Forever young,

by
Jesus Angel de las Heras Jiménez

1 Fishing for eternity.

This story is related to the myth of Beast and Beauty, so often taken to literature and from it to the cinema), the maimum example of which is —in my opinion— the literary jewel by the French writer Victor Hugo, Our Lady of Paris, in which the ugly hunchback Quasimodo falls in ove with the beautiful gypsy Esmeralda. In our tale the heroine is an attractive woman from the North of Spain who decided to jump into the river Sella from a bridge with the idea of committing suicide. The current is swift and whe was at the center of the rive when she repented from her crazy action, but there was no way back: it was useless to fight the stream, for it was so irreocable as the Law of Gravity itself, which did not permit her to go back to the bridge once in the air, when she suddenly realised that was not right, and she was being taken to the meanders which, a few kilometers yonder, had those rocks which will make her skull collapse or her to lose consciousness so that she would drown to death.

Only five hundred meters down the river from the bridge there was a man fishing and watching the strong stream which was running so fast, the nature wonder of which absorbed all his attention, when he noticed his hook had trapped somehing. And very big that fish had to be, because it nearly took his rod from his hands. He leveraged his feet on the ground behind a big rock, decided not to give up his prey to the Sella ,when he reaised that it was not a common fish, but it was more like a siren. Getting strenght from his sould, as he was rather lean, short and little, he fought as best as he could not to get it out of the water, but to get it closer to the river bank, what he succedded to accomplish little by little, till in the end she could grab one of the tree branches which overlooked down into the river.

When he realised that she was already anchored to the branches, he left his fishing rod on the floor and went to see the prodigy.

"You fell, didn't you?", the tired man said.

"I did", she said between breathings as she unhooked her belt

"It's a dangerous spot. Waters run down very fast here, and you can't miss those rocks", he pointed further down the river" and faint and drown, or get killed by the crash itself. You were only too lucky I was fishing here, young lady".

"Yes, you're right, Sir", she said. And then kept silent.

The man stared at her in curiosity. Did she fall, was she pushed, or did she jump herself? She was a beautiful woman, in her thirties, blond, tall, much taller tan him, and in spite of the heavy stress she had just gone through, she looked very healthy...

Suddenly she started crying like crazy, touching her belly. The man touched it, too, and knew at once what the matter was: that woman was about to have a miscarriage. He put her skirt up and took her underclothes off, and very carefully he took onto his hand what that woman was delivering: a two month old faetus, considering its size, only three centimetres. Poor thing, it would never be a person. It could not be saved. So the only practical thing to do was to throw everything into the river, including the placent.

Against her will, because she believed he wanted to drown her, the man managed to put her back into the river, completely naked, where he sank her up to her neck. It cost him a lot, not because she was strong, as in that moment she was exhausted, but because the poor man was skinny, small, weak, and besides, he was already of a certain age. But the river took away that girl's blood, it cleaned her, and the cold of the waters stopped her bleeding. Then, with great effort, he pulled her out of the water and dragged her into his vehicle. And before leaving he went back to pick up the recently aborted woman's clothes. And he took her to his own house.

"Where am I?", she said when she woke up, three days later.

"You're with me, girl", said the man. "What madness did you want to commit?"

"I'm very unfortunate..."

"Nothing justifies killing yourself. Nor kill another person..."

The man was very serious.

She observed the room: it was dark, it had a window through which sunlight came in. There was a table and a chair, where that peculiar man was sitting. She should be dead now, but she saw herself all of a sudden in an unknown place with a stranger, quite ugly, who had saved her life. And she didn't know whether to spit at him or hug him. The man was very short, completely bald, with no hair on his eyebrows or eyelashes on his eyes, of an indefinite color. But they were very clear, although it was clear that he was not albino.

"Who are you?"

"My name doesn't matter. Do you want to talk, unfortunate girl?"

"It's just... I'm very ashamed".

The man remembered the girl was naked under that sheet. He nodded and left the room. He returned shortly after with a loose robe that he placed on the bed.

"Here, get dressed, and come to the dining room. You have to eat something. You haven't eaten or drunk for three days, or more".

He left the room, and five minutes later she came out and found a bowl of milk, some buns, some bread and two fried eggs.

"I'm sorry that the menu is not very varied, but this will give you strength".

After the brief meal, she told him that a soldier had deceived her for weeks, and when he found out that she was pregnant, the soldier evaporated. That's why he had jumped into the river to kill himself and thus end all her problems.

"Such a beautiful girl as you..."

"Yes, I know it was crazy. As soon as I found myself in the river I regretted it, but the current was so strong that I couldn't reach the shore".

"Did you jump off the bridge?"

"Yes, that's why I fell in the center of the river".

"Nothing is worth losing your life, woman. Nothing nor nobody. And even less at your age".

"In 19^th century Spain, having a child without a husband..."

"It  happened to many before you. Are they braver than you?"

"Indeed.. I don't see myself alone with my child against the world".

"Look, little girl: I have lived a lot, and the older I get, the more I want to live. I never had a girlfriend, no one loved me, and I haven't had the option of having children. I would have loved it. I wish yours had survived. If you didn't want him, I would have taken care of him and educated him".

"Thank you, sir" she said, taking his hand. "You are very good!"

"Well, since I can't take care of your child, I'm going to take care of you until you can return to the world and can take care of yourself".

She smiled, she didn't see any danger in that little guy who was such a nice person. You could see the kindness on his face, although it was so strange. Besides, where was she going to go? To her parents' house, after what had happened? She wouldn't have the courage to look at their faces. Furthermore, she was already missing for several days from home. The offer of that little being that didn't seem real would solve things for her for the moment.

"Do you know?, he said after a long silent pause. "I don't know what your life has been like until now, but don't tell me about it, because it doesn't seem very pleasant. From now on your life will be beautiful. And I'm going to make up a name for you that's special. You are beautiful and cute. I'll call you Belle".

"Yes, it is a good idea. I will leave the past behind. Euphrasia no longer exists. Now I'm Bella".

And Belle, the beautiful girl, stayed in the house of that strange man, halfway between the beast from the story and the grumpy dwarf from Snow White.

But she had a problem when she wanted to go outside. Yes, she went through the front door without problems, but when she wanted to walk around the house, she noticed that something blocked her. A desert plain of brownish sand could be seen in all directions. The sky was black even if the Sun was shining brightly. And that scared her a lot.

So much so that he screamed for her savior:

"Hello! Sir! Where are you? Where are we?"

"O, yes, sorry", she heard from behind. "We should have gone to my country house. Here I had the remedies for you to recover, but now we'll go to my other house, which is in the countryside and is much nicer.  Come on, let's go".

They got into a very strange car. So strange that it didn't have wheels. It was really a box made of a very rare kind of wood. They locked themselves in it, and a few minutes later she felt as if they were pulling her down. He opened a door, and they came out in front of a two-story rural house, near the Sella River, where she almost died.

"This is my other house. And yours from now on".

They lived for many years. He taught her to read, write, and on history, biology, mathematics... Much more than what men learned at that time, not to mention women. He also taught her to play the piano and to develop a sensitivity for art like she had not seen in anyone else. It seemed unbelievable that such an unattractive guy knew so much. He had rightly saved her from the waters, and made her recover from them. She had never felt half as healthy as she had since she was there, with that man. He taught her to speak English and Italian perfectly. The only thing she didn't know was how long she had been there, in that country house.

Until he decided she was ready for life in society, and consequently gave her a house he had in the center of Madrid, and a checking account in which there was money to live on for several years, until she could earn her living.

But when she bought the newspaper, she saw that she had spent twenty years with the ugly man, as she called him. And yet, when she looked at herself in the mirror, she saw she looked the same as the day she had wanted to kill herself. What was happening? She was now fifty years old but she looked thirty.

She thought intensely about her savior, whom she knew by that name, Salvador, when there was a soft knock on the door.

"Hello", Salvador greeted her. "I came to see how you are doing".

"I'm in a mess. Look: I tried to commit suicide 20 years ago, when I was already 30 years old".

"That's right."

"But now I look the same as I did then, 30 years old, not 50".

The man looked at the ground, like children do when they are caught in a prank.

"Well..., you see..., I…"

"Yes? Can you explain it to me?"

"Look, Bella, when I found you you were in a very bad shape. I didn't want you to die. I liked you and I thought you hadn't come into my life by chance. And I wanted to keep you. I had to give you special treatment, and I'm afraid I cured you too much".

"What do you mean, too much? Either you heal, or you don't heal".

"You see, I overdid your dose: you're never going to get old".

"Won't I? Am I going to die this young?"

"No. You're not going to die either".

"What? Am I never going to die?"

"No, unless you kill yourself.

"In the Sella River I learned that life is beautiful and worth living. And I promised to myself, after you saved me, that I would live as many years as I could".

"Well, you're going to live them all. In the Sella River I also learned things. I learned to appreciate the beauty of Nature. Something was calling me to that shore. Now I know: I was waiting for you to show up. My beautiful mermaid..."

"What do you mean I'm going to live  them all?"

"Well, that you are never going to die".

"I can't believe that".

"You look 30, you're 50. What other proof do you need?"

"It's just a long time... What am I going to do?"

"Go back home, that is, to your parents'. Go back to Arriondas, and if your parents, or your siblings, are still alive, tell them that your mother left there because she became pregnant, and that you, her daughter, want to return to your roots. And when your parents or your brothers are no longer alive, we will meet again here.

"But I thought you wanted me to stay with you, that you saved my life for me to stay with you and looked after you..."

"I prefer you to live your life, girl".

"But..., how will I find you?"

"You can't. If I do not find you before, in a hundred years will meet again in this same place".

"But I thought", she insisted, "you wanted me to stay with you, because you had saved my life for you, to have me with you..."

"It is true that I love being with you, and that these twenty years have been some of the best I have lived because of you, but I am already very old. I could be your grandfather, if not more. So when I saved your life, I saved it for you, so that you may live a long and happy life. I will be happy if I see you happy".

She gave him a hug, and stayed for a long time sobbing on the shoulder of that little dwarf who was so good and so capable of anything. If he had been tall and handsome he would have been the prince charming that every woman has ever dreamed of. But she was right: she wanted to take advantage of life, to live a happy life from the point where she left it, now that she was so well prepared, twenty years later.

The year was 1890. She went to Arriondas, and even got her parents in their old age. They took her for her daughter, of course. But their other children told the old people that it was not possible. She herself explained to them that she was the daughter of the one who left. She explained to them why she had left, and told them a curious story, that she had tried to kill herself, but then a short and ugly man had rescued her and had married her, later having a daughter, who had decided not to die without seeing her roots. The poor old people cried with emotion, regretting that her daughter had not confided her problem to them. Maybe everyone would have been much happier, despite the town's gossip.

One of the town's young men, Henry, fell in love with Euphrasia as soon as he saw her. He asked her for a relationship, he went to ask the old men for her hand, and since they couldn't give her daughter's hand, they gave him her granddaughter's hand. But after thirty years, in 1920, he asked her why she didn't age. And she told him the truth. He rejected the idea, told her that she was a witch, and that he did not want to deal with the devil, and left the house. She had to get ahead with her son, and when he expressed his desire to study a career as a doctor, she took him to Madrid, and the two of them studied together. He became a specialist in heart diseases, and she became a psychiatrist. Over the years she went to visit her husband, who had fallen ill and was confined in a state facility. When he saw her he started screaming and she had to leave there. The next day they told her that he had died. She learned that day that not everyone was ready for the truth. In fact, almost no one is.

A few months later she said goodbye to his son and went to work with Doctors Without Borders for more than twenty years, in various places around the world. She ended up in India, where she met a very handsome man, James Carter, whom she married. She did not know that one of her brothers-in-law was a CIA agent whose cover was precisely his family and his activities as a businessman. Poor James died three years later, and then she went to work with Doctors United for the World, successor to DWB, changing locations from time to time, always asking to work in very small towns where there was no other doctor but her.

2 Nostalgy.

We all have a desire for immortality from the moment we are born, especially when we are aware that death exists and that one day we are going to die.

That sunny day I was swimming on the beach in front of the house that I had bequeathed to my granddaughter Jezebel. The blue sky did not have a single cloud, the sea was as blue as the sky it reflected; and there was no one else there on that entire privileged beach. No one had lived there for years, but I continued to take care of my house. The house that I had bought many years before and that my granddaughter had inherited when her mother, Isabel, died at the age of 90, and her uncle three years later. Her brother had gone to South America and probably he had a great time, because he didn't show any signs of life again. My granddaughter knew about her brother through the publications he made, since he was a famous writer and from time to time he would treat his audience to a new creation. But she personally had not heard from him for many years. It was a sad life that of my daughter Isabel, who had a son who disappeared much earlier than her. I had left the city sixty years before, and therefore I was no longer in time to see her. But I would see her daughter, my granddaughter Jezebel.

3 Greatgrandmother.

She was a lovely old lady. Scholarly, serene, retired painter, with snow hair and face wrinkled with worries, joys and sadness, but never without losing her good humor, slightly bent over, but at her 96 she is still totally independent, living with her memories, her joys and sorrows of a full life full with love. One meter sixty very well used.

Now she had no one left, or at least that's what she thought. Until the day I showed up at her house:

"Salvador!"

Hello, great-grandmother! No, I'm not my grandfather. My name is Celedonio and I am the son of your son's son Salvador."

"What? You look a lot like your grandfather, my son. Come on, come in, you have a lot to tell me."

As a good person with good manners, before entering I gave that charming woman a big hug, and I gave her a kiss on each cheek, with an I love you that smugled out of me.

"Jezebel", I told her when she was preparing the coffee that we were going to share, "my father, your grandson, was called Samuel, and I was born in Cuba, in Havana. A few months ago my father, your son's son, died. Salvador, and he told me to look for you, and that if you were alive, to give you something that his father, your son, had given him for you. He could not come to see you due to a series of circumstances that I will tell you later. But I came as soon as I could. They both talked to me so much about you, first my grandfather, and when he was gone, my father repeated to me the things he used to hear from his dad throughout his life, and I wanted to meet you while I still could, great-granny, unlike my dad who could not make it".

I handed her the package. The poor thing, in her excitement, couldn't open it, so I opened it for her and gave it to her.

"Ah, wow, he had it all these years. And I was looking for it, until I gave up for lost... As my grandmother Pepa used to say, Blessed that which returns home".

I also knew my great-great-grandmother's saying, and it was not like that. It was Blessed is the money that returns home. It was clear that my great-grandmother had adapted the saying to the circumstances...

"No, great-granny. Grandpa Salvador told my father that his uncle Felipe had given it to him."

"What?"

"Yes, apparently you gave that book to your uncle with your first salary. But he lent it to his nephew when he went to Brazil. So you will surely go back, he told me, if only for give it back to me, because I can't give it to you: my niece gave it to me, and a gift cannot be given, even if it can be lent, he said."

She opened it, and there was her dedication: To my uncle Felipe, with love, for having encouraged me to read . The book was Night Flight, by the French writer Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.

"I looked for this book in his house when my poor uncle died. I asked all the relatives, and none of them had it. I gave it up for lost."

"Well, now you have it. Grandpa Salvador knew you were going to love having it."

I had decided to stay and live with my great-grandmother, and when I found out that she was living alone, I strengthened that decision. Until I arrived, a social worker came every day to make her food and take her out for a walk. But I decided to free her from that mission, and have her care for another elderly who did not have a great-grandson who wanted her exclusively for himself.

But I did something else:

"Great-grandmother, when did you last go to the beach?"

"More than ten years ago. It is very sad without the ones I loved, son. —She got used to calling me that. She didn't like Celedonio, apparently."

"I'm going to take you tomorrow."

"No, no, forget it. It is very bad, abandoned. If it isn't full of squatters."

"Are you busy? Hmm…, I'll see. I'm going to go tomorrow alone, and if it's open to visitors, we'll go on Sunday."

The squatters problem had been solved for decades throughout the world, including Spain. The insufficient legislation that had existed was changed with the arrival of two new parties, as I had been informed in my country, Cuba, and now it was more profitable for people to work and buy a house than to steal it from those who could not defend it for themselves. But my great-grandmother, logically, still lived in the 21st century...

The next day in the afternoon I took my uncle Tomás' car, which had not been used since the poor man had died five years before. It was electric, and the motor still ran very well. I gave it a slow charge, 24 hours, and had a very pleasant trip, listening to my great-grandmother's grandfather Salvador's favorite radio station, Radio Clásica, which was one of the remains of that 20th century society. An hour later I arrived to the family duplex, which I would soon convert into a chalet because the entire neighborhood was for sale, and I bought the duplex attached to mine. In fact, it was all in a state of ruin or semi-ruin. I brought an architect from a nearby town, and he told me that mine was not bad, and that it could be inhabited, although he recommended a few repairs be made to strengthen the walls, and make it habitable. I arranged with him to start the work in a week, which would last just a month, and we signed a contract.

