Three brothers - color play E-Book

Frank Oberon

• Herausgeber: novum publishing
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 449

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Beschreibung

Rick causes a car accident in the middle of Munich and nothing is the same afterwards. At first, no one believes him that his traffic light was green when he drove into the intersection without braking. Similar mysterious incidents that seem to make no sense become more frequent. After all, murders are happening. And it seems to matter what color the victims' eyes are. Luckily, Rick has two brothers. A lead takes them to the cosmology institute for an obscure lecture on interstellar sleep viruses. Things get really exciting when Rick is able to calculate the course of the anomalies. Together with Rick's girlfriend Samantha and criminal assistant Rebecca from the Munich SoKo, the three brothers uncover something monstrous.

Leseprobe

Introduction

Do you believe that there is more between heaven and earth than unimaginative scientists would have us believe?

Yes:       read this book ...       you are not alone

No:       Read this book ...       and ask yourself again

Incidentally, it can happen anywhere. Munich and the Alpine foothills are no exception.

It's just more fun in Bavaria.

The three brothers

Prof. Dr. Chris Fox is a world-renowned nuclear physicist. Like his twin brother Rick, he is single, partly because his research trips into the subatomic world of quanta leave him no time for local romances. He does have his eye on Rebecca, an attractive detective from the Munich SoKo. But she's not into men.

Rick Fox lives in the Lehel district of Munich. Unlike his twin brother, he leads a relaxed lifestyle, loves his neighbor Samantha and gin tonic, and he smokes joints. He is self-employed and programs numerical algorithms.

Rudi Fox is a mountain guide and owns a sports store for alpine sports in Oberaudorf. The lives of his two brothers are alien to him because he doesn't understand quantum mechanics and doesn't want anything to do with the lascivious life in the Munich scene.

furthermore

Samantha Hilbert is Rick's neighbor. They both value their independence, but meet up several times a week when their hormone levels spill over. She loves and hates Rick's laid-back lifestyle. As a journalist, she knows the Munich scene. Her office is a table in Café Magnifique.

The investigative team

Hubert Piotrowski leads the Munich SoKo as Boss inspector. Like his role model Maigret, he has a razor-sharp mind. His only weaknesses are his poor memory for names and his nerves, which get the better of him when the head of the department goes berserk or his colleague Rebecca occasionally has intergalactic ideas.

Rebecca Jones hasn't been on the SoKo team that long. But she has quickly made a name for herself because her unconventional way of thinking is often crucial in unraveling the mysteries of crimes. But her appearance is also striking: snow-white short hair, black make-up and clothes. And she deliberately makes no secret of the fact that she is homosexual.

Jens Thorwald is Piotrowski's deputy. He is a loyal colleague and the good soul in the investigative team. Without him, his boss's conflicts with Rebecca would escalate more often.

furthermore

Dr. Julius Pauli, the head of the department. He doesn't have much helpful to contribute to current cases. But it's good that he's on first-name terms with the Minister President, especially when the lame progress of his SoKo is made fun of by the press.

Foreword

Colors are omnipresent. We humans see them from red to green, blue to violet. Most of us don't give them a second thought because they are simply there. Every day, just not at night. At night, everyone is gray, the cats, ... but also the humans. That's when they scare us. Can the colors play other tricks on us?

Three colors have a particular influence on our perception: blood is red, nature is green and the sky is blue. In the course of our evolution, humans have developed an awareness of these colors that is deeply rooted in our autonomic nervous system: Red for danger, green for life, blue for joy. The first two colors are used in every electrical device without having to explain their meaning, so elementary is this feeling:

Red -             malfunction            danger

Green -      everything OK       no danger

A practical example: traffic lights.

We step on the brakes when the light is red and on the gas pedal when it's green - clear sailing, no danger. Is that always true?

A theoretical example:

If the traffic light emitted red and green at the same time, you would see white light from a certain distance. Interesting, isn't it?

Monday - 16.08.2004

08h30

There is nothing to suggest that this Monday will be a disastrous day. It's a beautiful morning in Munich, already midsummer warm and cloudless. The biggest risk is probably being surprised by a thunderstorm with lightning and thunder.

High above the rooftops, the sun shines golden yellow rays into his loft, which he bought five years ago for the joy of now and not as a provision for tomorrow like others. Nevertheless, a 200-square-meter apartment in the Lehel district is a highly recommended investment. Rick calls it his wigwam. Life there takes place in one room: Sleeping, cooking, eating and drinking, television, office ... everything except showers and toilets. Drunk with sleep, he staggers into the bathroom and takes a long shower. He doesn't normally get up this early.

The Olympic Games in Athens opened three days ago. In the morning there are summary reports from the previous day, today swimming, 400 meters freestyle for the women. Definitely worth watching, he says. Then his thoughts wander over the rooftops of Munich as he sips a freshly brewed cappuccino with relish. Just like every day, really, only not so early.

There is absolutely nothing to indicate a threat that is inexorably approaching.

Rick is in his early thirties, athletic and in good shape. Given his lifestyle, this is actually a miracle. He and his twin brother were born on a St. John's night, Chris on June 21 at 23:50 and Rick on June 22 at 00:15. One indication of the correctness of these dates is their mother Christiane Fox's expression of displeasure that the two boys had ruined St. John's night for her.

The twins have probably been mixed up several times. How often is mathematically irrelevant because there are only two states, like the right and left sides of ships: starboard green and port red. The genes couldn't be mixed up anyway, they were the same. So only the names remain, Chris and Rick or Rick and Chris. Presumably they switched back and forth so often until he was sitting on the green, starboard side and was called Rick.

