Why on earth did I come in here? Maybe They are intentionally trying to lure me here? I’ll descend to the basement and a flat-faced kanukas, with a pale smile and swollen fingers that bend every which way, will be waiting for me. But the more fearful I get, the faster I move forward. Only a fool could fear that They would set such idiotic traps. Something much worse has long since been arranged for me, so for that very reason there are many things I don’t have to be afraid of.
I came here the same way others go to a sacred place of their childhood or youth: to the lone hundred-year-old oak on their native homestead, or to their parents’ graves. I could probably shed a tear, or simply remember who knows what — an undefined quivering fog, the haze of an existent or non-existent longing. But actually, this is a just business, an office like any other office, although it’s true the basement windows are barred.
I angrily rattle the doorknobs, try to push the bolts, but even today it’s not my destiny to go inside or to change anything here. I can only look through the little windows in the doors; I hope to see nothing but empty rooms and the indifferent walls of the cells. Only the very first one is empty. In the next one I see a raw-boned, gray-haired man standing in a yoga position on his head; it seems he’s stood there like that for a hundred years and will stand there until the end of time. His face is completely expressionless. He’s wearing a suit that doesn’t stand out; every other Vilniutian could be wearing one like that. Who is he? A refractory suspect, or a lieutenant who had decided to relax in his own particular way? His inertness is particularly shocking. The people petrified in the streets look somewhat alive in spite of it all, but this one, it seems, never did move. All of the observation windows are the same, only the view inside them changes like a kaleidoscope; I don’t even manage to check the faces out carefully. I’m in a hurry, all of Vilnius still awaits me. A man with a horsey face and a remarkably thin neck stares at the bars, an arm outstretched, as if he were preparing to rip the bars out with a single yank. A hollow-cheeked woman with neurotic features who looks like a drug addict stands in a corner, her blouse unbuttoned to the waist, both hands stuffed under her arms as if she were trying to pull her guts out. In a large cell, children concentrating on arranging toys have come to a complete standstill. How did they get here? What are they doing here? Their faces are unnaturally aged and much too serious. They can’t really be prisoners too? Or maybe this is a secret school for born agents, agents from the cradle? In yet another cell sits a large, beautiful dog, a brown and white collie. He sits majestically on the bunk and looks at the ceiling. I don’t even try to understand what that means; I keep hurrying on, something is driving me forward. One of the cells holds an aquarium: the seaweed is frozen, and huge lethargic fish hang motionless in the water; the bubbles are woven together like beads in a necklace. I hurry forward, only forward. The scenes grow confused, at intervals it seems as if all space is divided into myriad squares, out of which constantly changing images look at me. The ever more protuberant eyes of large-headed children. Pale women’s lips ever more distorted in passion. Monsters without faces, only gigantic orbs — perhaps a special variety of kanukas. The corridor bends in the form of a horseshoe, although earlier it seemed straight. It leads back to the beginning, to the first, empty cell (although maybe it’s some other empty cell), which waits for me. But it won’t see me — once again I squeeze past the fat slob stuck in the doorway, once again I make my way down the avenue. I suddenly realize how sick I feel. Really sick.
Vilnius has stopped. Now I don’t just see it, now I even smell that inertness; I sense its petrified taste. But it wouldn’t suffice to close your eyes and pinch your nose shut. Immobile Vilnius has penetrated into every one of my cells, into every nerve. It will remain inside me forever, I will always know that it stopped—even if I’ll see a bustling throng and smell the stench of gasoline and sweat. . Even if I hear human speech. . Everything has penetrated much too deeply inside me: the inert dusty leaves of the lindens. . and the petrified statues in strange poses. . Shout at them as much as you want. Shriek. Tear around. . But they won’t budge. . The great power of movement has vanished. . Vilnius Syndrome eats away at them. . The bug of Kovarskis’s disease eats away at them. . They’re helpless — and I’m helpless too, even though I’m still moving. I’m still alive. God knows how much I’d like to rouse them. . God has to exist, if only to see this. . How badly I want it!. . How I crave it!. . Move! Wake up! Burn the Vilnius syndrome out of yourselves. .
God knows how much I want to stroke that long-nosed girl over there. To push those three children forward. . To turn the branches of that linden to the sun. . Let me be unseen and undetectable. . Let me not exist at all. . But you, move. . Wake up!. . There’s just one thing I want to ask: is anyone else moving? Show him to me. I know that he must exist. I know that he is.
What one person has experienced, someone else surely must have experienced too. Somewhere there really is another Vytautas Vargalys (not necessarily named Vytautas Vargalys). Somewhere there is this person, living in his own Vilnius (it’s not necessarily called Vilnius). Somewhere there is at least one person like that (many people like that), who, at this very moment, is walking the streets of Vilnius. Somewhere, perhaps in his mother’s womb, hides the one who will come after me.
I know what everyone who is moving now is asking, because I’m asking the same thing: have They frozen in place too? Could I catch Them unawares — like those women, those men and children, and the trees, and the monsters, and the fish, and the streets, and the air, and the water, and. . And everything else under the sun, because all of Vilnius (all the world) has come to a stop, only I move and every instant I grow ever older. I grow ever older. . I remember something, I remember something, but it’s maddeningly vague: if you want to awaken those sleeping for eternity, you need to kiss somebody. . or stroke somebody (like that long-nosed girl there?). . Or make love to somebody. . or. .
But who could I kiss HERE — save perhaps the short, stumpy, and powerless phallus of Vilnius?
The frozen avenue looks downwards, towards Old Town, towards Their lair. I’m not walking on the street — I’m walking on the back of a corpse. Perhaps they’ll never awaken — I chase this thought aside, but it won’t retreat. The wind froze, the sky clouded over, the earth no longer breathed — I vaguely recall an old manuscript I read not so long ago. The wind froze, the sky clouded over, cows no longer brought forth calves, nor sheep lambs. Women no longer gave birth to children and water no longer flowed in the river, because all the gods had abandoned the world and nothing could change anymore. But what happened next? What solution did the manuscript offer? The frozen statues push me to the wall, to the avenue’s bricks; even in their lifeless condition they try to block my way. A heavy woman with a red face. Three drunk guys with their chests bared. The same city, the same figures, but every single thing is sterile and dead, like inside Kovarskis’s morgue. But a city should be shaken by convulsions before death. Stinking currents should pour out from the sewers, the Neris should flood its banks, the drowned words should come up to the surface of its waters at last.