A cosmic experiment

A stroll through Gelsum for a lovelorn

It smelled of old oil, cold cigarette smoke, and the kind of greed found in man-eating alleys that never gets its fill. Mustapha Muller stepped out of the Gelsum Central subway station into the pale light of late afternoon. Dusk came early at this time of year, especially in cities like this, where even the sun seemed reluctant to linger—as if ashamed to look down on a place like Gelsum, with all the broken dreams of its inhabitants and the stench of hopelessness.

The corpulent thirtysomething tugged at his cheap shirt, which clung to his windblown suit with all the charm of an old cheeseburger, and coughed into the dirty collar of his garment. The evening was damp, but not cool. Rather, it was musty, like the dirty old city. Like a shrout that had been left too long over the old corpse of Gelsum.

His feel-like 20,000th unsuccessful date had ended half an hour ago—abruptly, albeit with an arrogant politeness whose intellectual dimension Mustapha couldn't grasp. The impressive lady, a certain Kim something-or-other, had looked at him after thirteen minutes and a watered-down cappuccino with a smile that felt like a scalpel. Then the HR manager had presented him with her analysis as if he were a poorly written blurb: “You come across as if you're in a constant internal job interview, but unfortunately you're not well prepared. What's more, you have all the charm of a troglodyte, and I seriously doubt that your level of education comes close to that of a Cro-Magnon.” The rejected suitor didn't know what Cro-Magnon and troglodyte meant, but he assumed they weren't exactly compliments.

God, what were these chicks looking for? A hunk who was also rich and educated? These hot university graduates and their unrealistic expectations.

Lost in such profound self-reflection, the great thinker, who bore little resemblance to Adonis and even less to Hercules with his unathletic build, had come to a halt directly in front of a boarded-up Asian snack bar, whose sign promised only “DONG WOK” in pitifully flickering letters. A pigeon with only one leg hopped through a greasy patch on the pavement. He looked at it as if it could answer him. Just like the femaleness he desired, the animal paid no attention to the lonely walker.

Feeling uncomfortable, our lone wolf—okay, a poodle would be a more appropriate animal comparison—thought about his undemanding job. Mustapha worked at the Office for File Standardization, 4th floor, west wing. His actual title was “Cryptographic Documentation Validation Clerk.” He didn't know exactly what that meant, but none of his colleagues knew how to interpret the job title literally. It was probably better that way, as Uncle Cethegus so aptly remarked, because it wasn't good for extremely mediocre relatives to know too much. Reluctantly, the senior government official found a suitable position for his rather unloved nephew, as he had a strong sense of family.

Mustapha's job was mainly to check scanned forms for legibility and, if necessary, send a note to the re-digitization department. Sometimes he would type “illegible” in a field.

His boss, Mr. Bully, was a walking, breathing, screaming reflex with the hairstyle of a failed military commander and the temperament of an electric chair. The manager, who was by no means intellectually superior to his employees, rarely spoke normally—he barked more like the Hound of the Baskervilles. In the completely meaningless meetings, he looked like a Roman centurion on drugs ordering the crucifixion of three incorrectly stacked files. Mustapha laughed at him. Secretly. In his WhatsApp group “The Unbreakables, where four other nameless administrative zombies anointed their subservience with sarcasm born of cowardice.

But in the presence of the mindless tyrant, Mustapha nodded eagerly, orchestrated by servile remarks that would have done credit to insane Nero's favorite slave. Unfortunately, this produced an undesirable conditioning effect, as the WhatsApp rebel developed a strange twitch in his neck that he could no longer control.

Now he continued on his way. The street was called “Eagle Street”, although no birds flew here anymore except for the vultures of bankruptcy. Only plastic bags, torn election posters, and ghosts from a time when coal and steel were still the heartbeat of a city that was now brain dead. Today, Gelsum was nothing more than a dilapidated relic, a veritable incarnation of a lost place in a forgotten corner of the country—the so-called Curry Sausage Belt.

The wanderer through a forgotten world looked into dirty shop windows that had long since ceased to display anything. Instead, he saw torn cardboard boxes, windows fogged up by the breath of decay, graffiti with slogans such as “If God exists, he doesn't live here” or “Welcome to inferno, hell is freezing over!”

A young man dressed in urban underdog style crossed his path on an e-scooter, shouting something incomprehensible, which Mustapha, influenced by the paranoia of his petit bourgeois mentality, interpreted as an insult. Maybe it wasn't. Perhaps it was just a sound born of a dissociative, dysfunctional society that no longer spoke, but croaked out its refuse.

