ticket inspector for the Municipal Transport Company (MPK).

He tried many times to get a job elsewhere. But, oh well, being a great man isn't easy. Any office work was out of the question because of the size of Leszek's fingers—he could press four to eight keys at a time with his thumb. Any profession that required friendly contact with any member of society was out of the question. Well, with one notable exception: the tax office was interested in working with Leszek, but here, Leszek's remarkably unpredictable mind stood in the way.

The situation wasn't helped by the fact that Leszek was unrivaled in his profession as a controller. Every month, he won the internal company competition for the title of Most Effective Canary by a landslide. How did this happen? Well, every person caught free-riding has a reflex (pardon the punitive remark) of self-defense, a primal instinct to fight back without paying the fine. However, this instinct vanished irrevocably the moment the free-rider made eye contact with Leszek. When the person looked at his face and posture, they were ready to pay 100, 200, or 500 złoty immediately, just to avoid waking up one morning in the trunk of a Volga heading to the forest near Minsk.

One night, our hero was working on his autobiographical poem, "I'm Sorry." The work stretched into the early morning hours, so Leszek felt even worse than usual when he left for work. Leszek boarded the bus, pulled out his ID, and approached the first passenger. The passenger was Janina, a retiree on her way to the ophthalmologist, a naturally nervous and forgetful person. Both of these traits proved fatal: Janina forgot to validate her ticket and became terribly upset upon seeing Leszek. She stopped breathing, her face turned an extroverted beetroot color, and her heart gave way—and burst.

The elderly woman slumped to the floor, and Leszek stood paralyzed. He didn't move, not when the other passengers drew the first aid expert title, not when the ambulance arrived, not when the bus pulled into the depot. The paralysis gripped him for the entire day. But when he finally moved, he knew what to do.

He devoted the entire next weekend to studying modern self-presentation techniques. He even temporarily suspended writing poetry to best prepare for his plan, which aimed to change the perception of Leszek among MPK passengers.

On Monday morning, commuters on one of the city buses witnessed a rather unusual sight. A large man, dressed in a long, colorful sweater with lopsided hearts sewn on, trundled onto the bus. Dozens of small bells were attached to his red trousers. Passengers' attention was drawn to a large, fluorescent peace sign painted on the sweater, with an MPK controller's ID badge in the center. This individual wore painted cheeks, a red ball stuck to his nose, and held a teddy bear in his hand, singing in a booming voice: "Give me your ticket, hey, it'll only take a moment, don't worry, I'm cool, yeah."

The passengers were speechless, and then someone started giggling quietly. The giggles proved contagious – within moments, everyone was laughing uproariously. For the first time in Leszek's life, someone was laughing at the sight of him! The effect of the action exceeded his wildest expectations. To celebrate, he took sparklers from his pocket, lit them, and stuck them in various parts of his wardrobe, then sang a song of thanksgiving.

For the next two weeks, Leszek experienced the most wonderful time of his life. Each day, he expanded his repertoire: he learned to play the banjo, dressed up as Donald Duck, borrowed Kiki the monkey from the zoo and checked tickets with her. Passengers were overjoyed. A group of Leszek fans quickly formed, sharing buses with him.

Word of Leszek's exploits quickly reached his bosses, who, upon learning of the situation, fired him. This decision shocked Leszek's fans. However, they decided not to give up. They crowdfunded and used the funds to rent an old bus, which cruised the city streets, serving both a transportation and artistic function. The idea proved highly profitable. To this day, the colorful bus roars through the city streets, its passengers howling with laughter at the sight of Leszek. Leszek himself loves working this way. His posture is still the same, but there's a gleam in his eyes that means that even when he's not wearing his costume and painting his cheeks, no one will think to be afraid of him anymore.

Books aren't made in the way that babies are: they are made like pyramids. There's some long-pondered plan, and then great blocks of stone are placed one on top of the other, and it's back-breaking, sweaty, time consuming work. And all to no purpose! It just stands there in the desert! But it towers over it prodigiously. Jackals piss at the base of it, and bourgeois clamber to the top of it, etc. Continue this comparison.

There was an air of indifference about them, a calm produced by the gratification of every passion; and through their manners were suave, one could sense beneath them that special brutality which comes from the habit of breaking down half-hearted resistances that keep one fit and tickle one’s vanity—the handling of blooded horses, the pursuit of loose women.

In the many forms of government which have sprung up there has always been an acknowledgement of justice and proportionate equality, although mankind fail in attaining them, as indeed I have already explained. Democracy, for example, arises out of the notion that those who are equal in any respect are equal in all respects; because men are equally free, they claim to be absolutely equal.

I love to watch the fine mist of the night come on, The windows and the stars illumined, one by one, The rivers of dark smoke pour upward lazily, And the moon rise and turn them silver. I shall see The springs, the summers, and the autumns slowly pass; And when old Winter puts his blank face to the glass, I shall close all my shutters, pull the curtains tight, And build me stately palaces by candlelight.