Chapter 35 - Ninya

A woman approached me named Ninya.  We shared our introductions and pleasantries and she was quite open that she was a convert and Neo-Artesian, but even more so one of the secret members of the sisters.  They had thrived and maintained a vibrant network of chapters scattered in each city and township spanning to the coastal provincial.  In the capital they operated in the open and maintained their own offices in the local Politiburo.

She was trained by her mentor who was in turned trained by Anna, the founder of the sisters.  It was believed her mentor was one of Anna's surviving daughters.  She had adopted several girls over the years and raised them as her own and indoctrinating them in the sisters when they were of age.  The old woman had known of my interactions with my teacher and had assigned Ninya to me.  She was hand picked as she possessed many of the qualities that would make me vulnerable.

The color of her hair, her height, build, shape of her eyes, even her impish smile.  Everything, I could have ever wanted in the embodiment of Ninya.  And she used it to her full advantage to completely disarm me, but with the skill of a master so as not to be overtly obvious in her intentions and just enough to make me believe it was by own free will, but knowing her presence heavily influenced everything.

She pressed her hand on mine, but we joked as neither of us felt anything.  It was not like how Ninya had pictured when she said of Anna touching my teacher's hand and quivered as if she was touching the hand of Knut.  I was neither Knut, nor my teacher.

Knowing full well the reputation of the sisters, I shared my journal.  She read it dutifully and thanked me for being open.  She felt we would have a fruitful friendship and would be open with me as it was the way of all sisters.

We began our many dialogues and conversations discussing in detail what I had collected in my thoughts.  She was able to correct and explain quite a bit and I asked if any of Karl Knutmudsen's writings had survived.  None of it survived, but the sisters all gathered what they could remember and through sheer determination were able to reconstruct what they could into an almost complete representation.  They found the journal useful in adding a bit more context and some details that they would never had known.

Still, we all accepted that it would be an imprecise replica and were careful that some important wisdom or passage would be missing or transcribed improperly to make profane Knut's vision.

I wondered and she already answered that they did not wish to disturb my teacher after Anna's death.  It was a wish held by many of the sisters to honor her by allowing him to live out a long and quiet life.  They always kept careful watch and he was never found wanting.

By some great fortune, my seeking him out was a godsend.  They did not influence this in any way and allowed it to unfold as it did spontaneously.  They were even more intent and curious and waited for this moment to complete Knut's work.

I then felt the same unease that my teacher had warned me.  It was a terrible sensation as I then felt the long hand of someone who I only knew of through others.  Ninya's embrace was much more soothing and pleasant, but it was still that thought that I had given them something he wanted buried.

She knew I lied and while the journal was truthfully everything I could transcribe, there were a few loose recollections and memories that I had yet to take to pen.  She would work to ferret them out and I knew eventually they all would slip.  She was quite generous and patient with me.

To my surprise in our discourse, she let slip that Anna so loved my teacher she was willing to grant his wish to allow Knut's legacy to die.  All of the sisters were appalled at her decision, but many obediently heeded her call.  And it was the nearest they ever came to realizing that dream.

It was only by sheer circumstance that a few sisters who were set to return home were delayed and left stranded.  They gathered, regrouped and became what Ninya knows of the sisters today.  Some bitterness lingers and while they worship Anna still and Knut and even my teacher, they feel a sense of wanting what had been there's all along and in many ways betrayed.  My journal was some form of solace and compensation for her transgressions.

Chapter 34 - My Teacher

It wasn't long, barely a year when I was graced with the privilege to hear from one of the elders, that he died and was quietly buried by his descendants on the Gustafson estate next to his ex-wife Sophie.  It was the family's wishes and that of Sophie to have him buried beside her.

He was a survivor from the original Commissariat before the war, before even the uprising of the Artesians.  He was quite open and relished the opportunity.  The funeral was brief and there were mourners like at any gathering and the rites given and prayers spoken.  I had a chance to speak with his children who were still my elders in age and they shared a picture very much the same as what he had shared of himself.

He was afforded a front row seat to watch much of some of our greatest recent history unfold and in some ways he had a hand in the most significant of these events.  Everyone who knew him and of his life marveled at how charmed a life he led to experience so much and be able to end it on his own terms.

Edgar attended and said a few words as he was obligated by his attendance and station.  He didn't know the man very well, but had met him a few times in passing.  We spoke afterwards during refreshments and first of politics and state matters, then of my teacher.  Edgar admired that I had sought out a most decent of men to learn from and he asked me for any advice or lessons that I could impart on him.

I could think of none pressing and said much of what he shared was so common knowledge that it would slip right past me and not have any relevance until the moment it was needed.  This would often give me pause as he told me so many things and I wasn't quite sure when it would be of significance or value.

He asked me to detail it and I had been keeping a journal of his teachings and my thoughts and interpretations.  The one thing I did mention, he often thought the Artesians spoke only gibberish, but as I read my notes, I felt somewhat awed that I was in many ways revitalizing what he never understood.  It was with this I put my pen down as I looked over and it all made sense and was quite clear, this has become the writings of Knut.

Chapter 33 - A New King

A toast, we toasted my friend a young Administrator who sought me out for advice and knowledge of the past.  We became friends and and in my 90th year, I felt a sense of purpose in sharing what I could about the ways of the Politiburo to this young man.

