It had been her idea to trek out to the towns. There were bound to be pockets of resistance, men huddled around barrel fires plotting revenge and singing songs of great plunder through chattering teeth. Alexander hadn’t argued with her – he’d seen them with his own eyes. There was no way they would simply give up. They fought like the men in Torvald’s tales. Men like Benson Polzin, who died firing at the enemy force after he created their beachhead. Torvald was not an open book, but the tale of Benson brought a tear even to his eye. Benson had fought for his country, with a ragged determination, at great cost to himself, but brought to his comrades a wealth of freedom and victory. The soldiers that fought with him fought with nothing in their stomachs but determination, and that’s what Alexander had seen on the canal. Hungry men, who were making the last push they had to survive.

The city had acted as a buffer. No one in their right mind would stray north of the end of the world if they had encountered a city ripe for the picking when they arrived. The snow was too deep to tell, but Alexi wondered if they were marching on top of the dead. The army presence in the city, if there had been any, was invisible. The police didn’t identify themselves either. It was the same as it had been back in the villages – there are no ranks, or offices, statutes, or leaderships in the dead of winter under a month of snow. And there were even less come three months of it.

They had marched for the better part of a day when snow capped rooflines had hoved into view across what seemed to be a perfectly flat snowy field. The lay of the land told Alexander that it was actually ice – this was the river they had been told about. They said the bandits came from south of the river.

“Crouch” Kristina said, checking her guns, and tucking magazines into her pockets.

Alexi and Alexander got as low as they could, and drew their weapons reflexively.

“What do you see?” Alexi asked, straining his vision.

He saw nothing, as his eyes flitted from structure to structure. No smoke issued, he saw no tracks nearby or at a distance, and the silence hung as heavy as the chill still air. You could have heard a flake of snow breathe its last before it melted back to the earth in their quiet pause.

“This is what they described. Buildings on the other side of the river. A former logging camp that had become a fishing village. The bandits overran it in the spring, as they came from the more sparsely populated farmland to the south. A farmer that can’t crop is only a few weeks away from a murderer, if the times are hard enough” she said.

Alexi winced. He’d seen it before. Through selfishness, desertion, or any other number of things, giant villages had failed in this way especially those in the far west. Alexi had travelled more widely than the rest of them, and seen more of the ugly side of people and giants. But he saw nothing in this village. Kristina had already taken off, punching her way softly through the frost capped snow. The men readied their rifles hastily and followed.

“How did she know all that?” Alexander whispered.

“She’s a vault. Every time you talk, she will remember, and that goes for anyone. They say Clarence got two tongues when they were in the womb. Must mean that she got four ears.”

Kristina had already flattened her ear to the wall of a building by the time they were halfway across the ice. She motioned for them to stay still, and look for movement. Alexander felt incredibly exposed, and wished for once that more snow was clinging to his coat, for it would hide him better. Every windows was frosted thickly, and the evening sun lit some of them in the dazzling hues of sunset. They had to spend the night here, in addition to searching for marauders. Alexander hoped that they wouldn’t find anyone, because he worried that if they did, they would never leave this place that didn’t even seem to have a name. She motioned them follow when she seemed satisfied. They crept along walls, they peaked around corners and tried to peek in windows and through cracks. They dared not cross a doorway for fear of hordes teeming out of it faster than their bullets could leave their guns. Alexi stopped, and looked puzzled at a window. He stood upright and looked right at it, examining the frost. The others froze in fear, and hissed for him to lower his head. With one slow swipe of his thick finger, he cut a line through the frost. Underneath it he couldn’t see through to the interior of the building.

“There’s frost on the inside. And on the outside. Both sides are equally cold. There isn’t even the heat of a single person or an animal inside. This place has been cold for weeks, if not months. We have nothing to fear” he said simply.

Kristina and Alexander failed to get up quickly enough to stop him walking normally to the front of the building and opening the door. He had to shove to break the line of ice that sealed it shut. He was right, and he was wrong. There was no person inside, but they had much to fear. He turned away from the door and vomited promptly. Kristina shoved her guns into the doorway before she turned the corner, but was unable to stay facing the room. Alexander saw the true horrors. The beds had been stripped of their covers and sheets of wood had been placed on top. On top of the sheets lay assortments of bones, frozen entrails, congealed buckets of viscera, sharp tools caked with blood. And human bones full of saw and blade marks. No civilized people would have done this. What remained of the bodies here were those of outsiders, unfamiliar with the harshness of surviving winters this far north without a lifetime of knowledge. Whatever bandits had come here, and not retreated had taken to eating their dead. Alexander hoped against hope they had only eaten their dead. Not that that would have been a more honourable way to survive.

“We cannot stay here” Alexi said, “We can not stay here.”

“It’s already sunset, there’s no way we can make it back to the city before the winds freeze us. This was their butchery. There is bound to be another building for refuge” Alexander said, his eyes glazed with shock and tears.

They searched from building to building, and found most to be filled with death. And then Kristina was stopped in her tracks as something made her blood run cold. There was a single basement window, unwrapped by frost. There was warm life hiding down there. Blood still moved in veins here. She raised her guns with trembling hands, but could not speak. The men moved to either side of her, and they walked to a cellar door that lay closed, latched, and unchained. Alexi raised the door and Alexander trained his rifle on the dark chasm. Almost all the light had faded, and the moon was not due for a few hours. They had not lit their lamps out of fear of others. This was the only window they had yet found that showed signs of life behind it.

“Walk out. Hands raised. No fast movements.” Alexi bellowed down the hole, hard enough to rattle the windows in their frames.

A brief scurrying sounds followed his order, and then trudging footsteps. They stepped back and waited, as they saw a head emerge from the dark into the dim. An emaciated skeletal shape followed this lolling head that seemed vastly oversized. This thing looked like a corpse made walk upright, and draped in the rags that remained of a burial suit. Upon stepping outside it dropped to its knees and began eating snow. They had no idea what to say. After a moment Alexander drew his lamp from his pack and lit it. He placed it on the ground in front of him, so as to not spoil his shot if he had to take one. He was suddenly filled with rage. Rage for the dishonored dead he had seen on the northern edge of town.

“You ate them. Your comrades, your men, your brothers, whoever they were. You cut their flesh from them and used it to sustain your wicked form. And all because you wished to steal from us, for your southern crops failed? Have you no honor, no solidarity, no love for your fellow man?!”

Kristina and Alexi were taken aback by his reaction, but did not take their guns off the figure. He looked up from grey eye sockets. In fevered tones, he managed to strangle out some words. It seemed as if he had not talked in an eternity.

“The town was empty… the city wouldn’t let us in… we stole supplies from them to survive… they started killing us, we tried to flee but the winter… the winter… the winter… they went raiding east, but we said we had to stay, that we’d freeze in the winter… staying put was right… i hid from the winter… and now I’m alive… the last alive… the winter…”

He trailed off as he noticed who he was talking to. Or who he thought he was talking to. He saw the gleam of gunsteel extending from his sight, and upwards to the shoulder of a colossus, a giant made flesh. A great old curse from far beyond his understanding. Michael, the man that ended the war, the giant that came from the north with a great army to unite the country. The giant that told them they would be exterminated if they failed to protect the Soviet Union again.

“Do not kill me Michael” he whispered.

Kristina fired two rounds as the figure raised his hands above his head, while still kneeling. Her shots drove his frail form into the snow and expelled the last clinging remains of life from him. The darkness of night started to lift slightly, as the moon cracked the edge of the horizon and became visible, spiderwebbed by naked tree branches.

“You shot him. He knew what happened here, and he was trying to tell us, and you shot him!” Alexi yelled in disbelief.

“You already know exactly what happened here. We need no map to understand the road that led them here, or the path that they chose. The winter starved them, and then they killed each other to stay alive. It’s all very very clear. He crossed lines between human and carrion beast. There are no bandits here now, there are no men here now, and presently there are no vermin either” she said, placing two new rounds in her magazine.

“He said others went east. Michael, you saw the others at the canal, to the south of our village? We are east of there still, so there is further danger to the east? That is our next port of call?” she said, with cold resolve.

Alexander was shocked.

“I’m not Michael” he said.

Kristina hadn’t realized her mistake.