I entered those rooms used so many times by me and my family for so many years. My wife had not wanted to return there after I disappeared, because it was his refuge, where he was most comfortable, and that tought caused some pain in her chestg. I arranged it precisely for that reason, so that my granddaughter would have a second, or third, childhood there.

I swam on the beach, which had been left to me alone, since that was a ghost town in the 22^nd century. In the afternoon I returned to my great-grandmother's, bought groceries, and the next day I took Jezebel to where she spent her childhood, or at least part of it. When we drove the car into the courtyard of the duplex, she smiled and confessed to me:

"O, how many remembrances... Here I came when my granparents were still alive, and I enjoyed playing with my dolls while your grand-uncle Manuel was busy with his tablet..."

"How old were you"

"Six."

I made a mental calculation: it was 84 years ago that she explored these rooms searching everything with her insatiable curiosity, while her brother entertained himself or wrote with his electornic tablet, a toy that would later be a very useful tool for his oliterary creation.

"Tell me things about this house, great-grandmother."

"Oh, son! What do you want me to tell you? In this house my grandparents used to show me cartoons when my parents were away, because they didn't want my brother and I to be in front of a screen all day.."

"And very wise your parents were."

"Yes, but that annoyed us a lot. It was one of those things I thank them most for. Because I had to find other things to do. That's why I started painting, and my brother started writing."

"Oh, yes, Manuel, the writer. What happened to him"

"I do not really know. He went to South America and I never knew about him again. I only knew he published a book now and then."

"And about your son, Salvador?"

"He went to look for his unble, but he never came back. I do not know what's the matter with that continent, that everyone goes and disappears..."

"He was my granpa. I was born there and I came back from America; don't say that, great-granny. He had a happy life with my granny, Melinda. ONe day he told me he was going to tell me stories about our family, but a heart-attack took him away two hours later... I miss him a lot. My dad told me aobu thij and the things he used to tell him."

"I want you to tell me them. You are my link with my grandson and my son", she said with a tear."

"Of coursae, great-granny. But now get into your bikini, as we are going to the beach" I said pointing at what there was in front of us"

We were on the porch, from which we could see the extensive beach in front of us. The houses that had once been in front of us had finally been expropriated by the city council and a promenade had been built, but both that promenade and the road that separated it from our duplex had been invaded by sand, and now it was our house that which was right on the beach. A beach five hundred meters thick, but ours after all.

"Where are you going with a 96-year-old eyesore?"

"Granny, I'll hold you in the water if you no longer remember to swim."

"I don't know, great-grand-son. I haven't swam at all for 30 years."

But I insisted so much that she came swimming with me.

We had a very nice weekend. When we returned to the capital she told me with a smile on her face:

"It has been like going back to childhood. The same furniture, the same bed where my grandparents slept, then my parents... The same beach where my uncle Felipe threw my brother and me into the water..."

"Great-grandmother", I said, wanting to change the subject, "I want to buy this house on the beach from you."

"And why do you want it? This is an abandoned town."

"I like the peace there. In addition, it's an hour from your house in the capital. We can come whenever we want."

"And what do I want the money for?"

"You can leave it to your other heirs."

"They are no longer… There's only you. You are my unique heir…"

"Granny, I did not know that" I lied. I expressed surprise. "had Iknown, I would have come sooner.."

"You're a lovely boy. You should be out chasing some pretty girl, instead of being with an old woman like me."

"Granny", I said, giving her a kiss on the forehead and a hug, "they can't give me what you give me. You are family. Tell me things about the family."

And she told me the story of our family.

That house on the beach had been bought by his grandfather Salvador. There he hid to write since he retired. He also liked travelling, but he always came back from his trips. But one day he went for a walk, when he was already eighty years old, and he never came back. Her grandmother never got over it, despite all the love from his children and his grandchildren. Because husband left and he didn't come back. Her son Felipe often told her that thanks to his father she had had such a wonderful family. When they stopped looking for grandfather they assumed that he had fallen into the sea and been carried away by the current.

My granny's grandmother had died at the age of one hundred, one year older than her mother. Then the others, older and younger than her, filed by, and she was left alone until a great-grandson appeared out of no one knew where, me.

"Out of Cuba, great-grandmother. I am the last one from Cuba", I told her with sarcasm."

My great-grandmother lived with me for another ten years. I did her shopping, cooked for her, I helped her get up for a walk, I scrubbed her house, in short, I acted as a servant for the best person I had ever known in my life: my great-grandmother. Until she was 106 years old she said goodbye to me. She went out little by little, like a candle that is running out of wax.

"Celedonio, I'm leaving with my mother. With my husband. With my children. Thank you for these ten years. I will have done something good to deserve being with you."

I didn't answer. The tears wouldn't leave me.

Finally, with a thin voice, I heard her say in a final moment:

"Granny Loles... Wait, I'm going with you."

I jumped. So she was there. I followed the gaze of my supposed great-grandmother, actually my granddaughter, and said with a trembling voice:

"Dear wife, forgive me. I had to leave. I couldn't explain it to you. You wouldn't have believed it. I would have died three years later, if it hadn't been for Sint. Sorry, sorry, sorry".

I cried for my granddaughter and her grandmother until I was exhausted. I sank into the chair where I had witnessed the last words of my 106-year-old granddaughter, me, her grandfather who looked barely twenty-five. What had happened ninety-three years ago?"

4 My last walk.

It had happened ninety years earlier, actually. My granddaughter Jezebel was barely 16 at the time, and I was already graying at the age of eighty, according to my son-in-law, entering the ninth decade of my life.

I had a very worn-out body. Every day I took ten pills: for tension, sugar, heart... I had great intellectual activity, however. I read a lot, wrote for various newspapers in various countries, gave lectures from time to time, and when it occurred to me I played the piano or the guitar for a while, passions of my old age and youth, respectively. But I dragged my tired body from here to there. I smelled that my end was near.

It was on one of my walks on the beach, in fact my last, at dawn, when I found that man lying on the ground. Something was wrong with him. He was very thin and very pale, he had no hair on his head or eyebrows, and he was motionless, although I could see that he was breathing, with difficulty. I approached him and asked him if he was okay. He didn't answer me, so I touched his forehead to see if he had a temperature, and his wrist to feel his pulse. No sooner had I done the second than he jumped, half stood up and looked at me with those colorless eyes, with a scared look that made me very sorry.

Don't worry, man. You are in good hands. Should I call a doctor? What's wrong with you?

That man continued looking at me, and in the end he smiled at me. It was a smile without lips, without color, but his mouth curved into a smile and his eyes smiled too.

Then he pointed behind me. I turned and saw something behind some palm trees growing on the beach. You couldn't see what it was, but there was something.

"Do you want me to take you there?"

He nodded his head without stopping pointing towards it with that hand so white that I then realized that he only had three fingers: thumb, index finger and little finger.

I put my cane on the ground and picked him up. I was surprised that he weighed so little, just about seven kilos, when given his height he should weigh seven or eight times more.

What I saw behind the palm trees surprised me a lot. It was a kind of machine measuring one meter by one and a half meters by two meters. That couldn't be happening, what the hell was that thing? But the man, seeing that he had stopped me, touched me on the shoulder again and pointed out the thing to me.

When we reached it, he opened a small door through which I couldn't fit, but he did. I put it inside and stayed outside. The man smiled at me, and he stood up inside. The door closed and I retreated a few meters back. What would happen now?

I gave him the universal gesture of peace, the Indian greeting, raising the palm of my hand towards him. I sat on the ground, and I must have fallen asleep, because hours later, with the sun already shining high in the sky, I saw him sitting on the ground in front of me, with that device behind him. He gave me the Indian salute and smiled at me.

"Thank you", he told me with a thin but sweet voice.

If that being was a Martian or similar, I was very surprised that he spoke my language.

“Thanks for what?”

"For saving my life".

"Did I?"

"I went out without protection and something in your air was poisoning me. By bringing me to my car I got my breath back, and my medication revived me".

"It was my pleasure. You would have done the same for me".

"I will".

"What?"

"I analyzed you. You're not going to live long. Three years, at most. But I can cure you, if you want".

"But…, I am in good health. With my medication..."

"You won't take any more pills. But my help has a secondary defect".

"Has it? Look, I'm fine the way I am. I appreciate it, but let’s forget it".

"If you let me help you, your cells will no longer age and you will never know the disease again. You have accelerated old age right now. It won't take long for you to die".

"That’s life..."

"Don't you want to live anymore?"

"As much as I can".

"That's my help. I can repair your telomeres. They won't get any shorter. I can restore them to the ones you had when you were 25 years old".

"But but…"

"Yes, the but is the secondary defect".

"Which is?"

"You will never die".

"I can't believe that".

"What do you bet?"

"I don't have much to bet. I just hope you're right. I wouldn't want to sadden my children with my death..."

"Well, I'll make you a reverse bet: if I'm not right, you die. But if I have it, see you right here in a hundred years.

I looked at that being in disbelief. A hundred years? Me, one hundred and eighty years old?

"OK, I accept the bet: My death against your hundred years".

"Then there is a deal. Wait, I'm going to get my device..."

"Wait..! what's your name?"

"Xingst".

I don't know if it is the real spelling, but I know it is inaccurate, because the X sounds like K and S simultaneously, just like G, S and T, not one after the other.

"Jin…"

"Oh, call me Sint, that's my diminutive. Now you wait wait".

He entered his vehicle and came out with a type of small shoe box. He opened the side closest to me, and hit me squarely with a yellowish light that covered me from head to toe, passing through my clothes and shoes as if they weren't there. I felt like every cell in my body was stung at once. At first it had been a tingle, but it had grown in intensity until I felt like I was burning like a torch.

Nice way to thank me for saving your life, Sint!, I thought just before losing consciousness and falling to the ground.

When I woke up I found Sint leaning over me. He was giving me a massage with another strange device that I won't be able to describe. Furthermore, I was dizzy and it took me a while to get out of the state of stupor I was in.

"That's it, that's it... You haven't told me your name".

-Salvador.

"Salvador. How many fingers do you see on my hand?"

He showed me his hand with two fingers extended and the other hidden.

"-"Two. The other one is hidden".

"Okay, you passed the test".

"Hey, how is it possible that you speak my language?"

"I speak it, Salvador. Why not? It is not so difficult…"

After a short silence, he ended the interview:

"Okay, Salvador, I'm leaving. We have a date in a hundred years. Do not let me down".

As soon as he entered his device, the whole became transparent little by little until it disappeared completely. I entered the place I had occupied, and I couldn't feel anything with my hands. There was nothing there.

5 Family Problems.

I don't know what my new friend had done to me, but I felt very well, with strength, like I hadn't felt in many years. But I didn't believe any of that nonsense that Sint had told me. I retrieved my stick from the ground, and returned with it resting on my shoulder, as if it were a military rifle. From what I remembered, I had fallen and knocked me unconscious for several hours, and I had dreamed about a strange but kind creature who had made me live a fantasy. It had all been a dream. Nice, but unreal.

I got home and went to the toilet. I realized that I hadn't used it for several hours, and that surprised me. But what I saw in the mirror surprised me even more: I didn't have a single gray hair in my hair. Nor a single wrinkle. I looked at my hands: the same, no wrinkles. With good color, much more toasted than before.

It can't be!, I told myself.

I undressed and took a good look at myself in the mirror. The image that came back to me was that of a twenty-five-year-old man. How was it possible? Was he still sleeping that dream? How was I going to explain it to my wife?

I really panicked. I got dressed and went for a walk. I needed to think. So a healthy life had complications... I was condemned to being left without a family. I don't think they would accept it. I sat on the terrace in front of my house. After a while my wife stopped by.

“Salvador!”, she cried. "When did you come?”

That was a provisory solution: she confused me with our grandson, who had emigrated to South America ten years earlier.

“Hello, granny”, I greeted her. “I wanted to surprise you”.

My grandson and I were very similar, with the logical differences of the almost sixty years that we were apart. I humored her.

"Your grandfather is going to be really happy to see you. And your luggage?"

"I was unlucky, granny. Those guys on the plane lost it. They will send it to me in a few days, or else they’ll give me some money for it".

"Well, well, come on, come home with me and tell me everything. Excellent! I'm going to make a paella to celebrate".

But it was me who made the paella. She was no longer up to those things, for she was already eighty and could not stand for long. She sat down and told me what to do, and I cooked it.

She called Isabel, my mother, and Uncle Philip and his family, who came in the afternoon to see Salvador. But my mother came within minutes. The others would arrive later, so only my grandfather Salvador was missing.

Logically, granddad never returned. My grandmother filed a complaint at the police station and they looked for him everywhere, but they never found him. They assumed that he had been carried away by the tide, if he fell into the sea for some reason.

My mother wanted me to go to her house, but I told her that she would not separate me from my grandmother, because she saw her very sad and I wanted to take care of her. Let her come live with us if she wanted to be with me.

I don't know what was going through my daughter's head (she thought she was my mother), but a couple of tears escaped her.

"My son, I never imagined that you loved your grandmother so much".

"Grandpa has disappeared. I'm not going to leave her alone".

"OK, OK. I will come every day".

This is how my mother and I took care of my wife during the last twenty-four years of her life.

The day she died, seven hours before her life slipped away like water running out of a reservoir, she had a flash of clairvoyance:

"How you look like your grandfather! Yes, I would even say that you are him".

And I let my guard down:

"I am, beloved wife".

She looked at me and smiled:

"What a teaser you are, Salvador! But yes, you have the same eyes as him…, the same look as him..., the same way of speaking as him... But you don't have his bad mood…, his strangeness... You are attentive to me..., like he was when we first met" .

"Grandma, I am whatever you want. Because I love you. And you know it very well".

My grandmother looked up, and I turned: there was my mother. How much had she heard?

Surely enough, for she had water in her eyes.

I stayed with my mother for several years, until the stares and comments from family and friends began to bother me, saying that I had a pact with the devil, since I didn't have a single wrinkle or a single gray hair at 40. They said it as a joke, with sarcasm, but full of envy. So I decided to go find the true Salvador, my grandson.

"Mom", I said to her, "I have to go back to Brazil. I left some things unresolved there and my partners are calling me. You will hear from me frequently”.

She wasn't very happy about it, but she accepted it willingly. Dad had died three years before, from a rare illness, a kind of pneumonia without symptoms, and when I left I was left alone with my sister Jezebel, who was getting married shortly.

For the next twenty years I spoke with her almost every day by phone or video conference. Until one day Jezebel told me that mom is no longer here.

In Brazil I looked for my grandson Salvador. Meanwhile, I dedicated myself to business, buying and selling, I learned several trades, not all of them respectable, and five years after my arrival I was found by two thugs who were very surprised to see me.

After messing around with them I beat them up and left them K.O. When they woke up they were tied to a post, and I questioned them.

"Why did you attack me?"

"You're dead!"

"Wow, man… You are not in a position to threaten".

"No, no, we already killed you.

"Me? When?"

"Twenty years ago".

"Well, you see, you did not".

"We stabbed you and threw you into the river with a cement bag tied to your legs".

"Well, you see somehow I got free and swam back. Why did you kill me?"

"It was commissioned by Paco "The Fat One"".

After a long interrogation they told me the whole story. My poor grandson had gotten a good job in São Paulo, but he witnessed a crime, and the gangsters murdered him so that he wouldn't talk. They told me Paco "The Fat One"'s real name and where to find him.

I left them tied to the post and left there. I called the police and gave them all the details of the murder of my poor grandson, who for those scoundrels had come back from the grave to take revenge. That's why they had told me everything. The police went to rescue them, arrested them and Paco "The Fat One", but then released them due to lack of evidence.

I followed the case with interest. I saw that the law did not give me justice. That's why one day I reunited Paco "The Fat One" with those two mean ones. I had narcotized the three of them with chloroform and deposited them in a garage where no one would see them.

"So the lords of the crimes get away with them..."

"You! Don't kill us!"

"Why shouldn’t I?"

I pointed at two guns wide spread on the floor, at each end of the garage.

"None of them have bullets", I told them. "I'm going to throw one bullet one way and the other to the other. When two of you are dead, I will let the third go free of charge".

And I retreated out of sight of him, protected by the dark.

Those three wretches ran away. "The Fat One" grabbed a gun, but one of those two, the shorter one, grabbed another and ran for the bullet. The other had caught the bullet earlier. I heard a shot, and "The Fat One" fell to the ground. The other two got into a fight, one wanting to take the other's gun, and the other the bullet. Finally the shorter one got both things and killed the other.

