The Absurdium

Mist still clung to the bamboo forests of the lower slopes and all but the earliest risers in Ho-Chen City had yet to awaken, but in the courtyard of the kung fu school perched on the hillside above the city, sweat was already dripping from a hundred bodies.

…65… …66…

At the front of the class, counting the loudest, was Mika. Her back rose and fell steadily, unwavering like a plank on pistons.

…132… …133…

With every push muscles flexed and writhed like snakes beneath her tanned skin.

…196… …197…

Through gritted teeth the numbers came yet. Mika’s brown eyes smouldered with determination as drips of sweat fell from the tip of her nose.

…228… unhhh …229…

The rags wrapped around her fists were dirty and soaked with sweat, but they cushioned the earth from the wrath of her knuckles.

…three…oh…threeee…

Mika’s body slammed to the ground as her arms abruptly failed. All the other students stopped as well, slumping to the ground surprised and confused. No one had done more push-ups than Mika in at least eight years.

Mika got to her feet, anger surging in her chest. Pulling on her linen overshirt and trying to regain her breath, she walked to the edge of the courtyard and leaned against the stone wall of the dining hall. The rough surface bit her skin and caught her coarse hands. She resisted punching it. Soon the other students were standing, stretching out their arms and moving into the low, long building. A few asked her if she was okay, if she was feeling alright. She ignored them and ignored the murmurings of the crowd as they filed past her on their way inside.

Mika looked to the east; past the crowd of students moving slowly by her, beyond the hard packed dirt and paving stones of the training yard and the crumbling stone gateway which marked the boundary between the school and the real world, further still she fixed her gaze and from the far end of the valley, down where the river emptied into the ocean and the sea birds wheeled in the breeze, the sun broke above the horizon in hues of fire and roses. Mika sighed and stepped into the dining hall. It was time to eat.

Mika ate in silence, staring blankly at the wooden table as though in a trance. No one bothered her. The words her master had spoken to her the evening before were still resonating through her mind. She washed her bowl like an automaton and walked into the courtyard to warm herself in the weak rays of the rising sun before sitting down for the morning’s meditation.

The last of the mist lifted from the thickets and shaded crags as the sun rose unobstructed into the sky and threw its splendour across the mountainside. Little human statues sat silently in rows in the dirt; 117 human shadows moved more than their respective owners as they slowly turned and shrank before the climbing sun.

Mika could not focus. By now she should be drawing slow, unconscious breaths and lost inside her body and mind, relaxing, reflecting and realizing. The outside world would fade beyond concern as she looked steadily inwards. But this morning her thoughts kept her pinned to the real world and locked in her head. Her mind seethed, roiling like the sea beneath the black sky of a tai-fun. Suddenly she was facing an uncertain future again for the first time in nearly a decade and old fears that she had thought long since buried were rising once more. She could not block them from her mind despite her training and this lack of self-control was a further source of frustration.

Unable to focus, Mika was painfully aware of all that was going on around her. The slow breathing of the young student on her left, the whistles and chatter of songbirds, the whine of mosquitoes and buzz of the blue-bottle flies, the rustle of leaves in the gentle breeze, the snapping of a twig as someone approached in the trees…

Mika’s eyes flashed open, scanning for the source of the sound.  Nothing was moving but the sudden silence of the songbirds heightened her concern. Past the row of shaved heads and robed backs before her the five teachers of the school sat with their backs to the forest. Their upright posture, closed eyes and utterly calm faces indicated that they had heard nothing. Perhaps Mika’s agitated mind was playing tricks on her. After a few vigilant minutes she inhaled deeply and closed her eyes once more.

Then with unmistakeable clarity, Mika heard the creak of bending wood. Against all the rules of meditation, she leapt up running. Some students looked up in surprise, blinking in the sunlight, and the masters were all looking at her now, anger obvious on their faces. Before she cleared the last row of students Mika heard the twang of a bow and in the same second the ‘zittt’ of an arrow as it flashed from the trees and punched into the shoulder of Master Zhou! With a cry he fell forwards into the dirt, the arrow lodged in his back.