The Sky Inside

by Clare B. Dunkle

  He consolidated the supplies as best he could, tossing out a few of the worst flavors of bars to fit in as many bottles of water as possible. Although Cassie’s bunny took up valuable space, he refused to throw it away; he was sure he would be giving it to her soon. He draped the shapeless hospital gown over his head and shoulders to cover his burns, tying it around his forehead so that it became a flapping desert burnoose. “How cool does this look?” he said proudly to his dog. It was just as well that Chip couldn’t answer.

  They followed the packet line away from HM1. The landscape around them offered little change: a series of rolling valleys continuing ahead, and the wall of high hills off to their left slowly drawing nearer. Only in the farthest distance could Martin see something different, something that was a deeper, brighter green, and then, just at sunset, a flash of brilliant light where he had seen none before.

  “I bet Fred’s message never got through to Dad,” he told Chip. “I bet they’ll never know what happens to us. And Mom and Dad—what do they talk about now that Cassie and me are gone? We’re about all they ever used to talk about.”

  He imagined his parents sitting silently at the kitchen table. His heart ached, and even the beautiful sunset couldn’t make it feel better. But Chip crept up close beside him and pushed his furry head underneath Martin’s arm.

  “You know what’s a shame, Chip?” he murmured as he watched the colors fade to indigo. “Mom would so love it out here. I’ve gotta find Cassie now. She’s all I’ve got left.”

  Clouds moved in the next morning, bringing a cool breeze, and the sun stayed hidden behind a solid mat of gray. Light rain began to fall, the first Martin had ever encountered. He couldn’t say that he liked it.

  “Yesterday I was covered in plant dust, and today I’m covered in muck,” he said as they slogged along through wet weeds. “I wish I was like you, Chip. You never get dirty.” When a region of hair became grimy or tangled, the bot just resimulated it; patches of dirt slid off the regenerating hairs and fell right to the ground. But Martin didn’t have this comfort. Soon his clothes were soaked, splashed with pale, gooey mud and plastered with wet plant bits.

  When the rain ended, the sun didn’t reappear. The day became warm and steamy. They came to a shallow lake caught in a wide, low canyon formed of rock laid down in long stripes of orange and taupe. Here and there on the lakeshore were large beige boulders, left behind from the weathering of the canyon walls. The rocks were still wet, and when Martin poked one with a stick, it scratched easily in a bright white streak. This was something Martin hadn’t thought of: rocks could be soft or hard. He remembered his dream of the Jell-O landscape and wished it had been real.

  He was out of sorts. He plunked a stone into the lake, watched its ripples die away, and then sat down on one of those soft rocks. It didn’t feel particularly soft to sit on.

  “I’m going to run out of water soon,” he observed, taking off his backpack. “I guess I’ll have to drink this lake stuff. And I don’t know how much longer I can keep eating these disgusting bars. You’re lucky you don’t have to eat, Chip. Maybe starving is better.”

  A man in ragged cutoff jeans stepped from a nearby tangle of cattails, and Martin’s heart nearly jumped out of his chest. “Quiet,” the man commanded, holding up his hand. But he wasn’t talking to Martin. He was facing Chip, who stood some twenty feet away down the lakeshore.

  Martin couldn’t see the man’s face, but he saw his dog’s reaction. Chip, too, had been caught completely by surprise. Now he crouched with tail and muzzle almost touching the ground, apparently too frightened to move.

  “Hey!” Martin called. “What are you doing to my dog?”

  “Just letting him know who’s boss,” said the stranger. “Out here, life is dangerous. You have to take charge.”

  He looked as if he would know what he was talking about. He was big and solid like a wrestler, the opposite of the soft suburbanites Martin knew. His sun-bleached hair was clipped into a short fuzz, and he was clean-shaven. His eyes were ice blue, startling in his darkly tanned face.

  “It’s hazardous to drink lake water unless you treat it,” the man said. “So you’re in danger of starving?”

  “No,” Martin said, backing away. “Well, yes and no. I guess I will eventually; I mean, if I haven’t got where I’m going.”