“Who said you were? Vote. We return to the city, or we stay here?”

No one raised a hand. Alexi looked around.

“This is unholy ground no. To sleep here is to be cursed. I don’t know if I’m taking my chances walking back to the city, but I’ll sleep in a lean-to on the other side of the river before I even take the weight off my feet in this place” he said, as he started walking.

Alexander threw his hand up and followed quickly, trying to stay away from all the buildings they had passed. There was nothing more here that they could learn. And Kristina had already made up her mind. To find out what was going on, they had to pursue those that had travelled east. For if they lived, they would have answers. And there were plenty more responsible for the atrocity that had happened here than the grey skinned shell of a human that she had exterminated. No honour among thieves, they said. There didn’t seem to be any among doomed men either. And each and every raider that had come into her home, and yet drew breath was certainly doomed.

If you were to build a dome city from scratch, it would be significantly easier than retrofitting cities that already stood. Blasting could achieve the underground clearance needed in a new city. But if the city was already there, you had to work around its people. First was the core, the stomach of the city, deep below the other functions – the farms and water. By boring into the ground, cities could access groundwater. Some cities dropped a shaft, more than a mile deep into the earth, as simply a first step to ensuring survival. Without water, there was no future for the people. All water that came from the ground was circulated upwards, first to the farms and people, and then everywhere else. On cold days the breath of hundreds of thousands would condense on the glass of the dome, building a mist around the people, and trickling its way down. It didn’t meet soil – it met drains, that brought it through reclamation plants, distillers, and other treatment centers. If the water wasn’t kept clean, it would doom a city.

The next clear line was food. While auxiliary domes, with good access to water, and the space to grow grain, were important for providing meat for the population, no city could sustain itself on imports. The trains were efficient, but no train could beat the wilting of vegetables when travelling from coast to coast. So they built sprawling hydroponic farms underneath the cities. No farm was a source of food without men and women to work it. The toiled each day, hidden always from the harsh sun. Their skin grew pale, and sallow. They shuffled around under UV lighting, tending to masses of plants. There was no room for grain, but there was food. Some domes were prized for their abundant fruit, others for their winter squash, some for wine grapes, and others for cannabis and hemp. That which the dome needed or wanted most was grown. The crops cycled throughout the year, but the hydro farmers were a constant fixture. Pale skinned creatures, with hunched posters roamed between the rows of tubes, and foam, and nutrients, and life giving water. When one couldn’t escape a dome, they would escape to the farms. Newcomers took less than a month to lose their tan, and start turning shades of grey and white.

They slept surrounded by walls of stone or clay, with the water of the earth seeping back at them as they slept. All of this water was redirected to the great sump under the city, where it was brought back to the people. There could sometimes be a dozen layers of these farms. Stacked on top of one another – a veritable magazine of food, stored and grown so that the dome may live on.

Often the generators were buried below a city too. What passed for fresh air was pumped in from outside the domes, and fed to the engines. West facing inlets would give way to east facing exhausts, while at the center the living heart of the city beat on. Diesel engines as large as house hummed always. These eternal timekeepers kept the city in lights, but more importantly, they worked pumps. Water pumps, air pumps, waste pumps, air conditioners to keep the inside of a dome livable. These levels were often full of former trainmen, too sick to ride a train, or too old to travel the country anymore. They watched gauges with blackened eyeballs, as they moved nimbly around a metal heart that could kill them in an instant of carelessness. The engines never stopped, and neither did their engineers. Each soul below the street line of a city kept those above alive and happy. People would die without the filtered air, or the filtered water. This too was necessary. Even if an engine went down for repairs, there were usually three or four to take up the strain. The dome ran because it had to run. These were the last bastions of humanity in the Americas, and they would continue to be so as long as hydro farmers kept the machines running, and the engineers kept the engines running, and the water kept rising from the earth.

Once the city surfaces and became the street touched by the light, the world got a lot faster. Smooth paved streets were only worn down by boots, shoes, and bicycles. The car and the motorcycle were a near memory to most, but were unattainable by many. Dome air was rarefied, and couldn’t be filled with diesel fumes. For most cities the only source of diesel fumes was from the trains that brought them new life from across the country. Even this was controlled, with some cities unloading the trains miles away, and bringing cargo in a tram at a time.

All above ground, the machine that was the dome seemed to become filled with chaos. All over the city, droves moved like schools of fish, darting and changing as they swarmed through the streets. But the patterns were there to see. Those that could read a tide could understand the way fish moved, and those that understood a dome could understand its people fairly soon. The moved in the morning to work, the moved at sunset to drink, they swam slowly home through a haze of gin and beer. Sundays they took to the parks to watch the sun cast rainbows through the dome, they ate from street carts, they played with children on swing sets that would never feel wind part for their chains and seats. To the casual observer, the dome was perfect. To those that lived there, that was known to be far from the truth.

Wherever there are people, there is corruption. A parallel dome was sequestered here under the brilliant glass. Stock traders in the major cities bought and sold people as though they were commodities. The hydro farmers seemed to the city fathers a good trade resource. Everyone needed food, and bright men to work it. Not all food could travel a thousand miles. But a farmer could, relatively easily too. Gangbosses in the farm pits would keep an eye out for a bright farmer. Anyone that could diagnose and eliminate problems was added to a mental checklist. When violence, or shortage, or crop failure would strike a dome, the call would go out for men and women, of all castes. Shortages were always filled quickly when money was in abundant supply.

Higher still the citizens of the middle tiers lived. They were the managers of this world, the NAFTA confederated trade company employees, the ineffectual politicians, those that believed their work was doing some good. It most involved numbers and papers, very far removed from the work of most of this world. They slept in good beds because worlds away, those beneath them toiled. But their columns of numbers showed an increase in water production, or advances of train technology, or unusually high crop yields and congratulations were in order. They drank champagne. And the world carried on with or without their attention.

The highest levels of the city were palaces. The closer one was to the highest point of the dome, the better the life was. The wealthy and the dynastic awoke in the autumn mornings to tesselated rainbows adorning their soft bed sheets. Those that built the domes raised families here, while the engineers and workers that erected these structures lay sleeping in the earth beneath them. When luxury goods arrived on the trains, carefully guarded wooden trunks were destined for them. Rum was available to them.They moved in litters, or surrounded by armed men. Most stayed off the streets during daylight hours. The mayor of New York hadn’t left his apartment in months, taking meetings there, and trying to run the city from there. He was so obsessed with his perch high above the city that he expanded his windows, and added strained glass. A colourful palace sat atop the highest tower in New York, surveying the land below. But the mayor himself saw none of it. So obsessed was he with the light, that it consumed it. He believed himself the city’s protector, it’s founder, it’s saviour.

He died old, a luxury that eluded many. His son was waiting in the wings, ready to claim the throne as his own, and to rule the city like his father before him. His father’s body lay at rest in bed, his weight on his arms, staring into the rising sun. Hues of violet filled the room that night at sunset, bring to a close his legacy. He was the only mayor the city had yet known, and the future was uncertain. But in the high towers they had light, and divinity. They must be bright enough men to rule the people under their protection. It was the way of things.

The battle and siege had already been going on for months. Yet all the while, the hammers kept falling, and the guns kept being produced. Sometimes they were made from scrap metal, panels from old cars, even cut up broken guns. Anything to keep sending bullets forwards to keep the city theirs. Karas worked in secret all those months, to produce a very special commission. The order had come in under an anonymous name just days before the armies arrived beyond the outskirts of town. The artillery shells had already started falling by the time he had started machining.

Even months afterwards, Karas was still working on it in his tiny shop. He wasn’t a famous gunsmith, or even a particularly good gunsmith, but he’d felt compelled by the note that he’d received along with the sack of pure gold nuggets. He couldn’t even fathom the hands that would hold this gun, let alone the hands that tore these huge clumps of gold from the ground. He couldn’t hide the sack for it was too heavy. He’d had to move the nuggets three or four at a time to a pit beneath his house for safekeeping. But 4 months later, it was no longer about that gold. It was about the note.