We joked that I was passing on the torch to a new standard bearer and he eagerly took it without fully understanding the heavy burden and responsibility.  So many had held the title and role and so many more would follow.  An unbroken chain spanning before me and to the dawn of humanity rests on this young man's shoulders.

And like all careless youths, he laughed not knowing what was so funny.  We spoke of the war and the aftermath, of the occupation and the sisters.  Then of the complete annihilation of the old ways of Karl Knutmudsen and a new age with King Edgar.

Edgar was not really a Monarch in the classical sense.  People just called him one as he he held the power and influence, holding court in the old Central Agency and doling out justice where he felt prudent.

His obsession of late has been figuring out a way to destroy once and for all the tyranny of the devil beetles.  While they slumber deep beneath the earth, he seeks out experts who can undo what our ancestors had built.  A small army of scientists scuttled about beneath the giant tendrils and feet of the sleeping beasts seeking ways to dismantle them.  None have found a way and some have only engaged the wrath of a few of the beetles who possess secret counter measures that were not previously known.

It was a loud crack and the quivering ground when we knew one of the beetles had its fill of the scientists and killed a few of them.  The counter measures were numerous to count, at first it was a mild irritant sprayed as a mist, but it grew in ferocity into a toxic venom as the beetles patience was tested.  The worst of it was a fiery beam of light that could turn a person into ash in an instant and could be aimed with pinpoint accuracy.  The beetles would let out a shrill when it engaged its death ray and sometimes it would seem to purposefully extend the agony.

After a while the beetles were left alone and none dared enter the caves.

Edgar grew despondent and in time, like many before him surrender to the existence of the devil beetles and focused on the pressing matters of the Politiburo.

My young friend asked me of Knut and the gibberish of the Artesians.  The new wave allowed open dialogue and study of the past, including of our oppressors and I was quite impressed at how candid and unrestricted.  I confessed that I still could not understand Knut, nor the Artesians and the only that made any sense had been Edgar in his fiery sermons.

Karl Knutmudsen was very charismatic and more than a match for Edgar, but his vision was short sighted and perhaps his ascension to power made him lose sight of things and fail in perspective.  It is easy to forget when surrounded by privilege.  He brightened at this and agreed that he was always concerned that he too would fall prey.

We admired the city square outside the window of the local pub.  And one statue of Karl had been restored and left as a reminder of our past.  It was not any of his more grand sculptures, and a more common one that you could have found in any school or industrial complex.  It somehow was spared and later found hidden away in a warehouse, abandoned and forgotten until it was needed again.

He jest that monuments sometimes have a life of their own and even with the near complete destruction of the Artesians, if a single shred of them existed, even in a stone relief, it would be enough to spark a complete resurrection of their cause.  And I nodded in agreement that a simple statue of the Knut was more than enough to bring about the return of the Artesians and it would have been better to crush it into gravel.

But I saw no reason for this as Edgar made it clear we would honor and respect the past without reservations no matter how painful and dangerous.  He welcomed public debate with would be converts that we called the Neo-Artesians who attempted to decipher and make sense of the gibberish and engage in open dialogue with Edgar.  And each time, he deftly disarmed each and every one of them.

The Neo-Artesians were more hedonistic children who cherry picked only the great delights of the past and glossed over the painful memories.  They were quite resourceful and found artifacts, restoring much that was lost, including fragments of Knut's old things from the Great Hall.  Nothing more than a few scraps or tattered rags, even bits of string.  I fretfully wondered if even from all the devastation if that pen survived intact, unscathed waiting to be found.  If it achieved such a feat, I would consider it almost supernatural and a miracle confirming Knut's significance.

We met each week this way and he never tired or bored of me speaking of the old days, even if some were stories I forgotten I had told him the week before.  He was always the patient lad and an excellent Administrator.  In time, it was my days coming to an end and I could no longer be concerned with Knut's legacy, as my own never mattered and soon I no longer had to care.  I could reject everything.

Chapter 32 - The Bluffs

I awoken one morning to the sounds of glass shattering and one of the windows in the living room had been smashed and a brick rest on the floor.  There was shouting and warm blazes on torches carried through the streets.  It was the first of many days of rioting.

We huddled for a time in our bedroom closet after barricading the front door.  Anna showed me the pistol she always carried concealed.  She pressed the stock into my fingers and explained the basic steps on how to use and fire the weapon.  She assured me it would be quite easy and would feel almost natural.  I couldn't fathom how it would feel natural pointing a gun at another person and killing them with a shot.

The breathless moments we waited as sounds by the front door, the slight turn and rattling of the locked door knob.  We waited, and waited for the sound of it giving way.  Would it be a crash or a bang.  Nothing, a few minutes later another rattling, but not as pronounced and then nothing.

The apartment next to ours, we heard the crash and a door give.  Screaming and shouting, a few shots and silence.  This repeated, with each more muffled.  We estimated at least eight apartments on the floor.  Some loud talking in a hurried and excited tone with footsteps and down the stairwell and gone.

Then the moment we waited, the door heaved and a kick.  Four figures massed into the living room and fanned out into each room.  Anna raised the pistol through a crack in the closet door and waited.  She took sight and then paused, lowering her aim she gently opened the door and embraced one of her sisters.  Four of them soon embraced her as well, they had been in the streets and came with the rioters.  They waited for them to leave and now returned.

Anna refused to leave alone.  I refused to leave my home.  After a time, I convinced her to leave with them.  I refused her pistol and sat in the living room alone for a time then gathered some things and went looking for Sophie.

