who knows

Lets see if this works

All4.tex

@@ -56,23 +56,6 @@
 \newpage % Make sure the following content is on a new page
 
 
-%----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-%	INTRODUCTION SECTION
-%----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-\chapter*{Preface} % Introduction chapter suppressed from the table of contents
-
-\begin{quote}
-“‘I wish it need not have happened in my time,’ said Frodo.\newline
-‘So do I,’ said Gandalf, ‘and so do all who live to see such times.
-But that is not for them to decide.
-All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.’”\\
-\end{quote}
-
-\footnotesize{I started this project because I really like the book series and wanted it to exist in English for others to enjoy.
-I started it in my 2nd year of High School (2013) because I was bored in class, finishing it after I took a break to finish college, get a job, and get married to the love of my life, Alissa.}
-
-\newpage % Make sure the following content is on a new page
-
 %----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 %	TABLE OF CONTENTS
 %----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

README.md

@@ -9,6 +9,8 @@ reading over it too much. I’ll make sure the sentence makes
 some sense, but it isn’t gonna be perfect. I’ll need to go over it
 multiple times later anyway.
 
+You can find all the PDFs [here](https://files.daviddaily.dev/Anders/), that's updated automagically
+
 ---
 
 ## Book 1: The Dead City

book-1/10.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,700 @@
+\chapter{10}
+
+There was no way he could tell how long he had slept,
+but there was one thing that was definitely different:
+The unconsciousness that he had fallen into had given way to a normal sleep after a while,
+even though it wasn't particularly long or restorative in any form.
+Even as Andrew's consciousness glid over the border between sleep and being awake like a dead-tired swimmer,
+he could feel that there was real relief on the other side.
+Not too much had changed.
+He still had a headache and he was still a little queasy;
+at the very best the two weren't as bad as before.
+And his knee had stopped hurting.
+At least something.
+It was surprising how undemanding you get when you're feeling bad enough.
+
+He opened his eyes and at first he felt like he was still on the other side of the river in the burnt city,
+because he was still surrounded by grey twilight that removed all color and blurred the outlines of things as if he were inside of a blurred black-and-white picture.
+On second glance he realized that the explanation was much simpler.
+It had gotten dark outside and the holey curtains that hung in front of the windows in the surprisingly large room he was in blocked out even more of the murky light.
+If he recalled the few short moments before his senses had faded it was early afternoon.
+Apparently he had slept a little longer than he had thought.
+
+That memory let a different,
+more alarming picture rise to the top of Andrew's conciousness that he hastily dismissed.
+He already felt miserable enough without the tasteless jokes that his overstimulated imagination kept handy.
+
+He blinked a couple more times to get out his stupor,
+propped himself up on his elbows and carefully sat up.
+Something glid off his chest with a rustle and as Andrew looked down he discovered two things:
+He was completely naked and someone had covered him with a shoddy sheet that was bristling with dirt and smelled as bad as the bed he was laying on.
+
+Lightly disgusted, but also at least just as embarrassed,
+he sat up completely and swung his legs off the edge of the squeaking folding cot that he had woken up on and slung the grubby sheet around his hips.
+The floor that he set his naked feet on was warm.
+
+Andrew slowly turned his head to look around the room with more attention.
+The pale twilight was making it hard to discern details,
+but nevertheless he saw that the room was very big and furnished with a surprising amount of furniture,
+although they were all very old and in not too good of condition.
+Anything near enough to discern details seemed to be made exclusively out of metal and had burn marks on it;
+apparently anything flammable hadn't survived the catastrophe on this side of the river either.
+
+He heard a sound and turned towards the door that, like the windows, only had a sheet hung in front of it.
+The scrap was pushed to the side and Katt stepped in.
+Andrew could only recognize her silhouette,
+but he could tell that she had stopped abruptly in the middle of taking another step as she saw him sitting on the edge of the bed.
+
+``You're awake?''
+
+``As you can see.''
+Andrew started to cough and had to swallow a few times since his voice wanted to fail him.
+
+``Wait'', said Katt. ``I'll get you water.''
+
+Before Andrew could stop her, she turned on her heel and out of the room.
+Andrew stared after her befuddled, but he actually was thirsty;
+either way she had left so quickly that she would surely be back soon.
+
+He stood up, slung the cloth closer around his hips,
+and clumsily felt around the room for his clothes.
+He of course knew who had unclothed him
+--- even though he wasn't entirely sure why ---,
+but he thought it would be more embarrassing to get \textit{dressed} in front of her.
+
+He just barely made it.
+As the sheet was pushed to the side in front of the doorway again he was busy tying his shoes and only regarded Katt out of the corner of his eye.
+She hadn't come alone.
+Behind her a second,
+smaller shadow
+--- probably her sister ---
+stepped into the room,
+but stood at the doorway.
+Katt carried something in her hands and as she got closer Andrew heard a quiet gurgle that escalated his thirst to an almost unbearable burning in his throat.
+Without tying his shoe completely he turned around towards Katt and downright ripped the metal container from her hands.
+
+The water was warm and tasted a bit stale,
+but he still gulped it down with large, greedy swallows,
+and even though he emptied the whole cup he almost had more thirst afterwards than he had before.
+So as not to waste even the last drop he licked his lips and just now noticed how rough and chapped his lips were.
+The fever must have impacted him more than he had thought.
+
+``Thank you'', he said and held the cup out to Katt.
+``Can I have some more?''
+
+``Later'', answered Katt.
+``I don't think that you should drink too much at once.
+How do you feel?''
+
+The question was tinged with an unmistakeable astonishment to see him not only awake, but also standing and fully clothed.
+She herself had also recuperated quite well.
+She didn't necessarily look in the pink
+--- she was too lean and the traces of lifelong hardship were dug too deep in her face ---,
+but she seemed to have taken the previous day much better than he had,
+which Andrew registered with a slight stab of envy.
+
+``How you feel after a day like yesterday'', he said.
+``Where are we?''
+
+``Yessterday?'', asked Ratt from the door.
+Andrew took a quick look in her direction and a strange feeling washed over him.
+The picture from his memory wanted to push itself forward again, but Andrew hastily dismissed it again.
+Ratt had an odd way to speak,
+maybe even a speech impediment --- so?
+
+``In my house'', answered Katt.
+``Ratt and I brought you here.''
+She made a gesture as he wanted to say something and continued.
+``I would like it if you would sit down.
+We know how strong and tough you are,
+but that won't matter if you just collapse again.''
+
+That was too much, even with all the thankfulness Andrew still felt.
+Eventually she would have to stop getting on his nerves about her carrying him.
+
+Twice, to be exact.
+
+``Listen'', he started.
+``I think that\dots''
+
+The shadow at the door moved.
+Ratt got closer and stepped into the grey light that streamed through the holes in the tattered sheet that covered the window,
+and Andrew stopped mid sentence.
+His jaw dropped.
+The cup slipped out of his hand and fell rattling to the ground, but he didn't hear it.
+
+He stared at Katt's sister with an incredulous look.
+
+His memory hadn't been tricking him.
+
+And it wasn't a nightmare.
+
+In front of him a one and a half meter tall rat stood on its hind legs.
+
+``But \dots that's \dots impossible!'', he grunted.
+