In every moment he could, he worked on this gun. He timed his machines to hit their hardest when the shelling was its loudest, he worked to the rhythm of soldiers driving and marching past his shop, he ate and drank only during the silences of late evening and early morning. The note told him that he was building Zashchitnik otechestva – the defender of the fatherland. Karas had never been a patriotic man, but he saw some divine provenance in this message, for it had arrived hours before foreign invaders had. This was the gun fit for a man that would save the city. He hoped it could be the gun of a man that could save the nation.

Zashchitnik became his obsession. As it came together, with very minimal details other than size, it became clear he was building a gun for a colossus. As the receiver grew outwards, he could barely hold it in his hands. Finding adequate stock in his stores for a barrel had been impossible, but he refused to compromise. This was the gun of the protector, and he would not keep it from him. Karas had stolen gunmetal during the height of a war, from a government stockyard. The crime would likely be punishable as an act of treason, but he didn’t care. To deny the nation its protector would play on his mind for eternity. It took him weeks to craft the barrel, and weeks more to rifle it, sometimes building custom tools just to fashion custom tooling to work on such an immense project. The average man would usually never carry a gun more than about a meter long. From butt to sight this rifle was over 3 meters.

He’d heard the legends of the giants scattered across Siberia, but had dismissed them as fairy stories, even as a child. He couldn’t imagine something so large, that looked like a monstrous version of himself, walking through the familiar streets of the city. Such a figure would stick out, and be very noticeable. The legends always spoke of far off tundra to the north and east, where they lived in huge castles, defending the country from the dragons of winter, and catching great sea monsters with harpoons before they tried to swim up rivers into the country. With each mark he made in the metal, he believed all the more. A great protector would carry this weapon, he would save the city, he would save the people, and he would save the soviet union.

He was putting the final touches on the weapon as the fighting raged on, sometimes mere doors down from his own. Something kept them away from his padlocked doors, and boarded windows. Karas wasn’t sure if he was incredibly lucky, or if the commissioner of the gun stood guard, slaughtering men outside his door. After a certain point, he stopped leaving his shop, and later he stopped looking out the windows. He still somehow had water, but his food supplies had run low so he had stopped eating some days ago. It may have been weeks, he rarely kept track of anything. The gun had to be perfect, and it had to be a symbol. He adorned it with its name, in fine script, carved with hands shaking occasionally from hunger. He fashioned badges and pins bearing the great symbols of the fatherland and attached them to the gun, and to the magazines, and to the leather case to carry them, and to the trunk the gun would be stored in. He would awake and begin work, and would fall asleep only when exhausted. His skin had paled from lack of sun, and his fingers were hard from constant work. His bones ached, and his head throbbed most days, but not a single thing would deter him.

And one day it was complete. He had managed to create ammunition for it, and cartridges. He’d made a fine sling, he’d decorated the rifle, he’d used the finest wood to make the stock, he’d put sights of dazzling clarity on it. The defender of the fatherland was complete, and it was perfect. He cleared his tools away, and arranged everything in the chest he had built to house this weapon. He placed it upon his bench and retired to bed willingly for the first time in what felt like eternity. He awoke to the smell of cooking.

Karas was fairly sure he had awoken. The artillery and far away shots continued, as they had every day. The chest sat open, with the rifle laying on top. And next to it, kneeling so as not to press his frame through the roof, was a giant. Meat sizzled from the other side of the doorway.

“Do not alarm, Karas. I am your benefactor” the giant said, “I commissioned this weapon from you, and have brought the other half of your payment. You look very underfed, so I have brought you food. I did not wish to wake you.”

“You’re the protector. The great champion of the soviet union” Karas rasped and stammered.

“I am simply Michael. I have seen this war come and destroy many. I have seen it harm you, and others like you for too long. We could no longer maintain our silence. We had to help you” Michael responded.

He reached through the doorway, and retrieved the hot meat, still cracking in the pan. He placed it on a small table next to Karas’ bed, which was now in the workshop.

“You’re a fairy story…” Karas said, his eyes ever widening.

“I can assure you, I am real.”

He shouldered the weapon. It’s balance was remarkable. Even though Karas had never seen him, the gun seemed to fit perfectly against his shoulder, and his cheek. Karas had clearly lost some of his mind, having been isolated from the world so long, but none of that manifested in his hands as he worked. He had provided Michael with absolutely everything he’d wanted and more. The trunk even held spare parts, and a detailed maintenance manual. No giant had ever owned a finer firearm. He loaded several magazines and placed them in his pockets, as Karas started at him, not touching his food.

“Eat, Karas. For you, the war is over. You need not worry another day. You will have the protection of the giants as we retake the city, and thereafter you shall never be bothered” Michael said softly.

He pushed the case to the still chained double doors, and loaded the rifle. With a simple push, he snapped the chain, and removed a chunk of the door. The chill of an autumn night rushed in, and fresh air filled Karas with new life. Michael stood to his full height in the dark of night, and pulled the case into the street. Karas followed him, lamely, and saw giants begin to emerge from the shadows, and nearby buildings. They had hidden here, for who knows how long, all in the name of protecting one frail old man. 30 giants lined up behind Michael, all brandishing large rifles, shotguns, revolvers, clubs, swords, and all manner of other weapons. They didn’t need a uniform to signal that they were an army. Karas lifted something from the pocket of his thin coat and held it aloft to Michael. The badge bore a large brass sunburst, and within there was a crossed hammer and sickle. On the nameplate beneath, it read Zashchitnik otechestva. Michael bowed in respect to him, as did the others. He attached the badge to his chest, and walked forwards, into the war torn city.

The siege was ended three days later.

Dylan slid down against his perch, and stretched his leg to the fire, pushing small lumps of dry wood back before they could escape. Every fire seemed to burn brighter, and throw more sparks into the air. Carlos and Frank lay across the other side of the circle, Carlos asleep with his hat over his face, and his bag under his head. Frank whittled. They listened for the faint sounds of insects drawn by the fire, the dull beats of moth wings, the sharp puff when one of them strayed too close.

All around, their dogs lay sleeping. Dylan was a teenager, and he didn’t remember life before the choke, and neither did the others. This was the world they had always known since they could think about more than eating and sleep. Walking across the land, hunting for themselves and the dogs, and trying to find the meaning. They’d been educated, but as these things do, their small dome lost its people in a trickle. People weren’t having enough kids, too many special townspeople, like water engineers, couldn’t be kept there. The cities syphoned people away from the empty spaces. People would find a train line, and then they were in it. The conglomerate swallowed them up, taking them into the system. They got a number, a job assignment, housing, food. Each of your days was planned by others, and you just lived it until you died. Their mother had her children late, and they didn’t know their father. He was probably another one that left. They never could get their mother to leave, even when there was nothing left to stay for.

Out in the darkness, they heard yips. Several dogs woke from their sleep and started west. Dylan let out a low whistle, and they gathered to him. He waited for the sound, and none of his dogs moved, but they never stopped looking.

“Bring it here” he told them, and the dogs walked into the night.

Frank recalled the terrain. No bluffs big enough for an echo, too much ground scatter to carry sounds long distance. That dog was close.

“Another one? How many are we up to?”

“Doesn’t matter. We protect them, they protect us. They’ll find it, and they’ll try to bring it back. If it resists, then we don’t have anything more to worry about.”

“There’s coyotes out here. Mountain lions, maybe. Who’s saying they come back.”

“The rest hear a fight, and then it’s a time and numbers game.”

Frank finished his whittling. He’d carved a cross. Some little symbol he saw beside his mother’s bed, stamped into the cover of some book. She was quiet. Hadn’t taught them a lot. Most of what they knew, they learned alone. He tossed the cross into the fire and picked up a fresh scrap of wood. He let his hands wander, seeking for the shape within this piece of waste firewood.

“How different are coyotes?” Dylan asked the silence.

“Can’t be that different. Four legs, long muzzle, wagging tail. They always looked like dogs to me.”

“They’d be wild though.”

Dylan surveyed the pack that remained. A lot of their traits had started to cross over. The older dogs looked like purer breeds, but after a couple of years together, their pups became pure mongrel. Pieces of that dog would show up 2-3 generations later. Longer legs, humped backs, thick heads. He picked a puppy from a litter as it slept, and laid it in his lap. It didn’t waken as he pet it. Important to let them know that the pack was here for the little ones. Important to remind himself too. This pack had saved them more times than they could count. Raiders seemed spooked by dogs, let alone 30 or 40 of them. They had taught the dogs to circle around them, moving all the time, keeping an eye out. The smarter dogs were scouts, the stronger dogs stayed in the middle for protection. Puppies were carried in satchels until they could walk on their own.

