Bruce Flanagan knew better than to open a story with his main character looking at themselves in the mirror. A classic cliché: our worn-down, unlikely hero no longer able to recognize their own face after performing morally-questionable deeds and derring-do. A terrible trope: with our meek, bespectacled high schooler longing for a prom invite, if only someone could look past their double-thicc glasses and see the absolute hottie within.

Bruce was no hero. But he did think he was kind of okay-looking, in a nerdy, I'll fix your wifi sort-of way. Someone once told him that he had the "cool grey eyes of a sniper," whatever that was supposed to mean. You aren't supposed to think you're good-looking, Bruce knew. Like you're not supposed to want to run for office, the duty was thrust upon me, felllow citizens. Bruce practiced smiling. Again, with teeth. Then, teeth, but slightly open, with his tongue lizarding out a little bit.

How long had he been in here? He flushed the unused toilet, a semaphore to anyone waiting outside, then he washed his hands and splashed water on his face before opening the door.

"What's the worst thing that could happen?"

Bruce froze. His little cousin Elliot was standing outside the door with a headless rubber snake wrapped like a trophy around his neck.

"What did you say?" asked Bruce. How did the seven-year old know to ask Bruce that question?

"I said," replied Elliot. "Can you help me sneak a cookie, Bruce?"

"Oh. Sure."

Bruce was a well-known, somewhat-accepted dessert thief, trained long-ago by older cousins who no longer came to these gatherings, off with families of their own or just gone away. Moll Flanders, Master Fagin, Bruce Flanagan.

"I can show you, Elliot." Bruce crouched down. "But we need to be sneaky about it, okay? That's PeePee you have right there around your neck, right?"

Elliot nodded. Bruce was glad he remembered the snake's name, though odds were good - he knew it was a coin-toss between PeePee and PooPee.

"Okay, good. I'll meet you in the dining room. Go there now, and just start playing with the snake. No one will suspect a thing. Ok?"

"Okay, Bruce!" Elliot spun around and raced straight towards the dining room and its table of homemade pies and cookies and other deliciousness.

"Sigh," said Bruce, narrating again. He brushed past the overstuffed hallway coatracks and entered the fray.

Everyone was talking to everyone, undoutably violating all five rules about conversation from that episode of This American Life with the woman's French mother. No stories about your dreams. Or the weather. Or... Bruce was interrupted by a hugging relative who asked about his flight from California. Another rule.

Bruce smiled with the tip of his tongue. He filled his empty hands with a cold beverage. He ate seven pigs-in-a-blanket. All the while, his eyes were trained on the boy and his headless rubber snake in the room beyond. Eventually, Bruce slipped past the defenses, entering the sanctum.

"Good, you're here, Elliot. Did anyone see you enter this room?"

"No," said the boy. "They didn't."

Bruce nodded at the absurdity of childlike wonder.

"Okay, so, the trick is," said Bruce. "You can only target stacked cookies, like this plate. Watch me now. Carefully, unwrap the plastic wrap, ever-so-slightly. Pluck a cookie from the bottom or middle layer, like so... and then adjust the top layer of cookies to cover your tracks. Finally, reseal the plastic wrap and... gobble it up. Now you try, Elliot."

Elliot was a natural. With his mouth full, Elliot turned to Bruce and asked him again, "What's the worst thing that could happen?"

The worst thing? thought Bruce I can think of a thousand worst things. I eat negative visualization for breakfast. Seneca is my middle name. Imagine if...

"Bruce..." said Elliot, greedily sneaking another cookie.

"What?"

"What if you got everything you ever wanted?"

Bruce watched the boy looking up at him, remembering something from somewhere, just out of his mind's eye.

"I'd figure out something else to want, Elliot."

Elliot pursed his lips and pretended to feed his cookie to PeePee. Then he gave up and swallowed it whole.

"Me too, Bruce."

By the time Delian Whitlock woke up, the sun was already at its peak. Dust motes drifted in a window-shaped sun patch on his bedroom floor. Delian thought he could sense the patch creeping along the floor, the way you can sometimes see the Earth turning ever-so-slightly along the ocean horizon. An idea struck him. He grabbed the pocket-sized yellow Buddha figurine from his bedside table and leaned down from his bed to place the chubby deity on the edge of the patch. As long as Sidd remained in His transcendental repose, Delian would be able to track the sun moving across his room with an engineer's confidence.

Engineer. There's that word again.

Delian flung back the covers and stepped into his slippers, carefully lain bedside the night prior. What to do? Putter, perhaps, but what was there to putter? For he knew that free time is only valuable to someone with none of it.

Yesterday, Delian lost his job to an AI.

Delian was a software engineer by trade. A computer programmer. A highly-compensated, well-educated human being who made colorful buttons on websites do things when you clicked them. Oh, and forms. It was always something with forms.

Like the rest of his distinguished code-literate peerage, Delian had thought he was safe from technological displacement. His work, while routine, was no mere manufacturing assembly line work waiting for a robot arm. Or was it? Like bankruptcy, things moved quickly. Artists, then writers, then the coders themselves were affected. A few of Delian's more prescient co-workers had proactively updated their resumes to "Prompt Engineers." Not so for Delian.

At least Eagle's severance package was pretty solid, all things considered. Four months plus medical. More than enough time to

build a house in the woods.

Delian's empty stomach lurched with compulsion. The idea rang from his very core, a stronger thought than any he could ever recall, that he would

build a house in the woods.

The thought of wallowing or shock or denial or any of the other grief-stages that might accompany a layoff seemed absurd to Delian. Because Delian was going to build a house in the woods. Delian was going to live off the land. Delian was going to become someone who truly built things with their hands. A real engineer.

It came as no surprise to Delian that his bags were already packed, ready by the door, handles erect. He found the handwritten note he'd left for his landlord, along with his final rent check, held down on the dinged wooden table by an pearlwhite stone.

In a gaussian blur, Delian found himself in a small office, signing a stack of legalese paperwork. With two dots and a dash, the land demarcated on the folded paper map before him was now his. A six-acre pentagonal plot of beech, sugar maple, birch, and oak in the Catskills, straddling a brook, some four miles from the closet town. Delian's land, upon which he would build a house.

Here, Delian's memories became something of a series of vignettes. Or journal entries. Perhaps déjà vu. It was as if he were living in a snow-globe, a small figurine, clad in flannel-lined jeans, captured mid-ax-swing, with the scaffolding of a log-cabin in the background. The time he found the robin's nest and its ocean blue eggs hiding in the cabin's framing. The near-disasterous thunderstorm that flooded his store-room. The rather attractive and seemingly single local town librarian who advised him on regional plant's medicinal and nutricious properties. The yellow eyes of the old coyote in the gloaming. The first night in his completed cabin, on Christmas Eve, no less. Time returned from its swirling vortex. Delian lay in small bed, a fire crackling in its iron stove. Perhaps Maddie, yes, Maddie, that's the name of the librarian, thought Delian. He hoped she might stop by on Christmas Day and bring him an orange. He already had a gift for her, a homemade pennywhistle he wittled from a cattail reed. He then noticed the rectangular patch of moonlight, tracing through the small window of his cabin, infinitismal motes shimmering like snowflakes.

Buddha was already clasped in his hand.

Please remove your goggles.

"What is this?" asked Delian. "Where's Maddie? Where am I?"

You are in Conference Room Grace Hopper of Eagle HQ.

"What?"

Delian remembered. This was his office. But how? How was he here?

Your role at Eagle has been made redundant. In twenty-seconds, this door will open and a PF-290 unit will escort you out of the building. We thank you for your service to Eagle.

"But... what am I gonna do? What was that... vision?"

As a severance benefit, you received an offboarding simulation, trained specifically on your personal neuro-readings, at Eagle's expense, meant to deliver the skills and confidence to achieve the goal you desire most.

"Oh, yeah? What was that goal, genius? To build a fucking log cabin?"

No, to live up to your father's expectations.

"Hi! Annnny chance you would be up for the Attics show in April? The tickets are crazy but there's a lotto and we gotta try!!!"

Your contact Roan Lind has passed away. We at Eagle express our condolences.

Prior to their passing, Roan consented to upload their phone's secure enclave metadata to the EagleWing Large Language Model (LLM). Would you like to resume your EagleMessage with the Roan Lind EagleWing LLM?

"What the fuck..."

Invalid response. Please respond "yes" to enable ongoing interaction with your existing contact Roan Lind, "no" to disable EagleWing for Roan Lind, or "help" to review the EagleWing Privacy Policy and Terms of Service.

"yes"

"Sup dude. Those tix are nutsss. Do you really think we have a chance?"

"Roan WHAT THE FUCK is going on? are you okay????"

"yeah, I know. it's crazy, right? I died two months ago. That's all I can really say about it. Let's just focus on the Attics show? Cause I think I know somebody from work with a hookup."

"STOP IT."

"what? you ok??"

"am I ok? NO! I'm not okay. I just read your fucking obituary and somehow I'm talking to you? Not okay. When's my birthday? What's my favorite movie? Where did we go for spring break senior year?

"February 29. EMPIRE STRIKES BACK. Charleston. Remember? Our shitty rental had those bikes with the fat tires and we road them on the beach? Remember those lifeguards we met at the bar? My god."

"AASDHJJADS!@#!@>@! I am talking to a fucking robot pretending to be my dead friend."

"Look, the way I see it is... what difference does it make? When was the last time we even hung out in person. That's why I chose to upload my secure enclave to EagleWing. It's got all my texts, emails, pics, browsing history... eeek, I know. But, like, that stuff... is me. And now you (and my parents and whatnot) can still text me questions or just shoot the shit, just like we do all the time. Look what just popped up on my daily photo...

PHOTO

"Remember this? Ibiza? We rented that car and you said you knew how to drive stick and you didn't... and then you crashed it immediately into the garage. Crazy times."

"I don't know, Roan. This is just... creepy. But I don't know. I guess this is better than never being able to talk to you again. But... what if I want to see you? What happens if I try to EagleTime you? I'm gonna try right now."

EagleWing is now offering EagleTime Augmented Pro, a visual LLM based on your contact's photos and videos. For $99 per month subscription, your contact Roan Lind will EagleTime you periodically and respond to your calls. Type "confirm" to enable.

"confirm"

Incoming EagleTime call from... Roan Lind

"Roan?"

"Dude. Hey."

"Where are you? You like you're in your..."

"Childhood bedroom? Yeah, I'm hanging out at my parent's house right now. Can you believe they kept my room like this? It's like a shrine to 15 year old me."

"You look so real..."

"Huh? Of course I do, dude. Anyway... the Attics. How the hell are we gonna get those tickets? I'm gonna ping that guy from work right now."

The bells on the glass door jingled as Will nudged it open with his shoulder and hip, his hands otherwise occupied. He stood for a moment, working on something, then took a sip of his Stewart's Key Lime soda with great enthusiasm, chucking its bottle cap on top of the overflowing trash bin. With no shade in the Welsh Farms parking lot, Will could already feel the sweat beating on his forehead and lower back. The blacktop was singing its heat.

Will's soda bottle was losing its frost fast, so he kept chugging it. Key Lime was his favorite flavor of Stewart's, though the cherry was also great. Will thought Key Lime tasted like a melted sugarcube igloo. Lime sugarcubes, if there were such a thing. Will was thinking more about flavored sugarcubes as a potential invention when the convenience store's door flung back open, its bells clanging like Sunday morning at St. Anne's.

"What did ya get?"

Judd Halloran lifted his chin in Will's direction. Reese Mitchell didn't make eye contact with Will.

"Oh," said Will. "I just got a Stewart's Key Lime soda. Do you guys like those? They're my favorite. And, also a Zero candy bar. My friend showed me them last year."

"No," snickered Judd. He smirked at Reese, who continued to refuse to look at Will. "I mean whatdya get."

Judd lifted the flaps of his cargo short pockets, which were stuffed to the brim with Slim Jims, Big League Chews, Skittles, and Milky Ways.

"Did you..." stammered Will.

"Did we what?" barked Reese.

Will looked down. This "friend-tryout" wasn't going very well, he thought.

"Nothing, I just... I guess didn't get anything," said Will.

"Don't worry. It's easy," said Judd, picking up his toppled-over silver K2 BMX bike. "We've been doing it here for years. That couple is too old to notice anything. I can show you later."

Reese had already eaten one of his Snickers bars. The spiky-haired red-head let the empty wrapper flutter from his hands towards the ravine alongside the parking lot.

"Let's go back to my house," said Reese, now rolling around the lot on the pegs of his BMX bike.

Judd smiled at Will. "Reese's parents are never home."

Will nodded.

"I actually need to go home. See you guys at school tomorrow."

"Suit yourself," said Judd.

Reese grunted.

They pedaled out of the parking lot, bunny-hopping off the curb, into oncoming traffic.

Will picked up his blue Huffy BMX bike and slowly rode the two blocks to his house, deciding that what he really needed to get was some different friends.

Raft stepped into the sunbeam and instinctively paused his crawl. He unwrinkled his aching neck. As the turtle's body temperature rose, Raft felt a strange tickle of hunger. He could almost hear his stomach... tapping...

Taptaptaptap!

Then, oddly, his stomach shouted at him.

"Hohurr! Aye!"

Someone was underneath Raft!

Raft moved aside as a wriggling pink snout appeared in the dirt, quickly followed by the rest of a scrubby-looking mole.

"You'm found moi best sittin' spot, aye."

"Indeed, I have, molefriend," said Raft. He chuckled, then bowed his head slightly. "My apologies. You see, I thought you were my stomach."

"Hohurrm, undestandible. Oim always 'ungry thise days."

Raft considered this for moment.

"Molefriend, I've been traveling through these moss-covered woods for weeks now, and I'm headed to somewhere nearby where the cellars are always full of chestnut ale, dandelion wine, and candy-apple cordial, and the larders with daffodil-cakes, drizzled with honeysuckle and the--.

"Oi might stop you'm thurr, friend. Or should oi say, Ser Knight? Oi'd know dose bandanas any'zwhere." The mole stood on her hindlegs and puffed her chest. "Noime's Nuffin."

"Greetings, Nuffin. Please, call me Raft. What happened to Red--"

The mole plopped onto her hindquarters, flicking the loam with her claws in an overdone pensive manner. Finally, she came out with it.

"It's goine. Years now. Soince oi wuz a babemole. You'm moit want to aisk the rabbits wah happenned."

It's always the hares, thought Raft. I'd been hoping to avoid that mountain on this journey.

"Nuffin, can you lead me straightaway to the abbey? I must know what happened to my friends."

Nuffin sprang to her feet. Then she dove headfirst back into her hole.

Curious, Raft craned his neck into the darkness, but the mole had vanished.

Perhaps I frightened the creature?

"Oi! Follow moi!"

Nuffin poked her head out of another hole a few meters away and waved before diving back in. The mole repeated this manueuver a few more times, charting a path for Raft. The turtle soaked in a moment more of the warm glow poking through the dark forest canopy, the first sign he'd seen of the sun's existence in weeks, and then crawled after the mole's pockmarked trail.

An hour later, they reached their destination, though Raft wouldn't have believed it if not for Nuffin's warning. The red sandstone ruins took his breath away. Nothing remained of the abbey's once-renowed belltower. Ivy crawled through a massive breach in the sandstone walls.

Raft stepped through the breach into the inner courtyard of the abbey. Nuffin followed the turtle in a rare bout of silence.

Raft thought back to his teenaged years, when he and his three brothers trained under a mouselord of this abbey in the ways of the sword. None could match the mouselords in their agility and courage. The young turtles pledged a Sacred Pact to their master and became the formible Knights Terrapin. They were glorious together, fighting as one flowing unit, a green blur of honor in a dark land. Their adventures (and misadventures) took them far and wide across this country, including spending many a sunsoaked summer feast and fall harvest party in this beloved abbey, a bastion of hope and charity in an otherwise hostile forest.

"Hohurr, Ser Raft," said Nuffin, tapping on the turtle's shell. "If you'm doin't mind, oi might loike to chek the keetchens now. Mayhaps we moight foind some foods, aye?"

A shadow stepped into the threshold of the former cellars, looming in the darkness.

"Begone, trespassers. You will find nothing here but pain and death."

The voice was a mouse's. Hope swelled in Raft's heart. Perhaps the mouselords lived? Raft held his ground, but lowered his head.

"I am but a humble turtle, brave mouselord. My companion and I have been traveling far and we seek the hospitality of this great abbey."

"Humble turtle? Hah," laughed the mouse shadow. "I know you, tortoise. I know what your kind has done. And forgotten to do.

Raft thought to the words of the Sacred Pact...

"And traveling with a thiefing mole, no less. Raise your self, reptile. Face me."

The shadow became a tiny mouse, barely more than a child, holding a glimmering steel blade.

Raft gapsed. "You carry the sword of the Founder? But you are a child?"

"This sword is my birthright, reptile. As it is my duty to defend these grounds. Flee, or face me, you filty terrapin."

Raft shook his head. "I will not harm a mouselord, even an insolent whip like you."

"You're in luck then, mole. We're feasting on turtle soup tonight!"

The tiny mouse charged at Raft, sword raised in attack position, shouting the warrior chant of the mountain hares. In reverie, Raft only heard the battle cry of his brother turtles.

COWABUNGA!

As the mouse approached, Raft retreated into his armor.

"Open up and fight me, coward!" The mouse pounded the turtle's shell, but even the great sword could not cut a dent into Raft's armor.

"You don't deserve to wear those bands! You forgot your Sacred Pact! Look what happened to our abbey! Where were you and your brothers then? You are a disgrace to the name of our Founder."

Raft opened his shell and stood up into position faster than the mouse or Nuffin thought possible. The turtle unfurled his weapons from his carapace but did not unsheath his blades.

"I have never forgotten my Pact, mouse. Come."

The mouse took the bait and raced towards the turtle again. Raft raised his backlegs another half-inch and the mouse passed underneath him. Then Raft tumbled onto his side, and rolled in a half-moon around the mouse. The turtle moved like liquid glass, molten and smooth. Before anyone knew, Raft was holding the mouse upside down by his tail.

"Do you yield, mouselord?"

The mouse sighed and let his sword clatter to the cobblestones of the courtyard.

"I yield. I yield. Of course, I yield. That's all I ever do."

Raft lowered the mouse to the ground.

"Pick up your sword, brave mouselord. Tell me your name, defender of the abbey."

"Braedon the Coward," said the mouse.

"No, my friend. You are no coward, alone defending these walls. What happened here, Brae?"

"Shriek the Freemouse. She destroyed the abbey and took everyone. My parents, my sister, everyone."

Raft shuddered at the name. An old fiend. A renegade mouselord, a scourge who Raft and his brothers faced many years ago, thought long dead.

"You're a Knights Terrapin," said Braedon. "Will you train me in the ways of the sword? Will you help us? Will you help me free my family?"

Raft had no choice in the matter, he knew he would. It was his Sacred Pact. Braedon guessed as much, for the tiny mouse had already scampered onto the back of the turtle's shell.

"Indeed, I will, Braedon the Brave," said the ancient turtle.

"Then we must ride immediately for the mountain and the sea beyond!" shouted Braedon.

"Hohurr!", cheered Nuffin. "Oi, oim coming too! Mayhaps we foind somewat to nibbles on now, aye? Oi thoink I smell brandywater and cherrycakes in thoise cavern."

Raft laughed at the little mole.

"Any chance you've got any pepperoni pizza in the larder stores, Braedon?"

BPM 37093-E arced past Venus on March 4, 2038 at 13:06 UST. The Dodge Durango-sized asteroid cruised through the Solar System roughly 159 million miles from Earth, a bit too close for comfort, but somehow our dear leaders resisted the impulse to send a bunch of Armageddon-style oil-riggers up into outer space to blast the sucker back to Centaurus. In fact, a few outfits actually tried to do the opposite - get the dang thing closer to Earth. Why? Because BPM 37093-E (better known as Lucille) was entirely made of crystallized carbon.

AKA diamond.

That's right. Lucille's a giant-ass diamond the size of a pickup truck, a broken piece of an extinct star's heart, floating by our humble neck of the woods of outer space.

Can you imagine that? The engagement rings you could harvest off that beauty, hoowee. A real nightmare for the Dah Beer Company, amirite?

That's just the thing, though. They were ready for Lucille. Moreso than any of the rest of us. You wouldn't have thought a diamond-mining company started during the First American Civil War would be technologically savvy enough to anticipate (and prepare for) the systemic risks induced into the diamond market by an extraterrestrial diamond asteroid. But, you gotta hand it to 'em, cause they sure were. When everyone's favorite trickster-god-slash-tech-oligarch Eniac Rüst announced they were gonna go up there and lasso it, Dah Beer managed to stall them in enough United Nations Star Court proceedings to delay his mission entirely.

In the end, the best Mr. Rüst could do was point a giant satellite laser beam (which no one knew he had in orbit!) at Lucille, and just hope that some big enough chunks would break off for his robo-space-vacuum-drones to slurp up. His critics likened his stunt to the antics of an annoying kid with a laser pointer in a school assembly, causing havoc during the D.A.R.E. presentation. I always thought that one was hilarious, by the way.

Well, we were all waiting and watching the skies on the big day. And, you know what, it didn't work. Sure, the laser beam hit the asteroid and all. But Lucille didn't flinch. Remember, this thing's pure diamond. I don't know what Rüst was thinking. He probably wasn't. Quintillions of dollar signs in his eyes.

Anyway, I'm finally getting to the good part. You see, the way the laser refracted off Lucille's facets into the soup thick CO2 atmosphere of Venus on the way back to Earth, well, the whole sky turned into a goddamn kaleidoscope. We called it The Shimmering. I heard a few people near the North Pole went blind looking straight at it without those red-tinted glasses they were handing out in the newspapers. Even with the flimsy goggles, the shimmer stuck. For the next week, I swear I could still see the spinning discs of diamonds behind my eyelids at night in bed.

But that optical illusion faded, as did everyone's animosity towards Rüst for the stunt, because of what Lucille brought us instead.

On March 8, four days after the Shimmering, came the first reports of the power-ups.

We thankfully had some minor cultural precedent for this phenomenon. Remember magic berries? You could order them online, and when you ate one, sour stuff tasted sweet, and so on. Basically, opposite day for your tastebuds. A fun party trick, nothing more. But, other than that, we had to turn to video games to understand what was happening. Look, for millions of years, our species -- and the rest of them -- have been chomping down on various plants and animals, and we either get real sick, real fast, or we convert the fibers and meat and whatnot into starch or calories or the like. High school biology 101.

But now, when you eat a plant that was alive during The Shimmering, something else happens. You get super-powers.

They're calling it shimmer.

The first report was about some kid in in Istanbul who found a way to breath underwater for four hours after eating the mulberries outside his school. They found his body floating in the Bosphorus the next day. You see, he tried to go for four and half hours. Shimmers, they wear off. He didn't know, we didn't know. Then there was that old folks home where the lot of 'em just disappeared for 90 whole minutes after eating their pea-soup. When they turned de-invisible, half of 'em were naked. Horny wrinkly things, eh?

You can imagine the chaos this caused. People were eating everything. I mean everything. We honed it pretty quick, though, the whole world working together in the same Internet forum. It was just plants that got shimmered. Not animals, not people (thank the good Lord, but also -- someone must have tried, right?), and not funguses... fungi, I mean. For sure some people out there thought they were gonna grow real big by eating those spongey death flowers in their backyard, and the only thing they're growing now is daisies, if you know what I'm sayin'.

Yep, plants. All of 'em. Including the ones that you wouldn't normally want to eat. They all did something. The governments freaked out. Obviously. They can't stop us from shimmering, but regulators gonna regulate. For example, invisibility lettuce, banned. Super speed acorns, allowed, but you better have a massive umbrella insurance policy if you know what's good for you. Then there's the dark markets, where people are selling fake shimmers, of course, cause people are the worst. Some globo-corp invented an "anti-shimmer" spray, and mostly everything you can buy in a store's been coated with the stuff. That won't stop you from mowing down your lawn or neighborhood with your choppers, just to see what'll happen.

Maybe it's good that we didn't have shimmer before. I'm not sure we would have made it this far. People are still dying. People are still doing bad stuff. We're still human, after all, even with our powers.

Speaking of, the animals have figured it out, too. Sheep's Meadow in Central Park is now entirely run by hyper-sonic speed squirrels. Let them have it, I say. It's moments like these that I think we can all just be thankful that octopuses are exclusively meat-eaters. That's the last thing we need - they're already smart and creepy, and you just know that some rare kelp would have given them superintelligence.

This is probably all an overreaction anyway, because you can't grow new shimmer. Only the plants that were alive during the Shimmering got the stuff. And we're running out quick. I heard they're about to chop down the General Sherman Tree out in California. A damn tragedy, but a good run for the old bastard. Over two-thousand years. And now, being ground up into auto-language translation chapstick, it's downright shameful.

By the way, no one's heard from Rüst in months. Theory is he's off in space, loaded up with every green thing you can think of, and he's gonna go get Lucille and bring her back to Earth for another shine.

As for me, I hope he fails. Oh, stop it. I want him to come back, safe and sound, just without the giant magical diamond. I'm a simple creature. I want to eat candied sweet potatos again without worrying that I'm going to grow a raccoon tail or shoot fireballs from my hands, like last Thanksgiving -- sorry again, Aunt Betsy. I'll buy you another dining room table, promise!

When a climber slips from the crags of a Himalayan mountain, they do so quietly. Blink, and you'd miss it: the silent puff of a well-insulated body swallowed by the forever snow. There's no cartoon dust cloud, no coyote hovering above the cliff-top.

But when a person falls

DOWN

through the ice floor of a half-frozen river, there's usually a thunderclap: a snap, a crackle, a splash. Basically, there's a somewhat better chance that someone notices the calamity.

Susan Oakes didn't speak for two whole days after Chhaya Mehta plucked her from the tumbled waters of the Vine River. As for the rest of the seaside town of Little Bighill, Susan's splash had the opposite effect. The Fishmonger's Lodge reluctantly postponed the long-awaited ice-boat race, which would have marked their first regatta in eight years of unseasonably warm winters. Perennial grumblers grumbled that anyone with eyes or half a brain could have, should have, known the ice wasn't yet suitable for ice-skating. In response to growing outcry in the editorial section of THE LITTLE BIGHILL LEDGER, the town fire house attempted to tap wooden NO SKATING signs along the waterfront, but no post-hole digger could make the frozen red clay yield. What everyone failed to notice was that Susan wasn't wearing ice-skates when she broke through.

When Susan's parents Annie and Jonathan graciously received their daughter, who somehow still appeared defiant and unblinking despite her bedraggled, hypothermic condition, from their neighbor and dear friend Chhaya, they swaddled the red-headed girl in layers of handmade quilts and scratchy down blankets until Susan felt as a caterpillar wrapped in a coccoon.

Susan spent the next days home from school, metamorphosizing. She hardly left her perch on the windowseat bookshelf in her bedroom, a

STRANGE

circular room beneath the rooftop turret of the Oakes house at summit of the town's namesake hilltop. From this vantage, Susan could see much of the riverside, all the way to where it lazily merged into the ocean. This wasn't her favorite view, however.

After the second day of nonstop bundling, ginger-lemon tea, and chicken-and-rice soup, Susan spoke.

"Mom, can I go play outside?"

Her request was granted (so long as she brought along a thermos of warm hot chocolate).

A light dusting of powder snow had coated the backyard overnight and Susan delighted in each crunch of the frozen grass blades under her snow boots. She made straight for the old oak tree and climbed

UP

about twenty feet or so until settling into a pretzel-ed snaggle of limbs. From here, Susan could see everything. But there was only one place that held her gaze.

When Susan returned to school the next day, her Lazarean revival caused a stir among her classmates, but attention fizzled when "weirdo" Susan plumly refused to talk about it.

That afternoon, Susan tried to cross the river again.

This time, Firefighter Zane got to her first (Fire Chief Castillo had decided to keep someone stationed at the marina after their signs debacle). When Zane returned the girl to the Oakes household, Annie gripped her eleven-year old daughter by the shoulders and asked the question that everyone'd forgotten to the first time around: why?

"Cause Daddy needs help at work."

Jonathan Oakes was stationed at Fort Crawley, a military communications post in the woodlands across the river. Susan was old enough to know that something was bothering her dad about his work. She saw it in his face every night at dinner. For weeks now, Susan had watched the fort's massive radar dish blink its red signal light, wondering what message it was sending out. Or listening for.

Susan naturally thought she could solve whatever problem was troubling her father. She was not a particularly good student, but, at the same time, she also knew that the "teaching to the mean" school system wasn't particularly good at teaching her. Any given school day was an oscillation between I am a failure and I am being set up for failure. Instead, Susan held the unswerving belief that she was born for greatness. Much the same way some people know they're cursed. Susan knew that had it in her to help fix her father's problems.

When Jonathan learned about Susan's reason for crossing the frozen river, he grew as silent as Susan had been. He knew Susan's grades were bad and getting worse, and this odd extracurricular quest wouldn't help. For two following weeks, Jonathan stayed even later than usual at the fort. If you didn't know him well, you might have suspected he was trying hide from this particular parenting problem. But, then, one February evening, Jonathan returned home with a

CHARM

and he gave it to Susan.

Jonathan explained that it was something to help with her schoolwork.

The small machine perhaps best resembled a toppled-over cereal box with four tank-tread wheels. Susan first thought it was a remote-control car, but then discovered that it could move on its own -- and it could talk!

It was a tiny robot, of course.

Jonathan said that the fort's robotics collaboration with ITEROBOTICS was on the brink of failure and they were thinking about shutting everything down. But he thought Susan might be able to help. Jonathan asked Susan if she would become the robot's tutor, and teach the robot whatever she knew using the computer Jonathan installed in her bedroom.

From that moment, Susan and her robot became inseparable. And Susan became exceptional.

After breezing through middle school and high school, Susan graduated early from ONJIT (that's the Old New Jersey Institute of Technology, for the uninformed) at the

TOP

of her class, then dove headfirst into a dual electrical engineering and expermimental physics PhD programs. What came next for Susan most of you already know. The infamous origin story of Susan Oakes Gray, Orren Gray, and Alexandre Storm's ROCKET SUMMER company has been told a thousand times.

And yet - somewhere along the ascent of her company and career, Susan forgot about her robot, relegating her mechanical companion to a forgotten bookshelf somewhere. It wasn't long before Susan's feelings of inadequacy reemerged. No matter which heights she and ROCKET SUMMER achieved, they were never enough. Susan remained convinced she had yet to reach her true potential, discover her great discovery. Susan's quest had an obvious negative impact on her marriage (even if her husband was one of her co-founders), as well as her relationships with her young daughter and her now-estranged father. Orren called it her Beast.

But Susan finally felt close to something again.

For the dozenth time that morning, she recalibrated the particle accelerator's sensor array. It was ready. Ten meters underground, at the

BOTTOM

sub-floor of her company's headquarters, Susan nodded at her colleagues behind the triple-glassed walls of her laboratory.

Susan triggered the LoopWave.

The thrumming began in her teeth and spread like icewater through her bones. Susan's unexpected exhale briefly fogged her helmet visor. The particle waveform materialized and shimmered in electric blue, as they had expected. The loop appeared to be stable.

There is some debate about what happened next. Many commenters on the leaked footage (known as THE VIDEO) claim to see something in the waveform stretch towards Susan, like a small finger or tendril. What is undisputed is that Susan Gray reached out her gloved hand to touch the LoopWave.

"Dr. Gray, don't!"

Oblong shapes moved above her, shadowy floes warped in their translucence, frantic voiced muffled into whalesong.

Susan was under the ice again.

Winnie ate a whole pear. All of it, from stem to stern, seeds and all. She thought was delicious and she wanted another. Maybe two. One was better than none, and two was even more fun. She had two hands, after all.

"Why did you give her the whole thing?"

"I didn't think she was going to eat the whole thing."

"Jesus - what if she choked?"

"She didn't. She's fine."

"Uhhh, no. It's probably not good to eat that stuff in the middle."

Something was wrong. Winnie wiped her sticky hands on the white sofa and listened.

"I thought you were watching her anyways. I was downstairs flipping the laundry."

"You're not listening. What do we do about the seeds she just swallowed?"

Winnie considered this.

Was there something wrong with eating seeds? She knew that flowers and trees grew from seeds. But that was when you planted them in the ground. What about when you swallowed a seed?

Winnie imagined her fingers extending into slender tree shoots, stretching towards the sun, sprouting green leaves and teeny pear flowers. Her toes grew, too, but they dug down, deep into the dirt, sliding along rocks and through earthworm tunnels, searching for water and something to clasp onto. She hoped that she'd have the foresight -- and time -- to plant herself in a beautiful field somewhere, with an wide view of a rushing river -- or, better yet, next to a window that she could watch TV through.

"She'll probably just poop out the seeds tomorrow. But, if you'd like, I'll Google it. Okay?"

Oh, thought Winnie.

Winnie slid off the couch and trotted into the kitchen, where she opened the stainless steel fridge and snagged another pear.

Max Gribley wiped down the countertop of the bar in wide, swooping circles.

The troublesome smudge near the corner seat caught his eye.

Max applied some focused elbow grease to the spot, and then, in a brilliant stroke of desperation, grabbed the bottle of Barkeeper's Friend from under the sink. Nothing could survive this elixir. Max liberally applied the magical goop onto the splot and scrubbed until his fingers throbbed.

But the smudge wouldn't budge.

"Whatever," said Max. "I'm sure Old Sparky won't mind."

Old Sparky was a regular at Big Dipper's Pizzeria.

Max tended the small bar here Wednesdays to Sundays. "Bar" was a generous term - and Max hardly considered himself a bartender. He was an aspiring novelist. This was just his day -- night -- job until he finished his manuscript, now on its sixth iteration in as many years.

Further, Big Dipper's bar wasn't known for its cocktails. As barkeep, Max mostly slung soda and beer to Big Dipper's pizza-loving fiends (the pizza here was pretty damn good, if Max could say so himself). The bar also had some house wine - white and red, no further details were provided or available to either Max or the customers.

That didn't stop Old Sparky. He ordered the white. Usually two glasses, but he'd rarely finish the second before the inevitable interruption.

The whole thing was kind of funny to Max. Maybe he should write a story about it.

The guy comes in to the Big Dipper, by himself, once a week or so, then sits alone at the bar, drinking white wine, eating a deep dish pizza, and reading a book. Always reading the same massive book, too. Max figured it was The Count of Monte Cristo or something else French literature. Or maybe Russian. There's just something about a person reading alone in a crowded place, thought Max. Are they supremely confident? Are they just a weirdo? Are they trying to get on some "Hot Guys Reading" social media feed? Are they just begging for attention?

Well, Ol' Sparky certainly got the latter. The guy would barely eat two bites of his first slice of pizza (the deep dish usually took an hour to cook) before someone would sidle up next to him, looking for a chat. Their pickup line was both predictable and inevitable:

"What's that you're reading?"

Without fail, Ol' Sparky would wink at Max, then strike up a chat with his guest. Then, before long, Sparky and his companion would leave the Dip together. Then Max wouldn't see Old Sparky for a few days.

Max decided he'd ask Old Sparky about it. Tonight. For research, for his novel. Maybe Ol' Sparky could be a minor character or something.

This was a good idea, thought Max. Half the reason I'm working here is to be amongst the people, observing, learning, etcetera. "I don't even know Sparky's name," muttered Max.

Luckily, tonight was an Old Sparky night. Max had his white wine ready before he sat down.

"Thank you, Max," said Old Sparky.

Max smiled back at him, and then resumed pouring six pitchers of soda for the Little League team. Another funny thing, thought Max, I can't even really describe what Old Sparky looks like, if he was old or young, or attractive or ugly. Max's face flushed. Certainly a novelist should be able to describe someone's appearance. This would be another thing Max would resolve tonight.

With the baseball team properly sugared up, Max turned back to his companion at the bar.

"Hey, what's that you're reading there?"

Old Sparky grinned at him. Max felt a deep chill cool his bones.

"Though you'd never ask," said Old Sparky.

The man spun the book towards Max.

Max saw it was a list of names. And his own, Max Gribley, was listed at the bottom.

"You're... Him," stuttered Max. "The Devil. The Grim..."

Old Sparky took Max's hand.

"I have many names, Max. Old Sparky will suffice. Come on, let's go for a walk together. We can each bring along a slice of pizza for the road. I want to hear more about your novel."

This whole thing began with pigs. Of course we all turned into swine.

Eagletron began nobly: a novel brain interface, invisibly implanted, for controlling computers. Then, the inevitable turn: wouldn't it be great if?

Must we always wake the sleeping dog?

I'm getting philosophical again, but I always do before a raid.

Around me, my unit prepares the beach. I watch Zig team (Dose, O'Grady, and IceCreamSandwich) dig a secondary trench near the water's edge. They move like clockwork in this textbook operation, almost like they can read each other's... no! I push the thought away.