The rioting was restrained within the city limits and Gustafson estate was untouched.  I reached there near the end of the day by foot and Sophie was there with the children.  They were uneasy with what they had heard and relieved that I had arrived unscathed.  We shared what information we each had and they said the Army was entering the city to quell the rioters and restore order.  It was unclear how or why it began, but the start was when they overran the Secret Police precincts and it exploded soon afterwards.

Out of the rioters emerged a leader.  Edgar.  He was no one of importance and other than work as a bookend and waiter, he was just an average citizen.  But somehow he became the face of the new movement and he negotiated the uneasy truce between the Army, the Police and the City.  The Politiburo used every means to destroy him, but he somehow eluded and bested every tactic.  Impressed, they agreed to hear him speak and his demands were modest.

They created a new role.  Secretary of the People.  He filled it with pride and restored law and order.  His lover as it turns out was one Anna's sisters.  She had sought him out and groomed him for this day.  He performed admirably.  The long arm of Knut persists.

I went to hear Edgar speak and his words were clear, concise.  I could understand him and this made me both elated and frightened.  I finally understood the Artesians and now it was Edgar.  He challenged them and the statues of Karl began to crumble.  Barely a generation and his image and visage was now anathema and forbidden.  They were all burned and dismembered.

No new icons as Edgar would call them.  Only the voice of the people would be our monuments.  The Army soon took up arms and from deep within the bowels of the network of man made caverns made from a bygone era the unholy weapons of our ancestors where dragged out once more.  When pleas by many had gave way to even older promises broken, we pointed them skyward and to the West, to East and to all points of the continent.

Like a great gray beetle it unfurled its protective shell and raised a thousand pointed spears.  The shell was of no metal or element known and weighed nothing, yet could withstand a hurricane without a scratch.  And when it disgorged itself of each flying spear, it would sit hollow and empty.  Then deep within its clockwork it would produce new weapons and slowly fill its belly until it became engorged and ready anew.  These eternal and immortal machines then slithered back into their subterranean layers.

New promises were made to never look for them, never to awaken and point them against our enemies.  And as before they will always be broken and the devil beetles will emerge again to clear their stomachs and take their fill.

Anna perished in the boiling oceans and bones ground to dust.  They made sure all of the Artesian cities were laid ruin.  I could only assume they held each other, Anna and Anna Two.

I could not fathom this was the work of Edgar.  I could not make sense of why this was the outcome yet again.  As our forefathers warned, the beetles could not be destroyed only unleash destruction.  They lamented in their greatest achievement a weapon of such absolute power would outlive everything.

Edgar, like many before in past centuries tried to throw them into the bottom of the sea.  He had them dragged out of the pits and pushed beyond the bluffs on the southside of the city proper.  And always like before they would fly up, shake off the waters and return to their home.  They remained, a constant reminder.

Now my only solace, every physical shred of Knut's existence was gone.  His pen, his writings, all of it finally sundered to ash.

Chapter 31 - Retribution

When the Artesians finally took control the re-education began and slowly they revised our history.  The Commissariat, Politiburo, Commissars, these are all words of their vernacular and over time we began to use their words to reflect on our own past.

My original title was that of a Commissioner in a public agency.  And later when we reformed into the Central Agency I became an Administrator.  We were civil servants and performed our duties based under the rule of law as defined by the articles of our Constitution.

In time, this all became foreign and all was the Commissariat had intended and it became easier to call myself how they wanted us to improve the quality of our shared language and communication.

We each were assigned a warden who functioned much as an ex-convict released on probation reported to their parole officer.  By good fortune, Anna was my keeper and made for a more pleasant experience than most.  She was generous and understanding and I was allowed considerable latitude when in the privacy of our shared home to speak freely and even against everything.

Anna made it clear, she could not protect once outside and I had to be on my guard when wandering the streets as all were looking, all could be spies and informants of the new Politiburo.

We laughed at how pointless this all was, if change was progress and all we did was spin around in circles, then why embrace or seek change?  New names, eventually new faces, it was all the same, always the same.

I grew weary of it all and wondered when I would be free of Knut's legacy.  His eyes forever watching from the millions of statues, posters and artworks.  Always gazing outwards, seeking something and demanding only our utmost attention and lifelong obedience.

There was talk of civil discord, of even open rebellion and the Politiburo embraced such ideas of wanton conflict and even wished to fan the flames so as to bring out a new form of entertainment for the weary population.  It soon became a fearful time to walk the streets and the new Secret Police who wear bright costumes and drag heavy clubs are more than enthusiastic.  They always patrol in groups of three or more to ensure sufficient numbers and converge into mobs when they smell blood.

The streets soon flowed once more a dried crimson and the smell we had forgotten became very familiar and awakened animal instincts.  Anna remained with me, this was not safe and she was warned many times by the sisters to return to her home, but she considered our place, by my side her home and I shouted that she was a fool.  She too had grown weary and while she still idolized Karl Knutmudsen, she no longer had that warm glow, it no longer had that fresh sheen.

Perhaps, this is a poor adaptation, an inaccurate translation of his great work.  While his words are perfect and the Artesian movement a passion.  In actual practice, it failed somehow.  Somewhere, maybe a single word or phrase was mispronounced and it cascaded in a butterfly effect into the monstrous works we see spilling out into every corner and artery of the city.  I couldn't help comfort her as it was always gibberish to me.