It never bothered him and never interested him. He would always stand here today and realize that he had to hurry or he would be late for the notary appointment he had with his brothers in the city centre. It's about the estate of their parents, who died in a traffic accident six months ago. The notary has to check in person whether the three brothers are the ones she, as a high-born organ of the administration of justice, has designated and invited as the only survivors and sole heirs. The brothers do not see each other that often because they have different interests and live in different places. For family gatherings, someone has to marry or die. The latter are naturally becoming fewer and fewer and the former are not so many and the few don't want to, despite all the good coaxing.

That's why today is an event of the latter kind and should be approached with care and empathy. Rick is ready for this. To this end, he has resisted all temptations the evening before, which were ready for smoking in the drawer or chilled for drinking in the fridge, in order to present a neat, solid, well-shaved and combed fellow citizen today. To round off the good impression, he has also decided to carry a briefcase, although he doesn't yet know what to put in it. He wants to wear a light grey suit, an old pink T-shirt with a round neckline, a brown belt and Spanish espadrilles in a matching color, but no socks or underpants. It's summer. He doesn't think stockings and underpants are cool and you can't completely throw your principles overboard, even when the family clan is ante portas.

Rick is self-employed and earns his money by programming algorithms. He realized his passion for numerical mathematics late in life when he happened to notice that he had a natural ability to recognize patterns. And not patterns on wallpaper or on clothing fabrics, but in data series. Over time, he has developed a feeling for the mathematical operations he needs to apply to data series in order to elicit their telltale, unique patterns. Today, he has a large reservoir of such algorithms, which he offers as a freelance programmer to well-known companies from various industries.

The tidbits in his C code collection are prediction models for events that, as the name suggests, lie in the future. Based on values from the past, he can virtually see into the futureby adding precise initial and boundary conditions. Similar to the weatherman. However, with the not insignificant difference that his forecasting algorithm does not simply calculate the future extrapolatively, but changes it recursively until the data of the past and the data of the future form their own special pattern, which Rick calls the Eigen-Pattern of the data series. He has established that the predictions have an enormous level of confidence when an Eigen-Pattern is present.

His know-how has given him a comfortable lifestyle, but has also served him well in his private life. For example, Rick has programmed a predictive model to determine the hormonal surges of his lovely neighbor Samantha, whom he calls Sam for short. The conditioning of the parameters is based on basic data such as her blood type, BMI, age, height, and a few non-serious gimmicks such as moon phase, air pressure and the earth's magnetic field. Its algorithm converts this raw data into an event probability. At a value of 75%, his program reports DefCon2.

Rick took the name DefCon from the US Pentagon, the abbreviation for Defense Condition. The US military uses five DefCon levels, counting down from 5 to 1. At DefCon1, the shreds fly. Quite fitting, thought Rick. In his sam_alert.exe program, this corresponds to a value of 90 %. His algorithm reports DefCon1 today, i.e. red alert. The DefCon1 message opens a pop-up window on his smartphone. So be careful. Don't take the noisy elevator. Barefoot on tiptoe, he sneaks four floors into the underground garage. Better safe than sorry and his time is not so limited today that he can afford any major delays. Appointments with the notary are important. He has known since childhood from his mother that there is nothing more important. So he arrives fifteen minutes before the agreed time to go through all the questions with the receptionist, which he has already answered in writing by email.

As a local expert in Munich, Rick was instructed by his brothers to choose a notary for the estate settlement. His choice fell on the notary's office of Dr. Rautgundis von Adelboden on Marienplatz. The notary notarized the purchase contract for his wigwam five years ago. At the time, she went to great lengths to protect the economically unconcerned Rick from the insatiable greed of the real estate sharks. He was very pleased that a respectable, middle-aged lady with a doctorate put her protective hand over him. Out of gratitude, Rick invited her to the wigwam inauguration party. She arrived a little late, was very reserved and looked quite out of place, even in terms of clothing. You could tell that she had come out of pure politeness and not out of a desire to party. The thumping techno sound was not her preferred style of music, nor was the volume. The party had to be heard from afar. Hopefully no annoyed neighbor would call the public order office. Many such thoughts crossed the notary's mind. Hopefully it would all go well and she would get out of this tohuwabohu unscathed.

After an hour of agonizing, meaningless slurred conversations with various good-humoured party guests, she took an interest in a group of five men sitting on the floor a little way off, passing a chillum around. She didn't know what a chillum was, nor did she know the sweet smell. Filling gaps in our knowledge is one of the most striking characteristics of Homo sapiens. And so it was that at an advanced hour, the notary took off some of her unflattering clothes and fervently performed the Comanche rain dance, cheered on by the primeval rhythmic sounds of the seating group.

Around 16:00 in the morning, Rick drove the moody notary home without making a fuss. As he couldn't drive himself, he called his cab driver friend Muja. They put the doctor in the back seat, where she sang along to Phil Collins You can't hurry love, somewhat strange and slightly dissonant.

"Where are we going with the hot oven today?"

"Shh!" Rick commanded with his finger in front of his mouth.

"I found an ID card with an address in her handbag: Grünwald. I also found a key to the front door. Drive off now and don't talk so much and, above all, forget about it afterwards. She's a high-ranking public figure."

"Yeah, it's okay, Rick, don't worry."