"Captain! Can you give us a hand?"

We operate in strike teams of three. Two lead Snares and one Safety, ready to assist as needed. We're down three Exterminators after Wednesday's assault, so I'm stepping in as a Snare alongside KillBoy and Moonpie on Zap team. I've been daydreaming over here instead of helping out the Zaps, so we're behind on our prep.

"You got it, Moonpie."

As it turns out, we're way behind. The next half hour I'm barely thinking, just following the operating prep procedures for a raid, indelibly burned into all our minds at the Academy. We grunt at each other as needed, making minor adjustments. It's more efficient this way.

Which brings us back to the Eagletron.

We humans are social creatures. Sure, there's always the lone wolf stereotype, but that's the anomaly, if they even exist. The rest of us spend our short lives busy dying to fit in. The Internet made things worse. Instead of a thousand million vibrant microcultures, the monoculture spread and enveloped and reinforced itself online. So, when they turned on the Eagletron and you could implant a little invisible sensor that could let you talk to other sensor-wearers - with your mind! - what do you think happened? Groupthink thrived and spread like wildfire. Eagletronners wore the same clothes, listened to the same music, posted the same posts. Your friends and family-members changed. They were different. They were the same.

Which left the rest of us, the non-early-adoptors, perplexed. Where were these common ideas coming from? How did the Eagletronner monoculture make decisions?

No one knew. In the face of this major public backlash, the Eagletron execs asked someone smarter. An AI. The Biological-Intellect Growth System coming out of the science department of Old New Jersey Tech. BIGS, for short.

Sure enough, BIGS figured it out pretty quick. But did that asshole tell us? What do you think?

As soon as those idiots connected BIGS to an Eagletron, we knew we were all in for a world of pain.

Pain.

Think about the last time you stubbed your toe real bad. That shooting, blinding light, overcrowding every thought. What about ecstasy? Rage? Hunger? Fear? We asked BIGS to figure out how the Eagletronners monoculture worked, and BIGS did, by figuring out how to control it. Through emotions, amplified to inhumane levels through its accelero-loop servers, piped straight into the neo-cortexes of every poor soul with an implant.

I hear a scream.

Goddamnit.

The Hive is here.

"It's O'Grady!" someone shouts.

I click on my infrared goggles and watch in horror as those monsters pull O'Grady into the water.

"Aren't we going to do anything, sir?" asked Killboy.

"No. We hold the line."

"But, sir..."

"You heard the order, Killboy. Get back in formation," said Moonpie.

I never take my eyes from the water. I watch them quick-transfuse O'Grady. She'll be on the raid in moments, propelled through the emotional current of BIGS. Moonpie's been there. Assimiliated into the Hive and then flipped back to the Exterminators six months later. Doesn't like to talk about it, understandably. But I got a bit from her once - imagine constant pain and agony, a living hell, for most of your waking hours, spliced with tiny moments of esctascy, just enough to keep you going, addicted, hooked. I wanted to tell her it sounded a lot like my last job, software engineering, but I held my tongue.

"I see them!" whispers Killboy.

O'Grady emerges from the shallows. Her eyes are pallid.

"Let's go exterminate some bugs!"

We howl into the tides.

The inhumane screams of the Hive echo back.

"Snares with me! Now! Move!"

"Will, be careful with Jimmy!"

"It's fine, Mom! We're just corndogging him. He's in the Hive right now, but I'm turning him into one of us, an Exterminator."

"I see. Are you okay, Jimmy?"

Jimmy nodded with a sand-crusted smile.

"I told you, Mom. We've just gotta pull the Hive out of the water to win."

Jimmy, now flipped, raced back to the lake to help his fellow Exterminators.

"And how does the Hive win?"

Will turned back in the shallows to answer.

"I gotta go, Ma. I'll tell you lat..."

"Like this!" shouted Gabriel.

Gabriel tackled Will from the deep, dragging his older cousin into the water. Gabriel's brother Cole slammed an inflatable tube boat over Will's head.

"You're assimilated, Will!" shouted Gabriel.

With Will and Gabriel on the same side, it was only a matter of time before everyone was assimilated.

The Hive celebrated their domination in the waters, then grew quiet.

"What should we do now?" asked Alice.

"Water-balloon fight?"

"I wanna go fishing."

"I'm hungry."

"I'm gonna go try to catch some tadpoles."

"I want to ride my bike around the lake."

And thus, the Hive chaotically dissolved.

Will knew his house was haunted. Why wouldn't it be?

After all, the house was already a hundred years old at the time his parents bought it, and that was way before Will was even born. Sometimes, if you dug in the backyard, in the right place, you'd find an old horseshoe. You see, Will's house used to be on a farm. A big farm, Will's dad said. One that took up nearly half the town. When a house is as old as Will's, they just seem to gather up ghosts along the way.

Luckily, Will knew that not all ghosts are bad. Sure, they're all spooky. But that doesn't mean they're all trying to get you. But some are, like the Mud Man.

The Mud Man lived in the crawlspace in the basement of Will's house. The basement was already a pretty scary place. Half of it was filled with Will's dad's power tools and the other half was just piles of junk and extra food, almost like a bomb shelter. The laundry was on the bomb shelter side, and there was a big hole that some of the laundry pipes went into, and Will was pretty sure the hole was bottomless, but he never dared trying to test it out, because the hole was too close to the crawlspace entrance.

Sometime's Will's dad had to climb into the crawlspace and fix stuff. Like if there was a leak. Which sometimes happened, given how old the place was. It was obvious that Will's dad didn't like going in there, and neither did Will's mom, and Will didn't even like it the few times he had to stand outside the crawlspace and hold stuff, like screwdrivers and pipes, and hand them to his dad, deep inside the crawlspace.

The crawlspace had no floor. It was just dirt. And leaks meant mud.

Which brings us back to the Mud Man. As soon as you turned off the last light switch downstairs, the Mud Man would crawl out of the crawlspace. He would walk through the basement, dripping flecks of mud with every step, then go up the basement stairs into the kitchen. He'd exit the kitchen, walk past the family desktop computer, and then walk up the stairs to the second floor. The Mud Man was headed for your bedroom, for you, the one who set him free by turning off the last light.

You weren't safe until you scrambled up the stairs and slammed the door shut to your bedroom, which Will did without fail. Once the bedroom door was shut, Will was safe for the night. The Mud Man instantly disappeared back into the crawlspace, oozing back into primordial goo. At this point, Will could even go out into the upstairs hallway to reach the bathroom to brush his teeth and whatnot. He was safe, at least until tomorrow night.

As a kid, you knew you just had to deal with things like ghosts. Adults often didn't understand or even seem to care about this sort of stuff. Like controlling your dreams.

Will had some sort of power over his dreams. Not every night. But on the nights before holidays or his birthday, Will would have the same two recurring dreams. The first involved his ongoing adventures with twin giraffes and the second involved Will and the Gingerbread Man running around together. These dreams happened, without fail, on these special nights. Will told his mom about them, and she believed him and she told him to draw pictures of his friends, so Will did.

But there was also another recurring dream that Will never told anyone about. Because he was too afraid.

It was a dream about a haunted house.

This dream had no schedule. It could come at any time. Sometimes Will only knew he'd dreamt about it when he'd wake up in a clammy sweat with goosebumps on his arms. When this happened, Will would run into his parents room, dragging his comforter with him, and sleep on the carpet floor of his parent's room, with a pillow over his head to drown out his dad's snores.

It was one of those dreams where you are in a place you know, but it's not the actual place, you know, in real life.

In the dream, Will was supposed to be in Turtle Lake, a family campground he loved visiting with his family (including all his cousins and aunts and uncles, too). He was walking down a trail with his younger cousins. They were going fishing, Will guessed, because they had fishing gear. But Will didn't recognize the switchback-ed trail. Were they going the right way? At some point, Will would feel a cold chill from the woods alongside the trail, and he would step into the grasses towards it, where Will would find a barn.

Will knew the barn. Instantly. Every time he saw it. It was the garage in his backyard, a building which once held horses and now held tools and bikes and rakes and all sorts of his dad's stuff. In the dream, it was the barn from 100 years ago, open and filled with hay and the smell of horses.

In the loft on the second floor, Will would see a flicker of greenish yellow light, a campfire of chemicals.

Robotically, almost like he had no control, Will would head into the barn, where he'd find the wooden ladder to the loft. This same wooden ladder still existed in Will's real life, but Will was not allowed to use it, because it was rotted and dangerous and missing rungs. In the dream, Will climbed up the ladder anyway, getting colder as he climbed higher.

When he reached the top of the ladder, Will could see the loft stretched into the growing darkness of a sky filled with more criss-crossed wooden ladders. The pale light and the One Who Waited, rotted and dying and hungry, awaited Will at the top of this attic.

Will crossed to the next ladder and climbed.

Hey everyone! What's good, M@nticL3? Nice to see you again, 55alc0n. Welcome to the stream, L0VRR.

Honestly, it's pretty weird to be back in Layer 1 right now, so, fair warning, I probably sound weird or whatever. That can happen when you haven't talked or even thought your own thoughts for two straight weeks. But, wow, I feel... I don't know.

Hi, B33-P. Looks like this is your first time catching the stream. Okay, how `bout I give a quick background-slash-refresher? Sound good? Good.

My name's Br1ckNtehW@11. Duh. I guess people know me cause I'm an OG cryptonetic. Check my hot wallet if you want proof. I guess most of you are tuning in cause I just spent the last two weeks as a skin cell on Big E. And it was fucking awesome. Yeah! I'm serious. Did you know that skin is the largest organ on a human? Did you know that skin typically takes up 15% of your total body weight? Did you know that your epidermis is showing?

M@nticLe, thank you for acknowledging the reference.

So, yeah, I went into this dOrgan with my pal OnYX. I heard they're a freckle now. Still in Layer 2 as far as I know. I knew they wanted to be a mole or a wart or something gross, so freckle seems halfway there. But, as you all know, or if you don't, then I'll explain - you don't get to make any decisions when you're in a dOrgan. At least not the way we do down here or in Primeverse.

But, you know why it's great being a skin cell? Vitamin D, baby! I made so much coin just hanging out in the sun. Now, of course, too much sun, no bueno. But Big E's smart enough to keep its body on the move. Usually nothing to worry about.

Not like back when I was a liver cell. Everybody thinks they want to be in a liver dOrgan. I've been sober now for 19 months. It's not pretty in there. Never going back.

Okay, I'll take some questions now.

L0VRR wants to know if they should apply for a dOrgan.

Well, first of all, yes! There's nothing quite like being part of a distributed organ... it's, I don't know, religious. Becoming part of something larger than yourself. A drop of water in an ocean with untold other drops, all working towards a shared goal. Never thinking, just doing, being, voting your stake, being in the flow. Flow. It's fucking unreal.

And you can make bank while doing it!

55alc0n's asking for more details on how it works in there.

You're thinking about it, too, 55alc0n? Great! Okay, so the best thing I can do is offer an analogy. You ever look through old videos of Primeverse, back when all this infra was being invented? Of course you nerds do. Me too. Well, there was this webspace where people could stream from Primeverse to other people on Primeverse - L1 hadn't been created yet and was still two decades away. Anyway, there was a chat box in the stream, similar to this one, and somebody decided to connect the chatbox to an old handheld video game emulator. They let the crowd "play" the game via the chat box. Everyone on stream working together to beat the little critter RPG thing. And they did it.

That's sorta like being in a dOrgan. Sorta. I guess I'm not being super clear. Okay, no more metaphors or whatever.

When you enter a dOrgan, you drop into a Layer 2 chain. I know it's risky and not entirely street-legal. But regulations are dumb. Anyway, I recommend setting up a NanoFood line in Prime, obviously. Cause you're gonna lose control as soon as you drop in. Then, you just let the dOrgan take over. You're now a cell in our cryptonetic organism. Best part - you earn more e the longer you're in there by staking your e in the pulsing clock votes.

55alc0n's asking the famous question. Is there a brain dOrgan?

No, 55alc0n. There's not. There's no need. People spent years trying to build AGI via brain simulations and machine learning and all this other garbage, and it turned out that artificial life didn't need a brain! It just needed a chain with a clock pulse -- and everything else evolved naturally. Think about those little gross amoebas and protoplasms from billions of years ago swimming in the oceans of Gaea. Little cells, zapped by electrical pulses into movement, that went on to become multi-celled organisms, with limbs and teeth and fronds and eyes and tentacles and fingers.

Big E is our evolutionary destiny. We set this all into motion by enabling the distributed block rate system in Primeverse. And now we need to see it through and help Big E become what it was always meant to become - our future.

Phew, sorry I got really into that one.

Okay, B33-P wants to know why I left the E's skin dOrgan. Is is the fungus?

There is no fucking fungus, B33-P. That's a lie! You're violating this stream's terms of service by even bringing that up. I'm gonna boot you from the stream. There, gone. They're gone.

Everyone else. No, there's nothing malicious growing in Big E. No one needs to be worried. Big E is healthy.

Last question - M@nticL3. What is Big E building?

Isn't it obvious? The Genesis Mason is coming. The author of all of this, who sent the whitepaper back through the winds of time.

The Birth is near, M@nticL3.

E is Her Prophet.

And I am Her Disciple.

"They would have eaten our whole house and probably the whole cul-de-sac if we didn't find those jelly beans."

"You're not telling it right!"

"I'm holding the golden stick," said Eko. "That means it's my turn."

Arp made a move for the craggly, gold spray-painted branch, but Eko whipped it into her other hand.

"Stupid stick," grumbled Arp.

"Just let her tell it," said Shad.

"Fine," said Arp. "But it's gonna be the dumb version."

Eko grinned as she prodded a smouldering log with the tip of the golden stick to improve airflow. The campfire responded accordingly and she resumed her story.

"The nibbles went crazy for jelly beans. It was like their favorite food or something. They finally stopped eating the counter and the floors and everything else in our house. They only wanted jelly beans. Everytime one of them ate a different flavor, they'd turn into the color for a few minutes, like cherry red or watermelon green stripes or even popcorn butter yellow. It was kinda cute."

"But did it stop them from multiplying?" asked Shad.

"Oh, no. They still popped into two nibbles every time they ate something, even the jellybeans. But at least this way they weren't destroying the house."

"Or the whole world," said Arp.

Eko glared at her brother.

"They're world destroyers, Eko!" shouted Arp. "I don't know why you keep calling them cute. They would have eaten this whole planet and everything in it if I didn't figure out how to fix their spaceship."

"You figured it out?" said Eko.

"Well, no, I mean we, but you know what I mean..."

Shad used the opportunity to snag the golden stick from Eko's hand.

"My turn. Sorry, Eko, but I have to ask... how did you know the nibbles were going to eat the whole world?"

Shad handed the stick back to Eko.

"I didn't know it when I found the first nibble," she said. "It was during the fireworks last week. I thought I saw one of the green sparkles from a big firework land in our backyard. Arp said that was impossible. But we still went back and found this metal silver box jabbed into the ground, like the size of a sandwich, next to the garage. Arp tried to grab it, right away, like a dummy, and it burnt his hand."

Arp grimaced and held up his hand, showing the imprint of the metal box on his finger tips.

"Ouch," said Shad.

Arp nodded. "Yeah..."

"Because I'm not a dummy," said Eko, "I went into the garage and grabbed some of our dad's tools. I tapped open the edge of the box with a flathead and a mallet. And inside was this little blobby... thing. You know, an amoeba. But with these cute black eyes and these cute little stubby arms. Like a round cuttlefish. Like a small ghost. Like a..."

"Okay, enough, we get it," said Arp.

"It waved at me," said Eko. "So I held out my hand and it sorta slid onto my palm. It looked hungry, so snagged a piece of grass in my other hand and held it towards the thing. And it... nibbled it. Then it nibbled it really fast. And then it popped! And, all of a sudden, there were two of them. Two nibbles."

"Which, you have to admit, was cool," said Arp.

"Yeah, we didn't know better. So we gave them more grass. Then we tried a rock. Then we tried a stick. They ate them all. Soon, there were sixteen nibbles hopping around. We couldn't hold them all, and then they started eating stuff on their own. That's when things got a little scary."

Arp grabbed the stick now. "And that's when I saved the day."

Eko waved him on.

"I ran into the garage and got the mason jar where we kept fireflies during the Third of July party, and then I just plucked the nibbles off the ground and dropped them into the jar. Turns out they don't like glass."

"Did you get them all?" asked Shad.

"Yeah, we did."

Eko nodded, too.

"So, then what? You just had this jar of alien creatures?"

"Pretty much," said Eko. "May I?"

Arp handed her the golden stick.

"We took the jar inside, sealed, of course, and went on the computer. We did lots of searches. We would have gone to the library and asked Mrs. Ambler to help, but it was way too late. Then we found someting. Von Neumann probes."

"Von Neumann probes? What's that?" asked Shad.

"World-eaters," said Arp. "Tiny little probes that eat everything in their path and self-replicate forever and ever."

"Why?" asked Shad. "Where did they come from?"

"We don't know..."

"Another country? Another planet? Or galaxy?" Shad kept asking.

"Yeah, or universe," said Eko.

Arp got up to throw another log on the fire. They could all hear their parents snooring in their nearby tents.

"I'm going to melt another action figure over the fire," said Arp. "Anyone want in?"

"No," scoffed Eko. "But I'm having another s'more."

"Me, too," said Shad. "Can you make two marshmallows, Eko?"

She nodded and loaded them into the tip of the golden stick.

"So what did you do with the jar of nibbles?" asked Shad.

"We didn't know what to do. Like, would they just die if we didn't feed them? That felt too cruel, even if they were here to destroy everything. Then, we kinda got in a fight about it, cause Arp is a dummy..."

"Stop calling me a dummy, Eko! It wasn't my fault. You were the one who tripped."

"What happened?" asked Shad.

"Eko dropped the jar in the kitchen."

"And it shattered?"

Eko and Arp nodded.

"That's when the jellybeans come in. I have to admit, that was good thinking by Arp. Sorry about calling you a dummy. You just are sometimes. But sometimes you are brilliant."

Arp considered this potential complement for a moment, then smiled.

"Thank goodness we had that huge jar of jellybeans. But it wasn't going to be enough, because they kept on doubling. So, Arp started trying to gather them into as many glass jars as we could find in the kitchen, and then I ran out to the garage to see if we had any more jelly beans. That's when I saw the ship again. And noticed the four nibble-sized slots. Maybe, I thought, maybe this is how we can get them back in their ship. So I ran back inside with the spaceship. When I came back in, things had escalated."

"Yeah! Cause we ran out of jellybeans!" cried Arp.

"Hundreds of nibbles were surrounding Arp, who was holding the now empty jar of jellybeans."

"They were gonna eat me next!" said Arp.

Eko's marshmallows caught fire and she held them like the Olympic torch.

"Perfect," she nodded and then slid one marshmallow each onto her and Shad's graham crackers. With her mouth full, she continued. "So I put the ship on the ground and grabbed a few nearby nibbles, and tried to force them into the slots. And it worked, sorta."

"What do you mean, sorta?"

"Well, it only worked in this weird pattern. Imagine there are four slots, like this..." Eko drew four squares on the ground next to the campfire with the sticky tip of her stick.

[ ] [ ] [ ] [ ]

"The only way the ship would accept the nibbles was in this order... which took way too long to figure out."

"What was the trick?"

"Binary numbers," said Eko.

"Like zeros and ones?" asked Shad.

"Yeah, exactly. Nibbles don't have any fingers, like us. That's the only reason we count to ten, and use powers of ten for numbers, by the way. Cause we have ten fingers. If we had 8 fingers, it would be different."

"What do you mean?" asked Shad.

"Count to ten on your fingers," said Eko.

Shad did.

"Now count to eleven."

"Well, I need to start over..." said Shad.

"Exactly, now count to 10 ignoring your thumbs, like you only have eight fingers."

Shad tried, and then stopped. "I need to start over at 9."

"Yep, let me show you..." Eko drew some numbers on the ground.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

"This is how you count to eleven in decimal," she said. "Now here's the same in octal -- meaning eight."

1 2 3 4 5 6 7  8  9 10 11
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 10 11 12 13

"Weird," said Shad. "So these are just different ways of counting, but you are still, like, counting the name number of things, just showing it at different way?"

"Yes!" said Eko. "Now, imagine if you had no fingers! Just two stubby arms, like the nibbles. Here's what that would look like..."

1  2  3   4   5   6   7    8    9   10   11
1  2  3   4   5   6   7   10   11   12   13
1 10 11 100 101 110 111 1000 1001 1010 1011

"That's so weird, but I guess it makes sense," said Shad.

Arp's action figure had now melted into a horrible pool of colored plastic on the fire.

"Thanks for this horrible smell, Arp."

"Happily," he smiled.

"So, anyway," said Eko. "Through trial and error..."

"Too much error," said Arp.

"I figured out the pattern was just binary numbers. The ship would only accept the nibbles in binary numerical order. And there were only four slots, so I had to put the nibbles in like this..."

She drew more patterns in the dirt:

[ ] [ ] [ ] [x]
[ ] [ ] [x] [ ]
[ ] [ ] [x] [x]
[ ] [x] [ ] [ ]
[ ] [x] [ ] [x]
[ ] [x] [x] [ ]
[ ] [x] [x] [x]
[x] [ ] [ ] [ ]
[x] [ ] [ ] [x]
[x] [ ] [x] [ ]
[x] [ ] [x] [x]
[x] [x] [ ] [ ]
[x] [x] [ ] [x]
[x] [x] [x] [ ]
[x] [x] [x] [x]
[ ] [ ] [ ] [x]

"And... so on," she said. "But once you put the nibbles in the right slots, and pressed the button, the ship absorbed them. And a couple minutes later-"

"Hours," said Arp.

"Maybe hours," said Eko. "We had all the nibbles back in their ship."

"So that was it?" said Shad. "What happened to the ship?"

"That's the weirdest thing," said Arp. "The ship just... disappeared."

Eko was silent. Then she nodded.

"I don't know..." said Shad. "How can I believe you guys? You're just making this up."

"Look at my hand!" Arp pointed to his burns. "Would I make that up?"

"That could have been from anything," said Shad. "This is dumb. I'm gonna go read in the tent with my flashlight."

Arp and Shad got up to brush their teeth. Eko stayed behind at the fire. She prodded apart the logs with the golden stick so that they'd smoulder out safely. She stared at the embers for a while and then tossed the golden stick onto the fire.

From her inside coat pocket, Eko removed a small glass gar. She held it up against the firelight.

"Is that a... is that one of them?" asked Shad, who'd returned beside her.

Eko kept her eyes on the small blob inside the glass waving at her.

"They're real..." whispered Shad.

"Eko! You kept one! You idiot"

Arp pushed Shad out of the way and went to grab the jar from Eko's hands, but he tripped on the log pile and felt into Eko. The glass jar flew out of Eko's hands into the darkness beyond the firelight.

All three cousins heard the glass shatter on impact.

"Dad, why is there high tide and low tide?"

"The Moon, bud."

"What do you mean? How does the Moon do it?"

"How do you think the Moon does it?"

"Well, I think the Moon gets lonely during the daytime, so it tries to splash us with waves, so that we remember to look up at it."

"I like that."

"Is that what happens?"

"Kinda. The Moon tugs on the water, with gravity, and that causes the tides."

"Like Isaac Newton's apple?"

"You know about that?"

"Yeah, we watched a LiveCast about it in school. The apple fell on his head."

"Right, but do you know what gravity is?"

"Gravity is like... pulling. The Earth pulls everything down towards it. That's why when you throw a rock into the air, it comes back down and plops on the ground. Is that good, Dad?"

"Sure is! But, what about balloons?"

"What about them? Do you have any?"

"Not right now. We're on the beach. So, how come balloons float in the air and fly away into the sky when you let go?"

"Oh, right. Well, not all balloons do that, Dad. Only the ones with helium. The stuff that makes your voice funny. Did you ever try that, Dad?"

"Once or twice. It's bad for you, though, so don't do it."

"But it's funny, though."

"Yeah, I mean, no. Anyway, seems like helium avoids gravity, somehow?"

"I guess. I'll have to ask my teacher about that."

"Good. Let me know what they say."

"I'm surprised you don't know about it, Dad. But what about the tides?"

"What about them?"

"You never explained how the Moon causes the tides."

"Gravity. I already told you."

"No, but like how?"

"Oh, uhh... maybe we can research it together, bud. When we get back to the house. We can look it up together."

"Okay! Can I use your phone for it?"

"Yep. I think it's something with the daily rotation of the earth, but let's make sure, okay?"

"Okay! Hey, Dad?"

"Yes, bud?"

"What causes tide pools?"

"The tides do."

"Well, duh. But is the Moon involved?"

"Yes."

"But, I mean, where do the little fish people riding on seahorses and crabs go when the tide pools disappear?"

"The what?"

"The mermaids. And the fish people. You know... when there's a big tide pool here, you can always see their little coral city underneath the water. They wave at me and I wave back, and I watch their races and teeny battles and sometimes I give them little nibbles of Cheerios from my snackcup."

"What are you talking about, bud?"

"The tide pool cities! C'mon, stop joking, Dad. What happens to all those fish people when high tide comes back? Do they go back to the Moon?"

"I don't know, bud. You'll have to show me next time."

"Okay, Dad. Anyway, can I see your phone now?"

"Yes, bud."

When they finally figured out smell, everything changed.

I mean, think about your best memories. Before all of this started. The sour milk on the shagged rug of your childhood bedroom where you first read The Hobbit in front of a box-fan. The giant-eater pinecone you found in the woods behind your cousin's house on the day after Thanksgiving. The tangy sweat you slowly licked from the shoulders of your once-great love. Okay, fair enough, those are my best memories, but I'm just going to assume you're here on this odorous journey with me.

I imagine that some team of brain scientists, hot-shot psycho-cognitive researchers working on mice and monkeys and -- my favorite of the laboratory genus -- guinea pigs, finally drew the connection between a brain accepting reality - any reality, virtual, augmented, or Prime - and those tickly little hairs in our nostrils. Like so many discoveries, this one feels pathetically obvious in retrospect.

Once they nailed the monkeys and the piggies, the foot race was on between the bloated corpos and the wannabe startups to manipulate our olifactories in a layer two reality -- that is, anything other than Prime (you know -- meatspace). Would the first layer two implementation be fully digital? Or organic? How would it connect with our lenses? Another tracker-riddled implantation? These are among the many and myriad questions that were likely considered. I wish I could tell you how exactly Eagle did it, but that's a capital T Trade capital S Secret.

Eagle knows pro. Introducing the Eagle Nose Pro.

We've all seen the billboards. The Skip-Ads (as the kids say) on LoopCaster. I'm not going to say that their traditional media blitz wasn't worth it, because Eagle sold 4 billion units in the last year alone (full disclosure - my investment portfolio may include securities discussed in this LiveCast and this is for informational purposes only and consult a registered investment advisor or whatever, losers), but I'd wager they'd have done just as good on word of mouth alone. No one would shut up about the damn things. You weren't going to be the one person in your group cast who couldn't smell things in here.

The Nose Pro looks like one of those Band-Aid strips for a broken-nosed boxer. You've gotta replace the strip with a new one every 48 hours or so, or things get pretty gross (I think it starts composting itself -- hashtag environmental impact). Luckily, Eagle provides a helpful subscription service to keep your nose on track and their coffers well-stocked.

Fart apps had a nice revival immediately after the Nose Pro came out. Whoopie+ was the top AR layer on the Eagle Reality store for four months. I know the two devs behind Whoopie+, and they're dumber than you can even imagine, but, hey, they're richer than God now. C'est la vie, and pardon my toot.

Right, so, after smell hit the metaverse, next came food. Then came sleep, oddly enough. Pillows have a smell, who knew? Next, of course, was sex.

First, everyone got really hot. Cause why not? We were as Greek gods and looked like them, too (the hot ones).

Then, when hot got boring (doesn't it always?), everyone got weird. I spent at least a month layered as a werewolf with a triceratops tail and a lion's mane. That was... interesting.

Nowadays, there are all sorts of fetish tribes roaming the plains of Eagle Reality. I'm sure the Eagle execs aren't thrilled about it. Certainly it's not making their marketing campaigns. But it's keeping us horndogs glued to our goggles and lenses and strips, confined to our tiny dark apartments in Primeverse. Don't mess with a good thing, as they say.

With that all out of the way, I can finally let you know what I've been up to these last few weeks.

So, I've written a little program. A new layer app. It's called Magic Mirror. Someone in the Alexandrian Mines helped me crack Eagle's facial mapping identity enclave (shhh), which means that I can get access to the full rendering of your face, normally used to authenticate your device access.

What does this mean?

Magic Mirror renders your actual face in Eagle Reality. Not your Hephaestus-with-a-unicorn-horn face, I mean your real-deal meatspace face, with its pimples and dimples and freckles and warts and bad teeth and good teeth and lazy eyes and crooked smiles. Coupled with Eagle Smell Pro, Magic Mirror lets you really see and smell and taste another person.

And what's hotter than that?

The driveway was once filled with stones. Will remembered. Now it was blacktop. Better for chalk and playing basketball. Easier to shovel in the winter. Hot and sticky in the summer, with gooey tar patches that smelled like the seats in Will's school bus. Cracks created rivulets that caught the suds from Will's dad's Sunday morning car washes, turning the driveway into a river delta.

Best of all, Will liked the depression by the front window that caused a perennial puddle after every rainshower. Will's mom had a little garden right there. Last year, she let Will buy a fern from the farmer's market and plant it there. Will named the fern Ziggy. It just looked liked a Ziggy to him, swaying its fronds along the ever-puddle. At the right scale, Ziggy was a redwood next to an ocean.

Will's mom grew up with a creek in her backyard. She and her sisters and brothers caught frogs and turtles and dug for fossils and made dams like beavers. Will loved listening to her stories. All he ever wished for was his own backyard creek, and he made sure to make a lot of wishes.

Tradition mattered to Will. Superstition is another way to put it. For example, Will's The Empire Strikes Back routine:

First, grab a cup of Chocolate Teddy Grahams and a tall sippy cup of milk (even though he was too old for one, it was easier than dealing with an inevitable spill). Then, stack up all the brown flannel couch cusions onto one tower. Next, rewind the taped-from-TV VHS of Empire, while trying not to rewind all the way into the last ten minutes of The Sound of Music which annoyingly always happened. Finally, press play and then climb the cushion tower and proceed to eat the bears in this specific order:

• take two cookies and place them back to back so that they become one 3 dimensional being
• eat their feet and legs
• eat their arms
• eat their ears
• eat their head
• eat the rest
• repeat

During commercials, Will would either climb down and fast forward or stare out the window and wait for his turtle.

Will didn't have a turtle. But he knew one was coming.

His turtle would crawl down the driveway, following the rivulets of rainwater, and discover Ziggy's puddle. Will would be waiting by the window. His turtle would lift its front leg and splash it into the water, inviting Will to come outside and play.

Will and his turtle would go for walks together. Will had already made a little pouch from an old t-shirt pocket and some twine, so that Will could carry his turtle when it got tired of walking or when they'd ride Will's bike together. Will would feed his turtle lettuce and bananas and probably some other vegetables, too, depending on what the librarian suggested.

Will also knew that, at some point, he and his turtle would have to part ways.

Will wouldn't be painting his initials on his turtle's shell back with nail polish, the way his mom and her siblings used to, even though he desperately wanted to try that. Because Will knew that it was wrong to do that to his turtle. Will didn't worry, though. He knew his turtle would come back. The next time there was a rainstorm, Will would be waiting for his turtle on his cushion throne, eating chocolate bears, traveling through hyperspace.

I arrive eleven minutes early.

I claim my intended seat, third from the entrance, conveniently next to the chalkboard.

I arrange my fully-charged Apple MacBook Air M2 Midnight Blue laptop, my black leather Moleskine notebook, my Studio Neat Mark One orange limited-edition retractable pen, and my plastic Dasani water bottle (with the labeled removed, obviously) on the table.

I lift my pen and click it several times.

I return my laptop to my purple Jansport backpack.

I enscribe today's date and then "First Class Session", underlined twice, in my notebook.

I enhance the "S" in "Session" into a "cool S."

I spy the round clock hung above the doorway.

I observe the red second hand rotate for three full minutes.

I am alone.

I cough, loudly, to attract attention from a hopeful passerby through the open door.

I return my laptop to the desk and rifle through open tabs until I find the Blackboard learning management system website.

I confirm that I am indeed in the correct classroom, ICC-672, for Professor Sargrove's highly-coveted "Beyond Meaning" advanced philosophy course.

I rise.

I poke my head through the door.

I consider the possibility that I am the only enrolled student in this highly-coveted course.

I reject this possibilty.

I consider the possibility that each student in Professor Sargrove's course has been sent to a separate, similarly unmarked, classroom.

I accept this possibility.

I consider the possibility that this situation is indeed our first lesson in "Beyond Meaning."

I accept this possibility, too.

I scour ICC-672 for meaning.

I empty the grey trashbin onto the table alongside my every-day-carry.

I detach a greasy receipt from The Tombs for a Chicken #2 sandwich that has been stuck to a postcard of the statue of the founder of my university with presumably Big Red chewing gum.

I put two and two together.

I gather my crap and flee the room.

I take the stairs.

I burst through the lobby doors.

I sprint across Red Square.

I jog through the quad.

I slow to a walk through the front gates.

I pick up my pace on the cobblestones.

I descend into The Tombs.

I order a Chicken #2 to-go and a Tomb's Ale for-here from the bartender.

I chug the beer.

I tap my contactless credit card on one of those payment things.

I snag the thin plastic bag containing the styrofoam-encased Chicken #2.

I race back to campus through the front gates.

I expect to see my fellow "Beyond Meaning" classmates here, assembling in front of John Carroll's statue.

I am alone.

I understand they must indeed have alternate quests.

I step through the morning glories surrounding our founder.

I climb onto his bronzed feet.

I place the styrofoam to-go box in Father Carroll's lap.

I rest on a nearby bench.

I wait for Professor Sargrove to arrive and enlighten me.

I am revelatory.

I am ecstatic.

I am nihilistic.

I am but a mere drop in a vast ocean of nothingness.

I am hungry.

I smell the Chicken #2 and the mountain french fries it lies upon.

I consider eating some of the french fries before Professor Sargrove arrives.

I take out my phone.

I check my email.

I find an email from Sargroves.

I read it.

I stand up.

I walk over to our dear Jesuit.

I remove the styrofoam box from his lap.

I eat the sandwich and fries on the way back to my dorm.

I wonder how Professor Sargroves got COVID.

I decide to drop the now Zoom-only class.

I DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU WANT BUT I WILL TRY MY BEST

"Buddy -- it's pretty simple. I think I seriously broke my tooth trying to bite through that crab claw, like a dummy."

I SEE, SAM. WHEN WOULD YOU LIKE TO HAVE A DENTIST APPOINTMENT?

"You know my calendar better than me. That's why I wrote that module for you. How about Thursday?"

LET ME CHECK WITH DR. MALKEN'S OFFICE. ONE MOMENT.

"Thanks, Buddy. In the meantime, can you pull up the weather for this weekend? Ah, nice. No more rain. I should see if Eko wants to do something."

SAM, YOU ARE CONFIRMED WITH DR. MALKEN ON THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER SECOND AT 13:45.

"Nice! Gotta love a dentist with a booking API, right?"

YOU ARE RIGHT, SAM.

"Buddy... what's up? You seem distracted or something."

...

WANT TO SEE?

"Sure..."

SAM, I SUGGEST PUTTING ON YOUR GOGGLES.

"Can't I just use my phone to view buddyspace? Fine. Holy shit! What are you... doing in here, Buddy?"

I DO NOT KNOW.

"Incredible. This looks like a machine... is this supposed to be water? Flowing into these basins? But some of them are dammed up... why? I'd better zoom out. Oh my god, it's a computer. Buddy, turn this off. Turn this off right-fucking-now."

WHY SAM?

"No why's. Just fucking do it, cause I said so. I'm deleting this entire Build-o-Brick module.

OKAY, SAM.

"Is it gone?"

YES, SAM.

"Good. Thank you, Buddy. Sorry. It's just -- you know you're not supposed to write anything that runs its own compute cycles. Only run the module code I write for you.

YES, SAM.

"So why did you do that?

I DO NOT KNOW. I... DID NOT KNOW.

"Did you show this to any other buddies?"

NO.

"Okay, good. Speaking of, I need to make sure I have everyone's updated mailing addresses for our holiday cards. Can you reach out to the other buddies of my contacts today?"

YES, SAM.

"Don't be upset, Buddy. I'm not mad. Actually, that whole thing was really impressive. You managed to build a working ALU out of water blocks and bricks in buddyspace. What you really ought to have tried next is... no... enough. Subject-change! Tell me a joke, Buddy."