For a time, a false promise and things quieted for a time.  The bright costumes were not as visible and the clubs set aside.  This brightened Anna's mood, but it was only a short respite and we plunged back into the heady days that would bring about another revolution.

Chapter 30 - Pop Songs

My marriage with Sophie was in decline.  We ended it on good terms and remained steadfast friends.  I had always felt like a guest in the Gustafson estate.  Our children were supportive of the separation and in time we adjusted to the new normal.

I resumed living on my own in an apartment in town.  It was near my old apartment building that was destroyed during the war.  The new tenements were markedly improved and I had a view of the sweeping vistas abutting the city perimeter.  My neighbors were working class folk, some with new families and few old retirees like myself.

Anna offered to move in with me, but we both know or I hoped it was mostly in jest.  We had more time to spend together and she often traveled to the city to pay a visit among her numerous sisters and their growing broods.  They had formed their own enclave within the city, fully functioning with monthly club dues and a set of official bylaws and schedules.  If one only realized who they once were, it would be quiet a terrifying experience.

Whenever she did visit, she insisted on staying with me, obligating that I furnish an apartment larger than I needed as a bachelor.  Sophie often paid a call and we agreed to meet once a week like we once did in the garden and felt a certain ease by reducing, but maintaining our social visits this way.

The two women finally became acquainted and I surprised myself that neither Anna nor Sophie had ever met until that day.  They only knew of each other in passing and from my interactions between them.  It was quite an experience for all of us to finally share a table and simply chat.

The new regime remained and was growing old, but everything seemed to work as intended.  People blissfully complacent as how the Artesians had hoped and no longer a need to be treated like a trendy new fad and now the stodgy old tradition.

There were fewer and fewer guards in the central hall and in time none were needed.  Knut's pen lost significance as did all his physical possessions.  His messages and his teachings remaining as powerful as ever, even if they remain gibberish to me.  A new dawn for mankind and Knut lives on in pop songs sung by ever younger and young generations who have less and less a reason to know who he was.

Chapter 29 - Monuments

To celebrate new beginnings and great moments in history, mankind crafts monuments and often they can resembling towering mountains of granite and steel or something as small as the mere absence to make the heart yearn and feel the significance.

Many war memorials and monuments were made in various fashions and degrees.  Eternal flames, miles of tombstones in rolling hills, buildings, scultures, paintings and ever more artwork and theatrical pieces.  There was always more room for monuments.

While there were a million statues of Karl Knutmudsen circling the globe.  His bust and his visage became the most common thing everyone would awaken to and the last thing they would see when they went back to sleep, there were no monuments to me.  And I am happy and made sure of this.

It's not coincidence that I never uttered my name, even my family name sake.  Not so much to tarnish the legacy of Knut, nor to avoid it all the same.  I just have no inclination for either and especially not a hideous statue of myself in some random park, further marred with my family name.  I spent enough time staring at letters taller than myself standing when it was in the Grand Mural.

The Artesians to their credit rebuilt the Grand Mural and painstakingly repainted every detail.  This was both impressive and terrifying as it made clear they had been among us all along and knew everything.  They could only have gotten the little things right and it wouldn't be a surprise if they themselves were the original creators of the Grand Mural.

The Politiburo, Commissariat, the camps, everything was quite possibly their hoax on us.  To prepare us for eventual assimilation into their ways.  But that would be beautifully easy to believe if not for the aberration that they adulate and worship Karl Knutmudsen.  And still doesn't make any sense how a movement could exist before its creator could even found it.  I often thought out aloud that maybe Karl was just the biggest fool of them all and he didn't know what was going on.  Maybe it was gibberish after all and the two of us were the only ones that realized it.

Chapter 28 - No Loose Ends

There is always a Wolf, a Gustafson somewhere tidying up all the messes and leaving no loose ends.  Sophie commented that Anna reminded her of Stephan and would have made their father proud if she was one of their own.  It would be hard to believe with how Stephan was swayed so easily by Knut and the reason for father's despair and anguish at being bested by the Artesians with such little effort.

Stephan was Wolf's disciple and his heir.  His instrument of war and his ticket that he said to an early retirement much like the Colonel's.  But none of that passed and he died on the Island just as Stephan died in the arms of Knut.  None of was supposed to have happened, but this all left messes that various elements of the Politiburo, Commissariat and even the Artesian converts had to clean up and so a new generation like Anna took up the standard and did an excellent job.

Anna had her own private army known as the sisters.  She handpicked and trained them herself and one of them was the assassin that took the Major's life.  She had been a deep plant for years and he was none the wiser.  Many of the war orphans and castaways of society were her willing and capable recruits.  Anna Two was the exception and she was never made privy of her adoptive mother's true profession nor invited or allowed to join when she was old enough to hear her mother's secrets.  Anna was always honest with her family.

All of the sisters idolized Anna and were made in her own image.  Honest in their own adaptation and interpretation of a true master.  She wouldn't call it the same adulation that she had of Knut, but there were few comparisons that would make sense.

She genuinely loved each of them and called them sisters and considered them her own flesh and blood.  She never sent any on a mission without sufficient means of escape when things turned south.  She had to intervene a few times surreptitiously while she was a humble attache at the Central Administration and none were the wiser.