+``Yeah, I'm happy too meet you too\footnote{This needs some work. Book pg. 149}'', hissed Ratt.
+``And if it makesss you fffeel any better, I don't think you're handsssome either.''
+
+``I must be dreaming'', mumbled Andrew.
+Man-sized rats that walked on their hind legs and lisped sassy answers didn't exist.
+
+``Please sit down, Andrew'', Katt asked.
+``I think we need to explain something to you.''
+
+Andrew actually let himself sink obediently to the edge of the bed
+--- even if it was just because his knees suddenly felt like they were filled with pudding,
+and couldn't support the weight of his body any more.
+Katt watched him very carefully,
+and he didn't overlook that she was standing in a somewhat tense position so that she could jump in if he suddenly went limp again.
+This time Andrew didn't take her unmistakeable concern for granted.
+He really felt as if he could collapse at any moment.
+Everything was spinning around him,
+but this time it wasn't due to anything physical.
+He barely heard what Katt was saying.
+He could only stare at the unkempt shape next to her,
+who was now also a head taller than him as he sat there.
+She sneered down at him with her black eyes like a demon from a fever dream.
+
+But it wasn't a dream. In front of him stood a rat.\footnote{Oh shit! Its a rat!}
+
+\textit{Good God, there was a man-sized, speaking rat standing in front of him!}
+
+``Pull yourssselfff together'', hissed Ratt. ``Have you never seen a girl?''
+
+\textit{Not one like that,} thought Andrew.
+He wasn't able to pronounce the words,
+it was if his throat had been sown shut.
+Girl?
+\textit{Girl\textinterrobang}
+
+
+``I told you'', said Katt,
+facing her sister but without looking away from Andrew's face.
+She looked as if she was awaiting a specific reaction from him.
+No.
+As if she was \textit{afraid} of it.
+
+``Bullshit'', hissed Ratt.
+Her whiskers quivered like small nervous antennae as she shook her head intensely.
+``He'sss playing usss!''
+
+Andrew was far from overcoming his shock,
+but he was at least able to look at the rat girl more closely.
+Katt's sister wasn't really a rat,
+at least not completely.
+She was naked,
+so he could see that she was nearly completely covered with thick brown fur.
+Her build was more of a girl than a rodent:
+She had hands,
+her hind legs had turned into feet that were way too small on which she balanced with remarkable skill,
+and she even had a long naked whip tail that was nervously twitching back and forth.
+Her head was also a mixture of that of a human girl and that of a rat,
+but the result was utterly astounding:
+She was in no way ugly or even repulsive,
+in the contrary she was cute in a way that was hard to explain.
+
+``Yeah, whatever you mean'',
+said Katt and pulled a face that made any further explanation unnecessary.
+
+``Why don't you go and get something to eat for Andrew?
+He must be dying of starvation.
+And don't tell the others yet.
+I want to talk to him first.''
+
+Ratt nodded, but didn't move from where she was standing,
+instead flashing a more malicious look at Andrew with her little black button-eyes.
+Then she bared her teeth ---
+just that they weren't rat teeth,
+they were regular human pearly whites.
+
+``That's enough'', said Andrew. ``Now its enough.''
+
+Katt just looked at him questioningly,
+but Ratt puckered up disparagingly ---
+at least that's how Andrew interpreted it.
+He hadn't exactly had much experience reading the facial expressions of a rat.
+
+``You can stop with the theater now'', he continued.
+``I mean: you've had your fun, but I'm good now.
+You can take off your mask Ratt ---
+or whatever your name actually is.''
+
+Ratt stared at him with a murderous gaze and hissed threateningly ---
+but Andrew had the feeling that none of it was real and that behind the staged anger in her eyes in actuality was only tediously ill-concealed mockery.
+
+``The soup'', reminded Katt. ``and put a good amount of meat in it, he has a lot to catch up on.''
+
+Of course Ratt didn't leave without giving Andrew another angry look ---
+but she left.
+Andrew looked after her until the curtain had closed behind her,
+and even then he stared at the direction she had disappeared in for a considerable time.
+
+``Everything okay?'', asked Katt.
+
+``Of course'', mumbled Andrew.
+``I just had a conversation with a rat, but I'm fine \dots I think.''
+
+He tore his gaze from the door with some effort and looked at the girl.
+Katt's uncomprehending look made it clear to him that the irony in his voice hadn't been understood at all.
+He nodded again and this time in a serious tone
+``Yeah. I was just \dots caught off guard. I didn't figure something like this would happen.''
+
+
+Katt remained silent for a moment, then sat down on the edge of the bed with him
+and laid her hand on his thigh with a strangely familiar gesture.
+Her touch wasn't uncomfortable for Andrew,
+in fact it was the opposite.
+Even so he just barely could reign in his reaction to swat her hand away.
+He was frightened and for the most part more confused than he had ever been before in his life.
+
+``You're really from outside, right?'', she asked.
+
+Andrew kept quiet.
+He wasn't capable of thinking a clear thought,
+much less \textit{answer} anything.
+
+``Ratt still doesn't really believe it,
+but I know that its the truth.
+You were talking in your sleep.''
+
+``And?'', asked Andrew.
+`` What did I say?''
+
+``To be honest I didn't understand most of it'', Katt admitted.
+She laughed unsurely,
+as if confessing it were embarrassing.
+She raised her shoulders.
+``But maybe it was just pointless mumbling.
+You had a pretty high fever.
+For a time I wasn't sure if you were going to survive it.''
+
+``If I was talking in my fever,
+how would you know that it wasn't all just nonsense anyway?'', asked Andrew.
+
+``Was it?''
+
+``How should I know?
+I would have to remember what I had said.''
+He regretted his rough tone before he was even done speaking them.
+``Sorry.
+But I really can't remember.''
+He searched through his memory but the result was just a more confusing mess.
+He wasn't even sure which parts of what he remembered were real
+and which parts were a nightmare that was following him after he woke.
+
+``I'm not surprised'', said Katt.
+``You almost died.
+You're the first one that got the sickness and didn't die.''
+
+``What sickness?''
+``\textit{The Sickness}'', answered Katt.
+``Anybody that isn't from here gets it.
+Anybody from outside.''
+
+``Like the men in the black suits?''
+Suddenly at least one of the terrible memories that he had made sense,
+even though it was terrible through and through.
+``Is that why they killed their own comrade?''
+
+``They don't take anyone with them if their suit was damaged'', said Katt.
+That wasn't necessarily an answer to his question,
+but Andrew was still too confused to pay attention to that amount of detail.
+``Some of them kill themselves.
+The others die from the sickness.''
+
+``All of them?''
+
+``I don't know'', said Katt with a shrug.
+``It is said two of them were brought here,
+but they already had the sickness and died without waking up again.''
+
+``It is said?''
+
+``I wasn't here then'', answered Katt.
+``It was a long time ago.
+Maybe it isn't actually true.
+Its a really long time ago you know?
+Even all the old ones didn't see it themselves,
+they just heard it from their parents.
+That's why a lot of them don't believe that you're from outside.
+But I knew it.''
+
+The words were spoken with the utmost earnest,
+but something about them didn't feel right to Andrew.
+She believed him so it wasn't that.
+But the way in which she believed him and had taken him under her wing against the others
+(whoever that might be)
+filled him with unease.
+Little by little the feeling that Katt considered him to be one of her belongings crept over him.
+Something that she had found and didn't want to give back.
+
+``Your sister'', he asked. ``Ratt, is she \dots''
+He nervously flicked his tongue across his lips and had to start over.
+`` Is she really your sister?''
+
+``Of course'', answered Katt.
+``Don't you have siblings?''
+
+``Nope'', answered Andrew.
+``And if I had any they wouldn't look like that.''
+
+``Not like \textit{what}?'' Katt said sharply.
+
+``Not like you'', explained Andrew carefully.
+``Not so \dots different.''
+