“Have we ever had a coyote before?” Dylan wondered.

“Had a dingo once. And that mean little wolf. No coyote I remember.”

Out in the dark the yips returned, and then a few barks from closer to them.

“They found it. They’ll be trying to get it to come back over here. What are they good for?”

“Scavenge, I think. Could be useful, the pits can’t scavenge for shit.”

This time it was a star. Frank turned it over in his hands, counting its points, and the lines between. He idly counted to thirty as he refined the shape, trying to keep track of the changes as he flattened surfaces, and sharpened points. There was a rapid exchange of barking and yipping. Then silence.

“They got it. They’re bringing it back.”

:What makes you say that?: Frank asked. He threw the star into the fire and found another piece of iron-hard wood. He discarded his thirty count – you couldn’t let one whittle affect the next. Each was its own. He sharpened the point of his blade against the stone he sat on. After several minutes the dogs returned with no injuries, and with a coyote behind them. It was tall, but weak. Dogs didn’t seem to notice the world changing around them, and this one probably used to get a lot to eat out here. Carlos stirred from his sleep as knife scratched stone. He motioned to the others as he saw a new dog circling the edge of camp, unsure of these humans. Carlos threw it a little food when it came near enough. Within an hour of their coaxing, it was laid by the fire, sleeping with food in its belly. It was low in the rankings, but its size would make up for that.when it could walk around comfortably again. They’d take it to the stream to clean it up tomorrow.

“Why are we here?” Carlos wondered aloud, half asleep.

“We were on our way back north before the summer comes in. Too hot this far south, for both us and them.”

“I meant more like; why are we on this journey? We never seem to get any closer to a destination.”

“Journey is the destination” Frank muttered as he swirled his knife around an entrenched knot.

“That’s the whole thing? We just walk around, add dogs to the pack, and then do it again tomorrow.”

Nobody had an answer for him. They didn’t have a plan, they didn’t have a goal, and there wasn’t really any reason for them to consider going back to a town or a city. Probably no town would trust three teenagers travelling with a horde of dogs that seemed extremely loyal to them.

“We walk south before winter, we walk north come spring. I don’t know there’s anything else that we need to be doing right now. Getting by is fine” offered Dylan.

“Well what about the future? Don’t we have to figure something out at some point?”

“What’s there to figure out” Frank retorted, “Future’s going to happen tomorrow regardless of what we think, and what we try to do. It marches on. We’re just here because we’re here.If we weren’t, we’d be somewhere else. Tomorrow we’ll kick the fire out, round up the pack, and we’ll go.”

“That’s the thing though. We keep going. Are we ever going to stop?”

Dylan looked at the stars. Someone had told him once that they guided sailors in wooden boats across the oceans of the world. They took people to new lands, and they would take you to other continents far from here if you knew how to read them. He saw a brass compass once, and he wished that he’d stolen it like he wanted to. His mother was alive then, and he hadn’t wanted to make her mad. But it had been right there, sitting on the mayor’s desk, with all backs turned to it. They could be following its needle right now if they wanted to. All the way around the world.

“Let’s go see the ocean. The pacific should be a couple of weeks west of here. We’re bound to hit it eventually. We can see how big the world is, get a really big perspective. Maybe then we’ll know what to do.”

Carlos watched the coyote until he saw its breath change as it fell asleep. It belonged. The dogs all belonged, and even if they didn’t understand it, they were all a part of something bigger.

“Let’s do that. Summer won’t start for another few months, we’ll have plenty of time.”

Dylan whistled softly, and a few dogs walked over to him. He used sign language with them to make them understand that they were all going to sleep, and to keep watch until the sun came up. They were good dogs. And they were good boys.

The moon climbed on, bringing more dim illumination into the shadowy places. The eternal stone showed its cracks to the world, wearing its battle scars proudly. It had survived ice ages, and the boots of soldiers, and every end of the world so far. Madmen raved, carpetbaggers wheeled and dealed, saints whispers, tyrants screamed, and the everyday people talked of things deep, or idle. There was no more of that here. There was only one woman there to witness it.

Celia had grown up here. She barely knew of a world before the choke. Her father had told her stories, he had shown her the places where the plants were thick and lustrous. He told her about the arm thick vines that dipped their roots into the bottoms of streams and provided homes for tiny river fish that darted through the water like shooting stars. Providing brilliance in each moment. The moon crept on.

She had been away for years. The town of Centralia had gotten increasingly sick, and panicked as the choke worsened. People turned on each other as the world seemed to lose its colour. The flowers were the first to go. Delicate petals would take to the breeze one by one, greyer and sicker every year until one February the daffodils came in strong. Yellow as the sun, full blooms, proud stems and strong roots. Within a week the town was a burst of colour in a wasteland, and then on the morning of the 29th the town awakened to streets lined with dead blooms. They had lost none of their brilliance, they had not gone gentle into the end. They played a crescendo, and laid a carpet through the town with their decay. Footfalls were almost silent as with the flowers went the last of the hope. Celia had been 6 at the time. It was her strongest memory.

She and her father, Rusty, stayed for as long as they could, and they were among the last ten in Centralia. The town had fallen into disrepair, as more of those people critical to keeping order filtered away. Some had just left to leave, others in search of a better world. Most heard about the domes, and made their choice. The outside world was failing them, so what better to do than build a sanctuary? The coal fire started not long after the daffodils died. People walked as if in a haze, not believing that the world could change this way. Standards and pride fell, and when no one was watching, the world started to burn beneath their feet. The blank patches in the snow were the first clue. Then the cracks began to appear, and from them wisps of grey smoke. Centralia dwindled, drained of its people and their hope. The ground cracked open once, near the stream, the very stream she sat above, if she was remembering it right. The weak ground diverted water, and gouts of steam started to reach into the sky. Childhood images of volcanoes in school mixed with the world showing her an inferno. She ran home, and brought her father to see. By the time they came back, tall flames had started to emerge from the crack, bringing with them black smoke, and falling soot. A dark snow started to lay atop the crisp blanket over the town.

Then was the time to leave. Rusty didn’t think his daughter was old enough to understand the last meeting they had in the town, but she understood all too well. Hell was reaching out of the earth, and trying to drag them down. She knew the world was without flowers, but to imagine demons crawling from the soil, from the fissures in the stone, terrified her. She thought of them sleeping in her bed after they left. Nobody left to protect their home, to stop evil things from eating their food, and listening to their radio.

Even if there were demons, they’d never appreciate this place like Celia did. She had abandoned her dome. She had lived in the New York dome after they left Centralia. It was the first great dome to be built, after some smaller experiments across the rest of the country. She had no interest in taking to the bunkers under the earth, and neither did her father. Ten people left centralia, carrying what they could as what cars remained were useless in the snow. They would have been a burden, more than a help. They followed highways, but the trek took months. Some days their meagre rations could only sustain them for a few miles of walking. They slept in tents, huddled together for warmth. The hope of the dome kept them going. The hope that anywhere had to be better than Centralia. Anything had to be better than being swallowed by the ground, and choked by the air, and crushed by the deadness of what was once home.

Only eight of them survived the trip. Eustace had been too old. Even if he hadn’t been that old, his spirit was too worn to make the journey. He didn’t even die while hiking through hip deep snow, he didn’t have a heart attack while stumbling into a crevasse, he didn’t freeze to death, or die of exposure. He died in his sleep, in his tent. His body barely turning cold as they work in the morning to begin again. Somewhere in the wilds of Pennsylvania, miles from home and miles from anywhere, there may still stand an ignominious grave. A canvas mausoleum for one, tucked tight to a tree trunk, where the leave may once have shaded there is a monument to giving up. Eustace’s daughter Melanie was the other death. Her thin skin stretched over sparrow like bones hadn’t been warm in three months. She wasted away as they all did, but Melanie was destined for failure, being so ill all the time, even when times were close to good. She was 15. They buried her, because despite her weakness, she fought.