“Fucking Tinder,” muttered Mustapha. He thought of Kim, her clever, cold smile. And then of Sandy from the copy shop—nice, honest, tolerant, a little too loud, but interested in him. He had ignored her because she ”didn't fit.” Because he believed he was entitled to more. His pronounced narcissism, combined with a narrow-minded, average intellect, prevented him from realizing that even this admirer was way out of his league and, with her open-minded nature, would probably make a better partner for him than many a bourgeois career woman.

Our thwarted lover boy shrugged his shoulders and walked deeper into the city, whose heart had long since stopped beating. Above him, neon lights buzzed, soon to go out. Below him: the shadow of a man who was anything but a man.

***

Gentleman’s Agreement

The night had settled over Gelsum like a wet sack, heavy and stinking. The streetlights hummed wearily, as if suffering from some form of electrical depression.

Mustapha walked down King Street, which, with its splintered bus stops and jacked-up shopping carts, looked anything but aristocratic and more like a failed art project. He had his hands deep in his pockets and, with the moralistic attitude of the petit bourgeois, was searching—as so often—for self-righteous indignation in cigarette butts, fallen hot dog wrappers, and the shy glances of the homeless, whose bare existence the civil servant regarded in a stupidly fascist manner as a symbol of human laziness.

“Who do we have here? A lonely wanderer in the dark of night!”

The voice was polished, silky smooth, with a hint of theater stage and madhouse corridor. The great moral philosopher stopped in his tracks, abruptly torn from his less than philanthropic thoughts. The air suddenly smelled sweeter—like cheap aftershave poured over a decaying corpse. From the shadows of a former savings bank branch emerged a man, tall, thin, and dressed in an elegant designer suit that made Mustapha's cheap off-the-rack clothes look ridiculous. Involuntarily, the lonely wanderer, in a flash of uncharacteristic creativity, thought of a perfectly formed tarantula, whose bite, despite its morbid beauty, meant certain death.

“Good evening, my dear sir. What a fortunate coincidence that you have encountered two well-meaning citizens in this dangerous area. Jacob van Messer, also known as 'Gentleman Jack,' at your service.”

Jack the Knife bowed slightly, tipped his imaginary hat, and pointed at his companion with a mocking gesture.

“And this here—courtesy of the force of nature—is my esteemed colleague: Ali Butchinski. A true virtuoso of brute persuasion who knows how to wield a knife with surgical precision!”

Ali, known in professional circles as “the Rat” because he enjoyed informing on petty criminals to the corrupt law enforcement agencies in exchange for a small fee, was a massive lump of flesh in sweatpants. The talkative ogre scratched his shaved head, belched loudly, and cracked the knuckles of his paws. His expressionless eyes looked at Mustapha as if the illustrious official were nothing more than a piece of meat.

“What... what do you want?” Mustapha nervously fumbled for his wallet in his jacket pocket, even though it contradicted his petit bourgeois worldview that a common mugger would be dressed as elegantly as an investment banker, even though they were also experts at making a handsome profit in a zero-sum game with their customers.

“What an impolite greeting, and only concerned about your own wallet! It's obvious that you're an expert, in the redistribution industry, so to speak. May I guess: an overpaid civil servant?”

Jack smiled as kindly as a hungry lion looking at a lame antelope, sending shivers down Mustapha's spine.

“By the way, we're on patrol—let's call it community service. In a town like Gelsum, it's important that everyone does their part. Especially in such a bad neighborhood, where evil people can do very bad things to public servants who are out walking. Right, Ali?”

“Give me what you got, you loser.”

The ogre took half a step closer, while the asphalt beneath him seemed to groan.

“Now don't be so uncharming, my dear fellow,” remarked the gentleman of a special kind mischievously. ”I'm sure our diligent civil servant will gladly donate a handsome sum to a good cause!”

“I... don't have much with me...” Mustapha began in a state of fearful confusion, but the friendly donation collector made a reassuring gesture.

“Oh, my friend. It's not about much. It's about the principle. About... participating in social interaction.”

Jack carefully reached into Mustapha's breast pocket and pulled out the cell phone—an older model that had seen better days. He looked at it like a wine connoisseur would look at a cheap discount brand.

“Hmm. A relic. But with character. However, I am a little disappointed!”

Meanwhile, Ali stole the wallet with remarkable clumsiness, rummaged through it, and pulled out the 200 euros that the involuntarily generous donor had deposited there as a precaution before his failed date.

“Look, Jack – the nerd has a monthly pass for the Doner King!”

“Aha! A cultured person, then. Wonderful.”

Jack winked benevolently at Mustapha.

“Did you know that the Ottomans produced one of the great civilized cuisines? I myself am a lover of lamb. However, I prefer haute cuisine, but there's no accounting for taste. Ali, my dear, how much does our benefactor actually donate?”

“Uh, 200 bucks! I would have slaughter him like a Wutz (= Palatinate dialect for a four-legged, truffle-loving proboscis animal) for less!"