+He had done something wrong.
+Katt was silent for quite a while before she continued,
+and her voice was noticeably colder but definitely more inquisitive than before.
+``Does everyone where you're from look like you?''
+
+``Like me?''
+\textit{No hybrids between girls and rats?
+Nope, definitely not.}
+
+Katt looked at him expectingly,
+but pulled her had off his leg and scooted a little bit further away.
+``You don't want to talk about it'', she stated.
+
+``No, that's not it'', said Andrew hastily.
+He started to reach out to her,
+but didn't dare touch her.
+Odd, when they were running for their lives she had seemed like a pretty good friend.
+Now that they were alone and in relative safety it felt like they had just met.
+
+``What is it then?'', asked Katt.
+
+``I don't know.'', answered Andrew distressed.
+``I \dots''
+He shook his head helplessly.
+Everything was spinning around him.
+This could only \textit{be} a nightmare!
+He stood up with a start,
+stepped forward and almost fell over because he forgot to tie his right shoe,
+promptly stepping on one of the shoelaces.
+He hastily bent over,
+tied his shoe and wanted to turn towards the door,
+but Katt held him back with a quick motion.
+
+``Don't'', she said.
+She almost sounded frightened.
+
+``Why?'', asked Andrew.
+
+``I would rather if you \dots''
+Katt raised her shoulders.
+
+``If I don't go out there?'', he asked with an accompanying gesture towards the door.
+Katt nodded and Andrew pursed his lips, arriving at the door with two faster steps.
+With a determined yank he pulled the hanging to the side and stepped out.
+But in spite of everything he was still level-headed enough to stop after one step out of the door to look around.
+And in the next moment he was very glad he had done that.
+
+In front of him was a long,
+asymmetrical square that seemed to have been rectangular at one point.
+Now the entire row of houses on the other side had collapsed
+and made an enormous pile of rubble that shoved long fingers of stone and concrete into the square.
+The rest of the buildings were more or less heavily damaged and altogether leaning in the same direction,
+just like he had seen before.
+Red or yellow fire light shone from behind several windows and on the square two or three large fires,
+around whom a number of figures sat.
+In the darkness he could only identify them as stout shadows.
+
+And even that was enough for him to tell that they weren't all \textit{human}\dots
+
+Some of the outlines were too shaggy as if they had fur,
+had long pointy ears,
+or seemed to be humpbacked.
+Andrew saw more than one figure that had a tail trailing them,
+or some that seemed to walk on all fours.
+Even the sounds that he heard reminded him of the grunting of an entire zoo more than sounds humans would make.
+
+``Come back inside'', Katt said behind him.
+After a moment she added. ``Please.''
+
+Even though it was too dark to see the expressions on the faces of the assembled nightmare figures,
+Andrew could still feel their gaze resting on him,
+and the feeling was so uncomfortable that he withdrew only a moment later.
+Katt was still sitting on the edge of the bed,
+but Andrew didn't go back to her,
+instead steering towards one of the ancient chairs and carefully sat down on it;
+a camping chair made of metal that only had the wire frame left.
+
+``They're all like Ratt?'', he mumbled.
+Katt didn't react to the question and Andrew struggled to continue.
+Why was it suddenly so difficult for him to find the right words?
+He usually didn't have any problems with that.
+Eventually he got over himself and asked the question that he \textit{actually} wanted to ask.
+
+``But you're \dots?''
+
+``What?'', Katt interrupted. ``Normal?''
+
+Of course she wasn't.
+\textit{Katt}.
+At least after he had seen her sister
+--- Ratt ---,
+it should have been clear to him.
+She had heard things a while before \textit{he} had.
+Her oddly elegant gliding way to move about and her alarming strength.
+And it was almost as if she could see in the dark.\footnote{Thanks for the catgirls Elon}
+
+``No'', she said after a few seconds.
+Her voice sounded rough.
+``I'm a monster just like the everyone else here.''
+
+``I didn't mean that'', he said hastily.
+
+``Yes, that's exactly what you meant!''
+Katt stood up with a jolt.
+The mattress springs squeaked loudly.
+``Do you want to see?
+Here!
+Look very closely!''
+She stepped towards him and started to rip her clothes off with angry movements
+--- which didn't take long.
+She only had a shirt and pants with nothing underneath,
+and no shoes.
+
+In the pale light that filled the room like dully glowing haze,
+he could only see her body as a silhouette even though she was only two steps away.
+Just far enough away that he couldn't see any details
+--- or touch her if he had stuck out his arm quickly.
+
+At least at first glance her body seemed to be completely human,
+even though it was very lean and emaciated.
+Just looking at it gave him a sharp pang of guilt.
+Under normal circumstances he would have been embarrassed
+that a girl had gotten undressed in front of him just like that,
+but in that moment he didn't feel anything other than sympathy;
+and a gradual increase of anger for a fate that forced a kid to grow up in such squalor.
+Katt's gaunt body was just like her face:
+You couldn't ignore how pretty she \textit{could have been},
+if she would have had the chance.
+
+Then she turned around and he saw what she was actually trying to show him:
+Between her bony shoulder blades a striped strip of fluffy fur
+that followed her spine and ended right above her butt cheeks;
+as if it were supposed to end in a tail that to his relief wasn't there.
+
+Katt stood there motionless for a few seconds,
+then turned her head and looked at him through blinking eyes.
+Was he going crazy or did her pupils suddenly look small and shaped like those of a cat?
+
+``And?'', she asked pointedly.
+``Satisfied?
+Is it what you wanted to know or am I not monstrous enough?"
+
+After some hesitation Andrew stuck out his hand.
+he had to stand up to get to her,
+and even the he hesitated again before touching her.
+
+When he finally did it,
+it was the strangest feeling he had ever had.
+It felt like regular cat hair,
+but it was on the back of a \textit{human girl},
+and that felt more uncanny and\textit{wrong} than he couldn't have imagined a second ago.
+
+Katt recoiled slightly and shuddered from his touch,
+but Andrew had the feeling that it was for a completely different reason.
+
+He quickly chased away that thought and pulled his hand back.
+Katt turned around to him and laid her head into her neck to look up at him,
+and for a moment they were very close to each other.
+Her eyes weren't slits like cat ears any more,
+instead being large and round and seemed to be endlessly deep.
+Her look was so vulnerable and shy that it reminded Andrew of a scared deer.
+He raised his hand again,
+and the curtain behind them was pushed to the side and a hissing voice asked ``Am I disssssturbing you?''
+
+Andrew recoiled so quickly and abruptly that he tripped over the chair that he had just been sitting on.
+For half a second he stood there in an almost grotesque stance,
+waving his hands in the air to try and regain his balance before he fell over.
+
+For once he didn't hurt himself,
+but he still lay there for two,
+three seconds before struggling to his feet.
+Ratt stood in the door and held a metal bowl with steaming contents in her dainty hands.
+She grinned shamelessly as her gaze wandered between Andrew and Katt.
+
+Katt had taken a step back as well.
+All of a sudden it seemed that she was embarrassed to be in front of Andrew like that,
+because she folded her arms in front of her chest for a moment before bending over to collect her clothes and slip into them.
+
+``No'', she belatedly answered Ratt's question while attempting to skewer Andrew with her glances.
+``Andrew just wanted to see how far my deformations reached.''
+
+``I never said that!'', protested Andrew.
+Of course he had said that.
+At least \textit{meant} it.
+Katt left it at another scornful look and stuffed her shirt into her pants with angry movements.
+Andrew could see in her eyes that she was getting more and more embarrassed that she had gotten undressed in front of him with every second.
+
