Hollow World

Chapter Nine All in Good Time

“Your friend seems a little upset,” Warren said as Ellis sat back on the rocker beside him.

Pax was gone. Ellis had seen the familiar Gothic dining room through the portal and felt a desire to go along. Pax’s place was already more of a home to him than anywhere he’d known since his childhood, but he did feel better now that Pax wasn’t here. He could speak more freely, and he had some issues to address with his old friend.

“Pax has been under some stress—been investigating some murders.”

“Didn’t think they had those in Hollow World. The hairless been telling me they got rid of murder, death, warfare—both the regular kind and class—death, racism, sexism, poverty, all that shit.”

“Well, someone made an exception.”

“So what’s the bug up his butt?”

“His?”

Warren smirked. “His, her, its—whatever. Didn’t seem like stress. Acted sorta jealous of me. You two trying out some new-age sex toys? I hear they have this thing called a—”

“It’s not like that,” Ellis said, louder than he’d planned.

“Good. I thought maybe you were going native, walking on the other side of the road, so to speak.”

“I said it’s not like that.”

“Just saying, it seemed that way. And you never know. You hear about guys that go to prison and figure they got no choice, you know?”

“Like I said, Pax has just been under a lot of stress. We’ve been through a lot these last few days.”

“Yeah, well, we all have our crosses to bear. But damn, it’s good to see you. I’ve been wondering if you’d ever show up. Thought you might have gotten something wrong and fried your ass.”

The day was winding down. The lazy light of late afternoon reminded Ellis of after-school time, even to that day. Warren was right; it was hot out. He could see the heat waves rising, making the fields blurry, and hear the cicadas whining as loudly as the traffic used to be on old Michigan Avenue. Ellis, who still hadn’t seen a calendar, reasserted his belief that it was mid- to late summer. He could smell the grass and the scent of manure coming from the barn, and hear a horse snorting. There was corn in one of the fields, and it had to be elephant-eye high.

“Like your piece,” Warren said.

“My what?”

“Your gun.” Warren pointed at the holster. Ellis had almost forgotten it was there. It appeared invisible to everyone else. “Lemme see it.”

He only had a fraction of hesitation before pulling it out and handing it over. After all, this was Warren.

The two had met in the tenth grade—when Warren had also been known by just Ren, because two syllables were one too many for high schoolers to deal with, and in 1971 War was as unpopular as Nixon. They had shared a locker that Warren kept crammed with excess football gear that he had refused to leave in the gym. Old number forty-eight—the jersey was always there. In those three years, Ellis didn’t think his friend had ever washed the thing, and he’d had to hold his breath whenever he went for his books. Ellis didn’t care for the moose he had been forced to share space with until Ricky “the Dick” Downs targeted him.

Ellis was struggling to get his physics book past the set of shoulder pads when Ricky showed up and thought it might be fun to bounce him like a basketball. Ellis got in one good punch, but back then he’d only weighed one twenty, and the feeble blow just made Ricky mad. The Dick howled and punched Ellis in the stomach. Blowing his wind out wasn’t going to be enough to sate Ricky after having been hit. That boy had a mean streak. While he liked to pretend he got his nickname from the size of his prick, everyone knew Ricky the Dick was the sort to kick dogs for laughs.

“Now I’m gonna learn ya why fighting back is a bad idea.” The Dick had told him. “There’s a pecking order to the world, and God put you at the bottom.”

Ellis expected he’d be waking up in an ambulance, but that’s when Warren showed up. Like a game of Stratego, where a sergeant took a scout but a marshal took everything, the scenario played out; Ellis was the geek; Ricky was a basketball player with big sweaty hands, jabbing elbows, and a love of intimidation, but Warren was an offensive fullback on the football team. The “Eckard Express” they had called him on the field, and Ellis caught just a glimpse of Ricky in his Led Zeppelin T-shirt flying across the hall. He had left a dent in locker 243 before collapsing to the tile with a grunt followed by tears.

The principal had wanted to suspend Warren and Ricky both. He wasn’t interested in the excuses of two thugs, but Ellis was a straight-A student with no record of trouble. When he spoke on Warren’s behalf, Ricky the Dick received suspension for a month, and Warren only got a talking-to.

After that, Warren and he became best friends, his only friend for forty-three years. Ellis never was good at making new ones, and those he found had bigger dreams than Detroit could support. Warren, on the other hand, was steadfast, and the two settled together like sediment at the bottom of a lake. They were like Vietnam vets who could only fully relate to other combat vets—Warren understood him.

“Browning, right? Nice little weapon.” He turned the pistol side-to-side and peered one-eyed along the barrel, aiming down the length of Firestone Lane. “Funny, isn’t it? I told you I didn’t want to see the future, that I’d rather go to the past, but I wasn’t thinking back far enough. The Old West—that, my friend, was the real sweet spot. When every man had a pistol on his hip, and every crime ended in a hanging. You just went out, built a house, and lived your life, and if anyone tried to stop you. Bam! What happens in Tombstone…stays in Tombstone. Now here we are in the future but toting guns, living on a farm, and all on a planet with few people and no rules—except those we make.”

Ellis could hear Pax’s voice in his head, screaming, You gave him your gun! The man is a murderer!

He watched Warren play with the pistol, his two missing fingers making it more of a challenge to hold properly.

Two missing fingers. Same hand, same fingers; coincidence didn’t cover that adequately. There had to be a connection, but this was Warren Eckard in front of him. He’d known the man all his life. He grew up with him, had his first beer with him. They saw the first Star Wars movie at the Americana Theater together. Warren was like his brother—a close, protective older brother who’d always watched out for Ellis.

Only…he was different too.

Not just the white hair and beard or the weight loss—there was something in the way he talked. Warren had never been a happy man. He’d spent his entire adult life complaining about how he had gotten screwed. First there had been his mother and teachers who insisted he do better in school, forcing him to quit the football team when his grades had failed to meet expectations, and ruining what he knew was a promising career. Later it had been his bosses, his wives—who had become ex-wives—who never understood his worth. Then there was the government, incompetent and corrupt that destroyed everything. He’d spent years preaching from the pulpit of a bar stool. Many people heard; no one listened. Not even Ellis. He found it hard to heed a voice that dripped of so much self-pity, but all that was gone now. The unfocused grumblings were replaced with a strange optimism that made Ellis wonder if he really knew his old friend anymore.

But it’s still Warren, isn’t it?

Ellis watched him holding the gun and had to repress a desire to ask for it back.

“I was right too. This is the life.” Warren looked over with a sage expression that was another new part of his attire. “It’s hard. Don’t get me wrong. I thought I might die that first winter. Actually ate bugs. Nearly died trying out different berries, until I could tell the good from the bad. That’s the trick of it, learning the good from the bad. Knowing which things you can trust to help keep you alive and those that will sicken and kill you. But My Lord, Ellis, that spring—it was like what all those Bible thumpers used to talk about—a come-to-meeting with God. I felt born again. I crawled out of that grave of dirt and sticks into a new life, a new dawn for old Warren Eckard.”

Warren checked the pistol’s magazine, slapped it back in, slipped off the safety, and cocked it.

Ellis felt his heart quicken.

“I realized there was nothing holding me back anymore. I was free. I could do anything I wanted. No one around to stop me anymore. No laws at all, you know?” He gave Ellis a wicked old-man grin and a wink that shortened Ellis’s breath.

What kind of laws we talking here, Warren?

“If I fucked up, it’d be my own fault. I didn’t think anyone else existed, so I felt like Adam. Just me and God walking in Eden, before that bitch, Eve, showed up and ruined everything.” He chuckled and looked at Ellis. “Why you so quiet?”

“Can I have my gun back?”

He laughed. “Am I making you nervous?”

“Well, you don’t have a good track record after taking the safety guard off mechanical devices. Just concerned you might make a matched set of missing digits by shooting yourself in the foot.”