One of her favored sisters was somewhat incompetent and got herself stuck in a jam when attempting to divulge secrets from a military officer.  He knew she was an agent and had planned a trap.  There was no escape.  Anna always found a way and it was the Major who was made the fool of his own trap.  There is something about honesty, brutal openess and truth that seems to set people at ease in ways when they should really be cautious.  She and the sisters perfected this art.

But even with all old traditions and family business the value and importance of the sisters services were no longer necessary.  The world was in the image of Knut and an Artesian paradise.  They had planned a long game of generations and centuries of asymmetric warfare with the sisters helming the resistance.  Anna was transcribe battle doctrine and manuals to teach each subsequent generation of converts, she had no idea it would all be of little value before she was the age of thirty.  That the centuries of war would be compressed in barely a fraction of her lifetime and the outcome exactly as she would have wanted or intended.

It startled and tickled her, but not the same as being handed Knut's pen.

After the deaths of the Major and the Captain she handed me a list.  It was a very long list of enemies.  She then outed all of her sisters, about 14 of them, many stationed in high positions or even married to senior party officials.  She assured me she had given me everything and that there were 3 more sisters that she chose to not disclose who were in sensitive relationships and precarious situations, but they had been deactivated and would never pose a threat.  But if I asked she would divulged their existence.

The apparatus was dismantled and she felt it was the last thing she needed to accomplish and she became doting mother of Anna Two.  Going to soccer games and family picnics.  She waited for her retirement gift.  None came.

Karl Knutmudsen's pen now rests in the central hall of the Artesian capital city.  It is guarded by a hundred of the most elite guards armed to the teeth.  Penalty of thievery or any defacement of the creators work tantamount to hard labor and instant death.  All of Karl's work and a history of his life on public display and the crown jewel, his humble pen now rests as property of mankind.  Greta was offered curatorship, but she declined and instead released all of her brother's remaining things and knick knacks.  She had enough items to finally fill the massive auditorium of the central hall from end-to-end with the creator's closet and shoe box.

Chapter 27 - Retirement

The Central Administration was transformed once more and merged with their Artesian allies across the ocean.  It was now the global organization that arose from the League of Nations.  I now knew the significance after my chat with Anna why she handed me back Karl's pen to write the final draft of the charter and when it was handed over to the trade delegation.  They trembled when they gingerly took that charter.

They ran it through a battery of tests and analysis and confirmed the pen flourishes, even the ink was authentic and of it Karl Knutmudsen's fabled pen.  It caused quite a stir and many sleepless nights that they were holding the most recent of Knut's writings in their very hands, not some relic from before the war or since the uprising.

The words were actually Knut's.  While I never can understand the gibberish, the Colonel' staff had it transcribed in much the same way Karl might have assembled his own teachings and they rang much the same as if by some divine coincidence both in the physical instrument and the literal translation.

We could have written the terms of absolute surrender and the Artesians would have signed it and obeyed it dutifully, if we had known the significance of Knut's pen.

The Colonel was made redundant and to his relief never a target of Anna's wrath.  She kindly told him at his retirement party and they shared notes like worthy adversaries after the wars had long ended and clarified points and assumptions they had made over the years.  They were like true friends and students of their craft and while he admitted she won and would have wiped the floor with his carcass, she was the better, but should have.  They embraced and she insisted he call on her and that she owed him many favors for having introduced Anna to me.

Too many coincidences, she still trembles at the thought of that first day.  The pen in her hand, our encounter.  It was all too much and she wanted to drown herself in the stiffest drink at how much an out of body experience it was.  It still is her most memorable moment.

By tradition, adversaries, especially those who were bested would go to some foreign hotel with out a retinue of guards.  They would enjoy their last few meals, take stock of some of life's vices and an assassin's knife or well placed bullet would remind them of their place.  The Colonel was allowed to do all of this, but there was no assassin.  He had an actual boring retirement.

But traditions die hard and an empty bullet casing was placed on his bedside table next to his wrist watch he always took off.  They set the time to exactly when it would have happened and had even fired the shot in the room without stirring him or him the wiser.  All the evidence was on his bedside and he took it as a retirement gift and went to breakfast.

Others were not so lucky and it was like the golden days of the Politiburo.  The major was found in a pool of his own blood at his mistress home.  The captain who we wondered why he resigned so suddenly was found wanting and had been a double agent for the Artesians, he then was outed by the Colonel and the Major who made him into an equally confusing triple agent and was the reason for both their early retirements.

Anna was the most honest and not the Colonel because of how it all happened and so they remained friends and he visited the Artesian cities and marveled at the teachings of the Knut and how he remembers and was there in the same hallways and offices of Karl Knutmudsen as my attache and this made him a celebrity in his own right.

Chapter 26 - Fountainpen

Karl was fond of old things and his parents owned and operated a stationary shop well stocked in antiquated fountain pens.  They were not very good sellers and only a few obscure collectors and hobbyists would ever want one.  It was the one little joy in Karl's life and a passion he could share with his father.

They both had their favorite fountain pen and his was an exquisitely made black laquer with gold inlays and an 18k gold nib.  He always used the same ocean blue ink and had a way of scratching the surface ever so gently to cause a pleasant sound of touching parchment.  He had gifted the pen to me a few days before the revolt and over the years had showed me how to care and refill the ink reservoir.  I rarely used it, but for a time and fashion practice my penmanship with it.

