Episode Thirty: The Chase

Sarah awoke shortly after William got off the phone with Dean, but William was too distraught to talk. He sat on the hill looking down the river; tears marked his tired face. Elizabeth sat down with Sarah and unwound their bizarre situation to her. Although some distance away and with his back to them, William listened as Elizabeth told the tale, starting with Troy's grand vision of the Endless Frontier. A few times during the narrative, Sarah asked a question. William had missed her voice, and relished each word she spoke, but his rejoicing in her presence was poisoned by the knowledge that Dean had degraded her into a bartering chip. Her well being depended on his cooperation with the man who had robbed him of everything, twisting his masterpiece into a cage.
About the time Elizabeth was recounting the storm, Troy Lombardi appeared, standing on the Origin in the default clothing. Seeing William, he took a few steps in his direction before falling to his knees. William ran down the hill, concern for Troy let him forget his own problems for a minute. Troy was crumpled on the ground when William reached him. Troy's eyes were closed, but when William shook him, he opened them for a moment.
“The Horizon—” Troy whispered, then closed his eyes.
“What?” asked William, afraid to hope.
Barely audible, Troy said one final word before sleep enclosed him: “—open.”
Suddenly very aware of the camera mounted near them, William calmly picked Troy up and carried him up the hill. Elizabeth and Sarah hadn't noticed William's absence, but they both stopped talking and gave him their full attention when he appeared carrying Troy.
“What happened?”
“Who is that?”
William didn't answer them until he had fully passed the crest of the hill and knew that Dean couldn't see them. “The Horizon is open.” Elizabeth opened her mouth, forming a question, but William kept talking. “Troy must have gotten to the portal. I think Dean drugged him and sent him back in. If the three of us escape at the same time, I'm sure we will be able to overpower him. We went south and Troy went north; I think the quickest way out would be to head east: that ridge isn't has high. Elizabeth, I haven't been paying attention to time, how long do we have before my hour is up?”
“I don't know, maybe a half-hour, forty minutes at most.”
“I'll take the phone and talk to Dean when he calls—stall him as long as I can. He'll drug me before he pulls me out. Don't stop for me.” Even as he was talking William began walking, then when the girls followed he increased the speed to a jog.
As soon as they entered the trees they fell into line, William took the lead and Elizabeth held up the rear. There wasn't much of a trail, but the forest had only sparse underbrush, leaving the way forward mostly clear.
When William accidentally led them into the thick patch of brush, Sarah found a quick way through and took the lead, pushing the groups speed even faster then they had been going. Had they not been in the Endless Frontier, with a computer generated perfect fitness level, they never would have been able to keep going.
Running behind Sarah, William found himself admiring her. Dumped in a totally foreign world she hardly understood, exposed to torture of the most brutal kind, and finding a boy friend she must have given up on a long time ago and who had hardly even spoken to her, she was doing amazing well. With only a short explanation she was leading a charge through the wilderness on the faint hope of escape. Not having time to do anything about her long hair, she had tied it in a knot behind her head. Like everything else about her, he found that knot attractive.
As they ran up a grassy hill, William came up next to Sarah. “I'm sorry, you were pulled into this,” he said.
“I honestly can't say I'm glad to be here,” she responded quickly, “but I'm glad to see you alive.” Her voice dropped to a whisper that William could barely hear as they ran. “I never thought I would see you again.”
After about half an hour, the group had to slow down. They had reached the foothills and were all out of breath. As they walked William pointed out a canyon that he knew turned into the random horizon. He told the girls that would be the easiest route, but that they would have to cross a small stream multiple times as they ascended. “If we were on a Saturday afternoon hike, I would also mention the beautiful wildflowers,” he finished, somewhat surprised at the happiness he was feeling. They were going to make it! And even better, he thought, Sarah had missed him.