Warren offered the sort of smile that Ellis couldn’t read: amused, polite, condescending? Then he slipped the safety back on, lowered the hammer, and handed the pistol back before taking another sip of his tea.

“I’m actually surprised you’re enjoying this so much.” Ellis felt his heart coast as he checked the pistol, assuring himself that the safety was indeed on. “No beer, no ice, no football, no women. Not like you.”

“I was a man of no account in a world of wealth. Now I’m a king in a land of absence. Everything is before me. You see, it’s like I was a leftover part in a completed picture, but now the world is a blank canvas.”

“When did you become a philosopher? Four days ago the most eloquent thing coming out of your mouth was the jingle of a beer commercial.”

“That’s part of it. No TV, no radio, no Internet, and precious few books—with no diversions, a man thinks…a lot. I’ve done a lot of soul-searching, and I realized that I was a poor man, who also didn’t have any money,” he said with an amused look, watching to see if Ellis caught the twist of words.

He gave a slight smile.

Warren returned it with a wink. “The world has been erased. We can build whatever we want. We can be the founding fathers of a new civilization. Do it right this time.”

“There’s already a civilization. Millions of people might disagree with your vision of the future. From what I’ve heard, they consider the surface kinda sacred.”

“You’ve spent time with them. You know what they’re like. A bunch of children. They won’t fight. We’re like that Spanish guy that landed in Mexico…”

“Cortés?”

“Yeah—him. He whipped the whole country of Mexico with just a handful of men.”

“He defeated the Aztec Empire with five hundred men, advanced technology, and smallpox.”

“Yeah, whatever. We’re like him. We’re the only two real men left in the world. The rest are—I don’t know, really, but they synthesized aggression out of them. They remind me of my second wife. They’ll scream and pout, but the worst they’ll ever do is call you names and occasionally throw something. We could rule this world with nothing more than our fists and a hunting knife, and yet we both have guns. That practically makes us gods.”

Or devils.

He smirked at the look on Ellis’s face. “Relax. I’m not applying to be the next Hitler, just saying the baldies are content living underground, so there’s no reason we can’t make a town for ourselves right here. Why should they care?”

“They might.”

Warren seemed to ponder this, sipping his tea thoughtfully. Inside, there was a banging of pots and pans and the clap of a cupboard.

Ellis looked down at his gun. Funny that he hadn’t put it away. He always had in the past. He set the pistol in his lap, slid his backpack between his feet, and pulled out his coat.

“You cold?” Warren asked.

“No.” The single word sounded ominous, but maybe only to Ellis, because he alone knew what was coming next.

Ellis pulled the letters out of his coat pocket, where they’d been since 2014. He had considered not mentioning them. What good could come from bringing them up now? Peggy was dead, that whole world gone. For Ellis, however, the hurt was only a few days old, and there was no going forward until he dealt with that wound. His mother had taught him the best way to avoid infection was to pour a solid dose of hydrogen peroxide on deep cuts. It would hurt like hell, but it had to be done before any kind of bandage could be put on—before any healing could take place.

Ellis didn’t say a word. He just handed over the letters. Warren looked at them, puzzled, shuffling through the small stack. “Oh,” he finally said, understanding filling his eyes. “Damn, these are really old. Peggy kept these, huh?”

Ellis only glared.

“What?” Warren asked. Not a trace of guilt, not a hint of remorse.

“You were fucking my wife.”

“Yeah, I was.”

“Right after my son died, you were screwing Peggy.”

Warren was nodding like one of those stupid bobbleheads on a car dashboard.

“Have you got anything to say?”

Warren shrugged. “What do you want me to say, Ellis? That was over two thousand years ago.”

“Not for me. I just found out.”

Warren nodded with a fair-enough expression. “So, you want me to say I’m sorry. Is that it?” Warren looked over at the pistol, still in Ellis’s lap. “Or are you planning on killing me?”

Is this how these things happen? The subconscious just takes control? Is that the real reason he sent Pax away? Was he ashamed of what he might do? Pax thought so well of him; he didn’t want to ruin that. Wasn’t it always the same thing in the aftermath of a shooting?

He was a peaceful man, Officer. Never had a bad word to say about anyone. Don’t know how he could have done it. It just wasn’t like him.

He looked back at Warren. “I don’t want you to say you’re sorry—I want you to actually be sorry.”

“Okay.”

Okay?

“Goddammit, Warren! You were my friend. My only real friend. You had all kinds of women. I had one.”

But you weren’t doing anything with her no more, were you, buddy? You and Peggy hadn’t shared so much as a real kiss in months. And I was getting fat and not the looker I once was. So we did it. I had her in your bed on that nice lavender comforter. Used to sneak up there three times a week to rock that headboard against the wall. Glad you didn’t come home from work early. As they say, if the bed’s a-rockin’, don’t come up the stairs. Peggy even kept her high heels on.

Ellis realized his finger was inside the trigger guard of the gun.

“You really want the truth?” Warren’s eyes glanced at the gun in Ellis’s lap. “She was mad at you. Hated you. Blamed you for Isley’s death—but you already know that.” Warren rubbed his thumb thoughtfully along the side of his near-empty glass. “I was with her that day. I had stopped by to borrow your ladder just as she was coming home. We went to the garage, and we found Isley together. She screamed, and I held her while she cried.

“Then a month or two later, when she started writing me letters, I figured it was because we shared this moment, you know? But I think she was just trying to hurt you. It wasn’t like she wanted me. She wanted to get back at you. I didn’t know that beforehand. It was only the one time—but you already know that from the letters.” Warren handed them back to Ellis.

“We were in the back of her car parked in the corner of a Denny’s parking lot where we went after the bar had closed. Both of us were drunk. Wasn’t my finest hour by a long shot. I guess I thought I was helping her—and I was, just not the way I thought. I figured I was lending comfort to a woman cut off from her husband. Instead, I was providing her with the means to punish you. Course it didn’t turn out that way, because you never found out—until now. Like one of those World War II mines that blows off a kid’s foot fifty years later. She could have told you—don’t know why she didn’t. She’d also said she was going to get a divorce. Didn’t do that either. If you want to know what I think, I honestly believe that even though she wanted to, she just couldn’t stop loving you.”

Warren swallowed the last of his tea—Ellis just swallowed.

“Her revenge backfired in the end. After you did your vanishing act, Peggy became convinced you killed yourself because of those letters. I tried to tell her about the time machine, but you can imagine her reaction. When I insisted that’s what happened, she stopped taking my calls. Never got any response to my emails. She moved to Florida about a year later—but I doubt it was just to get away from me. Never remarried.”

Ellis’s gaze had drifted away from Warren to the fields, but snapped back at the sound of those last two words.

“How’d she die?”

Warren raised an eyebrow. “How should I know?”

“You said she never remarried. If she was still alive when you left, you would have said you don’t know if she ever remarried.”

“Mr. M.I.T.”

“So how did she die?”

Warren sighed. “Car accident.”

“Anyone else hurt?”

“She was alone. Hit a cement freeway viaduct.”

Ellis narrowed his eyes. “Bad weather?”

“Drunk, I was told.” Warren held his stare for half a minute. “At the funeral, her sister, what’s-her-name—the one in Omaha—Sandy! Sandy mentioned Peggy had begun drinking after you left. They tried to get her help. Tried to get her to AA or something. Didn’t work, I guess.” Warren watched him a second. He must have looked upset, because Warren felt it was necessary to add, “She, ah—she finally forgave you—for Isley and such.”

“How would you know?”

“That photo, the one she took of you and Isley at Cedar Point—the one she folded you out of? Sandy said she found it among her things. The fold was bent back, and Peggy had written the words I’m sorry across it with a black Sharpie.”

Ellis began to sob.