+Ratt grinned even wider and got closer.
+Her tail was waving amusedly while she held out the bowl.
+Andrew automatically grabbed for it and just barely didn't drop it.
+The metal was as hot as its contents seemed to be.
+He quickly took a step back and set the bowl on the table.
+Ratt's grin didn't change a bit the whole time,
+but he was pretty sure she had done it on purpose.
+Her hands looked as vulnerable as baby fingers,
+but apparently she could withstand significantly more heat than he could.
+Or she had just kept her cool very well.
+
+So as not to make the situation even more uncomfortable,
+he hastily set the stool that he had just tripped over upright and fished the rusty spoon out of the bowl.
+Of course it had slipped in,
+so he had to burn his fingers even more while he was fishing it out of the hot soup,
+but he would do anything to keep Ratt's grin from growing any larger.
+Without making a face he wiped the spoon handle,
+then his hands on his pants and started eating.
+The sou was so hot that he burnt his tongue immediately,
+and his fever-torn lips weren't exactly happy about it either.
+
+But maybe it was a good thing that the soup was that hot.
+It looked like slightly colored water,
+and probably tasted like it too if he would have been able to taste it.
+Andrew remembered that Katt had asked her sister to add plenty of meat to the soup,
+but she must have missed hearing that or their definitions of \textit{plenty} were completely different.
+Only a few stringy pieces of meat of an unidentifiable color swam in the almost colorless clear soup.
+And the spoon looked like it had been places a spoon definitely didn't belong.
+
+Nevertheless,
+Andrew spooned his soup into his mouth until there was none left and devoured every last shred of the tough meat.
+He only realized after he was done eating how hungry he actually was,
+and the thin water soup seemed to not only not have stilled his hunger,
+but had actually made it worse.
+But after all the last meal he had had was breakfast yesterday morning and he had barely touched it,
+since he was expecting to be able to eat on his father's Yacht by noon.
+
+Andrew almost regretted having thought that.
+Remembering the boarding school and his plans from yesterday showed him with brutal clarity how much his life had changed in the past twenty-four hours.
+Just yesterday at this time he was the son of a rich industrialist,
+living well looked after and far from any dangers,
+who's brightest outlook was going on a two week long Mediterranean cruise with a man who was his father,
+but that he barely knew.
+Since then he had been kidnapped and their plane had been shot down.
+Someone had shot at him with laser guns.
+His best friend was dead, shot in front of his eyes,
+equally meaning- and causeless.
+He had only avoided being eaten by ravenous killer insects by a hair,
+and now he was in a city that had been hit by an atom bomb a long time ago.
+
+Had he forgotten anything?
+Oh yeah, his food had been brought to him by a upright walking rat with a speech impediment.
+
+``Wassss it good?''
+
+Andrew almost let a full second pass before he realized the question was for him,
+and that Ratt had meant the soup with that;
+and then it took him another second to decide how he should answer.
+If she was being sincere and he gave her his honest opinion he would probably snub her,
+and he didn't want that.
+But he wouldn't put it past the pair of sisters to play a mean prank on him	and would be laughing later,
+that he had gulped down their old dishwater out of politeness and the afterward had even acted as if it were tasty.
+He answered with a head movement that was intentionally so vague that Ratt could decide its meaning herself.
+It was just absurd that he was still hungry enough that he had to control himself not to ask the rat girl for another portion.
+
+``And now tell us!'',
+Ratt asked him.
+Her tail whipped around nervously and tapped a beat to an imaginary beat on the floor.
+
+``Tell you?''
+Andrew turned to Katt with a questioning look,
+not to her her sister.
+``What?''
+
+``Of outsssside'', answered Ratt in Katt's place.
+``If you're really from outsssside, you should know what it'ssss like out there.''
+
+``Let him catch his breath first'', Katt came to his defence.
+``He isn't even all the way awake!''
+
+``I think he slept long enough'', answered Ratt.
+
+She bent forwards and sniffed Andrew's face,
+but he wasn't sure if she was just following her nature or taking the joke as far as she could.
+``I don't think he smells like someone from outside.'', she hissed.
+``Nope, not at all.
+He smells more like a dirty spy.''
+
+``Ratt, stop it'', sighed Katt.
+``I am just as curious as you,
+but we should give Andrew a chance to fully wake up.''
+
+Andrew gave her a quick thankful look,
+but he was also somewhat puzzled.
+Katt's skittishness confused him more and more.
+It made the girl even more unpredictable,
+and if it weren't more confusing already Katt added:
+``I can imagine that he has a lot of his own questions.''
+
+``Then you should hurry up and ansssswer them'', hissed Ratt.
+``A couple of the otherssss are already on their way here and they might not be assss patient assss me.''
+
+Andrew payed attention to that.
+``What do you mean?''
+
+``People like you aren't exactly loved around here,
+that'ssss how I mean it.'', answered Ratt
+--- and this time Andrew knew exactly what those words meant.
+
+``Ratt exaggerates'', Katt intruded.
+With an angry look in Ratt's direction she added:
+``As per usual.''
+
+Ratt reacted by sticking her tongue out at her sister,
+shamelessly grinning the whole time.
+
+``Go away and take care of Bat'', said Katt.
+``And keep the others away from us for a minute.
+Please.'',
+she added after a moment and with audible hesitation.
+
+Ratt stared at her sister for another heartbeat with her provocative eyes,
+but then she threw her head in her neck and strutted out the door insulted to a level that little sisters of all time and of all people
+(and as Andrew was beginning to suspect, species) were capable of.
+
+He waited until right after Ratt had left the room,
+then turned around to Katt with a worried look.
+``What did she mean with that?''
+
+``Ratt loves exaggerating'', answered Katt,
+but Andrew felt that it wasn't the truth.
+Katt was suddenly noticeably more nervous than before her sister had come in.
+She stepped back and forth in place uneasily for a moment and then continued without looking him in the eyes.
+
+``It can't hurt to be a little careful, you know?
+A couple of the others \dots weren't happy that I brought you with me.
+And one of two \dots''
+
+``\dots think I'm a spy,
+I know.'', Andrew finished her sentence when Katt didn't.
+``Maybe it would be good if I knew who's side I was apparently spying for?''
+
+Katt hemmed and hawed for a moment and Andrew could see that she was straining
+to find a good excuse or some pretence so she wouldn't have to answer him.
+
+She didn't need either of them.
+The curtain was pulled to the side and three so completely different figures stepped in,
+that Andrew had to reign himself in with all his might not to cough from the appalling view,
+even though he somewhat knew what to expect.
+
+At least he believed he had known.
+
+The first one was about as big as him,
+just as emaciated and haggard as Katt and looked like a normal human at first look,
+but had something unmistakeably dog-like to him that expressed itself more in his behavior than physically.
+Directly behind him a figure stepped into the house who's gender Andrew couldn't have possibly guessed.
+In contrast he could very easily identify the species who's DNA had snaked its way into its human ancestors.
+Sleek reptilian scales spanned over a flat,
+nearly expressionless face,
+and just like on a snake his long split tongue moved mistrustful in his direction,
+seeming to take in as much information as the yellow reptilian eyes that stared at him coldly.
+Their eyelids were even thinner than Katt and the Dog-man's and trembled with every movement as if they had no bones or a couple dozen additional joints.
+
+The third creature was so big that it had to bend down to get through the door to step inside,
+and when it stood back up Andrew couldn't hold down an unbelieving cough.
+
+It was a living, breathing, minotaur.

