Dmitriy Galkovskiy
Yuletide Bestiary #1
Translated by Alexander Sharov
A certain
classical rodent distinguished by keen inquisitiveness was once prowling around
in the basement, collapsed into the amphora with wine and quickly drowned. On
the ensuing day the amphora was dispatched to the seaport where it was loaded
onto a vessel. Thunderbolts fulminated into the vessel during a tempest,
conflagration erupted and the argosy sank midway between Jaffa and Piraeus. In
3694 the amphora with mummified vitrified mass was salvaged from the seabed and
the fossilized rat was hewn from it. The layout of the specimen’s volatile
memory was successfully reproduced by applying the methodology of algebraic
scanning, and through the instrumentality of the 16-dimensional super-computer,
emulating lower mammals’ sensory perception, the relevant video footage was
displayed. It transpired that the rat which so (in) felicitously floundered
into the amphora, six hours heretofore had sneaked into the presence of Pontius
Pilate interrogating Christ.
Clandestine
information on that matter was serendipitously unearthed by the computerized
archeological mission in 5118. Regretfully, the then retrieved informational
chip of the notorious NN-4 grid was almost utterly vandalized, and, in the
ultimate reckoning, a portion of the index of contents, de-contextualized
fragments of the dialogue and two video snapshots (from amongst the total of
two millions) were displayable. A sessile gentleman draped in the toga of the
Roman Martial Governor was seen on the former, the least corrupted frame. The
foreshortening is extraordinarily abortive – worm’s-eye and lateral-side views.
A hulking Romanesque-sandaled foot is visible, a disproportionately dwarfish
head with a comparatively hypertrophied mandible, a wrist with a signet ring is
on the lap. Opposite stands Christ – an approximately quadragenarian,
swarthy-complexioned Semite, luxuriously gowned, aquiline hooked nose, wispy
beard, bloated cheeks. The focalization of the snapshot (a chromatic splash) is
the signet ring, an ostentatiously flamboyant one, supposedly, the artifact
riveting the gnawer’s alertness this particular second. The latter snapshot is
severely blurred. Pilate is scarcely discernible thereon. Christ is
expostulating on something, gesticulating with his hand straightly at the rat.
A hexapod (conjecturally, Blatta orientalis) is zigzagging across the
foreground. The semantic cynosure of the snapshot is yawning. Evidently, the
instant of refocusing attention from the insect on the background is videoed.
Ostensibly, the rat lusted to ingurgitate the Blattoptera but was diverted by
an exclamation.
Extant gleanings
of the dialogue were exportable solely into the plain textual file format.
Consequently, unambiguous authentication of authorship proved to be
unidentifiable. The colloquy was being pursued in the Latin bureaucratese of
the 1st century AD, and corresponding locutions were, with a certain dosage of
conventionality, rendered into icon-based Vision English. Altogether, nineteen
isolated snippets were decrypted:
The lattermost
nineteenth fragment was identified as unequivocally attributable to Christ:
19. I beseech you
never to terrorize me any more. Altogether, I am clueless as to what Your
August Lordship is speaking about. I shall resurrect and persist everlastingly.
My father, Lord, my God hath enjoined thus!
*) Hereunder is
obfuscated whether figuratively or in the truest sense of the word.
Translated by Alexander Sharov
Dmitriy Galkovskiy (born 1960) is a Russian philosopher and man of letters. He matriculated from Moscow State University with a degree in Classical Philosophy. Attached hereunder is the translation of one of his short stories.
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