The kitchen of the Firestone Farm smelled wonderful. Moist air, born of baking bread, bubbling pots on a cast-iron stove, and meat cooking in the oven made Ellis think of childhood Thanksgivings, Christmases, and Easters. Shadowy figures worked in the streams of light entering the windows and screen door. That, too, reminded Ellis of holidays—of years ago when he was very young, and they used to visit his grandmother. Her house was old enough to have a coal chute, and in the basement she had an icebox and a concrete basin with an angled side where a washboard would attach. His grandmother’s place had been wired for electricity but wasn’t native to it, and many of the rooms were left dark.

The Firestone Farm lacked sound as well as light. The silence was surprising and far more noticeable than Ellis would have expected. For nearly sixty years he’d known the sounds of the inside: air-conditioning fans, the rattle and hum of refrigerators, the buzz of fluorescents, the squawk of television, and the music of radios and stereos. The farm had only the scuffle of bare feet, and the slow tick of a wall clock, which dominated the audio landscape as a metronome setting the room’s tempo. Unlike the coziness of smells and light, the lack of sound was disturbing—the dead atmosphere of a power outage.

They had all paused when he entered, turning while holding clay pots of steaming vegetables. They stared with the same looks Ellis had seen on the students at the crime scene. Maybe they had heard him crying. He’d sobbed for some time while Warren politely took his pistol for a walk to the barn, granting him some privacy. By the time he had returned, Ellis had stopped crying and was feeling empty and achy, as if he’d thrown up. They sat for a long while in silence before someone called them in for dinner.

“Quit your gawking, and get the food on the table,” Warren snapped, coming in behind Ellis. “Have to excuse them. To the baldies we’re like Marilyn Monroe, a unicorn, or maybe even Jesus. Been two years, and I still catch them looking up my skirt. Isn’t that right, Yal?”

Yal was the one with the apron. Despite each of them wearing the same Amish-style black pants and white button shirt, Ellis could tell them apart because each had their names stitched on their right breasts like old-fashioned gas station attendants. Yal had been the one peeking out the door, who now turned away sheepishly to resume stirring a big blackened kettle.

“Have a seat,” Warren said, dragging a chair. Then he walked to the butcher’s block and began sharpening a big knife on a strap that hung from the wall. “I slaughtered the fatted lamb for you.” He grinned. “Except that ole cotton ball was ancient, and I butchered her early this morning before I even knew you were coming—but hey, let’s not squabble with details, right?”

The table was already set with several homemade bowls filled with thick-cut carrots, potatoes, sausage and sauerkraut, and a basket of big fresh rolls. On a plate was a clump of butter, and it took Ellis a moment to recognize it, not having seen butter that didn’t come in a plastic tub or wax wrap. The fist-size glob had finger prints.

“You’re in for a treat, Ellis,” Warren declared. He covered his hand in a towel and threw open the oven’s door. “This is how a man was meant to eat. Everything’s fresh from the garden, the barn, or the woods.” He hauled out a big pan, holding what looked like a quarter of a lamb, the flesh golden brown. As he set the roast at the head of the table, the others took their seats. Besides himself and Warren, there were five—each with Pax’s face but not quite—too somber, too blank.

When they were all seated, Warren folded his hands, and the others imitated him.

“Dear Lord, thank you for this food, and for not frying Ellis’s ass like we’d thought you’d done,” Warren said briskly, followed by, “Amen.”

“Amen,” the others replied in chorus.

In all the meals Ellis had eaten with Warren, his friend had never said grace before. To his knowledge, while the man had always proudly declared himself a Christian, he’d never been to church—not even on Christmas. Thinking about it, Ellis wasn’t sure what denomination Warren was, and he wondered if even Warren knew.

“May I get you more tea?” one of the others asked from across the table.

“We also have milk and wine,” another said with eager-to-please eyes.

They all stared in anticipation of his next word.

Ellis didn’t care. “Ah—tea’s fine.”

The one who suggested it failed to suppress a smile and jumped up as if having received a great honor.

Standing at the head of the table, carving the meat, Warren smirked and shook his head. The scene reminded Ellis of a Norman Rockwell painting, if the artist had grown up in a community of identical Mennonite gas-station attendants.

“I didn’t think religion existed anymore,” Ellis said as Yal passed a bowl of carrots into his hands.

“One of the things I’m working at fixing,” Warren said. “Never thought I’d be a missionary called to spread the word of God among heathens. I guess that comes with that whole being-born-again experience. Got Dex to dig me up a copy of the Bible, and I have them all reading it. Oh—right. Guess I should introduce you.” Warren pointed with the carving knife that was dripping grease. “Dex, Hig, Ved One and Ved Two, and Yal. Dex is our resident surgeon and my third in command. He popped a new heart in my chest not long after we first met. Took care of the cancer and inoculated me against the new viruses too.”

“I was a member of the ISP team before coming here,” the one with the DEX stencil said.

“Was part of the problem, now part of the solution.” Warren slid out mutton chops to a parade of plates. “Hig was a tree hugger or something.”

“A bio-doc,” Hig said. “I was a member of HEM.”

“That’s the tree-hugger movement,” Warren added.

“The Hollow Earth Movement,” Hig said softly, passing Ellis the potatoes.

“Whatever. Hig is now our best fieldhand—great with the crops and the animals. Ved One plays a fiddle.”

“I was a composer of holo symphonies,” Ved One said. “But yes, I also play a violin.”

“Ved Two—no relation.” Warren laughed. No one else did, but Warren didn’t appear to notice. “Was a tattoo artist.”

“I interpreted internal personal expressions into outward identities.”

“And last there’s Yal—our newest convert. Yal is our cook. So if you don’t like the food, blame Yal.”

Ellis looked at Yal and waited, but no correction or clarification was forthcoming. Yal sat at the foot of the table struggling to eat left-handed and not doing a good job. Yal’s other hand remained hidden under the table. Ellis noticed for the first time that the order of food passing was consistent. Warren dished out the meat to Ellis first, then to Dex, then Hig, the two Veds, and finally to Yal.

The meal had all the wholesome purity that an unevenly heated stove could provide. The gravy had lumps, the bottoms of the rolls were burned, and the potatoes undercooked. The carrots were tasty, the sheep tough but savory, and the sausage and sauerkraut was wonderful, and Ellis didn’t think he liked sauerkraut. Imperfection bore its own virtue. Just as a concert album littered with technical errors was filled with more life than a perfectly tweaked studio production, the meal possessed more simple honesty than Ellis had experienced in years. This was what all those characters in movies had spoken of when they yearned for a home-cooked meal, back before the McDonald’s revolution, before the quintessential American meal came in a box.

“Had four new lambs arrive this year,” Warren was saying. “Funny as hell to watch Hig and the Veds experience the miracle of birth.”

“Doesn’t seem natural,” Ved One said. “More like a sickness.”

“See what I have to deal with?” Warren sighed. “Oh—and a great job burning the rolls, Yal.”

“I’m sorry. I’ve only worked with a Maker. I’m not used to a stove.”

“We don’t want excuses here. Get your shit together. It’s a stove, not a rocket ship, and your days of relying on a Maker are over.”

“I will do better next time, Ren Zero.”

“The name is Ren!” Warren raised his voice. “Just plain Ren. We aren’t numbers here—we’re people, dammit.”

Several shifted their eyes to the Veds.

Warren looked annoyed. “I’ve been meaning to change your names, might as well start now so poor Ellis doesn’t get confused. From now on Ved One will be called…Bob, and Ved Two…” Warren twisted his lips, thinking. “Ved Two will be Rob.” He nodded, agreeing with himself. “Restitch your shirts right after dinner, understand?”

The two nodded in perfect unison, which appeared to irritate Warren.

Conversation dried up for a few minutes, the vacuum filled by the ticking of the clock and forks scraping plates clean. Warren glared around the table while the others stared at their food.

“Just the six of you maintain this whole farm?” Ellis asked. He didn’t really care, just wanted the silence to disappear. He needed noise, the flow of words to knock out the thoughts crowding their way into his head, thoughts about Peggy and a photograph with the word sorry written on it. Warren said it was written in a Sharpie marker, but Ellis imagined it was scrawled in blood. He should have left a note. He should have said goodbye.

