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Marina Sprouz

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ISBN 978-5-0064-3304-5

Created with Ridero smart publishing system

Marina Sprouz

Mission 777 Possible

Novel

Foreword by the Author

People love to believe in fairy tales; they are comforting and always end well. My novel resembles a fairy tale, a touch of mysticism in reality. The characters and the story are fictional, though coincidences with reality are possible. I am not an outstanding writer or philosopher; I am an ordinary doctor, but we know from history that many doctors have written, such as Mikhail Bulgakov, Anton Chekhov, Somerset Maugham, and François Rabelais. In our hectic pace of life and new era, it is hard to surprise readers; but for a moment, imagine that the story in my novel actually happened. In the novel, we come into contact with a subtle, spiritual world. There is a spiritual world, whether we like it or not, an invisible world of struggle and different life. Everyone probably read Bulgakov’s “The Master and Margarita.” Have you ever wondered why the scenes about the Master and Margarita intertwine parallelly with the scenes about Jesus Christ? Think of Dan Brown’s “The Da Vinci Code,” also made into a film, and the wanderings of Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll. What was Alice searching for? My novel is a new myth, a myth or fairy tale.

Everything ever written and filmed in the history of humanity has its significance for human development. As they say, “Fairy tales lie, but there’s a hint in them…” I will immerse you in the world of a special fairy tale, a walk through the spiritual world. The scenes will intertwine about the past, future, and present in small chapters; always remember, time does not exist. The book is written with elements of storytelling and a literary script, and lyrical digressions in the form of poetry will be little gems or diamonds of the novel. The book contains many bright and colorful illustrations. At first, when you read about the heroine’s childhood, everything seems simple and primitive, but keep reading… The novel begins with a legend in poetic form, followed by prose. In the novel, sometimes you hear the heroine’s voice in the first person, and sometimes the author’s voice, as if the author is observing events from the side. All the events in the novel are fictional and not real.

Read, my dear readers! And I hope the reader will be with me, the author, during the reading of the novel.

Author Marina Sprouz

The novel was translated by the author into English from the Russian language.

Love Must Save the World
Lead to Life Through the Journey

Prologue

The Legend of Marianne

Did it happen or not, I don’t know.
But today, I must confess to you,
That I want to write about it,
And the poet’s mission is strange…
Let the language be neither scant nor proud,
And simple, like the common folk.
So, I started my tale,
A narrative and a story.
In those medieval times lived
A girl, alone in the world,
Her name was Marianne.
She wore a black hood
On her head, and a cloak.
“Marianne!” her mother called,
We need to prepare for the market:
All kinds of dishes and trinkets,
To survive – despite fate.
Those were hard times,
She lived in Italy,
The plague raged everywhere,
And war took lives.
Darkness loomed, heavy…
The air was tense, and evil froze.
Marianne and her mother were alone,
She did not remember her father.
Hunger and shame were everywhere,
Their every step was watched.
They prayed to saints in those times,
Marianne grew up fully;
She became beautiful and smart,
Unaware of it herself.
To avoid the plague,
She went to the market for water.
Filling her pitcher,
She wandered through the city.
At the market gate,
There sat a black cat:
Huge, fat, black cat,
Smiling widely.
“Chur! It seemed! I’m sick!
I must need a walk!”
Turning away from the market,
She went for a walk in the city.
By the fountain in the garden,
I’ll pluck a red rose;
I must not be sad – no way,
I like life, it’s a trifle.
I’ll pluck a rose, though the thorns are sharp:
They’ll prick my finger like needles.

Blood on my finger – and my head spins,
From the sight of blood, she faints.
Opening her eyes, she woke there:
Someone was slapping her cheeks.
I met a stranger’s eyes:
As if the Sun suddenly flared up;
I met love in reality,
I was looking for love – and now I live.
“I’ve been waiting for you, dear Marianne!
Life without you is a continuous wound.”
“I’m Marianne, yes. But who are you? Why?
And what is your name, I don’t understand.”
“I will not tell you my name,
I have many names in reality.
One thing I know – eternal love,
I will love you with all my blood.
Remember this – never,
Will trouble separate us forever.
He is my husband forever, and I am his wife,
I will follow him to any city,
Even if there is war.
But our happiness did not last long;
Villains – murderers stole the diamond,
Suddenly destroyed the treasure – our happiness,
They are leading my beloved to death…
They deceive my eyes, and the visions are wrong,
I see: my beloved is crucified…
The sky suddenly closed with a ringing, and a moan…
It spreads endlessly with the rain.
That hour was cursed with a beastly grin,
My beloved was crucified by a murderer.
Mixed with death…
All in blood and rain.
– And what is left for me?
We will not be together…
Killed for a coin,
The whole sky in dust,
And there is no life for me,
Since there is no love in it!
She stood silently at the abyss,
And the abyss opened to the very bottom.
And the unceasing rain poured on her head,
It will not save her from the passion of her heart.
Marianne knew the sorrow of love,
Marianne threw herself into that abyss in delirium.
And just as her feet left the ground,
A trail of blood remained on the pile of stones.
She flew over that abyss,
And no longer saw, she found peace…
Only the echo carries over the abyss:
Marianne will return at the appointed hour!

