* Author : Natalia Theodoridou

* Narrator : Thomas Busby

* Audio Producer : Peter Wood

*

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First published in Neon #42, February 2016

Mateus Goes Higher

by  Natalia Theodoridou

Mateus can no longer see the ground from the top of his tower. He calls it a tower somewhat pompously, as in reality it is but a crooked structure made of scavenged materials stacked higher and higher towards the sky. But what is he supposed to call it? A stack? Tower is good. It conveys its importance. Mateus balances on the platform of the latest level he has added and begins his descent to collect the materials he needs for the next. The brown cloud swirls around him and a sudden gust of wind blows dust into his face. Bits of sand make tiny scrapes on his goggles. He’ll soon need to find a new pair. He puts one hand on his bandanna and holds it tightly over his mouth. In the little while it takes for the wind to die down, the sound almost drowns out the whisper in his ears: Higher. Go higher.

He contemplates the idea of towers on his way down. Towers can be so many different things. They can be fortresses and observatories. Transmitters. Monuments, clock-holders, and structural parts of a bridge. They can even be tests. Prisons. And platforms from where to dive or launch. Who knows what Mateus’s tower will be when it’s finished and its purpose is revealed to him. But it’s bound to be great. And so he has to go higher.

The moment Mateus’s feet touch the ground, his legs feel like rubber and his stomach turns. After days of living on the tower, with its soft, lulling oscillation in the wind, the sudden solidity of the ground nauseates him. He takes a few moments, leaning against the tower, until the earth stops behaving like the sea. Then he grabs his cart and heads out.

He’s cleared a large area that extends a couple of hours’ worth of distance around the tower, except for a big stack of planks that he’s left next to the base of the construction. For an emergency, he told himself, although he had no idea what an emergency might look like. So far he hasn’t run into anyone in his scavenging expeditions. But with the dust cloud that surrounds everything now, visibility is very limited. He could be a few feet from an army and have no idea that anyone was there. An army. Ridiculous thought. There are no armies any more.

He’s picked a direction that he’s signposted with glowing yellow rods so that he doesn’t lose his way in the dust. There’s nothing else around. The ground is worn asphalt covered in so much dust you could mistake it for a dirt road. His cart’s wheel is whining. He might find some grease to put on it, if he’s lucky. But first he needs to find wood, nails, more metal rods. Bricks and stones are less and less useful the higher he goes; they make the whole structure unsteady. Precarious balance. He’s no architect—Mom loved reminding him of that every time he set out to build something, anything—but he can tell when a tall building starts tilting. The whole way the whisper keeps nagging at him, persistent, unrelenting. Higher. Go higher. But I’m on the ground, he wants to reply. I’m on the damn ground. Go higher. Go higher.

A small pile that starts being discernible a few meters outside the radius he’s already cleared turns out to be a goldmine of semi-rotten planks, broken window frames and black refuse bags.