Episode Twenty-Nine: The Horizon

Troy Lombardi awoke in tattered clothing with his back on the sandy beach. Nothing hurt. The wet sand was comfortably conformed to his body. After looking around the beach for a while he was able to find some of his gear, but not much. No tent, torn clothes, spoiled food, no canoe. He found some jerky, which for some reason seamed funny to him this morning. Meat in a world without animals.
He kept breakfast short, the quiet determination to go on hadn't left him, and he wanted to be on his way. For a short time he delayed, trying to decide if he should return to the remains of the lodge for supplies, or adventure into the wilderness with what he had. He decided to reach the top of the stairs and at least examine the next leg of the journey. If it looked easy, he would start out. If he felt like he would save time in the long run by getting gear, he would go back.
Once again Troy began to climb the stairs. As he realized that he was the only one who had ever actually climbed these stairs. The others had always gone off in other directions. He decided that he would call them the Lombardi stairs. And if these were the Lombardi stairs, the waterfall was certainly the Lombardi Falls, and the river the Lombardi River. These pleasant thoughts occupied him for most of the climb up. Near the top, he looked up and saw the clump of grass.
“This time,” he told the grass from below, “I'll reach you. I'll see what you see, when you look the other way.”
But to the north, there was nothing to see. At first Troy thought the ridge must immediately drop away, because he couldn't see anything beyond it, but the absolute nothingness of it shortly came into his full view. The landscape abruptly ended; only the sky continue on in a great blue sphere. Far below him, the sky turned black where stars looked upward at a blue sky.
“How?” Troy whispered to himself. Glancing back at the Origin Valley to make sure he wasn't dreaming, he saw that everything was in order; water appearing from nowhere rushed into the river at his left before plunging into the lake. Curious he picked up a rock and tossed it into the horizon, the moment it crossed over the line where the landscape ended, it vanished.
Then impulsively Troy threw himself into the void. Just like the rock, he vanished, or as he felt it, everything vanished—himself included. In the bareness of his thoughts, Troy had the wonderfully strange experience of gaining a thrill of hope after having believed all was lost. Freedom was about to be his.
Then reality hit him hard. Over two months of lying prone and unmoving had left his body weak. A feeding tube was jammed down his throat. He tried to move his hands, that were lying on the pillow above his head, but he couldn't. The room was slowly coming into focus, but his eyes didn't seem to work very well. After stretching his fingers a few times, he felt around with them and realized Dean had handcuffed him to the bed.
Slowly, painfully, he rolled onto his stomach and used his hands to pull out the feeding tube. His eyes were working better now, he could see the others one of which, to his surprise was Elizabeth. “What is she doing in there?” he thought. Another girl he didn't even recognize. He wondered if William and Jim knew about them. Using his feet he was sure he could hit the power switch on the white box under Elizabeth's bed, the one that housed the mind connection equipment, but he was certain that would only lead to his recapture.
The next closest was William; the head of his bed was against the foot of Troy's. Stretching as far as he could Troy was able to touch the white box with his foot, but not quite far enough to reach the switch. Unable to think of anything else, he kicked the box as hard as his weak legs would let him. Pain shot up his leg. Hearing a noise, Dean Senoma walked into the room, magazine in hand. Seeing Troy awake and moving he immediately stepped out of the room. When he returned a moment later, he was pointing a pistol right at Troy.
“How did you get out?” Dean demanded.
Not wanting to give anything away, Troy held his tongue—he wasn't sure if it still worked anyway. For good measure he kicked the white box a second time, but the only result was his own wincing. Dean walked over to the desk and shook the mouse. The screen lit up showing a window that was tracking the status of the computer's memory. It said sixty-one percent full.
“Something must have gone wrong with your connection. I should kill you now,” said Dean, “but William will want to see that you are still alive.” He waited for a response, but Troy wouldn't give one. “In fact, I think I'll send you back to the Origin right now. Perhaps having another one of his friends around will help him change his mind.”
Realizing he was about to be sent back into the Endless Frontier, Troy raised himself to his knees and stretched out his neck away from the pillow. His effort was rewarded as Dean cursed at the computer when it wouldn't connect. Seeing Troy's defiant effort he retrieved a syringe. In his weakened condition Troy couldn't put up much of a fight, but he did his best. In only a matter of moments, Dean had emptied the contents of the syringe into his arm. He lay back on the bed and drifted into the Endless Frontier.

