There was a plot of land there, fairly large, and surrounded by a fence. It was managed by a certain organization that gave the impression it owned it. But that wasn’t true. The organization merely supervised the lives of several groups of people who lived there—and nobody knew where they had come from.

Each group consisted of roughly thirty members. They were divided up so that every day they could go to a large gymnasium, which was extremely important, since outside of it there was nothing interesting that could be done on the property.

The gym could be accessed by elevators on the western side. Leaving, however, was only possible via elevators on the eastern side. On the southern side there was also a staircase—an emergency exit. But entry was strictly forbidden. Otherwise, the rules would be broken.

In the entire thirty years of Jason’s life, it happened only once that people used that staircase. It was an exception. Five years earlier, old Mr. Novak had suddenly become worse while playing football. Nobody even noticed, and he was already collapsing to the floor—a heart attack.

Believing he could still be saved, they didn’t hesitate and carried him outside via the staircase. That was when Jason noticed that the stairs led up to the roof.

He couldn’t shake it for an entire month. Every day he thought about what would happen if he went up there and broke the rule—but even more, he wondered what he would see there.

Finally, he worked up the courage. He climbed all the way up to the roof while everyone else was in the gym. It was six o’clock. He still had two hours.

Beyond distant forests, the sun was just setting. Jason had never seen anything so beautiful, and from that time on he went up to the roof at least twice a week. Always at six o’clock.

As the sun disappeared behind the treetops, he often asked himself a question:

“What’s out there?”

They said there were rivers, mountains, and seas out there. But nobody had ever gone there, because you weren’t supposed to go there either. The only thing you were allowed to do was play the game in the gym—a game within which anything could then be played.

The game had just one rule: when it was a group’s allotted hour in the gym, no member of that group was allowed—even by a single glance—to encounter any member of any other group.

The problem was that every group that entered the gym via the western elevators, which only went up, could leave the gym only at eight in the evening—the hour at which the eastern elevators went down.

That meant the groups had to hide from one another within the gym. That was how it had always been.

The gym opened at four o’clock. There were five groups. Each group had one hour. The gym was in great demand.

The easiest hiding place was the eastern elevators, where all you had to do was close the doors and no one could see anyone. It was also possible to hide in the toilets or in other rooms like the cafeteria, but there the risk was greater. The most absurd thing about the whole game was that everyone knew that almost everyone was hiding in the elevators. But the rule was not to see one another.

The game became significantly harder when the administration decided that the doors of the eastern elevators would no longer be closed. Panic spread. Everyone feared severe punishment if they were seen. Some group members even considered stopping their visits to the gym. But without the gym, life was impossible.

It was Jason who, one day after the tightening of the rule, noticed a hatch in the ceiling of one of the elevators. He opened it and discovered that above the elevators, both western and eastern, there was a large shaft where they could easily wait until eight o’clock, when the game ended and everyone could leave together.

Now everyone was hiding above the elevators. It went on like this for four years. The administration, of course, knew about it, but they couldn’t come up with anything to make the game even more unpleasant.

One day, as everyone was again sitting in the shaft and just waiting for eight o’clock, something exceptional happened.

“Fuck this, this is boring. I’m done with this shit,” said Jason.

Several faces stared at him wide-eyed. Most people preferred not to look at him at all.

Jason dropped down into the elevator. He was seen almost immediately. They were playing basketball. Everything stopped. An almost grave-like silence fell.

Jason stepped over the elevator threshold and entered the gym.

“Merry Christmas!” he said, and kept walking. It was June.

“Hey, you can’t be here!” someone shouted. It was a big guy, nearly two meters tall, holding a ball in his hand.

Jason saw him and said, “Come here!” Without stopping at all, he walked straight toward the door to the stairs.

“Me?” the man asked, pointing at himself.

“Yeah, you!”

The guy caught up with him and stepped in his way.

“You’re not playing! Why aren’t you playing?”

“Are you serious?” Jason asked, looking him straight in the eyes.

The man couldn’t answer. Everyone was watching, terrified to death.

“You know what? Go fuck yourself,” said Jason.

The man dropped the ball. It bounced off his foot and rolled away.

“Hospital! Hospital!” the man screamed, backing away, almost tripping over his own feet.

Jason opened the stairway door, went down the stairs and walked to the fence of the compound. There was a small gate there. There wasn’t even a lock. He opened it and walked away.