The woman in white

Two girls were playing in the backyard. One had fiery red hair and was arranging toy figures on a set of scales made from a wooden fence plank. The other girl, with expressive big eyes, was playing with a small jug.

“Tell me, what do you want to be when you grow up?” said the Red-haired girl.

“I don’t know yet…”

“I want to be a shopkeeper,” said the Red-haired girl, placing a child’s sand shoe on one side of the scales.

“I don’t know yet…,” said the other girl.

“What do you have in your jugs?” asked the Red-haired girl.

“It’s water. Did you know that in the future, there will be very little water, so you have to stock up…” said the big-eyed girl.

“Impossible!” said the Red-haired girl, surprised.

“But what will happen in the future?”

“I know that people will be led by a woman in white.”

“In white?”

“How interesting…”

The girls spoke, their voices getting quieter, like in fog…

Boy or Girl

A boy was probably supposed to be born, but a girl was born… Marianna.

A private house, a yard. Grandfather is fixing the fence, holding a hammer. Grandma Klavdiya appears on the porch.

“Anton, they called from the maternity hospital, a girl was born!”

Grandfather put down the hammer, frowned, paused.

“Go call again, there must be some mistake.”

A minute later, Grandma Klavdiya returns.

“A girl! They said it’s a girl!”

“Oh my… call again later…”

Fear of God

A room in my grandfather’s house. White walls, low ceilings. A little five-year-old girl sits on the bed with her legs tucked up and stares into the corner – it’s Marianne. Half darkness. The girl looks at a large icon in the corner. From the icon Jesus Christ is looking sternly. Marianne looks frightened, she stares intently at the image, Jesus seems to threaten with finger.

Girl

Rural road. Grandfather is carrying Marianne on the frame of his bicycle. She is about five years old.

“When you grow up, will you feed Grandpa?” – Grandpa asks as he walks along.

Little Marianne replies: “I will take you to Moscow.”

“To Moscow?”

“Yes! And I’ll feed you porridge!”

Grandpa laughs.

A grey-haired old man

“She has a fever,” Marianna’s mom said, touching the child’s forehead. “We need to call the doctor tomorrow.”

The girl shivered, her face red.

“Lie down, lie down,” Grandma tucks Marianna in.

The girl drank a sweet mixture and drifted off to sleep.

In the next room, the light was still on, and in her half-dream, Marianna could see it.

It seemed she had already fallen asleep…

Everything was foggy… Marianna felt very bad, she didn’t know why, she just felt it. The girl opened her eyes. An old man with a long gray beard stood by her bedside and looked at her. Marianna could see the old man, but very hazily. Closing her eyes, she drifted back to sleep.

Morning came, and the girl woke up completely healthy.

Later, Grandma said it was Saint Nicholas who had visited. Who knows… maybe it was another old man.

Deaf

Marianne was eight years old. Hospital. Ear, nose and throat doctor’s office. Grandfather brought Marianna to the doctor’s office.

The doctor: “The girl does not hear at all, this is nervous deafness, a complication after rubella. Give her to a school for the deaf-mute. There is no cure, you know…”

Grandpa: “What school? Are you crazy? She has to be cured.”

“We can’t do anything, this happens sometimes, all these children are in schools for the deaf,” said the doctor.

Grandfather stood puzzled for a long time, then took Marianne’s hand and walked towards the exit. He sat Marianna on the back seat of an old Zaporozhts and thought. His hands gripped the steering wheel with anger and despair.

“No! This will not do!” said the grandfather and pressed on the gas.

Marianne spent a fortnight in the Ear, Nose, Throat ward. Her arms were pricked all over, bruises appeared on her wrists, and antibiotics were painfully injected into her veins. Marianne couldn’t hear, but she could see, walk, but she couldn’t hear anything.

Probably, really – a school for deaf-mutes and that’s all…

But a miracle happened, which always comes when you least expect it.