Episode Twenty-Eight: Sarah

The cool smell of evergreen trees filled Sarah's nostrils. In a groggy state she felt the cot beneath her and tried to remember where she was. Filling her with fear, her memory slowly returned.
A man had called her, wanting to know about William. He said he was William's brother and wanted any information that might help find him. After telling him on the phone that she had already told the police everything she knew and that they were trying, he offered to take her out to lunch so they could talk about it. Unable to say no, she reluctantly accepted. She was tired of repeating how little she knew, wishing she knew more.
Lunch had been a ruse. Instead of taking her to a restaurant, he took her to a large office building, not saying a word the whole drive there even when she had tried to start a conversation. He just stared ahead and kept driving. In the parking garage below the building, after he brushed off her comment about there not being a restaurant in the building, she had demanded he take her home. He had been walking in front of her and turned around with a wicked smile on his face. She couldn't remember anything after that.
“Where am I?” she tried to ask, but the words came out jumbled and she had a hard time opening her eyes. Above her she could only see green, but in a moment a blurry face appeared above her.
“You are going to be alright Sarah,” the face said. She recognized that voice.
“William?”
“Yes, it is me.”
“What is going on? Where are we?” Her mind and senses were clearing quickly, but her confusion was mounting. She could tell now that her cot was under a green canopy and that William was the only one next to her. She tried to sit up, but still found herself weak. They were on a grassy hill top somewhere high in the mountains. “How did I get her? Where have you been?” William had a troubled look on his face. She could tell she was asking him too much all at once, but in her nervousness she couldn't help it. A sudden thought curdled her blood. “Are we dead?”
William heaved a sigh. “No, we're not dead. At least not yet.” He paused for a moment, then went on when Sarah kept looking at him in the eye, demanding answers. “We are in the virtual world I told you I was working on. We're being held captive—”
Elizabeth's voice shattered the air, coming from the bottom of the hill where she had been sitting alone. “No, Dean. Don't do it!” She jumped up and came running toward them. “William, if you don't help him, He's going to hurt Sarah!”
“What?” said William, visibly afraid.
Any answer Elizabeth may have been about to give was cut of by Sarah's piercing cry. She clutched her left arm protectively to her body and in a spasm tumbled out of the cot and onto the grass. William immediately dropped to her side and held her as she sobbed. After only a few seconds passed, Sarah screamed and tried to push William away.
“Sarah, what's wrong? I'm not hurting you.” William didn't know if he should hold her close or let her go. She responded to his voice but looked into space focusing on things he couldn't see. William wheeled on Elizabeth who had crumpled on the ground. Grabbing her shoulders and pulling her up to look her in the eye, he demanded, “What is Dean doing to her?”
“He is using a spliced mental connection with her. At any time he can play a recording to one of her senses that overrides the information being sent from the Endless Frontier.” Her words were strained and were broken by occasional sobs. “He can make her feel like she is burning alive, play recordings of starving children in her ears, make her see nothing but bullets and burning buildings around her. You have to stop him, William.”
William encased Sarah, who was now shuddering uncontrollably, in his arms. Great tears formed in his eyes and flowed without restraint. “Sarah, I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Sarah,” he whispered in her ears, not even sure what torment she was going through.  She suddenly went limp in his arms, even her breath stopped.
William jumped and took the phone from where Elizabeth had let if fall, still open. “Dean stop it now. I'll talk, just stop.” He gasped the words out in heaving breaths.
“Okay, I've stopped it,” Deans voice was calm, like they were engaged in small talk over lunch.
William looked over at Sarah and saw her chest rising and falling, but still unconscious. “What do you want from me?” he asked.
“Plans and diagrams on how to construct another computer like this one. Then if I can't find someone who can build it, I want you to build me one.”
“Will you let Sarah go.”
“I can't have her run to the police.”
“Why should I help you? You want everything and promise nothing in return.”
“You and your friends can live happily ever after in the world you have created, otherwise I'll dispose of Troy and Jim, move you and Sarah to a better location where I don't have to pay rent. There I will play with Sarah's senses until I break your will, I'm sure that will be much quicker than breaking your will directly. In the end you will help me either way.”
William felt hollow inside. He was ready to die, but he couldn't watch Sarah suffer. “Please Dean, give me an hour. Just to think.”
“What is there to think about?”
“Only an hour. Just one hour.”
“I'll call you in an hour. If you don't answer, or I don't like your answer, Sarah will feel her back bend and snap, repeated every ten seconds for the next five days!”
Already broken, William openly wept.

