SUMMER FICTION BONUS:
The Adventurer

Light shone weakly through the little window. Among the shadows inside you could see a man who had collapsed over his keyboard. The monitor glow flickered in front of him. The lower edge of the display said "You die of starvation. Do you want to try again?"

Slowly the man at the computer started to move as the weak light from the dusty window grew stronger. He laboriously got up, felt an increasing hunger. Where was he? Wait, he was in a desert. He could remember seeing a nasty lizard somewhere. He looked around and spotted the bed; no, he must be wrong.

He scanned his surroundings in confusion. Wait, now he knew where he was. How could he have missed it. Naturally he was in Cleveland on a quest for a 1934 Ford headlight, or...

He had to find food, but how? He started opening the window with a can opener, but realized that it was easier without it. He picked up the bedsheets and tied them into a long rope. He handed one end to his wife (who had just then walked in with a breakfast tray) and then swung out the window. Heedless of his wife's exclamations, he climbed the 75 centimeters to the ground.

Now he was at the driveway of a house. If he went north, he would come to a road. To the east was a garden, but that way was blocked by a fence. As a seasoned adventurer he immediately started examining the place carefully even though it seemed strangely familiar. In the flower bed he found a number of tulips, and he pocketed one in case of emergency.

The adventurer went north and found himself at a road which led away in two directions: east and west. He tried east and wandered slowly along the road along rows of houses. Suddenly a pseudo- intelligent being approached him. After a quick examination he found that the creature had a baby carriage. He was now in a situation critical to the success of his mission. Did he need a baby carriage? The answer he arrived at was the only natural one for a real adventurer: dunno! He tried giving the tulip to the creature, which frightened it and caused it to run away down the street.

The man did not let this bother him but simply picked up the slightly battered tulip and continued on his way. One by one he examined a manhole, a streetlamp and a mailbox. In the mailbox he found a letter, but was interrupted by the addressee before he had read more than half of it. It was signed "Kronofogden"1, from which he deduced that there must be a castle in the vicinity. He continued hurriedly to evade the letter recipient who did not like people reading his mail as well as two others in white smocks who appeared out of nowhere.

In front of him loomed the castle. Shining letters right at the middle spelled I.C.A.2 When he approached the doors they parted almost without a sound and he entered an enormous hall.

Slowly, hesitantly, he started walking across the glossy floor. Long rows of shelves towered above him on both sides and restricted his movements. The shelves were filled with multi-colored cans bearing various inscriptions. He took a can and examined it. It read "tomato paste," followed by a couple of magic symbols consisting of alternating white and black lines. He took the rest of the cans down from the shelf, but found only dust behind them so he continued walking. He spotted and grabbed a large bottle filled with a black liquid that might come in handy if he got thirsty. The label said "soy sauce".

Finally he saw the exit. All that barred his way was a lady sitting at a long table where something moved. He tried passing her when suddenly she yelled "Stop! Don't you try sneaking out without paying!" and pointed at the bottle in his hand.

Now he had to find out what the lady wanted. He took inventory of his belongings and decided that he could part with the tulip. No good. The angry red flush increasing in the lady's face and her penetrating stare made him drop the bottle and withdraw hastily.

He had the time however to put a coin in a machine at the exit, which gave him a piece of paper. The number was probably a combination for a safe, he was certain...

A statue stood at the middle of the marketplace. Like so many others, the statue depicted a horseman with sword and was covered with guano. Below it stood a man acting strangely. Sweat trickled down his forehead as he tried to turn the statue to point its arm in some other direction.

Finally he gave up and sat down, winded and frustrated, on the plinth. He looked around with empty gaze. He saw some houses, a church, a fountain and -- aha -- a black hole.

An orange-dressed workman raised his eyebrows in consternation as he saw our friend dive into the manhole and disappear into the darkness.

Carefully the adventurer made his way along the tunnel. Some half-forgotten memory made him expect to find an entrance to the palace of the Sultan or something along those lines. At intervals he yelled "kweepa," jumped a bit, and clapped his hands. These were all simple security measures. Now and then he could hear little splashes and frightened rats swimming away.

Suddenly a thin line of light from a hatch high above him appeared. He opened the hatch and climbed up, but to his disappointment found himself in a back-yard. A board fence ran between two large houses to the north and an imposing building stood to the south. The door of the building was open, but the adventurer naturally climbed through a window that stood slightly ajar.

Shelf after shelf of books filled the room from floor to ceiling. The adventurer carefully pulled out a book at random, but nothing happened. He started systematically to pull out the rest of the books from the shelf. When he got out the book "Martin's Desserts," a title that reminded him of something, something finally happened. A voice started to speak. He turned to see if someone was standing behind him, but did not see anyone. After a moment, however, he realized that he was facing the same way as before. When he turned again, slower this time, he saw that the voice belonged to a bespectacled man who continued:

-- May I help you?

The adventurer considered the question and said:

-- Librarian, give me small yellow card.

The adventurer considered this for a while and then took a piece of paper out of his pocket.

-- 4326, he said hopefully.

-- I'm sure there must be more figures, smiled the man with the glasses.

Our friend then decided to concentrate on other problems. To the librarian's great surprise, he left the room.

The room he entered was even larger than the previous one. The sun shone through a glass dome over some chairs surrounded by plants. Here, too, were books in abundance. He took out "Kite-Flying 101", "How to Spell-Bind your Listeners" and a set of headphones from a boy who had fallen asleep in one of the chairs.

He stopped for a moment and read a magic word on a green- glowing sign at the door. Before fleeing from the little boy who threatened him with his stick, and the man in glasses who had discovered all the books he had pulled down, he managed to snare the green "exit" sign.

The sun was shining from a clear blue sky. The adventurer wandered aimlessly through deserted streets. He should have drawn a map. He found an abandoned house and decided to investigate it. He entered the door which was adorned with posters in some foreign language. When he entered the large hall that filled part of the house the floor suddenly collapsed, and he fell into the basement.

In the dim light he saw old chairs, a bicycle, a ladder, another bicycle, two couches, an easy chair, an electrical outlet, a rat and a rusty food processor. But he saw no readily apparent exit. When he examined the room he found that the door was behind the two couches, one of the bicycles and the rat. He took inventory of what he had at hand and considered the situation.

After a while he got an idea. It was all really ridiculously simple: all he had to do was to connect the "exit" sign to the outlet so the light would come on. Then he could just walk out.

Sadly, his logical solution did not work. No door appeared. Apparently he had to try some other, more far-fetched solution, like raising the ladder to the hole and climbing out. Back on the street, slightly annoyed that the bicycles were too large to get through the hole, he went toward a canal he could barely make out between the houses.

A boat was bobbing at the quay. Ducks were hungrily devouring half-eaten cheese sandwiches. The boat's controls consisted of a mass of levers and gauges, but after a couple of hours our friend got it running and steered away slowly along the western quay.

About 10 meters forward the canal took a sharp turn. Instinctively he increased his speed as he approached the turn. He flew, hair fluttering, through the curve and landed in a kitchen that seemed strangely familiar. He tied the boat to the kitchen table and threw out some debris through the hole in the wall.

Apparently he had been here before. A corridor led to a room where his wife was standing. She held a rope made of bed sheets tied together and seemed surprised. He sat down at a flickering monitor that said:

  What do you want to do now?

You have:
A piece of paper with the figures 4326, a book, a book, a set of 
head-phones and a green electric sign.