In the afternoon, Marianne stood in the hospital ward, looked out the window and thought that now everything is fine, it does not hurt, doctors do not stick needles in her hands. It had become warm. Around her head, her whole body was enveloped by an unknown force, her head seemed to expand in the glow of invisible ions, and her eyes were like a big screen through which she felt and saw. Marianne began to hear. There were loud noises coming from the corridor. At first she caught the sounds with her nose, other parts of her body, felt with her whole body what the interlocutor was saying, but most importantly she looked at his lips when he spoke. A miracle happened, Marianne was healed by an unknown force.

A Part of That Force

Beach. Little Marianna on the shore of the sea. She splashes her feet in the water by the shore. She sees people swimming. The weather is sunny outside, just a little wind stirs the waves. Marianna enters the sea. She can’t swim and goes into the water up to her waist, splashing, then further and further…

A wave engulfs Marianna, swirling her around, she ends up completely in the water. She starts to drown and choke. An unknown wave lifts her body, vibrating and pushing her upwards. This is a part of that force that cured her deafness. Marianna paddles desperately with her arms. She swims… She swims on her own. She learned to swim.

Little Marianna

“Go to the reeds, to the swamps, where people don’t go, where God’s word doesn’t reach; there you will have visions, nourishment, forever and ever amen,” rasped the old woman’s voice over Marianna’s head. Then the old woman read prayers, and Marianna smelled the wax nearby: the old woman poured wax into a bowl of water.

Then holding the wax in her hand, she said, "– Look, look what’s here…”

Marianna had been going to the old woman for the tenth time already.

“You should come for the young moon,” the toothless old woman said. Little Marianna didn’t know that “young moon” meant the new moon.

But she had to come, her grandmother said she had to go to stop wetting the bed, to keep bed sheets from hanging and drying in the garden; she had to come for twenty readings.

They said there was fear, but what caused it wasn’t clear: maybe she was just scared of the dog, or maybe of the old lady, a neighbor. Granny, the neighbor, stepped outside wearing her terrible rags, she stood by the gate and watched. Marianna went along the road with her little feet, and she said in fear, “Grandma Aga.”

She heard and saw the frightened look of Marianna. Now the wet sheets…

The witch, the neighbor, came close to Marianna and whispered into her face, “Not enough? Not enough?”

Marianna didn’t understand what she meant by “not enough” back then. One day, she left her gate and found a crow that had been killed, its blood visible and horrifying…

She didn’t think about the witch, the neighbor, just the crow. At night, the granny stepped out, holding a book in her hands and whispered strange words as she walked around the garden fence. Granny Klavdiya constantly made finds: sometimes a buried piece of bread in her garden, sometimes a pot of feces thrown over the fence by someone.

One dream often haunted Marianna: she runs away, and a witch in rags chases her. In her dream, Marianna is in fear as she tries to run quickly from the gate to the porch; the monster chases her. The witch is about to grab her by her clothes.

The dream was repeated again and again.

Everything passes… time heals, and Marianna was healed of wet sheets.

Field of Bluebells

A little girl stands. Before her, an immense field stretches out, composed of countless purple bluebells. For the little girl, it’s enormous, a wave of joy and freedom surrounds her – Marianna. She runs across the vast field, happy and carefree. The field smells incredibly, probably the scent of bluebells, merging into a vast purple sea.

Marianna wakes up, someone is patting her cheeks, she hears sounds. It’s her grandmother, who found Marianna unconscious, snoring, with foam at her mouth.

Little Marianna lay in the corner near the yard’s barn, by the wooden fence. The cause of such a condition is still unclear, maybe it’s the aftermath of a vaccination she received today at the hospital. Marianna came to her senses, and it’s so sad… she wanted to get back to that field, smelling of freshness and the aroma of bluebells.

Star

The girl’s hand draws a star on notebook pages. She does it mechanically, just wanting to draw with a pen. The star is ordinary, like many five-pointed stars, with a sharp top at the top. Then she draws other shapes on the sheet.

As Marianna woke up, she saw that she had filled her school notebook. What have I done…

Amina

“Born…” whispered little Marianna, looking sadly at her baby sister Amina, who had just been brought from the maternity ward and placed on the pillow. Amina fit perfectly on the pillow. Marianna couldn’t imagine that Amina would grow up so quickly and cause so much trouble. From all of Marianna’s childhood photos, Amina cut out Marianna’s eyes and scratched them with scissors. She also took Marianna’s toys and pretty things for herself and hid them away. When Marianna asked her about the toys, Amina grabbed Marianna by the hair and pulled painfully. Once, a fight between the sisters went too far. Older now, Amina was stronger than Marianna: she hit Marianna hard on the edge of the bath, grabbed her by the hair, and started to drown her in a basin. Marianna was so angry that when it was all over, not feeling any more rage, and seeing Amina’s face gleefully triumphant, she shouted, “Curse you!”