“Not so harsh, my friend, I think that's a constructive start! I'm sure our protege would also like to donate his credit cards to a good cause!”

“That... that's theft...” croaked the forced protege, whose voice slowly began to fade.

How could this happen? How could they dare? He was part of the government elite!

“Oh no. No, no.”

Gentleman Jack put his arm around his shoulder in a fatherly manner, enveloping Mustapha in a cloud of exquisite aftershave.

“This is... urban redistribution. A small balancing of power. After all, we live in capitalist times. And those who have nothing should at least know who they have to thank for it.”

Meanwhile, the ogre had finished inspecting the wallet.

“The pussy only has an ID card!”

With feigned regret, the gentleman among the highwaymen shook his well-groomed head!

“Oh well, civil servants aren't what they used to be. I would have at least expected a tacky VISA card. But never mind, the ID card is probably worth 400 greenbacks among friends. Ali, since our friend was so cooperative, let him keep the kebab subscription. We don't want to ruin our stomachs!”

Ali yawned loudly and carelessly dropped the wallet, including the subscription card and organ donor pass.

“Come on, Jack. I want another steak at that fancy high-end restaurant in the posh part of town.”

“Patience, my little Polyphemus. The gentleman here has just given us a generous donation.”

Those miserable gangsters would regret it! He would report these antisocial elements immediately.

Despite these rather harsh thoughts, the potential king of criminal complaints remained silent with his usual lack of courage.

Gentleman Jack took two steps away, then turned around once more and bowed in his usual elegant manner.

“Thank you, my dear. For your attention, your generosity—and above all for your dignity. You have retained it. Not everyone does that. It is truly admirable. If you happen to see the police, please give my regards to Chief Inspector Capone and tell him to inform my godfather, Police Chief Fouché, that Ali will bring his share of the donations next Wednesday as usual.”

Jack tipped his imaginary hat once more as Ali made a final gesture toward Mustapha, somewhere between a greeting, a threat, and a digestive problem.

Then the two disappeared into the fog, as if they had never belonged to the world of the living.

Under these circumstances, Mustapha decided it would be better not to report the incident, because he knew how things worked.

And so he stood there, helpless and lost. Without money. Without a cell phone. Without pride. With only his Doner King subscription in his jacket pocket. He already had five stamps, and a sixth would soon be added—what else could he do?

***

The miracle at Doner King

The “Doner King” wasn't a place you went to eat because you were hungry. You went there because life had already half-digested you and spat you out again. A neon-lit waiting room for nothingness, with greasy aluminum tables whose sticky surfaces made it clear that neither hygiene nor hope had ever placed an order here.

Mustapha Muller pushed open the stiff door, accompanied by a creaking squeak that sounded like the last breath of an old man dying miserably in a dumpster. His stomach growled—not out of real hunger, but to compensate with a cheap gorge the humiliation he had suffered. A junk food binge born of a metaphysical mental vacuum. Inexpensive gluttony that he could really indulge in in this store abandoned by God and other customers.

The reader may well ask, “Why did our petit bourgeois, who mistakenly considered himself part of the elite, seek out such an inhospitable place?” The answer is simple: because, compared to the other rather shabby guests, he felt like King Louis himself.

Behind the counter sat the king of rotten meat, Jens Kippeneuker, a man with skin the color of fried cardboard and the look of an angry mafioso who had been lied to too many times. The archetype of a greedy, deceitful snack bar owner, he listlessly wiped a grill that hadn't been thoroughly cleaned since the 1990s with a rag. Next to him stood Marilyn, the blonde high priestess of rancid fat. With a rather graceful figure and the charm of an experienced but not too expensive courtesan, she was supposed to encourage the male clientele to consume various “delicacies” in the service of the cunning Kippeneuker. Her low-cut top distracted from her current bad mood. Such negative feelings were usually triggered when one of those few male guests entered the temple of unhealthy pleasures, whom even she found somewhat disgusting – Mustapha was the absolute frontrunner in this regard.

“One doner plate with everything,” mumbled Mustapha, as usual, practically undressing the waitress with his hungry eyes.

Marilyn glanced at him with a look that oscillated somewhere between pity and revulsion.

“With everything? Even extra sauce?”

“Yes... lots of sauce. I need a taste explosion today.”

Marilyn shrugged her shoulders.

“Whatever you want, honey. Maybe you'll actually explode today, it wouldn't be a shame!”

“Excuse me?”

Mustapha looked at the unfriendly waitress in confusion. However, a grim look from her boss, who probably taught killers to fear him, prompted Marilyn to refrain from answering. The pseudo-hungry civil servant, however, had clearly heard the words despite the question, but now assumed he had misheard, as his petit bourgeois worldview did not allow him to imagine that a snack bar waitress would dare to address such impertinent words to him.

