There has been a Christmas function planned at work. It’s a fairly economical affair this year. Normally we try a new restaurant, but this year we have chartered a bus.
I have to first go across the park to visit Mr B and his team at another government led think-tank. I take a bottle of red wine and a pair of thongs for some reason in a brown paper bag.
Upon arrival, they are having drinks and I stay for one, conscious that I really need to return to my party. I don’t want to miss the bus, or cause any unnecessary delay.
Mr B has been confined to walking sticks. His legs are somewhat frozen up. He hobbles around as if on his knees.
I have a drink and nibble on some food. As I make my way back to the main party, I find myself in a suburban shopping centre. There is an old ramshackle stair well, neglected and unsafe, and a number of us are scaling it via the handrails. For some reason its not practical to climb the actual stairs.
I see a couple of short cuts – gaps in the queue – and take advantage, leaping across the stairs at hand rail height. This hastens my progress back to the party.
On the way at the top floor, a concourse with driveway and car park – there are tables of more food, as if to distract me. I pick up a couple of pieces of some kind of slice. There are savour and sweet parts. The savoury version is basically layers of lasagne pasta separated with mustard. The sweet one is a crumbly apple slice.
I make it back to the bus to be one of the last boarders. When on I notice that a number of the passengers are Russian, in addition to my colleagues.
We move out and its apparent we are heading to some kind of boot camp. Its not clear to me whether we are new conscripts or prisoners.
When we arrive, I can see from the windows, an enormous complex of unusual buildings – all architecturally interesting. Folded aluminium or stainless steel in appearance. It looks like a designers holiday camp, with guns.
We leave the bus, and I am now with essentially the people on the bus, joined by hundreds of other me waiting to discover their fate. It seems we are being processed, and make small talk. Plans are discussed, and rumours circulate via some of the older hands, about the hardship we can expect – the limits we must endure.
There is a small canal, narrow but deep. Some men are swimming and taking a welcome dunk after the long bus ride. As expected, it is near freezing, so I don’t stay immersed for long.
The savoury mustard slice from before has morphed into a stash of contraband. It has assumed the status of drugs. I’m busily hiding the last piece I have in a large box of matches. I have secreted this first in a brown paper bag in my small kit of belongings then up on a shelf, so as to keep it away form me if I’m searched.
A joint has been passed around earlier, and now a large Russian guard is poking through our belongings, so my idea to secret the mustard slice came in handy.
I find a 4 litre tin of used paint solvent. I throw this into the bay of a passing military vehicle. Something like a troupe carrier, that is filled with rubbish, a combination of wet and dry. Indescribable stuff. Something is smouldering in the rubbish. I throw the can in and wait for it to ignite, and cause a diversion.
I wake up.
