Ellis thought to argue, to point out how competition kept a society strong, how altruism could lead to resentment. He felt he needed to defend the system he’d grown up in, only he couldn’t figure out why. It also wasn’t in his best interest, since all he had were a pair of diamond earrings and a few expensive rings he had forgotten to leave behind, none of which appeared to have any value in that world.
“I’ll take you to Pol as soon as you’re ready.”
“What will happen then?”
“You’ll be introduced to the Council, I assume. Lots of questions. Then I suspect you’ll be introduced into society, and you’ll no doubt become a very big celebrity. I can’t imagine anyone in Hollow World not completely bleezing when they hear about you.”
Ellis had no idea what that meant, but if it was related to being pleased, he didn’t share the opinion. So far only Pax had shown any sort of pleasure at his existence. “I don’t know what bleezing means, but I doubt Vin did it.”
“Vin is…” Pax squinted in an effort to think.
“Used to being the unique one?”
“Exactly.”
Ellis glanced out at the view again. The falselight sun was completely above the horizon, and the vast atrium was filled with what reminded Ellis of a bright, clear, autumn sort of light. He wondered if they had seasons. “Will I be coming back here afterward?”
“Pol will likely invite you to stay in Wegener.”
“What’s that?”
“I guess you could call it the chief city of Hollow World. It’s on the Antarctic Plate in the Kerguelen micro continent. Each plate has its own center, and most are bigger, but each plate sends a representative to Wegener. Some of the best artists work there, so it’s one of the most beautiful places in Hollow World.”
“It’s awfully beautiful right here,” Ellis said, continuing to look out over the balcony.
The conversation held a tone of solemn finality. Maybe there was some truth to the idea that Ellis could see what others couldn’t. The way Pax had come out that morning, so quiet and with such a soft tone of voice—apologetic, embarrassed even. The admission of admiration had borne all the openness of a deathbed farewell. Even if Pax refused to admit it, Ellis understood this was the last time they would be together. This conversation was goodbye.
Ellis felt a distinct sinking sensation, a general depression that settled over him, making it difficult to breathe, much the same way as the fibrosis. Pax and Alva were his only friends in this strange new world, and the idea of separating from them was just so painful—and ironic, he realized, as he’d just abandoned a whole existence, giving precious little thought to those he left behind. He had sacrificed Peggy and Warren, rolling the dice on a better trade. But that was before he knew what the future held, or so he told himself. So far everyone else he’d met hadn’t been very welcoming. He and Pax had shared a life-and-death moment that left a mark and made him feel they were connected.
And then there was just plain old traditional paranoia. He worried about Pax’s safety.
“You said you never met him, right?” Ellis asked.
“Pol? No. I’m an arbitrator, and I’ve never been a Council member or—”
“I meant Geo-24.”
“Oh—no. Well, it’s possible. I met a geomancer at a Miracles Day party once.”
“When?”
“Maybe a year ago.”
“What happened?”
“I don’t remember. Like anyone, I was just excited to actually speak to a geomancer, you know? They so infrequently appear in public. I think the encounter only lasted a few minutes. Just some small talk. I probably asked a bunch of stupid questions, like anyone would. What it’s like being a geomancer. Stuff like that.”
“Don’t you find it strange that Geo-24 was looking up your record about a year ago?” Ellis asked. “And don’t you find it odd that he instructed his vox to contact you, and only you, in the event of his death?”
“I didn’t say it wasn’t strange, but it also doesn’t make sense, and there’s no point in pondering crazy things that can never be answered.”
The quartet stopped their concert and began packing up as more people arrived with more balls and another group approached the big pond with toy boats.
“I’ll be able to visit, right?” Ellis asked, looking back.
Pax reached out, took his hand, and gave it a squeeze. “I think…I think it would be better for everyone if maybe you didn’t.”
“Why?”
“It—it would just…it would just be better if you didn’t.”
“Is it Vin?”
Pax looked away.
“Were you up all night because you couldn’t sleep or because you were talking about me?”