When they arrived at their destination, a cozy bungalow, the notary had fallen asleep in the back seat like a coma. Rick and Muja had to pull her out of the cab two by two and carry her to the front door. It was more strenuous than either of them had initially imagined.

"It always looks so easy in the movies. Just put it up, around your shoulder and off you go."

"But this isn't Hollywood, Muja, it's Grünwald ... and now go ahead."

They dragged the notary to the front door, which was about fifty meters from the garden gate of the semi-detached house, quietly so as not to wake the neighbors. And the neighbors were a tough bunch: Dr. Julius Pauli, the head of the Soko München department. When she was finally lying on the living room sofa, Rick took a blanket from the TV chair and a pillow. Somehow, seeing her lying there so innocently and vulnerably made him feel something. He would have liked to have seen more of her apartment, but he had to do without due to lack of light and time. He patted her bottom briefly and then went back to the front door, where Muja had been standing around for a while, tapping her finger impatiently on the sideboard.

"Do you want to lie down or can we go now, Rick?"

"Oh, give it a rest, Muja. She's really all right. You don't meet many people today who are as good a soul as Rauti."

They deposited the front door key on the sideboard next to the door and quietly pulled it shut again. Rick was glad that he could do something good for Rauti. They drove back to the party, which wasn't over yet. Rick and the notary never spoke about the party later, nor about who had taken her home.

Arriving at the garage, Rick can barely open his Triumph TR2 because General Manager Lührs has once again parked his swanky monster SUV from the second floor.

"Asshole," grumbles Rick as he squeezes into the TR2 with a long stretch.

He would love to fill the whole garage with classic cars, but his ingenious algorithms don't pay well enough for that. So he only has the Triumph TR2, built in 1954, in coral red. But he loves it like his best friend.

It quickly makes off with a loud roar. He is safe ... or so he thinks.

It's not far to the notary's office, only about five kilometers. He could easily take the No 19 streetcar, which stops right in front of his house and after six stops is within walking distance of the notary's office. But his outfit today is better suited to a coral-red TR2 than a dove-blue streetcar.

He won't be allowed to drive for long. What a pity. Nothing is nicer for him than driving through Munich's city center on a summer morning with the top down and feeling the envious glances of male passers-by. He heads into the city. After the Ludwigsbrücke bridge, just behind the Technical Museum, there is a junction with traffic lights. The view to the left and right fills his heart. The blue Isar ripples calmly through the middle of the city. To the south you can see the Alps shrouded in mist, to the north the Museum Island boasts lavish architecture. It is simply beautiful.

There are few cars on the road today and as his traffic light is green, he can enter the junction quickly. Rick is a good and experienced driver. He hasn't had a single accident since his driving test.

09h54

As soon as he enters the junction, he suddenly feels sick and is blinded by the bright white light. He then crashes into the passenger side of a police car coming into the junction from the left without braking. The police patrol is caught unawares. All the airbags in the patrol car deploy, including the side airbags. This is probably the reason why both police officers remain largely uninjured. Otherwise it would probably have ended badly.

His TR2 has no airbags that could have deployed. But the energy of the frontal impact was sufficiently absorbed by the impressive front bodywork so that Rick also remains unharmed, at least physically. The police officers and Rick sit dazed in their totally destroyed vehicles for a few minutes.

Rick angrily braces himself against the driver's door until it finally opens with a creaking sound, only to find himself standing in front of the wreckage of his passion. It's the kind of picture you only see in cheap action movies: the sophisticated TR2 hood has bent up spectacularly into a U-shape, the front end is practically gone, the radiator grille, headlights and glass splinters are scattered on the ground, the coolant is leaking out. A considerable pool has formed, showing bluish-green streaks in the morning sun. Obviously an oil line or the hydraulics of the disc brakes have been hit. The right front hubcap has made off and parked twenty meters further on, on the other side of the road, with a clattering pirouette in front of the restaurant Wienerwald. Two boys take the little tin dancer and make off.

The shock is huge. If he hadn't already been sick to his stomach before the accident, he would be now at the latest. After all, his beloved TR2 is ruined for all time. No expert opinion is required. The pure sight of horror is enough. Shaking his head, Rick sits down on the kerb and looks in all directions in disbelief. The week is already off to a good start, he says to himself, like the robber Kneißl when he was hanged on a Monday.

In the meantime, numerous spectators have gathered on the Ludwigsbrücke to enjoy the spectacle. The fact that a courageous fellow citizen has shot down the cops and disabled a patrol car fills many with satisfaction for the many injustices they have suffered and against which they were unable to defend themselves. The numerous tickets for illegal parking alone would be reason enough to feel schadenfreude, although not to show it too clearly. Rick could have given an autograph session on the Ludwigsbrücke right away: Rick, the little man's avenger. Many people buy a cone of ice cream from the ice cream store opposite. The Greek mafia is probably about to roll up with a chicken grill.

The two police officers also struggle to get out of the car. The completely crushed passenger door is stuck and cannot be opened. So they have to get out on the driver's side, which is not always easy even under normal circumstances. The whole thing is made more difficult because the fat man is sitting on the passenger side. When the slender driver gets out, he immediately throws up, while the fat man visibly struggles to get past the steering wheel. He doesn't succeed for a long time, despite pulling in his stomach and swearing loudly. Then he throws up in the middle of the cockpit and along the button panel. In his imperturbability, he tears his uniform.