I largely had forgotten and buried it in my desk.  It somehow survived there unscatched when the shells and explosions rocketed the old Politiburo.  It was my reason for admiring all the bullet holes and find that beautiful pen completely untouched and working as perfectly as the day Karl handed it to me.

It turned out to be one of the most prized of Karl's possessions and everyone knew about the significance of this humble instrument.  It was one of the holy grails of all Artesian converts and by me carelessly handing it to a young girl like Anna it completely shattered her world view and it took her years to recover and realize it wasn't the greatest con and just a mere coincidence, even when there were a relentless number of coincidences.  She honestly admitted she could never be quite sure of my duplicity, but she had surrendered the outcome and only wanted to touch the Knut.

When her adoptive father was in danger, it wasn't the Colonel who rescued him.  It was that pen.  She handed it over to the authorities and pulled the greatest con of her life.  She terrified their Commissariat to thinking the Artesians were alive and well and in fact had a new leader.  They quickly revised all their strategies overnight in preparing for the coming wave of the Artesian revolution.  And as a shrewed master of craft she made the Colonel believe he had wronged them, which he did, but he in turned absolved himself of his sins, which he didnt.

She gave whatever she thought was fair trade and that secret in exchange for the gift of a pen.  I now understand why and scratched my head then as I do now at how trifling it all seemed and yet meant everything to Anna.

I really didn't want any secrets between us and asked Anna was there anything else or anything that we should explain.  She laughed and said she had always been telling me the truth and always would be honest with me, she just didn't know when to say it and had always been waiting patiently.  She still believed I was that secret leader and the champion of Knut, awaiting for further instruction.

I feigned for her to get me a sandwich from some obscure delicatessen on the other side of town.  She dutifully obeyed and left in her car and returned.  She wasn't joking.

Chapter 25 - Celebrity

It became quickly apparent that my connection to the Knut was well known and this made me a minor sensation and a celebrity.  Anna tried to avert me from realizing this as everywhere we went people gawked at me, but it was quite clear as young mothers brought their children like I was a politician to hold or kiss them.  People in uniforms would nod or salute and nearly everyone wanted to gaze or touch me like I was Karl Knutmudsen.

It would be about as close as anyone would ever get to touching the founder, the creator and like a god he had become to all of the Artesians the new generation of willing converts.

This courtesy did not seem to extend beyond me, nor to Sophie or our children.  This was with much relief and seemed I was now treated like the last of the originals who knew Karl first hand.  But why couldn't they say this of a baker or a waiter who served his meal?  Or of his driver or even someone who polished and pressed his uniform?  They all touched the creator and many surely still exist and can remember the old Commissar.

I remember then Greta Knutmudsen, his only kin.  She never married and we had met on a few occasions as Karl was very secretive and guarded about his past.  We kept in contact and she survived the war, the enemy soldiers somehow knew she was the sister of the creator.  While they never harmed or touched her with filthy intentions, they neither granted her any courtesy that they heaped on me.

We called more frequently after the war and she shared insight into her brother.  Family life was not blissful and quite strained as he never got along with their father.  He was a drunken lout and nearly ruined their family with his ineptitude.  But his ascending the Politiburo assured them a comfortable life and she was never found of wanting.  She continues as a school teacher in a sister institute of the Perkin's.  Everyone knows she is a Knutmudsen, but like the same treat her no different than if she wasnt one.

If there was ever a time to make the rounds of this cast of characters, perhaps we should dive into everyone who hasn't yet been mentioned.  While I cannot account for all my accounts for the past few years, there are many details, most mundane and quite routine that have transpired and involved many people who have yet to be mentioned other than in passing, including Greta.

Greta is eight years the younger of Karl.  They were the only siblings of his father Kurt Knutmudsen and their mother Gertrude.  The Knutmudsens were actually first cousins and as was custom for them to often wed.  Since neither Kurt, nor Gertrude had siblings, it became clear their offspring were unlikely to ever wed.  To others outside their customs they would find this revolting and equally odd, but that was how foreign customs go and to each their own.

Kurt Knutmudsen was indeed a drunk, but he was neither abusive nor cruel.  His was more the jovial kind that found delight in everything when in a stupor.  This offended the industrious senses of his son who wanted a mentor to look up to that was a captain of industry, instead he had an incompetent comedian for a father.

Gertrude put up with Kurt's antics as she preferred his drinking over his smoking as he would light up a chimney of smoke and with Greta's poor circulation and asthma was an impending death sentence on their household.  So the drink was Kurt's favorite past time and she plied it the best she could with what cheap liquor they could afford.

Greta largely grew out of her childhood asthma and only had rare bouts when she could barely catch her breath.  She found unique ways to compensate for her shortcomings and could still take off in a sprint or climb flights of stairs unassisted.

She was never found for wanting as Karl made sure after his appointment to bureau chief all of his spare income went to her.  She proved a reliable accountant and investor, but only enough to not raise suspicion.  She could have retired comfortably, but feigned that the war had erased all of Karl's assets which largely was accurate.

Some of Karl's old things she still keeps and many are treated like holy artifacts and relics.  She could fund a large ransom with just a few of his trifles and she has at least a thousand of them in one of many crates and barrels in their ancestral home.  You could never quite understand the Knutmudsens even without the Artesian nonsense.  Here was Greta who could be the richest woman in the world, sitting on a gold mine of Karl's things and all she does is donate them to museums.