With his sticky kebab plate in his hand, Mustapha plopped down on one of the filthy seats. The TV on the wall blared quietly with booming stupidity—one of those slightly moronic game shows was on, in which a moderately talented joker entertained the mentally challenged.

Someone said:

“I recommend ayran. It makes your stomach cry, but your soul sing.”

Mustapha flinched, wondering who dared to verbally disturb his cheap pleasure. He hadn't even noticed the man sitting across from him. Inconspicuous. Average. No smell. No presence. And yet—a strange flicker in the air around him, as if reality itself had become blurred for a moment.

“You look like someone who doesn't enjoy life very much!” said the stranger, stirring leisurely in a mug containing an unidentifiable concoction that was impossible to tell whether Kippeneuker was passing off as coffee, tea, or something else entirely.

“What do you mean? Of course I'm happy—most of the time, anyway! I'm Mustapha Muller, a civil servant!” said Mustapha, expecting his statement to be explanation enough and that the annoying questioner would now freeze in awe.

“That's precisely why,” replied the man, “you may have more potential than you think.”

Mustapha almost spat out the rubbery mass of flesh in his mouth and eyed his counterpart suspiciously.

“Are you... a hobby therapist or something?”

“I am a construct of the spatiotemporal meta-level.”

“What?”
“An anomaly. A mistake. Or perhaps an impulse in the source code of the cosmos, hidden deep behind the plane of elementary particles. Difficult to explain to someone who doesn't have Nobel Prize-winning knowledge of physics. I... appear here, everywhere and nowhere. If it helps, you can call me Demiurge!”

Mustapha froze in his culinary activities.

Should he laugh out loud now? Was the whole thing a tasteless joke? Demiurge, what kind of name was that; Russian, perhaps? This person didn't look like he was joking. Oh God, a lunatic! There were thousands of those types in Gelsum. It was best to put on a brave face and play along with the crazy game, because you never knew how dangerous these sick guys were.

“Very interesting, but I think I should go now, as I have an important appointment at the office!”

However, before the uneducated civil servant, who had been so rudely interrupted in his delicious meal, could rise, the stranger continued.

“I'll make you an offer, Mustapha Muller. For five years, everything you do will succeed. Your plans, your desires, your ambitions – everything. But after that... there will be no more suffering, no more doubt, no more sadness. You will feel nothing but happiness. Permanently. Unconditionally. A life of eternal bliss.”

God, that guy is totally nuts! It's best not to provoke him! If you accept his offer, he might go away. But I should be subtle about it!

After such cautious thoughts, Mustapha put down his fork with a heavy heart.

“And the catch?”

“That was the catch.”

“So... I can't be sad anymore? That sounds great.”

“Not angry either. Or deeply moved. Or melancholic. Just happiness. Pure, unadulterated happiness.”

Mustapha stared at the large puddle in his Styrofoam container. Then he looked back at the stranger.

“Are you part of a cult or something? Just give me the address of your church or whatever your religious community is, and I'll come visit you tomorrow.”

The man smiled. “Let's just say... I work in the service of chaos theory.”

A crazy left-wing extremist! Well, better than a right-winger, you have to agree, because those guys don't understand humor!

Mustapha leaned back and laughed briefly, a chuckling, exhausted laugh.

“I will gladly accept your offer, of course, if it helps the world revolution!”

The man stood up, put on his coat, even though he had never worn one before, and nodded politely.

“The world revolution? So be it, it's a deal. Let the games begin!”

Then he was gone. Not gone. Simply disappeared.

Marilyn gave him an unusually interested look.

“Are you talking to yourself now, big guy?”

Mustapha grinned crookedly.

“No, darling, I was just talking to that weird guy over there!”

“But there was no one there! Don't worry, sweetheart, I talk to myself sometimes too!”

Mustapha was utterly astonished by the unexpected friendliness of the sought-after waitress and was now certain that he had hallucinated – probably an after-effect of the attack!

A short time later, our gourmet of a special kind had crushed the last bite of his kebab between his unkempt teeth and, after finishing his meal, slowly realized that something was different. While Mustapha Muller thought it was one of the sometimes unpleasant consequences of enjoying some of Kippeneuker's antique delicacies, it was merely a tiny change in the space-time continuum—a minimal shift, barely noticeable, yet epoch-making.

***

The burlesque begins

Marilyn, the blonde deep fryer nymph, was still standing behind the counter with her arms crossed, but she was looking at Mustapha, whose Paleolithic eating manners usually caused revulsion and disgust in the hardened waitress, with friendly confusion. Marilyn's forehead wrinkled as if she were under some kind of inner compulsion. The way a magnet acts on a piece of metal that should rather stay far away.