Episode Twenty-Seven: The Deadline

Buzzzz. Buzzzz. Buzzzz.
William felt the cold hard stone of the origin under him. Trying to relieve his aching head, he sat up and covered his hands against the bright light of the morning sun. I am alive, he thought. He remembered watching as Elizabeth lost strength and dipped beneath the waves. Pointlessly he had shouted her name. The urge to save her had almost given him the strength to dive after her, but he knew he was struggling just to keep his own head above water. Even in the freezing water, his arms and legs burned from the effort to stay alive. In the back of his mind he was aware that all the struggle was pointless, but the situation was just too real.
He remembered slipping beneath the waves, unable to wave his arms and legs any longer. Then heavy water water rushed in to fill his lungs as bad air burst out. Then darkness. I'm alive, he thought, almost disbelieving, I'm alive.
Buzzzz. Buzzzz. Buzzzz.
He only vaguely remembered hearing the first ring of his phone, but he ignored it a second time and looked around. A few feet to in front of him he saw Elizabeth, still unconscious in the default clothing. The pine forests and rugged mountains of the Origin valley surrounded him in all their majesty, but the sight only wearied him. He turned to look over his shoulder at the camera, wondering if Dean was watching him. A second woman lay between him and the camera, also with long hair and in the default clothing. Startled he jumped up and went to her. Kneeling over her he saw that this woman was Elizabeth. Then who was the first?
Buzzzz. Buzzzz. Buzzzz.
Cautiously walking over to her came to a horrible realization.
“NO! No. No. No. No No.” he cried. Behind  him he heard Elizabeth stir, but ignored it. He ran to Sarah's side and gently shook her. She remained totally unconscious, barely even breathing.
Buzzzz. Buzzzz. Buzzzz.
“What have you done to her!” William shouted into the phone, speaking before he was even sure it had connected.
“Uhhh—William, where are you?”
Williams voice suddenly dropped cool and hardened. “What have you done to Sarah?”
“I didn't know you would be at the Origin this morning,” answered Dean weakly.
“I died last night, but that is beside the point. What have you done to Sarah.”
William's shouting fully aroused Elizabeth. She moved over to Sarah and seeing a patient her medical training kicked in. She became cool and collected and began to look for a pulse.
“William, I promise you she is fine,” said Dean. “I wanted to talk to you before you saw her, but I guess that it too late now.”
“Why is she here.”
“This isn't about her, William. It's about you. I need your help.”
“I don't care what you do to me. Why is she here!”
“I know you don't care about yourself. She is my insurance. You won't help me for your own sake, so I'm asking you to help me for hers.”
Elizabeth had grasped the situation the moment she had seen Sarah. A part of her tried to convince her that she should be happy about it. With Sarah here, William was sure to cooperate. But she had learned that it was that same part of her that had let Dean pull her into this mess in the first place. No, she thought, another victim. Sarah is another victim, and Dean is the monster.
William was still as stone for a few long seconds. Elizabeth could tell that he didn't want to believe what was happening, but was trying to deal with it anyway.
“Listen to me Dean,” he said. “A week ago, you were right. I was going to die before I helped you. But a few days ago your brother Jim changed my mind. He wants to live much more than I do, so does Elizabeth. I was going to help you for their sakes, but not now.” Surprised Elizabeth looked up at him, but he wasn't looking at her. “I love Sarah more than anyone in the world, but I cannot help you now. How many people will you trap before this is over Dean? A hundred? No Dean I'll let Sarah die with the rest of us before I have to breath each day knowing others are trapped because I assisted you.” With a finality she knew she could not contest, William threw he phone to the ground. The plastic casing shattered, and little pieces scattered.
Without a word, William put Sarah on his shoulders and began to hike over the hill toward the lodge. Elizabeth waited for a moment, trying to get a grasp on what had happened before following. She met he at the top of the hill where he had stopped.
“Where is the lodge?” she asked, seeing the wreckage.
“I have no idea,” he replied. For a moment the two of them stood looking at the wreckage. William came to himself first, setting Sarah down on the grass. He gathered a canopy and cot from the mound of supplies that had replaced the shed, wading through a bit of water and generally having to clear a path through the rubble.
Elizabeth sat down next to Sarah and waited for him to return. “What are we going to do now?” she asked him.
“You start working on the canopy. I'll get the cot set up so Sarah doesn't have to lie on the ground.”
“I mean what are we going to do about Dean? About trying to stay alive?”
“We can't stop Dean from killing us.” As he spoke William opened up the cot bag and began piecing the different parts together. “If he does, it will be on his own prerogative; I'll have nothing to do with it. Right now I plan to do what I can for Sarah. If Dean doesn't kill us, I'll start pushing the horizon again, unless I can come up with a better plan of escape. Regardless of the method, I will always try to get out. But I will not—I will never—don't even ask me to—bargain with Dean.”

