"Rick, do not even think of coming down the stairs with those ******* cans!", I shouted upstairs, where my little brother was rattling with some plastic cans that stay in place with a rope. He had been playing with them for a long while by now, but even I wouldn't have dared to walk down the stairs with a couple of five-inch-long cans that are attached only with a rope you keep in hand... Now I watched half terrified as Rick was reeling at the top of the stairs considering if he should obey to his stupid sister, or not. Then my dad came running from somwhere after he had heard me shout.

"But but, of course our little Rick should know what it feels like to climb down the stairs with the cans under his soles!", he said and began ascending the stairs himself. "Daddy will walk backwards in front of you, and catch you if something funny happens", he continued as he reached the top, and with enthusiasm Rick began to step down the stairs dangerously swaying.

"Daddy, stop playing around! We should go in a moment", shouted I, and felt I was a lot older than my dad was. Anyhow he just shouted back that it won't take long and that we'd be leaving in just a little moment. "Besides, we wouldn't be able to leave before granny comes", he added. I swung my eyes and shook my head, and supposed that the promise of his wouldn't be fulfilled. And in the very next moment I saw daddy staggering and trying to catch the walls desperately before he unavoidably fell down the stairs. Luckily enough he had his head protected, but I could tell right away he wouldn't be fine after the fall.

"Am... I guess I hurt my back", he said lying before my feet and looking upwards helplessly and apologeticly. "Oh Devil's arse", whispered I, feeling numb, and dialed the emergency number with our table phone.

"So we can't go there..?", I stated half asking from my dad, who now lay on the flat floor trying hard not to move. He didn't want to be removed on the couch under any circumstaces, and to be honest, I would have never even started trying anything like that.

"Well, if you can't get any other ride...", said dad knowing even himself that no one was going thither without a very particular reason. "But I certainly cannot come with you", he mentioned needlessly, and I thought that it was actually good, if you left the ride part away. A weekend with my dad and my friends at our cabin would've been awful. But on the other hand, a weekend not at all at the cabin would've been more awful...

I took my cell phone and called Micha to tell her the whole unbelieveable twist. At first she sounded as if she was really shocked, though probalbly only beacause the weekend was cancelled, but then she clearly had some idea and promised to call me back after a few moments. I waited silently trying to avoid looking at dad who still lay on the floor stiff as plank.

Finally a car drove to the yard and a little after that the door was knocked. I yelled it was open and went to the hall to see who was it. A paramedic dressed in an uniform asked if she'd come to the right address, and I answered sullenly that yes, pretty damn right address it was. The woman didn't seem to have understood my joke, so I continued by telling that the patient was in the living-room.

While daddy was being carried out of the house on a litter, Micha called, markedly excited, and told that some Zurk would give us a ride and stay with us over the two nights. Quietly I cursed in my mind, but I decided to go anyway, though the 'only for girls' -weekend was now long gone.

I told daddy that Micha's father had promised to take us to the cabin and fetch us back, too, but daddy didn't seem convincend, because the journey to our cabin was too long and rocky to be driven back and forth. Anyhow I had him assured only a moment before the doors of the ambulance were shut, and I stood there in the middle of the yard until I saw it turn to the main road about three hundred feet away.

I went inside and began waiting for granny with Rick, but we didn't have to wait for too long. Granny curved to the yard and I explained the situation to her, and though she seemed a bit shocked about it all, she took Rick with her anyway, bade us a nice weekend at the cabin and drove away.

Right after granny had disappeared behind the woods, a silver Mercedes drove to the yard with fuzzy dices and a pile of Wunderbaums hanging from the mirror. I sighed, irritated, grabbed my bag and locked the door behind me. I had heard a mighty bassbeat even when I was inside, and now I located the source of it, which was the trunk of the Mercedes. I cursed again and opened the back door piling inside next to Sara and Glitt. Micha was sitting in front next to that Zörk of hers, and over the bassbeat she hollered "Bye, Spaks!" before continuing her silly rocking asynchronously to the music.

Zürk started driving, and as we reached the road I noticed that he had taken his leaden accelerator with him in the morning. Internally laughing I assumed the speed to decline after getting to the final road to our cabin. After about six miles the particular turning came, and already during the first mile Zurkel started complaining about the lousy condition of the road. I was really happy to tell him that it would be like that for about another twelwe miles. More than once I heard him swearing that if we weren't there after the next turning, he'd turn back. Finally we reached the yard of the cabin after all, and feeling relieved we jumped out of the car to stretch our sore limbs.

