A MONK'S TALE

 

 

This tale is part of a project we did at school after studying the importance of monasteries in the middle ages, the rule of St Benedict and monastic life, including the history of the Benedectine monasteries we have in our hometown, Subiaco. Divided in groups, one of our tasks was to write a story in English about monastic life,  set in the past, present or future,  with fantasy elements of our choice. 

The following story was written by Eleonora Campi with the support and help of Alexandru Balan, Christian Micozzi, Federico Mosetti, Riccardo Rossi. They also designed a pop-up book to illustrate the  story as well as a video in which they read it. We really hope you'll enjoy reading it!

Since the beginning of time a river has flowed in the Aniene's Valley. Its fast course and crystal clear water have always been a great attraction for many populations during the years, at the point of unleashing wars for the command of the territory.

 The first to discover this naturalistic treasure were the Equi, that then got conquered by the Romans. They built an aqueduct to bring its water to Rome and also after the fall of their empire many generations kept using its resources with respect,  from the late middle ages to the 2000s.

 The population of Subiaco, a town on the shores of the river now called Aniene, used it to produce energy for a paper mill.

Now it's been 20 years since the closure of the mill and the only people that kept using the river continuously since 1090, in order to water their garden,  are a community of monks. 

 

In fact, in a cave near the stream, lived for a while Saint Benedict who founded two monasteries just on the mountain that overlooks the course of the river.  The community came down to the present day thanks to their very rigid lifestyle. 

 That's what I, Don Gino Forma, love the most about being a Benedectine monk. 

We always start our days waking up in the very early morning, at 5.30, to read together excerpts from the Bible.

At 6.30 we have breakfast with some fruit we grow in our orchard and the morning mass usually starts at 7.30. After it finishes we must go study in the reading room. The only glimmer of technology is in this place, a computer. I enjoy using it every morning to look up some news, but I could never imagine what I was about to read when I opened The Messaggero website:

"The ACEA confesses: radioactive waste were released into a water reserve!"

 

The article talked about an open investigation by the police against the Municipal Energy and Environment Company due to some missing bins of highly radioactive substances. The place where they should be unloaded was still unknown. I was concerned, but all the information was really vague.

Before I knew it an hour went by and I had to go help the other monks with the land growing. 

 We took hoes and shovels and we went to work. 

"Brothers, something moved just near me!" the laziest monk of the community said while taking care of  the pumpkin plants. He was new, young and inexperienced. No one looked up from their activities, as they were accustomed to his complainings. 

"Come on Giuliano, keep it up! It must be a lizard." someone answered. 

But, little by little,  we all began to hear strange noises until the situation became ominous.

 

"AAAAAH!" Giuliano screamed after a while. 

"LIZARDS WEREN'T THAT BIG LAST TIME I SAW ONE!" Carletto exclaimed. 

 We were stunned. Three humongous malformed lizards were eating our tomatoes just nearby Giuliano. They were electric green, with a strange orange malformation around their heads. They resembled dinosaurs. After finishing devouring our harvest they started looking at us as if they weren't vegetarian. We ran inside the monastery while being chased by them. Pierluigi closed the door on their faces just when the last of us was in.

"This won't endure forever!" he warned us after locking it. The creatures were headbutting the wood it was made of. 

"What do we do?!" Giuliano exclaimed in panic.

"The real question is where do they come from. I don't remember us moving to Australia!" Paolo complained. 

"I think I know that... They were shining as if they were radioactive! I found an article this morning, it was about nuclear waste that was released into a water reserve. And we live just near a river! That must be somehow related!" I answered.

 "And now?" Carletto asked. 

"Now it's time to follow our rules. Let's pray!" Giovanni, the wisest, suggested. We started reciting Our Father Who Art in Heaven when we heard a very big roar noise from the outside. 

"I DON'T THINK THIS IS WORKING!" Giuliano began to hyperventilate. 

 

"Ugh, keep calm. I have a backup plan." Giovanni snorted. 

"I'm the oldest  and there's something you don't know about this place... Do you remember Don Sergej? Rest in peace, saint man. He died about five years ago. Before expiring he handed down to me the biggest secret about the miracle that happened here ten centuries ago. The ground started trembling. An earthquake was occurring, and Saint Benedict in person stopped the cliff from collapsing onto this place. Just three little rocks fell by. They had strange symbols on and the monks kept them as if they were relics. Sergej found and studied them about 50 years ago. He discovered that they can summon a person from the past. He hid them behind this structure, for any emergency. I think we need them now." 

 

"Well, who shall we evocate?" The other monks were skeptical, but they had no other choice than trusting his words.

"Our master, obviously!" Paolo responded.

"Eh? No way! What do you want him to do? Pray harder? Better? We're calling Saint George. He beat up a dragon! These lizards must be an appetizer for him!" Giovanni explained.

"That's why you're our abbot! We trust you!" Carletto said.

"Are we sure we want to sacrifice this treasure for this reason? We could call the police, or the firemen!" Giuliano suggested.

"That creatures are radioactive, we could put good men with families behind them in danger  . Instead Saint George is already dead. He can’t die again."  Pierluigi stated. 

 We started looking for the stones. One was hidden under a floor tile just at the base of the only picture of Saint Francis in the monastery, painted while he was still young. Another one was between the gravel of the disused holy crows cage, and the last one was in the cave where Saint Benedict used to pray when he was a hermit. We brought them together and stuck them into strange holes in the chapel wall that no one had ever noticed. 

 

A strange fire circle appeared at our feet and all the lights went off due to a sudden gust of wind. 

"We are looking for Saint George, killed by Diocletian's hand. Is he here?" Giovanni asked.

"I'm here." someone responded. He had a deep raspy voice and I felt a big hard hand laying down my shoulder accompanied by a metallic sound. 

The lights came on again. It was him. Tall and massive. Not the classic image of a saint, but of a warrior. He was wearing an ancient Roman attire and he had a giant sword with him. He could have been a warrior of the apocalypse.  

 "I'm here to fulfil one duty. After that I'll fade. Tell me what the matter is." He was serious. 

"There are radioactive creatures outside, exterminate them." Giovanni ordered.

"Consider it done." He accepted and went outside, proudly dragging his sword behind him. We stayed inside, waiting for his return. After two hours everything was too quiet, so we looked outside.

"Where is he?" Carletto asked, not finding him anywhere.

"I found the furrow his sword had made on the ground. He went into the woods. There must have been other tainted creatures out there",  I explained. 

 Since that day, we never heard from him again, but we heard from the environmental wardens! We reported that the radioactive bins had probably been unloaded nearby and,  after searching the area they found them! Then we decided to add a little part to the usual tour of our monastery, to show the visitors how much natural beauty we have around us, and how important  it is to protect it. 

 

We also invited tourists and visitors to support our land reclamation campaign  and I even posted an announcement about it in the Internet! We've started  raising money and soon we'll be able to repristinate the ecosystem near our peaceful home.  

 The end.

Watch our video

 (Written by Eleonora Campi with the support and help of Alex Balan,  Cristian Micozzi, Riccardo Rossi and Federico Mosetti )