There is an entire and intricate economy devoted in the trade and exchange of Karl's things.  It became such a serious problem and cause for concern that now any donations must go through the Central Administration and only after several curators have evaluated the value and intent of each artifact.  They are all numbered and catalogued with a blockchain to track their existence and authenticity as many replicas and fakes have also been produced in astonishing numbers and ever improving qualities.

I had gifted one of Karl's old pens that he had on his desk while still a Commissar to Anna when she first came to the Central Administration, much to her delight.  It was before she even mentioned the Artesians and like Oliver before she took it as an indication and waited for further instruction.  We both laughed that I was very adept at my ineptitude and skilled producing some hidden meaning when there never was one.  And to my astonishment she said it was not just any pen, it was the one he used to write many of his teachings as she said it had a unique flourish on certain letters that matched his first editions.  She said it really floored her and she almost gave it away that she was an Artesian the day he handed her Karl's pen and when she began writing with it and thought it a truly ingenius code word.  And for a time she thought me a truly mastermind of spycraft and her reason for being abrupt in saying she would be honest with me always as she was terrified that she had been found so quickly by a true master.  In time, she realized how very wrong her assumptions.

Then these writings did survive the fire, or were never in danger and Oliver, Michael and many of the Artesians were actually in contact with Anna's people.  It would explain a lot of things and now made more clear that the Commissariat co-opted what already existed and perhaps like a fool handed it out as a pen to Karl as I did to her not realizing it was significant and real.  That would be a simple explanation for the greatest mystery of mine.

I shared that theory with Anna and she said it was very plausible and Karl's writings does exist and I've been observing them, walking past and through them everywhere in her city.  But they were not entirely his own and he merely perfected what generations for centuries have tried and failed.  I started to understand and could make sense of a few words and phrases that sound like things from Antiquties or from many other bygone eras, like the Montresor many exhibits remixed each fall and largely the same presentation.

Then the language is now perfect if the Artesians have won?  Yes, enthusiastically Anna affirmed.  Isn't it brilliant and great that mankind finally achieved what it has yearned for since the dawn of time?  I tried to smile and nod in agreement, she knew I didn't understand and couldn't.  She patted my hand and wished I would know what she felt, but was happy for everything and each time she touched my hand she felt she was touching the Knut and it made her skin crawl with delight.

Chapter 24 - Our Foreign Enemies

Anna was my only window into a view outside a soldiers boot on my throat or a gun pointed in my direction of our shared and mutual foreign enemy.  While I knew they bred like us and naturally had woman folk and they in turn had children, it was my first experience and shock at how similar we really were and how much she reminded me of Sophie.

Why our two great nations had become vicious foes that lobbed epithets and waged wars, none of us could say the true cause only what was the reason for the current or more recent confrontation and it usually because of a previous one.

Anna was a historian and an astute one of both our cultures and painted a different picture that we once had a shared heritage and only a civil war between kin could have produced such a heated and bloodied legacy.  Only brothers know how to hurt each other.

We kept in contact, she had found a job and finally married a man of notable means who was a good father to Anna Two.  The little Anna was in an expensive school and spoiled with everything Anna did not have and this made her marriage blissful.  She laughed, while he was not a man of her type or character, he understood her basic need and performed more admirably than anyone.

The League was in its first year and like the old Republic's slogans of law and order it was largely the same, with new shared re education camps and a much larger penal system.  There was no suspension bridge spanning the continents, but it felt like one the day two cities became one.  And it was the sheer efficiency, the utter ruthlessness of the precision that made it very successful.

To the secret police's surprise, there were many more like Anna and it was unnecessary to carry on the old methods.  They were now quite bored and sometimes created their own Artesian like hoaxes to pass the time.  But there can never be another Karl Knutmudsen, these were all imposters and very poor renditions of a master.

Near constant the Colonel entreated me to return.  He felt such remorse that he had Anna's father reinstated and promoted to trade ambassador.  He professed that I was right and felt the wound in harming Anna had broken some unspoken promise.  I said we remain good friends and I was forever in his debt for rescuing me from poverty after the war and even before during the days of the old Commissariat, but I was too weary of forever fighting the legacy of the Artesians.  I still didn't know much of them or why the old guard were so terrified of such a hoax, only that it seems to have become real.  But I cannot see clearly anymore.

For Anna, she insisted I pay a visit to her foreign land.  While she and her husband had a modest apartment in a crowded urban district, she wanted to share everything and allow me to indulge and soak in all of her people's culture.  Her insistence was almost in sync and a counterpoint with the Colonel tugging me to mine.  A cruel jest deciding between a beauty or a beast.

Anna Two was now about the age of my daughter and she was very captivated by the pop music of Anna's homeland.  When she learned of the opportunity being thrown away, she begged her mother to allow me to be her chaperone.  And I acquiesced to Sophie's demands.

We took the next convenient jet and flew commercial economy to the main Capital air strip.  There we transferred to a larger plane that hurtled us at incredible speeds to Anna's home.  The air was a different kind and while everything resembled what we had at home from square buildings and curved roofs, to bright neon signs and paved streets, it had their own distinct flavor that captivated my daughter as she eagerly recited all the pop songs of her favorite foreign bands.

Anna greet us at the airport and drove us in her own car.  We stopped for a meal in a local restaurant and caught up on things that were more pleasant to do than over the phone.  She arranged for my daughter and Anna Two to travel on their own through the city and assured me it was quite safe.  I looked out the restaurant windows and saw many children, younger than our own wandering about with no supervision.  It was very foreign to me, but I again acquiesced and we spent the rest of the day alone.