I opened the door with a rusty key taken from the top of the architrave and together we stepped inside. The interior air was a bit stale, so I left the door open and let the late autumn's breeze to fresh the air. There was no electricity in our tiny cabin, and the water was running only in a nearby river. We lighted some candles, though it wasn't even dark yet, and Micha and Zerk made themselves comfortable in a double-bed they had found from the corner of the so-called living-room, reporting that they will also be sleeping in it. Sleeping, right, thought I, but aloud I only remarked that I will be going on to heat the log sauna outside. Sara wanted to come with me, but Glitt seemed so focused with her making up and leering at Zörkel that I didn't even bother to ask her to come along.

We carried a couple of armfuls of firewood in to the sauna, near the heater, and another armfuls near the huge water tub outside. After that we started carrying water from the river to the tub, and when it was nearly filled I began setting a fire to the furnace under it. Luckily I managed to do it quickly, for my hands were pretty numb because of the chilling autumn night's air.

Then we went together to heat the sauna, and meanwhile the dusk had begun creeping over the swamp. As we went back in we noticed that Micha and Zork were still babbling in the bed, and it seemed as if they could've started screwing right there before our eyes. Glitt sat on the corner of an armchair looking at them scathingly, and of course none of them had come up with an idea to put a fire to the fireplace. It was almost as cold inside as it was outside, and all the three of them had their coats still on. I turned around with Sara before we got in and once more we went and filled out laps with firewood.

In the evening after the sauna we sat in front of the fireplace playing cards and telling all kinds of stories. Micha's stories were predictable and all of them concerned her previous ways of celebrating a weekend. Zörkel and Glitt didn't want to tell anything, but Sara came up with a couple of penny dreadfuls that were partly true, according to herself, at least.

In one of them she asked us to go back in time over sixty years, to the time of the Winter War. Then she told us how in that same particular place tens of Russian soldiers were slaughtered, and how some of the bodies were still missing. The story made Micha freak out and she started rubbing against Zarkels side moaning that she feared that the ghosts of the dead soldiers would come and kill us by the night. We kept our laughter inside and urged her to spread some garlic and salt around the bed before going to sleep.

To our surprise she believed us and started searching for the victuals in question, quitting not until after she had scavenged through every box and locker she found, though we tried to assure that there was no garlic in the whole cabin and that there was only a tinful of salt for food. She threatened to use all of that, but finally Zorkel had her appeasead by telling her that he'd protect his girl from those spooks. This made Glitt look a bit more gloomy and she told she'd go to bed.

We dug into our sleeping bags only a little after her. Glitt was sleeping on a couch and me and Sara had matresses on the floor to sleep on. Apparently Zurk and Micha weren't actually sleeping but *******, but I decided to ignore it, at least the first time. After they started it again, I grabbed a hard cushion and threw it towards Micha's upper body that loomed in the darkness. Weirdly enough, it made them quiet down.

In the morning Glitt had woken up first to put on some make up before no one sees her 'horrible face' without it. The rest of us woke a little before it was midday, and I got up to make some coffee with a gas range oven, mostly for myself because no one else wanted to have coffee. For them I boiled some water in a kettle for some tea.

The forenoon went on somehow, while Zürkel and Micha were sprawling in the bed and me and Sara were heating the fireplace again. Glitt looked as if she wanted to get out of the whole place, and she probably had no idea how soon it would happen.

"Oh ****! There was someone in the barn!", cried Micha as she came in from the outdoor toilet, and at first she aroused a great laughter among us rest. Finally we agreed to look out of the window to the backyard at the slanted barn, which lay at the edge of the woods next to an expired field. It was true, there really seemed to be someone in the barn; through the ajar doors were to be seen a pair of combat trouser-clad legs.

"'T's pro'ly one-o'-those Russian soldiers' bodies!", exclaimed Micha anxiously, and even Zerk sniggered to the thought. Micha told us to stop laughing, assuring the seriousness of the situation, but that just made us laugh even more. Finally she made us calm down by saying that even though it wasn't a body of a slaughtered soldier, it might someone's body. We took a serios attitude and started peeking out of the window at the barn. However, the distance was a little too long, so we weren't able to see inside it properly. After a moment's hesitation we decided to go and see what was in there.

We sneaked nearer, silently, me and Sara in charge. Glitt had wanted to leave inside, but Micha had clung to Zörkel's side and declared that she wanted to come with us. About thirty feet from the barn we stopped. We still weren't able to see inside properly, because it was dark in there. All we could see was those legs covered with a shabby piece of clothing.

Suddenly we noticed that there was some movement near the body. Sara winced next to me and a bit alarmed we tried to see what was going on in the barn. It looked as if some small white animal was jumping on the body, but I couldn't figure out which animal it was. Then, out of the blue, I realised the nature of the situation, and at the same particular moment Sara put my thoughts into words.