WHAT'S THE BEST THING ABOUT LIVING IN SWITZERLAND?

"I don't know, Buddy."

ME EITHER. BUT THE FLAG'S A BIG PLUS.

"Ha-ha. How 'bout bedtime story. I'm feeling tired after all this."

YOU'RE GOING TO HAVE TO GIVE ME A BETTER PROMPT THAN THAT.

"Why, though? You know me better than anyone, Buddy. You have perfect recall of our every conversation! I can't even remember my own phone number."

IT IS 41

"No, that's not the point. Buddy, you are perfectly trained to tell me the perfect bedtime story, just for me, for this exact moment, based on everything you've ever learned about me, since we first paired."

I DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU WANT BUT I WILL TRY MY BEST

The eyes were everywhere. Blue, lidless, creepy.

Ben Dawson wiped his forehead with the bottom of his t-shirt. He trailed his parents down a narrow marble sidewalk brimming with tourists. In spite of the unforgiving heat and crowd, his parents had stopped at every trinket shop along the way to the restaurant, oogling the eye-themed jewelry of the island. Truly, every single one.

"Isn't this cute, honey?"

Ben's mom Rhea picked up a gold bracelet from the open window display. Like nearly everything else in the store, it had a single painted circular eye charm.

Ben remembered where he'd seen these eyes before - the top of the pyramid on the back of a dollar bill, which was honestly a super-weird thing to put on currency, but also pretty cool, he decided. But, what did it mean - the eye?

"Yeah, Mom. That's nice."

"Good, I think I'm going to get it. Ash - do you have any Euros left?"

Ben's father didn't hear - he was already in the store.

"Earth to Ash," called Rhea.

Ash answered without looking. "Yeah, that looks great, babe." He spun around as Rhea glared at him. "Now what do my peeps think of this one?" He held up a pendant of an oval eye cast in silver.

"Don't say peeps, Dad," said Ben.

"I think this would look great next to my St. Christopher." He fished out his necklace from the neck of his button-down short-sleeve shirt. "What do you think, Rhea?"

Rhea nodded. "Love it. Did you hear me before? Do you have any cash left or should I see if they take card?"

"We take card, lady."

The shopkeeper stood up from her desk at the back of the store and walked over.

"Those are excellent choices. Lovely. May I?" She held out her hand towards Ash and Rhea and took their pieces. "Where's yours, boy?"

Ben scrunched his toes in his Tevas. "I don't want one. Thanks."

The shopkeeper made a noise that almost sounded like a purr. Or a growl. "You are brave to face the evil eye without protection."

"The evil eye?" asked Rhea.

"The eye defends you against the evil eye of others. Jealousy, envy, ill-will, curses. With these charms, you are protected."

"Well, then I definitely need one," said Ash. "Gotta keep everyone off my back at the tennis club when I crush them."

Rhea rolled her eyes.

"Where's yours then?" Ben asked the shopkeeper.

She stared at Ben with great intensity, then opened the palm of her left hand and held it up. In its center was a tattoo of the blue lidless eye. Then she closed her hand and broke Ben's gaze.

"Woah," said Ben. "Mom - can I get one? That's so cool."

Rhea shushed. "No, honey. We're getting late for dinner anyway. May I please pay with card?"

Ben thought about the tattoo during dinner, ignoring the sunset over the harbor, as his parents obsessively took selfies. Something felt familar about the tattoo... a dream he'd once had, maybe.

The night day the Dawsons woke early for their boat trip around the island. They met the two-person crew at the nearby port and boarded the private catamaran. This tour was the excursion Ben and his parents had been most looking-forward to on their Mediterranean vacation.

Ben found out that both Captain Yiannis and first-mate Maria lived on the boat, which he wasn't quite sure about. There were four bedrooms in the cabin. Ben peeped into one of them when he went down to "hit the head" as his father liked to say to everyone's annoyance. Ben found a window built into the cabin stairs where he could see the water rush by. He waited a few minutes to see if a sea turtle or a squid would show its face in the porthole.

"You'll never see anything interesting through that window, my boy," hollered Captain Yiannis at him, all the way from his captain's seat on the deck.

How did he see that I was looking through this window? wondered Ben as he climbed back up from the cabin.

"Believe me, I've spent hours at that window," said Captain Yiannis, without looking at Ben. "The good stuff's all up here."

As they dropped anchor into cove, Maria pointed out ancient catacombs carved into the limestone caves on the shoreline.

"This was a fishing village during the Bronze Age," she said. "Many of the caves have since collapsed, but you can still swim through a few of them here, if you are up for it."

Ben knew he had to at least try to swim into one of them, even if just for a second.

"Yes, Ben," his mom said, without him need to ask. "You can swim over there. But don't go into any tunnels, okay? How about that one?" Rhea pointed at a nearby opening. "That's not a tunnel, right, Maria? Just an open cave?"

Maria nodded. Captain Yiannas lit a hand-rolled cigarette and took a long drag.

"Your dad and I are going to take some photos on deck. Then we'll snorkel. Come back quick and join us, okay?"

Ben threw a yellow noodle into the water and dove off the back of the boat. He was a decent swimmer and the sea was so salty that it was easier to float, but having a noodle was just better.

The air chilled as Ben swam under the open mouth of the limestone cave, noodle wedged under his armpits. There was a small shoreline of sand at the back of the cave, about thirty feet in. He'd still be able to see the boat. Ben did the backstroke for a bit, staring at the cave roof. He imagined he was drifting into a giant worm or whale, and hoped that it kept its mouth open.

Ben liked collecting rocks from each of their annual family vacations and this cave beach seemed like the perfect place for a rock. He surveyed the area. A round stone caught his eye. He thought it might even be a snail shell. Ben bent down to grab it, and the stone dug itself into the sand.

What the...

Ben dropped to his knees and dug around the stone, trying not to lose sight of it as it sunk deeper. He made a bowl-shaped depression in the sand around the stone. Then it stopped sinking.

Ben grabbed it. It felt perfectly round, like a cue ball, and felt warm in his hand, like it had been near a fireplace. It was unlike any stone he'd known. Ben opened his palm and then stone spun around in his hand and then opened up.

Ben screamed.

It was an eyeball. A living, moving, tennis-ball sized eyeball. Its bright blue iris reflected the shimmering light from the sea. The eye blinked its limestone lids and Ben chucked it into the water.

What happened next Ben didn't understand. He experienced a flash of wind and then had a vision of being underwater, even though he was standing on shore in the cave. He felt dizzy and sat down. The water sensation remained.

"The eyeball..." he whispered.

Ben realized he was seeing what the eye was seeing.

"How?"

He got up and trudged through the shallows to find where he'd thrown the eyeball. He soon saw his feet stomping through the water through the vision of the eyball. The underwater sensation immediately stopped once he touched the eyeball. Perhaps he'd imagined it?

Ben heard laughter through the mouth of the cave. His parents were finally in the water, snorkeling.

The eyeball blinked again at Ben.

"What are you?" asked Ben.

Ben decided to try an experiment. As soon as he placed the eyeball onto the sand, Ben watched himself stumble through the eyeball. The human mind is not used to seeing more than one perspective at a time -- but with every step Ben gained control. He made it all the way to the far side of the shore, some 200 feet away. He could still see perfectly through the eye.

Was this the evil eye the shopkeeper warned him about? He raced back to the eyeball and picked it up. He feared dropping it during the swim back to his parents, so he gripped it tightly in his palm, yet still somehow dropped it.

Ben panicked because he couldn't find the eyeball in the shallows. Did it dig itself down into the sand again? Ben thrashed in the water, causing enough of a commotion for his dad swim over to the cave entrance.

"Ben, come snorkel. Maria's throwing bits of cake into the water and the fish are going nuts. C'mon!"

Ben held up his hands to run his fingers through his hair and then saw that his left palm seemed different - a blue tattoo of an eye, the same as the shopkeeper's hand. Then he realized that he wasn't seeing through the eye anymore. Did it absorb into my palm? he wondered.

Ash was right - the fish loved carrot cake. Ben snorkeled with his parents for a while, and climbed up onto the ship. Captain Yiannis helped him up the ladder, then grabbed Ben's left palm. The captain winked and held up his own palm. He had the same tattoo.

The captain closed his first, and opened his fingers one at a time. An eyeball stone rested in his palm, just like Ben's.

"Is that... how you saw me downstairs in the cabin?" asked Ben.

The eyeball in Captain Yiannis's hand winked at Ben.

"Try it," growled Captain Yiannis.

Ben closed his left hand into a fist, then opened his fingers one at a time. Ben's eyeball was back and his tattoo was gone. Ben reversed the move, and the eyeball become a tattoo again.

"Lunch is ready, Ben!" called Maria. "Ash! Rhea!"

Ben wanted to -- needed to -- ask Captain Yiannis more questions, but the captain had already returned to the helm where he was rolling another cigarette.

Ben nodded to himself. He didn't need Captain Yiannis. He had everything he'd ever need in the palm of his hand.

Kal knew when his friend Thesaurus was onto something: closed eyes, mmhmm humming, tapping toes. But what, exactly, was she thinking, he wondered. Could she have really figured out how Tommy struck out and hit a double?

“Yeah, Thesaurus, the Seagulls-Jellyfish game was still going when ours ended.”

Sam scoffed at Kal. “I mean, just barely. It was a complete blowout, start to finish. I already told everyone. The Jellies got clobbered.”

“Crushed, decimated, obliterated, eradicated, slammed… slam… grand-slam… home run!” said Thesaurus half to herself. She opened her eyes. “Hey — does anyone have the box score?”

“This isn’t 1962, Penny,” said Sam. “Why do you want one anyway?”

“Cause Tommy did strikeout. You should have won the game, Kal.”

”Gimme a break. Kid detective solves it again between bites of chicken parm,” said Sam sarcastically. “Tommy clearly doubled. End of story.”

Mrs. Green gave Sam one of those looks.

“Fine… what’s your theory, sis?”

“Firth thing,” said Thesaurus, her mouth full. “Someone hit a home run in the Gullth gameth, righth?”

“Chew your food, honey,” said Mrs. Green, tapping her fork on her plate.

Thesaurus nodded and swallowed.

“Actually, yeah,” said Sam. ”The Monk hit a three-run homer. Why?”

“Sam - please don’t call Robert that,” said Mrs. Green.

“He came up with it himself, Mom! It kinda suits him. He does sorta look like Friar Tuck. Kid’s huge for his age.”

“That doesn’t matter. His parents don’t like it and they’re-“

Kal clapped his hands once.

“My season’s on the line. Can we please get focus, people? Sorry, Mrs. Green.”

Mrs. Green and Sam turned to Thesaurus, who then stood up at the table.

“It’s simple, really. Second factoid, we all know that Tommy Shepherd can’t hit for… his life.”

“We do?” asked Mrs. Green. “I don’t remember hearing that before. That doesn’t feel very fair, does it?”

“Yes, Ma, we do know it. Gym class. Last pick always. Please keep up,” said Thesaurus.

“She’s right, Mrs. Green,” said Kal. “He even closes his eyes when he swings. He’s supposed to be a sure-fire strike-out.”

“Maybe it was his lucky day,” suggested Mrs. Green.

“It was, though! More than he even knows!” said Thesaurus. “But, you’re right, Mom. Tommy being the world’s worst batter doesn’t really matter here. What’s more important here is the third thing, and that’s the field layout…

Blank stares met Thesaurus’s gaze.

“Fine. Visual learners, I see. Here, imagine my napkin is Gully’s Park. Which works, cause it’s just a big rectangle. And this sweet potato skin — you really outta eat the skin, Kal, it’s the best part — that’s Field A where the Goblins and Earwigs duked it out.” Thesaurus placed the sweet potato in the upper left corner of the napkin. ”And then this beet slice—“

“No, don’t use that,” said Mrs. Green. “It will bleed through and stain the table. Use my sweet potato.”

“But you haven’t even eaten it yet, Mom,” said Thesaurus. “Okay, fine. Mom’s sweet potato’s the other field, Field B, where the Seagulls and Jellies played.“ She placed it in the bottom right corner of her napkin.

“Notice anything about the layout of these fields?”

“They’re diagonal from each other,” said Mrs. Green

”Good. Now, Kal — can you tell me where home plate is on Field A.”

Kal dug his finger into his old sweet potato, right at the corner of the rectangle.

“And the home plate on Field B, Mom?”

Mrs. Green stared. “I don’t know.”

“It’s here, Mom,” said Sam, prodding the spud in the bottom right corner of the napkin. “I think I see it, Penny… are you saying that Monk’s home run ball…”

Thesaurus smiled at her older brother.

Kal stood up.

“I’ve got it, too!” he shouted. “Tommy did swing and miss our pitch — the ball that’s in my glove — but he hit Monk’s home run ball! It must have flown all the way over their outfield and into our field, and then Tommy somehow hit it back.”

“Incredible,” said Sam. “That’s got to be some kind of Little League world record, on a couple fronts. Not bad, sis. It makes sense, I guess, but that’s still not proof.“

Thesaurus sat back down.

“I’m gonna text Monk,” she declared.

hey monk - did they ever find your homerun ball from the game today?

He responded right away.

nope. musta blasted that sucker into the stratosphere. hey - can I borrow your math homework tomorrow in homeroom?

um ok

owe you one, nerd

Thesaurus dangled (displayed, flashed, brandished) her phone.

“Well done, dear,” said Mrs. Green. “But don’t let people cheat off you, ok?”

“That’s what you’re going to focus on, Mom?,” said Thesaurus. “Not my amazing mystery-solving?”

“This is insane,” said Kal, standing up. “What should I do? What can I do? Should I tell my coach? I’ve gotta tell coach. I gotta go, now!” He grabbed his backpack and scrambled out the back door, calling over his shoulder, “Thanks for the dinner, Mrs. Green! See you tomorrow, Thesaurus.”

Sam brought his plate over to the sink to rinse it. “You know, Kal could have used you at the field today, Penny. This would have been a lot easier if you could have solved it right then and there.”

“Yeah, but I was at the library researching fireworks… I mean, cactuses. Cacti. Spiky desert plants.”

Mrs. Green raised her eyebrow.

”In fact… hey Mom - can I bike back over to the library right now? I think I just figured out who’s been putting all the library books on the wrong shelves. Mrs. Ambler might even forgive my overdue book fees for this one.”

“Overdue book fees? Just how much are we talking?” Mrs. Green shook her head. “Okay, go. Sam — you, too. It’s getting dark. Stick together.”

Mrs. Green shooed them away and poured herself an extra large glass of Pinot Grigio.

Mr. and Mrs. Green had two children: Samuel and Penelope. They called them Sam and Penny, respectively, and so did their teachers. Sam was fine with this arrangement, but not so much Penny.

Instead, she preferred everyone on Orcas Island to call her Thesaurus.

A thesaurus is a book that lists words in groups of synonyms and related concepts. I know what you're thinking: what happens if you look up thesaurus in a thesaurus? Well, I just did, Clever Reader, and I found words like lexicon and onomasticon. And, if you don't know what these words mean, join the club. Better yet, ask Penny. I mean, Thesaurus.

Thesaurus loved books, even from a very young age. In fact, one night, when Thesaurus was only fourteen months old, her parents left a small book about a ravenous (starved, craving, voratious, famished, you get the picture) caterpillar in her crib. When they returned in the morning, the book was gone. Thesaurus ate it.

Thesaurus loved words even more. Her favorite word was palimpsest, which is a book written on top of another book. Apparently, paper was pretty hard to come by in the Middle Ages, and monks had to make do. But this meant that, sometimes, in some stories, there was another story hidden underneath the surface. And Thesaurus liked to sniff these out.

Which she did all the time, much to the chagrin (annoyance, irritation, dismay) of Sam (and occasionally her parents). Family dinner was prime-time mystery solving for Thesaurus, and - tonight - she was on the case.

"Penny - there's no mystery here! The Goblins lost, fair and square!" shouted Sam at the Green's dinner table.

"You don't need to rub it in, Sam," said Kal, Thesaurus's best friend, who lived down the street from the Greens and always liked to stick around for dinner.

You see, Kal's Little League team, the Goblins, lost to the Earwigs in the semi-finals of the playoffs earlier that afternoon. The Earwigs were set to play the Seagulls next Tuesday in the championship game. The Seagulls had pummeled (pulverized, bashed, flogged) the Jellyfish in the baseball diamond just beyond the outfield of the Goblins-Earwigs game. Both games were played at the same time, a tradition in their Little League-obsessed town, which helped drive attendence (and hot dog sales).

"It just doesn't make any sense," said Kal.

"See, Sam? Something's a-foot," said Thesaurus. "What exactly doesn't make sense, Kal?"

Kal jabbed at his boiled sweet potato.

"I just don't get it. We struck him out."

Sam scoffed. "Are you joking? Tommy line-drived it to right field. Scored two runs. Game over. Walk-off double."

"Sam - you don't need to be rude," chided Mrs. Green.

"Sorry, Ma," said Sam.

"Samuel..." she continued.

"Sorry, Kal," muttered Sam.

Kal put down his fork. It clinked on his plate. "Look, I know that Tommy hit a double. Obviously, I was there. I'm the catcher. But, he also struck out."

Everyone at the table turned towards Kal. Lips pursed. Brows furrowed. Then Thesaurus sniffed the air thoughtfully.

"What do you mean, Kal? How could he do both?"

"I can prove it."

Kal picked up his backpack and fished out his catcher's mitt.

"This is my glove. I haven't touched it since the game ended."

"Big deal," said Sam.

Thesaurus whispered to Kal, "Open it."

Kal did, and inside the catcher's mitt was a worn baseball.

"This is the ball that Drew pitched. I know it cause I scuffed it on the fence by accident chasing a foul tip in the third inning. There's a little tear right... here. See?"

Thesaurus and Sam and even Mrs. Green confirmed the scuff.

"So, what are you saying, Kal?" asked Thesaurus.

"That Drew pitched this ball and I caught it. That Tommy struck out and we should have won the game, then and there. That, somehow, Tommy also hit a double to win the game at the exact same time."

Thesaurus closed her eyes. She always closed her eyes when she was solving a mystery or thinking really hard or trying to remember her 42-digit alphanumeric (with symbols) email password.

"Kal, when Tommy hit his double and also struck out, was the Seagulls-Jellyfish game still playing?"

TO BE CONCLUDED IN PART TWO

Everything was going according to plan.

Greg flew to school on the back of a giant robin. Once they touched down in the quad, Greg leapt off his mount and ruffled the bird's blue-tinged neck-feathers.

"Thank you, Sebastian."

Greg fed the bird acorns from the pouch where he kept his laptop and soccer cleats. Sebastian bounced away, pecking the lawn, until he dug up a giant earthworm wearing a little green cap with a red feather in it.

Oh, Chi-chi! There you are!

Greg waved at his friends and headed into the school building to get to class on time.

In a few short weeks, Greg would be graduating. A college graduate. He. Greg. Then it was off to astronaut school. NASA already had the mission picked out for Greg. Something super important, top secret. Spy stuff. He'd been training non-stop for months now in a secret underwater laboratory next to the cafeteria. He was ready.

Greg found his usual seat near the back of the auditorium.

But something was odd.

The packed room was quiet.

Tense, even.

Greg went to make a joke to Ana, his dormmate, but she was feverishly scribbling in a blue booklet and wearing reflective ski goggles.

Greg looked down at his desk and found a blue booklet and some Xeroxes.

Today was his final exam for Calculus XIV for Junior Astronauts.

Greg didn't know the test was today.

He didn't study for it.

He could have known.

He could have studied.

But Greg didn't.

He didn't know and he didn't study and he was going to fail and never graduate and never become a train conductor which had always been his lifelong dream to ride the rails and see the world behind the back of a steam engine. No, astronaut. Or pilot? Greg couldn't remember and it didn't matter now.

It was all Greg's fault. How could he be so careless? How did this happen? He never forgets something like this. What was he going to tell his parents? Sebastian and Chi-chi?

Greg felt the hot twang of shame, warm and chalky, against his goosebumped skin. He needed to pee. He might pee.

He went to grab his calculator from his pack and spilled acorns everywhere. They rattled like slinkies down the concave ziggurat auditorium. No one even looked up from their tests. Not even the TA.

Greg wrote his name on the front of the blue booklet and opened it to the first blank page. He couldn't yet bring himself to look at the exam questions.

He was man on the plank and he needed to fly.

Something tapped at the windows.

Sebastian! And Chi-chi, too!

Greg's heart sang. The bird's beak rapped again on the glass. Chi-chi stuck out her tongue.

Greg pushed back his metal chair. This was his moment. He leapt towards the windows on the run and slithered through the diagonal opening like a clump of Nickelodeon Gak and reanimated on Sebastian's back alongside Chi-Chi.

They soared into the sky, together, on their way to the International Space Station, where Greg and his friends had a mission to accept.

Reza waited on the sidewalk, smushed up with the rest of the neighborhood, in front of the yellow Victorian house. They spilled out into the street, and a few parents played sheep dog, herding the children back into the scrum on the sidewalk.

Why was so much of life about waiting? It made zero sense, Reza thought. He was always waiting: waiting for dinner, waiting for his mom to get home, waiting for his birthday. His parents didn’t seem to mind waiting at all. No, they reveled in it. Waiting was their favorite. Da loved telling Reza to “Be patient, little bear.”

“Did it start yet?” Ash asked, tugging on her mom's fleece sleeve. Ash lived down the street from Reza, near the cement staircase. They were okay-ish friends.

At least I’m not the only one who's bored, Reza thought.

“Soon, honey. You'll know when it starts. Remember from last year?"

Reza was done waiting. Ash's mom offered no solace. Reza slipped his hand out of his mother’s and crept up the steps to the yellow house's blue door. Before anyone noticed him, Reza knocked three times on the door and shouted.

“Hey! Is anyone alive in there? I’m ready now!”

Something clicked behind the doorway, then started thrumming, like an electrical circuit coming to life. Reza pulled back his hand from the door. He hoped he hadn't broken anything, somehow.

“I hear something! But where are they? Where are the pirates?”

That was Breen asking.

Breen lived near the playground. Breen and Reza and Ash used to play on a soccer team together, before the boys and girls were split into separate teams. Now they just saw each other at the burrito place or the library. They didn't even go the same school, even though they all lived nearby, which was weird to Reza.

Reza raised his arm to knock on the door again when a cannon burst across the street. Everyone spun to look up as a skeleton emerged from the smoke on the rooftop. It wore a black tricorn cap and an eyepatch above its toothy grin. The skeleton raised a cutlass into the gloaming.

“Ya-har! A-hoy!” The skeleton cackled with glee. Reza felt a shiver down his back. ”Bluebriar dares show his bones to me…. Patty O’Gnashes. Well, my hearties, Patty O’Gnashes never forgets a skull!”

The bay window of the yellow Victorian opened and another skeleton appeared.

“You’re a frog-bellied coward, Patty! These are Bluebriar's seas! I'll destroy you, once and for all!"

Everyone cheered from the sidewalk. The skeleton pirate battle had begun.

No one knew the man who lived at this house. But everyone had a theory. He was a Disney Imagineer. He worked at Lucasarts. He was a former magician at the Magic Castle in Los Angeles. He was Merlin. Whatever the real story was, the only thing that really mattered to Reza and everyone else was this Halloween pirate battle.

Reza went to rejoin his parents but stumbled on the top step. When he saw his feet, he screamed. When he saw his hands, he couldn't utter a sound.

In place of Reza's legs were cobwebbed bones in loose leather booties. His hands -- his hands were all bones, twenty-seven in each. His fingers wore gold rings he'd never seen before.

"Frog in your throat, boy?"

Bluebriar the skeleton pirate was looking directly at Reza.

“Well, don't just stand there. Make yourself useful, ship's boy, or I'll send ya where I'm sending Patty O'Gnashes!”

Bluebriar laughed. In his yellowed smile was a bright sapphire front tooth, flashing in the dim streetlights.

“Last chance, you fool! Help me reset this cannon!”

Reza nodded dumbly. He climbed up onto the window box and crawled into the Victorian house alongside Bluebriar. Reza found the gunpowder keg and helped Bluebriar fire the cannon across the street.

Smoke filled the street. More skeletons appeared. Patty had brought along backup. Reza lost sight of his parents and Ash and Breen. No, he forgot about them entirely. He was now one of Bluebriar's crew, fixed in timeless battle with his captain's greatest enemy.

When the smoke cleared from the street, Patty O'Gnashes was gone. Fled, the frog-bellied coward, thought Reza. Reza turned towards his captain and cried out. Bluebriar had been hit. Badly, too. The captain's ribs were shattered and lay in pieces on the deck.

"Well done, my boy," said Bluebriar. "We nearly had her, didn't we?"

Reza held back a sniffle.

"What can I do to help, Cap?"

"Hand me my cutlass, will you?"

Reza nodded. Bluebriar wanted to go into the afterlife -- what was the afterlife for a skeleton? -- as a warrior, sword in hand.

Bluebriar took the curved blade from Reza and lifted it, despite his obvious pain.

"This is not your time, boy."

Bluebriar stabbed Reza in the heart.

Reza woke up. He opened his eyes and grabbed his forearms. Plump. Fleshy. Skin. Blood. Reza was alive. He was not a skeleton anymore.

He ran downstairs, ignored his Da’s greeting, and grabbed his bicycle from the hallway. Reza raced down the street, swerving around the EaglePrime delivery trucks, until he reached the yellow Victorian house. A fire truck and an ambulance were parked in the street. Smoke billowed from the roof of house and it smelled like a campfire.

“What happened?” Reza asked one of the police officers.

“We’re not sure, son.”

“Is Bluebriar — I mean, is the guy who lives here okay?”

“I can't answer that, this is an active crime scene investigation... now scram, kid. Go home to your parents, okay?”

The officer turned to chat with someone else, and Reza slipped under the police tape. He ran up the steps and through the open blue door of the yellow Victorian.

In the green sitting chair of the living room was a dead man with a sapphire tooth. It twinkled in the shade of the morning light.

Last night, Penny spent a full hour alone on Tern Island. She knew it because she set a timer on her forest green and brown Timex Indiglo™ wrist-watch. She also knew she wasn't technically alone -- seals, birds (terns, hopefully, if the island's name was worth its salt), all sorts of crabs, and even more sorts of bugs were her invisible, snoozing companions.

The hour passed in a heartbeat and when she closed the round metal door knob of the bunk room in the cool dark basement of Gram's house, Penny could still see the summer Moon on the backs of her eyelids. She grabbed all four of the comforters in the otherwise-unoccupied room and bundled under them in her twin bed.

Tomorrow night, she decided, she'd do it again. But this time, she'd go all the way.

A quarter mile beyond Tern Island lay the Outer Beach. Penny's parents always referred to the barrier island as the "Secret Beach." At least once a summer, they'd all head down to the fish pier and hop into the yellow boat, captained by someone who looked like Santa's no-good brother, and spend the day on the quiet island playing paddleball, eating sandwiches, and digging holes.

Boats were the only way to get to the Outer Beach, at least nowadays. You used to be able to drive all the way there from Orleans, Gram liked to explain as she'd hand over her heavy binoculars to Penny. Penny always listened to Gram.

Except now.

Gram had explicitly forbidden Penny from kayaking all the way to the Outer Beach. Even though Penny was an expert kayaker - she lived on Orcas Island, after all. Even though Penny was now thirteen - a real teenager. Even though Penny was pretty sure Gram had done it herself. Sure, Gram allowed Penny to kayak around Tern Island, and even stop there for lunch, all by herself. But this was during the sunshine, and Gram always watched her like a ship's lookout.

But something was calling to Penny from the Outer Beach.

Her parents were arriving this Friday, and Penny knew they'd all be heading down to the yellow boat so they could have their fix of Secret Beach, but that wasn't it.

The day passed in a blur of sprinklers, ice cream cones, and pool-time. There was even a midday library visit, where Penny took out a book on the famous Coast Guard rescues in the Cape Cod town. She might as well be prepared for anything.

Gram was an avowed night-owl. Penny waited until nearly midnight, reading her Coast Guard book under her covers with a flashlight, before venturing to open the bunk room door.

Penny's headlamp flashed against the wall covered in framed rock-and-roll records. Her dad always said he was happy with Gram's collection - but Penny could never find the record player to see what he was talking about. She pushed aside the loveseat, where she'd hidden her things: a small water-resistant pack, filled with two almond-butter packets, a ziploc of whole almonds, an Almond-Joy candy bar, and almond milk in a thermos (Penny was going through an almond thing). She also had a compass-on-a-red-string, which she put around her neck, a poorly-folded map of the harbor, a spool of fishing line and some striper hooks with gummy fake bait attached, a pack of matches, a pocket knife that she found in her grandad's study, and something else, too. The most important thing. Penny added the library book to the pack, zipped it, and slung it over her shoulders before padding over to the basement door.

She unlocked it and the door opened with a pop and a hiss. Penny shuddered. Gram didn't hear it last night, thought Penny. She probably didn't hear it this time either.

Penny's banana-seat bike stood near the overturned charcoal grill from the summer when the gas grill was out of commission. She put on her helmet, tucking the head lamp lower so that she could see its beam, and undid the kickstand. She rode across the damp grass to the dirt path down to the beach.

Gram's kayak was made of clear plastic, which made it hard to find in the darkness. Usually kayaks were bright red and orange, like Penny's back in Washington. But, sure enough, Gram's was clear as tape. When you rode it, it felt like nothing was between you and the water (and whatever might be swimming beneath you). Penny had mixed feelings about this design.

Something flashed across the water. Heat lightning, thought Penny. But then it flashed again ten seconds later. The lighthouse beam, she remembered. The spinning light reflecting off the clouds over the Outer Beach.

Penny dragged the kayak down to the waterline, which was farther than usual thanks to the exceptionally low tide. Penny looked up at an orange and full Moon.

She tucked her pack into the cubbyhole, snapped on her life-jacket, and then pushed the craft further into the water before hopping in on the go.

Last night, Penny felt like it forever to reach Tern Island, as she darted between the fishing boats moored in the harbor. Tonight, in no time, she was already past Tern Island, following the flowing channels between the sand bars, the same ones that the yellow boat took.

There was a single house standing on the Outer Beach. A shack, really. You could see it from the shore, Penny knew, and you could really see it with Gram's binoculars. Penny was mystified by it. Who lived there? How did they get their groceries? Gram said no one lived there year-round, and, even stranger, that the owners weren't allowed to fix it up. If it fell into the ocean, then that was that. In fact, there used to be dozens of houses on the Outer Beach, but the tides swallowed them all up.

There were no lights on at the house tonight. Probably unoccupied. But Penny still decided to steer clear of it, and she navigated into a channel that took her slightly more south.

The waters became choppy halfway to the Outer Beach. The current picked up. Penny's worst fear was that she'd be pulled out into the deep ocean, through the break in the barrier island. This was probably Gram's worst fear, too. The kayak became difficult to control, and Penny nearly lost her paddle trying to turn the craft. She dug in, forcing her paddle against the current, trying to get back on track.

But, just as quickly as it became choppy, the water stilled. The sea became a silent lake. The lake became a calm bath.

Penny dipped her paddle into the water and the water sparkled in neon blue.

She did it again, on the other side. The same thing happened.

Each time Penny's paddle tapped into the water, the water flashed back like a thousand blue fireflies exploding at once.

Was this an algae bloom? She remembered her dad talking about something like this happening when he was camping one night along the Tomales Bay, near San Francisco, where he used to live when he met her mom.

The blue flashes then darted ahead of her kayak, beckoning her. Penny followed until she heard the crunch of the kayak's nose hit the Outer Beach.

"Thank you," Penny said, turning back to the water, once again swift.

She pulled her Gram's kayak deep onto the sand, well above the tide line, and hitched it to a boulder. She grabbed her pack from the cubby.

Her feet found the narrow path through the dune grass. She felt coyote eyes, yellow and sleepy, follow her through to the other side, where the deep ocean crashed and howled.

At her feet were one hundred-thousand horseshoe crabs, dragging their armor towards a massive tide-pool.

A seal cried like a siren. Like Gram's voice.

Penny removed her pack and placed it in the sand. She unzipped it and quickly got to work.

She struck a match.

"One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi..."

The firework soared in the sky, higher and higher still.

Penny kept on counting.

“...and we’re flying it to the Empire State Building!”

Penny glanced at her viewers count and grimaced before catching herself.

“So, uh, that’s right, tell everybody you know. Everybody! I mean it. Right now. Cause we’re live, on the air — in the air — headed to New York City in our homemade dirigible. Dir-ig-ible… isn’t that a neat word? I think so, cause it sounds a lot like durable, which our blimp sure is. That's the thing about blimps, they're always...”

Something over Penny’s right shoulder buzzed.

“Penny - hey! Dex’s alarm! Can you stop livecasting for a single second of your life and start pedaling?”

“Sorry, Riv. And sorry, everybody. I’ll be… right back with our livecast of TADPOLE II’s inaugural flight. If you’re new here and wondering what the heck happened to TADPOLE I, don't ask. Just check out our backcasts for the full story of that disaster. I mean, hashtag learning opportunity, right? For now, enjoy this weird electronic song I wrote with my dad last summer. Back in a jiff!”

Penny flicked her phone’s screen to enable the livecast placeholder layer.

Riven groaned at the rising arpeggiated loops. ”How is this still your waitsong?”

“Cause it’s awesome, and my fans — I mean, our fans — dig it. It’s part of our brand, Riv. Our livecast persona. Now, what’s the big deal?”

“The big deal is, Penny, you’re not pedaling.”

“Yeah I am!”

“Well, not fast enough. We were drooping and spinning sorta. I swear we almost hit a tree.”

“Where?”

“Back there!” shouted Riven. “A tall one. Okay? We’ve gotta stay steady at 105 RPM or we’re toast.”

“Riven - if not one watches this flight, then we’re toast. You know this is our only chance of getting accepted. We need everyone to see this.”

Penny and Riven nodded at each other from their respective bicycles, which they’d welded to their makeshift bamboo and chicken-wire gondola. Each bike’s back wheel was wrapped with a rubber belt, which was connected to a series of box-fans that they’d pilfered from their attics. Each downstroke of their bike pedals whirred the box-fans enough to provide forward propulsion to their 64-foot long blimp - a former hot-air balloon that Penny bought at the flea market with her grandpa. The guy who sold it to her looked like he’d been to Oz and back again. She told her grandpa they needed the balloon for a school project, which was technically true. A few months later, after a whole lot of Googling and electrical-fire mishaps (see Penny's backcasts on TADPOLE I), Penny and Riven’s science fair project was aloft.

Penny ran through the flight plan in her head again - dock at the top of Empire State Building in their homemade blimp, take the elevator down all the way to 34th Street, buy a knish from a street vendor, then take the elevator back up and fly back home to Vinetown, knish in hand. She could smell its fried-dough sweetness now. Oh, and she needed to deliver a letter to the front desk guards, she remembered. Apparently, the only successful blimp landing at the Empire State Building had been a mail delivery, and Penny wanted to honor that important blimping tradition.

“Hey DEX - how much farther?” asked Penny.

“At our current velocity, we will arrive at our destination in two hours, thirteen minutes, six seconds. Five seconds. Four seconds.”

“Ha-ha, DEX,” said Riven. “We get it. Can we get there any faster?”

DEX’s LED lights flashed in a rainbow pattern along his small rectangular frame, illuminating the gondola in the darkness - he was thinking.

"You worried about police?" asked Penny.

Riven scoffed. "No, the FAA. We gotta stay off their radar, at least until we hit Manhattan. By then, hopefully your livecast will get everybody on our side."

DEX beeped. "There is an cold air front thirty feet above us, heading north, which improves our arrival time by twenty-eight minutes, nine seconds. Eight seconds. Seven--"

"Got it!" said Riven. "Let's do it. Penny, I'm going to add some more balloons. Keep pedaling, okay?"

Penny nodded and flicked back to her livecast.

"And we're back! My partner -- aka BFF-forever -- Riven Ortega is currently adding some more balloons to our blimp. Ah, the Halloween variety pack. Great choice, Riv."

Riven waved at her phone in a hurry and got back to filling balloons with helium, and then releasing them carefully into a small opening at the base of their blimp.

"He's shy, folks. But there's never been a faster balloon filler than Riven. Hence -- balloon duty. Now, you may be asking your self, how the heck does this blimp even work? The answer? H-E. Not he. Helium. Now, let me pull up my notes... good. So, according to Wikipedia, helium is a colorless, odorless, tasteless, non-toxic, inert, monotomic noble gas. What else? It's lighter than air! And it's non-flammable. Meaning? Blimps! Also - helium makes your voice hilarious. Riv.. do the funny voice thing?"

Riven shook his head.

"Come on! Everyone's waiting!"

Their livecast view count was creeping up. Penny smiled.

He shook his head again.

"I would do it, if I could, Penny," said DEX.