  “There’s a whole lake full of fish here!” said the stranger. “Eat one of them. Here, I’ll show you how.”

  He pulled off a dull mustard yellow knapsack and began to take out equipment. His mottled gray-green T-shirt was so faded and stained that it was impossible to guess what color it had started out, and his sneakers had reached such a state of battered old age that it was obvious they would sink down, sighing, like two flat scooter tires the minute he took his feet out of them. By comparison, the tattered cutoffs looked relatively new. At least Martin could still identify them as a former pair of jeans.

  Martin edged around him and ran to his dog. “Chip, are you okay?” he whispered. Shaking all over, Chip raised terrified eyes to his face. Then the dog laid his big head against Martin’s knee.

  “What’s the problem?” demanded a voice in Martin’s ear. The man stood right behind him, holding a fishing rod.

  “You scared my dog!” Martin said angrily. Chip was trembling like the jelly he actually was.

  The big man studied them with a puzzled frown. “Hey, I’m sorry,” he said. “I just want to help. We’ll try over here.”

  He scrambled onto a short bluff that overlooked the water, made his cast, and sat like a statue. Not three minutes later, the pole bent, and the man reeled in the line. A hand-size fish came up, shimmying from side to side. In spite of himself, Martin was impressed.

  The man shook his head. “Too small.” He expertly unhooked the shining creature and threw it back. Soon he had one twice that size on his hook, fighting to stay in the water.

  “My dad fished in the park,” Martin said, cautiously approaching, “but the fish would change into a number when you pulled them out—one, two, or three, depending on the size.”

  “I don’t know how to cook a number.”

  The stranger removed the struggling trout from his line. He smacked its head against the ground, and the fish stopped fighting. “This one’s small too,” he said. “But big enough for you. Do you know how to build a fire?”

  Suburb regulations strictly prohibited the sale of flammable devices. “What’s a fire?” asked Martin.

  The big man eyed him with something like disgusted pity and dropped the dead fish on the rock in front of him. “I’ll be back,” he said. “Watch out for the teeth; you can get nasty cuts from them.” And he walked off, passing Chip, who shimmied like a trout to get out of his way.

  In a surprisingly short amount of time, the man had kindled a fire, cleaned the fish, and cooked it in a lightweight skillet with a folding handle that he had produced from his capacious pack. “Here you go,” he said, setting the hot pan on the rocky ground in front of Martin. “A fork.” He brought out a flat fork with a shiny plastic handle. “Some salt.” He produced a tiny square saltshaker and sprinkled the fish. “Now you’re all set.”

  Martin ate ravenously. The lack of real cooking over the last several days made him ready to appreciate anything, but the fresh fish, barely out of the lake and right into his mouth, tasted blissful. He thought it was the best meal he had eaten in his life.

  “Don’t you want some?” he asked, but the man good-naturedly declined.

  “I’m not hungry right now.”

  As soon as Martin was finished, the stranger took care of his camping gear, cleaning it and stowing it away. Martin watched, fascinated by his efficient movements. Chip crept up next to him, and he absently stroked the dog.

  “Now that I’ve cooked for you,” the man said, “you should tell me your name.”

  “I’m Martin Glass. I lived in HM1. That’s the suburb down there.” He waved a hand in the direction from which they had come.


  “Martin.” The man used sandy dirt from the top of one of the soft rocks to scrub a spot from his skillet. “Nice name. My name’s Hertz.”

  “Like ‘hurts people’?” asked Martin respectfully.

  “No, I’ve never hurt people. It’s a different kind of Hertz.”

  “Are you from a suburb?” Martin wanted to know.

  “I don’t like to talk about the past,” Hertz said, fixing him with that ice blue stare. “I lost someone very important to me.”

  “Hey, I understand,” Martin said. “I lost someone important too.” And he told Hertz about Cassie. “I guess I should get going now. I don’t know how far I’ll have to travel.”

  “I’ll walk with you,” Hertz offered. “One direction is as good as another.” Chip looked apprehensive at this, but Martin was glad.

  They hiked through the open fields together and talked. Hertz knew an incredible amount of facts, from the names of insects, plants, and trees to the tracks and calls of animals. He told Martin that the high hills to the west were called mountains and described their snowstorms in winter.

