The Lonely Land

It took an hour before his eyes would open.

Open them a slit, close them, open them again. He did that over and over. The tears would not stop. That tears came at all surprised him a little.

The first thing he saw was his own hand. Under the hand was a floor.

Square panels laid down with no gaps. The panels were gray, with fine grooves cut into the surface. Nonslip.

The next thing he saw was the sky.

The sky was ordinary. Overcast. Marlow was a little angry that his first sky in thirty days was an overcast one.

Then he sat up.

＊

It was not the drill site.

No iron tower. No huts. No oxen.

The hole he had come out of opened in the middle of a flat floor. There was a railing around it. There was writing on the railing. Writing he could not read.

He raised his head.

There were buildings.

Not one. Too many to count. From ones about ten stories high to ones that looked fifty.

Not fallen.

Marlow had lived ten years in a fallen city. Every building in that city is half collapsed. The roof is down, the wall is gone, and people live in the gaps.

The buildings in front of him all stood straight. No broken windows. No grass growing out of the walls.

And there were lights on.

It was daytime, and some of the windows glowed white. Not the color of oil. The same color as the light One carried down below.

＊

There was a road.

On the road, people were walking.

Marlow went flat behind the railing. After he went down, he noticed that he had gone down. For the first time in thirty days, his body had moved on its own.

He looked over, carefully.

About thirty of them. Walking. Not in a hurry.

Some carrying bundles. Two of them carrying a board between them. Some standing still, talking.

It looked like an ordinary town.

One thing was different.

Nobody was smiling.

Not angry either. Not crying. Not troubled. All thirty of them wore the same face. The same expression, is what that means. The faces themselves were all different.

Marlow knew that face.

It was Otto's face. It was Sam's face. It was the face of men who bowed politely and said the same words twice.

＊

Marlow counted. The habit of counting had not worn off yet.

Thirty-four in sight.

Of those, four had the same face. All four were women of about fifty. Same height, same part in the hair. They were not walking together. In different places, doing different things.

Somewhere else, there were three men with the same face.

Last month's convoy had left fifty-eight sets of prints. Twenty-one men went out, and fifty-eight walked east.

Where had the extra thirty-seven come from.

The answer was walking past him.

＊

It was about thirty minutes before he stood up.

No use staying hidden. He had no water. No food. The cylinders for the climb were all empty.

He went over the railing and down onto the road.

At the sound of his steps, three people nearby turned around.

They were not startled.

A man had just come out of a hole after thirty days, and all three of them wore the face of someone passing a stranger in the street.

One of them walked over. A young man. Barely twenty. Wearing clean clothes.

He stopped three paces short and bowed politely.

“Mr. Marlow Kane, sir. We have been expecting you.”

Marlow had not heard that way of speaking in thirty days.

To be exact, he had heard it out of his own mouth on the twenty-fifth day.

“…You knew I was coming.”

“Yes, sir. We are informed that you take up your post next month.”

“What's the date.”

“The month has turned, sir. It is the eleventh day.”

The man bowed a second time.

“Please wash yourself and change your clothes, sir. After that, we will present you.”

“To who.”

“To the one who made you, sir.”

End of Chapter 18