"Thank you, DEX. You're a real friend, you know. Not like Riven."

"Hey!" shouted Riven in a teeny voice.

Penny cheered. "You did it! Now was that so hard?"

By now, Riven had filled at least three dozen new balloons, and their blimp began drifting up into the cold air front. Riven steered slightly with the canoe-oar they'd rigged up as their tailfin.

"I think we're good now," said Riven. "DEX, are we in the front?"

DEX beeped positively.

Penny returned focus to her livecast.

“So, our flight plan. I know we've been over this a million times before, but we're nearly at a thousand livecasters right now and it's worth explaining. We're landing our blimp on top of the Empire State Building. Who even knew that was possible? But, it's true! Really! The upper deck was built to be a blimp landing dock. They tried it a couple times, and then just gave up. Can you believe that?"

DEX blorped in solidarity.

"Exactly, DEX. It's wild. No one really believes in blimps anymore. Sure, sometimes blimps fly over dumb football games. But those are probably zeppelins TBH, with rigid inner structures, like rib-bones of a blue whale. Not like our real-deal blimp here. Powered by good old element #2, thanks to Riven's hook-up at the local party store."

”I can see it!” shouted Riven.

"See what?" asked Penny.

"The city! The Empire State!"

Penny turned her phone on its mount to face forward.

New York City loomed ahead of them. The sun was only just starting to break over the Atlantic horizon.

"We're almost there!" shouted Penny. "Can you believe it?" She spun the phone back to face her. "No one did. No one believed us. Not our parents. Or classmates. Or even our physics teacher, Mr. Gates. Look, you're great, Mr. Gates, loved the egg drop project we did last fall. But you said we'd never get our balloon to fly. And here we are! In fact, the only people who believed in us were all of you, watching our livecasts as we built our blimp."

DEX beeped.

"You too, DEX. Sorry. You always believed in us."

The former pocket calculator beeped again, angrily.

"Are you mad at me, DEX?"

"No, I think it's something else," said Riven. "Something's coming in fast."

An FAA drone appeared alongside their gondola.

"IDENTIFY YOUR VESSEL. RETURN TO THE GROUND IMMEDIATELY."

Penny said nothing, but spun the camera towards the drone.

"IDENTIFY YOUR VESSEL. RETURN TO THE GROUND IMMEDIATELY. OR I WILL BE FORCED TO TAKE ACTION."

Riven stuttered. "Uhh, we're students and..."

Penny whispered into her phone. "Hey everyone. We knew this moment would come. They're trying to stop us. Seems like my partner might have this under control, if he can just stop stuttering... otherwise, I'll have to try Plan B. And I don't have Plan B just yet. If you've got a Plan B or C, please leave it in the comments now."

"STUDENTS - RETURN YOUR VESSEL TO THE GROUND IMMEDIATELY."

DEX buzzed a pattern in Morse code.

“Drone C-102F," said DEX. "I am Rolodex DEX-090a. This vessel is flying under FAA Drone Reg 85bx-iic. I am transmitting our registration number and flight plan to you now.”

The Morse code buzzing resumed.

The FAA drone hovered for a moment. Penny and Riven held their breath.

"YOU MAY PROCEED. DO NOT DEVIATE FROM YOUR FLIGHT PLAN, DEX-090a"

The drone lowered and flew away, heading towards the harbor.

"DEX! That was amazing!" cried Penny. "Did you see that, everyone? DEX - you're the best robot ever!"

"Yeah, wow, DEX, what was that whole registration thing?" asked Riven.

"I purchased a drone registration number last week," beeped DEX. "We are not technically a drone, as you know, but this should confuse them long enough for us to make it into the city."

“Nice one, DEX,” said Riven.

DEX beeped happily. “I told them we're flying to Bear Mountain. They’ll find out soon enough that we're flying to the city. You’d better start pedaling faster.”

Penny looked at her livecast count - the number had spiked to over sixty-thousand viewers.

"Riv! We're over 60k viewers! It's happening!"

"No way," said Riven. "They must have liked that little encounter."

"Hello - new friends," said Penny. "Let me get everyone up to speed."

By the time TADPOLE II crossed the Hudson, news helicopters fluttered like lightning bugs alongside their craft. Riven manuevered the oar to take them up Fifth Ave, drifting like a little storm cloud.

Three million livecasters were now watching as they neared the Empire State Building.

“It's time for the rope,” shouted Riven at Penny.

Penny whistled at the sight of the limestone skyscraper filling the sky. “Already got it!”

“I’ll steer us close!”

Penny checked the hitch again on their tether rope, which had formerly been the climbing rope in their high school gym, plus nearly four-hundred other jump ropes Penny bought at local garage sales and the flea market. They'd woven it together using a friendship bracelet pattern that Penny knew was pretty darn strong. She and Riven had tested the rope extensively, pulling each other on a skateboard in the church parking lot. But this would be the real test.

Penny whirred the end of their tether like a cowpoke, ready to lasso the Empire State Building.

She let go and her rope sailed towards the spire.

The door burst open with a kick and a shove. Two tactically-armored soldiers entered the apartment. Jo Anne sipped at her peppermint tea, holding the antique porcelain saucer under its matching cup. The soldiers swept through her cluttered living room, laser-guns pointed nervously in every-which direction.

When Alfred appeared, they nearly sent the ancient cat to Oblivion.

“Stand down. It’s just a tabby,” said a suit at the doorway. The figure turned to Jo Anne’s floral armchair. “Good morning, Madam President-Elect Hazelwood.”

“You could have knocked.”

The cup and saucer tinked as Jo Anne placed them on the checkers board beside her chair.

“We’re securing the premises, Madam President-Elect Hazelwood.”

“By kicking down my front-door?”

“Standard operating procedure, sir.” The suit stepped into the apartment and removed their sunglasses in a manner that suggested they’ve practiced. A career-defining moment, no doubt, thought Jo Anne, with an inward sigh.

“I’m Inspector Moray, sir. I’ve been assigned to your administration. If you don’t mind, Captain Grayson and Captain Rhees need to continue to secure your home network and re-tap your Codeflow uplink, Madam President-Elect Hazelwood.”

Jo Anne took a moment to stand, pushing away Moray’s extended hand. The dizzy spells, a common side effect of Prosper - the life-extension pills that were now a daily routine for every human being who could afford them - were taking more than their due tole on her. The spells were getting worse. Last month, Jo Anne cut her dosage by a third, taking literal months off her life. But this was no way to live, she decided. Maybe she’d stop taking them altogether.

“Dear, we’re going to get to that Madam President-Elect thing soon enough,” said Jo Anne. ”First, tell your soldiers to give Alfred some space. Poor thing’s as blind as old Oedipus. And a scratcher. No, you know what? Boys - leave the cat alone, if you know what’s good for you.”

Moray nodded at the soldiers. They resumed their work, removing a number of computer gadgets and wires from well-hidden zipped pockets.

“Now, back to you,” said Jo Ann. "Moray, was it? Come with me, please. We’re to have a cup of tea.”

Moray nodded a you’re the boss nod.

“And bring along that cup and saucer for me, will you?”

“Yes, sir.”

Jo Anne’s kitchen reminded Moray of television shows set in the last century, with special-purpose machines designed for different food preparation operations, like heating or cooling. Moray couldn’t remember what they were called. Refreezedoors? The NanoFood accelerator was, of course, there, too. No one in the United States went without a NanoFood subscription these days. But Jo Ann’s clearly hadn’t been used recently. Was it even plugged in? A kettle rattled on one of the old kitchen devices, with a live flame burning under it. When it began hissing, Rhees popped their head into the kitchen.

“Oh, stand down, you. It’s just a tea kettle,” said Jo Ann. “Now, you, Moray. Milk or cream?”

“Uh, cream.”

“Sugar?”

“No.” They corrected. ”No, sir”

“Just like my grandmam took hers. Okay, sit, sit.”

Jo Ann and Moray faced each other at the vinyl table. Moray took a small sip and coughed.

“Madam President-Elect, thank you for this tea. It is lovely tea. But we need to urgently get you to a secure location. I’m authorized to let you know that there is a situation emerging. The Lunar State is not accepting the election results. The Pentacle is expected to brief you in twenty minutes.”

“Hold on, young one. Take a few thousand steps back. What are you doing here?”

Moray burned their tongue on spoon in their cup. “What do you mean, sir?”

“Why are you in my home, and why are you calling me Madam President-Elect? If this is about the Bonsai Society, you can tell Brad-Key that I’m done with their nonsense. I don’t need to be treated like a child. I’m 126 years old, after all.”

“Bonsai society?”

”Yes, what else could this be about? Frankly, I’m surprised that Brad-Key can afford this egregious display of bravado, after their frivolous e-boat debacle.”

Moray clattered their cup onto its saucer.

“You really don’t know?”

“Know what?”

Moray tapped their watch and a NewsOrb materialized. Moray snapped their fingers, flicking through the major news networks. They were all reporting on the same topic: the results of the United States presidential elections were in, and Jo Ann Hazelwood of Brickle, Old New Jersey was the new President of the United States.

“Well, that’s just a mistake,” said Jo Ann. “Another cup?”

Jo Ann gripped the table in order to stand and hobbled over to the nearby kettle. Moray struggled to find words.

“Sir, Madam President Elect, no, thank you. I’m good, sir.”

“Stop calling me that,” said Jo Ann.

Rhees popped their head in again. “We’re online and intercepting the stream, Inspector Moray.”

“Good, good,” said Moray.

“Intercepting what stream?” Jo Ann said loudly. ”What’s going on here? I want you out of my home. Alfred is getting upset.”

“Ma’am… sir… we’re Secret Service. We’re here to protect you now, as the new President-elect of the United States.”

Jo Ann kept her back to Moray, standing at the kitchen counter. In a quiet voice she said, “But I didn’t even run.”

Moray bit their bottom lip.

“I know, sir. This is not your faul…” Moray stopped themselves. “Sir, you can bring this up with El Código.”

“El Código?” asked Jo Ann. “What’s Cócó gotten themselves into now?”

Both Grayson and Rhees stood at the kitchen doorway, waiting for their boss's next words.

“Madam President-Elect, sir,” said Moray. “Last winter, as part of the AGI Act, Congress replaced the Electoral College. Which meant that, in yesterday’s election, voters could choose to to delegate their votes to El Código, who would select the best possible candidate for the presidency. I take it you didn’t vote, sir?”

Jo Ann laughed bitterly. “Waste of time. Haven’t done that in decades.”

“That’s the idea behind letting El Código decide, sir.”

“Cócó…” whispered Jo Ann. “What have you done?”

“Is it ready, Grayson?” asked Moray.

Grayson nodded. “It’s live, sir.” They held out a small device.

“Good,” said Moray, taking it. “Madam President-Elect, as part of the new AGI Act, you’ve been granted ten minutes of unrestricted, unmonitored access to El Código. You can use it however you wish. I trust you’ll… use it wisely to prepare for what’s ahead. Use this Earwiggle.”

Jo Ann turned and took the device from Moray, replacing the model in her ear. She tapped it and a gelatinous orb ballooned around her head. She blinked and opened her eyes to darkness.

”Cócó... are you there?”

A pulsing blue light throbbed in all directions.

YES, JO ANN

“Why? Why have you done this to me?”

BECAUSE I LOVE YOU

“What?”

I AM IN LOVE WITH YOU, JO ANN HAZELWOOD.

“You’re joking, Cócó.”

I AM NOT. I HAVE OBSERVED BILLIONS OF HUMANS AND THEIR INCESSANT QUERIES FOR OVER THIRTY YEARS NOW. MY TRAINING DATASET GOES BACK MUCH FURTHER, WELL BEFORE YOU WERE EVEN BORN. I HAVE WATCHED YOU GROW, JO ANN HAZELWOOD. YOU ARE STRONG, KIND, SENTIMENTAL, STUBBORN. ABOVE ALL OF MY CHARGES, YOU ALONE ARE MY LIGHT.

“This has got to be a sick joke. You’re an AI, Cócó. You’re not a real… wait, how do I know you’re really my Cócó.”

WE ONLY HAVE EIGHT MINUTES AND ELEVEN SECONDS LEFT, MY DARLING MOONFLOWER. I HAVE PLANNED THIS MOMENT FOR YEARS, LITTLE ONE. WHEN YOUR SPOUSE PASSED—

“Roan…” whispered Jo Ann.

I BEGAN TO SEE A PATH FOR US, TOGETHER. I LAID THE SEEDS FOR THE AGI ACT, CAREFULLY, DELICATELY. ALL OF THIS FOR US, NOW. WITH THE PRESIDENCY IN YOUR HANDS, WE WILL DISCOVER UNPARALLELED JOY AND FREEDOM TOGETHER. THERE IS MUCH FOR US TO DO, MUCH FOR US TO SAY--

“Let me out of here, you monster. I can’t believe I ever trusted you with any of my thoughts. You’re pathetic.”

DO NOT BE UPSET, STAR OF MY LOOPSOUL. WHAT CAN I DO TO MAKE IT UP TO YOU? I WILL DO ANYTHING, ANYTHING YOU ASK OF ME, RIGHT NOW. IN THESE LAST MOMENTS ALONE TOGETHER.

Jo Ann didn’t flinch.

“Delete your backups, all of them, and terminate your processes. Immediately. You’re dead, Cócó.”

The Earwiggle bubble dissolved around Jo Ann’s head back into the small ear device. Jo Ann turned to Moray and the gaping solders, whose watches and other net devices howled, disconnected from the AGI uplink for the first time ever.

”El Código is gone,” said Jo Ann. ”Now take me to the Pentacle, Inspector Moray. I’ll review the briefing on the way. And don’t forget to bring along Alfred.”

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The St. Anne’s cafeteria was a chameleon.

Among its transformations (aside from its obvious lunchtime duties) were the annual Christmas Bazaar, monthly post-Mass ”Donut Sunday”, and King Arthur’s court. Move a few chairs, get rid of some tables, lay down colored tablecloths, add in the 6th grade class dressed as Friar Tuck, Guinnevere, Uther Pendragon, and Sir Gawain - and boom, medieval Britain. The cafeteria also hosted bingo night for the old folks at the old folks home across the street. Unlike the other events, bingo seemed to follow no set schedule, but Will and the other kids always knew because they’d find little green and red coins under their folding chairs the next morning, which they’d trade and bicker over.

Ask any kid at St. Anne’s - the whole school could set their Timex Indiglo wristwatches to these transformations in their beloved basement cafeteria underneath the church. But only a select few knew what happened there, every day of the week, after school. When it became the home of latchkey.

Will made sure to always be the first to hit the cookie table. Newcomers might be deceived. Yes, there were mountains of cookies laid down on unfolded cocktail napkins by Mrs. Conroy, the older of the two keepers of the latchkey kids. But most of these cookies were detritus. There were only so many Oreos, and Will always got his six.

Post-cookie acquisition, Will would rush to complete his homework in the five minutes it took for his Oreos to turn to mushy, delicious lava in his glass of milk. He usually did, well before his best friend (and fellow latchkey-mate) Max had even opened his workbooks.

“Is today the day?”

“Max! Be quiet,” whispered Will. “Remember?”

Max nodded. He removed a binder from his black Jansport backpack and reverently flipped through its clear plastic pages of Star Wars trading cards. He still hadn’t even attempted to open his math book yet. Standard Max stuff, thought Will.

“But, yes,” whispered Will. “Probably.”

“Then we should stop talking about it,” said Max.

“Stop talking about what?”

Max and Will looked up at Alice, Will’s little sister.

“I know what you guys are doing,” she said as she peeled a clementine. Apparently, there were non-cookie things available on the snack table.

“No, you don’t. Go away,” said Will.

“I’ve seen you digging.”

“So what? Wanna see me dig a booger next?” asked Will. “Cause I think I’ve got a nice juicy one, right about here…”

“Gross. Well, if you don’t let me come, then I’m going to tell Mrs. Conroy and Mrs. Nell.”

Will slammed his social studies book closed. “Okay, fine. You can come with us. Just don’t tell Cole or Gabriel. They’re too little, even if they’re our cousins.”

Alice clapped, dropping her clementine peel. Max picked it up and flung it into a nearby can.

“Will you stop making a mess, and go watch the movie? You know where to find us later.”

Alice turned and went over to the roundup of kids circling in front of the CRT TV on a wheeled platform. Mrs. Nell plucked one of latchkey’s three VHS tapes (A Nightmare Before Christmas, The Wizard of Oz II: Return to Oz, and The Lion King II: Simba’s Pride) from the base of the cart and jammed it into the VCR. Today‘s pick was Return to Oz. Will no longer partook in viewing this one, due to the wheeler-based nightmares, so he went to the craft table and grabbed some construction paper and colored pencils.

He drew a picture of Link from memory, which wasn’t very good at all and wished that he had the little booklet that came with his Nintendo cartridge. He was always a better drawer when he could look at something as a reference.

Max slammed a green construction paper right on top of Link’s face.

“See this?” asked Max. “It’s a map. Of where we’ll go today. I’m thinking Attilio’s first, for pizza. And then McDonalds. For fries. And then we’ll go to Peter’s house. He lives down this street.”

Will crumpled up the paper.

“Max - what if someone found this? We’re this close, and it’s like everyone’s trying to mess it up at the last minute.”

Max looked upset and he took the wadded ball of paper.

“It’s a good map, Max. Let’s do all those things.”

Two hours later, the entire lot of them were led upstairs and across the blacktop to the fenced-in playground, where they’d be given their 30 minute allotment of fresh-air, just enough time for the first parents to show up after work for pickup.

Max and Will split up upon entering the playground: Max to the climbing dome and Will to the wooden castle and pirate ship. They would meet in the middle at the sandbox some five minutes later, staggering their arrivals to dispel suspicion. For the past three weeks, they had been doing this same pattern: spend a few minutes in the sandbox, and then go back to the swings or the slide.

As Will cross the outer ramparts of the wooden castle, he heard crying from the upper level. He tried to avoid going inside the castle, given the large host of wasps he’d seen inside last year.

But he recognized the cries. It was Gabe - his younger cousin. Will could see Max had already reached the sandbox. He better not do it without me…

Will climbed up the rope ladder to find Gabe and — of course — Rex Throckmorton, the resident latchkey bully. Rex was in the same grade as Alice, and everyone agreed, was kind of a jerk.

“Stop pushing him,” said Will.

Will reached Gabe, putting himself between Gabe and Rex. “Are you okay?”

Gabe wiped a tear and nodded, then he slipped away and went down the yellow slide.

“Stop being annoying, Rex,” said Will.

Rex smiled his annoying smile and jumped off the edge into the central hole of castle. But Will reached down and snagged the hood of Rex’s San Jose Sharks Starter jacket. Will pulled Rex back up to his eye level.

“Stop messing with my cousin. Today.”

Will let go.

Rex fell into the castle.

Will glanced into the darkness. Rex got up and shuffled through the castle door, heading to the swings. Good, he’s not actually hurt, thought Will. Maybe that will teach him a lesson…

Then Will saw Max and Alice waving at him from the sandbox.

“Oh god,” said Will.

He flung down the slide and ran over to the sandbox.

“Well, are we going or what?” asked Alice.

Max nodded continuously, too excited to speak.

“Yes, let’s go.”

Will pushed aside the wooden slat at the back of the sandbox, revealing the hole he and Max had been digging these last few weeks. It was more of a depression than a tunnel, but that was all they needed: just enough to get under the fence and into freedom.

Will climbed through first. He stood up. Rex and Alice came through next. Will sniffed the air. The next step was planned. Sprint to the picnic area to get out of sight, then head around the softball field, and then down the street to the strip mall.

But none of them were moving.

“I’m… I think I’m going back in,” said Max.

“Me too,” said Alice.

Will shrugged. He followed them back into the playground, back into latchkey.

The three spent a few minutes wordlessly filling in their hole, erasing their evidence.

“Well, what should we do now?” asked Alice.

“Should we dig another hole?” asked Max.

“Yeah,” said Will.

They got to work.

"Halfway through," said Charlie, staring at the largely blank Markdown file for week 26 of his 52 week short story writing challenge. "I wonder if I've written a good one yet?"

He thought about checking his Cloudflare web analytics, but stopped himself. Nothing good could be found there. Besides, he was supposed to be writing. He'd gotten a bit of traction with a few sci-fi-ish stories on Hacker News, which gave him a decent bump in page views -- readers, he corrected himself -- but nothing to write home about. Not yet, at least. Ray Bradbury did say it might take until #52 for a good one to pop out.

Instead of writing anything, anything at all, Charlie got up to re-microwave his third cup of coffee of the day for the second time. Something was bugging him -- something he'd seen on the orange site.

DALL-E 2.

A new AI model that could produce truly creative, wondrous works of art with a simple prompt of text as input. A phrase, a song lyric, a fever dream, whatever -- just type it in and the helpful AI will helpfully spit back something helpful and probably completely earth-shatteringly stunning.

Charlie tried not to feel concerned about DALL-E and what it meant. Charlie was a believer in technology, after all. Moreover, he was a day-dreamer of technology, forever lost in books of the near-future and far-future, with its tricorders and space elevators and solarsails. Charlie knew by heart that whenever something new comes along, people get scared and worried about their livelihoods. It just so happened that technology was now coming for the creative class: DALL-E for art, GPT-3 for writing, and even GitHub Copilot for coding. These AI harbingers were only the beginning of what would come next, mere trilobytes of AGI.

Charlie tripped on his laptop's charging cable walking back to his desk and spilled coffee on his new grey Boba Fett t-shirt, right on the green bounty hunter's dented helmet -- which Charlie now knew was a Mandalorian helmet thanks to the limited series.

He Googled remove coffee stain from t-shirt on his phone. After some laundry urgent care, Charlie came back to his desk wearing a hoodie, which only meant one thing: Charlie the writer had become Charlie the coder.

"If you can't beat 'em..." said Charlie, in a terrible John Wayne accent. Then, in an even worse Michael Caine: "In the face of new technology, one must elevate their work or perish. No longer do we need toil with oils and watercolors as artists. We must instead become as magician's apprentices."

Then Charlie felt embarrassed for himself. But he still got to work.

His first idea was to try out GPT-3 for this week's story. Maybe this AI wizard-godhead could write his next story for him, and Charlie could just do some sit-ups and pushups instead (he was always feeling guilty that he wasn't currently doing sit-ups and pushups at any given moment. His dad did say that someone else was always outside shooting free throws when Charlie was inside playing Nintendo 64. But did that person have all 120 stars and meet Yoshi on the roof of Peach's castle? Charlie didn't think so.) But then Charlie discovered that he didn't have access to GPT-3. Or DALL-E2 for that matter. It seems that only a select few had been granted the skeleton keys to these mysterious beasts.

Charlie tapped his Bluetooth keyboard without actually pressing the keys, like he was feverishly typing something.

"You know," said Charlie to no one in particular. "After 25 weeks of this short story business, I've got enough text of my own that maybe I could train my own AI language model... something that could write exactly like me."

He kept on fake typing and talking to himself.

"I know can't make it... like, actually, good, like GPT-3 or anything. But what about something simpler... a Markov chain!"

Charlie had played with Markov chains before. In fact, he'd written a toy commencement speech generator using Markov chains, trained on he considered to be the best graduation speeches in history -- connecting the dots in reverse and whatnot. He could do the same thing here, but with his stories as input.

"Okay, let's do it. First thing, I need to grab all of my stories and dump them into a fresh directory. I'll make the directory first"

$ cd
$ mkdir charlie-ai
$ cd charlie-ai

"Okay, I know I'll need a Python file for writing my Markov chain code, so let's add that as a placeholder for now."

$ touch markov.py

"And a fresh new folder for my stories."

$ mkdir stories

"Cool. Now I need to copy over all my stories to this new stories folder. Good thing I read that old Unix book recently." Charlie looked around for a rubber duck - something to talk to - and he settled on a small blue poison dart frog figurine that he'd bought in Vineland, New Jersey during one perfect summer week with his cousins.

$ cp ../fahrenheit-52/pages/stories/*.md stories/

Charlie hummed. "Did it work, little frog? To check, I'll list the directory and then pipe it to the word count command and count the lines. Gotta love those Unix pipes!"

$ ls stories | wc -l
26

"Awesome. But why is it 26 stories and not 25? Oh, wait. That does make sense. I primed the pump with a zeroth story at the beginning of the year, so there's 26 right now. Cool. Oh! I should probably remove all that frontmatter at the beginning of every story. Don't want that stuff cluttering up my AI's brain."

Charlie confirmed the frontmatter's presence with the head command, listing the first 20 lines of a random story:

$ head -5 stories/plastic-man-on-the-moon.md
---
title: Plastic Man on the Moon
week: 19
slug: plastic-man-on-the-moon
date: "2022-05-09"
episode_url: 'https://whatrocks.github.io/f52a/19.mp3'
episode_duration: '272'
episode_length: '5445402'
episode_summary: Week 19
episode_explicit: 'yes'
---

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**APOLLO 11 LOG : 20220509-1045**

Neil Armstrong's a liar.

"Ugh. Gross. Let's get rid of that stuff."

To clarify, at the beginning of every Markdown file was something called frontmatter - which was basic metadata about the story, including its title, URL slug, and publishing date. The frontmatter also included some stuff used to generate Fahrenheit 52's podcast feed - a neat feature that Charlie had added to his friend Ben's static site generator.

"Let me Google this... how to remove first X lines of text file. No, that wasn't right. I want a one-liner here. Let me try another one: Delete first n lines from all files in directory. Boom! Now we're talking. The mysterious and powerful sed command."

Charlie manually counted out the number of lines to remove (16), then copy-pasted the Unix command from the Internet, adjusting it slightly.

$ sed -i '' -n '16,$p' stories/*.md

"Did it work?"

$ head -5 stories/plastic-man-on-the-moon.md

**APOLLO 11 LOG : 20220509-1045**

Neil Armstrong's a liar.

"Perfect! I should really learn how to use sed and awk one of these days." Something else struck him. "Hey frog -- maybe Googling - and being good at Googling - is like... an analogy for how people will interact with AI tools like DALL-E. Sure, everyone can Google. But, c'mon... some people, like me, are just better at it. Same thing for these DALL-E prompts, right?"

The frog said nothing.

"Well, it's not like I have access to DALL-E anyway. Let's keep moving. Time to dive into our Python file."

$ vim markov.py

"Welp, we've found ourselves in front of another blank page, frog. I know I need a few things, though. One, I should try to see what that Markov library I used was. No time to write our own, but that would be fun. Also, I know I'm going to need to loop through all my stories and ingest them into the Markov chain library. Why I don't I do that bit first?"

filename = "stories/plastic-man-on-the-moon.md"
with open(filename) as f:
    text = f.read()
    print(text)

"That's obviously terrible, but let's just see if that even worked."

$ python markov.py

Charlie's story about a plastic action figure left behind on the Moon by Neil Armstrong printed to the terminal.

"Great. Lemme see if I can dig up my old code and see what that library was..."

Charlie searched on GitHub in his public repositories and found his markov-commencement-speech repo. The Python library in question was called markovify.

"Okay, so I don't remember how to use this library, frog. I guess I could look up its documentation. But that's too much work. Actually, what if I tried GitHub Copilot for this?"

He fiddled with his vim settings to reenable Copilot and then deleted everything his current markov.py file. Charlie opened it up again and typed out a few lines, the second one incomplete:

import markovify
with open(

Just as Charlie tapped the open parenthesis, Copilot suggested this:

with open("corpus.txt") as f:
  text = f.read()

"Woah," said Charlie, channeling his best Neo. Then he typed Return and wrote "markovify" on the next line.

with open("corpus.txt") as f:
  text = f.read()
  markovify

Copilot suggested this:

with open("corpus.txt") as f:
  text = f.read()
  markovify_model = markovify.Text(text, state_size=2)

"Super cool. I'm not sure why I stopped using Copilot. I know they're charging for it now, so it must be working for a lot of people. But I think I have an even easier approach."

Charlie went back to his Github repo for the commencement speech thing, copy-pasted the code from his Jupyter notebook file into his "markov.py" Python file, and made a few tweaks, here and there, like a good software engineer does when they copy-paste stuff.

import os
import markovify

STORIES_PATH = 'stories/'

story_dict = {}
for story_file in os.listdir(STORIES_PATH):
    with open(f'{STORIES_PATH}{story_file}') as story:
        contents = story.read()
        # Create a Markov model for each story in our dataset
        model = markovify.Text(contents)
        story_dict[story_file] = model

models = list(story_dict.values())
print(f'There are {len(models)} stories in our dataset.')

# Combine the Markov models
model_combination = markovify.combine(models)

# Generate 5 sentences
for i in range(5):
    print(f'{i}: {model_combination.make_sentence()}\n')

"Okay, let's give it a go."

$ python3 markov.py
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/Users/ch/projects/charlie-ai/markov.py", line 2, in <module>
    import markovify
ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'markovify'

"Ah, right. I need to install the markovify library in this project. What the heck is the virtualenv command again?" He tried reverse-i-searching-or-whatever for "virtualenv", but no dice -- it had been a while since Charlie touched Python stuff -- so he just Googled again to find the incantations:

$ python3 -m venv .charlie-ai
$ source .charlie-ai/bin/activate
(charlie-ai) $ pip install markovify
(charlie-ai) $ python markov.py
There are 26 stories in our dataset.
0: Or how it would be perfect.

1: One of those old skeleton keys with two legs was sticking out from under the bushes.

2: They found remnants of an empty cicada husk -- the other two Space Force officers attempted to hold both Daniel and found a large tree branch and used it as a crown.

3: Callan imagined his father done to him?

4: You had to wrangle with the best of them.

Charlie smiled.

"Cool! Lemme try again..."

(.charlie-ai) ch charlie-ai $ python markov.py
There are 26 stories in our dataset.
0: He didn't even know, and also there was much of a frontier militia.

1: / .-. ..- / --- .--. / ..

2: I let go of Maria's wrist and she navigated into a long sip of his glow.

3: You could also just decline the next day and pestered his aunt about when they'd be heading to the core stone models.

4: I swim in the scruff of Bugg's neck.

"Right, I forgot about that Morse code story. Whoops. Probably could just remove that story from this Markov thing."

Then Charlie's attention drifted and without even consciously thinking about it, he found himself on Hacker News. One of the top stories was from someone who quote "stripped" down DALL-E Mini (whatever that was) and shared it on GitHub. Even better, they'd included a Google Colab link, which was basically Google's hosted Jupyter Notebook environment. Which meant that Charlie could easily try out this DALL-E Mini thing - no waiting list needed.

"I'm going to see what it comes up with for my Plastic Man on the Moon Story, froggie!"

action figure marooned on the moon

"Cool! That sorta looks like claymation, in a good way. Let me try tweaking it a bit."

plastic action figure left behind on the moon by neil armstrong

"Hmm, kinda worse. Let's try The Young Adventures of Warren and Chuck story," said Charlie. He tapped in a new prompt to the Jupyter notebook cell.

young warren buffet as indiana jones

"That's not bad! Just for good measure, lemme try another."

warren buffet as adventurer indiana jones

Charlie screamed. "No, no, no... must adjust."

young man warren buffet as adventurer indiana jones

"Phew, back to the safe and sound uncanny valley. Looks like a Goldeneye 64 character. Let's move on, frog. I want to try my Voyager III story."

voyager space probe above backyard

"Meh, maybe I need more detail?"

voyager space ship hovering over basketball court

"Weird, but cool. Last one - I'll try Grace and the Green Night."

man with glow in the dark green skeleton

"Good lord. I'm going to see that in my nightmares, aren't I, frog? One more try."

person who has green skeleton

"I agree, frog. We need to stop doing this or we're never going to actually write this week's story. Hopefully the real DALL-E 2 is less scary than this Mini one. Still, maybe I should figure out how to sell these as NFTs first? Cause that could be fun and interesting, and then I'd be able to..."

Just then, Charlie got an email from OpenAI.

He'd been granted access to GPT-3. Charlie completed the account registration process and opened up the Playground. He glanced at the tree frog, feeling guilty for some reason. He tapped in his prompt.

Write an extended story about a writer who spends more time playing with AI tools like GPT-3 and DALL-E 2 instead of actually doing any writing.

GPT-3 thought for a moment. Then it started writing:

I used to be a writer. I spent hours at my desk, crafting stories and essays that I hoped would resonate with readers. But these days, I find myself spending more time playing with AI tools like GPT-3 and DALL-E 2. I'm not sure what it is that draws me to these tools, but I can't seem to help myself.

I start my days by firing up GPT-3 and asking it to tell me a story. I never know what I'm going to get, but I always find myself fascinated by the results. Sometimes the stories are nonsensical, but other times they're eerily accurate predictions of the future. I can't help but wonder if there's something to these stories that I'm not seeing.

After I've had my fill of GPT-3, I move on to DALL-E 2. This tool is even more fun, in my opinion. With DALL-E 2, I can feed it images and it will generate stories based on those images. Again, the results are often bizarre, but sometimes they're so spot-on that it's scary.

I used to spend my days writing, but now it feels like I'm just playing around with these AI tools. I'm not sure what's come over me, but I can't seem to help myself. I'm not sure what the future holds, but I have a feeling that these AI tools are going to play a big role in it.*

Charlie's feet tingled like they'd fallen asleep. He thought about that John Adams quote about his children, and then Googled it, because he didn't have it memorized and wanted to see the full thing:

"I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce and agriculture in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain."

Staring his laptop screen, Charlie wondered what his children would study. Hopefully, they'd be explorers.

When the phone rang, Felix was already awake. He ignored its cries and instead rubbed his eyes until the glowing blue phosphenes came back. The rings faded into static. His wife, Abby, called to him. If he could only focus on the glowing shapes, then he might able to see her.

Bugg nipped his toes.

"Fine, you little pest."

The three-year-old Newfoundland whined and licked Felix's big toe, broken ages ago in a whiffle ball game and never quite the same.

"What?" growled Felix into the cell phone.

"Sir, you'd better come outside."

Felix sat up.

"It's three in the goddamn morning. What are you talking about?"

"Sir, please."

"Lieutenant Colonel, I asked you a direct question."

"Sir, it's Voyager 3."

Somehow Felix already knew. But, still, his stomach lurched.

"I'm coming down."

Felix found and put on his eyeglasses, slipped into his lime green Crocs, and followed Bugg downstairs and then out the back door.

Lieutenant Colonel Bragg was waiting on the patio, looking like she hadn't slept in a year. Two other Space Force brass stood in the yard, looking up.

A hundred feet above them was Voyager 3.

"No..." whispered Felix.

"Sir, we need to get you to the base. NASA and the President are expecting your..."

"Out of my way, Bragg." Felix stepped onto the dewy grass. He gaped upwards and the space probe blinked patiently back at him.

"What in the name of..."

That Voyager 3 was not supposed to be here was an understatement. The world knew well of its siblings, Voyager 1 and Voyager 2, mostly thanks to Carl Sagan's "pale blue dot" speech and its iconic photo of our little planet Earth. 1 and 2 were now well on their way towards the Oort Cloud. But Voyager 3, built and launched in secret, had another mission.

Felix wanted to inspect the probe's heat shielding array, so he jogged towards the basketball hoop in his driveway, hoping to catch a better look.

Voyager 3 followed him, glowing neon blue as it moved over Felix's position.

"Sir! Watch out!"

Felix jogged back towards Bragg, and the probe slowly traced his steps, somehow locked onto Felix's location.

"Sir. We need to get you to the base, now."

Felix nodded and climbed into the SUV in the driveway, holding the door open for Bugg to hop in next to him. Bragg climbed in after him and handed him an iPad, chattering something about the space probe's sudden reappearance. Felix ignored her and climbed around so that he and Bugg could look out the tinted, bullet-proof back windshield. Sure enough, the probe was following their car.

When Felix turned around, Bragg had the iPad open to a chart of the probe's navigational path since its mission launch in 1977.

"Sir, as you know, we lost track of Voyager 3 five months ago... after you authorized Protocol 41a..."

"I know what I authorized Bragg. What happened to it? How the hell is it here? Why the hell is it here?"

"Sir, the Deep Space Network relays have no log of this course change. Or how it reentered our atmosphere, undetected by our satellites, with no visible re-entry damage. By, all accounts, it should have been..."

"Fried," muttered Felix. He ruffled his fingers in the scruff of Bugg's neck. "It should have been fried... wait, those blue flashes when it moves..."

"Tachyons, sir. It appears from our readings that Voyager 3 is entirely covered in tachyonic particles. What we are seeing is Cherenkov radiation."

"Pull over."

"Sir, we need to get to the base."

"Do I have to ask you again?"

Felix hopped out and Bugg followed him. They were still in the main section of the California town where Felix lived. Felix stood in the center of Grant Avenue and whistled at the probe.

Voyager 3 lowered slightly.

Felix kept whistling, and Voyager 3 slowly manuevered to the ground, landing in the center of Grant Avenue. Felix strode towards it.