“Just the six of us live here,” Warren said. “We add new converts by invitation only, of course.”

“Mib will be moving in soon,” Hig said. Ellis noticed that this Firestone fieldhand had a slightly darker tan than anyone else at the table except Warren.

“Which is good, because we could use someone who can run the glass shop,” Warren said.

Dex pointed at Yal. “We’ve lost several glasses lately.”

“Yes, it will be wonderful when Mib arrives.” Yal stood up then, and with a restrained look began to clear the table of empty bowls.

“Yal’s tired of being the new kid,” Bob said—or was it Rob?

“Six live here?” Ellis asked.

“Technically there are seven, but Pol doesn’t live here anymore. Used to, but got picked for the underworld High Council. I gave him permission to serve. Thought it would be in everyone’s best interest to have a”—he formed air quotes with his fingers—“man on the inside, as it were. Pol was one of the original three who found me. You’ll meet Pol tonight. Great organizer. If I died tomorrow, Pol would take over.”

“Take over what?”

Warren just grinned.

Yal came by and picked up the bowl of potatoes, and Ellis noticed the bloody bandages on the stumps of the last two fingers on Yal’s right hand.

As night arrived, Warren lit the hurricane lamp near the door and escorted them into the living room, leaving Yal to handle the cleanup. “It takes a long time to break them of the bad habits they pick up living in the underworld. They think everything is easy. They get here and find they’re wrong,” Warren explained with his new wise man’s voice—the Detroit Dalai Lama.

The living room’s décor was right out of the Civil War, with a couch and two matching black upholstered Queen Anne chairs that looked like something Lincoln might have been shot in. Pea-green-painted walls and dark mahogany only added to the formal funereal atmosphere. Everything had the smell of old books, old wood, and old people that might have been some form of rot. The place was hot too. The sun had baked the house, and the heat lingered in the wood, stone, and plaster. Dex and Hig shoved the windows open, hoping for a breeze, but got only the loud racket of crickets. This had been the life of pre-air-conditioned homes and why so many houses had porches.

Ellis, who felt his shirt sticking to him, was about to suggest moving to the porch when Warren took a seat in the big chair near the dormant fireplace. He put his bare feet up on a stool and said, “Don’t you love this room? I can’t walk in here and not think of Washington and Jefferson and all the others that created our great country.”

“I don’t think the United States exists anymore.”

Warren’s eyes lit up. “That’s just it—it does. This room—this farm is like one of those seed banks they created to allow us to rebuild the world after a global disaster. This village is the seed—the cutting—that will help us regrow America. We’ve got everything: a producing farm, blacksmith, glass, and pottery shops. Hell, we even have Edison’s lab here. This is the heart and soul of America.”

Hig sat on the couch. Ellis sat beside him.

“As we repopulate, we can expand outward from here. We can clear the land, build more farms, and then send some men to start looking for old mines. Maybe we can get a refinery working again.”

“Hard to repopulate without women.”

“Dex has that covered, right, Dex?”

“The ISP kept all the patterns going back to the first ones. They won’t be exactly originals, not like the two of you,” Dex said with reverence, as if speaking to twin popes. “They were altered for disease resistance, and aesthetic appearance, but natural selection should erode these initial genes back to a random state.”

“Still, a pretty small gene pool, right?” Ellis said. His mind filled with thoughts of royal families and jokes about rural West Virginia.

“Hey, the whole world started with just Adam and Eve, and we did fine with that,” Warren said. “So the plan is for Dex to grow us a little harem of women. We’ll be like two old pride lions, like the biblical patriarchs of old begetting a whole new nation of Americans. Go forth and multiply, you know? Think about that. We’ll literally be the founding fathers of the new United States.”

“And what if these women don’t have any interest in being human incubators? You ever consider that?”

“Outdated thinking, my friend. That’s the product of a feminist movement that doesn’t exist anymore. We’ll teach them it’s a sacred duty and great honor. They’ll be thrilled to contribute in such a vital way.”

“Even so, you’re in your sixties now, right? By the time these women are of age, you’ll be in your eighties.”

“Not a problem. Dex says he can extend my life for another hundred years at least.”

“Yeah, well, maybe you…you got your new heart and clean pancreas. I don’t think I’m gonna be around much longer.”

“Jesus, didn’t they fix you already?” Warren asked.

Ellis felt the crackle in his chest—wind across a field of steel wool. “No.”

Warren turned to Dex and hooked a thumb at Ellis. “Needs a new set of lungs.”

Dex nodded. “Absolutely. Not a problem.”

Are all major surgeries dispensed out of vending machines now? Ellis was thinking to ask when he noticed a flash outside. No one moved—no reaction at all. Just as Ellis was thinking they didn’t see it, he heard a creak followed by the slap of the screen door.

“Pol is here,” Yal called.

Pol-789—or fake Pol—Ellis didn’t know anymore—entered the living room. As youthful in appearance as all of them, and still dressed in the flamboyant orange robes of state, Ellis thought the Chief Councilor looked a bit like a college freshman attending a Halloween toga party.

“Aha!” Pol said the moment he saw Ellis, and added with a big smile, “Wonderful. You made it. I’ve been looking everywhere.”

“You’ve met?” Warren asked.

“Yes,” Pol said, smiling. “Briefly, at least. Ellis Rogers was in my office yesterday with Pax-43246018.”

Ellis was impressed the Chief Councilor remembered Pax’s full name. Ellis had never been good with names, particularly foreign ones with odd-sounding vowels and double consonants. Memorizing a series of numbers after a single telling was hopeless. He imagined Pol was the sort that could have recited his license number—if only they still had them.

“We’d just been introduced, and I was making plans to come here to reunite old friends, when events transpired beyond my control.” Pol stared at Ellis, marveling, studying him until Ellis felt uncomfortable.

“What kind of events?” Warren asked, indicating Pol should take a seat.

Pol turned back to the kitchen. “Yal? Can I get a glass of wine?”

“Of course, right away.”

Pol smiled at all of them before sitting in the other Queen Anne chair, which Dex had promptly vacated. Hig got up from the couch to let Dex sit there. Then Rob, or Bob, got up in turn to shift position. Ellis felt he was watching a silent version of musical chairs.

“We have a seating order,” Warren explained. “In the down-under they’ve forgotten all about authority, hierarchy, and structure. People just do whatever they want. I’m getting them familiar with discipline and the pecking order. Pol is number one, then Dex, then Hig, then—” Warren squinted at Ved One. “Are you Rob or Bob?”

“Bob, you said.”

“Okay, then—Bob, then Rob.”

“Do I have a place in this order?” Ellis asked. “And does it require me cutting off my fingers?”

Warren looked uncomfortable, but only for an instant. Then the serene face of an old master returned. “The fingers…well, the finger cutting is necessary for a few reasons. Identification, for one. My way of making certain I can tell the good ones from the bad. These underworlders change their shirts and you can’t tell one from another. Tattoos are easily put on and taken off. Fingers are a different matter. Plus, sacrificing them shows a commitment to the cause. I don’t want anyone here who isn’t in one hundred percent, and these people don’t understand real commitment anymore. They do something for a while, then change their minds and try something else. They don’t have marriage, don’t have countries. How can they understand the concept of loyalty? People won’t sacrifice two fingers without giving things a lot of thought. It’s the dues they pay to join me—to be special.”

“And me?” Ellis held up his right hand, wiggling his fingers.

Warren shook his head. “You’re a Darwin like me.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Means you’re not one of them. You’re above the law.” Warren raised his voice a bit. “And in case there’s any doubt, Ellis stands equal with me, and you will show him the same respect and recognize his authority just as you do mine.”

They all nodded. Ellis was sitting in a huddle of dogs that idolized a wolf.