Pax let go of his hand. “We spoke about you.”
“Doesn’t like me much.”
“That has nothing to do with it.”
“So what is it then?”
“Vin thinks you’re a bad influence.”
“I bet.”
Ellis was angry—too angry. Sure, he thought Vin was a pretentious prick, and he didn’t like the idea of losing his only real friend because of such a tool. But Ellis actually wanted to punch Vin—hard. That was far too extreme an emotion for the situation. He wouldn’t have felt that way if Warren had told him he couldn’t hang out anymore because his girlfriend disapproved. He wouldn’t have wanted to punch Marcia if she’d come between them, and he’d been friends with Warren for more than forty years. Granted, Marcia was a petite blonde with big blue eyes, and it would have been like beating up on a fawn. While Vin, on the other hand, was a pompous, melodramatic, diva, picking on the little ingénue who—
“We should go see Pol,” Pax said. “I’ll get your bag.” Pax offered a courageous smile that Ellis knew was forced.
By the time Pax returned, Vin had stepped out of one of the doors into the social room and stopped abruptly. The mask had been left behind, and Vin was wearing just the eighteenth-century suit. Vin looked identical to Pax. Ellis’s eyes shifted between them, his mind locking up like some computer asked to calculate the highest number or the absolute value of pi. If Vin put on a bowler hat…
“Why is Ellis Rogers still here?”
Pax crossed the room and pulled Ellis away.
Maybe Pax thought he might shoot Vin. The thought had crossed his mind. They didn’t seem to have any penalty for murder. He could offer the excuse that he was merely a product of his times. Pax pulled harder, shoved Ellis’s backpack at him, then drew out the iPortal. Ellis heard the now familiar snap and hiss as an opening was made. Looking through it, Ellis saw a circular pool surrounded by trees, lawns, and stone walkways.
“Please,” Pax begged him with a frightened face and motioned to the portal.
Ellis stared back, surprised at the emotion in Pax’s voice. Maybe Ellis wasn’t the only one to see things. He felt ashamed.
The portal shimmered, a perfect window into another reality that he just had to step through, but to Ellis it was another box of milk crates, another escape to a foreign place. He sighed and stepped through.
The first thing Ellis noticed was the gurgling sound of the fountain in the middle of the bowl-shaped pool that shot water up a good sixty feet. Tens of thousands of years had passed since humanity had escaped primeval forests, and there was still something about splashing water that had caused mankind to bring the babbling brook with them. Something soothing there, something embedded in the collective psyche—fountains were the clocks in puppies’ beds, simulating the heartbeat of a missing mother.
The second thing he noticed was all the people. Ellis hadn’t experienced a public space in Hollow World yet. He’d only looked down on the gardens below Pax’s balcony. Some gathered in groups, some walked with purpose, but none noticed him—yet. With childlike logic, he avoided looking at anyone, as if this would render him invisible. Besides, he didn’t need to see their faces—they were all the same.
The third thing Ellis notic
ed was the city. He was in a small park surrounded by massive buildings. Each was unusual, few had sharp angles—not a single “box” in the bunch—and all were works of art. Shrunken down, they would be marvels on pedestals in any museum. But at dozens of stories tall, they were breathtaking. Most appeared carved from solid rock, free-flowing organic sculptures. The interplay of metals—copper, brass, gold, and silver—created designs inlaid as decorations on the buildings and in the plazas and walkways. Art deco met tribal expressionism; nature living in harmony with high-industry; the soft and the sharp, made and grown, all blending into something new. Above it all remained the blue sky, this one streaked by thin clouds.
The last thing Ellis noticed was that Pax had followed him through.
Turning, he revealed his wide-eyed surprise.
“How could you think I was going to abandon you?” Pax chastised him and displayed an irritated look so pointed that Ellis knew it was artificial. “Do you know where Pol’s office is? Would you know how to find it?”
“In the past I just appeared where I was going.”