They saw it first between the peaks of New Jersey. Most wept with joy as they saw at last the object of their dreams. It rose, mostly completed, above the city beneath. It didn’t include the skyscrapers then, that came later. When they got there it covered Queens, Brooklyn, and it dipped it roots into the Hudson. It was painted bright, and its glass sent glitters into the evening, shining out as a beacon. It was to be home, it was to be salvation, it was to be safety. Celia thought it looked like a birdcage. Some shiny bubble designed to contain, not to save.

They waited weeks in the ramshackle camps outside the dome, held across the river. It was enormous up close. It seemed to rise vertically when you were near it, and it just kept going. The men of the city came one time, one man dressed in a suit, all the others in flat caps and long duster coats. Clearly they were the men of work, and the man in the suit was one of numbers. Maybe he was a doctor. Celia honestly couldn’t remember the man, just the impression of it. Like the impression of the dome, and the impression of the duster coats. These weren’t things in her memory that she could touch, like the daffodils, only things she could glance.

The duster coat men had asked for volunteers, strong men with skills that could work. Men with no fear of heights or danger. Rusty remembered the danger that he had known. The danger that he had clawed his daughter away from as the earth sank away into hell. He volunteered. He had been a mechanic all his life, and no machine or metal eluded him. He could smith shoes, he could weld steel, he could braze copper, and he could Goddamn sure save his daughter from this hell of starvation, and the unknown, and the cold. He held her tighter every night, not because he loved her more, but because they had both grown so thin, that they came closer. He would build the damn dome himself if he had to, pounding rivets, and manning a crane, and breaking his back so that she could have just one day without the pain she was in, the pain that this choke had brought. He volunteered five times in a month before they took him in. They gave them a medical inside the city, they gave them food, they got them into a bunkhouse. After Rusty fattened himself on all he could eat, he worked like a man chased by the devil. Within a month he was a coordinator. Within another he was a gangboss, then a foreman. Nobody wanted for anything when they worked for Rusty, and nobody died on his site.

His funeral was enormous. He was a hero to south Queens, who took in more volunteers than he was supposed to every day, not every week. Men and women with children were hired first. He hired the old, he hired the sick, he put a job in the hands of those struggling, and then he made sure they kept up. Hundreds of children in south Queens called him Papa Rusty, but none knew him like Celia. Her life had been blasted apart when he died. There were weeks and months of people coming over and filling her icebox with food. She shook hands with more people than she could understand. All she wanted was her father back once he was gone. But he wasn’t here anymore, not under this dome. He was at home, back where the ground burned, and the daffodils died, and the people fled in fear of their lives. She knew nothing of Centralia still stood before she left. She knew it as she rode the trains west, and as she walked south in the cool of the summer evenings. She knew it as she sat here, leaning against this warm rock, overlooking the place that had threatened to drag them all down to the core of the earth. She felt the fire shimmer under the ground, and she watched the plants twitch and strive and try. They tried so hard.

The moon reached it peak, and started its slow walk west, to fall into the sea and end the light for another night. He was in Centralia. And so was she.

Linus dragged his feet while walking and flopped down beside Chester. He slapped Chester on the shoulder to stir him out of his bobbing head doze.

“I’m awake, I’m good, I am ready to go” yawned Chester.

“Yeah me too. So what about Danny?” said Linus while rubbing his bloodshot eyes.

“He went talking to Juan the Baptist. He was asking about Philo. Juan mentioned that he had dumped a beer over his head, but that you had jumped in at the last minute. Juan doesn’t know your name, he’s just seen you about.”

“Well it looks like I’m not going back to FatWater’s for a while…” Linus trailed off. He wasn’t sure if he should tell Chester about how easy it was for Philo to get a gun. Chester was looking at him, waiting for more information.

“Philo was looking around the antique stores for a weapon. I think he ended up buying a knife or a pair of brass knuckles or something” Linus said.

“You think he bought one of those two? You’re not sure if one of the men we’re talking about has a knife or a pair of brass knuckles?” quizzed Chester, wary for his own safety.

“I didn’t want to hang around a wait until he got out of the shop with whatever new weapon he had just bought. He’d be a nervous and paranoid man with a new weapon. I didn’t want to get stabbed. And before you mention it, you’re not getting a gun, and I don’t want you going out and buying a knife either” said Linus, before Chester could mention anything. They sat quietly for a minute.

“I need it for protection” said Chester.

“You don’t need an offensive weapon for protection Chester” Linus interrupted, “If you want protection wear some armour and learn to react better to people throwing wild haymaker punches. Hell, learn to stay out of sight more.”

“Stay out of sight like you did in FatWater’s? He knows all about you, and he remembers you stepping up for Philo” retorted Chester.

“Yes, that’s unfortunate. I could be implicated if something goes wrong here.”

“And what’s going to go wrong here Linus? What do you know that I don’t?” said Chester.

Linus ran his hand down his face.

“The mystery man was following Philo last night. Philo went into a diner and he was already in there. I got out of there after I noticed. I’m missing something about what’s going on here” said Linus, defeated.

“You think there’s something more going on than the hatred these two guys apparently have for each other? Philo’s so scared that he’s apparently bought a weapon. And I’m not surprised. You saw Danny lock eyes with the guy, and charge him. Some people just hate each other.”

“It’s not that simple. What kind of hatred makes a man go from zero to fighting within the space of a glance. He ran like a stabbed rat after that kid. He ran the feet out from under himself and was nearly crushed by a tram. The client said that they grew up together. He never mentioned them being enemies, and that was the behaviour of an enemy” said Linus.

Chester looked at his cup of stone cold coffee and dumped it out on the grass. It seemed reluctant to seep into the soil. Something strange flashed into Chester’s mind.

“Who has that kind of hatred for someone they haven’t seen in years? The client said that they grew up together right? What happens in childhood that would create that lasting of an impression. I’ve never seen fear run a man that hard. Nor hatred. Both of them went to the same orphanage, yeah, if they grew up together?”

“I guess so. Where are you going with this?” asked Linus, slightly irritated that Chester had just repeated what he had said.

“Bear with me here a moment. How did Philo get his sweet job in this town?” said Chester. Linus was about to open his mouth but he stopped. He didn’t know how Philo had gotten the job.

“That’s an interesting question Chester. Have you found anything out? Something that I missed?”

“No I don’t have any information on it. But if they grew up in that orphanage together, then why did they end up in two entirely different industries? Doesn’t it seem likely that they’d be pushed along together, into whatever industry demanded people at the time. Being assigned is often more luck than anything.”

“For the sake of argument you could say that the aptitude tests aren’t biased and that they each got the job they were suited for” said Linus, scarcely believing his own argument.

He recalled his placement. He was conscripted into the police force at 15. Anyone that wasn’t part of an established family didn’t have much of a say in where they went or what they did under the dome. There were no lateral career moves, just vertical ones. You had the ability to work your job, and if you excelled, you worked the job above yours. He was only a detective because working with the police was too black and white. People still needed the grey to get things done.

“Even if that were the case, do you really think that Philo can afford his lifestyle with the job he works?” said Chester.

Linus thought for a moment, mentally adding up the money he had seen Philo spend, or at least what he projected that he had spent. He was one to flash money around, but Linus had the impression that Philo was a poser. Some rich kid that lucked his way into his position. Maybe he even had a backer.

“I’m not sure about that. We’re missing something. Something that’s probably staring us right in the face” said Linus.

“How about we try and forget about the client then, and we find out how Philo got here?”

.

“I’ll do that. I’ll go to the records office and see if I can’t dig something up about the landlord of Philo’s building, or the deed on his apartment or something. I’ll want you to keep an eye on Danny.”

“Danny’s going to the west side today. Juan told him to” said Chester.

“Marvellous” said Linus while pinching the bridge of his nose “So he’ll be running around trying to find Philo while we’re following both of them, and the client is hanging around. You think there’s any way you can detain him?” said Linus.

“Not without giving myself away as a detective.”

“Right then. I guess we’ll just have to do our best. And by the way Chester, ‘our best’ does not include you having a weapon”

“Fine” said Chester.

The men parted ways and hoped that during the course of the day they wouldn’t meet again.

“Tank”, he rasped at the other side of the room, “Tank, get up.”