 

It started to rain outside. Of course. In Gelsum, it always rained when a new insanity was born.

“Say... Mustapha, right?” she asked, as if she'd picked up his name from a third-rate crime novel.

He swallowed in surprise and dabbed his nose with a napkin that was more grease than paper.

“Uh... yes?”

“Fancy a coffee? Or something stronger. At my place. I live around the corner.”

Kippeneuker, who had just thrown a frozen lahmacun on the grill behind the counter, paused in mid-motion, confused. The frozen flatbread steamed defiantly as its owner blinked and stared at Marilyn as if she had just asked for his firstborn son's hand in marriage in ancient Greek.

“What the heck...?” Jens whispered so quietly that even the grill could barely hear him.

But Mustapha beamed like the sun on a hot summer day. He glowed so blissfully that even a half-starved golden retriever would have paled next to a steak. Marilyn? The Marilyn? The goddess of the glass yogurt dispenser, the jackpot, the unholy grail of his wet dreams? The irresistible Helen of ailing snack bars?

He stood up and rubbed his chin in disbelief. His head was ringing like a train station toilet.

Finally, she realizes what a tough guy I am. My patience, my charm, my animal magnetism... it worked!

“I knew it. You'd realize eventually...” he began, but Marilyn waved him off.

“Oh, shut up. Just come with me. I want... I don't know. To talk, screw, or something.”

Her voice was strangely dull, as if she were being controlled remotely. She too did not understand what was happening to her—she only sensed that it was against every feminine instinct and common sense.

Kippeneuker was still standing there, but now with his mouth open.

“But... yesterday you said he was like... like a burst pig's intestine in human form! And if that sleazy guy was the last man on earth, you'd rather become a lesbian than have anything to do with that little shit!”

Marilyn shrugged her shoulders.

“Maybe I like offal. I'm going to take some unpaid leave.”

“Are you crazy? No! I mean, of course you can go, I'll pay your lost earnings!”

The employer, who normally resembled Ebenezer Scrooge, couldn't believe the words that had just left his mouth, filled with rotten teeth. Confused, he stared at Marilyn, who left the scene of her work without a word, unable to speak.

And Mustapha—the great Casanova with the charm of an empty beer bottle—marched behind her with the self-confidence of a Roman Caesar. His gait had changed: less sluggish, more... heroic. At least, that's what he thought, while to the impartial observer his waddling movements would most likely have been more reminiscent of a lovesick goblin who could hardly walk due to unfulfilled lust.

When the door of the Doner King closed behind him, Jens Kippeneuker, who no longer understood himself or the world, stood motionless. Only the limp flatbread on the grill continued to sizzle defiantly—the last witness to a metaphysical miracle that had just violated the logic of this world.

And outside in the drizzling rain: Gelsum. Gloomy, neglected, a playground of broken hopes. But ready for a grotesque nightmare of mad gods that has now become reality.

***

The time is running down

Five years. Five miserable, absurd, undeserved years.

And yet: the man who once stuffed himself with greasy junk food at the Doner King as if it were divine cuisine from a gourmet temple now sat on a throne made of chrome, marble, and the finest silk upholstery. The government palace—a neo-baroque disaster of taste, half shopping mall, half spaceship—bore his name: “Mustapha Muller Center for Global Enlightenment.”

Outside, in the squares of the republic, children danced in uniforms bearing his likeness on their chests. Men with tears in their eyes kissed his official shoe replicas in souvenir shops, and countless women wished for a large brood of his offspring. Radio presenters whispered his name reverently before advertising his perfume: “Mustapha – the scent of success.” Journalists wrote panegyrics about him that would have made even Nero's most loyal favorite slave blush with shame – just like certain “attitude journalists” are today.

Inside his enormous office, between a golden aquarium full of fluorescent mini koi fish and holograms of his oversized, rather idealized self on the gold-leaf-adorned walls, sat His Grace Mustapha Muller, president for life, father of the fatherland, Secretary General of the EAPU—the Ecologically Alternative People's Front Union.

The party for a clean environment and a dirty truth against exploitation. That was the new slogan Mustapha himself had come up with in a fit of ideological inspiration. No one really understood the meaning of the phrase, least of all its inventor, but everyone thought it was revolutionary.

Outside the window, swarms of drones flashed across the sky, forming his face in light. Inside, however, there was a deceptive calm.

Mustapha sat in his ergonomic government chair, his feet resting on a gold-trimmed table. In his hand: a glass of lactose-free Imperial champagne from ecologically mined Andean glaciers, whose ice had been extracted by hard-working children at rock-bottom prices.