Pax smirked. “You can’t just port into the GWC. I’m sure you couldn’t just port into the palace of the Prime Minister of the United States without announcing yourself first either. Not that Pol, or anyone else in the Grand World Council, has the power to execute people on a whim like people did in your day, but still—it’s not polite.”
Ellis couldn’t help smiling. He was so happy Pax was with him that he overlooked the errors in history. Yet as they began crossing the park, Ellis remembered the history-grams and wondered if they really were errors. Two thousand years was a very long time. Perhaps at some point the United States did have a prime minister who ordered executions.
Pax led the way across the open plaza on which huge burnished metal shapes were embedded. Ellis guessed they must make some clever design that was indiscernible from the ground but would be lovely from the windows of the buildings. As they walked, Ellis saw a large river snaking in the distance and weaving between buildings. On the water were all sorts of boats, from traditional sailing ships to more exotic vessels which looked like they were powered by glass sails. No freighters, however, no barges hauling goods the way he’d seen on the Detroit River. Everything in this world was for enjoyment, as if every inhabitant was on permanent vacation. Where were the factories? Where were the men with jackhammers fixing the streets? For that matter, where were the streets?
Seconds after he appeared, people began noticing him. Heads turned. Individuals halted and just stared. Once they started walking, eyes grew wide, and those watching moved out of their way. Some mouths opened as if to speak, but Pax did not stop, and together they marched on. Ellis decided not to look back but heard mutterings and imagined a gathering there, swirls of people drawn close, eddying in their wake.
Finding the Grand World Council was easier than Pax had led him to believe, because it stood out dramatically like other capitols. In this case the building was center stage and topped by a giant sculpture of the earth made of gold and copper. The Hollow World globe didn’t depict the continents on its shell, but rather the tectonic plates. Divisions of land and sea were lightly etched into the surface of the massive plate cutouts, appearing as ghostly afterthoughts, no more than spots on a dog. Europe and Asia shared a plate, but the Arabian Peninsula had its own. North America, South America, and Africa all had their own plates, but they were much larger than the continents themselves, because they included a portion of the ocean as well. Ellis noticed several others he couldn’t place. Some were quite small, like one just off the coast of the American Northwest, and another near the Antarctic. Ellis wondered if that’s where he was at that moment, on the tiny chip at the bottom of the world between the tip of what had once been Argentina and the Cape of Good Hope.
Inside, the building was bright and airy despite walls of glassy, black marble. Sculptures and mosaics filled the space. The largest spelled out HOLLOW WORLD in cleverly pieced-together shapes. Ellis thought the place looked more like an art museum than a government building—and a top-notch one at that. The temperature was the same inside as out, which spared him a coughing attack. Ellis reminded himself he wasn’t entering from the outdoors, just moving between rooms.
Few people were in the lobby, and Ellis didn’t see any desk or clerk. Pax walked directly to a blank wall and tapped on the polished marble. A touchscreen appeared, and Pax moved through a few menus until finding Pol-789. Underneath this was a list of names, and Ellis was surprised to see Ellis Rogers on it alongside Pax-43246018. Pax tapped their names, and a portal appeared beside them.
Stepping through, they entered a tiny office. Circular in shape, all the walls appeared to be glass, letting in the falselight and providing panoramic views of the city now far below. In the center was a beautiful round table etched with a detailed map that might have been a projected flat version of the Hollow World interior, while the table’s centerpiece was a rotating replica of the giant globe Ellis had seen on the building.
“Welcome,” a very pleasant woman’s voice—a vox—greeted. “My name is Balmore. Chief Councilor Pol will be with you shortly. Please have a seat.”
Ellis and Pax sat in two of the four chairs. Pax sat very straight, adjusting the frock coat and resetting the angle of the bowler hat, only to adjust it again a moment later.
“You don’t come here often, do you?” Ellis asked, discovering he was feeling quite at ease by virtue of lacking any preconceived impressions. If this had been the Oval Office, or a palace, he might have been intimidated. Instead, this was just a room with a fancy table, and Ellis had seen more impressive principals’ offices.
