BEHIND THE MIRROR
Short Stories and Reflections
by
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Smashed with
fatigue and a long day’s frustration, we cooked something up in a flash and
guzzled it up like wolves. Then we hit the sack. Running late on a deadline and in desperate
need of those shots, we needed to catch some valuable rest, for tomorrow was
not going to be any easier. The weather seemed to have it in for us. The gusty
winds were not subsiding – in fact, they were getting worse – and our chances of
shooting good film were slim and thinning.
As soon as I
closed my eyes I started drifting off. I thought I heard someone ask:
‘Did anyone wash the dishes?’ Then nothing. Just the sweet embrace of a deeply-needed
summer night’s rest in the warmth of a heavy-duty sleeping bag. Outside the
wind rasped, stirring up the snow and blowing it across the endless plains.
Inside our little hut, though, there was absolute peace and comfort, warm
accommodating comfort, and a slow-burning stove. It felt like being with family.
I began drifting into a cosy dream…
I
don’t know how
long I’d slept or how deep I’d been, but when the door banged I felt I
had been
ripped away from something soothing and thrown headfirst into something
terrible. I scoured
around, hearing the others jumping out of their sleep and reaching for
their Maglites, their legs rasping noisily inside their sleeping bags.
Then
came another bang, much louder than before, followed by a growl... a
coarse,
menacing growl.
I flashed my Maglite towards the door and saw it shaking under the pounding of something beastly outside. With my stomach crunching up in knots, I fell to the ground and shone the beam at the bottom of the door frame. Two pairs of paws were standing behind it… white paws… their white hairs frozen into small short pleats, covered in ice crystals, refracting the light into the dark night outside. I blinked. At the end of each paw long claws were pushing out, tearing through the icy ground.
'Get the gun... Get the fucking gun!'
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About the Book
‘Can you put a price on speaking what you deeply, truly
believe in? Or is the voicing of personal belief priceless and fundamental to
one’s own development...?’
Victor is going through a tumultuous patch of life. Tortured and fading, he
writes to his friend and brother in arms, Xavier, asking for an open ear and a
helping hand, but he gets more than he expected; supportive as they may be,
Xavier's responses are forceful and quite unnerving, and they spark a fierce
correspondence that begins to examine reality rather than just reaffirm it.
The exchange of ideas between the two friends gradually
proliferates, piece by piece and story by story, and their perspectives expand
into broader issues and begin to blend into one another. Sometimes hard to
digest, and even harder to delineate, they seem to be set nowhere specific,
taking them on a ride around a misty stage where the actors are faceless and
the scenes nameless. Reality begins to break down, making less sense with every
insight gained, and a grim and overwhelming shadow starts to settle on an
increasingly meaningless world, where the spirit of life is under attack by
greed, anger, fear and disillusionment. With everything in turmoil and the future
under question, it slowly becomes apparent that the way forward, out of the
shadow and into a world of inspiration, is going to be hard to find...
***
‘Behind the
Mirror is a stimulating roller-coaster ride through the politics, personal
dilemmas, mystery and magic, humor and tragedy, of the human condition in
the 21st century. Beautifully written and full of insights and
fresh approaches to old problems, I couldn't put it down '
Graham
Hancock, author of The Sign and the Seal and Fingerprints of the Gods.
***
www.behindthemirror.com
About the Author
Nicolas
Sampson went to study at