His gaze was blank, as usual. Not melancholic—he was no longer capable of that. Just empty. It reflected the inner vacuum of a man who had achieved everything without knowing how. Who got everything without asking. Who was everything he could never be because of his abilities.

“How well I've thought all through...” he muttered contentedly, as his thoughts drifted through his mind in bizarre cascades. “I've always been visionary and clever...”

He couldn't quite remember the evening at Doner King. Not the mysterious stranger. Not the offer he had dismissed as a figment of his imagination. That peculiar conversation, which had vanished somewhere between the last remnants of his kebab and Marilyn's sudden, somewhat insane libido.

Instead, he believed firmly in himself. In his undisputed, absolutely deserved rise to power. His genius. His ability to manipulate women, political parties, countries, and the global economy to his own ends with grotesquely absurd plans, brainless slogans, and the charisma of a dead fish.

His enemies? They were finished. For example, his former boss Bully was serving a total of 165 years without parole for insubordination in Alcatraz State Prison, which had been reopened especially for him, and was still full of gratitude that he hadn't been given life imprisonment – well, as mentioned, the delinquent's cognitive abilities were no more developed than those of his former subordinate. Only Gentleman Jack and Ali escaped his universe-wide revenge campaign – untraceable, as they say!

His wife, Cleopatra Septima Lagos, a Hollywood star whose attractiveness and charm captivated countless men, had once again declared her unconditional love for him that morning. With a glazed look in her eyes and a strange tremor in her voice. Probably the most famous actress on the planet did not understand why she loved him – but she did. Like a doll under the spell of a voodoo priest, she was at the mercy of magic against her will.

He didn't have any children. “Too much responsibility, man,” he had said at some point in an interview with a servile sycophant from the public media. “I'm not stupid.” The published opinion applauded with frenetic enthusiasm. The world did not understand such cheers, like so much else that happened in his country in absurd denial of reality. Nevertheless, his popularity ratings continued to rise astronomically.

And now he was sitting here. On the eve of the fifth anniversary of that strange encounter with the mysterious stranger. In a few minutes, the Demiurge's experiment would enter its second phase. But Mustapha knew nothing about it. In his world, everything was controlled by a grotesquely insane autopilot—and the course was pointing upward.

Outside, bells began to ring. Not church bells. But the neural impulse bells of the capital—they rang only for him.

A new era, he thought.

My epoch, the age of a new savior!

He laughed loudly, sounding like the desperate cry of a moronic Grinch who had accidentally stolen fate.

Somewhere—far, far beyond the subatomic boundaries of reality—a portal opened, an eye. A very old, very patient, very cheerful eye. And then the moment came: Mustapha's time was up.

The same hour, the same minute, the same second, and so on into the immeasurable realm, into non-time—the party was over!

Mustapha's cell phone—a one-of-a-kind iMeFirst UltraPro Muller the Great model made especially for him—vibrated loudly on the gold-plated government desk, which was said to have once belonged to Napoleon Bonaparte. Who dared to disturb him in his meditative, egocentric self-reflections? It was Cleopatra Septima Lagos, his devoted wife, the goddess of cinema and the dreams of countless men. The woman who loved him like an addict loves crack.

 

He smiled like a circus clown on LSD, an overwhelming feeling of happiness and joy filled him with absolute inevitability, like the icy waters of the North Atlantic once flooded the Titanic.

“Baby, what a joy, my bunny! How's the world tour going?”

“I'm not your baby or your bunny, Mustapha!”

Her voice had changed. No trace of submissive affection remained—only razor blades.

“I've had enough of you! I'm getting a divorce, Mustapha. And I'm doing it publicly. Live. On CNN, BBC, and TikTok.”

"Ha ha,“ Mustapha giggled happily. ”Well, I'm excited, my little ray of sunshine, it's going to be a cool show!"

"Are you, you pathetic little man, making fun of me? I'm sick and tired of your primitiveness and stupidity! I don't know what kind of voodoo curse you put on me, but I've come to my senses! Half the world can think you're a messiah for all I care, but to me you're just a disgusting ignoramus with no skills whatsoever! When I think about your intimacy, I could throw up!"

He wanted to say something appropriate, something threatening that would put this rebellious woman in her place, but once again he was overcome by a grotesque cheerfulness.

“I love it when you're angry, it's so cute. Oh, I can't wait for the divorce show!”

"Don't you take me seriously, you damn bastard? I'll bring you down, even if it costs me my career! Do you think I didn't notice your dirty dealings? Actually, you were too stupid to hide anything from me. My dad, Ptolemaios Neos Dionysos, thinks you're too stupid for brunzing anyway (brunzen = Palatinate for “to piss”). What about those dirty deals with the pharmaceutical industry? The vaccine broth from Biondeath that cost thousands of lives worldwide! I'll destroy you, even if it's the last thing I do!"