Warren turned back to Pol. “So tell me who this Pax is and what happened in your office.”

Pol sighed. “Pax is an unusual case. Works as an arbitrator to some effect, but…well, there have been complaints of strange behavior.”

Strange behavior? Ellis wondered what normal was in a world where people walked around au naturel, danced in the rain, no one worked, and their world leader dressed like Julius Caesar.

“Then a few years ago, Pax tried to—”

Yal entered and handed Pol a glass of blood-red wine.

“Tried to what?” Ellis asked.

Pol took a dainty sip. “Pax opened a portal to the vacuum of space and tried to walk through it.”

No one said anything for a heartbeat. Each pair of eyes tried to process the sentence as if it were a riddle, one of those logic problems where a hunter who lives in a house with four windows all facing south shoots a bear, and people try to figure out the color of the dead animal.

“What?” Ellis felt the empty sensation rock him again. He was beginning to feel a little punch-drunk, an emotionally battered fighter unable to put his arms up to defend himself.

“I thought that wasn’t possible,” Warren said. “Thought those things—well, you said they had safety features blocking people from doing stupid shit like that.”

Dex, who was nodding, spoke. “They do. Living tissue is blocked from passing into hostile environments.”

“They do now,” Pol corrected. “The original CTWs had fixed destinations, so no one thought anything about it, but the first few generations of portals—they could go anywhere. After a few accidents, safety features were added.”

“But that was centuries ago,” Dex said.

“Pax, it turns out, is an antique collector of sorts,” Pol explained. “If it hadn’t been for the residence’s vox blocking the field, Pax would have committed suicide.”

Ellis felt guilty. He hadn’t had anything to do with the portal incident—didn’t even know how long ago it had happened—but he had just sent Pax away, crying. What is Pax doing right this moment?

“Are you saying this Pax person is insane?” Warren asked.

“Mentally ill,” Pol said. “Unstable. It’s why Pax lives with Vin-3667, a renowned artist. Vin volunteered to watch over Pax. I talked to Vin two days ago. Vin felt the excitement of being with Ellis Rogers has caused Pax to slip, and suggested Pax bring Ellis to me. Felt that Ellis Rogers was an upsetting influence.”

“So what happened?”

“The two arrived on schedule, but then Pax began venting, going sonic.”

“Leave out your underworld slang, Pol,” Warren said with a growl. “We speak proper American here.”

“Forgive me. Traveling between cultures is—”

“Get on with it.” Warren shuffled his feet, recrossing them on the stool in a manner as decisive as a judge banging a gavel.

“Pax became very upset,” Pol went on. “Acting threatened and frightened of me. Completely irrational. Before I could act, Pax had hauled Ellis Rogers through a portal, and the two disappeared. Thinking Ellis Rogers had just been abducted, I gathered people to help with a rescue. We chased them to Tuzo Stadium and into the jungles of the surface. Then we registered Pax stepping out into space.”

“Again?” Warren asked.

“To be honest, I thought the worst, for both of you.” Pol looked back at Ellis with a smile. “But here you are, safe.”

“Pax is fine too,” Ellis replied, although he wasn’t at all convinced that the Chief Councilor’s concern was sincere. Seeing the confusion on Warren’s face, he added, “We ejected Pax’s chip through a portal into space to avoid being followed.”

“Well, that’s unfortunate,” Pol said. “Now we have no idea where to look. Pax really should be found and helped. Do you know where Pax might be?”

Ellis shook his head. Maybe it was his long bias against politicians, but he didn’t trust the wine-sipping Buddhist monk.

I’ve looked after Pax for centuries, wonderful, wonderful person, and not at all crazy, you understand.

He remembered the tear running down Pax’s cheek.

I’m not crazy.

Was he being blind just because Pax was the first friend he’d made?

He focused on the statesman monk. “How did Pax know about Ren? In your office, Pax asked if you knew who Ren was, and you said you didn’t know. Why is that?”

Pol shrugged. “I have no idea how Pax knew. To be honest, I had no idea who Pax meant. The question was so completely without context. Like you said, how could Pax know? I’ve never spoken to anyone about Ren.”

“None of us is allowed to,” Hig said.

“Shut it while your better is speaking,” Dex snapped, and Hig cowered into the upholstery, looking at the floor.

Pol ignored them both. “I suppose if the question had been about a Darwin named Ren living at Greenfield Village, I would have given a different answer, but I was caught off guard and downright confused.”

“And what were you talking to Geo-24 about? Pax asked about that too. I didn’t catch your answer.”

Pol glanced at Warren briefly as he sipped from his wine again. “How much do you know about Hollow World?”

“A little. Spent about two days there.”

“Do you know about the geomancers?”

“They’re like weather forecasters, only they predict seismic storms, right?”

“Wonderful, but that’s only part of what they do. Geomancers are the descendants of the old energy corporations. Dyna Corp founded the Geomancy Institute in the years just before the Freedom Act.” Pol looked concerned. “How much of Hollow World history are you familiar with?”

“Very little,” Ellis said. “I watched a show where a dancing hourglass told me about how everyone moved underground. Didn’t get all the way to the Great Tempest, though. I fell asleep.”

Pol looked at Warren.

“Go ahead and fill him in. It will save me the trouble.” Warren got up, heading for the kitchen. “Hey, Yal, why don’t you bake cookies or something? Make your lazy ass useful.”

No one moved to take Warren’s seat, and Ellis wondered what would happen if he did.

“The thing you have to understand is that the Three Miracles changed everything: the Dynamo, the CTW, and the Maker.”

“CTW?”

“Controlled Terrestrial Wormholes. Most call them portals.”

“Oh—yeah, I know about those.”

“The Dynamo was invented first, and initially the technology was tightly controlled by Dyna Corp, which supplied the world with limitless energy.”

“Wait a second, what do you mean limitless energy?”

“A Dynamo is a…” Pol looked at Ellis, searching for the right words. “Well, it’s like what you might know as a battery, only it never runs out of power. Well, not never. Never is a very long time, after all. The Dynamo is mostly self-sustaining, although it does lose a small percentage of power each cycle, given that even a tiny Dynamo generates enough power to operate a whole quad of Hollow World for years, it’s as if they are eternal. Similar principle as the sun. It has a finite lifespan, but since that is so long, we never really think about it running out.”

“Fascinating.”

“Ellis used to work on batteries and solar power back in the day.” Warren mentioned, returning with a ceramic cup of something.

“Lithium-ion cells mostly,” Ellis clarified. “At least until everything was moved to LG Chem in South Korea.”

“How interesting all this must be for you then,” Pol said, and smiled. “But getting back to your question—along with the agro businesses, Dyna Corp built most of early Hollow World. They were the first to put their headquarters underground. People were out of the weather, but now had to be concerned about seismic shifts, and that’s when they established the Geomancy Institute. It is devoted to the study of not only seismic activity but also prevention of dangerous shifts.”

“How do they do that?”

Pol started to speak, hesitated, then held up a finger. “I’ll get back to that. We have two more miracles to get through.” Pol took a sip of wine. “The Dynamo was created as a result of the Energy Wars of 2185.”

“You can always count on a war to move along innovation,” Warren said, retaking his seat.

“Another group had been working on solving the transportation problem. Traffic on the surface had become unmanageable, and elevators into Hollow World were jammed, dangerous, and cut into the workday. But it wasn’t until Dyna Corp bought the CTW technology and applied the unlimited power of their Dynamo that the portal was made practical. This threw construction in Hollow World into a frenzy, because portals allowed for easy transportation of heavy equipment and the easy disposal of dirt and rock. All strictly controlled by Dyna Corp, which built portal booths everywhere, allowing people to pay to travel. This also coincided with the Great Tempest, a worldwide nonstop storm that killed millions of people left on the surface. There’s a wonderful holo that was made recently about the heroic evacuations called Ariel’s Escape.”

The others all nodded enthusiastically.