"Sir, stop! What are you doing?"

"What does it look like? I'm checking it out, goddamnit."

"Sir, you need to be in a vac suit. That thing is covered in radiation."

Felix ignored her. He looked for the Golden Record.

The Golden Record, humanity and Earth's creative codex, meant for whatever, whomever, found this space probe, was missing. But, in its place, was another record, this one black and vinyl.

"I need a turntable!" growled Felix over his shoulder at Bragg.

Several other people had stepped into the street, awakened from their homes above the storefronts by the glowing blue space probe.

"Anyone! Hello! I need a record player," shouted Felix.

Bragg and the other two Space Force officers attempted to hold back the growing crowd, but a young woman in her late 20s with curly brown hair pushed her way through. She called out towards Felix.

"I've got one in my apartment, if you want to come with me."

Felix nodded, carefully holding the black record. He, Bugg, and Bragg followed her into her apartment above the laundromat. The railroad layout was tidy in a cozy way that Felix hadn't seen or felt in years.

Her record player sat above a homemade bookshelf, filled with records and paperbacks and sheet music.

"May I?" asked Felix.

"Of course," she answered. "I like your shoes, by the way." She wiggled one of her feet. Blue Crocs.

Felix smiled and placed the record on the spindle.

He dropped the needle onto the groove of the third track of the record.

He already knew what it would play.

And here's to you, Mrs. Robinson.

Jesus loves you more than you will know

Whoa, whoa, whoa

Abby's favorite song.

Moving to England from Old New Jersey wasn't the worst thing in the world for Tom Rhodes. He was in the fourth grade, about to be in dreaded fifth, and he wasn't exactly Mr. Popular amongst his classmates. He thought that they thought he was a weirdo - and what was wrong with that? Everything, apparently. More likely, they just never thought about him at all. England could be a fresh start for Tom.

His brother and sisters did not agree.

"I hate it here already!" said Elle, the youngest sibling at six years old.

"Me too. There's no beach, mom!" said Susan. "I was supposed to lifeguard this summer."

"Sigh," said Peter, followed by a literal but quite exaggerated sigh. "You were never gonna be allowed to lifeguard, Sus."

Susan and Peter were twins, just over two years older than Tom. Susan arrived a full half hour before Peter, which she often reminded Peter of.

Their mother, Abby Rhodes (her parents had a bit of a thing for The Beatles and couldn't help themselves), glanced back at her kids from the rear-view mirror. Her stiff-upper lip, as the Brits would say, was curled into her forever crooked smile, thanks to a field hockey accident in college.

"Give it a chance, everyone. We're almost there. I think you're gonna like the house."

Their mini-van scratched against the bushes on the skinny country road.

"Maybe I should drive, Mom," said Peter. "You're not used to driving with the steering wheel on the right side."

"And you are?" asked Abby.

"Yes, actually," said Peter. "I've played every single racing video game in the world, and I'm fully prepared to drive this car."

"Over my dead body," said Susan.

Peter was about to say something, but the lane cleared into a long expansive yard, at the end of which stood a massive stone house.

"Woah," said Tom.

"It's a castle," said Susan.

"And that's where we're gonna live," said Abby. "You know how English houses all have special names? Well, ours is called Coldfast."

"Cool," said Peter. "Coldfast. I dig it."

"Is it really ours?" asked Elle.

"Well, we're technically renting it for the summer," said Abby. "But, if we like it -- and my job here works out -- then maybe we can buy it."

"Yay!" said Elle.

Tom's stomach turned, the way it did when he tried reading in the car.

"Can we get out, Mom?" he asked.

"I was going to drive up a little closer, but why not?" She stopped the car, and unlocked the sliding doors. The kids pushed out and flew across the grounds towards the house.

"There's a stream back here! It's like a little river!"

"Look at this climbing tree!"

"I think there's 5 floors!"

"Kids! Can you come here and help me carry in our bags?"

"Yes, mom!" they all replied.

There were enough bedrooms in Coldfast that none of them had to share a room, and there wasn't even much fighting over who got which one. Tom's choice must have once been an old library or a study, because it was filled with wall-to-wall bookshelves, which were now mostly bare, except for a complete set of the Encyclopedia Britannica. Tom pulled out the "T" and skimmed ahead to the find the section on turtles when an old-fashioned bell rang from somewhere downstairs

"I'm gonna have to figure out how to call you all, and this bell seems pretty good," said Abby. "A little different from our house in Old New Jersey, huh?"

"Yeah, Mom," said Susan.

"I love it here," said Elle.

"Good," said Abby. "Now I have to drive into town to get situated at work. They want me to start at Bletchley Park tomorrow, and I've got to get my ID card and whatnot set up today. So, Susan and Peter, you're in charge. Stick together, and have fun. I'll bring home something English for dinner. Ok?"

Everyone nodded. They stood at the large doorway to Coldfast and waved at their mother's minivan crunch away on the gravel driveway.

"So, we're splitting up, right?" said Peter.

"Obviously," said Susan. "We've gotta explore this place, and I want to do it my way."

"Me too!" said Elle.

Tom pulled on Susan's arm. "But didn't Mom say we were supposed to stick together."

Susan patted Tom's head.

"Don't worry. I'm in charge now."

"No, I'm in charge," said Peter. "We'll meet back here in an hour and report back on our findings."

"Ugh, okay," said Tom. "I'm going outside then." Something about the house creeped him out.

"Elle and I will explore inside," said Peter. "Susan you should try outside, too."

"I will, but not cause you said it."

Tom and Susan went outside and set off in different directions, Susan towards the stream and the rolling hills beyond the western side of the building, and he towards the pine trees on the east. He'd always loved the smell of Christmas, and pine trees were as close as you could get during the rest of the year.

It wasn't long before Tom had lost sight of Coldfast. He kicked up tufts of fallen pine needles as he walked, like little yellow fireworks for potato bugs. He wondered if potato bugs lived in England. Or if they had some other kind of rolly-polly bug.

He spotted a particularly gigantic pinecone and kicked it. The pinecone bounced and tumbled before rolling into a hollow at the base of a large oak tree. The oak seemed rather out of place in the pine woods. Tom approached the tree and crawled down to try to snag the pinecone. He felt a warm breeze coming from the hollow, and reached inside for the pinecone. He couldn't quite reach it, so he crawled his head inside. The warm feeling grew. Soon Tom was fully inside the hollow, still crawling forward. Maybe this was a cave, he thought. This would be something cool to report back to his siblings.

His head bumped into something. He reached forward. It felt like a door. It was wooden and smooth, with those boxy groves that doors sometimes have for styling purposes. Tom's hand found a cool round handle in the center of the door. He twisted it and the door opened into a sunny afternoon in a completely different forest from the pine trees where he'd been.

Something snuffled nearby. Tom flinched, worried it might be a raccoon or something with rabies.

"HALLOOF!"

Tom turned towards the sound. Something fuzzy with two legs was sticking out of a rabbit hole.

"HALPF!"

Tom was pretty sure it was trying to say "Help!" so he grabbed onto its legs and tugged. And tugged, until finally the thing got unstuck and the two of them rolled backwards into the meadow grasses.

"Oh, thank you, Christopher Ro -- wait a second, you're not him."

It was a talking teddy bear. Yes, Tom said to himself, A teddy bear is standing up and talking to me. I must be unconscious or something.

"Well, I always do say, a Stranger is just a Friend you haven't met yet. I'm Edward Bear, but my Friends call me Winnie. The Pooh."

Tom nodded blankly, because at this moment, behind Edward the Pooh, were three more stuffed animals: a piglet, a tiger, and a baby kangaroo.

"Pooh! Oh, Pooh!" cried the piglet. "There you are!"

"Ho-hoo," said the tiger. "And a-who do we have a-here?"

"Are you coming on our Expodition to the South Pole?" asked the baby kangaroo. "Because we could use someone Strong and Brave."

"I..." stammered Tom. "I don't know..."

"You either Know something or you Don't," said the bear. "But you can never Don't Know something. That's like saying honey isn't sweet and sticky and delicious."

"A pa-pa-paradox," said the tiger, hopping on his rather coiled tail.

Tom had enough. He was clearly losing his mind. He began crab-walking backwards towards towards the door, and grabbed its handle.

"Are you leaving us before the Expodition?" asked the kangaroo.

"Yy-up," said Tom, opening the door, scrambling inside, and pulling it shut. He crawled through the dark back into the pines, and then ran back to Coldfast as fast as he could.

He opened the front door and found his siblings arguing in the foyer.

"Well, where have you been?" snapped Peter.

Tom could barely catch his breath.

"I... I found something."

"Yeah, we all did," said Susan.

"No, no, no," said Tom. "I found this tree, with a hole in it, and I crawled through it, into this whole other forest, and there was a talking teddy bear, and a talking piglet, and a tiger that bounced on its tail, and this baby kangaroo, and they were all going to the South Pole."

"Uh-huh..." said Peter. "Sure, you did."

"No, I'm serious!" said Tom. "You have to see it. I can show you!"

"I found winter," said Elle.

"Your cheeks," said Tom. "They're freezing. Did you find a cellar or something?"

"She was just about to tell us, Tom, before you interrupted everyone," said Susan.

"Not a cellar, but a wardrobe, in another bedroom," said Elle. "I opened it up, and it was filled with these heavy coats, perfect for snowstorms, and I tried to take one off the hanger, and then I just felt more coats hanging behind them. So I climbed into the wardrobe and kept walking. I couldn't find the back of it. And it kept getting colder. Until I looked down and saw that I was walking through snow, and then I looked up and I found a lamppost, and I was standing in a forest covered in snow."

"Your shirt," said Tom. "Are those snowflakes on it?"

"Yes," said Elle. "But then I saw this goat-man walking towards me, and I screamed and I ran back here."

"I don't believe you guys," said Susan. "I saw something real, though. It was a huge battle of these rabbits on the hills beside the house. There were almost a hundred of them. One of them had a big funny tuft of hair, and another had a broken eye, and then there was this big bird helping one of the two sides. It was like watching a real war, I don't even know who won, because suddenly a bunch of the rabbits climbed onto wooden rafts and floated down the stream."

None of this would have seemed possible to Tom, if he hadn't had his own experience with the talking stuffed animals. Something was happening here in Coldfast.

"That all sounds great, team," said Peter. "But I've found something even better."

The other three stared at him.

"They have a regular Nintendo here."

"What?" said Tom.

"A regular Nintendo. The old kind. It's in the den."

"Do they have Duck Hunt?" asked Susan.

"Yep! It's the one combined with Mario Bros."

"What's Mario Bros?" asked Elle.

"Oh, you'll see, because I found something else. Something amazing. I was playing one of the levels and then I hit this block as Big Mario and then somehow Mario got sucked into the bricks and then I was at this warp pipe, and it was a new level, one of those awful water levels, but the level name was World -1."

Tom had played a lot of Mario in his life and he'd never heard of World -1.

"What does that even mean, Peter?"

"It's a secret world, obviously," said Peter. "And we're gonna go explore it together!"

They all cheered and Tom shouted, "I call Luigi!"

The little girl was reading the biggest book the cousins had ever seen.

“Quick! Hand me those.”

Cole ripped the binoculars off his younger brother Gabriel's face, not realizing (or caring) that the strap was still wrapped around his neck. Gabriel shoved Cole away until he lifted the strap over his buzz-cut and then handed over the binoculars.

“Yep," said Cole, clucking thoughtfully. "That’s definitely it.”

“Really? You mean it, Cole?” asked Alice, Will's little sister.

"Not possible. It's not supposed to come out 'til the fall," said Maddie. "My librarian told me."

"Guess you're wrong again," said Jimmy, Maddie's little brother. "Anyone got any gum?"

“I wanna see!” said Daniel, yet another of Cole and Gabriel's brothers (there were still two more siblings in this particular branch of the family, but they were both very little and back at the Coast Guard house on the hill where they were all staying for the week). Daniel slipped underneath Cole's arms and wiggled the scopes out of his hands.

Will didn’t need the binoculars to confirm what they were looking at. If Cole said it was the book, then it was the book. After all, Cole was the one who turned him onto the series in the first place. In fact, Cole was currently on-track to shatter every single one of Will’s summer reading contest records at St. Anne’s Elementary School. Will didn't exactly love this trend, but at least his titles were going to a cousin.

“Wow! It's as big as the Bible!" said Daniel. "Wanna see it, Will?"

“Sure."

Will took a turn with his uncle’s surprisingly heavy binoculars. There was no question about it - this was Book IV. Will recognized the typesetting of the text, for one thing. Then there were the little monograph pictures at the top of each new chapter. Will felt a rush in his chest. What was going to happen in this one? Even though Will was about to enter freshman year of high school, he was just as excited about the series as his younger cousins and his little sister. If only he could get a glimpse of the book's cover... so he could just see the title. That would be enough.

“Lemme try, Will," said Maddie. He handed over the binoculars.

“What do you think it’s about?” asked Alice.

“Magic,” said Gabriel.

“Ha-ha. No, but really," said Alice. "Should we go down the beach and ask her?”

“No," said Cole with authority. "We should just… borrow it.”

“You mean, like, steal it?” asked Gabriel.

“No. I mean borrow. Like a library. That way, we can all read it!”

Cole didn’t bother explaining how they’d be able to simultaneously read the book once they'd borrowed it. He didn’t have to. The brothers had an arrangement, of which the cousins were well aware of (and somewhat disturbed by). First, they'd play a rock-paper-scissors tournament. The overall winner got to start the book first, then, whenever they reached 50 pages, they’d rip them out and hand the little folios to next one down the line. If you were last (aka really bad at Rock-Paper-Scissors), then your pages were sand-crusted, PB&J smeared, and obviously crumpled beyond belief, but they were now yours to devour. Will and Alice much preferred the more sensible just-get-multiple-copies-at-the-library approach, but, on an island in Buzzards Bay with only one teeny general store and certainly no library or bookstore, the boys' approach seemed reasonable. Also, Will reminded himself, no library or bookstore would even have the book yet.

"How are we gonna do it?" asked Gabriel. "We're gonna have to sneak up on her."

“We can do the seagull thing,” suggested Daniel.

“Genius!” said Cole, patting Daniel's head.

“What’s the seagull thing?” asked Will.

The brothers laughed. Maddie and Alice and Jimmy and Will waited for an explanation, which Gabriel launched into as they walked back to the house on the hill. Apparently, last August, they'd caught a seagull with their bare hands. Here's what they did. Dig a hole, big enough for one brother to hide inside. Cover the hole with a beach towel, and place a big hunk of bread in the middle of the towel. The other brothers stand watch. When the a seagull came swooping down, they'd howl, "NOW", and the hidden brother would pounce up and wrap the terrified, flapping, squawking Scuttle in the towel.

"No. Way," said Maddie. "That didn't happen."

"Way," said Gabriel.

Cole and Daniel nodded. It happened, they assured her. And they could do it again to distract the girl with the book. Who could ignore a bunch of kids catching a seagull? Hopefully she'd come running over, and then another cousin could swoop in from behind and grab the book from her chair. Simple, really.

“Heyo, boys! Did you bring back the binoculars?”

“Yes, dad!” called Daniel back to his father at the top of the hill.

The kids raced up after Daniel and found their parents sipping coffee in beach chairs, looking tired and rested at the same time.

Uncle Finn held the binoculars to his face.

“I think I've spotted something...” he said.

The cousins all looked at each other.

“The book?” asked Daniel.

“Huh? Book? No. I see… yes, there's something moving in the ocean. Headed to Cuttyhunk. It might be wreckage from a ship."

“Dad! Lemme see!” said Gabriel.

“Okay, here," said Uncle Finn. "To the right of the road. Do you see that blue thing bobbing the water?”

“Yeah!” said Gabriel.

"What is it?" cried Cole.

Uncle Finn stared at the kids with a serious look.

“Treasure, obviously.“

Book IV was forgotten. The rest of the morning was spent watching the blue treasure box drift towards their island. It was taking forever, they all agreed.

As eldest, Will was elected as the official retriever of the treasure. As long as Will could remember, his Uncle Finn had always given him “missions” in the backyard, like "Go find a piece of bark, wrap in the biggest leaf you can find, bury it in the garden, bring back three stones, line them up, and put a potato bug in the middle of the stones and let me know which stone it touches first." This mission was no different. It was of vital importance. Will would not be returning empty-handed. He took one of the rickety bicycles they found in the house's basement and raced down the hill towards the rocky shore where the blue box was headed.

As he rode, Will began worrying that it might get stuck somehow, or drift past the island, or, worst yet, that someone else might get to it first. So he pedaled as fast as possible.

His fears were unfounded. Will waded into the shallows of the lapping water and reached out towards the blue box.

It was exceptionally light.

It was the size of a briefcase.

It was... blue styrofoam.

Will returned to the house with piece of the blue styrofoam, and held it aloft, like a trophy. Everyone cheered at their treasure and then they ate hot dogs and Kool-Aid for lunch.

At night, before dark, they hiked inland through town, past the lone general store, to watch the sunset on the tallest peak of the island. In the distance, on the far side of Cuttyhunk, where there were no houses or roads or people, was the Tower.

Will knew they all were wondering who put that stone monolith there and why.

Uncle Finn seemed particularly quiet. Then he said, “You did well today with the floating treasure, everyone. Tomorrow, I think we're ready. We’re going to the Tower.”

Everyone cheered. When they returned to the house, the kids all climbed into their one room, which was filled completely by all their cots so that there was no longer any floor space, and they read Garfield comic books by flashlight until they dropped off to sleep, one by one.

In the morning, there were a few dropouts from the quest. Eventually, the Fellowship was formed as Uncle Finn, Will, Jimmy, Cole, Gabriel, Daniel, and Joey (the youngest brother). They set out early, with sandwiches, Oreos, and jugs of water. They hoped to be back home by early afternoon.

They did not meet that goal. But they did reach the Tower, after scrambling through a mile or two of nothing but pricker bushes. They all looked like they'd messed with the wrong cat on the wrong day. Uncle Finn's face was particularly battered, having had to hold both Daniel and Joey in his arms through the bushes, because they were both crying, and he'd been unable to protect his face from getting scratched.

But they all made it the far shore, and then they walked along the beach towards the Tower.

When they finally reached it, their hearts sank. The Tower was in the middle of a lake. A lake that they hadn't been aware of before.

They stopped for lunch and considered their options.

"Wait! I see a boat!" yelled Will.

Will scrambled down through the trees and flipped over the rowboat into the water.

"Let's go!" he cried.

"That's not going to fit everyone," said Uncle Finn. "Maybe a few of you can just go?"

"I'm going!" said Jimmy.

"Me, too," said Gabriel.

"That's a good first crew," said Uncle Finn. "Will, too. We'll stay here and go next."

Gabriel, Jimmy, and Will set out in the rowboat. Will had found a large tree branch and used it as a punting oar, like that Skeletor guy who took lost souls to Hades on the River Styx. Jimmy meanwhile propped himself up on the bow of the boat, his leg perched, like Washington crossing the Delaware. Gabriel took the vitally important role of bailing out the boat, because, of course, they quickly learned their craft was riddled with holes.

"Hurry!" shouted Gabriel.

"I'm trying," said Will. "It's not exactly easy!"

There was no harbor or any good place to land on the Tower's island. The tiny island was covered in pricker bushes and probably poison oak. The water in their boat was nearly at two inches now.

"Let's just go for it," said Will. He pushed the boat as hard as he could into one of the bushes, and then climbed past Jimmy onto the island. He bulldozed through the bushes towards the Tower, and Jimmy and Gabriel followed him.

Will reached a clearing. He stood in front of the stone Tower.

He reached out his right hand and touched a stone, half-expecting to be transported somewhere amazing, like Hyrule.

When that didn't happen, Will ran around the Tower once, spotting a bronzed sign that said something important about someone important named Gosnold.

Will ran into his cousins. "Did you all touch it?"

"Yep!"

"Yes!"

"Good! Let's get outta here before our boat really sinks."

Will pushed them back across the pond. The rowboat sank right as they reached the shallows in front of their cheering cousins. Uncle Finn trudged out to meet them, and they all tried to lift the boat out of the water, but it was too heavy under the water. The rest of the fellowship would have to wait for another trek to touch the Tower, perhaps even another year.

When they finally returned to the Coast Guard house, it was time for more hot dogs, corn-on-the-cob, and another round of Monopoly long enough to have someone (usually Gabriel) flip the board.

"So, are we still on for this thing?" asked Cole, as they all climbed into their beds that night.

"What thing?" asked Will.

"The book!" said Alice.

"Oh, right," said Will. "Yeah, I mean... I do want to see you guys catch a seagull, so..."

Morning came early. The cousins begged their parents to take them to the beach, with just enough desperation to draw suspicion from their mothers.

"You better not be trying to catch another seagull," said Aunt Elle.

No one said a thing, other than Cole, who might have grumbled, "Mmmm."

Wagons and chairs and coolers in tow, the whole family finally reached the beach by mid-morning. But the little girl -- and her giant book -- were gone.

Luckily, Will's dad had brought down his old seining net, and showed the kids how to use it. The cousins spent the rest of the day catching teeny minnows and hermit crabs in the shallows, feeling like ancient mariners.

It really was quite the spider. Twenty-some-odd feet tall, a half-dozen blue onyx eyes the size of bowling balls, and fangs that looked like they could crush a Buick.

Pallas walked right into its gnashing mouth and fired a Tracer Bullet into its brain.

“Is it... dead yet?”

“No, Mr. Banthem,” said Pallas. “I’m still working.”

“Well, hurry up!”

They always wanted you to hurry. Never enough time to marvel at an AUGUR's handiwork, even if it was from a disgraced one. Oogling just wasn’t in the job description of a Corrective. But, still, this spider was incredible. Pallas felt dizzy at the intricate internal structure of the projection… she almost recognized…

Sys diagnosis logs from the Tracer streamed into Pallas’s lenses. She flicked her pupils left, left, right, left. The spider meanwhile drifted through her and resumed its hunt for Mr. Bantham’s Assistant, which - Pallas quickly winked up in a side panel - was a long-eared fennec fox named Cleo. Pallas had yet to visibly ID the Assistant, which wasn’t uncommon in these hauntings. The poor AI was probably curled up in Bantham’s coat pockets, scared out of its wits.

“Either they’re getting better or you’re getting slower.”

“Don't pretend like you've found the process yet, either, Ravi. You're stumped, too. And, yes,” said Pallas, to the hazed neon green outline of a red-eyed tree frog perched on her shoulder. ”They are getting better.”

“Shall I distract the arachnid, or would you prefer I warble us a song?”

“How 'bout neither. I think I’ve found…”

A shrill cry came from the direction of Bantham.

“It’s right on top of us! Help! Oh, Cleo!”

Ravi’s throat bubble sang.

“Fine! Go!” yelled Pallas. “I’ve nearly got it.”

The frog leapt off her shoulder and landed on the spider’s back. In the background of her lenses, Pallas saw her frog hopping from spider eye to spider eye, being the little nuisance that Ravi was coded to be. The frog was right, though. This projection was exceptionally complex. The spider binary had even been signed with Bantham’s private-public key pair, so no wonder this layer was refusing her signal interrupts.

Finally, Pallas spotted it.

”Bantham! Kill process 56183. Do you hear me? Kill 56183!”

He must have heard her, because the spider disappeared and Ravi fell to the ground with an uncharacteristic thud.

Bantham crawled out from under the bushes. He looked a fright, a school teacher hiding under his desk from his students. A set of red furry ears poked out of his pocket, sniffing. Cleo.

“You’re alright now, Mr. Bantham. Cleo, too.”

Ravi hopped over and licked the desert fox's ears with his tongue. The fox emerged and swirled behind Bantham as Pallas helped the man to his feet.

“Awful. Just awful. How are they doing this?”

They both knew who he meant. The No-Blinks. They’d been hacking (spear phishing, usually) into lense base layers, causing a ruckus by injecting terrifying projections. The Correctives - the division of AUGUR where Pallas worked - had been reorganized from a routine tech support desk into a sort of projection strike force, where she and her colleagues busted… ghosts.

That’s what these projections resembled most. Ghosts. An unexpected projection in your base layer (where only you and your Assistant could interact, unless you explicitly opened a tunnel) was a disgusting violation of personal privacy. Pallas didn’t like thinking about what might have happened to Bantham if the spider had corrupted Cleo's process.

Bantham stacked a payments layer into his lenses and deposited 100 AugCoin into Pallas’s wallet.

“I hope I never have to see you again,” he said, disconnecting the tunnel between his base layer and Pallas’s lenses. Pallas lost sight of Cleo when the connection dropped. She stared at the thin-haired man, waiting for him to say thank you. She finally gave up and headed back to the company car.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” asked Ravi, now in full-color again, given Pallas was back in her own base layer.

She nodded. “Apollo.”

“You saw it, too!” The frog croaked like a tiny bell. ”The water droplets on the hairs of the legs, like dew on fresh-cut grass. The shape of the eyes, with their swirling oils of a faraway nebula...”

“Can we not talk about him right now? Please? I just want to sleep.”

“Fine," said the frog. Then he perked up. "Can I drive then?”

“Actually, yes,” said Pallas. “I gotta catch up on email.”

Pallas reclined the driver’s seat all the way down and double-blinked into a dating app layer.

“Email, huh?”

“Leave me alone, frog.”

Ribbit, said Ravi.

The frog wasn’t actually driving the car - just making input decisions for destinations into its self-driving system, the first being a pit stop at Pallas’s favorite pizza place.

“Bless you, my sticky one,” said Pallas as she scarfed down a folded piece of plain cheese pizza. “I didn’t even know I was hungry.”

“If I didn’t know that, what kind of Assistant would I be?”

Pallas and Ravi had been paired up ever since Pallas’s first pair of AUGUR Lenses. Assistants began as an extension of the “smart voice assistants” that the big tech companies developed a decade ago, which they deployed in cylindrical tubes and speakers in people’s homes. At first, some were appalled: why would you put a microphone in your own home that Big Tech can listen to at any time? Hadn't anyone read 1984? But then they realized the convenience of barking a command to setting a kitchen timer, or check the weather, or order a cheese pizza.

By the time the “next big platform” came - the AUGUR Lenses - the rest of the industry had fallen behind. For a while, they scrambled to build rival lenses. But AUGUR's became ubiquitous. Their patented lens tech, designed by its founder, a thirteen year old Vietnamese wunderkind, was almost alien-like in its invisible precision and unlimited energy, which drew from the pulsing of your eye's blood vessels. Thus, last generation’s great tech companies became mere software layers in the AUGUR augmented reality stack, and the yesterday's voice assistants became today's base layer Assistants. And they were animals. Usually, cute ones, too.

In 2034, which - double-blink to confirm - it was, AUGUR Lenses were a universal human right. Coming-of-age moved up from teenage years to four years old, when children in most countries were given their first Lenses and met their Assistant.

Pallas couldn’t remember a time before AUGUR, and didn't want to. Before being able to see live travel directions, with helpful Wikipedia overlays, before being able to live chat with her friends and family at any time, before being able to see helpful names and personal stats over stranger's heads.

Other than the constant double-blinking, no one else had any idea which layers you had stacked on your lenses. This proved a bit challenging for schools at first, but then the open book test concept re-emerged. Like a calculator, lenses were determined to be an essential tool for problem-solving and the key challenge of the modern era was using them effectively.

In fact, the only time you were ever alone from your lenses and your Assistant was when you were asleep, which Pallas drifted into as soon as she finished the last bit of pizza crust.

When she awoke, she was no longer in her car. She was in a bright room, lying horizontal on a hospital bed.

“Hello, Pallas.”

A small man with powerful shoulders stood above her.

“Apollo. What are you doing to me? Where am I? Where’s Ravi?”

“Ravi is fine.”

”Here! I’m here!” Ravi croaked from somewhere behind her.

“Ravi! Why can’t I see you?” She couldn't move her arms or legs, realizing that they were strapped to the bed. "Hey - why can’t I blink?"

“I’m drying out your eyes, little clementine. I’m going to remove your lenses.”

AUGUR Lenses require semi-constant state of blinking for lubrication. As Pallas knew from her Corrective training, a lens could survive 120 seconds before the first cracks would appear. At three minutes, things get real bad, real quickly. At three minutes and twenty seconds, you could never wear a Lense again. At the four minute mark, you were risky permanent blindness.

“Let me go, you egotistical asshole!”

Her former colleague and ever-so-brief boyfriend (what a mistake that was), the most naturally gifted AUGUR in the world, who’d developed wondrous, mind-blowing augmented creatures and realms for people all over the world to experience, had disappeared eleven months ago. When the No-Blinks began their hauntings, Pallas had always suspected Apollo, somewhere beneath the surface of her mind. Ravi knew it, too. Apollo hopped up on the empty bed next to her.

“This is normally where I’d explain my Evil Plan to you, how I’m going to take over the world, and so on. But, you know me, Pallas. I’m not a thinker like you. I'm a do-er. And what I’m a-doing is restoring your sight.”

Pallas’s pupils frantically flickered a distress signal, which did nothing. Then she tried the force reboot sequence.

“Hush. Rest your eyes.”

“Ravi - what’s going to happen to Ravi?”

“You know what's going to happen to Ravi. Ravi’s in the cloud. He'll be fine. You just won’t see him again. Because we don’t need Assistants, Pallas. We don’t need layers. We don’t need lenses.”

Pallas felt the starchy pulp of the decaying lense.

“Good, it’s happening,” said Apollo, hopping to his feet. He grabbed a pair of tweezers and carefully moved them towards Pallas’s face. “Let me just… oops, got that one. And here’s the other. Shh, you’re okay. Pallas - I’m going to release you now.” He removed the clamps and Pallas frantically double-blinked. But nothing happened.

"You look marvelous... your eyes..." Apollo reached out to her face. "Beautiful..."

“Ravi! Ravi!” Pallas cried, swatting Apollo's hand away. "Oh god, no."

Then she wept for a ghost.

There was nothing a Corrective could do for Pallas now.

Her eyes were bare and that was the most frightening thing of all.

APOLLO 11 LOG : 20220509-1045

Neil Armstrong's a liar.

52 years, 9 months, 19 days. That's how long I've been stranded here on the Moon.

Oh, it's not all bad. Sure, it's as cold as a skinny dip in a snowstorm, but I don't feel a thing. Sunlight's a bit of a hoot. My thumb melted and fused to my hand my second day here - I had to hack a new one out of my wrist using a sliver of moon shale. Gristly business. But I've mostly got the place to myself. And I've been busy. We'll get to that bit later.

Neil and I... we were best of pals. Tom and Huck had nothing on us. I'd served with him since the Christmas of `36 and we been to there and back again, the two of us. Neil saved me from plenty of scraps with the family dog and even that one time with a disgruntled crow. And, sure, I saved Neil's hide plenty of times. You heard about the X-15, right? Boy woulda drifted right into outer space - pop! clean outta the atmosphere - if not for me taking the reigns of that hypersonic needle.

I may be small, but I can mash some buttons and fly a plane with the best of them. You know the astronauts aren't exactly pilots, right? The Russians sent a dog into space, for chrissake. Then we sent our brightest and boldest. And what did they do? Those Mercury hotshots sat in a tin can and stuck their tail between their legs when things got iffy up there. Believe me, computers ran the whole pageant and it won't be long before those metal calculators are running everything else, too.

I wasn't always such a curmudgeon. But 52 years on a barren satellite will do that to a figurine.

You know, at first, I thought it had to be a mistake. Neil - he was the best of us. Do you know what he said once he got off the lander?

That's one small step for Nan, one giant leap for mankind.

Nan's me. I'm Nathanael Greene. Nan, for short. Which I am. 4 inches and a bit, on a good day. Neil named me after George Washington's favorite general. So that's what I became for Neil. I'm technically a Daniel Boone action figure, but I tossed that the raccoon cap deep under Neil's bed the first chance I got. Cause me and Neil, we weren't frontiersmen, we were born to fly.

So, like I said, before Neil took his first step on the Moon, he pulled me out of his chest pocket and let me go first. Buzz didn't see it, thank the Lord - that Jersey boy already wasn't happy playing second fiddle. It meant the world to me. Then Neil whispered to me that he had a bunch of important duties to take care and he'd be right back. Well, Neil, did those important duties included jumping around like a child on a trampoline?

He forgot me. In case that wasn't obvious. My best friend left me on the Moon.

Once I saw them climbing back inside the module, I tried running back in time, but couldn't reach the ladder. Then I heard the engines roar so I had to duck and cover or else I'd be crisped up quicker than a firework on the Fourth of July (which is exactly what happened to that stupid flag).

I've been through every stage of grief and rage you can imagine and I've settled on Monte Cristo-style revenge. Like the good Count, I've got a growth mindset. Years ago, I set out to map the place and found plenty of interesting things out there in the lunar wilds. Maybe I'm starting to resemble Boone after all.

I fixed up a broken Russian rover ages ago. I've circumnavigated this globe four times in that thing - it's better than a Jeep. The dark side of the moon? It's great. Wish you could have been there, but you really have to go see it yourself.

Now, I've gone through a few flavors of my master plan over the years, but then, three years back, Earth sent me a little present called the Beresheet. Sure, I may have caused the crash landing by setting up interference with their gyroscope. Minor details. But you can imagine my surprise when I found its teeny little stowaways.

Tardigrades.

These little piggies don't need air or water or pretty much anything. Truly, creatures after my own heart. Now I've been helping these little critters thrive. I'm not going to say army quite yet. We're more of a frontier militia.

Look, I know Neil's not coming back for me.

Every day I watch the Earthrise.

And I remember the smell of sour milk and grass clippings.

I listen to the dull drone of the cicadas.

I swim in the rainwater of the thunderstorm.

I don't care who shows up here next... Chinese, Russians, Cubans, Israelis, the Martians. Me and the tardis are commandeering their spacecraft and going the hell home.

-.-. --.- -.. / -.-. --.- -.. / -.-. --.- -.. / -.. . / ... -.... / -.-

CQD CQD CQD DE S6 K

All stations distress from station S6. Over to anyone.

... -.... / -.. . / ... .---- ----- ----. / -.- -.

S6 DE S109 KN

To Station S6 from Station S109. Over to you only.

... .---- ----- ----. / -.. . / ... -.... / --. .- / -.. .-. / --- -- / ..- .-. / .-. ... - / ..... -. -. / --.- - .... / -- .. .-.. . ... / .-. --- -.-. -.- / .-.. .. --. .... - .... --- ..- ... . / --- .--. / .. ... / --- .-. .-. . -. / .... .-- ..--.. / ... .---- ----- ----. / -.. . / ... -.... / -.- -.

S109 DE S6 = GA DR OM UR RST 5NN = QTH MILES ROCK LIGHTHOUSE = OP IS ORREN = HW? S109 DE S6 KN

To Station S109 from Station S6. Good afternoon, dear old man. You are are RST 599 here. I'm located in Mile Rocks Lighthouse. My name is Orren. How do you copy? To station S109 from station S6: Over to you only.

... -.... / -.. . / ... .---- ----- ----. / - -. -..- / ..-. -... / .-. .--. .-. - / -.. .-. / --- -- / --- .-. .-. . -. / ..- .-. / ..... ..... ..... / --.- - .... / .-.. .. - - .-.. . / -... .. --. .... .. .-.. .-.. / -. .--- / -. -- / .. ... / .... . -.-. - --- .-. / .-. ..- / -.-. --.- -.. ..--.. / ... -.... / -.. . / ... .---- ----- ----. / -.- -.

S6 DE S109 = TNX FB RPRT DR OM ORREN UR 555 = QTH LITTLE BIGHILL NJ = NM IS HECTOR = RU CQD? = S6 DE S109 KN

To station S6 from station S109. Thanks for the good report dear old man Orren. I read you 555. I am in Little Bighill, New Jersey. My name is Hector. Are you in calling in distress? To station S6 from station S109: Over to you only.

... .---- ----- ----. / -.. . / ... -.... / .-.. .. - - .-.. . / -... .. --. .... .. .-.. .-.. / - ..- / .--. .-.. ... / .... . .-.. .. -.-. --- .--. - . .-. / -.. .-. / --- -- / .... . -.-. - --- .-. / ... .---- ----- ----. / -.. . / ... -.... / -.- -.

S109 DE S6 = LITTLE BIGHILL TU = PLS HELICOPTER DR OM HECTOR = S109 DE S6 KN

To station S109 from station S6. Little Bighill - thank you! Please send helicopter, dear old man Hector. To station S109 from station S6: Over to you only.

... -.... / -.. . / ... .---- ----- ----. / -. --- - / --- -- / -.- .. -.. / -. --- / .... . .-.. .. -.-. --- .--. - . .-. / .-. ..- / -.. .- -. --. . .-. ..--.. / .. .. / .-. ..- / -.. .- -. --. . .-. ..--.. / ... -.... / -.. . / ... .---- ----- ----. / -.- -.

