PROXIMA B
Giorgio Pulvirenti
Marco Negrone
Copyright © 2018. All rights reserved.
Pictures: Bruno Francesco, Rao Martina
Translator: Federico Favaro
Index
Chapter 1 – For the benefit of all!
Chapter 4 – Last days on Earth
Chapter 5 – The upcoming tomorrow
Chapter 12 – Misunderstandings
Proxima B. Around 12:00 AM.
Nothing seemed different from any other day. No cloud was in the rosy sky, no noise broke the silence of a cane thicket whose tops shifted softly as a feeble wind flew in. There a man went forth. He was about thirty and was wearing a gray uniform with some blue details and a crest on his epaulettes had a writing, ”New NASA Corporate”. He was holding an arm in his hands; it was an assault rifle. The farther he went into the thick vegetation, the darker and the more absorbed his expression grew. It looked like it was waiting for something dangerous and unknown that would grip him. His steps slowed down. Suddenly they stopped. Silence was all around them. The forest seemed to stop, too. Suddenly the man began to raise his rifle very slowly, as if he were about to aim. He looked impassive and so absorbed. He slid his finger over the trigger. He was about to shoot, but something moved very quickly. It emitted a tremendous cry, an incredible roar; it lay in wait behind him and was ready to attack him...
Chapter 1 – For the benefit of all!
Missoula, Montana.
S
ome workers were busily carrying out their job. They were scrupulously coordinated within an area where another 14-story building that was situated in the new zone of Missoula began to take shape. Peculiar cranes with long automatic jibs were tracking the contour of the building under the management of authorized personnel wearing hard hats and uniforms of “Garcia Enterprise” – that is the name of the society where the workers were employed – and supervising everything from below by means of some computers. Other workers were in the establishment and were arranging some tubes or other materials that apparently were not so heavy. Another expansion of the residential areas of the city of the U.S. state of Montana had already started some years earlier and urban territories needed more space that rural areas, which had almost completely disappeared, were obliged to cede. It was about 10 o’ clock in the morning and that same old Friday Philippe the foreman looked away from his workers for a while. He had to answer the phone. After a few seconds, the conversation was over. He had just confirmed that the work was going on and there were no glitches.
About half an hour later, those who were there were attracted by a black sedan that was about to cross the threshold of the workplace. Philippe, who was there, too, came up to the car. He was ready to greet the person who was about to get out.
“Good morning, Mr. Garcia!” Philippe said. He presumably greeted his supervisor that answered with a hint of a smile, “Dear Philippe, a plan every eight hours. Finally, we shall go back to the schedule… Excellent!”
David Garcia, a respectable man in his forties, was a successful businessman as well as one of the most valued civil engineers from Montana. And much more. After graduating from Billings University, he came back to Missoula some year ago to keep on increasing his business; he aimed mainly at the tender to erect buildings for dwellings that have a low environmental impact. You could think it was a paradox, but the fact is that David did not really like living in the city; he did not even like the life in the city. That is why he had arranged to keep on living in his grandparents’ house in the countryside just outside of Missoula. That house had always been a basic element in David’s life. He loved to stay right there when he was free from any meeting or business travel to enjoy that peaceful and silent place together with his son Leo and his wife Gaia. David considered himself to be a lucky man, since his job had allowed him to manage that corner of paradise where he preserved most of his childhood memories with his parents, his two brothers and his grandparents. David acknowledged the important values of life thanks to them, who taught him to take care of any animal or vegetal living form. David himself had struggled against deforestation in his land, but he could not do so much as a single citizen. That is why he arranged to study engineering; he aimed to be one of those who erected buildings, but, at the same time, he would never omit to fulfill the principles that his family had transmitted to him; he would respect the environment as much as possible. This philosophy was what he wanted his son Leo to absorb, but Leo was a child who was born in a modern and innovative era where what was “essential” for life was surely something different from cultivation and breeding. David moved forward along the perimeter delimited by his plantation. What he had always struggled for was about to come to life one more time.
“Sir, there are four stories left. We think they will be ready within Monday.”
Philippe was one of the most important members of “Garcia Enterprise”; David trusted him blindly and it was to him that he entrusted the management of the work that he considered important, just like the current work in the west side of the city.
“Excellent! I can tell our buyers that we’re going to have it ready in time,” David said. He was satisfied. He got nearer and nearer the building under construction.
“Let me know when the structure is ready so that I can inspect it,” the engineer told Philippe one more time, and Philippe made a signal in reply.
The two men said their goodbyes. One more time, David got into the same car by which he had got there.
David was inside a car that was traveling along a road in the countryside. There were several houses all around. They looked like ranches. They were completely different from the buildings in the city center of Missoula. When David could enjoy that rural panorama that he loved unopposedly, he did it, as if he were attached to those trees and those typical wheat fields. Past the first five dwellings, the car was about to cross the railings at the entrance. It delimited a path that led to David’s house.
The car stopped right