“I loved the part where Nguyen opens the portal as he’s falling,” Hig said.

“Great holo,” Dex agreed with a big grin. “Completely unrealistic, but a great holo.”

Warren yawned.

“Anyway,” Pol went on. “The Great Tempest caused the invention of the Port-a-Call that we know today, but it wasn’t sold except to a very few. Now, the Great Tempest was followed by the Famine. The storms had wiped the surface of usable soil, and there just wasn’t enough food in Hollow World to feed all the refugees. And that’s when the Maker was invented. Created by Network Azo—known to the world as Net. She was an employee of Dyna Corp. Almost overnight Maker booths popped up alongside the portal booths. They had a touchscreen menu—think they only had about a hundred patterns at the time, and after a retinal scan that deducted money from a digital bank account, you could use the Maker to create anything from a chicken dinner to a new shirt. Only problem was that few people had any money. Most had evacuated the surface with nothing. They were starving in the old tunnels while an unlimited supply of food was right at hand. All that dirt and stone could have been turned into vegetables and loaves of bread. Net was appalled, but the patent was owned by Dyna Corp, and when she protested they fired her.”

Warren started to scowl as he shifted uneasily in his seat, sipping from his cup. The others, in contrast, were leaning forward, listening intently. They all must have known the story, but Ellis assumed that in a rural farmhouse that lacked even an old radio, story time was grand entertainment, even if it was a rerun.

“That’s when she did it,” Pol said. “Net wrote a pattern for her own invention and made it public—a free download. People could walk into any Maker booth and create their own Maker. Net was arrested, but the dam had burst. From her cell, she called on everyone to revolt against the tyranny of a system that artificially forced restrictions that led to the deaths of thousands. It wasn’t long before a Dynamo and a portal pattern were stolen and released to the public. After that, everyone could go anywhere and make anything and all for free. Dyna Corp and the agro companies—well, just about every business collapsed. Net became a hero, the mother of Hollow World, and the first Chief Councilor.”

“And the destroyer of humanity as we knew it,” Warren said.

Pol nodded solemnly. “But the Geomancy Institute remained untouched. The last vestige of the Dyna Corporation, they continue to indulge in secrecy, divulging their knowledge and techniques only to fellow geomancers and only after they pass the long and grueling initiate process. They are followers of the Faith of Astheno, and no one who isn’t a geomancer really knows for certain what they do down there. It’s suspected that they track the currents in the asthenosphere, determine where pressure is building up, and—using portal technology—relieve the pressure before it causes a damaging shift in plates. Which means they are all that stands between Hollow World and certain destruction.”

“So what do you think happened to Geo-24?”

Pol looked toward Warren, who nodded.

“That was an unfortunate incident. You see, one of our associates was speaking to Geo-24 about our plans to settle the surface—just general questions concerning long-term climate and such. We weren’t sure if Firestone was the best place in the world to start such a project. Geo-24 was less than encouraging, and there was concern that the geomancer might urge the HEM to interfere with our plans. Since geomancers have considerable influence, this was a real danger. We hoped this would not be a problem, but one of us wasn’t satisfied with just hoping for the best. This ex-member was—well, there’s no other way to say it—a zealot. The idea that the geomancers were plotting to stop us became an obsession. We don’t know all the details, but it seems that the unthinkable happened…but you saw that for yourself, didn’t you?”

“And you were okay with this?” Ellis looked at Warren.

“Hell no, and that psychopath knew better than to come back here.” Warren said.

Pol looked at Ellis. “I believe this person tried to become Geo-24, but you and Pax saw past the disguise.”

“Why do you think Pax accused you of being an impostor?”

“Pax has been called in to help arbitrate a number of deaths. I can’t express enough how unusual and stressful that can be. I suspect Pax is suffering from paranoia and sees conspiracies around every corner. As we’ve already established, Pax is not of sound mind.”

“And the scar on your shoulder?” Ellis asked.

“This?” Pol exposed the mark. “Hig actually gave me this almost a year ago with a scythe.” Pol pointed at Hig, who displayed a guilty look.

“I remember that,” Warren said. “Lucky Pol didn’t lose the whole arm. Hig was still learning the ways of the farmer. But it’s proof that what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.”

“Survival of the fittest,” Pol said, smiling.

“Now to the real point of this meeting,” Warren said.

This is a meeting? Ellis had thought the point was to digest the food they’d just eaten.

Warren stood up and, setting down his cup on the green tablecloth covering the little oval table, hooked his thumbs under his suspenders like some old-timey preacher. “I’d all but given up hope of finding Ellis, but God has guided him to us, and I feel more certain than ever that the Almighty has sent both of us. It’s just like when he sent John the Baptist and Jesus to set mankind—who had gone astray—back on the path of righteousness. It’s an abomination what mankind has done to itself. Ellis and I are here to help guide you in ridding yourselves of your sins. Abandoning Him, and His teachings has led to a self-made hell, but we’ll create paradise.” He turned to face Ellis. “I’ve already begun to tell my friend of our plans to reintroduce women. How is that going, Dex?”

Dex’s face scrunched up miserably. Bad news was coming. “I tried again, but the ISP refuses to grant me access to the patterns and development labs.”

“Pol?” Warren said. “As Chief Councilor, can’t you do something to fix that?”

“Not really. Hollow World doesn’t—well, you know—work like Firestone Farm. I have more authority here than there. I can guide and suggest, but I can’t compel anyone to do anything. Policy decisions like that are made by a general vote. Even then, the ISP can ignore it if they want to. People just don’t take orders in Hollow World—because they don’t have to. But that’s where Ellis Rogers can help us.”

“Me?”

“Yes,” Pol said, looking over at Warren, who picked up his drink and motioned for Pol to continue. “You might not know it, but you’re a celebrity status.”

“Huh?” A mosquito had entered one of the windows and was buzzing around Ellis’s head near his left ear. The pest, the faint flickering light, and the heat were all aggravating. How did people ever live like this?

“Your appearance in Wegener caused a riot—not literally, of course, but people have been sonic—ah, excited—since they spotted you. Grams have circulated everywhere. There’s all sorts of inquiries going on. People want to know about the Darwin sighting. Most think you’re a hoax, a joke of some kind, maybe some sort of street theater or an interactive art exhibit. Everyone is waiting for the next sighting.”

“Why are they so shocked?”

“No one has ever proved a Darwin exists.”

Ellis pointed at Warren. Pol smiled. “We keep Ren a secret, at his request.”

“Meaning I’d kill the bastard who betrayed me.” Warren took a second to eye each of them with a cold stare.

“I can see now the wisdom of his decision,” Pol said. “You, on the other hand, have already been exposed. If I take you back, if I show you off as real, all of Hollow World will be at your feet. A genuine Darwin—a unique man—the people will worship you.”

“And you plan to use my celebrity status to do what exactly?”

“You go public with your story of time travel and how lonely you are for a mate, and the doors of the ISP will be flung wide to accommodate you. To do otherwise would be a cruelty, and Hollow World is never cruel. You and I will go on a tour of Hollow World. We’ll see all the sights, meet the people on all the plates. It will be simply wonderful. You’ll be loved by all—and then I’d like to see anyone try to deny you a woman. The people really would riot then.”

“What do you say, Ellis?” Warren asked. “Care to be the first ambassador of the New United States of America?”

Ellis didn’t know what to say.

Everyone at Firestone Farm was out of bed at first light except Yal, who rose long before. The new recruit already had the stove stoked, had gathered the eggs, and was mixing muffins by the time Dex led Ellis out the kitchen door, showing him the way to the outhouse. The morning air embraced with chilly, damp arms—a world silent and gray. Dew-laden grass gave off a pungent, wholesome scent of summer; the odor of the outhouse was stronger still.