“Baby, I'm really excited to hear the news! By the way, the CEO of Biondeath was a real funny guy and told me some great jokes when he handed me my bri.. - I mean commission. Do you know the one about the movie actress and the camel?”

After a scream of extreme rage, like an ominous banshee, the film actress hung up.

Mustapha laughed heartily, but didn't have time to put his cell phone down because the next call was already crying out for his attention. He was delighted to see that the next potential caller was his favorite nephew, Anusius Heinrichs. His intellectually slightly superior, averagely talented relative had, thanks to his uncle's favor, become CEO of the billion-dollar Miracle Investment Partnership, which was, of course, owned by Mustapha.

Shaking with joy, the billionaire answered the phone, but before he could say a word, he was overwhelmed by the hysterical screams of his nephew.

“Uncle! Uncle!! I... I think we're screwed, completely screwed!! The stock markets have crashed, our stablecoin is unstable, our real estate projects in Kazakhstan are underwater... literally... and, um... our IT investments are completely worthless! Frauding Scamming Ltd., in which we invested half of our capital, is suddenly insolvent. What am I supposed to do?”

Mustapha laughed heartily, greatly amused by the exaggerated voices of his interfamilial CEOs!

“Oh, you're such a joker! You're overreacting, it's only money, and you can't buy happiness.”

“Uncle, we've lost forty billion in a few minutes. If this continues, we'll be bankrupt tomorrow!”

A feeling of divine bliss flowed through the still-billionaire.

“I feel fantastic today, better than ever! How about accompanying me to the Comedia del Arte tonight? But I forgot, you're not the sharpest tool in the shed: Let's watch a Disney movie together instead!”

“Not the sharpest tool? I'm afraid, my dear uncle, that I must resign immediately for health reasons and retire to the Maldives. I'll take care of my severance pay myself before it's all gone!”

“The Maldives are supposed to be wonderful at this time of year! Take as much money as you want!”

Click.

The former CEO had ended the conversation while Mustapha was still grinning broadly.

With a pleasant feeling of bliss comparable to that of a fanatical preacher at the sight of the heavenly hosts, the president for life stood up, went to the window, and chuckled happily. Outside—smoke. Tumult. Posters.

“MUSTAWAY – THE LAND BELONGS TO US!”

“EAPU = Ecological Asshole Poverty Unit”

“DUMBED DOWN BY DESTRUCTION – RESIGN!”

A secretary in a grotesque livery—Mustapha's own design—stormed in. He was pale as chalk and looked like an aristocrat being led to the “national razor” during the French Revolution.

“Your Grace! The subjects... they dare... they... are demonstrating! Spontaneously! Nationwide! We can no longer control the servers, censorship has completely failed! Even your support bots have turned their backs on you and. . . are posting memes against you!”

“Oh, wonderful!” Mustapha cheered, slapping his thighs. “Isn't the mob funny! My heart is jumping, I'm laughing myself to death! My stomach is giggling! Demonstrating? Like the other day, enthusiastically supporting my edicts regarding the introduction of the 80-hour week and a 90% income tax? Oh, how funny it all is!”

“Mr. President, we are on the brink of a revolution! The police and military are also on the verge of revolt. They will wipe us off the face of the earth, or worse: we will lose our privileges and positions!”

“Oh dear, so what! I'm not going to let that spoil my mood. Haha. You'd make an excellent street sweeper or latrine keeper if they kick us out of office!”

The secretary recoiled in horror. Something like disgust and fear was written all over his face, but Mustapha didn't notice. He was too busy with his inner supernova of glee. Every nerve in his body was buzzing with blissful delight.

Mustapha's gaze fell on a portrait on the wall: He giving a child a pinwheel.

Staged. Fake. But now full of meaning.

He smiled at the picture. Then he let himself sink back into his chair.

A moment of peace.

Then, very quietly, a thought. Small. Uninvited. And yet: a splinter in the flawless happiness.

Wait a minute... that's kind of... strange, isn't it?

It wasn't really doubt. More like a quiet cough in her brain. Feedback. But it was there.

Mustapha smiled as the economy collapsed.

Mustapha laughed heartily as the country descended into chaos.

Mustapha thought, “Hee hee,” as the military staged a coup and he ended up in a psychiatric ward.

***

The final experiment

The air smelled of disinfectant, old urine, and a kind of hopelessness that clung to the ceiling like mold. Room 23—a closed ward in Wing IV of the newly established psychiatric institution for querulous personality disorders—was a place straight out of Dante's Inferno. Here lived the lost, the surplus, the mistakes in the text, and those who dared to criticize Generalissimo Godunov in any way; and as the most prominent “patient,” Mustapha Muller.