Some spectators try to encourage him with rhythmic clapping, others can barely hide a grin. Everyone finds it entertaining. Mothers point their fingers at the scene of the accident and explain to their children the consequences of reckless driving and that it is always men who cause such spectacular accidents. Obviously other people don't have appointments and can afford the luxury of spontaneously enjoying such free events, Rick thinks to himself. It bothers him that this open-air performance in the style of Cobra 11 is at the expense of his beloved TR2, which lies sadly on the road and dribbles pitifully along.

Rick shivers coldly at the irreversibility of the situation. He has the oppressive feeling that the world will never be the same again. He also feels sick to his stomach. Not much is missing and he could say hello to the good morning espresso again.

He is still sitting on the kerb like a heap of misery. The sheriffs have set their sights on him and stand in front of him in a threatening pose, fully equipped: pistol, baton, handcuffs, but dressed somewhat sloppily: both have their shirts hanging out of their trousers, one has the collar button ripped out and you can see traces of vomit along the button placket, the other's whole jacket and shirt are torn and also unappetizingly stained with digestive residue. Both officers exude a sour smell.

Rick is much better dressed and smells pleasantly of the cedar wood of his aftershave. But he is unarmed and looks pitiful in his pallor. His mother would give him a glass of Rotbäckchen and rusks right now, maybe even some drops from the feared Cod-Liver Oil.

The fat one with the torn uniform is probably the marshal and the younger one is his deputy, Rick assumes. The fat man pumps excitedly like a cockchafer, so that his hairy beer belly becomes visible in sync with the pumping frequency. Rick almost snorts. But the situation is too sad and he still feels sick.

"Are you twins too?" Rick asks the sheriffs.

"What makes you think that?" the fat man replies harshly.

"Well, because mummy dressed you straight away."

"Have you had anything to drink?" The tone becomes sharper.

"Yeah, right," says Rick snippily. "It's already 10 o'clock. For me it's five pints of beer and ten fruit schnapps ... And what about you two?"

"Get the Alkomat, Max." The fat man has obviously finished pumping up.

"OK, got it!" Deputy Max turns around as ordered and walks to the patrol car.

"But take three tubes with you, Max!" Rick shouts after him angrily. Rick is pleased with his self-confidence in this situation. He stands up and is now eye to eye with the marshal. "Your colleague Max can't take much ... the way he looks?"

The marshal does not allow himself to be provoked. Calm and composed, he searches his torn uniform for a notepad and pen. "Where have you just come from?"

"I come straight from the bed of my wigwam, if you want to know for sure. And unfortunately there's no witness to that today."

Rick realizes that the burgeoning anger is fighting off his nausea. The marshal remains unimpressed and says that he has to be prepared for a hefty fine, several points in Flensburg and a lengthy driving ban.

"It all depends," he says in a lecturing tone, "on how long it had been red when he drove into the junction."

Rick is massively unsettled. Who does he mean by "he"? Max or him in the end? An inner voice tells him that he could mean him, as unbelievable as it sounds.

The marshal orders him to get his documents, turns around and, together with Deputy Max, starts surveying the accident site, especially the distances between the traffic lights and the collision point. Then they fetch a camera and take pictures from all angles, almost with relish, as Rick feels. Then the fat man takes his company radio and babbles into the shell without a dot or a comma.

Rick can't say anything back at first and stares after the sheriffs with his mouth open. He is perplexed by their audacity. First driving into the intersection on red, without blue lights and without a siren, and then brazenly claiming that he drove into the intersection on red.

He looks around for help. There must be some of the many spectators who can confirm that he drove through the traffic lights on green or, better still, that the sheriffs drove into the junction on red. He approaches the sympathetic crowd with a good feeling. Because firstly, he is in the right and secondly, in the increasingly rare events where a courageous David fights Goliath, there should be allies who remember, however dimly, how it happened.

Most of them only heard the crash, the others only joined in after it had already happened, some of the others didn't want to get on bad terms with the sheriffs, the others didn't understand his question, presumably not yet fully integrated Nubians or Comanches. All he gets is a sympathetic pat on the back and a handshake as a gesture of respect. Thank you very much.

***

10h30

Chris and Rudi are in the notary's waiting room and look at their watches again.

"The appointment is now, isn't it?" Chris asks his brother.

"Did you get a call or a SMS?"

They both search through the call and SMS message lists on their mobiles. "Nope, nothing."

Then the imposing room-high double doors with dark brown leather fittings open and Dr. Rautgundis von Adelboden, the notary, appears. "Good morning gentlemen, are we ready?"

The notary is a resolute woman in her mid-forties and cannot be overlooked at 1.82 meters. Her sophisticated appearance is rounded off by her tangled gray hair and her dark, smoky voice. She's the kind of woman a man turns his back on, but doesn't know why.

"Unfortunately not, dear Madam Notary," Rudi stutters, "our brother Rick isn't here yet ... and we don't know where he is ... what he's doing and ... when he's coming ... and if he's coming at all."

"Oh, Rick isn't here yet ... well ..." the notary whispers smugly, to the obvious astonishment of Chris and Rudi.

"Well ... let's just wait a little longer, gentlemen," says the notary, turning around and disappearing back to where she came from, her hips swaying.

Silence ...

"Wow ... what was that?" Chris asks into the waiting room.

The anointed professor is about to lose the temper.

"What does that cawing gray owl believe who we are? One doesn't come at all and the other comes and goes. You don't hear anything from one of them and the other just says, 'Well, yeah. Where the hell are we? Then we also say well yeah and we go to the morning pint."