book-1/11.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,321 @@
+\chapter{11}
+
+The Minotaur was colossal.
+Even without the mighty horns that bent forwards he was at least two meters tall.
+His naked torso had the form and dimensions of a large wine barrel,
+and even though hunger and other deprivations had left an irreversible mark on him,
+his muscles looked like they would break railroad ties just for fun some times.
+The face was one hundred percent that of a bull,
+but from his neck down he seemed to be a normal person:
+if you ignored the nearly monstrous musculature.
+
+``So it is true'', the dog man growled.
+``He's finally awake\footnote{You were trying to cross the border, right?}''
+He actually \textit{growled},
+even though it was clearly modulated and had a surprisingly pleasant sound.
+All the same every word he said seemed to be accompanied by a threatening growling.
+The reptilian being didn't add anything,
+but its tongue flicked in Andrew's direction more nervously than it had been.
+
+``Then maybe we can talk to him now'', the minotaur added.
+His voice was just as resonant and deep as Andrew had imagined,
+but he spoke very slowly and added an audible pause after every word as if it were difficult for him to speak.
+Maybe his vocal cords were more that of a bull than those of a human,
+Andrew thought.
+The brain behind that massive forehead was definitely human,
+which he could tell from one look into his large unmistakeably intelligence-filled eyes.
+Andrew made a mental note not to underestimate the minotaur.
+This creature was not only strong,
+but also smart.
+
+He raised his shoulders.
+``No objections.''
+
+Katt gave him an almost imploring look.
+``This is Andrew'', she said hastily,
+then just as quickly she pointed to the dog man,
+the snake, and the minotaur.
+``Rex, Liz, and Bull, the oldest in the tribe.''
+
+Short names seemed to be very beloved here,
+Andrew thought amused,
+and just as \textit{unimaginative}.
+As to their authenticity he only had more doubts.
+He wouldn't dare guessing the age of the snake person,
+much less the minotaur,
+but there was no way Rex was older than Katt.
+
+``You can't expect too much from him'',
+Katt continued to the three \textit{elders} in an abrupt tone and distinctly louder than it needed to be.
+Andrew had the feeling that she was just talking so that \textit{he} wouldn't say anything.
+``He's still somewhat flustered and his fever isn't all the way gone!''
+
+She made a circular motion near her temple,
+which apparently meant the same thing across cultures and species.
+When she turned around to Andrew she gave him the same imploring look she had given him earlier.
+It was impossible to overlook the immense respect she had for the three figures.
+
+``Why don't you let us decide that, Katt?'', asked Bull.
+The words confirmed Andrew's suspicion.
+The minotaur was the leader of the three.
+
+``Sure'', Katt said nervously.
+
+``Why don't you wait outside?'', the minotaur suggested.
+``You can help Ratt with Bat. I don't think she is doing too well.''
+
+Katt hesitated and Andrew smiled at her and said cheerily:
+``Go ahead.
+If they are your friends,
+then they're friends of mine too.''
+He turned directly towards Bull.
+``I will answer all of your questions.
+As much as I can, that is.''
+
+Andrew regretted the last restriction almost as soon as he said it.
+He could tell that the eyes of a bull were able to exude a feeling of mistrust,
+but he didn't break eye contact.
+After a moment Katt reluctantly turned around and left.
+Rex followed her to the door.
+He didn't didn't hide the fact that he was doing it to make sure she actually left and didn't just stand right outside the door to listen in.
+
+``Katt said you helped her'',
+Bull began after the dog man had come back and had nodded to him.
+``Is this true?''
+
+Andrew was a little surprised.
+He had expected that the minotaur would have asked where he was from.
+He simply nodded.
+
+``Why?'', asked Rex.
+
+``Why?'' Andrew didn't understand the question.
+
+``Why'', confirmed the dog man.
+``Nobody helps anyone if they don't get something out of it.''
+
+``Where I'm from they do'', answered Andrew automatically.
+
+``Not here'', said Bull.
+He didn't even take the out Andrew had given him.
+``So, why did you help her?''
+
+It was at the forefront of his mind to just tell the truth.
+\textit{Because I owed her.
+She had saved my life before that and risked her own life for it.}
+But for something told him that that wouldn't have been smart.
+Apparently the values here were different than where he was from.
+
+``Without her I wouldn't have made it'', he said 
+--- which was the truth.
+``She knew the way.
+I didn't.''
+
+\textit{This} answer seemed to satisfy the minotaur.
+``Katt also told us that the dragons had chased after you'', he said.
+``Is that true?''
+
+\textit{Dragons?}
+At first Andrew wasn't sure what Bull was talking about,
+but then he understood:
+Frightening flying monster that spewed fire.
+Dragons.
+Of course.
+``Yes''
+
+``Why?'', Rex growled.
+
+``That I do not know'', answered Andrew.
+
+``You're from outside and you don't know why the dragons were chasing you?'', asked Bull.
+``Why would I believe that?''
+His drawn-out way of speaking gave the words a heft that warned Andrew to be especially careful.
+He had just been wondering why the minotaur hadn't immediately asked him where he was from,
+but now it was clear to him that they weren't talking about anything else this whole time.
+
+``Because that is the truth'', he said.
+``I don't know who these \dots \textit{dragons} are.
+And I don't know why they killed my friend or wanted to kill me.
+Before I came here I didn't know that they existed.''
+
+``Even though you claim to be from outside?'', Rex asked.
+``The dragons come from outside.
+Who would believe that?''
+
+``Not from where I'm from'', answered Andrew.
+In a lightly snotty tone he added:
+``There's quite a few places, you know?''
+
+Rex's eyes flashed with anger and Andrew had the feeling that he had said something that wasn't quite so smart.
+Regardless he not only forced himself to calmly maintain eye contact,
+but also smiled a little.
+He himself had never had a dog,
+but he knew that you could never show weakness towards them.
+
+Liz hissed and Bull said slowly:
+``That's enough.''
+Andrew noticed that the snake had always hissed before the minotaur had said anything.
+Was it possible that he had been wrong and that Bull was just the translator for the snake person?
+
+``I'm sorry'', he said.
+``But that is the truth.
+The world I am from is very large.
+I have never seen anything like these dragons before or ever heard of them,
+you have to believe me.
+I also don't know why they are trying to kill me.''
+
+``Then why are you here?'', asked Bull.
+
+Andrew almost laughed out loud.
+``Definitely not on purpose'', he answered.
+``Nick and I crashed in our airplane.
+At least that's what I thought at first.''
+He instinctively decided to leave off the whole prologue and not to say anything about Scarhand and his companions either.
+It was already complicated enough.
+``But now I think one of your dragons shot us down.''
+
+``An airplane?''
+Rex sniffed his shoulder as if he could tell if Andrew was lying by doing that.
+``What is that supposed to be?''
+
+``A machine'', answered Andrew.
+``A contraption that flies.''
+
+Mistake number \dots oh whatever.
+A huge mistake since not only Rex took a quick step backwards.
+Liz hissed agitatedly and Bills eyes were saturated with mistrust.
+
+``Like the dragons?'', barked Rex.
+
+``No'', answered Andrew quickly.
+``Well yes, but \dots''
+He shook his head confusedly.
+Something told him that a lot of things
+---his life for example ---
+were depending on his next words,
+but it was getting more and more difficult to find the right words.
+
+``But?'', asked Bull/
+
+``An airplane isn't anything special where I'm from.'', he said carefully.
+``But they aren't dangerous.
+You just use them to get from one place to the next.
+Not to kill people.''
+
+``You fly from one place to another one with it?'', barked Rex.
+Maybe it was a mocking laugh.
+``What would that be good for?''
+
+``Because its fast'', answered Andrew.
+``You can go the same distance in a few hours that it would usually take weeks or even months to travel.''
+
+Bull and the dog man looked at each other with a knowing look,
+but Andrew couldn't tell if they didn't understand his question or if they just didn't believe anything he said.
+Or both.
+
+``Then its bigger outside than here?'', asked Bull.
+
+Andrew didn't know how big \textit{here} was,
+but he nodded nonetheless.
+``I think so.''
+
+``And they're all like you?''
+
+``Like me?''
+Andrew asked, but he already felt that the answer was a little too rash.
+From Bull's and Rex's point of view all the other people were \textit{like him}.
+``More or less'', he constrained.
+
+``I don't believe him'', barked Rex.
+Liz hissed and Bull shook his head.
+
+``We will see'', said Bull.
+``For now he should stay here.
+We'll decide what will happen to him after the hunt.
+In the mean time he can stay here with Katt.
+But in my eyes you are responsible for him.''
+He had said the last sentence louder than the rest.
+He laughed and continued after a quick pause:
+```You understand me, Katt?
+Come on in and answer.
+I know that you're standing outside eavesdropping.''
+
+For a moment nothing happened,
+but then the cloth in front of the door was pulled to the side and Katt sheepishly stepped in;
+followed closely from a somewhat smaller shadow with pointy ears.
+
+``As if I needed to'', Katt mumbled sulkily.
+
+The minotaur laughed good-naturedly.
+``I know how sharp your hearing is.
+But the same doesn't go for your sister.
+Instead she is much more curious.
+You heard what we said?''
+
+Katt nodded.
+
+``Then remember it'', Bull continued.
+``And pay good attention to your friend.
+If he does something that hurts the tribe,
+you'll be responsible for it.''
+
+Andrew tried to imagine what it would be like to hold a really long conversation with the bull-headed giant,
+much less an argument.
+It probably made people go insane waiting on someone who took fifteen minutes for each sentence.
+
+``We'll be back this evening and will speak to your friend'', he continued.
+``Make sure that he is rested up until then,
+because we have a lot of questions for him.
+And find something for him to do.
+He needs to work if he wants to eat.''
+
+With that he left.
+Liz followed him and lastly Rex too,
+but not without a final menacing growl in Andrew's direction.
+Katt gave him and angry look and Ratt stuck her tongue out at the dog man
+--- however only after they had left and the curtain had closed so she could be sure he didn't see her.
+
+``So those are your leaders?'', asked Andrew.
+
+``Leaders?''
+
+``Your eldest'', Andrew corrected himself.
+``Those who have the say around here.''
+
+Katt needed a couple ticks to understand what he meant.
+Then much to Andrew's surprise she shook her head.
+``We don't have any leaders'', she said.
+
+``It didn't sound like that just now''
+
+``Bull and the others are the oldest'', Katt said completely uncomprehendingly.
+``Bull is very smart.
+He tells us what the best for all of is,
+but he would never order us to do anything.''
+
+``You all do what he tells you because you know that its the best thing for you'', Andrew assured himself.
+
+``Yes'', answered Katt.
+``Anything else would be dumb, right?''
+
+``Sure'', sighed Andrew.
+He suddenly didn't have any motivation to continue \textit{this} conversation.
+Somehow it demoralized him.
+Instead he made a movement towards the door with his head.
+
+``Can I leave the house or am I under house arrest?''
+
+``You can do what you want'', answered Katt.
+But Andrew hadn't forgotten what the Minotaur had said.
+Of course he wouldn't do anything that would get Katt into trouble.
+
+``Can you show me around?'', he requested.
+``I just don't want to get lost.''
+
+Katt gave him a quick thankful look.
+She had understood.
+Nevertheless she hesitated and only nodded after a considerable while.
+Andrew had the feeling that he had done something wrong again,
+but for the life of him he couldn't figure out what.
+Katt didn't make any efforts to explain anything.
+Without a word she turned around and left the building.