Simple. That was the way he saw the world that morning, now that he had put a little time between himself and the death of Peggy. A man couldn’t get much simpler than sitting bare-assed on a hole cut in the top of a wooden box in a rickety shed. Ellis had sore muscles from the lumpy bed, and the damp chill was bracing—even though it was summer. How would it be when snow covered the path, and he couldn’t sit because the seat was too cold? But peering out the gaps between the wall boards, Ellis felt good. The night before everything had an ominous, oppressive tone, but much of that was likely due to the news about Peggy and having to send Pax home. Emotions were peculiar that way. Nights affected attitudes too; mornings were always the happy optimists. And in the light of day, he had to admit there was virtue in a simple, uncomplicated, unfettered life.

On his way back, Ellis paused, just standing in the yard to witness the morning. Birds sang, frogs peeped, and a light breeze brushed the blades of grass. The brilliance of the sun pierced leaves, casting shafts of gold that splashed against the weathered boards of the barn. Ellis felt as if caught in a coffee commercial. A lovely middle-aged blonde wrapped in a homey cardigan sweater should appear behind him with a steaming cup and a life-loving smile. The breeze blew, and Ellis, dressed only in his T-shirt and pants, shivered. This was the difference between reality and replication. Hollow World presented a beautiful picture, a movie of sight and sound; the real world addressed all the senses, delivering the bad with the good.

Behind him the screen door slapped. The sound, hardly noticeable the night before, cracked offensively.

“Come with me, Ellis Rogers,” Bob said. The former Ved must have worked by candlelight the night before, because Ellis saw the new name stitched where the old one used to be. Bob carried four bright steel buckets, swaying them as they walked to the barn. “Ren teaches us that nothing is free. That everything is reached through hard work and self-reliance. The Maker is a cheat and a sin. It makes life too easy, and a pain-free life is not the way God intended His children to live.”

“You believe in God? You’re a Christian?”

“I’m working on it. I want to please Ren, but…” Bob looked troubled. “I’ve lived five hundred and twenty-eight years now, and it’s hard to believe in something that’s supposed to be so vital, and yet I’ve never heard of it before. Plus, a lot of the teachings center around an afterlife, but everyone in Hollow World lives forever. I’m still trying to make sense of it all and it’s hard with everything based on the word of just one person.”

“And a book.”

“Yes, the book. Have you read it?”

“Parts.”

“Ren reads to us in the evenings. He won’t let us use the holos. He’s read several books, and, honestly, so far I prefer the ones by Agatha Christie.” Bob looked up at the sky. “I still have problems believing in something I can’t see.”

“No one heard about germs before either,” Ellis said. “And most had to take their existence on faith. Scientists are sort of like priests that way.”

Bob nodded. “I see your point, but germs don’t demand our belief in them in order to save ourselves from eternal suffering, do they?”

“They do if you’re visiting a leper colony.”

“A what?”

“Never mind.”

“Besides, the ISP has made everyone in Hollow World immune to germs. And people don’t die anymore, so this whole idea of a better afterlife is just…well…silly.” Bob frowned.

“So why are you here?”

“To be special—to be like you and Ren. You’re just so—I want you to know how much I admire you. We all do. Ren explains that to be like you, we need to build character. Can’t be an individual without character. He says it’s through pain and struggle that we grow as people and become unique. We need to be rocks like the two of you instead of what we are, dandelion puffs blown in the wind.”

“Ren called you that?”

Bob smiled. “No—my own thought. Nice, don’t you think?”

“Very poetic.”

Bob threw the latch on the barn and pulled the big doors open. Inside was a dark, manure-scented cave defined only by white slices of light cutting between vertical boards. “Everyone needs to be responsible for themselves. No free rides. If you can’t cut it, you don’t deserve to live. It’s that simple.”

Ellis grinned, hearing Warren’s words spilling out of Bob’s mouth. In his head, Ellis imagined a giant clown getting out of a tiny car.

“Survival of the fittest,” Bob said. “That’s the Darwins’ creed, isn’t it?”

“That was Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection—which traditionally hasn’t coexisted all that comfortably with Christianity.”

Standing before the row of cows, Bob paused, looking at Ellis with a puzzled expression. “I don’t know about such things, but”—Bob held out the buckets—“Ren said you’d want to contribute for your breakfast.”

“Oh, right, of course. No free lunch.” Ellis smiled and took the pails. “You’ll need to show me.”

Ellis expected milking a cow would be a complicated thing. It always was in movies, but, then again, according to Hollywood grown men, who could build highways and clean out putrid city-sewer tunnels, couldn’t manage to change a baby’s diaper without rubber gloves and a gas mask. The process was remarkably easy once he formed a rhythm and was assured he wasn’t hurting the cow by tugging. The hardest part was avoiding the swish of the manure-coated tail while sitting on the little stool and holding the bucket between his knees.

Bob watched until satisfied that Ellis was doing okay, then went about feeding and watering the barn’s other residents.

“How long have you been here—at this farm?” Ellis asked over the jet of milk hitting the side of the pail.

“Little less than half a year.”

Ellis couldn’t see Bob, who was on the other side of the cow that had been introduced as Olivia. “And you like it better than Hollow World?”

“Oh—much!” Ellis heard the scrape of a shovel. “I didn’t think I would, and I didn’t at first. Life in the forest must have been hard. Only Ren could appreciate that challenge. Too advanced for the rest of us. But here it’s much—well, it’s a lot easier.”

“Don’t you find it boring? Even a little stupid—I mean, struggling when you don’t have to?”

“That’s the point. It’s unpleasant living here—especially when you don’t feel well and you have to go out in a cold rain. I’ll stand at the door sometimes just looking out and wonder what the bleez I’m doing. Then I force myself, and a funny thing happens. I get the work done, hating all of it, but afterward I feel great. I mean, I’m exhausted and filthy, but I know I did something. We call it Ren’s magic. It’s like a delectation that you can get all by yourself. You don’t need a device to feel pleasure, and the good feeling lasts for days. I never really felt that back in Hollow World. Nothing anyone does really seems to matter there. That’s another part of character building—a sense of pride.”

By the time Ellis finished filling the four buckets, he had sore hands, and, as inclined as he was to ridicule Warren’s patchwork of philosophies, he had to admit it did feel good to do something worth doing. Everyone in the house would appreciate the milk, and the cows appeared to appreciate being relieved of their bloat. In all his years of ten- and twelve-hour days filled with thousands of hours of meetings, he had never felt that sort of pride or accomplishment. Somewhere along the way people had traded the virtues of work for a steady paycheck.

“It makes the food taste better when you’ve a hand in making it,” Bob explained, picking up two of the pails and leading the way back to the house, each of them sloshing buckets of steaming milk.

Breakfast was better than dinner, consisting of unburned blueberry muffins and omelets. After the meal, Warren abandoned him and disappeared upstairs with Pol and Dex. Ellis didn’t mind; he didn’t know exactly when Pax would return and preferred they meet alone. He helped Yal with dishes, then walked out the front door and down Firestone Lane, figuring Pax would port in about where they had separated the day before.

What am I going to say?

Hig was out cutting hay, and Ellis marveled at the ingenuity of the mowing machine. Circling the field in a clockwise manner, the two big horses—Noah and Webster—pulled the device, which appeared to be little more than two big wagon wheels and a seat. A crankshaft and connecting rod transformed the rotary power of the axle into the reciprocating motion of the saw blade that sliced back and forth between triangle ledger plates as they combed through the grass. The whole thing was just a larger version of hair clippers, but what Ellis found fascinating was how it was powered by the rotating wheels. It shouldn’t have come as such a surprise; he’d seen the same concept in a push lawn mower. This just worked so much better cutting a wide swath with each pass as Hig drove the horses from the seat between the wheels.

The smell of cut grass filled the air. Ellis sighed.

What am I going to say?

He didn’t really know.