Rudi nods in agreement. He wouldn't have dared to veto due to his congenital weakness in formulation in crisis situations, and when he hears the word "Frühschoppen", his Noch-a-Mass program automatically kicks in. In the course of his personal evolution, this program has become resident in the spinal cord near the seat flesh and no longer needs a brain to be executed.

So you both go to the door and tell the secretary that you will contact her about a new appointment.

They only have to walk a few hundred meters and then they are where Chris thinks "we should have gone straight there", the Müllerbräu.

Rudi continues to nod approvingly while his program instinctively orders two „Mass“ of beer and two times three „Weißwürste“.

The Müllerbräu is a Bavarian cult pub, as the dictionary says. A large room four meters high, morbid wood panelling and robust waitresses. They are the good souls of the Bräustube. For many foreign guests, the historical part of the menu is more a funny joke, but not a meal. Ox muzzle salad, boiled calves' feet, boiled calf's head, baked cow udders or lukewarm calf's down are just a few examples from the imaginative Krösen cuisine. The latter were also a favorite dish of the Roman city governor Caius Aerobus, as you can read in Asterix. Courageous, mostly alcoholic youngsters, who were persuaded by their jeering clique to try the baked cow's udder, lost their nerve at the sight of the waitress's menacing-looking udder and spontaneously ordered Leberkäs with potato salad.

***

Rick's frantic search for witnesses who would testify in the name of the holy Apostle Paul, by the beard of the Prophet, or at least in God's name, that he orderly drove into the intersection on green, remains fruitless. He has no witnesses. The policemen do; there are two of them.

There's even an over-zealous authority slimeball who confirms the police patrol's green phase, probably in the hope that he can exchange this slime for a few points in the Flensburg penalty register or at least that he and his wife will be invited to the next police charity event at the Bayerischer Hof.

Looks bad for Rick's truth. The truth of the others has better cards. For him, there is nothing worse than being in the right and not getting it in the end. Injustice is the breeding ground for rebellion and the hour of the Robin Hoods and Zorros. Rick clearly feels this burning urge to rebel, but unlike his famous predecessors, he will have to swallow this urge for better or worse. He simply doesn't have the time to mobilize the masses for the storming of police headquarters.

Speaking of time ... he has an appointment at 10:30 with his favorite notary. He thinks Rauti has a thing for him. At least she winked at him a few times when he bought his wigwam. He pretended not to notice. She interpreted it as cute shyness.

Rick looks at his wristwatch in shock: 11:17. The emergency appointment was at 10:30. The disasters are never-ending today. His cell phone is still in the TR2. He finds it blinking red excitedly on the floor between the brake pedal and the clutch. He opens the glove compartment and takes out his papers. The cell phone shows three missed calls from brother Chris and a call from Rauti.

How did the notary get his cell phone number? He has to put this question on hold. Call Chris first. Rick is already getting ready for a telling off.

***

"Well, who's to say. Barely an hour has passed and he's already calling, Mr. Brother."

Chris toasts Rudi. Both have now drunk their first beer and eaten their Weißwürste.

Rudi's Noch-a-Mass program has already ordered the next round of beer. The charged atmosphere has relaxed. Chris has managed to bring his adrenaline level back down to normal.

"WHAT happened to you?!"

He puts his hand over his mouth to stop himself from bursting out uninhibitedly. Rudi looks at him questioningly and excitedly tells him to switch on speakerphone.

"We're sitting in the Müllerbräu. Come by and we'll discuss the rest."

Chris ends the conversation and takes a big sip.

"Just think, Rudi, Rick has just had an accident with a police car at the front of the Deutsches Museum."

Rudi raises his eyebrows.

"How can you be so stupid as to ram a police car in broad daylight. He was probably stoned again or the alcohol left over from the day before got the better of him. But he's coming round anyway. Then he can tell the whole story. Cheers then, Rudi."

***

Rick shows the sheriffs his papers and the address of his wigwam.

"All right, Mr. Fox ... that's your name, Rick Oberon Fox, isn't it?"

"Yeah, that's right, it's clearly written right here," Rick grumbles back. "Sheriff, I've got a really urgent appointment and I have to go now."

"Take it easy, Mr. Fox. We've recorded everything and are just going to interview the witnesses. The tow truck has already been called. We'll come and see you tomorrow morning. You'll have calmed down by then. You can then read and sign the accident report at your leisure. Then we can also tell you where the red wreck was parked. All you have to do is take a breathalyzer test and then we're done."

The marshal hands him the Alkomat and inserts a new mouthpiece.

"Well, give me that, but you'll be disappointed, Sheriff."

"So Mr. Fox, you have to blow as long as you hear a sound."

"Yes, then. Here we go." Rick holds the device to his mouth and waits with a loyal look in the direction of the marshal.

The latter looks at him no less stupidly. "What's going on? Now give me a blow job!"

"Yes, but I can't hear a sound yet, Boss Superintendent. I'm supposed to blow when I hear a sound. That's what you said."

"The sound is already coming. You should blow until you hear the sound and not blow when you hear the sound."

"Sheriff, can you repeat that again, especially where the sound is coming from."

"It's hard to believe you passed your driver's license test with your comprehension skills."

"We had to drive more and blow less back then, Mr. Marshall. It's best if you do a demo, then we can also put your alcohol level on file. Maybe that could become important at some point, don't you think?"