Episode Twenty-Six: The Peak

During the night as the snow deepened encasing Jim in his small hovel, the sounds of the storm were muffled into silence. In a few hours his own heat had comfortably raised the temperature, and he drifted into a deep sleep. He became aware of morning as a passage of time; the snow blocked the rising sun. Preparing himself to brace the storm anew, he used a hatchet like as an improvised shovel and hacked his way to open air.
The morning was still new. Blue sky was everywhere and the snow was dazzled by the light of a new sun. Jim saw that he had been closer to his goal than he thought. Less than a hundred yards up the ridge the peak was raised against the sky. Leaving his sleeping bag and pack, putting socks on his hands again to protect them from the snow, and reawakening his hopes that he might yet live through the day, he began to struggle through the waist deep snow toward the peak.
The air was abnormally warm for a snow covered peak, but perhaps the storm and snow were the true abnormality. The ridge he had been following came from the direction of the shore and at the peak joined another ridge that was still blocking his view. When he saw the land beyond pushing back the horizon he would see it all at once.
His heart began beating as he neared the peak, to the west he could see the mountain range sank into the ocean many miles away. To the east he could only see peak behind peaks and the plains next to the ocean. To the north, there was only a horizon.
When his eyes reached the same level as the peak, the whole world froze.  He could clearly see that he was on a peninsula with an ocean on the north and the south, but the peak still blocked a wedged shape of the northern ocean from his view. The next moment he could move again and surged up to the peak.
He had found the horizon. A black void, an inverted triangle in the shape of the mountain that had blocked his view the moment the memory in the computer ran out, lay like a strange shadow in which nothing could be seen across the surface of the ocean. Jim guessed the computer had started trying to fill that void in with the land nearest him, because the north side of the mountain was solid and whole.  A large band of ocean had also been filled in, but the void was there—just a few miles from the shore.
His mind leaped to William and Elizabeth. Their boat would reach the horizon long before he could—unless Dean was already talking with them. Perhaps Dean had already talked with them and taken them out! Then Troy, wherever he was must be close to the horizon. It would take Jim at least a full day to get down to the shore and a few more to make a boat.  He would have to wait.
For a moment he considered the glade at the foot of the mountain, but now that he had seen the horizon he just couldn't let it leave his sight.  After getting his things, he returned to the peak and began walking to the horizon—but this time, he could see it.

