(Translated by Jan Čulík and Lesley Keen)
One corner of the large municipal park touches the city centre. Although the size of the park has become somewhat reduced in recent years, it still reaches out both to the busiest part of town as well as to the sleepy villa quarter, which the park enters through the clay surface of its tennis courts. It is from here that on languid Saturday afternoons I can hear the endless tapping of the tennis balls, interrupted only by the sparkling laughter of young girls or by frivolous ... but that’s none of our business. If you walk round the circumference of the whole park, you will easily find that it is surrounded not only by a wall of ageing blocks of flats and dilapidated, once affluent villas, but also by municipal office blocks, by hospitals, by the university, by libraries. At one point the park adjoins the rear section of one of the four municipal brothels. Thus students, office workers, doctors and nurses, librarians and prostitutes, as well as members of other social groups and professions from the buildings situated further afield cross the park regularly.
It may seem to you that I am placing too much importance on a mere municipal park. But if you were in my place, you would do the same. I have spent a large part of my life in the park, I spent my childhood and my adolescence here. The park has been my nanny and my only true friend... enough before I embarrass myself. The park was the natural choice for my place of birth, if you want to use such high-flown language. If you are really interested, one very dark night, when two flying saucers strayed into this place, I ... but let’s not get into all that.
I have grown to be what I am today thanks only to the park, which made it possible for me to acquire an excellent, or as is sometimes said, refined education, even though the means whereby I picked up my knowledge were often quite unusual. I followed groups of students, like a bad smell, attentively listening to their debates. I hovered like a swarm of gnats above office workers taking a walk, thus learning everything about political intrigue and ambitious dreams. The contents of a deftly stolen doctor’s briefcase provided me in a nutshell with everything I needed to know about medicine. Disguised as a little ant I managed to slip through a hole in a stocking to a place where I learned all about love.
These days, my education is quite sufficient (I mean excellent!). I look back with affection on the many happy years of preparation and study. I have learned just about everything I need to know about people. Now it is high time to leave the large municipal park and pursue my vocation.
What is my vocation? It would horrify you to learn ... but thank god you will learn nothing, this faucet in my soul remains tightly closed. I am only a soldier in a large (and ruthless!) army of the universe. It is my task to keep my mouth shut and follow the orders.
So, in the next few days I will join people (that means you, my dear ones) under a borrowed name, with somebody else’s face, taking over his life. I admit that some time ago, I singled out a little man whose life, appearance and name will allow me to assume human identity. If asked to explain right now why him, perhaps I could not even say. In the end I would probably say it was my trusty intuition again. It has helped me so many times before.
This person occasionally walks across my park. When he did so on 4th January, it was very frosty. There was no snow, but the twigs and branches sparkled with hoarfrost against the overcast sky, creating an image like a piece of graphic art. When my man was completely alone on the path, I attacked him, strangled him and quickly pulled his body through a thicket of frozen wild rose bushes to a previously prepared hole in the ground. I placed him in it, filled the hole with earth again, and carefully stamped it down with my feet. Then I took over the man’s identity cards (his name was Jiří Kratochvil), his life, his face and his habits. In the meantime, it had gone quickly dark, the bare branches turned black and the suddenly clear skies lit up with billions of stars.
Without any regrets I am now about to leave the large municipal park (where I stayed during my preparatory years). I will slip into the stream of human beings in the streets, completely merging with it. My appearance is now just as inconspicuous as the appearance of any of you. My name is not unusual. I do not think that the silly few habits that I have taken over from my man are a cause for concern.
One of these is the habit of writing short texts. If I am to remain inconspicuous, I must retain this bad habit that Kratochvil indulged in. Why not? Right now, I am writing a story entitled Alien IV. Its contents are so outlandish that I do not need to fear that any of you will give it any credence.