"Now ... that's enough, Mr. Fox. You blow into the pipe right now or I'll take you to the hospital for a blood sample. It's entirely up to you."

"Well then, on your responsibility. I'm going to blow into this without hearing the tone you were so insistent on before ... You change your mind in no time at all. It's just as well that I can adapt quickly to changing situations. That's one of my strengths, Sheriff."

Rick actually wants everything to end quickly. He has nothing to fear. He can't remember when he was drier than he is now. You could have filmed Lawrence of Arabia in his mouth. He blows on it and stops immediately when he hears a sound.

"Haaa! Sheriff, there it is, the sound. Then we're ready to go, aren't we?"

"Yes, you genius. Just keep blowing it, Mr. Fox."

The policeman takes the tube out of the breathalyzer and looks at the discoloration.

"All right. Alcohol level 0.015 ‰. That's all right. I'll make a note in the report: The driver was not intoxicated. Is that all right with you?"

Rick is fine with everything now. He just wants to get away from here, leave this place of horror and find solace with his brothers and his good old parallel university, the Müllerbräu. Rick leaves the scene of the accident. Some spectators clap, as if at the end of a performance. Rick refrains from taking a bow.

Chris is a physicist and a polyglot professional nomad. Rick once asked him where his home is. He said where the bills arrive. Ten years ago, Chris had a serious relationship with Anuschka Schérghowa, the daughter of a Russian construction oligarch who emigrated to Bavaria. He met her in a research laboratory in Moscow. They took a correspondingly brash approach. The relationship had a half-life of three months ... well. Chris has absolutely no understanding of paraphysics, ufology, aliens or Area51 and the like. He doesn't even watch such cheap science fiction crap in feature films. He works with real, measurable matter and its energy. He makes an exception for the dark side of matter. But until recently he ignored this too.

Rudi is local and down-to-earth. He speaks fluent Bavarian. He has owned a small store for professional mountain sports equipment in Oberaudorf, a dreamy village at the foot of the Alps, for over 20 years. His customers include well-known free-climbing protagonists, who can occasionally be seen on various TV talk shows. But the local mountain rescue service also likes to buy its equipment from "Rudi's Mountain World": rucksacks, protective jackets, ropes in various impact strengths, Beal carabiners and an extensive range of pitons, firn anchors, ice screws, quickdraws, flares and even pocket books with mountain tours for beginners and advanced climbers. Rudi himself is an enthusiastic mountain expert and can explain and recommend his products from his own experience. The fact that he has never had a fatal fall, he says, speaks for the quality of his products.

As Rick stands at the entrance to the parallel university, he immediately sees his brothers sitting in the far right corner. They seem to be having a good time. Halfway there, they see Rick approaching and make a hand gesture to show him the way. Yes, thank you very much, Rick thinks to himself for this valuable signpost. He would have just walked past and crashed into the wall.

"Hello Chris, hello Rudi, nice to see you again." Rick tries not to let the ominous events immediately become the focus of the conversation.

"Yes, you do nice things." Brother Chris nips his plan in the bud.

"Well, Chris ... I still don't know what went wrong."

Rudi's program orders another beer. After a few hearty sips of beer, Rick takes heart and tells the story of his TR2's demise. The brothers' grief is limited. The strange circumstances seem to arouse more interest. At least for Chris.

"It's very unlikely that the police, of all people, would commit such a traffic offense. Running a red light."

"But if they are notified of an emergency at that very moment and race off before they switch on the flashing blue lights and the shrill tatütata horn," counters Rick.

"Well, yes..." says Chris, "but still very unlikely. Let's assume that both cars set off on green, then either the traffic lights are faulty or it would be, as we say, an anomaly."

Of course, that's not an issue for a real physicist. Rick washes down his brother's short, unenlightening lecture with a big gulp.

"There's nothing more you can do anyway," intervenes Rudi, "have a drink and call it a day. The important thing is that nothing has happened to you. Everything else is just tin and just plain stupid, but not as important as your health."

My God, how right brother Rudi is. Rick can make friends with that.

"What are we going to do with your Rautgundis now?" Chris wants to know.

"We'll call them and reschedule, what else?" Rick answers as if shot from a pistol, quickly and deliberately emotionless. He has clearly noticed the smug undertone in the question. That's why he wants to quickly move on to other topics. "How much longer will you be in Munich? Where do you actually live at the moment? What are you currently doing?"

Chris has been waiting for these questions. He would have answered them even if no one had asked. But it's easier this way.

And so comes the inevitable lecture, but one that is easy to endure in a parallel university., like the Müllerbräu. He has been living in Switzerland for three months because he was asked to work on a sensational experiment at the research reactor there, namely determining the mass of neutrinos.

Perhaps it would have been instructive, or at least informative, or in any case interesting, if they had listened attentively, Rudi and Rick. But both were mentally distracted, Rudi by the Noch-a-Maß programand Rick by the scary movie Death in a Ditch. What a pity. If they had, they would now know that neutrinos have a mass and that they are classified as dark matter. But although there are supposed to be a lot of them, they hardly weigh anything and so it's just not enough. He explained it like this: "They weigh almost nothing, but there are an incredible number of them ... and incredible-many times almost-nothing equals insanely-many."

Rudi raises his eyebrows. He's already heard a line like that from the tax authority when he mentioned he had almost nothing anyway.

"And what are you going to do now that it's not enough?" Rick teases.