"I won!", the short one said triumphantly.

"Yes, you did. They are dead and you are alive. Justice has been done".

"Yes, you have already taken revenge".

"I told you I would set free whoever survived alive, right?"

"Yes, you did".

"I lied at you", I told him. "Shit like you can't have the truth".

I stuck a knife into his throat and slit it sideways. I left there after finishing the others off with my knife.

What had happened to me? Had I become a murderer? Well, he had just done justice. I had also passed the Rubicon, twenty years into my new state, I had gone well beyond my limits, and I was hard inside. And crying on the outside. Salvador, Salvador. Now I would be Salvador. My grandson Salvador.

6 Second visit.

Ten years went by. I busied myself with various jobs in Brazil, not all of them trustworthy, but I made a lot of money, so I did not need to work regularly. From the outset I stayed with The Fat One's business until I had saved a fortune more than enough to live on my own, and then I reported the entire organization in exchange for immunity from the North American DEA, which forced the Brazilian government to put them all in jail, including the twelve police officers who had collaborated with that small drug emporium. I gave them enough evidence about all the murders they had committed, which solved many falsely closed cases.

And finally, one hundred years after my tune-up, I was once again on that beach, waiting for Sint.

Punctual until the second, the alien or whatever it was appeared with his vehicle behind the same palm trees as before.

"Hello, Sint".

"Salvador, greetings", he replied. "How did you do the last century?"

"I do not know what to tell you. The truth is that now I am more afraid of death than before, when my life was worth 90 years at most. Now it is much more valuable to me".

"Do you give up, then, knowing what there is after life?"

"There is nothing".

"Are you sure?"

At that moment I remembered the last words of my granddaughter, "Granny Loles..." But it could have just been the result of the weakness of her brain that was already shutting down.

"Sure".

"Well, I can give you another gift..."

"What is it?"

"Making you invulnerable".

"What?"

"This way nothing and no one can kill you".

"Not even a river of lava?"

"When the lava solidifies, your cells will reunite after coming out of the dry lava, and they will come together with the same organization as now. Whatever it takes, maybe years, but it will have been like a dream to you".

"That would be amazing".

"Do you desire it?"

"Yeah. But tell me... in exchange for what?"

"So that you are my man on Earth".

"What?"

"My contact".

"What for?"

"The world is very badly. I may have to give a shout out to one of their leaders. When I ask you, you have to be my voice to those who control it".

"I guess I can't refuse. Do you expect me to help you conquer my planet?"

"I don't believe in private property".

"Alright, then. Yes, I desire it".

"Lie down".

This time the light in that shoebox was orange. But I didn't feel anything.

"That's it", he said after ten minutes. "You can get up".

He pulled out a Terran pistol and shot me in the arm.

"Hey, this hurts!"

"Wait. Look at your arm".

Before my astonished gaze, the pain decreased as the wound closed until my arm looked as if I had not been shot. It was all over in two minutes.

"Keep the bullet as a souvenir, if you want".

Yes, there it was, a few meters behind me. The bullet had embedded itself in the sand. I took it out and saw that it was not very deformed. It still reminded the shape of a suppository.

"I'm impressed. You have just given me invulnerability?!"

"Well, Salvador, in a hundred years we will meet again right here, don't fail me. If you are not here, in two hundred years I will give you another chance".

"I won't be missing, Sint. Every time we see each other you give me a gift…"

7 Beating, shooting stabbing.

Thirsty for experiences, I acquired a new identity—pretending that I had lost my memory—in a French police station. They gave me the identity of a young man who had disappeared a few years before and had not reappeared, Dominique Dupont, provisionally until he regained his memory, and a new identity number. Asked what I wanted to do, I said I would like to be a police officer, since they had treated me so well. The social services took care of me, and after several months of preparation, I entered the training course, and a year later I was a police gendarme at the central police station in Marseille.

The five years I spent in the French police gave me a lot of life experience. In Marseille there are many criminal gangs who sell drugs and commit murders. That gave me the opportunity to see myself in the middle of shootouts the only survivor of which was me, or almost so. Those people shot to kill, and when they ran out of bullets they surrendered. If my companions were all down, I didn't leave any of those cowards alive. Now that I knew that my life had an unusual extension, I learned to value that of others, especially because I saw them so short-lived, and thus I had no compassion for those who did not value the lives of others.

"Dominique, help me!", a colleague who was hit several times, lying on the ground, screamed at me on one occasion. As I went to her to see how she was doing, I felt a blow on my back. It was an accurate shot. I fell to the ground, but after two minutes, when that mean man approached to finish us off, I raised the gun and put a bullet between his eyes. It still took me a few seconds to get up, but I was already completely rebuilt. That time they did not take the loot from the bank, but rather they died trying. Other times they were lucky and never found.

Most of my time as a police officer I had that girl, Dominique DesPoints, as a partner, a somewhat timid woman who insisted on proving to herself that she was good for the job, day by day. I recommended her to be nice and steady, to keep peace in herself, for it was better to let a criminal at large than to lock up an innocent person, but if she was sure she found a real criminal, she should have no compassion, nor dark thoughts about it later. She'd seen that the day she nearly died, at the bank robbery. Although I thought my three companions were dead, she was still conscious, even if when the paramedics arrived she pretended to be asleep. When she recovered from her three gunshot wounds, before returning to work, she met me on a terrace next to the port, and she confessed to me her stupor:

"Dominique", we were called the same in that identity of mine, "I know what you did".

"What did I do?"

"You executed those five robbers. I don't know how, I thought they hit you".

"They did hit me, but, you see, I had a reinforced bulletproof vest", I lied, "and they stunned me with the impact of the bullet. When they came for me, I defended myself".

"And that's why you got up and ran out and killed those two who were surrendering, and also the driver when he saw that you were taking no prisoners and he took off with the car. You discharged your gun and mine at him, and he crashed into a container and died instantly".

"Okay, yes. They had killed my three companions, or so I thought at the time".

"Revenge?"

"No: justice".

"You have good aim".

"No, no, I was lucky. And I didn't stop trying until I hit it".

"And a good way to lie. A drop of blood was found on me that wasn't mine. It was yours".

"Oh, no, it surely belonged to Jean Pierre, your companion. His corpse was next to you".

"Probably".

"Well, now what you have to do is to get well and return to duty. What did the shrink tell you?"

"Let me rest, let me not think about my fallen colleagues, and leave the job".

"And you, what are you going to do?"

"Maybe I'll obey his advice. I can't stop dreaming about me lying on the floor, on my back, and the face you made when you were hit by the bullet, when you were trying to revive me, in the middle of the mess. You forgot about the criminals for me. I felt guilty that they killed you because of me".

"You see they did not".

"I still can't understand. You were hit. If you were wearing the vest it didn't help you at all.

"And if it didn't help me, why am I here?"

"I don't know. I don't understand. But I saw you die".

"Hehe, you know evil weeds never die".

But Dominique did not leave the police. Instead, on the advice of the shrink, if she had to return, he reported she should patrol with the other police officer who survived the shooting, so that she would feel saferº. And so we were patrolling together again, recovered physically and perhaps also mentally. But something had changed in her. Now she was more cautious, even more reserved, more observant, and above all more distrustful.

"I will discover your secret", she told me. "Someday I will know".

I smiled. That was already beginning to be a mantra. But I found it very funny. I got used to being with her every day on patrol, or doing paperwork. On days off it seemed to me that something was missing, and when we saw each other again we told each other everything. Well, I told her almost everything. I didn't tell her, for example, that I went to clandestine gambling dens with a fake beard and mustache, and that by playing poker I made a fortune, and I learned a lot of dirty laundry that could be useful to me later.

But I was discovered once. somehow one of them knew I was a policeman, and they shot me twice on the spot, in my chest and in my head. When they were going to put me in a bag to throw me into the sea, I kicked the guy nex to to me in the throat, I took his gun and I killed the other four, because they were only bags of shit and because they had killed me, and also so that they could not tell others. It was complicated to create that cover and I wouldn't lose it because of those five bastards. I put them in the bag and borrowed the motorboat they had for those errands and I threw them in the middle of the bay with the respective sandbags tied to their feet. Previously I took all the money they had on them, and returned to the place to bust the safe and take what was inside. By the time the ropes that tied them to the bags rotted they would have already been eaten by the fish.

The day after those gangsters killed me, I was as fresh as a rose.

"Look", Dominique told me, showing me the newspaper, "in this neighborhood they have discovered a gambling den full of blood, but the bodies are missing.

"Some detective is going to have a lot of work".

"No, another case closed before it was opened".

"Because of the lack of bodies of crime, I suppose. The thing is that today's criminals are very considerate. As long as they kill each other..., less work for us".

"How do you know it was other criminals?"

"Well, I can't imagine you or other colleagues evading corpses...

"Yes, it's not good. But you're not surprised by the news".

"I heard it on the radio when I was coming here.

She looked at me in silence, and then she repeated:

"Dominique, namesake, someday I will discover you".

"Why don't we go to the movies this afternoon? This way you can discover another side of me".

She opened her eyes wide. She then smiled and accepted:

"Why not? Maybe you'll let your guard down and show me your Bluebeard secret room".

"It does not scare you?"

"No. You would never hurt me. You love me well. You saved my life once".

"And why this obsession of yours that I have a secret?"

"Female intuition".

That gave me something to think about. Either I got rid of her, or I got on top of her. She was a grown woman of about thirty-five years old, with several years of service and very tough. We had been patrolling together for three years now, and I knew everything about her, or almost. With a very fair complexion, brown hair tied in a bun, some freckles, big brown eyes, athletic body, medium breasts, little buttocks and long legs, neither fat nor skinny, she was a good companion and surely a charm in normal life.

She chose the movie. It was a pretty old one, Dirty Harry.

"What did you think?" I asked as we come out of the cinema.

"Not bad. A good police officer, who puts justice before the law".

"Do you think she was a good cop?"

"The best".

"Are you like him?"

"Eh..., this is France. Here we are more civilized. If you do that they put you in jail the next day".

It was clear that that film was part of her private investigation on me.

"Personally", I concluded, "I prefer Hercule Poirot".

"The Belgian invented by Agatha Christie?"

"That same one. He's more civilized".

For almost an hour I discoursed on Poirot's virtues and defects, while she watched me in silence. Since the shooting in the neighborhood she had become more silent.

But I was very amused by her insinuations. In particular, what I found funny was herself. I did like her.

"Dominique", I told her one day, "I've thought about leaving the police force".

"Oh, are you? And why is that?"

"To marry you. It's not right for us to be together at work and at home too".

"Are you... are you proposing to me?"

"Yes. Do you want me to kneel?"

"No".

She looked impressed.

"I don't know what to tell you. I didn't see it coming. Give me time to think about it".

She had a strange face. I couldn't tell if angry, betrayed, pleased, flattered, were the way she felt. I hadn't screwed up it all. I just wanted to have her close to me. To know how far he had suspected, what her theories were".

"But you can't trivialize this", she said at last. "Do you love me?"

"Sure, of course".

"You haven't proposed. You've assumed that I'm going to marry you".

"Let's say I'm counting on it".

"Is it not a joke?"

"Well, I would never play with your feelings".

"You don't know if I love you..".

"You don't know it yet, maybe, but I think you do love me".

"You are an arrogant fool".

"Yes, of course. That's why you love me".

She did something that surprised me: she asked for another partner. She said that after so many years together she had already got tired of me. She also requested a transfer to Lyon, where her parents lived.

My new partner, Jean Paul, was a very funny young man, always funny. He decided to call me boss and that's how I stayed. The other colleagues took the joke as clever and started calling me that too. In the end I got used to it myself and adopted the nickname.

"I've been called worse things", he told them.

Although I did not admit it to myself, I missed Dominique DesPoints very much. She hadn't written or called me since she left, and neither had I. I had actually found out about the change when I arrived at the prefecture and met Jean Paul instead of her. It was a French-style farewell. Maybe she thought she had found out my secret and she didn't like it, whatever she would have imagined.

One day our real boss, the Prefect de la Rose, told us that our former partner, Dominique DesPoints, had been promoted to detective. We sent her a collective letter with a photo of us all, to congratulate her.

When I least expected it, she came to see me, without warning either. I was leaving off duty and suddenly I heard her voice behind me:

"Bonjour, amant!"

I turned and saw her leaning against the wall, dressed in a trench coat and under a hat, just like we had seen Humphrey Bogart so many times in his detective movies. Still, through the sunglasses she wore on that dark night, I saw an imaginative look, and her hidden beauty.

"Bonjour, chère", I replied. "What do I owe the honor to?"

"The answer is yes".

"What to?"

"The answer to the question you never asked me".

"The truth is that I don't remember...

"Then goodbye".

And she left.

"Detective DesPoints!" I screamed when she was already twenty meters away. I guess she was hoping I would stop her. "Wait, don't go".

I approached her and took her hand.

"Things have to be done slowly", I continued.

"Have you missed me, boss?"

"Yes, namesake. I see that your information is good. More than it should. But you never wrote to me".

"Not you either. You're the man. You're the one who declared himself in that sexist way".

"That's super sexist... Well, it doesn't matter. Did you come to tell me that you love me?"

"No. I have come to marry you. It is not the same".

"Haha, yes, of course, it's not the same. People love each other, get married, hate each other and get divorced. You do it the other way around: first you divorced, now you hate me, then you will marry me, and finally you will love me" .

"Exactly! You realised", she said sarcastically. "You see? "We get along like when we were a couple".

"Yes, partner. This is going to be a nice, French-style romance".

"It's what we are, right? We're both French..."

There was something of a double meaning in her words. Yes, it was going to be a funny marriage.

"Of course yes. But you have to do things slowly, I've already told you this once. Look, there's a hotel there. We can do a preliminary investigation on the spot".

"That's fine with me. You can stay silent, you know, but anything you say can be used...

But we didn't say much. At least at the beginning. After two hours of uninterrupted mutual interrogation we began to talk.

"Don't you hate me anymore?"

"You no longer remember what you said... Yes, I hate you. I hate you so much that I want to make your life miserable by marrying you".

"Uh... is that a proposition?

"No. You proposed to me three years ago. This is the answer: yes. And the hidden message: you'll regret the day you set your eyes on me".

"If that's what you have to tell me, tomorrow we'll get married".

"Tomorrow? And why not today?"

I looked at the clock, and it was true that it was already one in the morning.

"Okay, in ten hours at the town hall".

"I want for the church".

"That takes longer".

"I know. Tomorrow we are going to see the mayor. I will arrange the paperwork in my parish. You have to do the same in yours".

"Are you Catholic?"

"Yes, I am. And you?"

"No. But for you I am whatever you want".

"Well, better".

And we went back to questioning each other. The next morning we got married in the mairie, that is, the town hall. She was on vacation, and she spent it with me, at my house. After 20 days we were married in his parish, in Lyon, in Saint-Nizare, near the Saône River.

We were granted two weeks' marriage leave, and we spent our honey moon in Spain, which she didn't know. That's how I returned to the summer house I had bought, under another identity, almost two hundred years before and that my granddaughter Jezebel had returned to me shortly before she died.

"Hey, do you already know my secret?" I told her shortly before returning to France.

"You're more tender than I thought".

"Was that the secret?"

"No. It's one of your mysteries. I would never have suspected it in that man who got rid of five thugs with no hesitation".

"It has nothing to do with it. It made me angry to see my three fallen companions. They weren't going to get away with it".

"No. When they saw that surrendering wasn't going to save them, they ran away. What did they see in you?"

"I don't know. What did you see?"

"I had my back turned. I saw a gendarme shooting. By the way, you took my gun and used it too".

"I didn't have time to reload the gun. They wew trying to escape".

"Of course, and you hit even the prompter".

"Yes, but have you seen the secret you thought?

"You are a complex man. I will discover you".

The first thing she discovered to me when we returned to France was that she was pregnant. That worried me. Would my son be invulnerable and immortal, like me? I'd have to ask Sint, or wait 30 to 40 years to find out, whichever came first. But I had to tell Dominique. But when? I loved her much more, and I reminded her of her strategy:

"Now you can't hate me anymore: now you have to love me a lot, for our son".

"Or daughter".

"That's it. And so, someday you will start to know me".

8 Fabian.

That was the name we chose for our son. There was no Fabian in her family or mine. Well, yes, not even in mine, since I was already going with another identity, I was a Frenchman from Marseille, and my entire family had unfortunately died, with me being an only child. But there was no Fabian in our supposed family tree.

