I stand up, feel the blanket sliding off my shoulders. I don’t care. Something’s dulling my thoughts. Something that’s making them slower.
I obey a voice inside me telling me I should leave this place at once. And that I should leave the car Gabor got for me. It seems alien, this voice, but it’s crystal clear and commanding. I leave the parking lot behind me; there’s now a steady stream of new emergency vehicles and people arriving.
No one takes notice of me. Someone who can walk unaided doesn’t need attention right now.
The voice in my head is telling me about a defective boiler and an attempt to run me off the road.
And then it repeats the content of an email I saw on Gabor’s laptop by accident.
Munich central station, October 18th. 1:10 p.m. More details to follow.
Not a word about any chief negotiators arriving. Just a date and a time. Exactly the time at which the explosion happened.
29
It’s Munich. The train station.
I’m kneeling in front of the television as though it were an altar, staring at the images, unable to comprehend what’s happening.
The camera captures stumbling, dust-covered people, running emergency service workers, and a half-collapsed building. All of it in a flickering blue light. The journalist, standing in front of the station, is shouting to make himself heard over the blaring sirens in the background.
“We still don’t know the details, just that there were at least two explosions which rocked the central train station in Munich and partially destroyed it. There are a number of people injured, and from what we can make out there have also been casualties.”
The man steps out of the path of two ambulance workers running past with a stretcher. It’s evident that it takes all of his strength and professionalism to keep his eyes fixed on the camera.
Casualties. I’m struggling to breathe. Erik was on his way to Munich station, he was in such a hurry …
My phone is still on the floor. I reach down to pick it up, fumbling because my hands are shaking so much. Only on the second attempt do I manage to bring up the recent calls. I dial Erik’s number.
Please.
Please.
Please pick up.
It takes a while before I’m connected. Except that it doesn’t put me through to him.
The number you have dialed is not available.
It can’t be, it can’t. But maybe the network is just overloaded because everyone is trying to reach their family and friends. To let them know they’re all fine. And at the same time, everyone else is trying to contact their loved ones who they think are at the station. Just like I am.
Try again. Wait. Don’t let your thoughts get carried away, don’t let the images push their way into your mind.…
The number you have dialed is not available …
If it’s not the network, then it must be the phone itself. Lying in pieces under the rubble, along with its owner.
No. I can’t let myself think that. Because it’s not like that. It can’t be.
Another attempt. The same result.
As I dial Erik’s number again and again and again, the live report continues, the red news ticker announcing: Special report: Explosion at Munich central station +++ Number of victims not yet known +++ Terrorist attack not ruled out.
After the tenth or fifteenth attempt, I give up. I crawl even closer to the television, try to spot Erik among the people running and limping on the screen. Many are propping each other up, almost all of them are crying, but they’re all too far away to make out any faces. Somewhere in the background, heartbreaking screams. “Mama! I want my mama!”
Then the reporter again, his pale face staring into the camera.
“We’ve just received more information. It seems that the detonation took part right on the platform, directly next to the express 701009 train which had just arrived from Hamburg. According to eyewitness reports, the explosion must have been very powerful, destroying not just the train but also a large part of the station building.”
In the background, a man passes by who is built like Erik, but his face is unrecognizable because it’s white and gray with dust, with just a sharp, blood-red line across his forehead.
No. Now that the man’s closer to the camera, I can see that it’s not Erik.
“We have an eyewitness who was in the station when the explosion took place,” the reporter is saying. An older man comes into the picture, visibly struggling to breathe.
“Could you describe for us what you experienced?”
The man coughs. “It’s indescribable,” he croaks. “I was just inside the main entrance and suddenly there was a bang, an unbelievably loud bang—and then fire, and smoke. I turned around, but before I did I saw part of the ceiling collapsing inward. On top of … people.” He turns aside, wiping his hand over his face. “If it had been three minutes later, I would have been standing right there. My God. Those poor people.”
“Thank you,” the reporter says, and the camera sweeps to the side, to a medic who is just getting into an ambulance. Then back to the building. A mixture of smoke and dust is still billowing out from it.
I know they aren’t allowed to film inside. Or at least, not to broadcast what they’re filming. Luckily.
They switch back to the studio, where the presenter gives an emergency hotline number for those worried about loved ones. As I note it down, my hand shakes so much that I can barely read it.
But first I try to reach Erik’s phone again directly, wishing nothing more than to hear his voice, so that I don’t have to keep imagining his dead body underneath the rubble.
Nothing. Just the network message again. The number you have dialed is not available.
The hotline, then. The first time I call it’s busy, and on the second try I’m placed on hold.
Waiting, in this situation. Doomed to uncertainty and helplessness. I know I won’t be able to stand this for much longer, and at the same time I’m surprised, wondering where this strong reaction is coming from.
The man I’m worrying about is … No, not a stranger anymore, but neither do I know him well enough to feel this much fear at the prospect that something could have happened to him.
Would I be this upset if it were Darja? Or Ela? I’ve known both of them longer than Erik, have a kind of friendship with both of them. But all the same—my panic wouldn’t be as great as it is right now. I would be terribly worried, sure, and I would try to find out if they were OK, but not with desperate urgency like this.
Ela. Thinking of her raises my spirits a little. If I can get hold of her, that’s better than any hotline. She can make inquiries with her friends in the hospitals—I know she would. She cares about Erik a great deal, she would do anything to find out if he’s OK.
But she doesn’t pick up either. I should have guessed; all of the hospitals far and wide must have put their emergency procedures into action, and with all likelihood there’s chaos at the lab as well.