Something massive stirred in its cot, but didn’t rise. Abel threw a dented hubcap at the cot, but ended up just knocking over a can of rusty nails. He gave up on rousting Tank, wrapped himself in something that approximated clothes and stepped outside into the breeze. He stared out at what he figured would soon be the rising sun and walked away from the beaten camp to find a latrine. He snatched a small folding shovel from his bike in case he didn’t find one. You always had to bury it; you didn’t want to alert the flying insects to your presence for any reason. He pondered as he squatted that even though there wasn’t a lot of eating on them, if you got enough insects together you could get a decent handful of protein. He buried it anyway; there would be better ways to eat today.

Tank stomped out of the tiny hut as Abel was checking the workings of his motorcycle. Tank lumbered over to his own, substantially larger, monowheel and dug in his belongings for a canteen of something that passed for water. The water in the badlands was scarce, and tasted terrible at the best of times. Badland kids were ruined for life if they ever got their hands on fresh rainwater; they’d realize just how bad they had it. The water in Tank’s canteen was so full of metals that it almost rusted in his stomach as it sat there like cooling slag. He whipped the canteen to Abel who caught it without turning around. Abel paused before drinking; he needed to steel himself for the unpleasantness.

“Where today Abel?” said Tank.

Abel glanced at the dim glow on the horizon and turned around to recline against  his bike. Just like every day, they’d pick a direction and ride in search of food, fuel, water, parts… anything they could trade, work or barter for. Or steal. Despite his gargantuan size Tank was a good thief; surprisingly good.

“How does East sound” mumbled Abel. Tank consulted with his mental mapping.

“State line is east. Lordsburg might still be standing. Heard a few months ago that it was” Tank said as he glanced at the mountain to the Northwest.

“Did those crackpots ever dome the place by themselves? You think fine gentlemen such as us would have a place in their high society?” asked Abel while gesticulating with a greasy ring spanner.

“When have we ever been refused entry to anything?” responded Tank.

Abel stretched his left leg and felt the twinge of a long healed bullet wound tense up,  snaring his shin and foot. Tank had never been refused anything because most people were too scared to say anything to a man that was verging on ten feet tall. Tank started to prime his engine and Abel took the hint.

There was no point trying to hide anything, or lock anything up at the camp; this was a nomad camp that happened to be empty. Anyone riding around the badlands would spend a night there, maybe two, and then head along. Anyone that actually wanted to get inside could probably just grab the bottom of the wall and tip any of the shacks over. Abel had spent a lot of time in camps like these, and each was as bad as the last.

The idling of Tank’s engine didn’t help Abel concentrate on his pre-start checks. Abel took a little longer to start his bike. It was a leftover from before The Choke and it was crammed full of all kinds of gizmos. Even after a few years of practice it still took Abel a minute or two to fire up the anti-gravity, to make sure that the circuitry hadn’t shorted out again, and to check that everything was getting fed with the myriad of fluids required to keep everything in equilibrium.

Tank started off slowly without Abel; he knew he’d catch up. Tank loved the simplicity of his monowheel. The engine sat inside two former truck tyres, and the front-mounted platform had a seat on it and two levers. A smaller platform extended from the back with the rest of Tank’s life on it. If you didn’t own property you’d better get used to living light and moving fast. Nobody had claim over the badlands, much less packets of land within it. Out here to be stationary was to be vulnerable.

Three minutes later Abel’s bike caught up and they accelerated in unison to Tank’s top speed. Abel’s bike had the potential to be much faster, mainly because it didn’t have to contend with the rocky ground. He buzzed over sand traps, he trimmed dead vegetation, he soared. The bike was very out of place for this kind of country. It had likely been some rich man’s toy in one of the cities. Abel could picture a smug city dweller polishing the chrome, waxing the paint, putting on his nicest clothes and driving this machine at less than 10 kilometers per hour around smooth paved streets. The continued survival of this bike with the strength of spun glass was either incredible luck, or a testament to the build quality of pre-choke technology. Abel tried to treat it well, but half of it could be powered by faith and magic for all he knew.

It rapidly became apparent that it was going to be an inhumanely hot day in the desert. The rising shimmers would be punishing by noon, and it would take until at least then to reach Lordsburg. Hopefully there’d be fuel in Lordsburg; otherwise they’d have pretty much wasted the journey. Most of the smaller towns had disbanded, been absorbed by the large domed cities, or become bastions of lawlessness; Tank’s kind of territory.

Tank had once been idolized. He’d been somewhat of a travelling celebrity. As far as anyone knew he was the only Siberian giant this far west, and in all likelihood he was the only one in the country. He had been given the best of everything, and for years he had been content with the easy life: the women, the alcohol, the cigarettes, the real meat and the fresh vegetables. About two years ago he had realized that the whole thing was a joke. He couldn’t walk down the street without being gawked at or without facing the same dumb questions. He has once gotten into a bar fight with a man with something to prove. The other patrons in the bar dragged the aggressor away and threw themselves at his knees. They thought him a monster that would destroy them all if given half a chance. As if he were some one man army just waiting for an excuse.  And while that may have been true Tank didn’t want an easy target. Given his renown, influence and sheer size he could have become king of any domed city in the hemisphere. He was in the badlands to prove to himself that he possessed some truer power.

Abel had nothing to prove to anyone. He’d left his home town, found a bike out in the wilderness and rode it ever since. It had taken him a long time to figure out just how everything worked, and he was quite pleased at his self taught expertise. Nobody would ever be able to steal his bike because it would be so incomprehensible to anyone not familiar with it. Anyone observing it would notice one thing immediately – it didn’t have any wheels. The technology contained in this formerly shiny toy would be alien to even the best mechanics. Only Abel could make it run. Abel pulled ahead and gestured to Tank with his arm out and palm down. As Abel’s bike wound down it dropped onto the ground and the circuits buzzed quietly, then ceased. Without saying a word Tank threw his canteen of wretched water to Abel, who began saturating a piece of fabric with the lukewarm swill to wrap around his head. Anything that could abate the heat had to be applied without delay. Small decisions could mean surviving, or being scorched to bones out here.

Tank took the opportunity to hop off his platform and inspect his brakes. It was hard enough to pilot this cobbled together beast without having to worry about the bike launching end over end when you tried to come to a stop. It wouldn’t be the first time that it had happened, so Tank had become very wary of the sensitivity involved. He couldn’t even imagine maintaining Abel’s dinosaur-nightmare. There was more technology in that machine than in many of the midsized towns that dotted areas between the domes. A quick upwards nod set them off again after Abel had warmed up the tubes and circuits. His damp rag idea only lasted him a few miles, but he had learned to cherish even the minor victories. Victories like “ate today”, “drank fresh water” or even “didn’t get stabbed in my sleep” were enough to keep him ticking along quite happily for at least a few days. The barren plains had worn on him for long enough, and he was looking forward to spending at least a little time in a town. Sometimes they had beds, and even showers.

Water was scarce, but a town without a well, or a stream would certainly be abandoned quickly, especially at this time of year. Only the incredibly hardy or the amazingly stupid would live in a water free town. Tank’s mouth was drier than chalk and he became more and more aware of it the closer they came to town. He’d heard rumors that Lordsburg was trying to dome itself independent of the cities and unions. It was a substantial task, even for a town that was abundant in resources, which Lordsburg likely wasn’t. He hoped they were still building because without money or anything decent to trade all they could hope to offer on arrival was labour. The kilometers rolled on, and after no small share of difficulties they saw Lordsburg appear through the noon heat haze. A rickety wood and metal skeleton hung over the town, partially wrapped in a patchwork of old plastic and sheet metal. Its unnatural nature told them that people still lived here, and worked here. But Tank and Abel only had one thing on their minds presently.

Please let there be water and fuel. Doesn’t even have to be good water. Just let there be water. One glass will do.

Chester leaned back in his rocking chair, as the young children looked at him afraid, and the teenagers sat clasping their hands waiting for the world of the story to get better. He was never sure just how each new group would react, but he knew that history had to be preserved in more than just books. These children had never known the world outside this safe place, so they needed to know how it once was up there on the surface.