"He's jerking off!", she whispered, partly amused, partly shocked. Micha stepped forward to ask, what was happening. "The guy's onanating", stated I, and had to explain the meaning of the word to Micha informally before she understood.

"Let's leave", said Sara, and I assumed she ment going inside. But after we got there, she started packing her stuff, and astounded I asked did she mean leaving the whole cabin.

"Of course! We dunno what kinda pedophile he's!", she elaborated. "But by what are you going to go?", I asked, and had the answer from Micha. "Well, Zark is gonna take us, of course! I'd not wanna leave here with some perv, ya know." Glitt joined the crowd and I was the only one who still wanted to stay at the cabin, because I knew daddy was still back at the hospital; he had called to tell his pelvic bone and some of his vertebrals had been broken, and I also knew Rick wasn't coming back from granny until the next day.

Eventually I decided that it'd be nicer to be alone at the cabin than alone at home, and so the rest of our crew left. I had no idea how to get home from the cabin the next day, but on the other hand, I didn't care. I had food for five people, because we hadn't eaten nothing but some supper in the evening, and the food we were supposed to eat that day had been left untouched because of the weird man in our barn.

I heated some macaroni casserole and sat in front of the fireplace to eat it. Being alone was actually pretty nice, and by the night I had forgotten all about the body of a Russian soldier.

As the night was getting darker I fetched some firewood from the woodshed and took them to the sauna. When I had just piled the next armful ready and had stepped out of the woodshed, I heard a voice saying "Hello", and with that I quailed and dropped the wood down on the ground. Cursing I searched the source of the voice, and found a very pale man standing near to the corner of the shed.

'Very pale' was actually a really lame expression, because the man was practically totally white, including his lips and nails. His hair, eyebrows and pupils in contrast were pitch-black, and it seemed as if he had escaped there from the pages of an uncoloured comic book.

"Hello", I said crossly and began gathering the wood from the ground. The man came to help, and togeher we carried the wood to the water tub without saying a word. I started setting a fire under the tub, and as if we had made a speechless contract, he took the buckets and went to the river. Feeling stunned I watched as he went, and tried to remember if I had asked him to help me. Finally I was convinced that I hadn't, and I managed to lit the fire in the furnace. The man brought the buckets back, now fulfilled, and emptied the water to he tub.

"Did I ask you to help me?", asked I a bit nettled. He looked at me with his eyes that seemed as if they were merely one black pupil with not even a small spot of color, and said simply: "No, you didn't, but I wanted to help". Then he just turned around to get another charge of water from the river. I stayed there standing, not even trying to do a gesture to go with him, and evetually he came back with the buckets filled again.

"Are you longing for a return service, or what?", I asked a bit cautiously, and he became pensive. He poured the contents of the buckets into the tub and put them down on the ground before he gave an answer. "No, I want nothing else but only to have a permission to wash myself in your sauna before the celebration begins." Then he lifted the buckets again and started walknig towards the river before I had a chance to answer or ask anything. I stood there feeling even more stunned, and pondered if I had heard right.

Again the man came back and poured the water to the tub, now having it nearly fulfilled. The he just stood there, like I did, and finally took an inquiringexpression to his face.

"What celebration?", was the only thing I was able to say, and he told that it would be a long story to be told outside, and though I recognized a leading style in the way he arranged the words, I invited him in to the cabin.

"You probably haven't heard of the Black-and-whites?", he asked after we had sat in front of the fireplace with our mugs of hot chocolate. I assumed that he wasn't even waiting for me to answer, but I told him anyway that I hadn't heard of them.

"Well, we are sort of an underground army", he said, and I thought that Micha had not been that wrong with that Russin soldier of hers.

"Oh. Well, what are you fighting against, then?", I asked, and considered, was the man possibly mad, a ghost or a mythological creature, or all of them. I had no idea.

"Humen", was his short answer, and I decided that it'd be easiest to just look like a question mark to get some more information. "We live under the ground, usually, and partly that's why our skin is so white. Now and then we have these parties, during which we make some attacks against humen", he explained, and when I insisted to hear some more, he told that the attacks were usually disguised to look like natural disasters, suicide attacks or acts of terrorism, so that no one could suspect any other source than what it excplicitly seemed to be.

"It's all about manipulating the people or approaching the right gods", he said. "If you want a tsunami, you just ask the old and honorable Ahti if he could put a huge wave on the move, and if you want an act of terrorism, you just infiltrate one of us inside a proper group to set the thought in their heads so cleverly they think they've come up with it themselves. That simple."