book-1/12.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,324 @@
+\chapter{12}
+
+Even if it wasn't by much,
+the part of the city that Katt and her tribe lived in was different than the part where he had met the cat girl and ran for his life.
+There was one important difference:
+The night sky that spread out above the crumbling roofs of the ill-treated city wasn't a light-swallowing darkness,
+but a completely normal sky with a small sickle moon and countless twinkling stars.
+
+And they had only left the house for a couple of minutes when it got bright.
+The sky in the east started to turn grey and started to brighten almost unnaturally quickly,
+but Andrew kept his thoughts in check even though they wanted to go on absurd wanderings.
+They were high in the mountains,
+which was known for how quickly it got bright,
+but also dark in the evening.
+Even if he didn't have a shred of proof for it,
+by now he was completely sure that he was on a different planet in the future or in another dimension.
+And he was also (pretty) sure that he wasn't having a nightmare or was hallucinating the whole thing.
+He was in the time he belonged in,
+and he was actually experiencing all of it.
+He just did not have a single idea as to why.
+
+Katt had accompanied him out of the house obediently,
+but had stood still,
+keeping just as silent as before and Andrew had left it at that for a while.
+What he was seeing was enough to keep his thoughts busy for a while.
+
+Bull, Liz and Rex weren't the only uncanny mixtures between human and animal that he saw that morning,
+and not even the most bizarre.
+Andrew chose not to focus too much on a lot of the figures to keep them from following him into his nightmares,
+but he did see that not \textit{all} of the members of the tribe were as mutated as Bull or Ratt.
+A lot of the figures that sat,
+ate breakfast,
+or were just taking in the sunrise at the extinguished fire looked completely normal.
+If they even had any mutations they were either hidden under their clothes or were so little that they weren't noticeable.
+
+After they had silently strolled across the Plaza for a while the silence got so uncomfortable that he couldn't stand it any more.
+He stood still,
+ turned around to her and tried to catch her eyes,
+but he didn't manage it.
+Just to say anything
+(and to not talk about Bull and the rest;
+he wasn't motivated to do that)
+he asked: ``How is Bat doing?''
+
+Katt threw a quick glance in the direction that they had come from before she answered.
+Fires burnt in most but not all of the buildings that surrounded the Plaza.
+One of them was lit up enough that it was bright as day inside, with fires even going on the roof of the three-storied building.
+
+``She's getting better.'', she said.
+``She's having a baby.
+But it doesn't look good.''
+
+``I'm sorry'', answered Andrew.
+``Hopefully it isn't anything too bad?''
+
+Katt shrugged.
+``It will only take two or three more days.
+Then we'll see.''
+
+``Is she your friend?''
+
+Katt looked at the well-lit building again before she answered.
+``She's having a baby'', she said as if that were enough of an answer.
+It could be that that was enough of one for her.
+Andrew didn't ask her to elaborate any more.
+He didn't really want to talk about Bat.
+It was just about breaking the increasingly awkward silence to him,
+and he had finally succeeded.
+
+``So this is your \dots''
+He searched for the right word for a moment.
+``camp'', he settled on.
+Katt just nodded.
+
+``How big is your tribe?'', asked Andrew.
+
+``Very big'', answered Katt.
+A trace of pride was interlaced with her voice.
+``We're almost a hundred strong.
+The biggest tribe of all.''
+
+``There are other tribes?'', asked Andrew surprised.
+
+``Five others'', answered Katt.
+``But none of them are as big as ours.
+And we have the most successful hunters.
+Last winter nobody starved to death!''
+
+``And even that is a success, huh?''
+Katt's answer made him mad since he could feel that the whim of fate wasn't the only thing responsible for the miserable life  Katt and all these pitiful creatures had to live.
+
+``That is more than some other tribes can say'', Katt reciprocated in a lightly wounded tone.
+``Is it not like that where you're from?''
+She apparently did not understand his anger.
+
+``Of course not!'', he answered furiously.
+``Most people where I'm from don't even know what hunger is!''
+
+``Then you are from a very happy place'', said Katt.
+She sounded sad.
+
+Andrew was going to give an even more furious answer,
+but left it at a wordless shake of his head,
+adding:
+``Sorry.''
+
+``What for?''
+
+``Nothing'', said Andrew.
+``Well, tell me about your people.
+How do you live here?
+What do you do?
+What do you live on?''
+
+Katt looked at him for a long time and in a way that sent a shudder down Andrew's back.
+``I would much rather hear something about you'', she admitted.
+``About the outside.''
+
+``You don't know anything about it, do you?''
+Andrew's gaze left Katt's face for a moment and glid to the mountains that surrounded the ruined city on all sides but one.
+Only the north was empty of mountain peaks,
+with only hazy distance to be seen.
+``Have you all always lived in this valley?''
+
+``Nobody knows'', answered Katt.
+She shrugged and for a moment her gaze glid in the same direction Andrew's did.
+A peculiar look appeared in her eyes that Andrew couldn't identify.
+But it wasn't pleasant.
+He wasn't sure he actually wanted to know the story that was behind that look.
+
+``I was born here and so was my mother'', she continued after a small eternity,
+unprompted and very shyly.
+``Nobody knows what was before.''
+
+``What do you mean, nobody?'', assured Andrew.
+``There must be people who remember.
+Your parents!
+Or the old ones!
+I don't mean Bull and the supposed old ones,
+but the \textit{actually} old ones!''
+
+Katt looked at him unintelligibly.
+``Nobody gets older than Bull or Liz.'', she said.
+``Bull has almost survived twenty winters.
+Nobody before him has lived that long before him,
+and the only reason he made it so far is because he is so strong.
+But he might not survive the next hunt or the one after that.
+
+``And that doesn't bother him?''
+
+``That's how life is'', said Katt apathetically.
+``Bull knows that.
+Is it different where you're from?
+Do you never die?''
+
+``We do'', answered Andrew.
+``But not like that!
+At twenty?
+Life is just starting at that point!''
+
+Katt looked at him with a look that he didn't understand at first.
+Then as he understood her look he recoiled and felt bad about what he had said.
+If what Katt had said was true,
+then she already had most of her life behind her;
+In fact it was the \textit{biggest} part of her life.
+His words must be pure scorn.
+
+``Sorry'', he said again.
+``But I \dots I just don't understand!
+What happened here?
+Why won't anyone help you\textinterrobang''
+
+``Help?'', repeated Katt uncomprehending.
+``But who and why?''
+
+Andrew ignored the question about \textit{who}.
+The only contact that these pitiful creatures had had with people from the outside were clearly just the men from the black fighter helicopters,
+which these people aptly named \textit{Dragons} and that had already demonstrated what their \textit{help} looked like.
+But why?
+
+``Why did you help me?'', he asked.
+
+``Because you had saved my life before that'', answered Katt.
+``I repay my debts.''
+
+``That isn't true'', Andrew insisted.
+``You started it.
+I would have been dead if you hadn't pulled me off that roof.
+And now don't you tell me it wasn't dangerous!
+They would have shot you just like they would have done to me!''
+
+``Maybe I was just being dumb'', Katt answered spitefully.
+``Or maybe I didn't want them to win.''
+
+Her change in tone didn't elude Andrew.
+Apparently it wasn't common for people to help strangers out here,
+and Katt seemed to be embarrassed to have broken that rule.
+He left it at that,
+at least for the moment.
+
+``So, what happened here?'' he asked again.
+He made a wide gesture.
+``Who did this to you?''
+
+``Did this to us?''
+
+``Somebody destroyed this city'', Andrew persevered.
+``You must know who or why.
+There \dots must be some kind of stories!''
+
+``I don't know what you mean'', said Katt.
+It sounded honest.
+
+``Nobody here has any memories of the past?'', asked Andrew doubtfully.
+``No lore?
+Not even legends of a big fire that fell from the skies,
+of as far as I'm concerned the wrath of the gods,
+or maybe a dragon that had burnt your world?''
+
+``That's nonsense'', answered Katt.
+``It has always been like this.''
+
+``No, god damn it, it was not!'', contradicted Andrew.
+``And it isn't even that long ago!''
+
+``How would you know?'', asked Katt.
+Suddenly her mistrust was back, stronger than before.
+``Until now you have been acting like you don't know anything about us.''
+
+``That is true'', answered Andrew.
+``But you know,
+we have cities like this too.
+Just that they are very different.''
+
+``And how?'', Katt wanted to know.
+
+``Not destroyed'', answered Andrew.
+``Not burnt like this one.
+The houses there have roofs and windows and doors.''
+He shook his head.
+``Have you never wondered who built all of this?''
+
+``Nobody builds anything'', answered Katt offhandedly.
+``It's not allowed.''
+
+``Nonsense'', said Andrew vehemently.
+``Something isn't right here Katt.
+Something happened here.
+Something terrible.
+And apparently none of you want to know what it was.''
+
+``Knowing is dangerous'', answered Katt.
+It came as quickly as a lifelong memorized reflex,
+a litany that she automatically recited without thinking about it for a fraction of a second.
+``And useless.
+What do you get from knowing what happened before?''
+
+Andrew started to formulate a sharply-worded answer,
+but he let it go.
+It didn't make sense to argue with Katt.
+He kept silent.
+
+``Maybe Rex and the others are right'', said Katt.
+
+``Right?
+About what?''
+
+``They say that you're dangerous to us.''
+
+``Yeah, maybe'', Andrew said with a shrug.
+``But you don't have to worry.
+I won't be here long enough to actually be dangerous for you.''
+
+Katt wrinkled her brow.
+``What do you mean?''
+
+``Just like I said'', answered Andrew.
+``I'm definitely not staying here.''
+
+``Nonsense'', Katt rebutted.
+``Nobody leaves from here.''
+
+``Has anyone ever tried it?''
+
+``A couple'', answered Katt.
+``They all died.
+Nobody gets over the mountains.''
+
+``I can'', Andrew insisted.
+Katt wanted to talk back again,
+but this time Andrew's quick and slightly louder tone cut her off
+--- even though he felt like he shouldn't say it.
+``I'm not just anyone, you know?
+I mean:
+I'm neither extraordinarily important nor famous or irreplaceable.
+But my father is a very influential man and is also filthy rich.
+He noticed a long time ago that our plane hasn't arrived like it was planned,
+and he will move heaven and earth to find me.''
+With a snide noise he motioned towards the black mountains that loomed over the roofs of the city
+like gigantic stone prison guards.
+``Those mountains would have to reach all the way to the moon.
+I'll bet it won't even take three days before he finds me.''
+
+``Are you sure?', asked Katt.
+
+Something in the way that she asked that irritated Andrew.
+Maybe it would have scared him if he would have let her.
+He still nodded.
+
+``You had the sickness,
+Andrew.'', Katt said after a couple seconds.
+It was still in the same empathetic tone that was making him more and more uncomfortable.
+
+``And?''
+
+``You had a heavy fever'', Katt continued.
+``We all thought that you would die,
+but you made it.''
+
+Andrew stared at her.
+His heart started beating.
+``How long \dots did I sleep?'', he asked hesitantly.
+
+``Ten days'', answered Katt.