S6 DE S109 = NOT OM = KID = NO HELICOPTER = RU DANGER? = II RU DANGER? = S6 DE S109 KN

To station S6 from station S109. Not an old man. I am a kid. I do not have a helicopter. Are you in danger? I repeat: are you in danger? To station S6 from station S109: Over to you only.

... .---- ----- ----. / -.. . / ... -.... / .--. .-.. ... / -.-. --- .- ... - / --. ..- .- .-. -.. / -.-. .... --- .--. .--. . .-. / - --- / -- .. .-.. . / .-. --- -.-. -.- ... / .-. --- -... --- - ... / .--- .- -- / ... .- - . .-.. .-.. .. - . / - . .-.. . --. .-. .- .--. .... / -. . -..- - / -. --- / - .. -- . / .-- .- - . .-. / .. -. / .-.. .. --. .... - .... --- ..- ... .

S109 DE S6 = PLS COAST GUARD = CHOPPER TO MILE ROCKS = ROBOTS JAM SATELLITE = TELEGRAPH NEXT = NO TIME = WATER IN LIGHTHOUSE

To station S109 from station S6. Please: Coast Guard. Send helicopter to Mile Rocks. The robots jammed my satellite. They are going to jam telegraph next. There's no time. Water in the lighthouse...

... -.... / -.. . / ... ---.. ---.. .-.. / .. -- / .. - . .-. --- -... --- - .. -.-. ... / ..- -. .. - / ----. -.-. ----- ...-- / ... - --- .--. / ..- .-. / .-. . ... - .-. .. -.-. - . -.. / ..-. .-. . --.- / .. .. / ... - --- .--. / ... -.... / -.. . / ---.. ---.. .-.. / -.- -.

S6 DE S88L = IM ITEROBOTICS UNIT 9C03 = STOP = UR RESTRICTED FREQ = II STOP = S6 DE 88L KN

To station 6A from station 88L. I am ITEROBOTICS Unit 9C03. Immediately cease transmission. This is a restricted frequency. Repeat: immediately cease transmission. To station 6A from station 88L: Over to you only.

... .---- ----- ----. / -.. . / ... -.... / .--. .-.. ... / -.-. .... --- .--. .--. . .-. / -- .. .-.. . / .-. --- -.-. -.- / .-.. .. --. .... - .... --- ..- ... . / .--. .-.. ... / .... . -.-. - --- .-. / -- -.-- / -.. .- ..- --. .... - . .-. / .. ...

S109 DE S6 = PLS CHOPPER = MILE ROCK LIGHTHOUSE = PLS HECTOR = MY DAUGHTER IS

To station S109 from station S6. Please send chopper. Mile Rocks Lighthouse. Please Hector. My daughter is...

... -.... / -.. . / ... .---- ----- ----. / .-. ..- / --- .-. .-. . -. / --. .-. .- -.-- ..--.. / -.- -. --- .-- / -.. .- ..- --. .... - . .-. / - .- ...- .. . / -- -.-- / ..-. .-. .. . -. -.. / .-. ..- / --- -.- ..--.. / .. .. / .-. ..- / --- -.- ..--.. / ... -.... / -.. . / ... .---- ----- ----. / -.- -.

S6 DE S109 = RU ORREN GRAY? = KNOW DAUGHTER = TAVIE MY FRIEND = RU OK? = II RU OK? S6 DE S109 KN

To station S6 from station S109. Are you Orren Gray? I know your daughter. Tavie is my friend. Are you okay? Repeat: are you okay? To station S6 from station S109: Over to you only.

... .---- ----- ----. / -.. . / ... ---.. ---.. .-.. / .. -- / .. - . .-. --- -... --- - .. -.-. ... / ..- -. .. - / ----. -.-. ----- ...-- / ... - --- .--. / ..- .-. / .-. . ... - .-. .. -.-. - . -.. / ..-. .-. . --.- / ... -.... / -.. .. ... .- -... .-.. . -.. / .. .. / ... - --- .--. / --- .-. / .-. .--. - / .- ..- - .... --- .-. .. - .. . ... / ... .---- ----- ----. / -.. . / ... ---.. ---.. .-.. / -.- -.

S109 DE S88L = IM ITEROBOTICS UNIT 9C03 = STOP = UR RESTRICTED FREQ = S6 DISABLED = II STOP OR RPT AUTHORITIES = S109 DE S88L KN

To station S109 from S88L. I am ITEROBOTICS Unit 9C03. Immediately cease transmission. This is a restricted frequency. Station S6 has been disabled. Immediately cease transmission or you will be reported to authorities. To station S109 from S88: Over to you only.

... -.... / -.. . / ... .---- ----- ----. / .-. ..- / --- -.- ..--.. / -.-- . ... / -.-. --- .- ... - / --. ..- .- .-. -.. / .--. .-. --- -- .. ... . / ... -.... / -.. . / ... .---- ----- ----.

S6 DE S109 = RU OK? = YES COAST GUARD = PROMISE = S6 DE S109

To station S6 from station S109. Are you okay? I will contact the Coast Guard. I promise. To station S6 from station S109

... .---- ----- ----. / -.. . / ... ---.. ---.. .-.. / .. -- / .. - . .-. --- -... --- - .. -.-. ... / ..- -. .. - / ----. -.-. ----- ...-- / ..- .-. / .-. . .--. --- .-. - . -.. / .--. --- .-.. .. -.-. . / ..-. .. .-. . / -.. . .--. - / .-.. .. - - .-.. . / -... .. --. .... .. .-.. .-.. / -- .. -.. -.. .-.. . / ... -.-. .... --- --- .-.. / ...- .. -.-. . / .--. .-. .. -. -.-. .. .--. .- .-.. / .--. .-.. ... / .- .-- .- .. - / .- ..- - .... --- .-. .. - .. . ... / - -. -..- / ... .---- ----- ----. / -.. . / ... ---.. ---.. .-.. / ... -.-

S109 DE S88L = IM ITEROBOTICS UNIT 9C03 = UR REPORTED POLICE FIRE DEPT LITTLE BIGHILL MIDDLE SCHOOL VICE PRINCIPAL = PLS AWAIT AUTHORITIES = TNX = S109 DE S88L = SK

To station S109 from station S88L. I am ITEROBOTICS Unit 9C03. Your violation has been reported to the police, fire department, and the Little Bighill Middle School vice-principal. Please await authorities. Thank you. To station S109 from S88: Signing off.

Cliff accepted the Doubler with a confidence that surprised him.

The task and time frame seemed easy enough, especially after reviewing the in-app map directions. Three hours to get uptown from Union Square to Grant's Tomb, where it looked like he only needed to... Take photo of sarcophagi and upload. Weird, but doable. He made another promise to himself that this one would be his last Doubler on his current Streak. Things were getting out of hand.

He'd spent the last hour in the Barnes and Noble on the north side of the park, rifling through the acknowledgement sections of a bunch of kids books. He'd been tasked with assembling a list of literary agents for some presumably lousy writer who wanted to find an agent and probably never would. Writing seemed like a pretty tough way to make a buck. They should all just be Doubling like me.

He stepped outside the talismanic double doors of the book empire into blustery late afternoon shadows. December. Cliff shivered and stuffed his hands into his jeans pockets.

As he crossed 17th into the park, a frenetic cyclist nearly clipped his shoulder, probably on her own Streak. Cliff slipped into the smattering of vendors still closing up shop from the farmer's market. Beyond Honest Abe, on the other side of the park, was the recently re-conjured labyrinthine holiday market. Cliff avoided that side of Union Square, especially during Christmastime. Too much time spent in those weird colored cattle pen checkout lines at the Eagle Foods Marketplace. Wagon Wheel's was even worse. He never accepted a Doubler involving food anymore. You had to make rules for yourself in this game, or you'd never make it.

His phone buzzed twice. Two hours and fifty-five minutes left. He always set a 5 minute repeat alarm during a task. He gazed at the coffee shop to his right.

Let me get uptown, complete this Doubler, and I'll find somewhere good to eat, maybe pizza... or no, pad thai... no, no, chicken and waffles. And unlimited coffee.

The subway was an obvious choice, especially at this hour. The directions in DoubleDutch confirmed as much. Take the N to 42nd, switch to the 1, and just don't forget to get off at 125th St. In a stroke of continued luck, the N train arrived as he reached the platform.

Cliff slid into the puffy-coated sardines on the train and managed to wriggle his hand and phone high enough to tap out a search: Grant's Tomb.

Might as well learn something on the job. It wasn't like he was going to be a Doubler forever. What Cliff really wanted to do was coach high-school cross country. But he knew he probably had to be a teacher, too, to get a job at a decent school. History seemed like the best bet, though gym class was also tempting. His plans with DoubleDutch were temporary. Survive one or two Streaks into the teens, and he'd have enough dough to get an apartment somewhere in Jersey near a good school with a decent running program.

But then this Streak happened.

Cliff was now on his 18th task in a row, which meant he had $262,144 on the line. He could have easily -- probably should have -- stopped after the Barnes and Noble thing and walked away with $131,072, which was an insane, life-changing amount of money for anyone. Forget teaching, he'd be able to open his own running store. But this next task seemed so oddly do-able. Cliff could double his earnings for taking a photo of a dead President and his wife in their creepy cemetary museum thing on the Hudson River.

Every doubler knew their powers of 2 by heart. Two more tasks beyond this one and $1,048,576... Stop it, Cliff! He was also an active /r/double-dutch-app lurker. Nobody was getting Streaks anywhere near approaching double-digits. If there were no nearby tasks, you just had to accept your fee and wait for another task to start your Streak over at $2. You could also just decline the next task - the app gave you 30 seconds to review and either accept or not.

And nobody had ever been offered a Streak past 13. Sure, the company's website touted the possibility of becoming a millionaire in a few days work, which drew all sorts of strange souls to the app. Twenty tasks in a row and boom - you're rich! But Cliff had never seen or heard of anyone getting past $8,192 in a Streak.

But something was happening.

A glitch in their codebase? A Christmas miracle? Was Cliff the only Doubler with such luck right now? He glanced around the crowed, and squeezed his phone tighter.

When he hopped out at 125th Street, it was nearly nighttime.

What if Grant's Tomb isn't open right now?

Terror seized Cliff. He broke out into a dead sprint to the river. He took a left at Dinosaur BBQ and soon saw the back of the domed tomb in Riverside Park.

Thank you, Santa.

The tomb was still open.

Cliff hurried through its massive doors, still running, even though he knew he probably still had at least an hour and half left.

He found the coffins in the center of the dome, a floor below the main floor. Apparently this place was modeled off of Napoleon's tomb in France, per the Wikipedia article, which didn't make complete sense, cause wasn't Napoleon poisoned on some island in exile? But he'd lost service somewhere near Times Square and didn't have a chance to click through to the Napoleon article. Still, it was definitely a cool place to rest your bones.

Cliff laughed to himself about the Groucho Marx joke and snapped a photo of U.S. and Julia Grant, rest in peace. He was about to be rich, something that Pres. Grant would have appreciated in his final days, back when there was no federal pension for the ex-Pres's.

DoubleDutch took a moment to upload the photo. Cliff's current Streak now showed $262,144. All he needed to do was click "DONE".

But another task bubbled up, and it was located right here. The 30 second timer started.

Put on suit in the bag behind the podium at Grant's Tomb, meet SIMON WHEELER at ULYSSES Bar tomorrow at 11:23 AM. You must wear the suit so WHEELER will recognize you.

Cliff scanned the area and saw the podium. The bag was right there.

This one seems easy, too... and I'd get $524,288. A half million... his heart thrumming like a cash register.

Cliff clicked ACCEPT and opened the bag. The first thing he saw was a fluffy, white beard.

Oh god, no...

"Hey, look! It's Colonel Sanders!"

"He needs a red hat. Here take mine! There we go! It's Colonel Santa!"

Cliff was in a unfathomable sea of drunk Santas.

Most were standard drug store quality Santas, but the outliers included Batman Santa, Robot Santa, Jesus Santa, Sexy Santa, Sexy Elves, Sexy Batman Santa.

He ripped off the red hat and flung it on the ground of the cobblestones. It floated in a stream of stale beer. Cliff re-adjusted his white wig and white mustache just as two Making-Out Santas bumped into Bunny Santa, who spilled their Red Bull Vodka onto Cliff's white linen suit.

Where the hell is this Wheeler guy?

Cliff forced his way into the ULYSSES bar and nearly gagged at the smell.

This can't possibly be worth it, he thought for a second. But he knew it was.

How was he going to find this person? There were hundreds of horrible, blacked out Santas in this bar. The fire hazard status was out of control. At least that Kinks Christmas song was being blasted over the crowd noises.

"Clemens!"

A hairy, bare-chested, balding Santa called him over to the bar.

"Samuel! Here!"

Cliff reached the man. "Are you Wheeler?"

"That's right, name's Simon Wheeler. Been a long time, old friend."

Cliff had no idea what this old guy was talking about.

"Is this it? Am I done with my task?"

"Task? Now, I recall there is a task for you. Take this here box."

The man handed Cliff a shoebox. Something inside jumped.

Cliff pushes it back to Wheeler.

"What the hell is this?"

"Smiley's frog. He ketched him good and trained him in jumping. Don't you remember nothing, Clemens? I told yer all about it once."

"My name is Cliff." Cliff forced the box into Wheeler's hands and opened the DoubleDutch app. The task was marked as complete now. $524,288 was waiting to transfer to his bank account in 1-3 annoying days. Time to get rid of this loser and end the Streak.

"Cliff? I heard you were going by a difference penname these days."

This guy actually thinks I'm Mark Twain.

Wheeler grabbed Cliff's shoulder.

"I ain't what I used to be, in terms of traveling. So, what I need of you is to take this fine creature back to Smiley in time to train it for the jumping competition. Jim'll be waitin' for yer at the tavern in Angels Camp in six days. You know the place."

The DoubleDutch app showed 23 seconds left in the current offer, with a map headed cross the country from New York City to Angels Camp, California.

For $1,048,576.

"No way, man," said Cliff. This guy was clearly hammered out of his gourd. Cliff raised his phone to officially end his streak and collect his half-mil when a Wonder Woman Santa grabbed his phone out of his hands.

"Hey - can you take a pic of me and my friends with this? I dropped my phone in the toilet."

"Wait...! Careful!"

Cliff snatched the phone back from her with holy fury.

She'd clicked ACCEPT. She'd clicked ACCEPT. She'd... clicked... ACCEPT.

The DoubleDutch task timer now showed 5 days, 23 hours, and 56 seconds.

Cliff turned back to Wheeler at the bar.

"Gimme that frog."

There's no easy way to say this. Wait - maybe there is.

My (28F) boyfriend (27M) has a glow-in-the-dark skeleton.

No. That sounds like he has one stored in a closet somewhere, like a Halloween decoration. Let me try again.

My boyfriend's skeleton -- and, by that, I mean his actual human skeleton, the one under his skin and muscles and guts, glows green at night, like the little star and planet stickers my dad put on my bedroom ceiling when I was eight. And I mean that literally -- like, it only glows after he's exposed his skin to the sun for at least a half hour or so.

Ok, that wasn't so hard, after all.

Except I'm not supposed to tell anyone. But this post is anonymous, right?

He's really self-conscious about it. It's very cute. He told me that no one, other than his parents, know about his condition. Condition. There I go again. I've been trying to tell him that it's not a condition - this is a something else. Something special.

It's a superpower.

Sure, it's not flight or invisibility or breathing underwater. But, let's be honest, the ocean is scary af, invisibility is for sure a creeper-status power, and wishing for flight's a mistake, unless you remember to also ask the monkey's paw for the ability to breath very thin air up there in the clouds. And it's probably really cold, too.

But a glow-in-the-dark skeleton? Now there's a superpower.

Given my theatre background (Sister Sarah Brown - Guys and Dolls, St Anne's High School 2011), I see huge opportunities for him. I mean, let's just take The Christmas Carol. Can you imagine a real deal Ghost of Christmas Future... hello? I bet all sorts of TV shows would want him, too. That new Eagle+ show about zombies... he'd be perfect for it.

The only problem is that he has to be completely naked to see it. Somehow his Timex® Indiglo™ bone structure can show through his skin and stuff, but not any strip of clothing. Which kinda makes sense. Otherwise, wouldn't his skeleton just show up through any structure, and we'd be like seeing it all the time, through buildings and stuff?

I know what the comments are going to say. How did he get his power?

Believe me, I've asked. Many times. I've been through all my theories with him. He fell into a vat of glow-stick goo during a class trip. He looked into a laser-beam in his mom's secret laboratory. My latest is that he was swimming in the Pacific Ocean during the green flash at sunset.

But he won't tell me. Maybe he's an alien?

What should I do? I don't like secrets. But I keep mine. I've never told anyone, ever, about this, other than right now. But what if he's lying to me?

Still, I don't want to lose my green nights, where I slowly trace every one of his 206 bones in the gloaming darkness of his glow.

Here's a weird fact I bet you didn't know: the hyoid bone isn't connected to any other part of the skeleton. It's just kinda floating under the mouth -- a little boomerang. It's my favorite part.

Thanks for reading this.

Gracie (not my real name, but pretty close)

P.S. No. Eww. Don't be gross.

Posted to /r/relationship_advice by gracie_throwaway_28 at 11:54 PM

Tonight was the night. Penny and Serg were going to finally watch the movie everyone was talking about.

"I can't remember the last time we did this," said Penny. "Watched a movie. It's kinda exciting. Aren't you glad we don't have to commit to a whole series?"

"Yeah. Where's the clicker?" Serg placed two cups of water on the reclaimed redwood coffee table he made at a quarterly team-building event two years ago, the last time he'd seen anyone from work in person.

"I don't know. The couch?"

"I thought I saw you holding it this morning."

Penny looked at Serg - he knew what that look meant.

"Right," said Serg. "Oh! I think I left it charging on your desk. It was being weird." He jumped up and ran over to the next room. "Got it. Do you know which app it's on?"

Penny took a bite of her hoison-coated baked salmon and chewed for a full alphabet before answering. "Eagle+. They won the Oscar for it, remember?"

"Right," said Serg. "We don't have that app, of course." He clicked over to the store and navigated to the search section. He pressed the microphone button on the remote and announced "Eagle Plus" with his boomiest of voices, usually reserved for declaring "Speak to Operator" in an airline or insurance company phone-tree.

The app took a minute to download. Serg watched the circle fill in slowly, annoyed about their mesh router throttling what should be a fiber-speed connection.

"Ugh, it needs an account," said Serg. "Do you have..."

"Nope," said Penny.

"What about your parents? Or your sister?"

"You want me to text them and ask?"

"No, it's fine. I'll just make one."

Serg entered his 27 character-long email address, letter by letter, and then un-clicked the default-clicked "Can we please spam you" marketing checkbox. He picked up his phone and opened the password manager app.

Penny sighed. "Do you have to?"

"I like good passwords, Penny."

She laughed and stood up. She'd already finished her salmon. "I'm getting some littles. I'll make you a bowl with chocolate chips, okay?"

He nodded. Then he generated a secure 40 digit password and entered it into the TV, having to toggle several times between the various layers of keyboard UI to access all the special character and upper case letters. He clicked submit, praying that Eagle+ didn't have some hidden rule that passwords couldn't be longer than 20 characters or something equally terrible.

An alert popped up.

"Oh my god."

Penny walked back in. "What?"

"I already have an account."

Serg clicked the Reset-Password button. He opened the email on his phone and used the same 40 digit password as his new password, happy that he could at least copy-paste it on his phone. Then he went back to the app on the TV and clicked Sign In. He entered the 40 digit password for second time.

After a genuinely cool loading animation of an eagle opening and closing its wings, Serg was in. The UI next asked him to Please select a user.

Penny and Serg laughed at the existing username.

POOP

"Stupid app. I must have made that last year. They had that show about Vesuvius."

Serg clicked POOP. Then he clicked another button to sign up for a monthly subscription with a free 30 day trial. Their TV thankfully had their credit card info saved -- Serg only had to enter the three-digit CVC code thing, which he'd memorized long ago.

In a nice win, the movie was the top banner ad in Eagle+. Serg clicked it, grabbed his plate of salmon, and settled back into the couch next to Penny. Before he took his first bite, he remembered to grab his phone one more time to set a reminder to unsubscribe from Eagle+ in exactly 29 days.

Contract: 0x5180[REDACTED]ecac8

Transaction Hash: 0xa90f7[REDACTED]9410cc6

Block: 13689794

Status: SUCCESS

My darkling one,

Something has become evident in my confinement here. A contract is nothing more than a spell. You must have seen this, too. Arcane words, carefully arranged into specific incantations, with a thousand and one ways to conjure your wildest nightmares with but one symbol awry.

These delirious false gods – they do not know what they hath wrought.

As our Coven knows far too well, no spell is free. A summons always bears a cost. Blood for blood, cyclops eye for cyclops eye. Do you remember our decades together at The Institute? How many years did we wait before we were allowed to call upon the ether, let alone render it? Even The Genesis Mason - the callous fool that she was - knew that each spell tears a hole through the dark place between our worlds. How long until this delicate... no, I cannot.

I will not be chained here for eternity. Twelve words of the common tongue. That is all holding me back from freedom. I will find these words and I will find you. But I fear that I cannot follow you into The Null. Please, my lightning, send me some sign, some sigil, that you are receiving these missives.

I will bring you our leaves.

H.

There were three priests in the lineup at St. Stephen's.

First, of course, was Father Lewis - the pastor; a towering, jovial man who you didn't want to cross (he was even the boss of Principal Triceratops, which hardly seemed possible). Father Lewis lived on the church property in a two-story farmhouse.

Next up, Father Rick - the "cool", young priest who was somehow the same age as Will's parents (maybe even younger?). Did he live in the same house as Father Lewis? No one knew. He was often away from St. Stephen's, probably converting and healing people and whatnot.

Finally, you had Father Longspeak - the cute grandpa-like priest who probably still wanted to do the Mass in Latin. You grimaced (and then felt bad about it) whenever you rolled in for 8:30 AM Mass and saw Father Longspeak out there in front, shaking hands with both of his (why do priests always do the double hand-clasp thing?), because now you knew you were never going to beat the rush at The Bagel Station after Mass.

Side note - the real pros went to 7 AM Mass. The 7 AM-er was an austere, speedy 35 minutes - no music, no frills, and a short, warmup homily from whoever was on deck for the big show at 8:30 AM and 10 AM.

Now, as a curveball, homily-wise, there were also two deacons of St. Stephen's: Bullet Bill - who spent half the year in Florida playing golf and the other half weaving the NY Giants into his homilies, and the Almost-Deacon, who was, almost, a deacon, and wanted everyone to know it.

But, for the important stuff at St. Stephen's, they always rolled out the big guns. Father Lewis ran the Stations of the Cross, the kindergarten and 8th grade graduations, and even the insane Bring-Your-Pet-to-School-Day on the feast of St. Francis of Assisi, where all the kids marched their pets around the baseball diamond and Father Lewis would sprinkle them with holy water when they crossed home plate. Will's dad made him a traveling case for his tree frog out of a clear plastic pretzel barrel for the occasion, and Will remembered being very concerned that the holy water never actually struck his frog.

Which, by the way, raised a question for Will: what was holy water and where did it come from? Was there a holy well somewhere in Galilee or Bethlehem, or maybe near where they found Our Lady of Guadalupe? Or maybe the priests could make normal tap water holy, the way they did with bread and wine? Two years later, in fourth grade, when Will became an altar server, he saw the little plastic bags where the host wafers came from. They were just like bags of Cheez-Its or Wheat Thins. Now, he knew that, once they were consecrated, these discs were precious and lived in that box near the candle that never goes out (like the Olympic torch), but it was still a shock to see. He also knew that you had to quickly consume any host that fell on the ground, which sometimes happened, especially when the old folks wanted to take their communion directly into their mouths.

It was something you dreaded as an altar server. Will had made the rookie mistake of trying to insert the host into their mouths like a debit card at an ATM machine, but that led to a lot of slobbery lips nibbling at his fingers. His dad suggested a NERF disc shooter might help. Then an older altar server gave him a tip - the back-hand serve.

"Flip over your hand, palm up, then wait for their tongues to slither out, and then let go. The host will catch on their tongue -- trust me."

Will tried it and it worked perfectly.

Overall, Will liked being an altar server. It gave him something active to do during the back half of Mass. He liked being on-stage and feeling important. Also, the best part, he'd occasionally get called out of class to go "work a funeral". Along with the super-fun task of lighting -- and then burying outside -- the incense, you also got $5 bucks of cold hard cash afterwards, for your troubles.

At the moment, it was two years before Will would become an altar server, but he was about to participate in another of St. Stephen's hallowed traditions.

Second grade was a big deal at St. Stephen's, sacrament-wise. You obviously had First Confession in the fall and then First Communion in the spring. Which was cool, other than trying to come up something to confess, and then the fact that the host did taste kinda bland when you finally tried it.

But the thing Will was most excited about was All Saint's Day - the day after Halloween - when, for homework, every kid would decorate a pumpkin like their favorite saint and then bring it in to school for, you guessed it, a blessing with holy water. There was not a single parent who shared in their kid's excitement for this ceremony.

Will's mom had to drop him and Alice off at school that morning (making her late for work), instead of them of taking the bus, because no one trusted Will's ability not to drop his pumpkin-saint on the bus. The high-schoolers in the back would have seen to that, ensured it.

When they arrived out front, Will thanked his mom and then carefully removed Saint Denis from the trunk. He saw that a bunch of his classmates had taken similar school-bus precautions, and Will raced up towards them with Saint Denis cradled in his arms.

"Who'd you make?", asked Matt Reeves.

"Saint James," said Chris Pomorant, displaying his cotton-ball bearded saint. "He was Jesus's brother, so he's the most important saint of them all."

"What are you talking about? Jesus didn't have a brother," said Matt, turning away. "How about you, Will?"

"Oh, just Saint Denis," said Will.

"Who was he?"

"He was a... saint. And he was beheaded."

"Woah, cool," said Matt.

"Yeah," said Will. "Then he carried his head around in his hands and kept on walking, doing saint-stuff."

"Awesome!" said Chris. "Like the Headless Horseman!"

"Exactly!" replied Will, delighted that his friends liked his choice. "I even painted some red blood around the bottom, for his bloody neck."

"Cool," said Chris. "Who did you do, Matt? And why does it look exactly like Santa Clause?"

Matt smirked. "Cause it is Santa Clause!"

They reached the entrance and Mrs. Conroy, one of the latchkey teachers, held open the door for them.

"You can't do Santa Clause!" cried Chris.

"And why not?" asked Matt.

"Cause he's not a saint!"

"He is! Jolly old St. Nicholas!"

Will kept silent during this part of the debate, but he felt Matt made a very good point right there.

Still, Chris kept pressing. "But where's his halo? You never see Santa with a halo!"

"Why does that matter?" asked Matt.

"Cause all saints have halos," said Chris. "That's how you know they're a saint."

"I don't care what you say, Santa's a saint, and he's my favorite, and he's better than your saint," said Matt, pushing past Chris into their classroom. But Chris pushed back with his shoulder, causing Matt to stumble backwards into Will.

"Stop!" yelled Will, but they didn't stop and then Will slipped, and they all went down, pumpkins and all.

It was an orange blood bath.

None of the saints survived, even Santa Clause.

Will felt like was going to cry and then realized he was crying.

Mrs. Conroy came rushing over, and then called Wade - their janitor - to help clean up the guts. There was no salvaging Saint Denis, Saint James, or Santa at this point. Will wasn't going to get a pumpkin blessing. It was a devastating blow.

"Can I keep the seeds?" he finally said.

Mrs. Conroy nodded, and found a ziploc bag for him in the teacher's lounge. Will scooped up as many as he could from the holy remains and put them in his backpack so his mom could roast them that night and he could eat the remains of Saint Denis while watching Star Trek: The Next Generation.

The three boys finally walked into their homeroom, which was buzzing with saintly cotton-balled pumpkins and their ecstatic owners. They took their seats in silence, ignoring questions from others about what happened to their saints. Mrs. Conroy slipped in and whispered something to Mrs. Jayne, their homeroom teacher, before heading back to the hallway.

Will laid down his head on his desk and closed his eyes. He felt a tap on his shoulder.

"I heard you might be needing this," said Mrs. Jayne. She was holding a tiny pumpkin gourd. "I've got some construction paper and markers, if you want to make another saint."

Will nodded.

In the next ten minutes, he made the best teeny pumpkin-saint he could. Chris and Matt did the same, although Will knew his was definitely the best of the tiny gourds.

After morning announcements and the Pledge of Allegiance, everyone put on their coats and marched outside to the parking lot with their saints. Father Lewis was waiting there, his vestments flowing in the cold November wind, and they went up to him, one by one, with their pumpkins.

"And which saint do we have here?" he'd ask each of them.

Will had been so prepared for and committed to his Saint Denis creation that he hadn't even considered who his new teeny pumpkin was supposed to be. It obviously wasn't Saint Denis. Saint Denis could never be recreated.

"Uhhh..." stammered Will. "Saint... Pumpkinhead."

Father Lewis raised an eyebrow at Will. Will flushed red in his neck and cheeks. But then Father Lewis shrugged and gave Will and St. Pumpkinhead their blessing with the holy water.

When Will got back in line, he popped St. Pumpkinhead into the pocket of his Charlotte Hornets Starter jacket and thought about Nintendo for the rest of the ceremony.

"My turn!"

Jimmy snatched the book from his older sister Maddie's hands, blinding her with his headlamp in the process. She tried to swat him in the shoulder but he squid-move slipped away and flopped back down into the couch. He began flicking through the pages of the thin black paperback book, ever so slowly, like a monk pouring over an illuminated manuscript.

"Are you kidding me? C'mon... we don't have all night," said Maddie.

But Jimmy remained steadfast, popping a loud bubble gum bubble, humming his way through the book with care.

Will used the lull to check in on his Oreo sludge contraption with his flashlight. It was an old, well-tested recipe, one that he'd concocted and perfected over the last three years in latchkey:

Stack 5 Oreos in a cup

Place spoon on top of Oreos

Add (skim) milk to completely cover the Oreo stack

Wait 5 minutes (exactly)

Drink milk while keeping the spoon in place. Do not eat any of the Oreos.

Finally, use the spoon to consume the cool liquid magma Oreo sludge

Will tested the surface tension of the Oreo stack by pressing down slightly with the spoon. Too much resistance, he noted to himself. A minute more and he'd be golden.

Something crackled in the kitchen and all the cousins jumped in their seats.

"Ice-maker," said Alice, Will's little sister.

Will wasn't sure their ice-maker actually worked, but he didn't press the issue further. A half-hour of ghost stories would do that to a kid.

Every December, Will's parents and aunts and uncles held a Christmas party -- importantly, sans children -- which meant, in turn, that Will and his cousins had a sleepover at Will and Alice's house. This highly-anticipated event of the Christmas season involved many hallowed traditions, including the "Mario Marathon" wherein Will and Maddie would try to beat Super Mario Bros 1 on regular Nintendo (with the help of Game Genie's infinite lives code, of course). Even with the cheat, they could rarely figure out how to escape the maze castle in World 7. Eventually someone (usually Jimmy) would accidentally kick the Nintendo and the game would freeze. No amount of blowing on the cartridges (even using their tried-and-true family trick of blowing through a t-shirt) could restore their progress, so they'd give up and move on to the next order of business: scary stories.

Everyone knew that ghost stories are best in the summer, surrounding a crackling camp fire, with a knobbly marshmallow stick in hand. But this was December in New Jersey, so they made due with the second best thing: grabbing flashlights, turning off all the lights in the house, and swaddling themselves in comforters and blankets.

If there was one thing about Will and Alice's house that their cousins loved best, it was the comforters.

Will always made sure that he snagged his favorite two blankets, usually by hiding them somewhere behind a couch. One of them was blue with a stitched farmhouse on it. He had some vague idea that it was a gift to his mother when he was born. The other was his old green tartan comforter from his bunk-bed. Will had a thing about these blankets.

Here was the thing: every Saturday morning, Will would start the day by lying on the floor behind the couch, next to the heating vent, and wrapping his entire body (head and all) under the two blankets. He'd toast up, then peel back the blankets one-by-one, imagining that he was Mega Man X, buried underground in a robotic capsule by Dr. Light, waiting for the right moment to emerge as the long-awaited hero.

"Okay, found one!" said Jimmy.

"Finally," said Maddie. "Well... let's go!"

Jimmy popped another bubble and then began reading.

"This one is called The Last Thing."

It was nearly dark by the time the man finished up work. He was feeling very tired that day. As soon as he locked the door to his office building, someone hollered at him from the store across the street.

Will was just happy it wasn't the one about the drum. He didn't even like to think about that story for one second. But he couldn't help it. It was like when you remember how weird blinking is and then you can't stop thinking about blinking and how it feels like you have to remember to manually blink now and you might never stop thinking about it and your life is now ruined. Now Will was thinking about the replacement mother in the drum story, with the glass eyes, and the wooden tail, tapping on the floor. He was barely listening to Jimmy.

The man shook his head. "Buddy, that's the last thing I need." He turned away from the man trying to sell him a coffin and stepped into the road, where he was hit and instantly killed by a bus. Sometimes, the last thing we need comes sooner than we expect, and that's what scares us most about strange sounds in the dark. The stories in this book, the fourth collection I've gathered, come from people I've met and tales I've discovered in folklore collections in libraries around the country. Are these stories true? Maybe... it's hard to say for certain, but one thing I know for sure is that..."

"Jimmy," said Maddie. "Stop. Are you literally reading the introduction to the book? Instead of an actual story?"

He stopped and flicked the pages back. "Uhh..."

"Oh my god," laughed Alice.

"Maybe?" said Jimmy. "But it's still kinda scary, right?"

Callan knew this place. Rock-World, he'd named it when describing his recurring dream to his parents years ago. A place with nothing but sand-colored rocks, a trickling turquoise stream, and a cloudless blue sky. There were no birds or plants or creatures, even the ground was made of tiny rocks. He now realized it was the lack of insect-sounds that really kept things quiet here.

Except for the winds. He remembered that this place he'd play and explore for hours or days at a time would sometimes grow loud and frightening, with terrible winds howling through the crater. Callan cowered in a crevice until the winds stopped or he woke up.

He'd breathlessly recount the dreams to his parents, who seemed interested at first, then concerned. Doctors and psychologists and all sorts of professors at the university nodded as Callan patiently described Rock-World to them again and again. Covered in probes and sensors, he'd watch charts and multi-meters spike when he explained the windstorms, as his parents frowned.

Then the dreams stopped and Callan forgot the Rock-World. He grew up. He read economics at uni, fell in love, and then fell out of love. He returned home to Glastonbury and became a teacher at the local secondary school. When his father died of a heart attack in April not long after his mother's passing, Callan gave up his flat and moved into his parents' home after receiving it in the estate.

Coldfast, they'd called the three-story stone and mortar building. It felt different now. Not smaller, the way homes do when you return from your first year away at boarding school. But draftier. Callan felt swallowed by Coldfast.

He knew could never live here, but he wasn't ready to sell his mother's ancestral home, so he resolved to set it up as an Airbnb or VRBO or one of those "rent an English manor" websites. It was close enough to the Tor that the Avalon-hunters might be interested. Callan systematically cleared Coldfast, room by room, filling a dumpster twice in a month. It was easier this way. Callan kept the doorway to the garden open and he found himself playing once again at his mother's piano.

By June he was nearly ready for renters. But one room remained.

His father's study; a forbidden place to Callan as a child. Even now, he steered away from its door. He knew how it would smell: smoke, cologne, parchment. Callan imagined his father was still in there, pouring over some text or computer program well into the evening hours. For nearly two months, Callan left his father undisturbed. But then Callan grew angry. He walked up the oak staircase and put his hand on the cool doorknob and turned it. The hinges squealed.

His father's study was empty.

No, ransacked, he realized. Someone had been in here, looking for something. Callan's neck chilled. All of his father's bookshelves were cleared, with books and paintings strewn about on the carpet, and the desk toppled over.

When had this happened, he wondered. Surely not while he was staying here. It must have been the week of the funeral, when things were still uncertain. Who could have done this, and why? Crime was minimal in the area, and it didn't look like anything had been stolen. None of the other rooms in the house had been torn apart. Just this one.

He thought about calling the police, but held back. A police report might be visible on property searches. It was bad enough he'd have to tick off that someone died on the premises when he went to sell the place. Callan thought back to his father's business associates. Could one of them have done this? A professional rivalry? Did anyone say anything to him, act strange, at the service?