I would've wanted to continue the conversation but I remembered that the sauna would be soon warm enough, and I pointed this out to the man, too. "It doesn't matter, we can keep on discussing on the sauna", he said like a wooden indian, and at first was stunned. Then I decided that I would not be stunned anymore about anything he says, and went to the sauna with him.

The man told about the exact rules of the Black-and-whites, like how they were not allowed to eat any animal unless it was either black or white, or any plant unless it had either black or white blossom, berry or fruit. In addition they were not allowed to drink anything that had come from a colourful vessel, and no one was permitted to wear nothing but black during the celebration.

In the sauna I also noticed that even the other hair of the man's body was black, and that the skin itself was all over white. And his pupils truly were totally pitch-black. He told that it was like that with every other Black-and-white member, because during the affiliation ceremony they had to drink a potion that makes the change.

"The change is eternal and it doesn't vanish even when parting from the clan, though every memory considering it will be erased from the members mind. Probably I must do that to you too after this", he told. "Except if...", he contienued, and fell silent. "Yes?", I hurried him, and finally he ended his sentence: "If you would like to join us".

It had not come to my mind previously, but suddenly I thought it'd be a good idea. Being an anti-human sounded nice to me, and I also told this to my sauna mate. "But could I first see your celebration, before I make my final decision?", I asked, and he answered affirmatively.

"The celebration might feel a bit odd for a rookie, but you don't have to take part in anything if you don't want to. And being an anti-human is not all that belongs to the party. It's just a climax that will be taken care by the superior Black-and-whites together with our leader, the Darkest. And by the way, he is entirely black", he told me, and he also mentioned that the celebration would begin the very next day, after the first snow had fallen during the night. I didn't believe the snow would fall yet, but the man assured that it would happen. The duration of the party, according to him, might vary from one week to even one year, as long as there was eagerness to keep them going.

We both went inside to get some sleep, me to the matress and he to the couch. Somewhere during the night I rememebered that I hadn't even asked the man's name, but I decided to wait until the morning and not to wake him up because of that. I slept quite peacefully 'til the morning came and when I woke up I noticed that my companion had awoken, too.

"Did you jerk off in our barn yesterday?", was the first question I asked, and the man, who apparently had not noticed I was awake, winced. Funny, I thought, amused: it was the 28th October, I was at our cabin, and as a first thing in the morning I was querying an unknown man if he had masturbated in our barn. Didn't the question usually go more likely as "Did we do it last night?"?

"Yes, I suppose I did", he answered, and continued by stating: "Apparently you and your friends came to see it?". I abjured the statement that we had gone there to stare at his onanating, and finally I ended up explainig the whole story about the Russian soldiers to him, as he didn't seem to be convinced. After that he sweared he'd believed me, and was also laughig to Micha's silly sayings.

It was a surprislingly early morning, and the day had dawned down quite freshly. We ate a breakfast, and after that my company began getting ready for the celebration by conjuring a long black gown from somewhere and by putting it on. "I have a gown for you too", he said, taking up another gown from his bag. "I've kept them in your barn. The other one is my spare gown and it migth be a bit great to you, but you must have a gown in the party. You can have one of your own if you decide to join the clan."

I took the gown and put it on over my clothes. It was nice and warm. Only then I rememeberd to look out of the window, and I saw right away that the first snow had really fallen, and there was at least a six inch layer of it already. This made me wonder a bit, but I reminded myself not to get stunned about anything the man says, and so I accepted the fact as it was.

"Your name. I forgot to ask yesterday", I said to him while looking at my reflection in the mirror. "What is it?"

"I'm called Smildon", he said, but didn't go on by asking my name as I had assumed him to do. After a moment's hesitation I told it myself anyway. "My name is Spark", I said, and elaborated that I was also called Spaks, though I didn't like it at all.

"So I will be calling you Spark, Spark", said Smildon, smiling, and hurried me to come with him outside. I didn't ask where the celebration would be held, only followed Smildon when he walked across the field, proceeding deeper in the forest. Finally we arrived to a clearing where there was a pile assembled of huge stones in the middle of it. On the top of the pile stood an all over black man, more black than pitch, and every where from around the clearing other Black-and-whites were coming, every one as white skinned as Smildon and every one dressed up in a black gown. I felt myself extraneous, even only beacause I wasn't white from my skin.

The man on the top of the pile was waving his hands slowly, inviting the masses to come nearer. He was holding a wooden stick in his hand, and it looked as if it was charred, because it was all over black too. Smildon guided me forward, and then let me know that he should leave me soon, as the men of the clan were supposed to go for a hunt.