Rudi raises his eyebrows. He fears that part two is coming. He orders three fruit brandies as a precaution. Rick nods in agreement. Perhaps the fruit brandies will help to combat the queasy feeling in his stomach. Unfortunately, he's also got a headache in the meantime.

"I've rented a small chalet in Switzerland, probably for the next two years," Chris continues. "It will probably take that long for our experiments to produce usable results."

"That Insanely-Much is Sufficiently-Much after all?"

"Yeah, something like that, Rick," Chris is conciliatory and tips the fruit brandies away.

"We simply have to generate enormous amounts of energy and carry out highly complex experiments. We have already carried out initial tests, but we are still in the dark at the moment."

In the meantime, Rick calls the notary's office.

"Yes, this is Rick Fox, we need a replacement appointment soon, maybe tomorrow? Yes ... I'll wait ... one moment, I'll ask around." Rick puts his mobile phone aside.

"We could get an alternative appointment tomorrow, at 2 o’clock."

Chris and Rudi nod.

"OK, all right. See you tomorrow then," says Rick into his smartphone, "and best wishes to Mrs. von Adelboden."

"I thought her name was Rautgundis," Chris teases.

***

Rick has returned to his wigwam. He lies on the TV sofa and stares lost in thought at the 100-inch TV screen: Olympics, heavyweight lifting. A bloated Russian bullfrogs pulls on a barbell that looks like the axle of a freight wagon. Everything seems on the verge of bursting. Heavy fare for an aesthete like Rick.

His headache has become even more unpleasant, despite several aspirin tablets.

The doorbell rings like the bell of Jericho. Unbearable pain. The sheriffs weren't supposed to come until tomorrow, were they? Rick staggers to the front door and opens it.

Oh God! Sam!

She was no longer on his radar. She pushes her way into the wigwam as if it were her apartment.

"Hey Rick, you look like shit."

Typical Sam ... Never minces her words. Samantha Hilbert works as a sports journalist for the Süddeutsche Tageblatt. So she knows God and the world and is well connected with celebrities and the scene. There is never a VIP party to which she does not receive an invitation. Outwardly, she doesn't immediately stand out. She is a dark, slim type with long hair, always wearing a sports cap, sparingly made up and usually dressed in oriental wrap dresses. Her sporty figure remains hidden and is reserved for insiders only. Rick is one of them. They usually see each other twice a week, mostly on Wednesdays, when Rick cooks, and at the weekend. They both like to spend the rest of the week independently of each other.

Since she moved into the house a year ago, she has relatively quickly classified Rick as a fellow-with-benefits. The door-to-door neighborhood has many advantages in this respect. It doesn't depend on the weather, can be used spontaneously and is quick to take away like Coffee2Go. Rick is also a nice guy, good-looking and uncomplicated. She has been very happy with him so far. It bothers her that Rick smokes pot, but she sometimes smokes a bag with him.

"What's wrong, Rick? Did it not go so well today?"

Sam asks this cliché question as she opens the American Fridge and prepares two drinks: Suntoki Gin.

"You're really droll ... didn't go so well, he says. That was by far the worst day of my life."

Sam sits down next to him, pats him on the thigh, pulls the straw hollow-cheeked and stares at him trustingly. "Go on."

"I wrecked the TR2." Actually, he didn't want to tell this sad story again.

"I swear by all that is sacred to me that I drove on green."

"I didn't know you held anything sacred, but we have to find out what happened." Sam pulls at the straw again. "I'll call Rebecca tomorrow."

Now the journalist comes through. She knows, who would have guessed otherwise, Boss Inspector Hubert Piotrowski from Soko München, and his assistant Rebecca Jones is even a long-time friend.

"Sam, what I can't get out of my head are the circumstances. I wasn't in a hurry at all, well rested and fit. You can't confuse red and green so easily, even if you're colorblind. The green light is at the bottom and the red light is at the top. Good, I felt sick just before. You know when your stomach heaves, like when there's turbulence on a plane? And now I've got a terrible headache too."

"Sure, Rick, you've got whiplash from the impact. You urgently need a neck massage," Sam diagnoses.

"That's great. And where do you get a neck massage at this time of night?"

Rick's teasing question wasn't really meant seriously. Coincidentally, today is also DefCon1. It would be like the devil if there wasn't a neck massage.

Yoga, massage and chakras, i.e. the energy centers, are part of Sam's basic knowledge. These were the first unsolicited lectures Sam had to endure every evening. Now the meridian lines, her specialty, come into play.

As it's the back meridians' turn first, Rick has to undress first. He already knows this, but not so early in the evening.

"Find the meridian lines, then follow the path of energy. Power is only released where energy flows," she explains to him, lecturing.

Rick doesn't dare ask what these powers are. What's more, the treatment already seems to be working. The powers of the stimulated meridians at least dispel the horrors of the day.

"So Rick, turn around!"

She throws herself on top of him and looks into his eyes in a mesmerizing way.

"Really, Rick, your different colored eyes look really cool ... in the daytime."

Rick still remembers his childhood doctor, Dr. Mahlzahn. He raised his roughly brushed eyebrows when he realized that his genetic clone Chris had two blue eyes and Rick did not. Increasing the tension, he drew on his White Owl cigar for several seconds, thoughtfully blew a fat puff of smoke into the office and then he croaked something about nature'snormal anomalies, but that it was completely harmless. His mother breathed a sigh of relief. For her, that was a good enough explanation, although she had never heard of anomalies or anything like that before.