Injustice

Grandpa sat behind the wheel of his old Zaporozhets. Marianna sat next to him. She was already a teenager. They had to stop because of a funeral procession. They were burying a young woman who left behind a child. Grandpa looked at the funeral procession and couldn’t calm down: “Where is the justice… They took away the mother… The child is an orphan… Is this right…” Marianna looked at her thoughtful grandpa. She didn’t understand what injustice was; she didn’t understand anything.

After school

Marianna didn’t know where to go after school.

But it seems fate decided everything for her.

Zinulya – Marianna’s favorite friend – dreamed of studying medicine, but to apply, she needed work experience as a hospital orderly, so she immediately took action. As luck would have it, there was a spot at the clinic, and we both started working there even during school. And so, I finally put on a white coat for the first time, although there was still a silly white cap. That’s how my journey in medicine began, as if someone invisible was guiding me. After working for a year, Zinka inexplicably changed her mind about applying, or more precisely, didn’t apply anywhere, but got married and started a household.

I corresponded with my mom; the letters took a long time because she and Dad were living in the Far North, having gone there to work. In one letter, I asked my mom: where should I apply, what should I do… And in her letter, Mom replied: “You need to live, choose…”

Honestly, I didn’t know myself and tried to figure out my path. One day after school, I sat thoughtfully at my desk, did my homework as usual, books lay before me, and I just stared into emptiness. Slightly in a daze, a picture appeared before me: I was sitting in a white coat in an office, with shelves of pills and tablets in the background. So, to begin my path in medicine, I needed to enroll in medical school.

Misfortune

It happened one May evening; I went out with a friend and, like a good girl, called my grandparents from a payphone from time to time.

“Marianna… Marianna… hurry home!” I heard a strange hoarse voice from Grandpa on the phone, it seemed he was crying.

At home, I saw two of our relatives from the neighboring village, everyone sitting around the table. Grandma informed me of my mother’s death, Grandpa couldn’t say anything, just wheezed and sobbed, having drunk Corvalol. Of course, I didn’t fully realize it at first, and I didn’t feel the pain right away; there was Mom, and now no Mom, it couldn’t be true. And I cried a lot in the bathroom, my eyes turned into two swollen bags. I remember Mom… she was like an angel, with extraordinary eyes. Then they said she was killed. One memory remains in my mind: I was sitting next to Mom when she was still alive, and my soul was incredibly warm, perhaps this feeling a fetus feels in the womb. Her eyes were especially memorable, large unusual upper eyelids, her face reminded me of an angel and Leonardo da Vinci’s painting “Head of an Angel,” and her hands were very delicate. Like some virgin maiden hides Leonardo’s painting, and in the picture – my mom, my mommy:

You’re tender, like something fragile and delicate,

What are you like… as if something is in a daze.

Vulnerable, like a virgin flower,

Grown-up and spring stem.

You look like a girl from a painting:

Semi-transparent face and canopies;

The mouth is slightly open sensually,

As if getting ready for a trip;

And a tired look aimed,

Olive eyes – without falsehood.

Vulnerable, invisible, barefoot,

She came down from the picture – you, heavenly – such…

I will look at the lips and eyes,

As if they can tell you,

About the secret of the eternal tender maiden;

And listen to the first tunes,

When the morning dew rings…

The funeral of my mother was terrible. Grandpa no longer cried but wheezed, and the nurse injected him with injections right through his clothes. Grandma’s face was without tears, and Marianna’s eyes swelled and puffed up from crying. We said our last words of farewell. A stranger woman standing by the grave threw a handful of dirt over Marianna’s collar and said, “So she wouldn’t be afraid of the dead.”

Orphan

So, Marianna became an orphan.

Why is it that often the main character is necessarily an orphan, or becomes one? Let’s remember: Harry Potter, poor Cinderella without a mother, the heroine of the tale “12 Months”. But like all heroes, Marianna became an orphan too.

Amina’s Abilities

Train. Ukraine.

Marianna and her sister Amina sit on the wooden benches of the train, the train quietly clatters along. Amina twirls a matchbox in her hand. She places it on the bench, moves her hand, and the box slides away.

“Wow! Show me again,” and she places an iron can on the bench.

Amina flashes her eyes and stares intently at the can. The can moves forward, shifts.