The man who was probably the most hated in the country after the dictator and former president for life ended up in the aforementioned institution after the military coup. This was not least due to his unusual behavior during the “democratic unrest,” which was brutally suppressed by the armed forces under their charismatic leader Godunov. However, informed circles believed that by placing his former master, to whom he had been devoted like a dog for five years for inexplicable reasons, in a psychiatric institution, the generalissimo wanted to take revenge on the one hand and prove his unchallenged power on the other.

Mustapha was treated personally by the horror of all the inmates the clinic's director, Prof. Dr. Joseph Frankenstein. The notorious psychiatrist enjoyed a certain reputation for his medieval inquisitor-like therapies and his penchant for bizarre experiments with fatal outcomes. However, Mustapha's case gradually drove him into an even more severe madness than he already suffered from. While the clinic director, dressed entirely in black, usually inspired fear and horror in his unfortunate charges, he only met with amusement from Mustapha. Only his fear of the military dictator prevented Frankenstein from “finishing off” the former president as part of one of his experiments.

Meanwhile, Mustapha sat on a shabby bed that knew more about him than his mother did. He wore baggy hospital pajamas and grinned happily into the void, humming the melody of a popular but awful pop song.

Then – a knock.

Three times. Polite. Inappropriately polite.

No one knocked in this ward. Instead, the black-uniformed guards with red armbands stormed in, shouting, to sedate the patients with their rubber truncheons or brutally inject them with sometimes lethal drugs.

The door opened and a man entered who looked like a memory rendered too smoothly. Jeans. T-shirt. “I <3 Quantum Paradox.”

The patient smiled cheerfully at his benefactor from the Doner King, whose existence had long since faded from his memory.

“Ah, a new shrink! Have you come to lobotomize me, as Dr. Frankenstein hysterically remarked during the last session?”

Mustapha laughed heartily, as if he had told a delicious joke.

“Not at all, my dear, but you don't recognize me, do you? Perhaps you would prefer to talk to the figure I took on when I selected you!”

To the delight of the chosen one, the newcomer transformed into a person who was very well remembered.

“What a magic trick, it's ‘Gentleman Jack’! Where have you and your funny friend been all this time? What brings you here?”

“Ali is in the parallel universe from which I once brought him. There he lives among his own kind, namely Michael, Gabriel, and the old troublemaker Lucifer. All quaintly creations of mine, aren't they? But let's get down to business! To answer your last question: I am here to end this phase of the experiment. To do so, I will now switch you back to ‘normal’. So let the time of joy be over!”

A buzzing flicker, a brief twitch in Mustapha's forehead—and the memory came back like a wrecking ball in his skull.

The five years.

The ridiculous power.

The undeserved love.

The total collapse.

And all of it drenched in this obscene, inescapable cheerfulness.

Mustapha doubled over, sobbing like a little child who had just learned that Santa Claus had been finished off by the Boogeyman.

“I... why I... GOD! I don't deserve this!” he whimpered.

“I'm afraid so!” said the demiurge with the perfect politeness of the gentleman. "But it doesn't really matter. You weren't a particularly fascinating subject, but you were useful! Let's finish the experiment. I'll make you one last offer: I'll change space-time again, and everything will be undone. Everything will be forgotten. You will be a meaningless petit bourgeois again. What do you say, my dear experimental subject? "

Mustapha banged his fist on the linoleum bed.

“Yes! Take it away! I can't take it anymore!”

So Gentleman Jack reset the cosmic calculator.

Then: light and silence.

***

An epilogue

The grill sizzled. The TV blared dull images. A piece of bell pepper fell into the deep fryer and died with a final bubble, and Kippeneuker let out a quiet curse.

Mustapha sat alone on his dirty plastic chair. His face was frozen in a kind of cretinous fatalism. In front of him was a plate of mushy meat that had probably never been an animal. He ate. Chewed. Swallowed.

Then: a brief twitch.

Something passed through his skull—a premonition, a forgotten symphony on another plane of reality, an echo of brilliance. A shadow from a future that was, but never would be.

The reckless gourmet shook his unwise head, while Marilyn glanced at him from the bar, her expression expressing both disgust and scorn.

“Honey, you look like you have an extreme form of brain softening! Or are you actually losing yourself in unattainable daydreams?”

Even the strict Kippeneuker, who was well aware of Mustapha's sexual desires for Marilyn, couldn't help but laughed maliciously.

Mustapha remained silent as usual and pushed the last piece of kebab into his mouth with a smacking sound.

And outside, it started to rain.

© 2025 Q.A.Juyub alias Aldhar Ibn Beju

• Read other works of Qayid Aljaysh Juyub
• Send e-Mail to Qayid Aljaysh Juyub
• https://whackystuffandundergroundstories.blogspot.com/

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