  “We had a snow globe in the living room,” Martin said. “When you shook it, white snow flew around a little Santa Claus guy.”

  Hertz pondered this. “Maybe it was a terrarium that contained a mountainous or northern ecosystem.”

  “Well, it did have a teeny street sign that said The North Pole.”

  In late afternoon, they moved away from the packet line, heading toward a camping spot Hertz knew. Martin wasn’t sorry to distance himself from the steel rails, where the bot woman traveled. On the other hand, they were his only clue to finding Cassie.

  “I wish I knew where she was,” he said. “I’m so worried about her. What if that Motley guy is on the other side of those mountains by now? Maybe I’m wasting my time.”

  Hertz grew thoughtful, and they walked in silence for several minutes. “Martin, I think you should ask about her,” he said.

  “Ask who? Do you have friends out here? Like, is there a whole group of you or something?”

  “Sort of like that,” Hertz said. “Don’t you ever get the feeling that we’re surrounded by forces we can’t see?”

  Martin slowly shook his head.

  “Well, I know we are,” Hertz said with that intense look of his. “Twice a day, I go up high and look at all the wonders of the world below me. And I seek guidance, and I find answers.”

  “You mean you figure out stuff?”

  “It’s not like that. Come with me next time. Then you’ll see.”

  They had been heading, Martin realized, toward a high knob of ground. Over the next thirty minutes, they climbed it by the straightest path Hertz could find. Toward the end, it grew steep, and Martin needed help to scramble up. Chip slunk along behind them like a canine criminal.

  The top was a bald white crown of rock completely bare of plant life, about the size of the suburb’s old schoolyard. Gusts of wind swept across it, and Martin was nervous about standing up there, but Hertz evidently loved it.

  “Look at that view!” he said.

  Martin could see for miles back the way they had come. He saw part of the lake where Hertz had caught his fish, its canyon walls folding it into the surrounding landscape. Ahead lay the bright green land he’d seen earlier, big rectangles edged with pale beige, like a giant’s tile floor. Not far from it were more regular spaces: square patches that were all one color, dark objects dotted at intervals along the hills, dark ribbons and lines crawling across them. Whatever these things were, Martin could tell one thing about them: they didn’t belong to a natural landscape.

  He walked over to Hertz, who was gazing at the sky and the pale, sculpted hills. “What is all that stuff?” he asked, pointing at the squares.

  “Awful things,” Hertz answered shortly. “I never go that way if I can help it. It’s time,” he went on, squinting at the sun. “Let’s find out about your sister.”

  Hertz sat them both down near the center of their rocky stage and directed Martin to close his eyes. “Think of your question,” he instructed. “Free your worries. Be receptive. The guidance comes from within you and all around.”

  It wasn’t that Martin didn’t try. He certainly would have liked to free his worries. But he kept peeking, and that probably didn’t help. His companion sat cross-legged in a state of deep concentration, and Martin kept checking to see whether he had moved. The longer Hertz stayed relaxed, the more active Martin became. By the time Hertz opened his eyes, Martin was shifting from place to place as if he were sitting in nettles.

  “Well?” asked Hertz. “Do you know where your sister is now? No? That’s odd. Oh well, maybe tomorrow morning.”

  They clambered off the knob and headed toward their camping place. Martin was feeling puzzled. “Did you get any answers up there?” he asked.

  “I sure did,” said Hertz. “I learned that I should help you find your sister. It’s very important. It may even be the reason I was put here on this Earth.”

  Martin felt even more bewildered and a little uncomfortable. He liked Hertz, but he wasn’t sure he wanted such a devoted traveling companion, especially one with such strange intuitions. For the first time in hours, he glanced back at his dog. Chip was watching him like a prisoner being led away to die.

  “Hertz, did the person who was important to you teach you about all that stuff?” he asked. “You know, going up on a hilltop to get answers?”

  “What person?” asked Hertz with a slight frown.

  “You know, the one from your past. The one you miss so much.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Hertz said. “I live alone. You’re the first person I’ve ever met.”