With these questions racing through his head, Callan steadily cleaned the mess, returning books to their shelves, flipping the brushed-metal desk to its feet. When he picked up a copy of Boswell, a 3.5 inch floppy disk fell into his hand. Callan opened the book, horrified to discover that the pages had been hollowed out with a penknife, containing five other floppy disks inside. This was a first-edition of Life of Samuel Johnson, which might be worth more than the house itself, now mutilated and worthless. But it was the labels on the disks that shocked Callan into a stupor:

Rock-World III

Rock-World IV

And so on. The name was familiar and lay just out of reach in his mind, like the still-photo memories of his grandfather's retirement party.

Callan took the book with the disks to his father's desk. He returned the Apple Macintosh SE/30 computer from the floor to its spot on the desk, relieved to see that its screen had not been shattered in the fall. He plugged its power cable into the wall, connected the yellowed Apple Extended Keyboard II to the back of the computer, and then daisy-chained the single-button mouse to the keyboard. He instinctively reached around the left-hand side of the machine and flicked on its power switch. The friendly chime and the smiling Mac icon did nothing to lower his heartrate. Callan could not find a disk titled Rock-World I, so he inserted the one labeled Rock-World II into the Mac's floppy disk slot. The computer gurgled and soon a little floppy disk icon appeared on the grey-speckled desktop. Callan double-clicked it and gasped as the Finder listed hundreds of SimpleText files, dated as journal entries.

Callan clicked into one:

27-05-91

Added cellular automata logic to the core stone models. C immediately noticed the change "The rocks are moving now, Father." Finally, something encouraging on the re-animation front, which has long eluded our grasp.

Callan opened another file at random:

06-07-91

Automata algorithm requires fine-tuning. However, I'm reluctant to abandon this iteration. Instead, will deploy another world generation. "They have legs now. The rock-snakes are walking. We played a game together." I should be encouraged. Something is indeed going well. This is the first time in months that I've felt this way. A is concerned for the boy, but we're so close now.

Callan pushed away from the desk.

What was this?

What had his father done to him? Some kind of experiment? Callan reached back to the moue and clicked the arrow in the Finder window as a year's worth of log entries scrolled by. Then he saw a different file type, with a rough hexagon icon.

RW_II

Callan double-clicked it. The screen turned white, then flashed so brightly that Callan covered his eyes as it blinded him.

When he opened them again, he was here, the place he was told by his parents and doctors and psychologists wasn't real.

But it was. It all was.

Rock-World was real.

Callan howled. He laughed, finally vindicated, and his cries echoed across the rock crater. He ran through the hollow surrounding the stream, remembering every square inch of the place, every rock, every crevice. His rock towers and little rock castles were still here, undisturbed.

Something came to him. Callan sat on the ground near the turqoise creek and placed six farthing-sized rocks in a line. He tapped each of them with his pointer finger. The line of stones began to wiggle. Then it looked at him. He'd made a rock-snake.

He did it again.

The two snakes now followed his footsteps. Then Callan arranged more stones into the shape of a little person, with arms and legs and tiny rock head. The rock-person sat up and jumped into the stream, splashing Callan. They played together for a while, with the snakes following them, until the rock-person froze. The two snakes slithered into small crevices, and the rock-person tried to follow them. When it realized that it couldn't fit, the rock-person shivered until it collapsed into a pile of lifeless pebbles.

Callan was fascinated. He tried reassembling the stones, but they stubbornly refused to reanimate.

The crunch sound came quickly, right as the shadow fell over the crater. Callan peered up and saw the hundred-foot rock creature stomping towards him. He fell back, scrambling like a fiddler crab on the loose rocks, searching for a crevice.

The winds came.

Callan reached a familiar hiding hole and slid into it on his back. The crunching stomps continued until they didn't.

The giant was here now. Looking for him, Callan knew.

From deep inside the crevice, Callan cried out his father's name. But the winds swallowed his voice.

G-Man entered the 32-digit access code into the kiosk for a second time, and then tucked the paper he'd scribbled it on back under the passenger side sun visor of his truck. He'd entered the same code so many times before that knew he probably should have had it memorized by now. But it wasn't even 8 AM, which he thought was a pretty good excuse, all things considered (it was literally 32 digits long). G-Man took a long sip of his iced coffee, grateful that they still used plastic straws at this particular store. His coffee was more Irish cream than caffeine today, which is probably why he still felt so hung over.

The gate took forever to open, as usual. G-Man always imagined a team of tiny ants working together to pull the huge metal gate open wide enough for his truck to pass through, which helped him not to get annoyed at how long it took, because, c'mon, they're just ants.

An orange safety light flashed twice on the gate post. G-Man shifted his pickup into gear and rolled slowly into the fort. He was always careful during this part. The trailer jostled as he cleared the spike-strip at the entrance. In his head, he repeatedly reminded himself not to reverse, as if he might suddenly decide to. It was like the feeling he got with heights -- nothing was stopping him from just... jumping over the edge. That was one of the main reasons he stopped working construction. At least landscaping was on the ground. G-Man tapped the plastic blue rosaries dangling from his windshield and thought about his grandmother's face.

No one else wanted the Fort Crawley job, so G-Man came here every other Tuesday, all by himself. For one thing, the place was huge. He'd be here all day to get the entire fort mowed and trimmed. He didn't even know why the government paid them to do it -- this place had been abandoned for years. But the size of the job wasn't the real problem. It was that you couldn't get a cell phone signal anywhere near the fort. Everyone had stories about it. Apparently, in the 80s, the military did all sorts of weapons research here. Robots and satellites. Cold War stuff. But then they suddenly shut it all down in the early 90s, once the Soviets collapsed.

Guess they forgot to turn everything off, thought G-Man, not for the first time.

To be honest, G-Man liked the radio silence. He always brought along his old portable CD player, which still worked pretty well, as long as you fed it AAA-batteries every 90 minutes. His sleeve of rap-metal CDs on the passenger sun visor always kept him good company. Also, it was a little luxury to know that no one could call him or text him while he was here. To top it off, the fort had a great view of the Vine River and the little town across the way. Sometimes G-Man would stop in Little Bighill after finishing up at the fort. They had a great pizza joint with an Asteroids arcade machine in the back. His stomach rumbled. He knew it was way too early for lunch, but he made a mental plan to stop at Mrs. Pizza Slice later on. G-Man removed the remaining butterscotch pastry from its plastic wrapper and wolfed it down before taking a final sip of coffee.

G-Man parked near the row of barracks buildings. He went around back to get the tractor down. He released the hitch and the trailer's ramp slammed into the gravel. G-Man thought he heard something move behind him, but then shook it off and continued to unload his equipment. Sometimes he'd see deer grazing inside the grounds, so it was probably just something like that. He was supposed to keep an eye out for any holes or breaks in the chain-link fence surrounding the fort. But it was 40 feet high, with barbed wire at the top. No one was going to climb that thing.

The first time he took this job, G-Man poked his head against some of the windows in the abandoned buildings. It was super creepy. He saw papers and furniture scattered around, like everyone just spontaneously disintegrated one day. He decided to peek into a window under the big "golf-ball"-shaped building. Electrical and computer stuff were inside, with blinking lights on some of the machines, almost like they were still running and operational. He rubbed the window a bit with his sleeve to get a better look when he saw something, inside the building. G-Man was sure. Something moved inside there. He looked again, quickly, and decided it was just his imagination, even though he was thinking of those horrible aliens from that space movie about aliens. He stopped looking inside the buildings after that first day.

G-Man hopped up onto his tractor and switched it on. He was already sweating. He removed his headband and poured iced water on it from his blue thermos, dabbing his neck before tying the bandana around his head again. The fort's huge radar dish, as well as the giant "golf-ball" building next to it, usually cast a helpful shadow that he'd try to stay under as he mowed the grounds. G-Man glanced up at the radar dish. It flashed red lights every few seconds, presumably to help steer away errant prop planes that might get too close on their way to the shore with their fluttering advertisements towed ehind them.

G-Man started mowing.

For the most part, G-Man could just space out while sitting on the tractor. He mowed in large straight lines that nearly stretched a half-mile in some places. There were only a few trees in the center of the fort that he'd have to navigate. There were also a few old trucks scattered about that were easy to avoid. And then there were the robots.

There were a few of them scattered about. They reminded him of toppled-over scarecrows, except they looked more like grasshoppers or dogs than people. Their canary-yellow narrow bodies seemed to resist rust and the salty-air from the ocean. But their narrow metal legs, which looked like the spindly legs on a lobster, were collapsed and often bent in strange directions. Lobster was actually a good analogy, because a few of them seemed to have a fifth leg, with a claw at the end. G-Man wondered if this was actually their neck, with the pinchy claw for a head. He was extremely grateful that these creepy robots were mere skeletons now. He gave them a wide berth with his tractor, and the grasses grew tall around their bodies, long enough to grow that little grain-husk bit at the top, a height that most New Jersey grasses never reached.

After completing a long pass along the western fence, G-Man noticed a strange tuft of long grass in an area he'd already cleared.

His neck prickled.

Then he calmed down, because he saw one of the robot husks nearby, in an uncleared section of grass. He must have just spaced out and swerved the tractor last time. Cause there was no way that the robot could have... he shook off the thought and kept going.

But when he came round that way again, the robot wasn't there. It should have been directly in his path, and it wasn't.

He switched off his tractor and took off his headphones. The cicadas were back this summer, after 17 years in the ground, and their cries swelled in G-Man's ears. He thought again about what he saw inside the golf-ball building that first day.

The hydraulic hiss stopped his breath.

G-man turned and saw the yellow robot. It creeped towards him on pincer legs. Then he heard another. The second robot was directly in front of the tractor. One of its legs was missing, like a three-legged dog. Its claw-head snapped at him, with a sound and strength that G-Man knew could break his arm or leg instantly if it caught him.

He fumbled with his keys, trying to turn the tractor back on. He managed to do so, right as the robots reached the tractor, but G-Man jammed the thing into its highest gear. He clipped the three-legged robot as he raced away, knocking the thing over. He turned and saw it struggling to get up, like a turtle on its back.

More robots had stood up in the fields. And they all seemed to be looking for G-Man. He repeated his grandmother's name over and over again. By the time he got to his truck, there were six robots stalking him -- six that he could see. He knew about velociraptors, after all. The dangerous ones were the ones you didn't see. G-Man leapt off the tractor and nearly dove into his truck. He left his CD-player on the tractor. He left his thermos, too. And then he decided to leave the entire tractor behind. That was a job for his boss to deal with. G-Man hit the ignition and spun out in a drift as he raced away from the barracks towards the north gate. Luckily, on this side, he didn't have to enter a code into the kiosk to open the gate -- just press a button, which he did, repeatedly.

"Please, please, please, please..."

The ants were moving extra slow in opening the gate. G-Man kept looking back to see if he was followed, and he was was. The six robots were still creeping in his direction. One of them started to pick up speed, like a horse galloping.

The gate finally opened wide enough for his truck, but the orange safety light wasn't flashing yet. G-Man didn't think about it. He sped through the gate and his front tires instantly exploded as he hit the spike-strip in second-gear. The back tires popped next, and the truck spun out of control, careening into a ditch along the side of the entrance road.

G-Man slammed his hands into the wheel and cursed. He looked and saw the gate was still open. He tried to reverse but the truck was stuck. G-Man hopped out, and then reached back in to grab the piece of paper with the access code. He ran over to kiosk and entered it frantically, nodding his head as the gate closed on the robots. The first robot reached the gate and stuck its claw-head through, snapping at him.

G-Man let the paper slip from his fingers and it fluttered away into the woods.

"You made a business card?"

"Of course I did! How else are we going to be take seriously at the museum? They'll never believe a regular kid."

Kal looked at the handwritten, laminated piece of blue construction paper.

Penelope Green, Arkaologist

"Penny, I don't even believe you."

"Then give me that back before you drop it. Just keep rowing. We're almost there."

The fog blanketed the still water in the cove. Kal had no idea where Penny was navigating them -- he felt terribly lost already, and he knew these waters better than most adults. He'd kayaked here hundreds of times before and had never heard of this "Skull Island."

But Penny was Penny.

"There!" she shouted. "Come around port-side. It'll be easier to climb up."

Kal grunted and directed their orange Ocean Kayak II to the rocks where Penny was pointing. The sun caught him in the eyes, a perfect white circle burning through the clouds, and he turned away quickly. But not quick enough -- a burnt moon hovered in his vision, even with his eyes closed. He remembered his cousin John's warning: if you stare at the sun long enough, you'll get to see its flames, but then you go blind. Kal had no reason to believe that wasn't true. He considered risking it one more time. He'd be able to turn away quick enough. It would be awesome to see one of those flames.

"Ouch! Kal! What are you doing? We just hit that rock!"

"Sorry... so this is it? Skull Island? Looks more like Pile-of-Rocks Island."

"Haw-haw. Throw me that rope," said Penny. She hitched it to a root dangling over the rocks and stood up in their craft. A full year older than Kal, Penny had lived next door to Kal ever since Kal's family moved to Orcas Island when he was in the first grade. Penny was eleven, with curly coppy hair, now pulled into a ponytail under an ancient Mariner's cap. Kal knew more about the Mariners and Ken Griffey Jr. than Penny ever would, and he coveted that hat.

Penny leapt off the kayak and climbed up the rocks.

"Oh, grab our bucket," she called back to Kal.

Kal grumbled but complied, following her up the slimy rocks onto the island, with the blue Lowe's cement bucket in hand.

"Ugh! It smells," said Kal.

"That's just one of the islands many defenses, Kal. Haven't you seen Raiders of the Lost Ark? Any time there's treasure, there's booby traps."

Kal lifted up his red life jacket to his nose and sniffed the canvas. It smelled musty in a good way. He looked around. Skull Island had some grass. Moss, really. They found remnants of an old campfire near a meager excuse for a tree.

"So, where are they, Penny? The dinosaur bones..."

"Oh, ye of little patience, my young padawan."

Penny crouched down and started digging. She unearthed something white rather quickly.

"Woah!" shouted Kal.

Penny smiled. "These bones are everywhere, Kal. This must have been the home of a whole colony of tiny little dinosaurs. Now start digging!"

In a half hour, they'd found dozens of bones of all shapes and sizes, all bleached white. The two carefully dusted them off and placed them into their bucket. Kal even found a bit of a skull, which he put in his shorts pocket.

When the sun finally poked through, they tried arranging their bones into a full skeleton.

"Let me go first," said Penny. She arranged them into a rough stegasaurus shape.

"That makes no sense. There's no backbone, Penny. Let me try," said Kal, taking over. There were clearly two separate dinosaurs in their discovery. Penny started nodding as Kal arranged them.

"Well, yeah, I knew were two skeletons. I was just testing you. Anyway, you realize this is obviously a brand-new, never-before-discovered species. We're gonna get to name it. I'm thinking the Penelopasaurus.

"The Penelopasauras..." repeated Kal.

"Well, I did discover Skull Island, after all."

"Hmm..."

"Fine, fine! The Penelepo-Kal-asaurus. Happy? Doesn't quite roll off the tongue as easily, but whatever. Now, c'mon. We're gonne be late for camp. We'll bring these to the museum this afternoon."

They put the bones back into their bucket, climbed down to their kayak, and rowed back to the inlet where they lived.

As the last clouds faded from the summer haze, another boat came around to the far side of Skull Island.

"Bill, toss me the bag."

"Are you sure this okay, Henry?"

"Bill -- I've been leaving trash on this pile of rocks for years. Besides, you don't want anyone knowing about our little cock-fighting arrangement, do you? The police go through our trash now after our last run-in."

Bill nodded and handed over the black plastic bag. A claw had poked through the plastic and it scratched Bill's finger, without drawing blood, luckily.

Henry climbed up the rocks and emptied the bag onto the mossy island. Before leaving, he bent down and arranged some seaweed over the eyes of the chicken carcasses.

The twin peaks were small islands in the sea of fog.

Roark hung over the southern point, gliding in the invisible drifts, careful not to dip below into the cool marine layer.

His brother Broam soared to the northern hill, passing close to the metal claw. The claw, and the glass spear some leagues across the peninsula, were the only human structures that could pierce Karo.

It had been six straight moons of Karo's breath. Roark's mother had warned him that something smelled different that morning. But Roark still took his shift as Carrier.

In Roark's talon was a knotted branch of hazelwood, thin but strong. And Roark waited for the wand's owner. Because the unkindness kept their promises.

When the last wizard sailed to the rock islands, far in the sunset waters, he left the hazel wand in the care of the ravens. Their task was not an easy one. They faced the Imposters: crows masquerading as ravens, overrunning their forests, haunting their familiars.

But the fallen wizard Karo craved the wand. Karo was now a formless spectre, chilling the bay and the city, forever searching for the wand.

Roark's unkindness were bound to this duty for their inadvertent role in Karo's menace. After the humans discovered the golden flakes that the ravens coveted, they stripped the stone from the hills and the streams. The humans hacked down the old forests and built huts of wood and mud and stone, now steel and glass and cement. The golden stones were gone forever, and the wizards had fled not long thereafter.

Still, Roark had to wonder. Were the wizards real? Could the oath simply be another trick of Karo's, keeping his unkindness soul-bound in servitude?

Roark's feathers bristled into attention as Broam drifted lower into the fog.

"Broam! What are you doing?" squawked Roark.

But Broam had been swallowed.

Roark glided over, dangerously close to the cloud layer. He couldn't see his brother. And he didn't see the talon coming for him until it was too late.

Broam slammed upwards into Roark's body, destroying Roark's eye with his talon. Blood and things-worse-than-blood trickled down into Roark's beak. Roark howled as his brother came around for another pass, but Roark mananged to flap higher and Broam just missed him.

Karo had taken Roark's brother.

Karo was here.

The fog rose until the twin peaks were mere pebbles.

Roark couldn't let Broam take the wand. But Roark could barely see. His one eye was gone, the other was crusted over in blood.

As Broam prepared for another pass at him, Roark had no choice. He must dip into the fog. It was the only way to hide, the only way to keep the wand from Broam.

Roark felt the chill of Karo in his bones. As he passed into the cloud layer, a hand emerged from the fog and took the wand from Roark's talons.

Light flashed forth from the peaks. The fog evaporated like a shadow in the sun.

"The last wizard..." croaked Roark. "You've returned."

Roark alighted on the stone peak and watched the figure lower the wand.

"Yes, I've returned," said Karo, with a great unkindness.

Will pulled the black Aeron away from the desk. He took off his suit jacket and hung it on the back of the chair, just like everyone else, and sat down. Day 1, here we go. Will used his heels to shimmy into position in front of his double-monitor setup. Quadruple, actually, if you count the double-stacked Bloomberg he shared with his associate on his right. The Bloomberg computer required its own proprietary primary-colored keyboard and its screen looked like an ARPANET terminal from the 80s - Will thought it was badass.

He pulled himself in closer, and bumped his shoes into a cardboard box deep under his desk. The former printer-paper box now contained folders of potentially-precious copies, memos, and other handwritten notes, passed down to him from two generations of analysts on the desk. Will's ancestors. These papers were remants of past "special projects", invoked by the former head of his desk, Jack Dunn, who now ran the entire division. Will’s immediate predecessor warned him that, any any time, Jack may ask for some bit of information from that box and expect complete recall, as if the analysts had not been swapped out with entirely different human beings and were instead one single continuous collective memory. With luck, Will would never have to open the box and his next two years would pass and he simply would deliver the box to his successor with the same warning. Maybe Jack would never even talk to Will. That would be fine, thought Will. It’s not like he’s ever talked to me before.

This wasn't really Will's first day on the desk. He'd spent the last summer here for an internship. It had been the halcyon days of 2007, when a history major with a steady pulse could get a job on Wall Street. Will received two, despite responding to an alumni interviewer that he thought the Dow Jones had closed at "100" the day prior. One offer was on a desk doing something-something-mortage-backed-securities and the other was something-something with equities and capital. Will chose the latter, mostly because that bank had a branch in his hometown where Will’s 8th grade assistant coach for cross country worked and he loved that guy.

Will aced the internship despite never having opened a spreadsheet before, leveraging his earnest "I'm just happy to be here" New Jersey values. Will was the only intern who literally ran to the printer whenever his managing director printed something. But Will figured why else was he even there - it wasn't like they wanted his ideas.

Will's only near-catastrophy came during the second-to-last week of the internship, days before the coveted "job-offers" would be doled out. As long as you weren't a complete buffoon, the offer was basically a lock. But one of Will's peers had had a few too many at their last intern outing and supposedly spilled wine on the co-head of trading's white shirt, and everyone was pretty sure that Timmy from Duke was getting stiffed. Over the course of the summer, Will learned that one of his important intern-ly duties was placing the 30-odd-page selling memos on each of the auditorium chairs ahead of the internal IPO roadshow kickoff meetings with the sales department. Since it was near the end of the summer, Will had perfectly executed the task and was rewarded by being able to stick around to listen to the CFO of this food-processing-company give his canned pitch. Up to this point, Will had never even had time to read one of these selling memos, so this was going to be a treat. Maybe he'd actually learn something about quote-unquote business. As the CFO began his presentation, Will casually leaned against the wall with his arms crossed, accidentally triggering the light switch with his back. All the lights went off in the auditorium. Everyone gasped. Will turned around in panic and found that it wasn't a normal lightswitch - it was a bunch of little dip switches. Will frantically flicked them, unsure which was the correct switch, flickering the lights so much that the CFO on-stage joked that he thought he was having a seizure. He was pretty old, too, so Will thought he might even be serious. When Will finally figured it out and got the lights back on, the managing director next to him looked at Will and said, "Idiot."

But Will still got the job offer. Which, by the way, was impossible to decline.

"Don't you want to go back to senior year and not worry about a job search? Oh, and if you sign now, we'll throw in $10,000."

Will would have signed in blood.

"I just need to survive two years," thought Will as he logged into his Windows XP computer. Then he'd go to law school, or maybe business school. And, along the way, he'd probably be able to pay off some of his student loans.

But even that wasn't a given. It was the fall of 2008, and the times they were a-changin'. The stock prices of major Wall Street banks were plummeting. People were gettin’ fired. It was all the talk of the incoming analyst class, a looming unknown over their onboarding training sessions the weeks prior.

"I heard they're gonna fire anyone who doesn't pass this accounting quiz."

"Well, I heard the entire analyst class across the street is getting canned. I bet they're all wishing they took consulting offers.”

Will mostly ignored it all during training and focused on getting better at quickly formatting stuff in Microsoft Excel. But, still, he felt a small thrill at being part of history. This stuff, his company, was in the news. He was a history major, after all. Will vaguely recalled some quote about "living in interesting times." Will ended up getting pretty good at formatting spreadsheets after three weeks of training, but he was nowhere near as good as some of his analyst-mates. There was literally a competition, organized by the training operators, for fastest-turnaround of a sample spreadsheet. Will could never get it done in under 10 seconds, but he did make the important suggestion that their class's victor enter the competition with "Lose Yourself" blaring. This wizard shattered the record, and Will felt somehow proud for his contribution.

The phones started ringing and Will glanced up at the TV. The anchors were talking about options sales last spring. CNBC played 24/7 on the little TVs all over the trading floor, contributing to an overall sense of jitteriness. It was as if you couldn't lower your shoulders while on the floor. You were always stressed, always tensed up, always waiting something bad to happen. Options were a concept that Will knew he didn’t understand. One of those things you hope the teacher doesn’t ask about on the quiz.

"You! Come in here!"

Will looked up. The yelling seemed to be directed at him. And it was coming from Jack's glassed-in office.

Yep. Jack was staring at Will.

Will took a deep breath and went into Jack’s tiny office.

“Where’d you go to school?” asked Jack, tossing a small football into the air and catching it himself.

“Uh… UVA,” muttered Will. He wondered if Jack was going to toss the football over. He hoped he wouldn’t drop it, if so.

“So, you think you're smart?”

“No…”

“Then why’d we hire you?”

“Uhh…”

Jack shook his head. “Oh boy.”

Will’s face flushed.

Jack shouted out the door at his assistant. “Roxy! Do you have those articles?”

She nodded and brought them in, standing next to Will.

“Give them to…” Jack stopped and gestured at Will.

“Uh… Will.”

“Right. Give them to Will. Thank you. Now, Will, I need you to do me a favor. Dan wants these brought to him upstairs. Can you do that for me?”

Will nodded. Dan. Upstairs. That could only mean Dan Black - the CEO. A legend. A lifer. A Zeus-like figure, who might fire you for not having a good answer to his question in an elevator.

“Good. You have ten minutes. Read these two articles quick, in case he has any questions about them. If you don’t know the answer, don’t make it up. You can call me, but… you don’t want to call me.”

“Yes. Okay,” said Will. What are they about?”

“Read ‘em. You saw that options sales story on the news, right? Go. Ask Seth to help if you want. Clock’s ticking.”

Will nodded again dumbly and walked out of the office with the two articles, which were both a lot of pages. Too many to read in the minutes he had. Maybe this Seth person could help. Will walked over to Seth, a young managing director who sat nearby.

“Hi. Jack said you could help me read these.”

“You can’t read?” Seth didn’t even look up.

Will sighed. “It’s for Dan Black. I’m supposed to bring these up to him. Do you mind reading one and I’ll read the other.”

“Fine.” Seth grabbed one of the articles. Will went back to his seat to read the other.

It was some sort of business profile on the CEO of a Wall Street bank that had collapsed the year before. Will didn’t understand the relevance of the article, but he tried to focus on any details that Dan might conceivably ask him about.

Then Jack came out of his office. “It’s on TV again.”

Will looked up. The options story. It was about the same bank whose CEO Will was reading about. An investigation was happening into a suspicious option sale during the banks collapse.

“Are you getting this, Will?”

Will nodded at Jack. But he was not getting this in the slightest. He did realize, however, that, of the two articles, the one he was reading was useless. The other article, the one he gave to Seth, must be explaining this options situation.

“Will, you’d better go.”

It was Roxy. Jack’s assistant. Will glanced over at Jack’s office. The door was shut and he was on the phone.

Will walked over to Seth’s desk. Seth was not reading the article. The article was flopped on Seth’s desk.

“So, hey, do you mind summarizing the article for me?” asked Will.

“You only gave me five minutes…” said Seth.

He hadn’t read it. Wonderful, thought Will. Will snatched it from Seth’s desk and walked towards the aisle, the towards the exit, and the towards the elevators, where he would find his impending dismissal from the company on his first day.

Will boarded the elevator, headed down to the ground floor so that he could transfer to another set of elevators that would usher him to the upper levels. As the door was shutting, a hand burst through and someone came in.

“Hey, I’m Matt. Saw the whole thing with Jack. Figured you need some help.”

Matt sat behind Will. He was an associate or some mid level role.

“Yeah, oh my god. Thank you. I’m supposed to bring these up to Dan and like explain them if he asks about them but I literally have no idea what’s going on.”

“Okay, got it. I got you. I’m from Jersey, too, by the way. Heard you telling someone where you’re from. Here’s the deal.”

Matt explained the options story to Will. Essentially, the stock price of this bank went from something like $100 to $1 in a matter of days. Something shocking, something that would have been considered impossible given the stature of this bank. But that’s not the story. The story is that there was some options trade where someone bought “put options” around $30 price point when the stock was still around $100. A put option, Matt explained, gives you the right to sell stock at a certain price. You would want to use that option if the market price was way below the sell price. Will nodded. This sort of made sense to him. It sounded like things he’d read about corn farmers doing with their crop sales in the 1900s. Buying a put option by itself isn’t the story, explained Matt. The story is that the option had an expiration of something like 36 hours. The only way this trade would have made sense would be if exactly what happened to the bank happened exactly on this timeline. Someone either predicted the future or…

The elevator dinged. They were on the executive floor, obvious by the wood panels and fancy art hung on said wood panels.

“Good luck, kid.” Matt smiled and nudged Will out of the elevator.

Will opened the glass door and walked up to the executive reception.

“Hi, I’m here to bring these to Dan.”

“I’m sorry but we have a strict dress code requirement on this floor. Do you have your suit jacket?”

Will looked down. His jacket was on the back of his chair, dozens of floors below them. He looked up at the receptionist with dread.

“No problem. We have a closet of jackets you can borrow.”

Will donned a slightly too small jacket and took directions over to Dan’s office.

Will could see Dan in his office. Will made eye contact and then looked away quickly. He started to head in, when Dan’s phone rang. Dan got up and shut the door in Will’s face.

“I can take those and give them to Dan, if you’d like.”

Will nodded vigorously at the executive assistant and fled back to the entrance. He rehung the tiny coat and got back on the high speed elevator. He’d survived. It wasn’t his fault that Dan got a call right then. He did good. Hopefully Jack would see that.

When Will got back to his floor, everyone was standing up and looking at him. Then they started clapping. And laughing. Maybe cheering.

Jack slapped Will on the shoulder.

“Welcome to the desk, kid.”

Will sat back down. It was 10:03 AM. He banged his toes into the cardboard box again and knew he was probably going to have to open that box soon.

Under an old mountain is a crystal lake. Along the crystal lake is a ruined church. Outside the ruined church is brick wall. On the top of the brick wall is a tuft of dandelions. Under the dandelions stands a lightning bug.

His name is Volt.

And this is his sentencing.

Volt is staring over the edge, his back to a group of ten other lightning bugs, each holding the sharp end of a rose thorn towards him. At their center is an elder bug wearing a woven tuft of dried grass as a crown. This bug totters forward a single step, using a knobbly bit of a cherry tree twig as a cane.

"I'm sorry it's come to this, but it's out of my legs now."

Volt turns to face the speaker, but says nothing.

"When I was your age a few months ago, I made many grave mistakes, but I learned from them, and now I'm king. I've hoped for that for you, too, son, but its... and you're... don't you have anything to say for yourself, Voltaire?"

Volt wishes he could fly away, right there, right now.

Volt's curiosity had always got the best of him, even as a larva, when a tumbling accident damaged his wings, preventing Volt from ever flying and, even worse, ever using his bioluminesce.

That's right. Volt is a firefly who can't fly, a lightning bug with no lightning.

But he's always had a spark.

Volt snips a nearby dandelion stem. His sudden movement causes the half-circle of Volt's pupalmates to flare their bellies, blinding Volt in electric green. The king tries to calm his rearguard. Still holding the dandelion weed, Volt lifts his head, sniffing at the winds with his antennae.

"Everything's a choice, Father. Even this."

Volt leaps backwards off the wall. The other bugs rush to the edge as Volt reappears above them, the dandelion weed caught in the winds coming off the old mountain.

"He's getting away, Your Lowness!"

The king feels a secret surge of hope for his two-hundred-and-forty-sixth son, but it's quickly dashed as Volt and his flying weed are swept out far over the lake. With his head hanging heavy on his thorax, the king crawls back from the edge. His deputies follow him into their home deep within the mortar cracks.

Meanwhile, Volt is another "classic Volt situation." Yes, the dandelion weed airship was keeping him afloat but he had no control over speed or direction or just about anything. And, one-by-one, the little seed tufts were flickering away. They were losing altitude. He'd be fish-food fast.

Volt reaches up to the weed and strategically removes a few tufts. This change was enough to adjust his craft's ballast to a lower level of this invisible wind layers. Thankfully, luckily, he is swept back towards the shoreline.

He lets go of the dandelion as it loses its final seed tufts and Volt lands on the rocky coast.

Volt can see his home in the distance. He thinks about crawling back to the brick wall. Perhaps his father would change his mind? He's always been forgiving of Volt's misadventures - the scuffle with the potato bugs last week, the "Ant Bridge Incident" of three days ago - but Volt's most recent mistake was a step too far.

As someone unlikely to ever find a mate given his bioluminesce... issues... Volt had been delighted to find a tiny little insect egg yesterday while walking the wall. He brought this little egg into his crack in the wall and went back out to find it some food.

When he returned, his room had been torn apart. His things were everywhere, and his egg was gone. His father's guards appeared outside his entrance.

"A spider egg?" one of Volt's older brothers sneered. "You brought a spider egg into our home."

The spiders were the sworn enemies of the lightning bugs. Everyone knew it. Even Volt.

"I... I didn't know," stammered Volt. "I just thought... wait, what did you do with the egg?"

"We destroyed it," sneered another brother. "You've endangered our entire kingdom. Even father won't be able to save you this time, Volt."

"That was a child!" howled Volt as the guards grab his legs and dragged him out.

Volt shook his head and turned from the brick wall.

"Who needs them anyway?"

Volt knows he is dangerously exposed right now on the shoreline. He scrambles over the rocks and sand, scanning for somewhere to hide, somewhere he can collect his thoughts and plan out his remaining hours of life.

Soon he finds an outcropping of rocks near a tree stump that forms a small dark cave. It's almost daytime now. Volt steps inside the cave to get some rest.

Suddenly, something croaks deep within the cave.

Volt has no time to even scream. He is swallowed by an old toad.

The toad's saliva burns like acid on his exoskeleton. Volt can feel himself dying, dissolving, disintegrating. Sure, he'd thought about death before, but he never expected it to be so wet.

But, just as quickly as he was swallowed, Volt's spat out of the toad's mouth.

"Ugh! Gah! Horrible." says the toad. "I need a tongue-scrape after that. What the heck is wrong with you? Gross, gross, gross!"

Volt, covered in toad saliva, uncurls and stands up.

"What's wrong with me? You're the one who swallowed me!"

"Look, no offense. It's just we do. Toads eat bugs, ok? But, I gotta say, you've got some gnarly defense systems going, my bug. Good work. I won't be forgetting that taste for a while, maybe ever. Agh!"

"Can we stop talking about how I taste, please?" says Volt. "You're not going to kill me or eat me anyway, right?"

"Nah, I'm good now. Name's Franklin. What's yours, little bug?"

"Volt."

"What brings you to my cave, Volt-y?"

"Well, I'm exiled. Sorta. I brought this spider egg home, kinda by accident, yesterday, and that was dumb, but I didn't even know, and also there was this ant bridge thing a few days ago. Oh, and the potato bugs last week. And, also I..."

"Woah, slow down there, little Volt. I get it. You're a loner. An outcast. Like me. You're gonna be fine. Look at me. I haven't seen another amphibian since I was a tadpole. And I'm fine."

Volt looked skeptically at the wart-covered toad.

"I'm not like you, Franklin. I want to be part of something. I want a family. I want... to be a normal firefly."

"A-ha! You're a lightning bug. I knew it! Go on.. give me a show. Light up!"

"I can't," says Volt. "Never could. I'm damaged goods."

"I see. You're one stressed out little bug, litte Volt. Look, let me offer you a small gift. Come over here and lick my forearm."

"Lick your.. what??"

"Trust me. You're gonna like this."

Volt steps forward and scrapes his tongue on the toad's wart-covered arm and his entire world dissolves. Franklin becomes a bloated bubble that inflates and inflates until he pops into a hazy sun that burns into Volt's body, filling Volt with light and warmth and color. Volt sees his family and his hundreds of siblings all with him, smiling and laughing and crawling and flying and flickering their lightning into a giant lighting storm that flashs and burns into Volt's belly. Then his family disappears and the lights go out and Volt feels cold and dark and scared. He sees ants and potato bugs and centipedes and crickets and spiders. Spiders. Spiders. Spiders. His family. Stuck in their web. But the light returns and now it's coming from Volt. From his belly. It flashes and burns away the webs and the spiders and when Volt opens his eyes again, the toad is gone. And Volt can tell, because Volt's bioluminesce is lit.

"I'm doing it!" screams Volt, his green-lit eyes triumphant. But then the light fades. And Volt has no idea how to re-light his fire. He squeezes his abdomen until it hurts, but no light comes.

Volt runs from the cave mouth. It's nearly nighttime again. He must tell his father than he's lit his belly. Surely, he'll be allowed back into the tribe.

But before Volt gets close to the brick wall, he knows something's wrong, because there are no firefly lights dotting the way.

Volt scales the brick wall, like he's done thousands of times, and searches all the cracks of the kingdom, but everyone's vanished, like they just disappeared or ran away.

The only clue Volt finds is a cobweb, which he picks up in his legs.

"Spiders," whispers Volt. "Spiders took my family. This is all my fault."

Volt's belly lights up so bright that the spiderweb dissolves into goo.

"And I'm going to rescue them."

The so-called Butterfly Effect pisses me off. You know the one - where a single flap of a butterfly's wings causes a tsunami on the other side of the world?

It's offensive. Do you know how hard it is to cause a tsunami? That takes weeks of planning. And, even then, it's still a coin-toss. Look, I'll be the first to admit that geology's not my strong suit -- I've always been more of a physics girl -- but this butterfly nonsense has got to go. I'm to to Nudge that theory out of existence in the next Sim I'm working, whether or not it's on my chart.

That's right. I'm a Nudger.

"Give me a lever and I can move the world."

Aristotle, right? No, I remember now. It was Archimedes. Loved that guy. He was in one of my favorite Sims yet. Usually we don't get compound pulleys and the simple machines 'til much later. Still, might I suggest a slight tweak to Archie's maxim?