My Dominique had endured her job almost until the moment of delivery. I had already left the police and we lived in Lyon, where her mother and her brothers could give us a hand. In fact, her mother came to live with us, and when I wasn't needed at home, I went to my father-in-law's store to help him. It was a clothing store, Chez DesPoints, that was successful enough for his entire family to live on. None of his four children had wanted to follow the family tradition, so the poor man had already come to terms with the idea that the store would die with him, after three generations.

—Dad —I said, for he was the closest I had to a real father in my new identity, —that doesn't have to be like that.

—I’m listening —he said, with a smile.

—Look, I like this buying and selling thing. If you leave the store to Dominique, I can take it over when you are unfortunately no longer with us, or if you decide to retire.

That man gave me a hug.

—Thank you son!

It was the first time he called me son. And I stayed with that title as long as my poor father-in-law lived.

Fabián arrived the same day that I had signed the contract with my father-in-law by means of that hug. I think it was at that very same moment. Things of destiny? Maybe. Because I immediately learned all the procedures of that business, and from a very young age the boy loved the store. In fact, it was very good for Detective DesPoints that her husband took care of her son and the store at the same time.

The child was born healthy and strong, weighing three kilos. Like his mother and his grandmother, he had brown hair and little by little he grew up and learned to run the business, because after school he came to the store, we ate in the back room, and he returned to class. And when he returned he would have a snack with me right there, and then he would stay in the store reading or studying while I served customers. At the age of twelve he was already replacing me or attending to those who came just to ask. Later he was entrusted with some sales, and at sixteen the store already had two clerks.

My father-in-law had retired when Fabián was two years old. I convinced him that he had already done his part, and now it was my turn, on behalf of his daughter Dominique. He dedicated his time to being a grandfather: from time to time he came to take his grandson for a walk, and over the years it was the grandson who took his grandfather for a walk, since he died when Fabian was already 17 years old.

"Look, Fabián", I told him when we came from burying his grandfather Lucien, "that business has been run by four generations of DesPoints, and you would be the fifth if you commit to running it."

—Sure Dad. Do I have to study something to do it?

—If you don't want to, no. But the better prepared you are, the better it will be for business.

—I like mathematics.

—Ah, then you will study Maths at university.

—And the business?

—I'll take care of it until you get your doctorate, don't worry.

I remember those years of my third life with affection. I didn't have the insecurity that I had had in Brazil or in Marseille. I was once again recovering the peace and harmony that I experienced with my great-grandmother Jezebel, the blessed Jezebel, daughter of Isabel, my daughter...

My son Fabián was very affectionate and quite funny. When he was seven years old he discovered that his mother was a police officer, and that the police were the authority. That's why when he saw his mother arrive, he came running and said:

—Here comes the authority!

And I pretended to hide. And soon the alarm code changed:

—Dad, hide, the authority is coming!

And they were looking for me between the two.

I was very comfortable with our store, but everything has an end, maybe happy, maybe less so, depending on how my wife understood it.

Fabián had already finished his doctorate and had done a master's degree in Madrid and another one in Oxford. When he returned with all the titles from him, he told me:

—Dad, I'm already trained to run the store. Now I need you to teach me everything that grandfather taught you.

That touched my heart. I was hoping that the kid would replace me, but it would never have occurred to me to force him.

—Do you really want to stay in charge of all this when I retire?

—Sure Dad. That was our agreement, right?

—But…, you are a doctor in Mathematics.

9 Time of truth.

My wife was lovely, she always was, but also observant.

"It is unbelievable, Dominique, at fifty years old you don't have a single gray hair. Not even the shadow of a wrinkle! Do you dye your hair? Do you iron your wrinkles when I don't see you?"

"No, wife. That's sissy."

"Well, I don't understand... It looks as if you had a pact with the Devil!"

"No, not with the Devil...

She had meant it as a joke. but her detective instinct alerted her:

"With who?"

"With a Martian. Well, I think he's a Martian, but I don't know exactly. He never told me."

"Wow, you joker." Remembering something important, looking like she had discovered something, she returned to the fray. "What's your secret?"

"Will you promise not to get angry or scared, wife?"

"Let's see if you have drunk from the fountain of eternal youth...

"You wanted to know my secret, well, here it goes: years ago I found a someone who gave me that, eternal youth. I will always be 25 years old.

And I told him about my interview, the first, with Sint. With every single detail. I remembered it like it was yesterday. She listened to me very carefully.

"I dont believe it".

"Well, I have proof: do you think I've aged since we met? Look at the photos from then and now.

She looked up and saw the two of us in the mirror that presided over our dining room.

"Wow, I look a lot older than you."

"And yet it's the other way round."

"But, Dominique, on your ID it says that you are fifty years old."

"Yeah, that's right. I'll have to get a new one."

"Is it false? That is a crime...

"Yes, it's fake, detective. Are you going to arrest me?"

She became very serious.

"Have you been lying to me all these years? What's your real name?"

"Salvador".

"Salvador! Are you Spanish?"

"I am.

"And how old are you, Salvador, if I may know?"

"Two hundred and fifty".

"A quarter of a millennium! Merde de Dieu! And not a single wrinkle, not a single gray hair. No, I don't believe it. It's enough, stop making fun of me!"

"Do you remember the house we spent our honeymoon in?"

"Yes, the one from the South of Spain."

"It's mine. Whenever you want, we'll go back there."

"Okay. I'll take you at your word. They owe me a vacation. The day after tomorrow we are leaving.

We left the store in charge of our son and went on our second honeymoon to Spain.

Along the way I explained to her how I acquired that house in the middle of the twentieth century, but I went to Brazil when I was only eighty years old, avoiding telling my then wife, may she be blessed, these explanations that I was now giving her. I was stupid. When I disappeared due to the panic attack I suffered, I caused her deep pain, which will hurt me all my life, because I never thought I would hurt the people I loved and love."

"That's why I'm telling you, wife. What you do with what I'm telling you is your responsibility.

She remained thoughtful. We were on that beach that had been abandoned for decades. The Spanish population was now 25% of what it was when I bought the house, for various reasons. Now mine was the only house still standing in the entire neighborhood, because I had rebuilt it almost in its entirety. Only the furniture was original, and I was very fond of it.

"Whenever I want to disappear, I come here."

"Uh-huh. You haven't been here in years, then."

"Well, some of the trips I've made to see our suppliers include a weekend here...

"And the store pays you that without my knowing?"

"Dominique, the store has not paid me for these trips. Do you think in the 200 years before I met you I didn't make any money?"

"Ah. Do you have it in the bank? To what name?"

"The trick is to have it in a secret account in Switzerland. With a number instead of a name. Identification number and the password, and they give me my money. In Lyon I have a safe deposit box in a bank, where I keep only one hundred million euros for eventual expenses".

"Is that pocket change for you?"

"Well yes, I'm sorry to seem immodest...

"And what are you doing running a clothing store in Lyon?"

"Living. I don't know how to be alone."

"How many wives have you had?"

"Two".

"How long?"

"Let's say that I only found two in my life that deserved Until death do us part, only that with the first one I broke my promise..., a furtive tear escaped me.

"Wow, thanks. Does that mean you'll stay with me until I die?"

"If you want, yes. In many years. But when you retire you have to come with me. I can't stay longer. I've decided to start dyeing my highlights white, but I don't think it’ll do."

"No. Your face is smooth like that of a twenty-year-old. When people see us on the street, they think I'm your mother."

"Well, nowadays there are couples in which the man is much younger than the woman, and nothing happens."

"Well, husband, I'm already considering retiring."

"Do you no longer like what you do?"

"Yes, I like it, but I don't want to be shot three times again when you're not there. Do you remember when we met?"

"Yes. They killed my partner and yours."

"And they shot you. For a few minutes I thought I was going to be the only one who could to tell it later. But..., it's one thing not to die and another thing to be cured."

"Yeah".

"You weren't wearing a vest!"

"No".

"And then?"

"Well..., the Martian visited me again.

And I had to tell her the whole truth: even if my head was destroyed, my cells would reorganize themselves correctly and I would not die.

She asked me the pertinent question:

"And Fabian? Is that hereditary?"

"The truth is that I don't know. He's 2 years old now. When he turns 25 or 30, if he stops looking older, we'll know. But he also has your genes. That's why I don't know.

"Remember he's never been sick."

"Yes. He heals quickly. That's my second gift. We'll see if he has the first one, too."

"What about me? Can your Martian grant me that wish?"

"Ugh. I agreed to meet him in fifty years. If you can hold out, we'll ask him together."

"And my parents..., they died recently.

"If it's a shame.

It was true: my mother-in-law died fifteen years ago, and my father-in-law two years later. I didn't know how to live without her.

But I did not disappear from the lives of my loved ones. Once was enough. I learned the lesson. I, the tough guy, was unable to fall asleep many nights when I thought about Loles. Poor dear wife of mine. From what I was told, she never got over it. I wouldn't allow Dominique to duet with her to visit me at night. That's why I told her everything. There, bathing in the waters of Mazarrón, both of us naked because there was no one else, and that had been my beach in the strictest sense of the term for more than a century. We sunbathed, we ate on the beach. There we saw the wonderful sunsets silhouetted against the mountains of Bolnuevo…

And as soon as we returned to Lyon my wife asked for voluntary retirement, to everyone's surprise.

"I'm tired of stirring up shit", she told her colleagues. "Now I'm going to take care of my parents' store and enjoy life."

And a discreet way to do it was to open a branch in Paris. There we went and opened Chez Despoints et fils, that is, the House of Points and Son. I was the son, of course. If they had seen us sleeping together at night they would have accused us of incest, because I love my wife. I loved her all her life. And she had a very long one, but in her last twenty years we gave the Parisian store to the care of Fabián's eldest daughter, and I devoted myself to the care of my Dominique until she died at an advanced age, 97 years old.

I never told my granddaughter Lucienne the truth, but I promised her I’d visit her as often as I could, since from that moment on she was left alone. I advised her to find a good man and get married, to maintain that store from generation to generation.

Then I went to see my son Fabián, who unfortunately did not look like he was 25 years old, but rather like he was fifty-five. He and his wife, Christine, welcomed me with joy, although I told them that I was a distant cousin passing through Lyon.

But when I was alone with Fabián I told him the whole truth.

"Son, in ten years I will see my Martian, and I will ask him if I can pass my gift on to you and your daughter...

"Don't worry, dad. Mom's death already hurt me. Knowing that I'm never going to cry for you, I'm very happy.

That deserved a hug. My Fabián always so understanding and so loving. He looked like my father, because of the good doing that only age provides.

10 The third visit.

When I saw Sint again, I put the problem to him:

"You shouldn't have told anyone".

"They are discreet. They won't tell".

"Even so. You're in serious danger if anyone finds out".

"Why?"

"I have enemies. There are many battles on Earth that you are not aware of".

"Battles? Are we in danger?"

"No. They do not affect you. You will never see any of us or the Others. But I will not tell you anything. The less you know, the less danger you will be in".

"Good".

"Keep quiet about everything I tell you. It will be the best for you".

"Okay. I'll make up a story".

"If you change your identity every two or three decades it will be fine".

"I guess I'll still be your contact on Earth".

"That's right. But there is another eternal on your planet".

"Another one?"

"Yes. It's a woman. I won't tell you who she is. It's a project we're controlling".

"And why don't you tell me who she is? Are you afraid that we'll hook up and have eternal offspring?"

"I don't think that’s possible. In both cases your gifts have been acquired, not inborn. Most likely, your children will be normal, short-lived, centenarians".

"So what is the problem?"

"She has a different mission than yours. You could interfere with each other. Most likely, you would unify them into a third one that would have no use for us".

"A mission... You haven't told me what it is".

"No. You'll have to find out that. She doesn't know hers either".

"Uh huh... Such a secret... Hey, I have a question to ask you".

"I hope I can satisfy your curiosity. Tell me".

"Can I have children from a normal woman who have from birth the two gifts that you gave me?"

"I don't think so. It has never been the case, although each animal breed is different. I'm not saying it's impossible or not. You have to be prepared for both cases".

"Well, Fabián is not eternal... Another one that is dying".

"Don't complain. Would you rather have them crying for you one hundred and sixty-seven years ago?"

"No, not really. I'm sorry I sounded ungrateful. Being eternal has given me my French family. A real gift".

"You are lucky to be able to make all your descendants happy. Don't forget it.

All my descendants. Where were those from my first life?

"I will give you another gift. It will be the last, I think".

"Thank you very much. Which one will it be?"

"This".

He pointed the usual shoebox at me and from there came a ray of light, this time violet, that invaded me from head to toe. It lasted just ten seconds. I felt a state of infinite happiness. I felt great when it went off.

-That's it".

"I feel good", I said. "What is it?"

~Look at my lips, he said.

"I look at them. What?"

~That I'm not moving them".

~Good Lord, it's true. Telepathy?"

~Partial. If the other person doesn't want to, you won't be able to read their mind. The advantage is that he will not know that you are reading it to him, and therefore he will not be able to object. If you encounter a telepath, however, you will be able to block your thoughts".

"Great".

~You no longer need to talk to me, or for me to use this translation machine, he told me.

"But I prefer it".

~There is a gift associated with this that you have to be careful with. It's not another gift, it's a side effect of it".

"Oh yeah? What does it consist of?"

"You've been feeling happy, haven't you?"

"Yes of course".

"Because I'm happy. I'm proud of you".

"Empathy?"

"That's right".

"And I can't block it?"

"You can, yes. Despite the strength of the mind. But I already told you that you will not always be able to do it. There are people who block their thoughts naturally. How to overcome those barriers is something that you will have to discover on your own, although some barriers are more difficult to overcome than others. You will find some that will be impossible to overcome, or almost.

And having said all this, Sint got into his machine, which became transparent until it dissolved into the air.

I stayed there, looking at those palm trees that were older than me. Century after century I had seen them there. The same three. A bit further on there were some more, a whole palm grove. But in front of it were these three, one growing straight up, and the other two at an angle of 15º in either direction. Was this a hidden message from Sint? Were there three of us instead of two eternals, as he called us? Before leaving he told me that the other eternal was in a distant country, but he did not tell me in which direction, or what country it was. He also told me that his goal was different from mine. I thought about looking for her, but he told me that it would not be useful. So that? If I met her, would I live with her? Would we hook up? Would we have eternal children? Honestly, that would destroy her experiment, whatever it was.

No, my objective was very clear to me: to live, to acquire experiences to tell Sint. Now I saw it clearly. And take care of my family.

11 Back home.

I came back to Spain and located my living relatives. A motorcycle racer called Amancio and a primary school teacher called Magdalena. They were from different family branches, the former from Jezabel's, and the latter from my son Felipe's. Both from the eighth generation after mine. Only the biker kept my surname. He had that of her paternal grandfather. His name was Amancio Rodríguez, and she was Magdalena Periago.

I followed them both, and pretended to meet them. I did not become present in their lives until Amancio had a serious accident. Then I went to the hospital, assuming the identity of an uncle of his who had left home at the age of fifteen and had disappeared; and I took him to the best hospital in Europe, located in Berlin. There he was operated on and managed to recover completely.

"I've been told that my uncle has paid for all this", he told me when I visited him after the operation.

"What you have to do now is get well. We'll talk later".

"Ok. Is Belén here?"

"Who is Belén?"

"She's my fiancée".

"Why don't you call her?" I said, handing him my cell phone. "She'll be worried".

The next day she was in the hospital. I brought her from Navarra, where she lived with her parents and worked in a music store in the centre of Pamplona. The owner gave her leave to visit his boyfriend in Germany, as he was a national star.

"He doesn't want to give up his bikes", he had told me on the plane. "He's very stubborn".

However, he gave me another explanation:

"Look, uncle, I have a contract with my sponsor. I'd have to give him a hundred thousand euros for him to let me go. Besides, this is what I do. It's my job. I don't know how to do anything else. Ask me anything about bikes... I don't have a clue about anything else".

"Well, your father gave me some money to leave home. I got along really badly with your grandfather. Your father was already working, and he gave me enough to go to America and settle there. At the current exchange rate, what he gave me would be about one hundred and five thousand euros. I'm giving it to you so that you can leave your sponsor and the others in the lurch".

"Oh, okay, thanks, uncle. But tell me: why are you giving it to me? It was my father who helped you… "

"It's a way of paying him back, don't you think?"

"Sure, sure. But what am I going to do?"

"You can open a motorcycle workshop".

"It costs money, uncle. Five thousand euros won't do it. Plus the hospital bill… "

"That's already paid for. You're my nephew and your health is important to me".