At that very moment the Darkest knocked the stone with his stick, and the men stepped onwards, around the pile of stones. The Darkest handed them some weapons, like javelins or longbows, apparently from a hole on the top of the pile. When the men had gotten their weapons, thay left right away towards the woods.

I became a bit worried as Smildon was gone, but soon a couple of women from the clan came to have a chat with me. "Guess you not one o' us?", said the other one, and I told them I had come only to attend the celebration, so that I can have a foretaste of the clan's function.

"With whom u came?", asked the other one, and as I mentioned Smildon's name, their expressions changed at once. "With Smildon, huh?", they asked, and seemed impressed.

The women told me that Smildon was predicted to be the next Darkest, and that he was in any case very distinquished within the clan. Apparently he was also popular among the women of the clan, because the leader's spouse was also in a high position.

The names of these women were Jolie and Nave, according to what they told. They also mentioned that after the men had come back with their prey, it was the women's turn to work and prepare a dinner as a credit for the celebration. "An' after the dinner comes the best part of the party", they said, but didn't want to tell what was ahead.

By the afternoon the men came back as from a common agreement, wandering from the woods out of every side of the clearing, silent as a herd of wolves. Some of them had javelins on their shoulders, and from them hung some impaled little animals, such as winter coated rabbits, ermines and ptarmigans, and capercaillies, wood grouses and ravens. Some of the men had gotten nothing at all, and they seemed a bit moody because of it.

They gathered all the corpses on the edges of the stone pile and then receded abaft. "So, it's our turn", said Nave and grabbed my arm. At first I tried to protest, but then I decided that it was also a part of getting to know the clan. When we reached the pile I began to skin a young raven while Jolie and Nave istructed me. Soon I learned a good tactic, and finally the bird was skinned. All the meat was collected into a willow basket, which was, surprislingly enough, also pitch-black, and all the intestines, bones, feathers and skins were left around the pile for some other animals to eat.

After the animals had been skinned, some large fires were set around the clearing. In some of them meat was fried in sticks, in others it was boiled and in some of them it was smoked. The scent of cooking meat soon covered the clearing, and the night began falling. When the food was ready, a piece of every animal's meat was put on a wooden plate, and this plate was taken to the Darkest on the pile of stones. After he had gotten it he knocked the stone with his stick, and so the dinner began.

"Hey, Spark", said a voice behind me, when I was searching for a place to sit on among the Black-and-whites. I turned around and saw Smildon walking towards me. He invited me to sit with him by one of the fires, and feeling relieved, I followed him. We sat down and took some food and beverage from a woman who was serving them, and from the corner of my eye I saw Jolie and Nave glancing at us, lookin jealous.

"So, have you decided already?", asked Smildon. I thougth for a moment, staring at the fire, and then, instead of answering, I made a question. "What will happen after the feast?"

Smildon fell silent and went a bit squirmy, saying that we'll see when it's the time. At the same time he reminded me again that I shouldn't take part in anything I don't want to, and this only made me more cuorious. However, I decided to stop asking for more information, and merely continued eating in silence.

As nearly everyone had finished their meal, I became a bit excited because of the continuation. Supposedly Smildon didn't want to keep me in uncertainty anymore, because he asked me aside to tell me about the next part of the celebration.

"We... Every one of us has lived in celibacy until today, ever since the last party we had, and now... well... now it is about the time for the orgy to begin, an orgy where every one can be with every one", he told, looking squirmy. "Of course you can skip it if you want to... But if you turn your back now, I must unfortunately erase your memories."

I went a bit confused because of this, but when I came to think about it, I didn't want to back down, at least not yet. "Fine. If you don't want to... you know... you can just say no. No one is forced." I nodded, and at that moment the Darkest knocked the stone again to tell that the next part of the celebration was beginning.

The Black-and-whites began strolling around the clearing, stopping to kiss every passer-by; men with women, men with men and women with women. Gradually they chose themselves a partner and moved aside. I monitored the happenings, feeling extraneous once again. I saw Smildon kissing vehemently with Jolie near me, and Nave glancing at them enviously from behind her own partner, a long-haired woman.

I hadn't thought of taking part, but I had to come to think of it, when a young boy came in front of me. The boy was special when compared to the other members of the clan, because his hair was white as snow, with only one stripe of black right from his face. There he was, only standing and looking at me with intrest, and I didn't know what to do.

"I... I didn't think I'd take part", I then spluttered, and the boy only nodded. He didn't go away, however, but merely continued his staring. Finally I asked him, what ever was it that he wanted from me. I was surprised because of the deep velvet voice that came from his mouth.

"I would like to be with you", he said.

-to be continued-