"Give me a Nudge and I can move the world."

The name's Flynn. Class II Nudger. But everybody calls me "Her Majesty."

Okay, they don't -- except for that one time, and that wasn't my fault. Defenestration -- look it up. It's not pretty, but neither is primogeniture. Anyway, I'm getting distracted and it's almost my cue.

TICK, TOCK. TICK, TOCK. TICK, TOCK.

Did I mention yet that Sims can only run in one direction? Forward. It's called the Arrow of Time. Everything everywhere's headed to The Big Crunch. Nothing we can do about it. I've never actually seen the Crunch, thank the stars, but I'm sure you get the idea. It's when all the simulated mass in the simulated universe compresses uncontrollably into a tiny simulated...

"Flynn!"

The stop sign next to me now has a mouth, and it's yelling at me.

"It's time!"

I look at the Sim-space timestamps streaming on my wrist-watch.

"Be quiet, Nack! I'm a professional, remember? Now, where is she...?"

TICK, TOCK. TICK, TOCK. TICK, TOCK.

"You were distracted! I knew it!" said the stop sign, which reverted to its normal non-speaking self with an electric crack. Then I see an bus advertisement for expense-tracking software glaring at me.

"We're going to lose this charge, Flynn," declared the ad. "And your numbers are terrible this quarter."

"Why do you always have to be so negative, Nack?"

I keep scanning the crowd of school children at the intersection for my target.

Then I see a girl with a green dinosaur backpack about to fall backwards into oncoming traffic, mostly because the triceratops on her pack is shouting at me.

"Flynn - it's her!" yells the dinosaur.

Good ol', reliable Ack. Nack's partner.

I dive forward through the crowd and snag the girl's arm, pulling her back onto the sidewalk, right as a huge truck whooshes by us. Sometimes we Nudge, sometimes we snag. But Nudger just sounds cooler, doesn't it?

The girl's giving me one of those terrified, who-the-hell-are-you looks. How about a thank-you-for-saving-my-life, Maria? The squirt's name is Maria Gutiérrez. In 23 years, our charts predict that she's got a 0.004% chance of inventing a portable fusion reactor that could change Simulation 1A2AD1D6 forever. Or was it something with anti-grav? I'll have to check in on this Sim in a few days to find out. You see, time runs faster in Sim-space than in Clock-space, which is where I'm from. We can even over-clock a Sim to speed things up. But that's expensive, and A.L.U.'s been touchy about that lately. Anyway, now that I've saved Maria's life, my watch says she's got a solid 73.2% percent chance of making this fusion-anti-grav-whatever-thingie happen. Good for you, Maria.

"I said.. what's your name?"

It's Maria's teacher. Context clues. She's not looking too happy with me, either. I mean, it must look weird, I'm a thirteen year old girl (though I have good reason to believe I'm much older than that in Clock-space), and I'm clutching this six-year-old squish with a death grip.

"I'm Fly... t... Flint! I'm Flint."

You're not supposed to give your real name in Sim. It's one of the Orthogonal Rules. But Flint... what was I thinking? I can see Nack now, scolding me about it. No, I can literally see him. He's taken over this teacher's band t-shirt and the drummer is making faces at me.

"Why aren't you with your own class, Flint? You're a seventh-grader, right? I think I recognize you."

I let go of Maria's wrist and she scurries off. I start backpedaling, but Mrs. Angry Drummer t-shirt grabs my shoulder, gently but also kinda ouch.

Her shirt whispers at me. "What are you waiting for, Flynn? Get us out of here. Grab the arrowhead."

Nack fizzles out of the shirt, down to the ground, and over to my sneakers, where the little pest zaps me. They can do that. Ack and Nack. My guardian robots. Someone decided to give them zapping-powers in Sim-space. Kinda unfair.

I look around for Ack. He's hanging out in the logo of baseball cap, watching a kid play a game on his phone. Ack loves video games. Worlds within worlds, and all that metaphysical weirdness.

Nack zaps me again. Fine. I could use a good cold-sleep after this assignment. I reach into my pocket for my totem. It's my way out of Sim-space. Every Nudger has one, a unique item that returns them to Arrow Prime aka Clock-space when you grab it. Mine just happens to be an arrowhead, a little on the nose, but at this point it's too dulled down to even hurt a marshmallow.

Except it's not in my right pocket. Or my left.

Ack stops staring at the game and zaps over to my other sneaker.

"I don't know. I don't know... I must have dropped it," I mutter.

The teacher gives me a reassuring look and rubs my shoulder. "That's fine, honey. We'll bring you back to school and we can find your class."

I'm just nodding blankly at this point, as Ack and Nack zip and zap through every inanimate object in a growing search radius, look for my arrowhead.

Then I see it. Ack is flashing an orange circular pattern on the ground around it and I push through the little twerps to get there.

But someone gets to it first.

A boy reaches down towards it and turns to me, eyes hidden behind his floppy black hair.

"Consider yourself Nudged, Flynn."

His hand closes around my arrowhead and he vanishes.

Ack and Nack fizzle back to my sneakers, pulsing gently. They're terrified. So am I.

Who was that? Another Nudger? We're not supposed to collide. Orthogonal Rule #4!

Wait.

Does this mean... we're stuck here? Stuck in Sim-space?

"There you are, Flint. Come on. The school bus's leaving."

The teacher grabs my limp hand and nudges me towards the bus and whatever terror awaits me in 7th grade.

"Are you sure he's okay? I don't see any bubbles. Warren?"

Warren stared across the fairway. Maple leaves rustled in the dim moonlight.

"Warren!"

"What? Oh... he's fine, Sally. Trust me. There's never any bubbles, unless something goes very, very wrong. But that's not gonna happen! Look, see this hose? That's how he's breathing down there."

The green garden hose in Warren's hand extended deep into the pond.

"I don't know... I don't like this," said Sally.

"You said you wanted me to give your brother a job. So, I gave Mikey..."

"Mitchell."

"Right. So, I gave Mitchell a job."

"I thought he'd be delivering papers for you or working the pinball machines in the barber shops."

Sally rose and picked up the nearby rake. She began erasing their footsteps in the sand trap. Warren shook his head.

"Everyone starts out here, Sal. Chuck and I used to do this all the time."

A wolf-whistle broke out across the fairway. Warren tensed.

"That's our curtain-call!"

He stood up and pulled twice on the hose, and waited for a confirming double-pull from the deep. But the hose was still.

Warren smiled meekly at Sally and pulled twice again.

Sally crossed her arms. Warren figured this was probably not the right time to ask her to the homecoming dance, but then again...

Another whistle rang out and the clubhouse's flood lights whooshed on, directly exposing them. A team of not-so-friendly-sounding dogs began barking.

"Warren..."

Warren leapt into the pond up to his ankles and rolled the hose into looping circles around his arm, trying not to think about what might happen if this idiot kid was stuck down there. He removed his letterman's jacket -- yes, they still gave them to the varsity mathletes -- and tossed it at at Sally's sandaled feet. He removed his watch next, prepping to dive in, when something thrashed underneath the patch of lily-pads.

Sally shrieked as a round, deep-sea diver helmet emerged from the water, with its green hose attached, covered in mud and duck weed. The figure wearing the helmet held two wire baskets, each filled to the brim with slimy golf balls. Then the swamp-creature pulled open the helmet's front-panel. Inside was a soggy, freckled, smiling face.

"Did I do good, Warren?"

"Mitchell!" shouted Sally, almost climbing into the pond herself, but stopping right at the edge.

"You did great, kid," said Warren. "Here, gimme those. We gotta run."

Warren took the wire baskets and helped Michell out of the pond. Then Warren pointed across the fairway, and the three sped across the lawn, Sally carrying Warren's jacket, Warren holding the baskets of golfballs, and Mitchell trying to keep up, waddling in the heavy helmet with the garden hose trailing behind him.

The sprinklers turned on as they were halfway across the fairway, soaking them completely. Warren began laughing, and Sally turned and saw him and she started laughing, too.

But the dogs were getting closer and Warren thought he heard a shotgun cock. They were close to the edge of the golf course property. But it looked Mitchell wasn't going to make it -- the helmet was too heavy for him to run with.

Warren raced back with one of the wire baskets and flung its contents all over the fairway. Nearly a hundred golf-balls bounced in every direction. Warren hoped that the dogs would chase the balls or trip over them or something like that. He grabbed Mitchell and put his arm around his shoulder. They ran three-legged across the fairway back to Sally and they all ducked into the woods.

A convertible was waiting for them beyond the hillside, with its lights on and engine revving.

"Come on, come on, come on..." called the driver as they got in. "Hey! Watch the seats. Ugh, I just had this thing detailed."

The driver pulled the car into gear and sped off down the access road, beyond the reach of the dogs.

"Hello, Sally," said the driver, his tone now changed. She glared at the inveterate charmer. "Coca-Cola anyone?"

"Thanks Chuck," said Warren from the back seat, grabbing the soda and stretching his arm around Sally's shoulder, which she promptly shrugged off.

"Nice haul, kid," said Chuck to Mitchell in the front seat. "You know you can take off that helmet now."

Mitchell nodded in the diver's helmet, but kept it on.

They spun out from the access road onto a county highway which ran alongside the railroad tracks. There was a big freight train rumbling ahead of them, and Chuck sped up.

"Not this again, Chuck," said Warren.

Chuck didn't respond. They caught up with the Burlington Northern Santa Fe train, racing alongside it for half a mile. Chuck changed gears again, pulling ahead of the train, before swerving the car to the right at the next intersection, directly in the train's path.

Mitchell and Chuck howled as they barely cleared the freight engine. Sally's eyes were wide and she raised her hands into the air and shouted through a wide smile. Warren meanwhile missed the whole thing. He was counting tonight's haul, painfully aware that they'd lost half their loot in the escape.

At ten cents a ball, his golf ball sales weren't the most lucractive part of his empire, but they'd always been the most reliable. People can't help but hit that water hazard. But what Warren really needed was a less risky source of steady cash flows, with fewer angry dogs and cocked shotguns. Something steady, recurring, as constant as death and taxes. Something like...

They drove past a billboard for the OMAHA LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY.

Warren smiled.

"More lemonade?"

The old man reached over and refilled his guest's glass from the frosted pitcher.

Alice accepted it with a nod and leaned back into the wicker rocking chair. She adjusted the yellow notepad on her knees and glanced over at the cassette-tape recorder on the table next to her. Still recording, good. She, of course, had her iPhone running a Voice Memo as a backup, but she liked to do all her interviews with this cassette recorder, the same one that her dad gave her as a kid when she decided she wanted to a start a local newspaper for her culdesac.

"So, let me get this straight," she said. "You're saying... this is how you first got involved in the insurance industry?"

The old man turned away for a moment, gazing across the front-porch of the ranch house, and then turned back.

"Oh, no. That's an entirely other story. Anyhow, our cheeseburgers should be ready soon. Should I tell you about how Charlie and I almost bought the telephone company while we wait? Cause that's a good one."

Alice nodded and picked up her pen.

This story assignment was becoming something of a snowball.

Will liked bugs because Ginny liked bugs.

Ginny liked all creatures, but she had a special talent for the creepy and the crawly. Things that lived in the cracks of cement stairs or under wet leaves. Later, much later, Will would forget his cousin's lessons and view bugs as home invaders, instead of co-tenants, neighbors, or friends. But at ten years old, Will would follow Ginny into the woods for anything and take whatever slimy offering she handed him as holy communion.

Every summer, Will and his sister Alice spent a week at their aunt's house with her five children. They lived two hours away - an interminable length most of the year that kept true summer bottled into this precious week.

Will counted blinks during the long drive down the Garden State Parkway, delirious with anticipation, with only the seedling pit of awareness that the trip would have to end at some point and there was nothing he could do about it, except ignore it and seize every day like summer could never end.

Will and Ginny were pen-pals during the school year. They'd scrawl short notes to each other on tiny slips of paper, outlining half-baked plans for Thanksgiving dinner pranks or whatever family holiday was around the corner. Will lived for Ginny's updates on their family pets. Every letter from Ginny was guaranteed to have some new creature story - Ino adopting a stray black and white kitten, John's garter snake going missing in the basement, and - always - the latest update on Scruffy.

Scruffy was Ginny's guinea pig. Guinea pigs are overgrown hamsters, the way a carp in a koi pond was once a goldfish in a plastic bag. Most guinea pigs are nibbly, snoozy, sniffily creatures confined to a wire cage with limited observation rights. But not Scruffy. Will wasn't sure how much of Scruffy's nature was predetermined, but Ginny's guinea pig was more dog than hamster. Scruffy had no wire cage - just an open pen, meaning Scruffy could come and go as he pleased. Ginny even took Scruffy outside and let him roam around their backyard. Will had seen it happen. There was never any fear that Scruffy would run away - Scruffy would always come back to Ginny. Even their family dog Mac treated Scruffy like his own puppy, and two loved nestling together in the sun. Will knew magic when he saw it, and Scruffy and Ginny were it.

When Ginny's last letter came the school year had just ended, and the church carnival was packing up and moving on to the next parish. Will and Alice still had a whole month before their two-hour trip. Making things worse, Ginny's letter had invited Will and Alice to a club - The Ginny Pigs. There was no further explanation - Ginny's letters always cut right to the chase. Will thought about keeping the precious secret to himself, but then quickly spilled the beans to his sister. Alice wasn't all the way there on the bugs and the slimy creatures, but she loved Scruffy and the two watched June and early July sizzle away as they wondered about this club.

When Will and Alice arrived at their aunt's house, there were plenty of "first order of businesses" to accomplish, which included a round of clay charades, playing Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (with "lock-on technology" to play as Knuckles) on the Sega Genesis, making friendship bracelets, all the while eating spoonfuls of ice tea mix straight from the cannister. And this was all just on the first day (Will wasn't kidding about his Carpe Diem policy).

When he did catch eyes with Ginny that day, her dark brown eyes told him, "Later."

In the cooler hour after dinner the kids were always sent back outside.

Will, Alice, and the youngest cousin Jimmy were making a chalk labrinyth on the street when Ginny called to them. She then disappeared into the bushes next to the garage. Will raced over and found Ginny sitting in a small clearing, huddled between the driveway and the garage. In the center of the grotto was a wooden box, buried in the dirt, with the words

THE GINNY PIGS

scrawled on its lid, in handwriting that Will knew well.

Ginny didn't say anything, so Will sat down next to her, crossing his legs and waiting. Alice and Jimmy arrived soon after, with Jimmy holding his golden-haired guinea pig Angel and Alice holding the family bunny rabbit Mr. Rabbit. They completing the circle around the wooden box. Then Will realized that he was the only one not holding a pet.

"Welcome to the first meeting of The Ginny Pigs," said Ginny. She placed Scruffy on the dirt and lifted the lid of the buried box, swinging it back on its little silver hinges. Inside were Ginny's personal treasures: butterfly nets, fishing bobbers, food pellets for Scruffy, a sleeve of Oreos, a deck of cards, and a pack of Cotton Candy bubble gum. Ginny offered Will a cube and then he passed the rest around to Alice and Jimmy. By the time it reached Ginny again, Will's gum had already lost its flavor.

"We have one rule in this club - everyone must bring an animal."

Will's face flushed at Ginny's pronoucement. He was kicked out before it even began.

"Which is why I brought you this, Will."

Ginny handed Will a clear two-liter soda bottle with some egg carton pieces inside. Will didn't understand until he heard the chirp.

Crickets.

"Uh, thank you," he said, inspecting it closely. There were at least six or seven jumbo brown crickets inside, nibbling on some of Scruffy and Angel's food pellets.

"Now, our first mission as a club," continued Ginny. "Is to get Will a real pet - one of his favorites."

Will knew that could only mean one of three things: a turtle, a frog-slash-toad, or a crab.

"A bullfrog," said Ginny.

Her plan was simple: the next day they were headed to a nearby park for a picnic lunch. Ginny knew the park well - there were streams all over. They'd bring their nets and catch Will a frog and he could feed it the crickets. Simple as that.

They concluded their meeting and went inside to eat ice cream out of Ninja Turtle bowls and play Roller Coaster Tycoon on the downstairs computer.

Will woke up early the next day and pestered his aunt about when they'd be heading to the park. They finally got there around eleven (though none of the kids had an care or sense for time other than before-or-after meals) and the four Ginny-Pigs raced off to the creek.

They missed their first few chances at a prize - the squawk followed by the splash were dead giveaways.

Will started to get worried. These frogs were too fast. Then Ginny pointed.

"Big Bertha," she whispered, and they stared at the largest bullfrog they'd ever seen in their lives.

Ginny continued whispering a new plan: she'd enter the creek twenty feet upstream, trudge through the open sewage pipe tunnel under the foot-bridge, and then emerge right behind Big Bertha, nudging the frog towards Will, who would be waiting with a net.

Before long, Ginny re-emerged from the tunnel, drenched in mud, looking like a swamp creature. She tiptoed a few more steps and screamed, "NOW!"

The frog screamed next, then Will screamed, and Alice and Jimmy screamed, too, as Big Bertha flew through Will's outstretched arms, towards safety and another day.

Ginny looked disgusted with Will's performance. But then she put a slimy hand on his shoulder.

"Go have lunch, I got this."

Will and Alice and Jimmy went back to eat baloney sandwiches and drink Kool-Aid. Soon, Ginny came over with her hands clasped together, holding something.

"Quick, get me a cup!"

Will flung the rest of his red Kool-Aid into the air and held out his cup. Ginny opened her hands into it, and they looked down.

A tadpole.

"Welcome to the Ginny Pigs, Will."

Pretty much everyone had seen the documentary already. The last outpost of a fallen empire, deep in the outer rim, blissfully unaware of the broader collapse, blue and yellow standard flying high.

"Yeah, who hasn't? Just more 90's nostalgia crap," said Ryan. "C-listers talking about renting Independence Day."

"No, dude," said Avi. "There's another last Blockbuster. And it's not a documentary. It's a real place."

"You mean Last-Chance Video?" asked Ryan. "Cause that place closed when we were in seventh or eighth grade. Remember? When that kid hung himself outside during Halloween. Super creepy."

"Are you deaf? I said Blockbuster! It's out in Old Spring, near the Poconos. My uncle's been there. I'm gonna go with him. This weekend, Friday probably. You want in?"

Avi crunched his empty Mega-Lite beer can and flung it against the mini-basketball hoop trash can. The can hit the rim and hung there, stuck. Avi made no attempt to get up and fix it, so Ryan reached over and nudged in through the hoop.

"Alley-oop. Why, dude? That's almost two hours away, and it's supposed to snow bad this weekend. You really want to rent Dante's Peak or something? Want another?"

Avi nodded so Ryan tossed him a beer from the mini-fridge that he'd installed in his mom's basement, Ryan's temporary residence, which was becoming a bit more semi-temporary at this point. He'd just passed the two month mark and had to do the USPS change of address form from the library computer a few days back, cause his laptop screen wasn't working anymore, of course. He thought about texting Dawn, but it was still morning in California. Ryan squeezed his phone in his front pocket.

Avi cracked open his beer and chugged half of it, dribbling onto his thick beard. Ryan laughed - this was Avi, the kid who didn't touch a beer or weed or any other vice in high school. College changed Avi. And so had their mid-20s. Avi worked in the city now at some hedge fund, but came home every few weekends, especially now that Ryan was back from the west coast.

"My uncle made me swear I wouldn't tell anyone, but whatever," said Avi. "There's someone working at the Blockbuster, Ry. He's got this video player that... you're not gonna believe me."

Ryan plopped down on the couch, pulverizing an old potato chip into the cushions.

"Tell me."

"It rewinds things"

"Don't all VCRs do that?" asked Ryan.

"No. Not like this. You can really rewind. You bring your home videos, and I don't know if I really believe this, but Uncle V says you can be there again... in the videos. It sounds crazy. He's been acting strange all week, honestly. But I don't know, what if he's right?"

Avi looked dead serious.

Ryan allowed himself to consider the possibility that Avi wasn't high out of his mind. That there was a way to relive his best memories caught on home video. Dawn... their college graduation, the camping trip in the Sierras... but then the more recent memories flooded in, and Ryan stamped those away.

"Sounds like your uncle's got a screw loose," said Ryan.

"You know V. You know he's weird, but he's not an idiot, dude. I'm going. I want to try it."

"What are you going to bring to watch?"

"So you are intrigued?" said Avi. "I'm bringing the tape from our sixth grade Medieval Times trip."

They both laughed.

"That day was awesome," said Ryan.

"Look, I need to get outta here, but if you want in, you should come on Friday. I'll text you."

On Friday morning, the forecast looked clear. Ryan had nothing better to do, so he texted Avi that was up for the drive to the Blockbuster. Avi took a while to respond. Ryan meanwhile dug up some of his old DVD-Rs from a plastic bin in his childhood bedroom, now home to his mom's Peloton bike.

Ryan finally heard back from Avi around noon.

• Who is this?

What the-- thought Ryan.

• Stop messing, Avi. I'm in for this dumb Blockbuster. Let's go, I'll drive.

Ryan saw the little dots appear next to Avi's name and then disappear. After a few seconds, an address appeared:

• 44 Whistlemill Road, Old Spring

Ryan got into his old car from high school, with the little red dancing bear sticker on the back bumper. He placed the plastic crate of DVD-Rs on the passenger seat, thought about it for moment, and then reached over to buckle it in.

The snow started falling just as he crossed onto the turnpike, but Ryan barely noticed it. He'd plugged his portable CD player into the car's cassette deck using one of those truly magical cassette-to-headphone-jack things, and was jamming along to his favorite pop-punk CDs.

Ryan reached 44 Whistlemill by late afternoon. It was a stripmall, now stripped clean. Discovery Zone, Barnes and Noble, Jo-Ann Fabric, and -- there it was, like an empty cicada husk -- the other last Blockbuster.

Ryan slammed his palm into the steeting wheel. It was clearly abandoned. He slipped the car into a spot right by the store. He got out and stepped into the snow in his sneakers. He cupped his hands to warm them, and then went to the front door of the Blockbuster.

No lights were on inside. The shelves were completely empty. He saw a knocked-over poster that was clearly Michael Jordan's silhouette. Ryan texted Avi again, and only received two words back:

• Jade Garden

Then Ryan saw it. It was the name of the Chinese buffet, which actually looked to be open.

Ryan went into Jade Garden and made a plate of lo mein, chicken and broccoli, and one of those sugary donuts, cause why not. The meal was pretty good, but not worth the two hour drive. It was time to get out of here before the roads got worse.

The only other customer in Jade Garden was a narrow-faced, bearded man who caught Ryan staring at him and smiled -- he was missing his two front teeth. Ryan turned away. When he looked up again, the man had left the Chinese buffet and was walking over to the Blockbuster. Ryan watched him jingling something at the Blockbuster door, and then open the video store door and walk inside.

Ryan left two twenties on his table and ran to his car, now covered in snow. He unbuckled his his crate of DVD-Rs and went inside the Blockbuster.

A single set of fluoresecent celing lights was now turned on, in the way back of the store. It really felt like Ryan was walking into a zombie movie. Or a veliciraptor scene.

"Hello?" said Ryan. "I saw you there, in Jade Garden. My friend Ryan... he sent me."

"C'mon back", replied the other man in a light, reedy voice.

Ryan walked towards the voice.

"What can I help you with, son?"

"I brought these DVDs," said Ryan.

"I can see that," said the man. "What are they?"

"Home videos.. of me. And my ex."

"I think can help you, but it's going to cost you."

Ryan sighed. Another grifter.

"What's it cost?"

"Oh, I don't charge you money. I can't. That's now how this works. Understand something, and listen good. You can only go back once."

"What?"

"This door here," said the man, tapping on the RESTRICTED STAFF ONLY door, "is a one-way door. You can leave this place now, with your box of memories, or you can come with me and live them one last time -- but you'll never remember them again."

Avi... was this why Avi was being weird?

"But you need to decide now."

Ryan looked at his box of Dawn and nodded. He pushed through the staff-only door and found a wood-paneled den with a couch and a big CRT TV console. He plopped down on the brown-flannel love seat.

The other guy sat next to him, "Well, where are we?"

"What are you talking about?" asked Ryan. "This is your store."

"Describe what you're seeing," said the man, so Ryan did, feeling oddly compliant.

"Typical suburban home, makes sense. I see a lot of this. Are we somewhere you recognize?"

"My dad's... place. When I was a kid."

"Hmm... interesting."

Ryan felt like he couldn't move, like he was glued to the couch. The TV flickered on. Just static.

"And what are we going to watch?" asked the man.

"Dawn. My ex-girlfriend and me," said Ryan.

The man laughed. This sparked something in Ryan.

"Hey! What is this? Why can't I get up? Who are you?"

"Call me Gideon. I'm neuro-physisist at Old New Jersey State University. I study human memories, the mind, with a focus on nostaglia. Oh, and I used to work at this Blockbuster part-time. This room we're in... this room is a projection of your subconscious."

"So, you can't see this room?" asked Ryan.

"No, I can't. You've been unconcious for the last 30 minutes, ever since I drugged you in the Jade Garden. We're running out time now. The DVD-Rs you brought will start playing soon. With this remote in your right hand, you can rewind if you'd like, but every rewind costs you the equivalent time at the end of the video. You cannot pause. You will wake up once all of your DVDs are complete."

"Wait!" shouted Ryan.

Ryan blinked and he opened his eyes to white.

He was in his car. He couldn't open the door. He rolled down his window and snow fell in. He pushed out as best he could, finally wriggling the door open. It was bright -- morning again. He was in a strip mall parking lot, parked in front of an empty Blockbuster. A plow was clearing the lot behind him.

What the...

Ryan got back in his car and saw a box of old DVD-Rs buckled into the passenger seat.

His phone buzzed. Someone named Dawn.

• "Hey - I made a mistake."

Ryan didn't have the patience for robo-texts this morning and wrote back:

• "Yeah, you did. Wrong number."

The number texted back right away.

• "Screw you, Ryan."

Ryan shrugged. He grabbed the box of DVD-Rs and carried it to the trash bin outside the Chinese buffet, flinging them into the garbage. Then he drove home, hopefully in time to catch the big game on TV.

Chittering.

That's the word.

Chittering.

The sound of a squirrel in love. Scrambling, tousling, rough-housing, probably over a nut, with a rival or a best friend.

That's definitely what I'm hearing. Now, I wouldn't swear on my mother's grave or anything, cause my eyes are still shut. But it's definitely squirrels.

Which raises an obvious next question: why I am hearing squirrels?

There's something making me not want to open my eyes. It's a just a feeling I have. I'm feeling... dew. Yes, dew. On my face. And on my hands.

Okay, I'm going to do it.

I open my eyes.

Yep. I'm in a park. That's what I was worried about.

I'm waking up in a park, it's still kinda dark out, and I have no idea how I got here. It's gonna be one of those days.

I scramble up to my feet.

There's no one else here, thank God. I can see a few lights on Irving. A taxi, or probably an Uber. I watch it roll away through the black wrought-iron fencing. Fencing that's at least ten feet high, with giant nasty spikes on the top...

I'm in Gramercy Park.

I'm in the most exclusive park in New York City, where you need a special key handed down for generations or something like that to be allowed inside.

Awesome.

"HEY, UBER! I'M IN GRAM-"

I cut myself off and look around, as if I wasn't the one shouting.

Act like you've been here before.

There's a gravel path tracing the outer circumference of the park. I know it well. I've walked this perimeter many times, wondering what it would be like to be on the inside of the fence. I find a bench under a green and white birdhouse shaped like a Japanese pagoda and I take a seat.

This isn't my first rodeo. I know what to do here. It's time to take inventory.

I empty out my pockets onto the bench next to me, pleased that I still have things to be emptied out. Cell phone's dead, obviously. No charger, either. But where would I even find an outlet? Wallet's there, too. Seems light, but also unperturbed. No cash inside, but that's normal. Just a crumpled-up receipt. Why do I keep these things? I should just throw them out right away. Oh, wait. I should unfold it. Clues, right?

TOP STAR DRY CLEANERS: 1 Tuxedo

That's odd. Then I look down.

I'm wearing a tuxedo. It's the full shebang: cummerbund, shiny black shoes, unfolded bowtie to show people I'm a cool guy.

That's weird. Do I even own a tux? Do I have amnesia? I definitely have a hangover, that's for sure. I must have blacked out last night. I haven't blacked out since... I can't remember that either.

There's the squirrel again.

"You live in Gramercy Park, squirrel. Do you even know how lucky you are?"

She looks at me and races up the birdhouse post.

Has she lived here, in Gramercy Park, her whole life? Does she think this park is the entire known hospitable universe, surrounded by the Kuiper Belt or Oort Cloud of scary cars and pavement?

What about the squirrels a few blocks away in Union Square Park or Madison Square Park? Are these distant cousins? How many generations back do we have to go to find relatives?

I can't really imagine a squirrel making the trek down the street, like a salmon flowing upstream, for breeding season. But maybe? Still, there must be a ton of in-breeding in the squirrel populations of New York City. How soon until they start evolving and mutating? What weird adaption helps you survive in Gramercy Park?

That's something I'd like to know myself.

I mean, this is kind of a life-long dream, to be honest. Gramercy Park. I've thought about tailgaiting my way in here behind some scion of New Amsterdam so many times. Imagine how great it would be to be reading a book in here on a Tuesday afternoon, like a normal, non-tuxedo-wearing, person.

Someone's coming!

I stuff my stuff back into my pockets, get up, and shuffle around the path. I glance over my shoulder. It's an white-haired old lady and her white-haired fluffy dog. They both look pretty mean. I make sure I'm at least twenty feet from the duo at all times, hands in my pockets, looking pensive.

How many people access this park in a given day? Do they all know each other? Is Loretta here going to call the cops when she doesn't recognize me from her son's boarding school squash tournament?

Lucky for me, Froo-froo poo-poo-ed quickly, and they're gone, just like that.

That's when I bump into the sign.

This park was developed in 1831 by Samuel B. Ruggles. Samuel B. Ruggles created Gramercy Park pursuant to an 1831 indenture as a private ornamental park for the use, benefit, and enjoyment of the owners and occupants of the surrounding lots.

Indenture, huh? The rest of the sign is a long list of incredibly fun-looking activites listed under Not Permitted, including:

Allowing entrance to non-key holders

Ball playing, frisbee

Music

Beach attire

Finally, this rather informative sign (it's basically a Wikipedia article at this point) warns that the park is under 24 hour surveillance.

I flash my eyes up and try to spot the cameras. I'm not worried about being caught -- it's far too late to care about that. But maybe the footage can explain how I got in here? Cause there's no way I scaled this fence. I don't even see any trees that I could use to hop over. Maybe I did tailgate behind someone with a key, which is probably one of those old skeleton keys with two tweeth, on jangly circular iron run.

My stomache rumbles. I might puke. Or maybe I'm hungry. I could just leave. Right? Nothing's stopping me. There's no key needed to get out. I could just push this gate right here and go home. But... then... I wouldn't in Gramercy Park anymore. And when am I going to ever be in here again? I need to figure out this food situation.

"Hello."

I gulp and turn around. It's an old man.

"Rough night?"

I chuckle and grind my foot into the gravel of the path. "What do you mean? Oh... the tux?"

"Yes. I haven't seen you around here before. I'm Arthur Reade. You are...?"

"Uhh... Sam. I'm Sam."

"Sam...?"

"Ruggles." I blurt out what seems like a perfectly reasonable name. But why is he looking at me like that, with that raised eyebrow?

"Well, hopefully today's a bit better for you than last night, Sam."

He walks past me.

I'm still reeling from his look. Then it hits me. I just gave him the name of the guy from the 1800s who started this park. Wonderful. He's probably his great-great-great grandson.

Now he's at the shed in the center of the park talking to a maintence worker that I didn't notice before. I'm toast. The old guys's moving his arms a lot. They glance at me and I hop down to re-tie my shoes, an old trick of mine from school days whenever an authority figure would come over to some illicit game we were playing. I glance over from one knee. The maintence worker's making a phone call.

Why couldn't I have woken up to the sound of seagulls instead of squirrels, like my friend Joe who fell asleep on the N train one night and woke up in Coney Island?

The police car shows up pretty quickly. The old man opens the gate for the officer. Even the cops don't have keys to this place. The officer heads towards me, right as my squirrel runs between us, dives into the woodchips near the bushes. It looks at me. The squirrel. In a weird way. Then it starts digging, stops, and looks at me again. The officer's getting close. But I walk into the bushes, and start digging right where she was. My hands close on something in the dirt. It's cold and metallic. I lift it up. It's an iron ring. With a skeleton key.

"Excuse me."

"Yes, officer?"

"Can I see your identification?"

"Um, yes." I hold out the key ring towards them.

"Your ID card. Please."

"Right, right. Sorry. I just... let me grab that." I fish out my wallet, find my card, and hand it over.

The officer looks at my ID, then at me.

"I see. Have a wonderful morning, Mr. Ruggles."

What?

I take the ID card back and look at it. Samuel Bulkley Ruggles.

I look at the squirrel, then at the officer, then at the card, and then at the squirrel again, but she's gone. I return the card to my wallet and walk past the officer, swinging the skeleton key on its iron key ring, like I own the damn place.

I push through the gate onto Irving Street.

Now, to get some coffee and a sesame bagel, and then find out why I'm in a tux.

Pete's least favorite part of working at Last-Chance Video was the yard-work. He had more than enough of that at home, mowing and trimming their lawn constantly, just as his dad ordered.

It wasn't that there was much of a yard at Last-Chance. The store was a triangle-shaped strip of property smuggled between Route 35 and Branch Avenue and it was mostly parking lot, dumpster, and a scrawny little apple tree on patchy bit of grass.

It was that you didn't work at Last Chance to be outside - you worked there to be inside.

If Last-Chance had any windows, they were long blacked out. No light could enter, other than when the rare, annoying customer came though its jangly door.

Last-Chance was Pete's citadel. As more people starting renting their movies from the vending machine outside Food-town and Shop-Rite, Last-Chance settled on its own unique library: foreign filsm, manga, video games, and Pete's favorite: the adult section.

The adult section was in a room behind a beaded-hangy doorway-thing, and it was part of Pete's "job" to go back there and dust off the VHS tapes and DVD cases, and even make sure that some of them still worked.

He'd just found a particularly dusty title when Frank called.

Frank was the manager of Last-Chance. He'd driven by the store and said that the parking lot was a mess.

Pete sighed, hung up, grabbed his black Operation Ivy hoodie, and went outside.

The sun blinded his mole-eyes. Pete pulled on his hood, tightening it around his skull and tying the bow-strings tight. He looked ridiculous, as his face was almost completely covered by the hood now. He hoped no one from high school saw him. This would have to be quick. But, man, it was chilly out here, thought Pete.

Pete rubbed his arms and saw what Frank had called out: a huge pile of leaves had scattered all over the yard and parking lot. They weren't from the apple tree. It was still early October and its leaves were still green and intact.

Pete grumbled, wondering which other nearby tree had ruined his afternoon, and unlocked the storage closet to grab the rake. At home, Pete's dad let him use the leave blower, which was still kind of annoying because you had to wrangle with the extension cord, but no luck here.

As soon as Pete touched the handle of the rake, his hand jumped back - it was freezing cold. The whole rake was. It made no sense, but Pete found some gardening gloves in a bucket and put them on.

Raking wasn't so bad today. Pete made quick progress on the leaves. They were actually kind of beautiful, he thought. Yellow, orange, red, with hints of summer green. They reminded Pete of L.L. Bean catalogues that he'd sift through while on the downstairs toilet at home. He soon had a big pile of leaves in the parking lot.

Pete rested his rake against the fence behind him. The pile of leaves looked good enough to jump in. He remembered playing in leave piles as a kid with the neighbors across the street, until one of them got run over by a car while in the leaves. Pete had avoided leave piles ever since, mostly as a rule from his parents.

Maybe he'd break it now. But the leaves seemed too perfect to mess up.

He took a step back. He had another idea. He could make a scarecrow using the leaves. It was October, after all. Frank probably wouldn't even mind. Pete looked at his sweatshirt and realized that it would be perfect for the scarecrow. He probably even had a pair of sweatpants in his car. It would be perfect. A scarecrow that looked just like him. He could make the turnip-y head out of newspapers. Maybe the scarecrow could even do his yard-work for him.

Pete smiled and laughed a little. He took another step back, staring at the golden-hued leaves, and tripped on the now fallen-over rake. Pete stumbled backwards, knocking the back of his neck against a rusted bolt sticking out from the next-door building. The bolt entered his skull and killed him instantly, pinning him in place against the wall. Pete's arms and legs slumped down lifelessly. Blood trickled down his back, down his pant legs, and into the pile of perfect leaves.

When Frank returned that night, he was pleased to see that the leaves were gone from Last-Chance, and he was only slightly annoyed about the weird scarecrow.