It was May 22, 2003. Autumn had arrived warm that year, almost summery. The sun sank slowly over the waterfront, staining everything orange. Ivo and Uda walked hand in hand, the salt of the sea still on their skin and the fresh laughter of an afternoon at the beach still with them. They were in no hurry. They had lingered after everyone else, watching the water turn to a mirror beneath the golden sky.
Ivo was slender and of average height, with brown hair that fell to his shoulders in curls he never quite managed to comb. He wore a white T-shirt and navy-blue shorts, his pockets bulging with his wallet, the keys to their boardinghouse, and his old phone.
Uda walked beside him, almost as tall thanks to her thick-soled sandals. Strong legs, slender arms, brown skin. Her black hair fell down her back like a shining curtain. She smiled with her usual ease, with a luminous joy that seemed invented for him alone.
They took pictures with the last frames on the roll, laughing foolishly at their own poses. At the bend in the beach, they stopped to look at the city once more, as though they wanted to store it whole in their memories before continuing toward another nearby beach. It was a perfect moment, and they knew it. They savored it.
"Ivo," Uda said, breaking the silence as they walked, "did you go to the travel agency to ask about flights to Sumatra?"
He laughed, thinking she was joking.
"You were serious?"
"Of course. I've always dreamed of rain forests. Places that still hold secrets. Endless green beneath the mist. I want to be there."
"There are also mosquitoes, snakes, and paths that don't appear on any map," he said with a smile.
Uda shook her head, amused.
"You're impossible. You always see the gloomy side. Those places are untouched, Ivo. Places that haven't been ravaged yet. I want to see something like that before the world reaches it."
"And we're going to be the ones who 'don't touch it'?" he said, laughing again.
She nudged him gently with her shoulder.
"Don't ruin my dream."
He sighed.
"Uda... getting to Indonesia costs more than I earn in two years. We could barely afford this trip."
"And if you'd accepted my father's help..."
"No. We've already discussed that." His voice was gentle but firm.
She looked away toward the sea. Ivo stopped and took her by the waist, turning her back toward him. Their eyes met. The afternoon wind moved Uda's hair across her face like a dark veil.
Behind Uda, sunset set the horizon ablaze in warm shades—oranges, pinks, and golds dissolving over the sea. Farther away, to the east, dark clouds gathered, dense, as if a storm were breathing in the distance.
"We'll go," Ivo said, looking into her eyes. "I don't know when or how... but we'll go."
Uda watched him in silence, as though searching for something in his gaze.
"Do you promise?"
"I promise," he replied without looking away.
They kissed slowly, with the quiet certainty of those who still believe the future belongs to them.
After the kiss, they continued arm in arm toward the next beach. To their left, the sunset burned in warm colors over a sea humming its familiar saltwater melodies. To their right, the storm advanced slowly, gathering in dark clouds.
"Do you remember the abandoned house next to yours?" Uda asked with a nostalgic smile.
Ivo laughed.
"We climbed in through the roof. You were afraid of the creaking boards."
"And you stamped harder just to frighten me," she replied, nudging him with her shoulder.
They walked on, laughing.
"And the factory?" Ivo said. "The one we thought was abandoned."
"God..." Uda put a hand to her forehead, laughing. "It was full of guards. They almost caught us. If my father had found out..."
"How old were we... twelve?" he asked.
"I was nine," she corrected him, proud and embarrassed at once.
"We were reckless," Ivo said with a laugh.
"We were brave," Uda corrected him.
They stopped. The sand felt soft and cool beneath their feet as they removed their sandals and shoes. They exchanged the wordless look of two people who understood each other completely. Then Ivo looked toward the dark sky in the east.
"The storm is coming closer."
Uda took his hand.
"Relax. This day couldn't be more perfect. Nothing is going to happen."
Their smiles lit both their faces.
"It's strange," Ivo said, looking around. "In this heat... no one's here."
"It's May," Uda replied, pulling off her shirt. "No one thinks of coming to the beach in autumn. Only us."
"Even better." He smiled. "More room for us."
Uda gave him a mischievous look.
"I can think of a couple of things we could do," she murmured, gently biting her lip.
Ivo raised his eyebrows, amused.
"In the water?"
She nodded slowly three times, without a word.
Then they ran toward the sea like children, barefoot across the cold sand, laughing with the carefree joy that comes only once in a lifetime. The sun descended before them, and the water still held the day's warmth.
The couple entered the cold water and dove beneath it together. Under the surface, they searched for each other, touched, and swam through the golden light filtering down from above. Then they emerged among the waves, laughing and gasping, drenched and happy. They embraced and kissed beneath the few rays of sunlight that pierced the black clouds. For an instant, the world seemed to stop.
Then Ivo opened his eyes after the kiss. His smile vanished. Uda looked at him in confusion.
"What's wrong, love?"
"Look," Ivo whispered, unable to take his eyes from the sky.
Uda turned.
The clouds that had been distant before, soft and dark along the horizon, now hung directly above them. They did not resemble clouds but thick masses, dense as boiling jelly, colliding in slow, heavy bubbles. From the sea, almost imperceptibly, an invisible vortex seemed to be exhaling them into the sky. The water around them vibrated, breathed, contracted.
"What is that?" Uda asked, her voice barely audible.
"A storm," Ivo said. "One coming from below. We have to leave. Now."
"Yes. Let's go."
They tried to move toward shore, but the sea had changed. The current dragged them outward, toward the forming vortex. They struggled for the beach, but the ocean transformed in an instant. Waves began to rise from below, from some deep point, as though something enormous were breathing beneath them. The water pushed and pulled at once, first beneath their feet, like a carpet suddenly sliding away.
Ivo took Uda's hand. They splashed and struggled to keep their balance, their hair plastered to their faces by salt and wind. Then they saw it. A beam of turquoise light pierced the ocean's surface from below. The cold, almost solid radiance enveloped them as though it had chosen them.
Before he was blinded, Ivo made out something else: a metal structure slowly emerged within the vortex. It was dark, dull, and rough, as large as a car, with an upper surface shaped like a mushroom. It seemed coated in nearly unrecognizable organic textures—or at least fragments and scraps of them.
"Ivo!" Uda screamed. "The water is dragging me away! I can't...!"
The current wrenched at their legs, hard and relentless, toward the whirlpool opening beneath them. Uda looked at him with her dark eyes in a way Ivo would remember for the rest of his life: without fear, without words, as though they both knew there was no time left for anything else. Then a steep, violent wave crashed down upon them with all its weight.
The current reversed without warning and pulled toward the artifact spinning beneath the surface. Uda's scream drowned in the water as her hand slipped free. Ivo tumbled through the waves and was dragged across the sandy bottom until he managed to stand. For an instant he froze, unable to understand anything. Then the world broke apart.
"Uda!" he screamed desperately, in a voice he did not recognize as his own.
He threw himself into the sea, plunged beneath the surface, and swam toward the vortex and the turquoise light, toward the solid metal thing spinning without pause. The entire ocean seemed to breathe downward.
For several moments, the rotation spread toward the coast: wind shook houses, cars, and windows; people covered their faces without knowing why. Then, suddenly, everything stopped. The vortex dissolved, the black clouds scattered, and the ocean became calm again. The strange artifact was gone. So was Uda.
No one else on that beach saw what truly happened to Ivo and Uda that day.
END OF AVAILABLE CHAPTERS