We were all travelling across the country, trying to find anywhere that was safe. Some of us came with families, others walked the roads alone. All they knew as they walked was that anywhere had to be better than where they came from. Disaster followed us, as the weeks dragged into months. It’s not unreasonable to say that the world was crumbling around us. But worry not, children, because the good Lord provided for us. It was here in Tennessee that we found our first shelter. Some cities here stood, filled with fine christians that welcomed us as wanderers from the desert. In those days people had started to turn bad, but there were some out there that would give an arm to give a fellow man another day. When we saw what they were building, we knew that we had to help. It began simply as a mine in its last days. They used to mine coal here. In the early days, it was their power here. Just enough coal to build great furnaces and smelters. They dragged what they needed from the earth to build rolling mills, and crucibles, and steel works. The Lord provided.

As they dug into the earth they made it strong, and hard, and able to support the roofs above us and the floors below us. We all worked tirelessly, as that was what the Lord sent us here to do. He gathered us, his chosen people, and told us that we could save ourselves with work. The great men in this room were the children that cleaned tools, and apprenticed, and learned from those that gave all of themselves to build this place. Our haven, our safety, our ark. You remember Genesis, children?

A silent chorus of nods rippled through the room. Children turned to each other, unafraid for the first time since Chester began talking.

Well, Noah built a great ark to save the animals, and to save mankind, and we did the same. But ours is in the ground, not the sea. Our hull is steel, not wood, and we decided to save more men and women. We couldn’t just save ourselves. The teacher in the back spoke up. She had heard the elders make speeches like this for years, and she knew Chester’s favourite verse.

“Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.”

Chester smiled at her. Izabelle listened to him and the others like the children did; in love with the history of their people.

We must work together, children, as we did then. As we do now. Because 100 times the number of people in this room right now laid down their lives so that each of you could live. We gathered the great minds of our time that had no other place to go. The steelworkers gave us a home, the scientists showed us a better way forward, the engineers made sure that this structure would last for generations. It has stood now for 100 years, unmoved by the maelstrom above. Bad people may still walk the earth up there, but down here we are filled with the light of the Lord. As we have built ourselves a house, we have built him a house. You know the light in the church on Sundays? The one over the altar that issues from no bulbs? That’s the sunlight, far above, letting us know that we are not forgotten, we are protected and we are cared for. We must cherish that light, and we must all work towards the day when we open the hatches, and retake the earth in his name.

“Amen” a few children offered.

“Amen” Chester said emphatically.

“AMEN!” they shouted.

Chester raised his old bones from his chair and raised his hands high above his head.

“We give thanks to the Lord! Amen!”

The children stood and shrieked Amen with him, filled with pride in their people. They would save the world, like Chester saved them.

After an hour of questions, Izabelle ushered the children away, back to their classroom across the complex. Chester was full of fire, maybe more even than the pastors, but his voice grew hoarse, his eyes dropped, and he became lost in memory as his stories meandered. The more he talked, the more his thoughts connected, and formed a large web, trapping him inside.

He sat in the quiet, remembering the oldest days he knew. The things they had all seen, and they had all done to make it to this place, and to make this place. Inexperienced boys burned by hot steel and slag, arms lost to rolling mills and heavy presses. Some of the soldiers that came to protect them from raiders were boys themselves. Many could scarcely control the recoil of their father’s rifles. Not everyone that came here did so to be saved, some came to steal. They were exiled. They wouldn’t work, and so they were cast out to live with the heathens. If they were so interested in sin, they could find a world of it out there, growing in the dust, whirling in the winds, winding through the deepening waters. Idolaters came, with a worship of money, and tried to buy their way in. They were exiled. All the gold in the world couldn’t buy them a work ethic, or a strong pair of hands.

Not all were destined for salvation. Chester thanked the merciful God every day that he woke, and every day that he was given to keep spreading the word about this place to the children. That’s why they were here, that’s why they shunned people, that’s why they sacrificed and gave, in blood and in time. Miles from camp, he once came across a crucified raider boy, barely older than him. His corpse wore a sign warning only the righteous to step beyond his body. No riches, or goods, or snake tongued words would save a sinner walking towards the ark. Not even piety would save a godly man from pitching in. If you would not work, you would not be saved. For salvation was for all, not for a lone man that would eat their bread, and wash no pans, or pound no wheat, or knead no dough. The lazy were the worst sinners of all. They wished to partake of the kingdom without paying the tax.

Chester continued muttering to himself for an hour before he began to slow, and found himself drifting into a doze. The clocks said it was evening time. Most of the other elders had shuffled to their private mess hall. They were well taken care of in their old age. Any that had survived the time before they sealed their doors were treated most kindly by all. The children wished to hear their stories, the parents wanted their wisdom, the cooks and caretakers, the launderers and cleaners, they all considered it an honour to serve the elders. They honoured them as they would their own fathers and mothers. Chester fell into a sleep as the others ate. A plate of food was placed under a cloche, and set next to him. He would eat when he woke.

—–

Ulricht watched the bank of monitors on the far side of the control room. Monitors flickered as they switched from one place to another. Some watched the mess halls, the generators, the hallways, the chapel, the common areas. But the top eight monitors never changed. They all looked outwards, in the cardinal directions above the hatches.

“When did they pass?” he asked Eric, the watcher.

“Four hours ago. We caught them passing two cameras, so they’re heading Northwest. Five, maybe six bikes, with perhaps ten riders between them. They didn’t come within 500 yards.”

“Any signs since then? No movement?”

Eric shook his head and stared down at his control panel. He knew the protocols that were in place. When someone saw raiders on the cameras, he may have signed their death warrants. But it had to be done to protect the people.

“Mobilize the soldiers. Have them wait by the northern hatch – inside. If we see so much as new tire track, they will exit and scout the area. Keep the blast doors sealed behind them until midnight. Lord willing there will be no more raiders out there.”

“Lord willing.”

The bright and vivid hues of the peaches in summertime, or the deep browns of pecans and walnuts in the autumn. He tilled soil, he pruned trees, he planted each seed with care. No day began without a breakfast made possible by his work. The nights spent caring for plants, walking between the furrows spraying deftly at the leaves, clipping leaves, straightening petals. The world began and ended with food. And he was the world’s farmer.

97 reached the end of his chain and felt an abrupt jerk backwards. He had reached the end of his tether. He pondered a step forwards. His feet would begin grinding into the well managed earth, and he could fight his way against his bounds, but to no avail. He had worked this patch of land for 14 years, and he would continue to work it each day as he had before. He had seen men and women driven mad by their confinement. But he knew it was for the best. Each had their place on this earth, each was put there either by fate or by government, and who was he to fight against the powers that kept this earth from ruin?

Each day he rose from his cot and lined up with the others. They were fed well from the harvest, and they were sent into the fields under the dome. Each day he would pass by the tall shoots of corn, the patches filled with gourds, the near motionless fields of grain. He would walk several miles before he was where he needed to be. His place was on the edge of other places, those areas where wheat met tomatoes, met cauliflower. Those better than him were smart enough to rotate the crops, and though he worked the same acre, he was always facing new challenges. He had worked this acre so long because he knew what he was doing. He excelled with the plants, caring for each as a child, because they were to feed the children. The world could not be refilled and reconquered if the people did not grow up big and strong. He knew all too well what happened to a man if he was unable to work to his fullest potential.

More than one worker had managed to hang themselves from their chains, giving up the gift of caring for prosperity. Some farmers, mostly hydro farmers couldn’t take it. The hydro farmers couldn’t take the days of sunlight under the dome at a time. They grew up underground, deprived of the light that made these crops grown strong. They languished under the light of UV bulbs, their skin growing pale and sallow as their crops grew strong. There was nothing to be done for them. They were a weak people, only made weaker by the buzzing lights. They poured themselves into the crop, and they seemed to gain nothing from it. Not the rich bounty of harvest, nor the satisfaction of hearing the train pull away, loaded with saving life and power. Those things that make a body strong, and a mind sharp. Everyone benefited when you worked hard. Wrapping the chain around your neck at the most slack point and running until you flew at the end of your track, and then swung in the air was weakness. He had known the sun under the dome all his life, and he knew that his tasks were noble. Those that killed themselves were weaklings that did well only by removing themselves from the farms. They couldn’t support the people, they weren’t strong enough to wake by day, work by sunlight, and sleep by night. They were well taken care of here. He couldn’t understand the desire to end it all. All he wanted was to care for more plants.