"Okay, uncle, thanks a lot. But the rent and the machinery… "

"Why don't we become partners? I'll pay for the premises and the machines, and you do the work. And we'll split 50/50. Does that sound like a good idea to you?

That surprised both of them pleasantly".

"We could get married already", said Belén.

"And have children", I said.

"Yes, Uncle Martin. I'm retiring from motorcycling to become a mechanic", he said with a vague smile.

But he didn't go back on the deal. I spoke to the damn sponsor and paid him the damn hundred thousand euros, and he agreed, although he did ask some impertinent questions: "

"Is this black money?"

"Do you want them or not?"

"Yes, of course".

My great-great-great-great-grandson turned out to be a good mechanic and businessman. He was in the workshop all day, happy and content. They had eight children, and every time he had one I would reduce my percentage, as a help to my new godson. In the end I kept 5% of the profits, which over the years was a lot. I had a legal account in a bank in Pamplona. But before disappearing again, I gave it to Martín, the first-born of their children, who would also be a mechanic when he grew up, a car mechanic, thus continuing the family tradition, in some way.

At the same time, I helped Magdalena, my other great-great-great-great-granddaughter. She was a national school teacher, as I said before, and the only very serious problem she had had in her life was having fallen in love with an abuser. She often comes to class with a bruise. I followed her discreetly and one day I introduced myself as her uncle Martín, who had recently arrived in Segovia, where she was living. I asked her about her bruises, and she gave me the excuses that abused women usually give:

"I hit myself when I fell down the stairs a few days ago".

"Oh. Do you have children?"

"No, luckily not".

I didn't need to know more.

I went to see her Pepelu, her husband, and made him an offer:

"I'll give you a million euros if you get a divorce and disappear from Magdalena's life".

"But who are you?"

"Half a million now, and the other half five years after you get divorced", I said, dangling five thousand euros in front of his nose. "Do you take it or leave it?"

"You're crazy, but I'll take it. And who's tells you that I’ll keep the half a million and get no divorce?"

"Do you think that if I have a kilo to give you, I don't have money to have some thugs make you disappear out of existence? Look at the table over there, or the one next to it: are you sure they're not my men who will beat you up at a signal from me?"

That ruffian looked at the two young men, one drinking coffee and the other reading the newspaper.

"Well, man, there's no need to be like that. We can meet here tomorrow to give me the rest of the half a million to start the paperwork".

"I think it's a good idea".

"Now let's see what I say to Magdalena".

"That's up to you. But don't let her suffer. Tell her anything that will put her at ease. Feel guilty about whatever it is, and get out of the way. Oh, and one more thing: if I see another bruise, if you raise your hand, if you just say one bad word to her, the deal is off, and I'll send the thugs to earn their half a million by getting you out of the way".

At the sudden silence of that guy, I got up and left.

Twenty-four hours later I put a briefcase in front of his nose, and left.

A month later Magdalena finally signed the papers and was free of that bastard. Apparently he had gotten a job in the United States, and he wasn't going to be able to go back, so she wanted a divorce so she could rebuild her life.

"Magdalena", I said to her when I found out about her divorce, "are you okay?"

"Yes, uncley. Better than ever".

"Don't repeat your mistake. Promise me that you will visit this woman", I put the card of a well-known psychologist in front of her. "She's the best in the city. She'll help you not to repeat that mistake".

"But, uncle, I don't have the money to pay for her sessions…"

"It's a bit expensive, yes. About €300 per session. I've already paid for the first ten. And I've told her that if you need more, she should call me directly, and I'll pay her".

"Dear uncle, I don't have the money to pay you back either".

"You owe me nothing, dear. When I needed it, your mother sent me her savings to get me out of a serious bind, a very ugly affair. Now it's time to repay her for what she did for me, by helping her daughter".

I also visited my French family, on a regular basis, taking on the persona of the son of the one who had helped Grandma Dominique. Nothing more was ever heard of Grandpa Dominique. Only Fabian knew, and the very cunning man claimed that from time to time he spoke to me, to his Grandpa Dominique, on the phone. With him the secret died. He taught me a great lesson that I will never forget.

12 Mr. Doctor.

After so long a stay in France, my knowledge of French was already enough to finish a university degree. Since I always had so much spare time, I enrolled in medical school at the Sorbonne in Paris, and I devoted ten years of my life to get a doctorate in the art of medicine, department of epidemiology. And when I finished my degree, I went to Africa to treat people for a meager salary, which is usually given to us by Doctors of the NRO United Around the World. Well, actually it wasn't Africa, but Madagascar, a huge island in front of to that African giant.

My first destination was the small town of Sahamitevina, in the east of the island, about eleven kilometers inland from the Indian Ocean. There was a malaria epidemic there, and the two doctors who were assigned there had to wrestle to vaccinate the 5,000 remaining inhabitants. At one time the population was double, but emigration and disease greatly reduced its number. The other doctor was an English woman called Belinda Carter.

Would Belinda be the other eternal? Sint told me that she lived in a far country, but he did not tell me which one. And Belinda, despite being English, was born in Mumbay, India. She lived there until she decided to spend some time in Madagascar working within the organization Doctors United for the World (DUW).

However, I was the one who got there first. On reaching the place, I had to create the hospital, as the previous doctor had left about seven years ago, and the natives there had plundered Dr. Keaton's house, which had never been made into a hospital. The poor man went back to his country tired of no one paying attention to him and sending him medicines and devices that he needed to take care of his patients. My organization, DUW, did provide us with resources, but what was scarce was exactly human material. That is why they welcomed me with enthusiasm, because of the fact that I, a French doctor, was ready to spend part of my life with those people who are so in need of health support. Five native nurses worked with me: Desirée, Chantal, Marie, Jeanne and Lulu, who despite their European names were of Indonesian origin, descendants of the island's first colonists.

Two months after my arrival I had nearly all the children vaccinated, but I still had a lot to do. That is why I was very happy when Dr. Carter from the University of Mumbay arrived. I expected a woman more tanned by the sun, and therefore I was surprised to find a red-haired English woman with very white skin and a face full of freckles. Despite her delicate appearance, she had a very strong character but was friendly, so she immediately made friends with the natives. Between the two of us, we soon finished our malaria prevention work, and organized the hospital, which we enlarged with the building provided to us by the Malagasy government.

"It was easier for you, because the natives speak French".

"Don't think so", I replied in the language she used, hers, "They are not French and sometimes it is difficult for me to understand what they mean, even if they tell me in French".

"Well, I speak to them in my limited French and we understand each other".

"I can understand that, Mrs. Carter, since your French is like theirs, if you permit me to tell you . . ."

It wasn't a very good start, I admit.

"But some speak English", I added. "And it's not a problem for me to speak your language. I did a course in Oxford before I specialized".

Little by little she polished her French with my help, and the fact of being colleagues and working side by side, sharing problems and being the only two Europeans in the place even —though she was only half European— we smoothed out rough edges and got a certain friendship, the kind you make in the trenches, I guess, that last as long as hostilities in the war.

I thought she might be the eternal one because she gave me the impression that she was shielding her thoughts. Until I realized that she didn't have much to hide: when she wasn't working or talking, her mind was simply empty. And that made me envious, because I couldn't let my mind rest, I was always thinking about something. I have done it all my life, and it has lasted more than three hundred years. Three hundred and twenty to be exact.

"What are you thinking about?" I told her on more than one occasion. And instead of it’s none of your business, she answered that nothing at all.

And I had to tell her that she was lucky, for my mind was never at ease, and that in those moments I thought about how beautiful the blue of her eyes was, for example.

Belinda told me things about the Mumbay she knew, so full of people, many of whom were only there, but many others were always moving, always going somewhere, and she liked the quiet. That's why she became a doctor, because he wanted to go somewhere quiet and help a small community. In fact, she asked for this destination thinking that there was no other doctor. Apparently, while her request was being made, they awarded it to me, as there had not been a doctor here for years, and when they discovered that there would be two doctors, they kept silent and said nothing to her. However, she was reassigned two years later, when she no longer wanted to, to a town in Mozambique where there was no doctor, leaving me alone with my nurses. But their help was crucial to finish organizing health care in that small town.

However, before she left, she made an important revelation to me that would unite us in a certain sense for the rest of his life. We were once talking about how difficult it was for her to master the Malagasy language, which was official in those countries, and French, which was also official in the country.

"All those endings in the verbs are absurd. In English we have four or five and we say the same things as you.

"Yes, it is true. There should be one language for everybody".

"In the Middle Ages it was Latin. It was difficult to learn it, but you knew that with it you could understand and make yourself understood throughout the civilized world.

I smiled thinking that maybe she thought that the place we were in was civilized, since if they had any medicine at all it was because of the generosity of Doctors United for the World and the individuals, who contributed with their donations to preserve and maintain the organization, exactly, and not because the government prioritized the health of their citizens.

"TRUE. It's a shame that Latin is no longer used even in the civilized world.

"No. Now we have Esperanto, but that is a private matter.

"How private? Does it belong to a corporation?

"No, of course not I mean it's a private matter for each person to learn it or not. No state promotes it.

"It's curious. I've never met anyone who speaks it.

Certe vi konas! Of course you know!"

"Who?"

"Me. I speak it, and I just told you in Esperanto that of course you do know it.

"Ah, interesting. Is it very difficult?

"No. It was designed to be easy for everyone to learn.

"How is that?

"It has sixteen grammar rules and no exceptions.

She told me the rules and left me a dictionary and grammar, and soon I was able to tell her some things in her language, the dearest to her. I did not share that devotion to that language, but I had to admit that it was easy and sounded very nice.

"Every year", she told me, "there is a universal Esperanto congress in a different city, all over the world. That's why I already know more than fifty countries. It is an economical way to get to know the planet.

That appealed to me. In that year the 409^th conference would be held in Edinburgh, one of the cities I liked most among those I have already visited. According to Belinda, anyone can join if you pay the fee. She put me in touch with the organization that sets it up, the Universal Esperanto Union, based in Lisbon, and on August 3^rd, five thousand people from all over the world gathered in the capital of Scotland, and that's how I was able to meet many people from different countries and languages, whose minds I could read thanks to the international language. Many told me that my use of Esperanto was expert, almost professional, because everyone understood me and I understood everyone very easily.

13 Helen.

During the week, along the Esperanto congress, I met many people, among them Yu Lin, a boy from Nanjing, and Shui, his partner, and also Aiko Moto, Chinese and Japanese respectively. They had a different way of seeing life compared to Westerners, much more respectful. Especially Aiko (whose name means dear daughter, she told me). I met Belinda at a conference on The problems of current Esperanto: why the Final Victory still hasn't come after 400 years. The speaker, Italian Sandra Bellacqua, gave a very interesting presentation about the history of Esperanto, according to which famous surnames such as Corsetti, Lapenna and Charters appeared, in addition to the archaic Zamenof, Hodler and Kabe, who with their examples defined the three basic types of Esperantists most imitated by the present: those who are idealistic to the core, those who do something practical and effective, and those who do eternal work and then forget about the rest of the Esperantists. She also spoke about a virtual Esperantist, who was actually a series of writers who took over from generation to generation the edition of the oldest literary and political magazine in Esperanto, The Kajeroj el la Sudo whose editors always sign with the pseudonym of Christ, Jesuo (Jesus). She made reference to several of the articles published in its 1318 quarterly notebooks because they actually marked a new bridging trend between the three main recent quotes, because they make people think in and about the Esperanto language, and provide the tools to respond to the objections being discussed, and also provides the linguistic and cultural heritage necessary to propagate the knowledge and use of the language background, that is, among the Esperantists themselves, without paying religious worship either to the language or to its leading personalities neither from the past nor from the present, without being disrespectful to anyone. The magazine is free and can be obtained through social networks and virtual libraries around the world.

"Do you know that magazine?", I asked Belinda later, while we were drinking coffee.

"Yes. It's a current classic. Besides, anyone can write there. There's a two-year waiting list for new articles, though".

"What?"

"Yes, if you send an article and the editor likes it, the current Jesus will publish it within two years, unless he considers it very valuable but ephemeral. Then he chooses not to publish, or to publish it now, skipping the waiting list".

That got me thinking, and then I sent him an article about the important work Doctors United for the World was doing in so many lost cities around the planet. I was lucky, and the current Jesus published it in the next issue, October 2302, at number 1320ª. Many readers wrote to the magazine asking for information from many countries around the world, and the editor forwarded their messages to me. In the long run I was honored to know that that article created many vocations for medicine, and even among the doctors themselves the idea of ​​joining DUW spread. Two years later I was asked to speak at the Universal Congress in Mumbay about the altruistic health organization for which I had already worked for 12 years.

But let's go back to Edinburgh. During the three remaining days of the conference I met Belinda every day for hours. I introduced her to my new friends, especially Aiko and Shui, among whom I thought the eternal I was unconsciously searching for was hiding.

Eternal?, the question came to me loud and clear. It wasn't any of those three, because they were talking about their business, laughing and joking at the bar while I heard the word in my head. I looked in all directions, and then I saw a woman who was looking at me, but when she realized that I had noticed her, she turned and ran away. I remembered her face. So the eternal was an esperantist... I decided from now on to block my thoughts, or cover them with landscapes or other images that I liked to remember from time to time. Sint warned me not to tell anyone who I was. And I just broadcast it in an environment of people from all over the world…

Belinda's hug brought me out of my reverie.

"What is this about?"

"You are very sad. What is tormenting you is not worth the pain".

Then I remembered Belinda's department, and I smiled.

"Oh, I forgot you're a psychiatrist. What do you think is tormenting me?"

"I don't know. I was taught psychiatry, not telepathy".

That took away the thought that Belinda could be the other immortal. However, I wanted to ask her the question openly.

"I thought about death. About mine. You and I shared very difficult moments. Patients we loved very much died in our hands. Do you think that one day we will be immortal?"

"Seeing shit per sécula seculorum?"

"Well, there are also beautiful things".

"Yes, islands of honey in a sea of ​​bile".

"Oh, you are a poetess. I think that the sea is made of honey, although sometimes there are islands of bitterness".

"Touchée, you beat me This is the prize” and she gave me a kiss on the cheek.

"Ohhh”, said Aiko, "are you two engaged?"

The four of us laughed.

"He just won the prize for the most ingenious sentence", said my colleague.

"If you want, we can play that. So we'll practice Esperanto".

And so, saying sentences and sentences, I had to kiss the three of them several times, and they kissed me several times, but always on the cheek. The best sentence of all was said by Shui: Skribonte, mi pensis pli klare pri mi mem (On the verge of writing I thought more clearly about myself).

That convention ended, and I was left with the idea that I didn't know if the eternal one was Shui, Aiko, or the mysterious woman who ran away when she realized I saw her looking at me. And if that was her, is she a telepath, did she run away because she was one of the Others that Sint warned me against? Did she go tell her friends so they would hurt me? I didn't want to discover that anymore, no. And if it was one of my friends..., she did better than me. When I saw Miss X, I saw that next to her was my friend Rodrigo, President of the Spanish Federation of Esperanto Workers. Since it was difficult to find someone among the five thousand who joined the congress, I left a message on the Random Board, that is the appointment board, with my cell phone number. On the last day, three after my request, he called me and we agreed to meet for a beer.

"Do you remember the woman you spoke to three days ago at the top of the stairs?"

"Ugh, three days ago...I talked to hundreds of people. That day with dozens. Can you be more specific?"

"Yes, of course. She was a young woman, maybe 20 or 25 years old, dark skinned, a little taller than you, with long braided hair, very thin and slightly slanted eyes, and skin quite tanned by the sun".

"Wow, that could be Ellen, from Australia; or Mary, from Glasgow; Petra, from Bonn; Setadesh, from Iran; Luisa, from Barcelona; Melec, from Istanbul... I don't remember more, sorry".

"And did you get the impression that any of them were reading your thoughts?"

"What a strange question! No. Why?"

"Years ago I was told about an Esperanto speaker who completes the sentences of his interlocutor... I thought that's what telepaths do".

"That's what Dr. Liddel does. But I don't know her personally."

"Is she an Esperantist?"

"Yes. Yesterday she spoke about sidereal physics. A very interesting lecture".

"I didn't go. I'm sorry. Is she very old?"

"She's about seventy years old, maybe more. Why?"

"No, not at all. I'm interested in the subject of telepathy, that's all".

And then I saw her again. She was with three men. Would it be my turn to run today?

But when she saw me, she said something to them, and left them there suddenly. She slowly walked away, and they shrugged. Had they been The Others, they would at least look at me.

I left my friend and went after her. When I was less than two meters away from her, she turned the corner. When I did that, she was no longer there. Did she volatilize into thin air? I remembered Sint and his gifts. Maybe she got invisibility. Or teleportation. Or both.