book-1/13.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,213 @@
+\chapter{13}
+
+Almost half of the day was spent in a state of shock between speechless horror,
+bewildered disbelief,
+and anger.
+Ten days?
+Apparently he laid there in a fever for \textit{ten days} without noticing it?
+Other than that it was hard for him to believe it,
+he just didn't \textit{want} to.
+The consequences would have been too frightening.
+
+Just like before,
+Andrew was convinced that his father would try anything to find him.
+Surely he had already started the largest manhunt the country had ever seen,
+and he wouldn't rest until his people had overturned every stone,
+searched every lake,
+looked in every well,
+and grilled every applicable previously arrested wannabe-criminal for any information.
+
+But ten days was an unbelievably long time.
+Of course Andrew had never been the subject of a manhunt,
+but he wasn't the first person to disappear,
+and he had followed other manhunts on the news:
+Hundreds of policemen and thousands of volunteers that searched woods and marshes,
+supported by airplanes,
+helicopters,
+and sometimes even fighter jets that would scan the ground below them with thermal cameras and all sorts of other technical equipment.
+Regrettably, he also knew that the longer the undertaking took,
+the less likely it was that they would be successful.
+Missing people were mostly found quickly
+--- or not at all.
+Most of the missing people that weren't found within the first couple of hours or days would only be found after weeks or sometimes months;
+Buried in the woods and found by people walking by or in a plastic bag that got caught in the dam of a sewage treatment plant.
+
+It took some effort for Andrew to reign in his rampaging fantasy.
+In the end he was still alive,
+and with some luck it could stay that way.
+But not here.
+He just couldn't imagine that his father would give up before he hadn't found him
+--- or held the definitive proof that he was dead in his hands.
+
+Andrew didn't want it,
+but the thought created a reality in his head that he would have loved to deny:
+The men in the black outfits that had collected the wreckage of the Cessna and loaded it into the helicopters that had landed on the plaza.
+Maybe they \textit{had} convinced his father of his death a long time ago,
+and instead of a search party he was standing in front of an open grave with an empty coffin in it,
+just like they did in some symbolic burials.
+Maybe he was already dead and this was hell,
+or at least the purgatory where he would spend the next six hundred thousand years or at least until Judgement Day.
+
+Just that as far as he knew he had not done anything bad enough to deserve this.
+
+The sound of naked feet on a hard stone floor tore him out of his sullen contemplations.
+He looked up and noticed that Katt had come in and was slowly approaching him with an almost shy smile.
+He returned it,
+even though it was more out of relief that it wasn't her sister,
+but not \textit{just} for that reason.
+Ratt had come in two or three times and he was happy when she left every time.
+He didn't have anything against the rat-girl;
+It was quite the opposite.
+Once you got used to the way she looked she was kinda cute in her own way.
+But she was also a complete pain in the neck:
+Her character had inherited a healthy amount of the non-human parts of her heritage.
+
+``How are you doing?", asked Katt.
+
+Andrew shrugged.
+Katt wasn't just making conversation, he knew that much.
+She was actually worried about him.
+``How am I supposed to be doing?''
+
+Katt slowly got closer and stood still two steps away from him.
+Andrew could see how hard she was debating what to say.
+Eventually she shrugged her shoulders and made an awkward hand movement behind her,
+towards the exit.
+
+``I have water duty'', she said hesitantly.
+``Do you want to come with?''
+
+What ever \textit{water duty} was.
+Andrew shrugged,
+letting the motion seamlessly transform into a nod and standing up.
+He had sat here half a day and felt bad for himself;
+maybe it would be good if he got some fresh air and let the bleak thoughts blow away with the wind.
+``Why not?''
+
+Katt looked at him questioning for another moment,
+but then she nodded and went outside,
+Andrew following close behind her.
+
+The sun was shining down so brightly from the cloudless sky that he was forced to close his eyes and raised his hand over his face.
+It was very warm, almost hot,
+and there was not even the slightest breeze.
+Andrew let a moment pass for his eyes to adjust to the change in light conditions,
+then motioned to Katt with a nod that she should keep going.
+She motioned to the left,
+but went in the opposite direction out of the same movement.
+Two steps away from the door an unorganized row of old metal canisters,
+rusty and big enough to hold at least twenty liters each.
+They were similar to the containers that held the \textit{firewater}
+that Katt used to protect the safe place.
+
+She took two of the containers that were apparently empty and Andrew followed her and did the same.
+Katt doubtfully furrowed her brow.
+
+``Are you sure?'', she asked.
+
+``What?''
+
+``The canisters get pretty heavy when they're full''
+, answered Katt.
+
+``Doy you think you've recovered enough to be able to do that?''
+
+``I guess we'll see'', Andrew answered.
+Even though he knew that Katt only meant well,
+they bothered him again.
+Mostly because she was probably right.
+He felt everything but refreshed and as a matter of fact he already felt the weight of the two \textit{empty} canisters.
+But of course he was too proud to accept Katt's almost unnoticeable offer and only to only entertain himself with one canister.
+Instead he added in an obviously spiteful tone:
+``Bull said I need to work if I want to eat.''
+
+``He didn't say that you have to overexert yourself'', answered Katt,
+but left it at a shrug and turned around.
+Andrew was finally smart enough not to continue the senseless discussion,
+but to shut up instead.
+
+In the bright daylight the ruined city made a maybe not friendly,
+but at least less creepy impression.
+The ruins were the same as they were before,
+immense black skeletons that looked like they had never housed anyone.
+The left side of the plaza was blocked by piles of rubble that nobody had seemed to put in the effort to move,
+and even though Katt had said there were at least one hundred members in the tribe,
+most of the buildings seemed to be empty.
+Only a hand full of the doors had the grey rags that Katt and her sister used as curtains.
+Almost nobody from the tribe was currently able to be seen,
+which Andrew wasn't too sad about.
+On the other side of the large plaza some kids were playing,
+but Andrew decided he didn't want to look at them too closely.
+Even if he had gotten a taste of the tribe through Ratt, Liz, and the others,
+he felt it would be better to get to know the rest of the menagerie in homeopathic doses.
+
+Shortly before they left the plaza,
+Andrew stopped and looked around him.
+On the roof of the house next to where Katt and her sister lived a fire was still burning.
+It was too bright to really see the flames,
+but Andrew could see the column of oily black smoke that went almost completely vertical in the unmoving air,
+before it dissolved into the air thirty or forty meters up.
+He blinked questioningly.
+
+``She'll have her child today'', answered Katt,
+who had noticed his facial expression.
+``At the latest tomorrow.''
+
+``You always light a bonfire when one of you expects a child?''
+
+``Is it not like that where you're from?'', asked Katt blankly.
+
+Andrew laughed.
+``No.
+Our tribes are \dots a little bigger than yours.''
+
+``That much bigger?''
+
+Andrew nodded.
+
+``How many?'', asked Katt.
+
+Andrew thought about it for a moment,
+then he made a sweeping motion around himself with the empty canister.
+``Imagine this whole city were full of humans.
+A whole family would live in each room.''
+
+Katt's eyes widened.
+``I don't believe you.''
+
+``And then imagine it was a hundred times as big'', Andrew continued.
+``And there were a hundred of those cities.''
+
+Katt stared at him further in bewilderment and in her eyes a fear appeared that Andrew didn't understand at first.
+She laughed, but it sounded nervous and not real.
+``You're pulling my leg'', she said.
+``No tribe can get that big.
+What would they all eat?''
+
+Andrew mentally warned himself to be careful.
+It might not matter to him if Katt believed him or not,
+but maybe the danger was that she \textit{would} believe him.
+Maybe he wasn't the only one that needed the truth in homeopathic doses.
+
+``Yeah, you are probably right'', he said ambiguously and made motions to continue walking.
+She looked at him for a moment longer with such hopelessness and bewilderment that Andrew almost regretted his own words.
+As they kept walking Andrew mentally warned himself again to be much more careful with what he said.
+He really should be thinking about every word he says very carefully.
+
+They left the plaza and stepped on to a street that was mostly blocked by rubble and other debris.
+It continued straight for a good one and a half or two kilometers.
+The houses,
+even though they were destroyed,
+were still so tall that they held most of the sunlight back;
+At the floor of the brick ravine it was not only darker,
+but also noticeably cooler than on the big plaza where the tribe lived.
+only a small stripe on the left lay in the sun,
+but Katt avoided walking there,
+instead opting to march along the other side even though they were constantly forced to climb over frequent boulders and other rubble.
+Andrew was wondering why she was doing that,
+but he figured that Katt would know what she was doing and followed her without complaints.
+He also passed on asking how far they had to go.
+With two full water canisters the way back would be torture.
+
+While he was closely following Katt he took the time to really look around himself.
+