  Martin was dumbfounded. But before he could argue, Hertz stopped them both with a gesture, pulling his knife from a loop on his knapsack. He silently shifted it to the other hand and then hurled it into the weeds ahead. There was a squeal and thrashing, and Hertz strode forward to collect his prize. “See?” He held up a bloodstained jackrabbit. “I never miss, Martin. Wait till you taste this!”

  The evening was as awful as the day had been wonderful. For a couple of minutes, the dead rabbit looked like Cassie’s plush toy. Then Hertz showed Martin how to skin it. He cooked it up and watched fondly as Martin choked it down, but he didn’t eat any himself. “I told you I’m not hungry,” he said. “Life out here takes discipline. You can’t just do anything you want. Which reminds me. You need to learn the proper way to use the local water.”

  Crouching by a stream, he demonstrated the use of a water-filtering pump, filling one of Martin’s empty water bottles. Then he broke the seal on a little medicine bottle and explained how it killed germs that lived in the water. Martin and Chip watched solemnly, as if they expected an exam to follow. Now, everywhere that Hertz went, two apprehensive pairs of eyes studied his every move.

  When night fell, the big man took a foil pouch out of his knapsack and ripped it open. “Wrap yourself up in this,” he directed. “You’ll stay warmer.”

  Martin received the thin metallic sheet without protest or comment and did as he was told. He stayed warm too: that night, he was as comfortable as he had ever been outside a suburb. But his dreams were garish. Shiny bright skillets and plastic-handled forks danced around and taunted him. Sharp buck knives climbed out of knapsacks and hunted him down.

  A poke on the shoulder roused him from sleep, and those pale blue eyes were the first thing he saw. No wonder he let out a yell.

  “Hey, nothing’s wrong,” said Hertz. “I’m going to climb my hill again. Want to come? It’s a great way to start off the day.”

  Martin sat up and shook his head. “No thanks,” he muttered. “I’d just slow you down.”

  “Okay then. Back in a bit. I’ll keep an eye on you, don’t worry.”

  Martin watched Hertz dwindle into the distance, then come back into view as he began his climb into the cloudy sky. Sure enough, Hertz was keeping an eye on him. The m
inuscule figure waved cheerfully in his direction from time to time. Hertz didn’t spend many minutes on the morning ritual either. It wasn’t long before he was coming back down.

  Chip crept over and laid his furry head in Martin’s lap. Although Martin breathed easier knowing that their strange companion was away, the shepherd seemed just as frightened as if Hertz were there. Those dark eyes pleaded with Martin for understanding.

  “I dreamt about camping supplies,” Martin told him. “All night long. Bright shiny skillets and bright plastic-handled forks, without a single scratch. Without . . . a single scratch.”

  Suddenly, the air seemed frigid. He felt the blood drain from his face. “And bottles that have never been opened,” he whispered. “And blankets that were never used. Chip! His clothes are so old that they’re falling off, but his camping gear’s never been touched!”

  Chip licked Martin’s hand, as if to signal his approval.

  “This is wrong,” Martin breathed. “This is bad. Very, very bad. We can’t run. He’ll find us. Can’t hide. I can’t fight him. And I don’t know what’s going on. Chip, I know you do. I know he did something—threatened you, threatened me, maybe—but you have to help me figure this out.”

  The dog’s intelligent brown eyes gazed up at him, and he thought Chip was about to give him a sign. But at that moment, they heard a halloo from across the field. The shepherd ducked away as if it were gunfire.

  Now that he knew they were in serious trouble, Martin felt more composed. He mustn’t rouse any suspicions, so he prepared himself to act normal. That shouldn’t be too hard. All he had to do was keep behaving like a kid.

  “Any new answers?” he asked as Hertz strode up.

  “No,” replied Hertz serenely. “But that’s okay. It’s just good to know we’re not alone in this world.”

  They prepared to break camp. Crouching over his knapsack, Hertz packed up his pristine gear while Martin put on his sneakers and picked the burrs out of his rapidly fuzzing socks. Chip slunk up beside him and copied him, gnawing at a front paw as if he were trying to extract a sticker from between his pads.