Mind your thoughts, it came to me again very clearly. Yes, she should be the eternal one. When I turned to go to Rodrigo, I saw Aiko and Melinda, who were looking at me with a mocking face.

"Weren't you supposed to see Rodrigo?"

"Yes. Come and I will introduce him to you".

The Spaniard did not move from his chair. Indeed, he followed me with his eyes as he finished his beer, because he was surprised to see me running after a woman, as I had always warned him against Congress loves, because they did not survive from one convention to the next.

"Rodrigo, meet Melinda and Aiko, respectively from the UK and from Kyoto".

"Pleased to meet you, ladies", he told them respectfully, making a small shake of his head, because he was aware that in many cultures kissing is sexual assault, or is considered as such".

Then, turning to me, he said:

"Was that the girl you were talking about?"

Aiko and Belinda looked at me carefully.

"Yes. Do you know her? - I asked them".

"I think she's a friend of Shui's", Aiko told me. "I saw them talking several times. But every time I came, she left".

"Strange", I said. "Do you know her name?"

"No. But Shui certainly knows".

Unfortunately, my Chinese friend left for her country that day at seven in the morning.

"Why do you ask about her?"

"I saw her and thought I knew her in the past. Every time I approach her, she walks away. And that makes me wonder".

"That's what happens when Aiko approaches too. That's strange".

Aiko told me she was Russian and her name was Galina, but she didn't know more. She got to know her on the first day, when they happened to meet in adjacent seats at the concert of the pianist Bulgov, from Moscow. She spoke admiringly of him, and diris that he is a famous pianist in Russia.

Bulgov, I thought, yes I heard some Chopin sonata played by him on the radio.

"Do you think Bulgov knows her?"

"I don't know. Why?"

"Because I could find her based on the convention number if we know it..."

"Hehe, you look like a police officer looking for the killer. Does she owe you money?"

"No, but the fact that she runs away every time I want to get close to her makes me really angry. Although I see it's not just me. It happens to Aiko too".

"Right", she said. "There are very strange people in the world".

"Well, it doesn't matter, I've lost interest", I concluded".

However, I saw her again without looking for her. In the congress there is usually one or more Esperanto doctors in case of emergency. On the last day they asked me for help, because they found a dead person in her chair after a concert by a Lithuanian harpist. They took her to the hospital, and the doctor found nothing to indicate a heart attack. Knowing that I was an epidemiologist, I was called in to decide if we had to immobilize people. Temporarily the doors were closed and no one will be able to enter or leave, which caused natural discussions.

And here is the mysterious lady. Dead, but not cold. It looked like she had just died because she had no pulse and was unresponsive to the tests that were done on her. I examined her carefully and a clear thought suddenly came to me: I am not dead. Don't let them cremate me.

I asked how they knew I was a doctor, and I was told that one of those who went there that morning told them there was an epidemiologist at the convention, and they were given my convention number, KN 3824. Who was it?

Remembering the dialogue with Sint, I thought out so that she could hear it:

I blocked my mind to check something that became clear to me: Sint! She is the eternal!

This girl knew a lot. Sint didn't tell me how to call him. Why does she know?

"Poor woman. Does she have siblings, or family?"

She thought of the phone number where I could reach Sint. I memorized it to let him know, and decided to call him later.

Could this all be a setup? Just in case, I asked the doctor who takes care of her:

"Tell me, Zak, have you thought about what to do with the body?"

"Oh, no. We have to take her to Moscow. We have insurance for these cases".

"Okay. Don't worry, it's not contagious at all. Let the alarm go off. Open the doors".

Everyone could get out or get in by now, but no one told anyone what had happened, so that the panic wouldn't spread.

I asked as if for myself... What's your name, girl?

"Helen", she said, opening her eyes wide. Suddenly she punched me and ran away".

The doors were already opened when Helen ran out, followed by four guys who looked like thugs. Did they chase her or escort her?

14 The alternative aeternal.

It was clear that Helen was telepathic. I did not reveal to her my status as a telepath, and therefore she had no reason to know that I was not a normal person, and therefore if she knew or suspected it, it was because someone told her, or she found out through other means, but which ? On the contrary, she gave me more than enough reasons to suspect that she might be the other immortal, or one of The Others, that Sint had warned me against. In time I would clarify my doubts. But I lost the desire to look for her.

Or was it all Sints macabre game, telling me one story and telling her the opposite, for example that the bad guys are after her but without telling her that there is another eternal like her? It was clear that the Esperanto Congress did not fulfill my expectations.

But it did help me to meet people and travel around the world for very little money, living in the homes of Esperantists who did not have the means to travel, but who wanted to use the Universal Language and learn about other cultures.

I took a vacation when work slowed down a bit, and I left everything in the hands of my faithful nurses. I went to Israel to the house of my friend Shemer, who taught me about the history of his unfortunate people, always expelled from everywhere, because they remained faithful to their only true God, whose name they could not say, out of pure respect. He also taught me to say several things in Hebrew, and I returned happy with that country, small but important to the rest of the world.

When Belinda arrived in Qussaya she saw that someone was wrong about her again, because that town was much bigger than Sahamitevina, where there was only me, and now she found two hospitals there. She was sent to replace a shrink who retired. She requested an immediate transfer to a city of less than five thousand inhabitants, informing that if her request was not met, she would return to India. And after this was communicated, she returned to Sahamitevina to help me temporarily. She liked the place, but she really disliked being made fun of, so after staying with me for three more months without getting an answer, she went back home to Mumbay, to her family. A month later she received a communication from DUW, but when I told her, she told me to throw it in the trash. Curious, I opened it and discovered that they were sending her to a small town in Tanzania. But, true to her wish, I tore up the letter and threw the pieces into the trash.

I was also tired of that city, and I asked for help. They promised to send a doctor within a month, and I left when that period expired before a new doctor appeared. I went to the home of the first Esperantist I ever met, in Mumbay.

Belinda was very glad to see me, and I stayed with her and her family for a few months, or at least that was my first intention. Her family accepted me willingly. Her father was also a doctor, but already retired. The older brother, Alan, was a businessman, and the youngest, Alfred', was a lawyer and had a very select clientele. It was obvious that this family had money. Maybe they looked at me as an upstart, but I surprised them when the house opposite theirs was for sale and I told them I was moving to my new house, pointing it out to them. It was 500 square meters and so I had to hire two maids, a 40-year-old woman named Uma and her daughter Ayla, who would be my cook. They were both very helpful and friendly, yet very calm.

"Have you already retired, like dad, or are you going to work, like me? In my hospital, we need experienced doctors...".

"Ugh, I don't know. The truth is I want to take a long vacation. By the way, when do you take your regular vacation?"

"Why?"

"Because I want you to show me your country. In return I promise to show you your other country, England, which I don't think you know".

"Well, I was in London, but not for long".

"Ok, I'll see if I can work something out, although I'd like to study this culture. It's fascinating".

"So you're going to get rid of the art of healing?"

"I've been a doctor for a long time..", I bit my tongue not to say more than 20 years.

"I don't think so. You're kidding me. You're almost my age".

"You are 30 years old. I am also there. My parents were kind, like yours. Time is kind to us...".

"Hehe, I'm your age, but I look older. What an injustice".

"Tell me, Belinda, why didn't you get married?"

"The people I know seem shallow to me. If I ever get married, it must be with someone who tells me something, who teaches me something".

"So that excludes me".

She looked at me with surprise.

"Why? You are a rare case. You look young, but your words are those of older people".

"Would you marry me?" ing?"

"I don't see why not. I like you, I like your company. You're my companion for several years... No, I am not romantic in the sense of novels, but a practical woman".

"Have you never thought about having children?"

"Yes, I would like to. At least four. But I never found the man with whom I would have them".

"Touchée".

"No, I didn't say that for you. "Belinda", I said out of pure impulse, without thinking, "marry me".

"What!"

"I found you in Madagascar. I followed you here. You fascinate me. I would like to marry you".

"I don't know..". She looked down, very serious.

I got the idea. I knelt down and took her hand:

"Belinda Carter, will you marry me till death do us part?"

She looked at me very seriously, and a tear escaped.

"Yes", she said with a smile.

I stood up, gently hugged her and kissed her on the mouth, almost in chastity.

"I will make you your four children".

Then I asked myself why I did it. I've already been married twice, and marrying a normal girl would be a problem for me, like those two times. I should ever tell her my condition, like Dominique, or leave her away, like Loles. And I didn't like either of the two solutions. The first would endanger me, and perhaps Sint too, and the second would give me a lot of pangs of conscience, as it still did, two hundred years after the end of that family, my original family. To what extent was I not a victim of the moment? Why did I say that?

I shrugged and spent that morning looking for a good engagement ring. In one of the best jewelry stores in town I found a gold ring with a small diamond in the center. I had a little heart and the date engraved inside, March 6, 2300, and then I went to eat alone in a restaurant, the Mahala, which despite its name was one of the few that had good French cuisine, which was my favorite.

That day I had dinner at the neighbors' house, because Belinda had invited me to make our engagement official. But before she said anything, at the end of the dinner, when silence had already been requested so that my fiancée could speak, I knelt down in front of her and showed her the ring:

"Belinda Carter, will you be my wife until death do us part?"

She saw that I was very serious. More than I thought, because of the certainty with which I said, til death do us part. This was no mere promise for her parents to watch. It publicly declared my love for her.

"Yes, of course", she said with a smile that spread to the rest of the table.

I got up and kissed her.

We got married in the British Consulate the next day. As they were Anglicans, we also got married in St George's Church, near our homes. Then we went to see northern India, as I requested. We were on the holy Ganges River, where someone is always being cremated, but the sunsets of which are unforgettable, and our boat rides took on a more romantic meaning. We were also in Varanasi, Agra, Jaipur, we admired the Taj Mahal, that monument to love, the erotic temples of Khajuraho, and finally we returned to Mumbay with the promise of a child in Belinda's womb.

"I would say you already love me", I told her as I carried her into my chalet in my arms, "my wife".

"Yes, that's what I would say. And you, do you love me?"

"I knelt before you because I already loved you".

"Since when?"

"I don't know. In Madagascar I didn't like you very much at first, but when you left I felt amputated. Something was missing. When I saw you in Edinburgh, I noticed that you were recovering, and when you came back to Sahamitevina the days suddenly seemed brighter to me. Therefore I followed you to your country.

"Yes, Dominique, yes. And for all those things I love you too".

I caressed her belly, which was already a little swollen, and kissed it.

By my calculations, that would be my third child. In fact my second son, with a difference of almost four hundred years from the first, who already had descendants in his eighth, if not ninth, generation. Would I tell Belinda my secret? No, better not. Happiness for me had an expiration date of about thirty years…

"Did you know anything about that Helen at the convention she asked me some days later. "It seemed like you wanted to have something with her?"

"No. It wasn't that. Why are you asking?"

"I felt jealous when I saw your interest in her. But she told me there was nothing between you two".

"Did you have feelings for me then?" I asked to avoid the subject.

"I think so: I fell in love with you: I also realized that my life was missing something that I didn't want to admit to myself".

"That's why you came back from Mozambique".

"Yes, because of that and because those at DUW have already let me down twice. Then mom wrote to me with an offer from the Central Hospital that I couldn't resist".

"And that's why I came looking for you. Did you think I would?"

"No, to be honest, I thought I was only a bit of an annoying colleague for you, who left you in peace when she left".

"At first yes, but then I began to ask myself what you would do in such a situation that was presented to me, and I came to the conclusion that it was not the same thing without you around to check your view on things. Your opinions were very important to me".

"Love sneaks through unimaginable cracks... But tell me about Helen. Why were you so interested?"

"That girl kept looking at me from a distance, but when I got closer, she left. That aroused my curiosity. Among so many people, why did she stand looking at me? And if she did, why did she leave? Did I know her? Was she afraid of me? She owed me an explanation she didn't want to give me.

"She was said to have died during the Congress".

"No. It was a case of short-term catalepsy. She stood up in front of me and ran away. I haven't seen her since».

"And if you saw her now, what would you say to her?"

"I'd listen to her if she had something to say to me. And if not, I'd say the usual unimportant things about the weather, where you're from, etc. We have nothing in common, as far as I know. I just know she's Russian".

As far as I know, I repeated to myself. Is she eternal? Is she one of the bad guys? The truth is that now, being the father of my French-English-Indian child, I didn't care. Because 85 years before my date with Sint, I can well have a normal life with my wife and my son, Rabindranath, whom we named so in honor of the Indian sage and poet.

Years passed, and my in-laws died. My brothers-in-law grew old, and we had our four children: Sara, Tom and Antonio followed Rabindranath.

"Hey, do you dye your hair?"

"Well, no".

"How can you stay so young?"

"I'm not asking you those things, husband".

"No, I don't dye either".

"I know why".

"?"

"You are the other eternal", she told me with a laugh.

"What?" That left me speechless: according to Sint, the other immortal knew nothing about me. Disbelief seized me..".

"You've been looking for me for years, but I found you first".

"Were you looking for me?"

"No. Maybe that's why I found you".

"Well", I said relieved, "so this is our eternal love", I added with hidden irony.

I kissed her and gave her a long hug. And I started crying like a child. She stroked my head as if I were a real child.

"Don't cry. It's not that bad".

"I'm crying with happiness", I told her "I'm already home".

"When are you supposed to see Sint?"

"In 65 years. And you?"

"My mentor is not Sint. But I have to see him next year".

"Who is it?"

"I shouldn't tell you. His name is Alban".

"And how do you know mine is Sint?"

"Maybe you don't know that you talk in your dreams. You say his name often in your dreams. Sometimes in your nightmares. You also talk about some Loles. Who is she?"

"My first wife. I ran away from home so I wouldn't tell her anything about this".

"And does that bother you".

"Yes a lot".

"Well, you did well. I also told Henry, my first husband, and he divorced me. He said I was crazy. Poor guy, when I visited him, forty years later, looking just like I do now, he died because of that shock. Our fate is to live with those hundred-year-old people for only thirty, maybe forty years, and then go somewhere else, like the Wandering Jew".

"It's nice to finally be able to talk to someone about this. I'm glad I married you."

"Yes, I say the same. I discovered you when I saw that the years had passed and you had not aged".

"Hey, if it's your turn next year, you'll be at least 99, right?"

"Four hundred and seventy".

Wow, older than me… And where did you get that family from?

"From my late husband. He died two years before I met you. I missed him and that's why I went where nothing would remind me of him. And I found you".

"Wow, tragedy. I've had several too. It's the fate of the immortal. Thank God, it's over".

"Yes".

"Was your first husband Henry?"

"Yes. You are third. I had friends before, but this eternal youth did not allow me to have a family. I thought it would be different with Henry, because he was very much in love, but I was wrong. People in our condition do not have an easy life".

"Have you had children before?"

"No. Yours are the first I have".

"And why didn't you tell me your family was political?"

"They loved me very much. And I to them".

"Well now I am your family, and I have no family except you and the children".

"And the neighbors across the street, Alan and family".

"Yes, of course, but it's not the same".

"No".

"Did you really rule me out as an eternal?"

"Well, yes. You are very good at blocking out thoughts".

“I think it's a gift from birth, but I read yourslike an open book".

"You must have laughed a lot..."

"Very much. I was surprised to know that you are of Spanish origin, just like me".

"How about you? I'm from Villajoyosa, province of Alicante, and you?"

"From Arriondas, in Asturias".

"So we are Spaniards by origin, but now we are Indians".

"And how old are you, husband?"

"Let's see..., we are in 2340..., three hundred and ninety".

"You're from 1950".

"Yes, and you?"

"From 1840. I take you no more than a century and ten years".

"Alas, several generations separate us".

"Looks like you're not humanity's oldest immortal".

"We'll never know. Maybe there are others who hide better than us... Haven't you met someone who looks a lot like someone from a previous generation?"

"No, not really. I don't think there are many people with this genetic change we have".

That nailed me to the chair I was sitting on. A genetic change? This is the second contradiction she has with the information Sint gave me.

"Did Alban tell you that? He must be another immortal, right?"

"Yes. He is Belgian. And Sint, where is he from?"

"Well, I don't know. He never told me. I'll ask him when I see him again".

I began to distrust my wife. What didn't she tell me? I thought something infamous about her, to see if it was true that she read my thoughts despite my blocks:

"The truth is I was very lucky to find you, or rather you found me", I said as I thought What a whore you are. And you brought me to this land of people dying of hunger and misery..."

She didn't lose her smile, nor did she look surprised. Indeed: her knowledge of me was not genuine. I kept asking her:

"Did you have any brothers?"