“I’ve only been to Wegener once, a long time ago, and I’ve never been inside the GWC, much less the Chief Councilor’s office.”
When the door opened, Pax jumped up, standing like a soldier at attention. Not familiar with protocol, Ellis followed suit.
The person who entered was another identical copy of Pax. That’s how Ellis saw everyone, even though he understood that, at only a few hundred years old, Pax was far younger than everyone else. Full names, he guessed, were an indication. Like Delaware license plates, or online user names, the lower numbers must indicate age of creation and perhaps social status. Ellis considered the numbers might also just show the popularity of that name, but the fact that a geomancer was called Geo made him think otherwise. Geo-24 was probably very old—only twenty-three Geos had come before—while Pol-789 would be younger, and Pax-43246018 would be a baby in comparison.
“Wonderful—you’re here,” their host greeted them. “I’m Chief Councilor Pol. So nice to meet you. Please sit down.”
Pol wore clothes, too, but had stolen fashions far older than Pax’s or Vin’s. The Chief Councilor was dressed in a bright-orange, Grecian-style toga, which was fastened at the shoulder by an ornate gold clasp in the shape of the tectonic world. Just as bald and dark skinned as the rest, Pol was the first to look normal to Ellis’s eyes, appearing as any of the Tibetan monks that he had seen on television or the cover of National Geographic magazine. Pol greeted them formally, standing straight, with one hand in the fold of his robes like Napoleon.
“Thank you for seeing us,” Pax said, sitting down. Ellis did the same, his eyes still taking in the views.
Pol was equally fascinated by Ellis, even bending to see what parts of him were hidden beneath the table. “Wonderful. Simply wonderful.”
“Ellis Rogers is a real gift,” Pax agreed. “The only one of his kind. As I explained in the memo, Ellis Rogers is here from the early twenty-first century, long before the ISP was formed, before the first excavations of Hollow World, and even before Monsanto started the first subterranean farms. His world still ran on fossil fuel, ate slaughtered animals, and lived every day on the grass at the mercy of the weather.”
Ellis hadn’t heard Pax speak like this before—so formal and filled with admiration. It surprised him.
“A true Darwin,” Pol said, nodd
ing. “And you traveled in a time machine like H. G. Wells—one of your own making?”
“I built it in my garage. It wasn’t that hard. A guy named Hoffmann did all the real work. He figured out how to do it.”
“Can you return to your time? Are you just visiting?”
“No. It’s a one-way thing. I’m here permanently, although I won’t be here long.”
“No?”
“Well, you see—I have a medical condition that—”
Pol held up a palm. “Pax explained about that in the message sent to me along with an accounting of your role in helping to stop a murderer, who had killed one of our beloved geomancers. Trust me, all of Hollow World is in your debt, and we will see to it that any defect you have is corrected. You’re a treasure to us, and a hero—not that you needed to be. Those at the ISP love this sort of challenge, and to work with a true Darwin, well…” Pol appeared at a loss for words.
Pol reached out and squeezed Ellis’s hand. “We’ll take great care of you.” Pol then turned to Pax. “Thank you for bringing Ellis Rogers to us, and for your role in solving the murders as well. You’ve performed an invaluable service to Hollow World, Pax. I’ll see to it that you’re remembered for this.”
Pol tapped the brooch at the shoulder of the tunic, and the portal reappeared behind their chairs. “And you can trust that I’ll take very good care of Ellis Rogers.”
A moment of silence hung. Pax stood slowly, eyes cast low.
“Thank you again, Pax,” Pol said.
The time for saying goodbye was at hand again, and while Ellis was pleased to discover he’d earned a free medical procedure, he felt awful once more. What else could he do? What else did he expect? How long had he even known Pax? Ellis couldn’t understand his own feelings. All he knew was that he enjoyed being around Pax, and the idea of never meeting again was so unpleasant he dropped into depression.
He put his game face on. Ellis was going to suck it up and be manly. He watched as Pax hesitated, then turned back to face Pol with serious, troubled eyes. “Who is Ren?”
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