He wanted to break the chains, not to escape, but to care for more people. He would work his hands to bone, and his soul to ashes, if it meant one more person would have one more day to work for the farms, work for the domes, work for the trains. Just once he wanted to stop on his way here and view the works under the dome. To man a tractor, to do more than water and harvest, to decide and divine, to drive the future of the world outside this dome.

The others didn’t understand, that this was where they belonged. Since he was a child he had known where he belonged. This place was the cradle of all life, and to take your own in this place meant becoming fertilizer. Even in failure, it was assumed that your last act would carry this place forwards. The others didn’t understand. They didn’t understand at all.

“Do you know how impossible it’s going to be to find him?” said Lawrence aimlessly, as if speaking to no one in particular.

Patton lit the cigarette and looked up at Lawrence’s face. Lawrence stared out over the Siberian planes and exhaled slowly, his gargantuan chest rising and falling as he smoked. He was totally at home with the snow silently falling on his shoulders, while keeping a sharp eye out for arctic foxes and bears.

“It couldn’t possibly be as hard as you think” said Patton, struggling a little with the cigar sized cigarette.

“I haven’t seen him in years but…” he trailed off and Lawrence tilted his head down as if he was waiting for the rest of the sentence. When no sentence arrived he straightened up and resumed his chosen position as watchman. He watched carefully over the placid snow and ice for any imperceptible twitches or movements. Most of the animals near the canals had learned to remain still when one of the boats passed by; fresh meat and bear pelts were big prizes on the extended trips between cities.

Patton tried to shake the cold air out of his lungs as he threw the cigarette stub over the side. He walked carefully over the snow flecked deck, between the covered sacks and boxes, trying to make his way to the rear cabin. There was a battery of cooling fans and diffusers underneath the rear cabin but it was always busy and standing inside for too long made you a nuisance to the crew. Patton left his coat on the hook outside and stepped in to the blasting heat.

Dozens of little dials, indicator lights, displays and switches were being monitored by the captain and a rotation of engineers. The engineers were ascending and descending a small staircase after viewing the dials for only a few seconds; they made small adjustments, ran back down, and then back up to view the dials again. They chatted to the captain in a mixture of Russian and English and he made the necessary adjustments. His hands moved quickly, like a typist or a tailor, but his medium wasn’t cloth or words: it was core temperatures and kilowatt-hours. All of the captain’s concentration was wrapped up in the task at hand – there was a very small window of productive power, especially in these temperatures. Incorrect operation could cause any number of catastrophic failures too terrible to even consider. Canal boat captains didn’t live long lives. Tube displays hummed and clicked and the thin engineers bolted up and down to the stairs making micro-adjustments to the reactors and the cooling system. Patton wondered why there weren’t just dials down in the power room until he realized that he was getting in the way. The engineers were taking time away from their work to shoot him glances. Patton went back outside and hurried himself into his coat. A huge bang rang out from behind him and he almost jumped over the side of boat.

Lawrence steadied his enormous rifle and widened his stance. He exhaled slowly in an attempt to take the cold shake out of his fingers. The deer was running quickly to the right, hemmed in by sharp rocks and trees. It had no way to run further away from the canal; all it could do was try to run ahead of it. Lawrence held firm, led his target and fired. The whole boat rocked with the recoil as the gun kicked and he was forced to take a step back. Lawrence was ten feet and one inch tall and he was unaccustomed to taking a step back. He righted himself quickly and scanned area for his target. The deer was gone. The tree that had been hit by the bullet creaked and groaned. It splintered as it fell and threw a small cloud of snow towards the canal; as if it was mocking Lawrence.

Patton appeared beside Lawrence as he reloaded his rifle and set it back on the deck.

“Did you get him?” asked Patton.

“No. No fresh meat tonight, unless you think tree is a meat” Lawrence mumbled.

The two stood in silence again for a while listening to the hull crack the ice of the canal, and listening for the dull thud sounds that the clumps of ice made as they bounced down the sides of the boat. The snow had a muffling effect on the surrounding landscape, making only nearby sounds seem present. The world closed in when it snowed this heavily. All sound and vision was muted and stifled as they squinted to keep out the snowflakes out of their eyes. Lawrence produced a pair of goggles and pulled his hat down a little lower. Patton was content to turn his back to the soft wind and look back over the length of the boat.

Steaming water trickled out of the sides of the boat and back into the icy canal. The reactors needed a lot of cooling and the ice filled canal was perfect for the task. The hot water helped to keep the ice from freezing to the side of the boat which the engineers were eternally grateful for: they were not men accustomed to raising picks and hammers to chip ice. Lawrence could have helped them out immensely if it had been necessary but they distrusted giants. Patton had noticed the engineers using words like “oaf” and “menace” when Lawrence was out of earshot but he thought it best to keep that to himself. This journey was going to take days, or even weeks depending on the ice and it would be a bad idea to have the technicians fighting with the largest man on the boat.

Patton pulled a beaten old liquor flask out of his coat and swigged from it. He offered it to Lawrence.

“No thank you. I want my aim to be nice and steady in case I see another deer”

Before Patton tucked the flask back into his coat he studied the red enamel flag logo on it. It said C.C.C.P, and the enamel had small cracks running over its surface. He had found it in his father’s apartment in Leningrad six weeks ago. Patton had searched his father’s apartment from top to bottom over and over again looking for some clue or hint as to where he might have gone. The door to his father’s apartment was broken when Patton had arrived to spend the evening with him. The police had been very little help, and the few people in the dingy apartment building had heard nothing. Either because of their deafness or a disinterest in their neighbours – they knew nothing.

The flask had caught Patton’s eye several times during his search of the apartment. It kept drawing him back for some reason, like a canary being drawn to its own reflection. It was dingy, it was dented, the logo was cracked, and the leather wrapping was in tatters, but something about it kept drawing him in. Maybe his father had kept it because of his drinking problem, but Patton had never seen him use it. There was nothing in it when Patton got to it, and there may never have been. It might have been a relic from before the choke that meant a great deal to his father. It seemed like the kind of object that somebody voluntarily leaving their home of 30 years wouldn’t leave behind.

Patton and his father had been drifting apart over the last few years to the point that Patton didn’t feel he knew him at all anymore. Something about the flask had lodged in his brain and he had to take it with him. He’d kept it on him ever since he started this journey; it was like his compass.

“Cover your ears and step back” Lawrence whispered.

Patton bolted back out of the way and clamped his hands to his ears as Lawrence raised his massive rifle to his shoulder, and then shifted it carefully to line up the iron sights. He braced himself and while clamping his teeth together he pulled the trigger. A cloud of red spray shot up onto the rocks and Lawrence smiled to himself. He placed the rifle back down and grabbed his revolver. Patton watched him leap from the boat to the shore in one bound. The snow was three feet deep, but it hardly fazed Lawrence as he moved quickly towards the downed deer. He watched for any signs of life as he held his revolver ready, but there were none. Lawrence tucked his revolver away and dragged the deer back towards the slowly advancing boat. The engineers and the captain stared at the giant hauling the deer through as if it were a normal man pulling a rabbit behind him. They were glad of fresh meat, but they weren’t happy about having the giant aboard. The engineers resumed their duties after only seconds of watching.

Patton watched Lawrence throw the deer aboard, and then watched the giant leap aboard. Lawrence worked quickly to drain the deer of blood. After a lifetime of living off harsh and unforgiving land butchering was like second nature to him. There was easily 250 pounds of animal that everyone on the boat could eat for days on end, but he knew it was imperative that the butchering happen quickly and the meat be prepared for storage. There was nothing worse that wasted food to a man like Lawrence, a man who had gone without so many times.

Patton helped pack the meat with ice in boxes while Lawrence stood in front of the suspended carcass carefully selecting the best cuts. After the last of the meat was packed Lawrence threw the bones and organs as far away from the boat as he could manage. Patton was the only man aboard that hadn’t experienced a bear showing up on the boat, or in a village, in search of food in the middle of the night, and as his guide Lawrence intended to keep it that way.