Rick was never bothered by this anomaly in his eye colors. On the contrary, he was even able to put it to good use. Countless girls in discos and nightclubs paid a lot of attention to him, partly because the green eye reflected the disco UV light strongly. He was therefore something special.

He memorized phantasized evolutionary stories about his mutationsso well that he could still recite them flawlessly after ten gin tonics. His male competitors had to pay for a lot of bubbly and spend hours slurping dripping lard into the female ear in order to win the favor of the ear owner. Rick, on the other hand, only had to look trustingly with his two-tone eyes and whisper the key word anomaly at the end. There was no stopping him when he then mentioned that this wasn't the only anomaly he had to deal with. The girls rolled their eyes and looked at each other expectantly. The rest was just a mown meadow, so to speak.

When Rick wakes up the next morning, Sam is gone.

Tuesday - 17.08.2004

09h15

With his eyes still closed, he tosses and turns in bed and feels his left side. Sam is gone, but his headache is not.

He doesn't want to get up at all. It is day 1 after TR2. A new era begins. Rick goes to the TV. Summary of Athens from the previous day: swimming. No one drowned. Like every day, a steaming espresso to wake up.

At the start of the new era, he has a small joint for breakfast today, as an exception. His loft is filled with the sweet smell of smoke. A small glass of single malt whisky goes well with it.

It's actually not that bad, Rick thinks to himself after a quarter of an hour. Rudi is absolutely right, just a battle of materials. And his TR2 didn't do too badly. In any case, he has rendered the police car from 2002 harmless. The fact that he gave his life for it was a truly chivalrous act of self-sacrifice for the community. He will be remembered forever.

He takes out his smartphone and swipes the pictures from last year's trip to Italy from right to left: Lake Garda, Florence, Pisa, the Amalfi Coast ... fabulously beautiful images ... the rich red of the polished paintwork against the glittering blue of the sea and the lush growth of cypresses and plane trees in iridescent shades of green ... He pulls melancholically on the stem. Today, he finds the intensity of the colors particularly powerful. Sometimes his TR2 is even blue and the sea glistens red. Wonderful memories. He sentimentally blows smoke rings into the air, which slowly rise up to disappear into nothingness.

Now a few tears run down his cheeks and his eyes redden. His initial serenity turns into a whimpering wail. The melancholy is periodically mixed with anger and a desire for revenge. After all, he was innocent. How could he have prevented the end of his TR2? Stop at the green light and first make sure that the Carabinieri weren't coming from the left on red? Run the lights at full throttle on red? He has already experienced this with cab drivers in Italy.

Solo una raccomandazione, said the driver reassuringly when he noticed Rick's horrified look through the rear-view mirror. But not the German sheriffs. They don't do that, do they?

What is he supposed to do with the TR2? Watch it being heartlessly crushed in the car graveyard? He wouldn't be able to bear that. His brother Chris could probably use quantum mechanics to transform it into a red cube the size of a cubic centimeter. He would then put it in a small jewelry box and keep it at home. Without having any idea, however, he believes that the cost of this would exceed his budget. He takes the vehicle registration document out of the dresser and studies the technical data. According to this, the small jewelry box would weigh a whopping 839 kilograms. His high-quality Kröncke wardrobe wouldn't be able to withstand that, probably not even the floor of his wigwam. My little one would break through all the way down to Director General Lührs, he muses with a grin.

"He's put on quite a bit of weight ... that's from years of good care and from the fact that I've treated him to everything that's available, premium gasoline instead of tasteless biofuel."

Rick doesn't realize that he is babbling more and more nonsense and starting to drool like an English bull terrier, and that unappetizing snot is running out of his nose.

It's good that the doorbell brings him out of this deeply depressed phase. Without thinking about what he is doing, he opens the front door.

"Hello Rick ... Wow! ... You've prepared perfectly for the visit from the police," Samantha bursts out.

"Your place looks like a recycling center, it smells like an oriental cannabis bazaar and you look like a whimpering addict in the final stages of addiction. So, there's a credible guy standing there who wouldn't under any circumstances run a red light ... yes, are you completely balla-balla, Rick!"

Sam is horrified and after two seconds Rick is too.

"The sheriffs!" He looks around. "Shit, I totally forgot about them."

Rick looks at the wall clock. It's just before 10:00. So they could turn up any minute.

"Sam, I've got to get going." Rick pushes Sam towards the front door.

"Yeah, that's all right. I just wanted to bring you a neck pillow for your whiplash," Sam replies brusquely.

"Here, put it on. You'll see it helps. Probably also when the police visit. The sick and injured are treated with a little more compassion. You can certainly use that. Bye, see you in a few days ... and ..." she turns around as she leaves, "... drink some lemon juice. Citric acid destroys THC. It's a shame about the nice trip, but it's certainly beneficial if you're not totally high during the interrogation."

"Yes, OK, I will ... see you later."

Rick doesn't know where to start. At first he runs aimlessly back and forth in the loft. How can he save the situation? Rick blows his nose, loud as an elephant, wipes the drool from his mouth and surveys the situation with red eyes.

The smoke has to come out! He tears open the doors and windows, waves the clouds of smoke outside with his sauna towel for several minutes and sprays a lot of Pitralon into the air, an historic Christmas present from his mother.

"Yuck, yuck, that stuff smells really bad. They're going to fall over unconscious. Possibly another criminal offense."

Rick grabs the towel again. OK, that should be enough. Now clear the table, straight into the garbage can, without pre-sorting, wipe up, push onto the floor and under the carpet. Oh God, the floor