"Yes, two. Ellen and Keith".

"And none of them inherited the immortality gene?"

"Well no. And you, do you have siblings?"

"I have a sister who did inherit it. But my other two brothers didn't".

"What is your eternal sister's name?"

"Marisol. Why do you want to know?"

"Because I would like to share experiences with another immortal of my gender. Women have a different way of feeling. Sometimes this thing about immortality is difficult for me".

"Not now. Now you have me".

"Sure. And what's Sint like?"

Aha, now you're interested in Sint, bitch. Do you think I will tell you? The hell I will!

"Well, look, the truth is, I wouldn't know what to tell you. He's a normal, ordinary man, short, with thick eyebrows, rather burnt skin, and thick black hair. I'd say he's a Turk, though we've never talked about him. Always about me. I don't know what he means, but the truth is that I don't care much about eternity. I think he is one of the first ones".

"And how come you don't see each other more often?"

"I don't know. Maybe he doesn't want anyone to locate him for some strange reason".

"Didn't he tell you?"

"No".

"Nor did he warn you about other people?"

"Well, not really. -And I changed the subject, because I already knew what I wanted: -I'm thinking of enrolling at the University of Mumbay to do Indian Studies. I'm fascinated by this culture".

"Weren't you thinking of going back to work?"

"What for? In my mafia past I already made enough money to live forever with some comfort".

15 The secret.

That woman was following me. I was in Crawford Market, distractedly looking at some spices, when I noticed something in the pocket of my jacket: I looked and saw a hand coming out of it. I was surprised, because I had nothing there, but when I tried to take that hand I discovered that there was something in the pocket: a phone. The woman had left it behind as she walked away, wrapped in a sari. When I wanted to react, she was already lost in the crowd.

When I finally got out of the market, I sat down at Café Firdos to think calmly. Who was this stranger? Why had she given me a phone?

I was left in doubt ten minutes later when the phone rang.

Hello, Dominique. It's Helen.

I was stunned. This game had been going on too long. She would look for me, find me, and leave whenever she wanted. I had to be careful not to let her hang up on me. "

"Hello, Helen, my beautiful boxer. Your punch still hurts."

"I'll explain, I promise. I'm calling because you're in danger."

"In danger...? From what?"

"They'll kill you. They hunt us, use us to get to the others aeternals, and then study us inside and out. You won't survive."

"But no one knows about me. I'm with my family…"

"Your wife isn't what she says."

"Impossible, she's eternal."

"She's not. It's a setup."

"And why should I trust you?"

"Not doing so could cost us both our lives."

"Why don't you meet up and tell me everything?"

"You're under surveillance twenty-four hours a day. If we meet up, they'll kidnap me again. And if they see you with me, they'll kidnap you too."

"I don't understand anything, Helen."

"I'll meet you in Paris in three days. Wednesday at three o'clock at the foot of the Eiffel Tower. Don't let anyone follow you.

And he hung up. Should I go or not? What if she's crazy? Or, worse, what if she's one of the bad guys?

Yes, Belinda wasn't who she said she was, I already knew that. And Helen, wasn't she from The Others?

Sint, Sint, why didn't you leave me an emergency phone number? But it was clear: those people knew about Sint and had located me. Through me they already knew that in 65 years I would see him. We were already in 2340, so in 2405 I had to be in a place that I instinctively didn't tell Belinda about... Well, all this could be paranoia. I would go to that meeting with Helen, yes, but I wouldn't go unarmed, just in case.

Without saying anything at home, and without picking up any luggage, I went to Chhatrapati Shivaji Airport, the oldest in Bombay. I didn't take a taxi so they couldn't track me, but I went by bus, and at the airport I bought a flowered shirt and some shorts, a moustache, a fake beard, some sunglasses and a tacky tourist hat. And a backpack and a small suitcase to put everything in, even the backpack. Luckily I have the habit of not leaving home without my credit card and my ID.

I went into the men's room and changed my personality completely. At passport control I said I had lost my passport, but to return home I only needed my identity card, and they didn't give me any problems.

When I arrived in Paris I didn't go to the police to report the loss or to get another passport, but to see Henri DelaPorte, the best forger I've known for several centuries. It cost me a fortune, but he made me ten passports and their corresponding identity cards from as many countries, including those from my original past lives, but written so that they would be useful to me at the present time, that is, from 2320. Then I went to see another of my old friends, Serge Chemelle, who got me a revolver and a box of 20 bullets, which I camouflaged in the back of my pants and in the pocket of my coat, respectively.

And so, on the third day I was in the café at the Eiffel Tower. I said goodbye to Belinda in the French way, as befitted my new French personality. I was no longer Dominique, but Antoine Després. Poor Belinda must still be looking for me, or waiting for me to call or write to her. The truth is that Helen had confirmed my doubts, and put me on the right track. But I don't trust her either. What can I do? What if, instead of her, those four thugs arrive down there?

She arrived on time, 3:00 p.m., and got in line with those who were going to buy the ticket to go up to see the tower. I made a phone call, and a kid to whom I had given a few euros for that, approached her on a scooter and stopped in front of her, and handed her a package:

"Tiens", he said. And before she could react, the kid went away as fast as he came.

In the package was the phone she had slipped into my pocket three days earlier.

"Hello, Helen", I said as soon as she had it in her hand. "My name is Antoine Després now. How are you?"

"Hello, Antoine. My name is Estelle now. How about we meet up?"

"Okay. Go up."

"Where to?"

"Upstairs, I'll follow you. Don't stop going up until you see me.

She climbed to the top floor and waited. She had been admiring the Paris cityscape for five minutes when I had already judged that no one was following her."

"Saluton, tovarich, I greeted her."

"No, I'm not Russian, Antoine, she replied. "I guess you're full of unanswered questions."

"Yes, of course. Although some of my answers await some corresponding questions..."

"First I'll give you some background. Then ask me and, if I can, I'll answer you."

"That's fine."

"I'm not Russian. Nor French, I'm Yankee. There I was arrested by the CIA and taken to Rockwell. They thought I was an alien. They had seen me in photos from a long time ago. It was easier to go unnoticed before, but with so much government control it was only a matter of time before they found me and arrested me."

"Why?"

"They say they're looking for the longevity gene. They want to study us. They want to know how they can have long-lived soldiers, who don't have to be trained from scratch every so often. Super veterans."

"I understand."

"They sought me out to extract the secret of my longevity, even though they knew they would have to kill me to get the information, which is not in my brain, but in my cells."

"Tell me, what does that have to do with me? Why do you follow me, and yet you run away when I approach you?"

"I wasn't running away from you, but from those who were with you."

"Shui? Aiko? Belinda?"

"Rodrigo. He's the head of the squadron that's looking for me. I wanted to talk to you. I know what you're thinking. I am telepathic.

Bullshit! Another one who wants to spy on me.

"No, Antoine. Your wife lied to you, but I didn't. If you're also telepathic, let's continue without words.

We were silent for a few minutes. The truth is that we were left blank. I had finally mastered the art of Belinda…

And the truth is that she did teach me. It wasn't complicated. I could disguise them with other, innocuous thoughts, the ones everyone thinks, while with my deep brain I thought about what really worried me. I could also put up a barrier of white noise, which is what I thought Belinda did.

At that moment I saw two gendarmes approach us, and they asked me for my papers. Smiling, I showed them the Carte d'Identité. They studied it and compared it with a small device they carried in their hands, walked around me, scratched their heads and asked me:

"Sir, were you talking to a lady a while ago?"

"Yes. She had gotten lost and I told her how to get to the bus stop for line 3.

"Ah, very well. At your service, sir, we are leaving. We are sorry to have bothered you.

When they left, my companion's thought came to me:

We did this for hours, until we established that the telepathic connection was broken after ten kilometers, but as long as it worked, it didn't matter if I was outside or inside a building, even if I was inside an elevator, or in the basement.

I continued walking along the banks of the Seine for a long time. Those two policemen had followed me while Estelle was with me. But suddenly I saw them turning away, looking at a pocket-sized device from time to time. Apparently Estelle was following someone else to throw them off track.

I thought about this visit to Paris. It had been a very educational one, yes.

I thought long and hard about what I should do. I could continue to flee, like Helen-Estelle, changing jobs and camouflaging myself. Or I could use Belinda's cover. Those bastards might be after me, but I would be waiting for them.

I left for the airport and several hours later I was back in Bombay. But before I got back to my house, I located a hut in a field on the outskirts and snuck in through a window. Estelle and I busted the door open from the inside. It was necessary for my alibi."

My wife was very happy to see me suddenly when I got home.

"Dominique! Where have you been? We were worried about you."

"I guess so. I've been kidnapped. Some idiots had mistaken me for someone or other, and demanded my ransom. They were shocked when the supposed kidnapped person answered the phone instead of his family. They found the phone and ran away. And with time and effort, I managed to break down the door and get out of there."

16 It depends..., on what?

But Estelle kept a discreet distance. Just in case Belinda could follow a telepathic conversation, we thought of our messages indirectly. The Yankees would know that she was in India, but in another town. Where to look? The area was huge, about 314 square kilometers. And when they saw her with their devices, they couldn't see her with their own eyes. They hadn't thought of the impossible: that she was invisible. How she managed to fool them was something they couldn't imagine.

"Wife", I said to Belinda, "I've thought better of it: I'm going to go back to practicing medicine. Do you think there's room in your hospital for an epidemiologist?"

"That's great! We need doctors in any specialty. If you come with us you can join the research team. They are always looking for new vaccines and remedies for new diseases."

"It will be a pleasure to return to practice."

However, at the private Hospital de la Merced, they made me a better offer and I went to work there. Belinda looked annoyed, because she wanted us to work together again, but it was not to be.

"And what about Indian culture?" she asked me. "Don't you want to study it anymore?"

"Woman, of course I do. When I leave the hospital I will go to university, to the evening-night shift. But slowly, I have time."

"Well, you only have ten more years of this life left. After that we should fold and go somewhere else."

"Yes, it's possible. With our children grown, we could go on a trip and fake an accident."

"That's it."

And we can finally study you, she blurted out. I don't know where she got all the information she has on me, but it was clear she wasn't telepathic.

"Have you never met another eternal, wife?"

"No, you're the first. Alban already told me there was another eternal like me. A male."

Lie, I thought. Sint would never lie to me. He told me she didn't even know I existed. What business would my wife have with me? Why hadn't her thugs acted yet? They knew about Sint from one of the two poor people they had dissected, Erica and Jonas. No wonder Sint was so cautious… but who the hell was Sint? What was he?

I went back to work. At the Hospital de la Merced they put me on the contagious diseases floor. I treated patients with malaria, leprosy and other highly contagious diseases. We developed various vaccines and remedies that we later published in medical journals, after transferring the patents to the public domain. In this way we ensured the collaboration of doctors from the rest of the world and also the hatred of the pharmaceutical industry. I had an eight-hour shift at the hospital, but what nobody knew was that instead of going to university, I spent several hours every day in a gym where a kid called Chandra helped me systematize the notions of self-defense that I had acquired during my time as a mobster in Brazil through the disciplines of judo, karate, Tae Kwondo and Kung Fu. My mentor once suggested that I take the black belt exam in these disciplines, but I declined the offer, because I wanted to keep it a secret for personal and family reasons. I don't know what he thought of that, but the truth is that he didn't care about anything except the copious amount that I gave him every month for his tutelage in these disciplines.

"You could start your own school", he told me one day. "I can't charge you more for not teaching you anything new. It's not right."

But he agreed to let me go to his gym to practice with him for a symbolic amount.

I suddenly remembered something that I had stored in the back of my memory, and although I was sure that he would lie to me, I would have to clarify with my wife.

"Belinda, when I met you, you told me you'd have an appointment with your mentor the following year, and I asked you to go with me, but you didn't take me. Or did you not have said interview? Because I will take you to see Sint—I thought of putting that bait in suddenly."

If he did, his mental block failed him. A phrase escaped him: Where?

"Tell me", I insisted.

"Yes, I saw him. But he told me that no one could know that I saw him. For security reasons. There is a faction of the CIA—he told me with all his aplomb—that is dedicated to harassing us. They have caught three, killed two, and the third escaped before they did the same to her."

"Oh, wow. We have to be careful. But how could Alban tell you that before we meet?"

"He texts me every time to tell me where we'll meet."

I was careful not to actively think anything that contradicted my words, but she wasn't, and her nervousness and contradiction were obvious.

"Of course. Luckily, no one knows we're here, lost in this sea of ​​millions of people."

"You know, I'd give anything to go back to Madagascar."

"Yeah, we had a good time there."

"The best time of my life, even though I didn't value it then."

"You know, Belinda, I'm sick of dying my hair white and sticking plastic wrinkles on. And I guess you are too."

If he only knew, she blurted out. I look my age.

"Well, let's resign and retire now. Let's go around the world. Does that sound okay, wife?"

We really had a bit too much time in Bombay. When we arrived we looked to be in our twenties and thirties, and we had been here forty years already, so we were already at retirement age, 70. Our four children were already older than we looked without the makeup that made us look older.

So, a few days later we applied for retirement, which was accepted immediately.

In Delhi we planned to plan our accident and passage to another life so that I could finally get rid of all these artificial skins that I had glued to my face for so many years, and wash my hair to get some of my natural color back, although the truth is that it would not get that color back until my hair grew back. But I was shocked when I came out of the bathroom to find my wife looking exactly as she did when I met her. Just like that.

"How did you do that?"

"I went to a ladies' hair salon that was recommended to me. They are very efficient."

"What about the wrinkles?"

"I did that myself before I went."

I didn't buy it, of course. I searched her mind, and it was totally empty. Like when we met in Madagascar.

"Do you remember when we met?"

"Yeah, sure. Why do you ask?"

The mental images weren't hers. There was something false about them.

Learned, came to me from a familiar voice."

Well, husband, my supposed rib told me, we have to plan for tomorrow.

Tomorrow was an accident to reassure our children, who would have ashes to visit every year in the British cemetery in Bombay.

Very early we rented a car and went on an excursion to the port. When we were near the dock, an all-terrain vehicle hit us from the passenger side, but I saw it in time and jumped into the water. Then I climbed onto the dock, helped by my invisible angel. I realized that the clone had died instantly, crushed by the metal of the front door of the other car. They wanted me alive, and they didn't hesitate to kill their agent.

When those two thugs went to get me out, I attacked them from behind. I kicked one of his neck, and when the other turned around, I kicked him in the throat, destroying it. To ease his agony, I stepped on his neck, killing him almost instantly. I thought about throwing them into the sea, but then I put one of them in the car, in the driver's seat, and the other in his own. Taking advantage of the fact that no one was watching at that early hour, I took gasoline from the tank and spread it inside the two cars, and set them on fire. They burned until the fire caught on their guns, and there were several explosions, and then the two fuel tanks exploded. I walked away from that place, and with the cell phone of one of those bastards I called the police, saying that I had seen two cars on fire. After which I threw the cell phone into the water, and we left there.

The next day I saw in the newspaper that my wife and I were presumed dead, as well as the driver of the other vehicle.

She put something in my hand, I looked and suddenly it appeared.onto a keychain with the BMW emblem.

I pressed the remote he had just given me and was startled by the horn of the car right next to us.

17 Mission: Hunting.

This running away was fine to stay alive, but we did have to attack so that they would get scared and leave us alone. We had two casualties, two of our own dead worth ten or more of theirs. We had to get rid of at least twenty agents so that they would want to talk. To do that we had to hurt them.

I showed up at my brother-in-law's house the next day in camouflage and with the identification of the Intelligence Bureau of India, that is, the Intelligence Office of the Union of India.

“Sir,” I said, “we are investigating the murder of your sister and brother-in-law, which occurred yesterday on the docks of this city.”

“Oh, yes, I read it in the newspaper. An unfortunate accident.”

“That is what we have leaked to the press. But we have enough evidence to believe that it was a murder perpetrated by a foreign power."

"How? They were two unknown doctors."

"We assume they were special. They had powers that neither you nor I have, sir."

"How? What powers? Listen, you're wrong. My sister…"

"We know that she was actually your ex-sister-in-law. She married Mr. Dupont for the second time."

"Listen, how do you know that?"

"I'm from the Intelligence Office, sir. That's why we know that you are a colleague of a foreign power, the suspects, therefore, of the murders."

"What? Listen, I demand to see my lawyer."

"Do you think you're in the United States? We do things differently here, sir. Either you tell me the names of all of them, or I'll arrest you.”

That guy was a tough nut to crack. But he panicked and I read in his mind the names of almost all of his men and some of his phone numbers.