book-1/Main.tex

@@ -61,13 +61,13 @@
 %	INTRODUCTION SECTION
 %----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 \chapter*{Hey, Listen!} % Introduction chapter suppressed from the table of contents
-{\Huge This is a work in progress.
+{\Huge This is a work in progress.}
 
-\large Current stage: First draft.
+{\large Current stage: First draft.}
 
-\normalsize I'm just going through and translating it as best I can without reading over it too much.
+I'm just going through and translating it as best I can without reading over it too much.
 I'll make sure the sentence makes some sense, but it isn't gonna be perfect.
-I'll need to go over it multiple times later anyway.}
+I'll need to go over it multiple times later anyway.
 
 
 \newpage % Make sure the following content is on a new page
@@ -89,7 +89,11 @@ I'll need to go over it multiple times later anyway.}
 \input{6}
 \input{7}
 \input{8}
-
+\input{9}
+\input{10}
+\input{11}
+\input{12}
+\input{13}
 
 
 \end{document}

book-1/all.tex

@@ -1,10 +1,20 @@
 \part{The Dead City}
 
 \input{book-1/1}
+	\addtocontents{toc}{\protect\setcounter{tocdepth}{-1}}
 \input{book-1/2}
 \input{book-1/3}
 \input{book-1/4}
+	\addtocontents{toc}{\protect\setcounter{tocdepth}{3}}
 \input{book-1/5}
+	\addtocontents{toc}{\protect\setcounter{tocdepth}{-1}}
 \input{book-1/6}
 \input{book-1/7}
 \input{book-1/8}
+\input{book-1/9}
+	\addtocontents{toc}{\protect\setcounter{tocdepth}{3}}
+\input{book-1/10}
+	\addtocontents{toc}{\protect\setcounter{tocdepth}{-1}}
+\input{book-1/11}
+\input{book-1/12}
+\input{book-1/13}

book-2/all.tex

@@ -1,3 +1,4 @@
 \part{The Dark Land}
 
 \input{book-2/1}
+\addtocontents{toc}{\protect\setcounter{tocdepth}{-1}}

book-3/all.tex

@@ -1,3 +1,4 @@
 \part{Title of book 3}
 
 \input{book-3/1}
+\addtocontents{toc}{\protect\setcounter{tocdepth}{-1}}

book-4/all.tex

@@ -1,3 +1,4 @@
 \part{Title of book 4}
 
 \input{book-4/1}
+\addtocontents{toc}{\protect\setcounter{tocdepth}{-1}}

dictcc.sh

@@ -0,0 +1,30 @@
+#!/bin/sh
+# dictcc.sh - simple cli interface to dict.cc
+# Usage: dictcc.sh TERM [LANG1] [LANG2] [NUM] defaults to de->en with 10 results
+if [ -z "$2" ]; then
+	lf=de
+else
+	lf=$2
+fi
+
+if [ -z "$3" ]; then
+	lt=en
+else
+	lt=$3
+fi
+
+
+if [ -n "$4" ]; then
+		num=$4
+else
+		num=10
+fi
+
+echo ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+curl -s -X GET -G "https://$lf$lt.dict.cc/" --data-urlencode "s=$1" | \
+		grep -E "(c1Arr|c2Arr)" | \
+		sed -e "s/var \(c1Arr\|c2Arr\) = new Array(\"\",//" -e "s/);//" \
+		-e "s/\"//g" | awk 'NR == 1{split($0,lang1,",");} NR == 2{split($0,lang2,",");} 
+                END{for(i in lang1) print lang1[i] , "\t" , lang2[i]}' | head -n $num
+echo ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

render.sh

@@ -1,38 +0,0 @@
-#!/bin/bash
-
-cd "$(dirname "$0")"
-
-git pull
-
-/usr/bin/pdflatex -file-line-error -interaction nonstopmode -jobname=All4 All4.tex
-/usr/bin/pdflatex -file-line-error -interaction nonstopmode -jobname=All4 All4.tex
-rm All4.aux All4.out All4.toc
-mv All4.pdf /home/david/fileshare/Anders/
-
-cd book-1
-/usr/bin/pdflatex -file-line-error -interaction nonstopmode -jobname=Book1 "Main.tex"
-/usr/bin/pdflatex -file-line-error -interaction nonstopmode -jobname=Book1 "Main.tex"
-rm Book1.aux Book1.out Book1.toc
-mv Book1.pdf /home/david/fileshare/Anders/
-
-cd ../book-2
-/usr/bin/pdflatex -file-line-error -interaction nonstopmode -jobname=Book2 "Main.tex"
-/usr/bin/pdflatex -file-line-error -interaction nonstopmode -jobname=Book2 "Main.tex"
-rm Book2.aux Book2.out Book2.toc
-mv Book2.pdf /home/david/fileshare/Anders/
-
-cd ../book-3
-/usr/bin/pdflatex -file-line-error -interaction nonstopmode -jobname=Book3 "Main.tex"
-/usr/bin/pdflatex -file-line-error -interaction nonstopmode -jobname=Book3 "Main.tex"
-rm Book3.aux Book3.out Book3.toc
-mv Book3.pdf /home/david/fileshare/Anders/
-
-cd ../book-4
-/usr/bin/pdflatex -file-line-error -interaction nonstopmode -jobname=Book4 "Main.tex"
-/usr/bin/pdflatex -file-line-error -interaction nonstopmode -jobname=Book4 "Main.tex"
-rm Book4.aux Book4.out Book4.toc
-<<<<<<< HEAD
-mv Book4.pdf /home/david/fileshare/Anders/
-=======
-mv Book4.pdf /home/david/fileshare/Anders/
->>>>>>> dev