Part 11: Cuentos Completos 2

The wind whistles.
It cascades over the Atacama Plateau, scouring the sands along the highway. Literary Critic: Oh, thank God! I actually got through!

Literary Critic: Please, don't hang up, sir. You wouldn't believe what I've just been through.

Literary Critic: Listen, we ... we're stranded on some highway in the middle of nowhere. Wanna know what I can see? Well ... sand, sand dunes ... endless sand dunes ... no villages, no steeples in sight ... only a highway, half-buried beneath the desert ... wolves lurking behind the dunes ... not even a single cactus.

Literary Critic: There's a sign just ahead-it says ... Cuentos Completos! It says we're on the Cuentos Completos! That's impossible! I've lived in Antofagasta long enough to know there's no such road!

Literary Critic: There's nothing else around here apart from this phone booth. Weird, isn't it? A road to nowhere, with this strange relic of something that once was ... and somehow, it's now my only hope.

Literary Critic: I dialed every number I could think of-emergency services, roadside assistance, the publishing house, the university, the bank ... Nothing. Not a single connection. I was about to lose my mind.

Literary Critic: I'm still half-convinced this phone booth is nothing more than a hallucination, but then I caught sight of your number. An impossible coincidence-it had been scribbled onto the back of a manuscript, lying forgotten in my car. With a scruffily written note: He can answer any question.

Literary Critic: Call it ... an impulse? A feeling? I can't explain it, but I called your number, and against all reason ... it's gone through! Thank God-I was beginning to think I'd wound up in hell.

Aleph: Hello, madam.

Literary Critic: Please, uh, just call me ... erm ... the Literary Critic. That's what my colleagues call me-mockingly, of course. They think I'm hopelessly out of my depth, a clueless fraud, an impostor in the world of letters.

Literary Critic: But there's no use dwelling on it now. I've accepted the name, just as I've accepted the weight of this job.

Literary Critic: Oh, that's right, I forgot to mention-I'm an editor working for H.A. Publishing House! You know, The Forgotten Crows, The Portrait ... ring any bells?

Aleph: An editor.

Literary Critic: Hah, very perceptive, sir. In fact, that's precisely why I'm out here stranded on this "Cuentos Completos."

Literary Critic: It's my friend Lise's birthday, see. We were supposed to go to the reserve; we were going to visit the geysers and the valley, the flamingos, the little desert towns ... all the things she loves. The colonial architecture, abandoned settlements, remnants of religion, history, natural landscapes, geometry ... It's supposed to be a perfect day.

Literary Critic: Then I noticed something in the backseat-manuscripts I was sure had already been submitted. I had sent them to the publishing house yesterday, and yet, here they are ...

Literary Critic: So I had to turn back to drop these manuscripts off at the publisher. But Lise-she wasn't pleased. We argued, and by the time I looked back at the road, everything had changed.

Literary Critic: We've been driving in circles for ... what, two hours? Three? I don't even know anymore. There's nothing but sand stretching out in all directions.

Literary Critic: Except for a sign marking this place as the Cuentos Completos and this strange phone booth.

Literary Critic: If you can truly answer anything, sir, then answer this-what do I do next?