At that moment Estelle, who was present but invisible during the interrogation, called me on the phone, but she told me telepathically that she had everything.

I hung up and looked at him with a very guilty face, and apologized:

"Excuse me, sir. I have just been informed that the head of the spy network has just been arrested, and therefore it could not be you. If you want to make a complaint, they will gladly process it for you.

I went to the door, and from there I apologized again.

The man told me that it was nothing, that anyone can make a mistake. He was obviously very relieved, and so he let his guard down, and this time I was also able to read the names and addresses of all of them. We passed all that information to the real Indian Intelligence Service, so they could do whatever they wanted with it. The truth is that we never heard anything from my brother-in-law again.

We went to a garage on the outskirts, and sat down to wait for them to appear, like flies for a plate of honey. She remained invisible, of course, but armed with a pair of revolvers, just like me. They did not expect the victims to counterattack. We left their bodies in front of the door of the American embassy with a note in their mouths:

When we had already killed 30 of them, we left the last one a different note in his mouth:

And we left him an email.

But no mail arrived at that address. We decided to continue hunting, until they gave up.

They answered when they realized that going after Estelle was suicide. We had already killed 60 people and they still didn't know where Estelle was or how many of us were protecting her.

They suggested an interview in a public place.

"Officer Richards", I said as soon as we were seated, "I've got a man aiming at your head right now. If you don't get all your snipers out right away, this interview will be over as of now, because you'll be dead."

Sure enough, Estelle had one of those orange laser toys that kids have been using for ages pointed at the center of the table. The officer saw that orange dot move across the table and land on his head."

"I can tell you the same thing."

"Goodbye”.

I got up and left."

"Wait, wait, for goodness sake!"

"I don't make deals with traitors. Either your boss comes, or the war will continue."

"Wait. I'm the boss."

"Then get in", I said, opening the door of the taxi I had just climbed into. "We'll talk here."

"But the taxi driver…"

"He doesn't know French."

I felt my fairy godmother next to my seat, on the other side of the one Richards was occupying.

"Well, what do you propose?"

"Easy: a cessation of hostilities. You don't send us more hitmen, and we won’t kill them".

"Us? How many of you are there?"

"As many as we are. Enough to wipe out the entire CIA."

"Well, it's impressive, but we have our methods."

"If we get cocky, I'm getting off at that corner."

"Wait, man. You're hard to negotiate with."

"Negotiate? What do you propose?"

"I propose... that you let me study one of your kind. We promise that your health will not be at risk this time."

"I'm not interested. Driver, stop!"

Before that idiot had time to react, I said to him from outside the taxi:

"The war continues. When you stop sending us people, CIA agents will stop dying. And we might pay a visit to their headquarters, because killing them one by one or two by two is tiring."

And I went for a walk.

Those people were hard-headed. They kept sending us agents and we kept eliminating them. We changed meeting places with them. They put a price on my head, and I was the most wanted criminal by the CIA and the FBI.

As I had promised that idiot who had told me he was the head of the CIA, we showed up at their headquarters. I asked something to the guard at the main door while my invisible friend took his gun and hit him with it, knocking him out. If anyone was watching through a camera, they would see that the guy's gun had evaporated and shortly after he fell unconscious to the floor. In the first office I found there I asked for the head of the CIA. A very young blonde girl pointed us to the site, thinking perhaps that I was a clueless agent.

I sat down in front of a stunned Agent Richards.

"It seems that it is true that you are the head of this mess of an agency."

"What..? How..?"

"It doesn't matter how. Let's see what. I thought that if I shoot you, the hunt will be over."

"What?" he said, pulling out a pistol from under the table, but before he could aim at me, he found my revolver pointed at his face."

"I expected that. Give it to me by the barrel, or this will be the last thing you see. Get up".

I searched him and he had no more weapons.

"Well, if I kill you, another useless guy will be in your position, and we'll start again... So I thought of something more practical: I've placed several bombs throughout the building", yes, by then Estelle should be getting at work, "so if I were you I would give the evacuation order so that everyone leaves and no one dies when this thing blows up", I said, taking out a remote button and showing it to him.

He pressed the alarm button to evacuate the building. When everyone had left, we slowly came out, always pointing my revolver at him from the pocket of my jacket.

"Well, let's continue this interesting conversation, Richards. Do you think that the destruction of this emblematic building will convince the President of the United States of America that it is better to leave us alone and give orders to forget about us, or we will have to kidnap his wife?"

"Yes, of course. It can work", he said with a lot of sarcasm. It was obvious that he believed that I was bluffing, despite evacuating just in case.

Shortly after reaching the outside, from a safe place we turned to watch the explosion. Estelle told me at that moment that everything was ready and she was in a safe place.

“Well, Richards, now you’ll see why it’s best for you to forget we even exist. You cancel the warrants with the price off my head, or you’ll have several more rolling around instead of mine.”

I pushed the button and several explosions rang out inside the building, which lit up orange and fell like it had been held in place by a rope that had just been cut.

That impressed Richards. I walked away slowly, unnoticed, and a driverless car pulled up beside me. I got in on the driver’s side and off we went, my guardian angel and I.

There were only ten years left until we were due to meet. She told me that her turn would be a year after mine, but she asked me to come with me to do the joint interview. That put me on my guard a little. I remembered Sint's words: You shouldn't have told anyone.

"Where are you meeting him?"

"I don't know. He tells me telepathically a few days before."

"You don't know the exact day either?"

"The truth is that I don’t. He usually changes it every time", I lied so naturally that she swallowed it. "But I still couldn't tell you even if I knew, in the same way as you shouldn't tell me no matter how much we want to share it".

"True. Sixty-two deaths and a destroyed building confirm it. We have to be very cautious", she said, perhaps with the idea that I wouldn't distrust her.

But I was sure that she wouldn't leave my side until I went to see Sint... How would I get her off my back? Yes, the mental block worked, because otherwise she would have had some other reaction.

18 The pact.

The next to locate us was Agent Richards himself. But there was something new: when he saw me he brandished a white flag, not a gun.

"Well?" I greeted him.

"The President wants to talk to you."

"Which President?"

"My country’s."

President McCaine wanted to talk. Was it a trap? I wasn't sure if they knew or not that I was a one-man army, even if it was obvious that I had more help. If they eliminated me, the problem would be solved, although they would never have the opportunity to study me, or —what I liked even less— clone me. I would later see that had been impossible for them... But what they certainly didn't know was that they couldn't eliminate me and that I had also taught Estelle to shoot, and she was very good at it. Her clothes and everything within 20 centimeters away from her body became invisible, since what her body was actually doing was deflecting the rays of light around her, like mirages do, but in a controlled way, so that the human eye saw through her—actually around her—as if she weren't there. That's why when we attacked the CIA base she was able to take out a couple of agents who were pointing their gun at me without me seeing them. Two bullets out of nowhere finished them off.

"What guarantees do you give me that it's not a trap?"

"I can't give you any, but we know you're not alone, and I won't risk another visit to my office…”

"Okay, you've convinced me. When is it convenient for your president?"

"As soon as possible. He'll leave what he's doing when you come”.

"Okay. Tell him I'm on my way."

Richards himself escorted me to the Oval Office. President McCaine was quite an affable person, but behind his fine words there was a tough personality. Small in stature, he had an unusual broadmindedness. That's why he was the President, and not a person like Richards.

"My agent informs me that there have been misunderstandings between you and my administration”.

"Yes, Mr. President. To be exact, sixty-four misunderstandings. We hope to leave it at that”.

The President looked at Richards disapprovingly, but concentrated on the offer.

"I'm told you're a different species. A superior species derived from our own”.

"Mr. President, with all due respect, I am here to make peace, not to discuss biology”.

"However, we must know who we are dealing with”.

"Mr. President, we are as human as you. But just as you have certain uncommon faculties that have brought you to the White House, we have other faculties that will allow us to progress and help the human race if we do not have to be busy defending ourselves from your attempts at assassination. And after you killed two of us, the rest of us have decided that we will not be killed any more, no matter who falls”.

"Are you threatening me?”

"No, Mr. President. I am describing the situation. Remember that you get more with honey than with gall. And I am here today to reach a Pact of Good Will, if you wish so”.

"I was informed that we have had 62 casualties since this began. I presume that you had only two”.

"You presume well, Mr. President”.

"If we make peace, can we count on your help and collaboration?”

"It depends. We will study each project that you present to us, but we will not be agents of the CIA or any other agency of this country or any other. We think in terms of all humanity, not of countries”.

"So, you only want us to stop sending you hitmen, as you call them. In exchange, you do not kill them”.

"I am empowered by my people," I said, not falling into their trap, "to sign this pact and nothing else”.

"And how do I know that you will not use these special powers you speak of against the American people?”

"You have our formal word that we will never use our powers against the American people, or the French people, or any national of any other country on Earth. So far we have only used them to defend ourselves against you, and to destroy a building, and it was only after you murdered two of us in such a horrible way and with the excuse of science, like the sadly famous Dr. Mengele, but if you give up your attitude, we will give up ours, Mr. President. You know that we did nothing else than defending ourselves”.

"And why have you insisted on speaking to me personally?”

"I represent many innocent people who trust that the word of the President of the United States is the law. That is why we want to sign this pact with you in person”.

The President looked at me with respect, and he knew that what I was telling him was It's true.

I'll take the risk, he thought.

And he took his pen and signed the paper I presented to him. I signed it next, and each of us kept our copy.

"Can I trust that your successor will honor his word, Mr. President?"

"This Peace Treaty was not signed by John McCaine," he said very seriously, "but by the President of the United States of America in the name of all the American people," he said gravely.

Then we shook hands, and I was escorted by Richards to the front door. They never suspected that there was an invisible witness, my personal escort, my guardian angel, the most French of the French, Estelle.

Outside, no one noticed that a well-dressed twenty-five-year-old had just changed the destiny of humanity. I walked around, head down, as if meditating, until I sat down on a bench to contemplate from afar that magnificent building where the peace had just been signed. Would it last?

But I assumed she was gone, for I could not think of her, nor even feel her presence, which had become so familiar to me in recent months. The secondary defect had become useful: my empathy allows me to know whether someone is with me or not.

19 Sint’s secret.

On January 13^th, 2405, I found myself in the place of the three palm trees for the fourth time, waiting for Sint. I had arrived several hours earlier than agreed, to do a progressive scan to make sure that Elena-Estelle had not followed me. Some things she had told me had made me suspicious, despite being half of my army, the one that had won that silent war that will never be recorded in the annals of history, and about whose outcome we had had so many doubts.

I obeyed, until the familiar voice of my friend spoke to me again.

"You can open your eyes now.

"Are you not talking to me with your mind anymore?"

"We are far away, but the voice does not reach where the thought can reach. It depends on the receiver and his ability to break the blocks."

"You are a little paranoid, aren't you?"

"Come on, look out the window. What do you see?"

"The sky is black", I said as I looked out. "Is there going to be a storm, or is it suddenly night time?"

"No, my friend, it is not night time. What is that blue balloon hanging up there?"

"It's... it seems... it can't be!"

"Yes, Antoine", he told me sarcastically, "it's your beloved planet. So now you're on the Moon. It's my secret base."

"Where Estelle wanted to be."

"Her name isn't Estelle. It's Ulmete. She's been lying at you about everything since she met you."

"But it can't be, she helped me against the Americans."

"Of course she helped you. Because it was in her interest. But she's not the eternal one."

My disappointment was very evident.

"And who is the eternal? Will I ever meet her?"

"Of course, when you finish your next mission you will see her again."

"Will I come back? Do I even know her?"

"Yes. You had a child with her."

"Belinda! But she died…"

"No. One of her clones died. In fact, the three who replaced her. They had your other three children. I'm afraid your Mister President hasn't been entirely honest with you."

"So Belinda is the eternal, right?"

"Yes. And yes, I did tell her there was another eternal one. She looked for you and found you in Madagascar. That was her mission, while I advised you against looking for her."

"But you told me…"

"I told her after I saw you for the last time. I didn't lie to you. I hadn't told her yet then. But I assumed she would find you by intuition. It's one of her abilities".

"And how could she..?"

"You see: telepathy doesn't have the ten kilometer limit that you think."

"You... you mean also Ulmete."

"Exactly. The theoretical range of telepathy is a million kilometers."

"There isn't that distance on Earth. Not even from Earth to the Moon."

"That's it. It would triple the distance from here to your house, and there would still be 16 diameters of the planet left. That's why the theoretical limit is irrelevant."

"And if that has never been experienced, how do you know that that is the limit, even if it is theoretical?"

"By mathematics, my friend. Telepathy is not an art, it is a science that can be explained."

"And how can I increase my telepathic radius?"

"You have it approximately three hundred thousand kilometers away. It is Ulmate who has it limited. Her race does not allow for more."

"Her race? What and who is Ulmate?"

"She is one of the Others that you have to guard against."

"But she has helped me."

"No. She has helped herself. And helping you has been a side effect, one that she hopes to have won you over to her cause."

"So my mission is to locate and destroy the Others?"

"Almost. You don't need to destroy them: I'm happy to neutralize them."

"And then I'll see Belinda again."

"No. You'll see her first. Because rescuing her is your training mission. And her help can be very effective in other missions."

"But you said she had a mission, and me finding her could spoil both of yours and turn them into a third mission."

"Her mission was to find you. Yours was to rescue her, as a pre-mission, as I told you. Because your real mission is to find and neutralize the Others."

That puzzled me. Apparently the Others' actions had upset my godfather Sint's plans.

"So, if what you told me is true, which I don't doubt, I could know what Ulmate is thinking right now, right?"

"That's it. Concentrate."

I concentrated, and I didn't like what I heard very much.

I've lost him, said to someone. Either he sleeps all day, or he's dead. I can't hear an echo.

Keep looking, I heard another mind say. Sint must be found. And when you find him, you know what to do.

"Have you heard?" I asked my friend.

"Yes. They've been playing that song for hundreds of years."

"And what do you think they'll do when they find you?"

"I don't know. Maybe destroy me."

"And why haven't you stopped them?

"That's why I need you."

"Why didn't you say so before?"

"You were preparing yourself. Compared to what you have to do, the CIA thing was a piece of cake."

"Uh, well, I had the help of an invisible."

"Yeah, but it won't be so for you anymore. Go on, lie down on that cot."

The cot was a kind of vaguely anthropomorphic bed with a fitted lid that closed as soon as I lay down on it. Within a few minutes I fell into a very pleasant sleep.

Several hours later I woke up. The sarcophagus-like thing was open, and next to it stood a short, bushy-browed man with very thick black hair and very sun-tanned skin.

"Hello, Sint", I said. "I see I have no more secrets for you".

"No, no. But now you have a couple more abilities. You'll practice them before you leave."

"Leave?"

"Yes. I brought you, but now you can leave. Instant teleportation is one of your new abilities."

"And what else do I have?"

"You can turn invisible, but you'll be able to see the other invisible. Ulmete will no longer be invisible to you. You'll see her in pale pink when she turns invisible. But she won't see you. And your new telepathic blocker will make her think you're not there. But there's more."

"More?"

"Nebulization. You can change your form at will, mimicking that of any person, animal, or thing, without losing consciousness. You can even transform into a cloud of transparent gas. That's why I call it nebulization instead of polymorphism, as it is known in some circles."

"Wow, wow. That's a lot to take in."

"But that's not your greatest power."

"Oh no? Wow, what is it?"

"It's called persuasion. You have to use it wisely, because the people you use it on won't be responsible for their actions. You will".

"There's something I don't understand, Sint. If you can give me all these powers... why haven't you used them yourself to take out the Others?"

"That's a long story. But I can't incorporate all those powers because I don't have life support for that much. You saw how much I weigh. My body is weak and delicate".

"Yes, I remember, but I don't know what you mean".

"My own nature can't handle it. I have to do with machines what you can already do with the life force of your body. And now rest".

Sint left that room after pointing to a bed that was attached to the wall. There was also a refrigerator and a table and a chair.

"Before you go, eat and rest. A hard task awaits you. For a change, I will supervise you from here and speak to you only if strictly necessary. You decide your course of action, and also when and where we will meet. If I am within a radius of a million kilometers from you, I will come to your call".

"And my mission then…""

"Twofold: rescue the real Belinda and neutralize the cell of The Others on this planet. Only then we will be at peace."

I ate a light meal, and fell into that bed. I don't know when I woke up, or how many hours I slept, but it was certainly a lot. I woke up as if I were new, ready for the job Sint had assigned me. Although his mystery persisted. He hadn't told me who or what he was. As usual, we had been talking about me the whole time.

20 Rescue.

21 The Queen meets The God of gods.

22 Conclusion.