Warren had invited him to be part of his little village. Life at Firestone might be harder than he was used to, and for Dex, Yal, Hig, and Bob, this might be a pretend life, like dude ranching used to be, some sort of rugged vacation or spiritual retreat. But for Warren and himself, who didn’t have a natural place in Hollow World, this could be home. He was a bit too old to be hauling bales of hay, but it was familiar and felt real, and he liked the idea of building something. Having faced death with nothing to show for it, he had discovered such things mattered.

But then there was Pax.

Ellis found he was anxious for Pax’s return, and surprised to find he was trembling as he waited at the fence. He couldn’t help thinking how great it would be if Pax would join them at Firestone. They could share a house, farm the land, create their own food, and read around the stove in winter. Living with Pax would be different from how it had been with Peggy. What had attracted him to her was sex. When it dried up, and it had all too quickly, all they shared was their child. At Isley’s passing, all that had remained was convenience. It would be different with Pax. He felt—

I thought maybe you were going native, walking on the other side of the road, so to speak.

Warren was nuts. He liked Pax—that was all. Who wouldn’t like Pax? The two of them just sort of clicked, like old friends who’d just met. Friends-at-first-sight, if there was such a thing. Pax made him feel better about himself, made him feel like he was someone important. Pax had a strange way of making him feel happy. That’s what good friends were supposed to do, right? Maybe he just never had a really good friend before. Maybe that was why…Ellis watched Hig orbit the field, wondering if it was possible to fall in love with someone—just someone—not a woman, not a man—just a person. What is love anyway?

Ellis shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts. What the hell am I thinking?

He was starting to feel a little light-headed. His hands felt a bit numb as well.

“Ellis Rogers.”

There hadn’t been a flash or pop, but when he turned he saw the familiar bowler hat and silver vest. Pax’s face was rich with joy—beaming with a wide smile.

Pax ran the distance between them and without warning hugged Ellis tight. “I was worried. I’m so glad you’re all right.”

“I missed you too,” he said, noticing how Pax smelled like cinnamon, like the room he’d first awakened in.

Pax drew back and shot a quick glance over Ellis’s shoulder at the house and another at Hig and his horse team. “Can we go? Alva misses you too.”

“What about Vin?”

“Vin can kiss my hairless butt.”

Ellis couldn’t help laughing, which made Pax laugh, and he was surprised how much he enjoyed that sound and seeing Pax happy. “C’mon.” Pax formed a portal just behind them, and once more Ellis could see the dining room. “Alva has a hot-chocolate pattern for you to try.”

“Hot chocolate, eh?”

“With something called marshmallows—although Alva won’t tell me what they are. Every time I ask about food from your time she says, ‘You don’t want to know.’”

Ellis hesitated. He wanted to go. But…

You hear about guys that go to prison and figure they got no choice, you know?

“Pax,” Ellis began, “I don’t think I can.”

“What do you mean?”

The dining room looked so inviting, and yet…You two trying out some new-age sex toys?

“I think I’m going to stay here.”

“What?” The word was spoken in a barely audible whisper that killed the smile.

Ellis felt horrible. “I don’t really belong in Hollow World, but I was thinking that maybe you might consider staying here, too—with me.”

“What are you talking about? Everyone belongs in Hollow World. That’s the world. People aren’t meant to live on the surface.”

“But what would I do there?”

“Live, like everyone else.”

“But I’m not like everyone else.”

“I know. Don’t you think I know that? But…” Pax looked again toward the house. “This place, these people, that Ren—they’re…bad. They’re…evil.”

“Warren is like my brother.” Ellis sighed, realizing how useless it was to describe that kind of bond to someone who had never been part of a family. “He and I are very close. We’ve been through a lot together. He’s always been there when I needed him—always.”

“You have to listen to me, Ellis Rogers. We didn’t solve all the mysteries concerning the murder of Geo-24. Something else is going on. Geo-24 was killed for a reason. The real Pol-789 was killed for a reason, and Ren is behind all of it. Ren said they came to this farm a year ago. Well, a year ago was when the first murder took place, and it was then that protests against the Hive Project became more organized and vocal. Protests against something that isn’t even possible. They’re up to something, something horrible, and if you stay here…”

“What? I’ll become evil too?”

Pax looked down at his pistol, still strapped to his hip. Wearing it had become a habit.

“Of course not—you could never be. That’s why they’ll have to kill you. They will kill you, take your gun, and then kill others. Come back with me, please.”

“But you still can’t tell me why—why you think any of this?”

Pax looked away. “Can’t you just trust me?”

“Pol told me about your past—some of it, at least. Why Vin lives with you.”

Pax sucked in a breath and quivered. Tears formed. One slipped down, leaving a glistening trail. “That was personal, confidential. The real Pol would never tell anyone.”

“Pol was just trying to help.”

“Help Ren, you mean. Ren’s not your friend. They want you for something. Something they need. Something they can’t get on their own. I wish you could just believe me. I’ve never lied to you.”

Ellis felt horrible. He hated the look on Pax’s face, knowing he had put it there. Pax had been so happy, and now…“I don’t think it’s a matter of lying. Maybe it’s just that you don’t know the difference.”

Again Pax stared at him, injured. “Because—because I’m crazy?”

“No—I didn’t say that.”

“But you think there’s something wrong with me.”

“This isn’t about you. It’s about taking responsibility for one’s self. It’s about doing something worthwhile. And…think about it for a second. I’ve known you for what? Three days? I’ve known Warren since I was fourteen. We share a history, a life, a world. I understand him. He understands me, but I barely know you.”

“I understand you, Ellis Rogers, whether you believe it or not. I also know that if you stay here, they’ll use you. They’ll take your gun and—”

“Here.” Ellis unbuckled the holster and pressed it into Pax’s hands. “Space it if it makes you feel better. Do like we did to your chip. Destroy it. I don’t care. I’m going to stay here. Warren traveled two thousand years to find me. I can’t just abandon him to go drink hot chocolate. He needs me—more than he knows, because he’s got some really stupid ideas that I’m going to have to straighten out. We’re going to try and build a future, a real future in a real world with real people.”

“Real people?”

“I—I didn’t mean it that way.”

“How did you mean it?”

“I meant…”

“You meant people like you—Darwins.”

“Well—yeah. Warren thinks we can get the ISP to provide access to some female patterns, then we can restart a natural population here.”

Pax didn’t say anything.

“Pax, I’m going to stay. You might not understand it, but I belong here, I think. I was actually hoping that maybe you could join us.”

“Join you? You aren’t hearing me, Ellis Rogers. These people are murderers. They killed Geo-24. They killed Pol-789, and they’re planning on doing something much, much worse. They—”

“I know you are afraid of them, and you were right about Geo-24, but they didn’t have anything to do with that killing. Well, one of them did, but it wasn’t sanctioned. They didn’t know what that person was up to. That’s why the killer assumed Geo-24’s identity; they weren’t allowed to come back here. Warren wouldn’t forgive a murderer. Believe me, Warren has always been pro death penalty. And Pol isn’t an impostor. You’re just seeing things. You’re letting your imagination get away from you. You’re just being—” Ellis stopped himself.

Pax stood rigid, staring, shivering as if it were midwinter. “Paranoid? That’s what you were going to say, isn’t it? And that’s just another way of saying I’m crazy.”

The door to the house slapped. Ellis could hear the crack echo behind him.

“Please,” was all Pax said, the word spoken in a whisper, another tear falling.

Ellis looked over his shoulder. Warren, Pol, and Dex were on the porch, looking their way. “Maybe you should go.”

The look on Pax’s face broke Ellis’s heart.

As Pax walked through the portal, as the opening to that homey space in Hollow World closed, he felt oddly drunk, dizzy even. Ellis reached out to steady himself with the fence but couldn’t feel the wood. His whole arm was numb. Then the pain exploded in his chest. No warning. A truck just hit him. Ellis collapsed, bouncing off the fence and landing on his back.

The last sight he saw was the blue sky. His last thoughts weren’t of Peggy or Isley, but of Pax, a woodstove, and maybe a dog. Yes, they definitely should have had a dog.