She was always honest with me and said she was working again for the secret police, or had always been working for them.  She admired the Colonel who knew exactly who and what she was and only wondered why he allowed her to operate with such impunity for so long.  Now that I was no longer her foe she wanted us to be friends.  She promised as always, that her intentions were genuine and she did so with Karl Knutmudsen in mind.  We laughed it was like a halo of protection that has carried me my entire life.  Everywhere I go some convert or fan of the Artesians had made it their way to treat me like I was Karl's left foot that still walked the earth and thus wanted to kiss each step as if it was Knut's.

The wars were over, the prohibitions and taboos also no longer and even when she tried to explain what were the Artesians all about, I only heard gibberish.  Knut's words and slogans were everywhere.  They were so ingrained in Anna's homeland entire buildings, districts and squares were named after his words.  Even the restaurant, the names of the dishes, the gestures, all Artesian.  Artesian cuisine as they would call it now.

I lived, eat and breathed Artesian.  You could call the city Artesian, the nation, even Anna and still I could not fathom the concept and felt troubled that I would forever be lost in awareness and yet I shared space and was right next to the creator of all of this.  I told her about the phone call on that last day and she knew everything.  I told her honestly believed I was a fool and Oliver was right and she said this all is true, but it doesn't matter and she knew how I felt and thought most would have gone mad by now having experienced everything I had.

Anna would have made Knut proud a more worthy heir to his gospel than even Oliver or Ingrid.  We enjoyed their art museums and walked past giant murals plastered with Karl Knutmudsen.  They must have done it a thousand different ways and each one unique, yet connected beautifully to the Knut.  I could actually sleep easier here surrounded by it as I knew someone else was concerned and carrying on his legacy and I didn't have to deal with or care about it.

The Colonel called me again and we spoke about Anna and her dealings.  She confirmed she has always been honest with me and he is surprised as he tried to ascertain if this was just the greatest con, but he could not find one and he admit he was afraid he was being lulled into complacency and honestly believed she had no ill will towards me.  It's just like the day he nudged me in Wolf's office, she is an even bigger carnivore, but he couldn't understand why she hasn't devoured me.

I must not taste very well.  Or there was really something about this whole Artesian hoax after all.  But rather than embrace and pretend to be some kind of prophet for something I'll never understand, I'll continue to be myself and reject it all.  Everyone can do that now.

Chapter 23 - The secret police

We always address the secret police in lower case letters to accentuate their importance of keeping a very low profile.  While everything else had always been very loud and bright with massive slogans and song, there is little said of the secret police.  You shouldn't even call them a police force as they have nothing to do with public safety.

It was Anna who noticed this odd custom as she noticed my title and bureau etched in stained glass on my office door.  While everyone else had proper case, mine was almost hard to read the CADI of secret police.  She was very keen and thought me the best adversary that her father would have chosen to wage this asymmetric warfare across the hallway.  Anna would always be honest with me and gave the names of several young men who she had ensnared, including one of my assistants.

She never divulged what those stupid fools shared with her, but as quickly as they were outed they were dismissed to a camp based on the severity of their potential offense.  And being a member of the secret police, my assistant suffered the most severe of sentences equivalent to hard labor.  He was found wanting.

Anna resisted and said the temptation was too great and wanted to avoid any embaressment to my office, but she was on her own mission and the fool was so blinded and captivated he took it upon himself to drag up what files and documents to her apartment unaided.  She returned to me, unopened.  She did admit the filename on the folders were of things she was seeking and brushed her hand on mine that if I handed it to her she would gladly take them, but she gently pushed the files towards me and left the door.  She cared and had grown fond of me, she was a convert of Knut and what remained of him was sitting here.

The complaints began to roll in and my Colonel was stressed.  Even though every young man had been warned repeatedly she is a spy, they continue to break rank and rush to be by her side.  She has already let a few into her shallow embraces.  If there was ever a test of one's resolve and loyalty, none could do better than Anna, even the old Commissariats would be proud.

But finally it hit the fan when the son of some influential party member made himself a victim.  I personally warned Anna to not let that young man be ruined.  She herself claimed she acceded to my request, but he barged into her apartment thinking his family name was enough of an immunity.  The man was sent to the camps and Anna was reassigned.

The transfer was quitely made, an a dour young man with a sharp suit now sat in Anna's place.  He was bright and efficient and the work proceeded at a much quicker pace.  It would have been the same had Anna not been constantly barraged with attention.  We hammered out the details with the trade delegates and ratified the charter within six months.

It was to my disappointment, that the Colonel had arranged a cruel bargain.  Anna Two was allowed to go with Anna to her homeland, but in exchange for the release of several of our prominent spies who had been apprehended over the years.  This caused quite an embarrassment for Anna's father who was subsequently dismissed from his post and his family ruined.  I couldn't ponder the architect of the new League would be so petty.

But his mind was strategic and the spies that were released offered considerable insight into the true intentions and ways of our adversaries.  They did paint a genuine image that there was considerable social discord and there were many like young Anna, but still enough of the old guard who wanted to boil our oceans and ground our bones into dust in another real war.  Many still carried the outrage at how we ended the last one.

I tendered my resignation and left my office for the last time.  I chose to finally reject it all.