Episode Twenty-Five: The Storm

Jim gripped the wooden handle of the large knife tightly as he hacked a path through the thick bushes. From a distance they just looked like tall grass, or else he would have gone around them. He didn't know what kind of bush they were, but their green tops were almost chest high and their stems were so intertwined that pushing through was impossible. A blister had formed and popped leaving his palm raw, but he figured it would be gone in a few hours. No point in slowing up; he grit his teeth and hacked at a particularly thick branch.
Two days ago when William finally realized he had to accept Dean's offer to prevent them all from getting killed, he agreed to do so on the condition that they continue looking for the horizon until the last minute possible. Glad for an excuse to get off that little boat, Jim had mentioned that it was a waste to have all three of them together when it only took two to handle the boat. As soon as they had seen land that afternoon they dropped him off.
Since that time he had accomplished nothing. From the boat they had seen gentle hills resting before a row of mountain peaks that hid the interior of the continent from view. Now he was two days into those hills. When he had looked from the boat, he hadn't realized how many there were. In two days he hadn't added a single foot of land to the computer's memory.
Tomorrow was the last day: the day Dean said he would kill them, unless William gave in. Jim didn't know what it would be like for him. If Dean did kill him, it would probably just be like it had been in the tree, a deep sleep suddenly overcoming him. Even if his body felt pain, he wouldn't know it with his mind in the Endless Frontier.
And if Dean didn't kill them, what then? He was hundreds of miles from the origin valley. He wouldn't see Troy. He would just be alone in a vast wilderness waiting. Waiting to die, or waiting for William to somehow get him out. Just like his family was waiting. Waiting for the news that he had died, or waiting for him to come home. Or just waiting never knowing.
He supposed that even if he spent the rest of his life pushing the horizon he would never see it. Dean would add more memory, or just put him to sleep and clear the memory every once in a while. Around noon he found a nice glade in a small canyon at the foot of the mountain. A large boulder had fallen there—or rather had been generated there—and had a hollowed out side. He imagined that with very little difficulty he could use some trees and brush and make a very good shelter.
“I told William I would chase the horizon until tomorrow,” he said aloud. “He'll never know if I did. What I do now won't change if he accepts Dean's offer.” He sat down in the shade of the boulder for a few minutes, enjoying the rest.
The whole time he sat there, he knew he wouldn't stay. He couldn't. But maybe tomorrow, he finally decided. Once he reached the peak, there would be no where he could go before tomorrow ran out. No more land for him to generate. Then he decided he could rest.
Shouldering his pack, grabbing a branch that would make a good walking stick, he faced the mountain. As he walked he noticed that the wind was blowing dark clouds over the summit of the peak far above him.
Following the small canyon where the creek came down, he made good time, but as he pressed onward the temperature began to drop. Soon he got out the coat he had packed. Another or mile or so up the trail snow began to fall.
White snow on green shrubbery and trees with green leaves. There wasn't an evergreen in sight. Jim wondered if the snow was some kind of glitch. Without a trail he frequently pushed aside branches and scrambled up cold rocks that left his cold hands raw. Determined to press on to the peak before giving up, he stopped again and put a pair of socks over his hands.
Darkness came early, hiding the peak from his view. Still he pressed on, though somewhat reluctantly. The trees he had been hiking among had vanished some time ago. The snow was up to his shins and he was bitter cold. Between snow, fog, wind, and darkness he couldn't see more than thirty feet.
Suddenly the ground angled downward and he almost tripped. He looked out into the flakes of white and darkness and wondered if there, less than thirty feet from him, the horizon waited. He was definitely on a ridge, but he didn't know if it was the ridge he had seen from the boat. He might still have miles before then. Too cold and tired to really care, he turned up the ridge and continued, resolved to stop at the first sign of a half decent shelter.
Shelter came in the form of a crack under a large boulder just under the ridge. It was dry under there, and slightly warmer. He shoved his sleeping bag in then barely wedged himself into it. He covered his head, that was still sticking out with his coat and used his pack as a pillow. It wasn't comfortable, but after a while it was warm.
The snow deepened around him. The wind howled. But his thoughts were of home which he didn't know if he would ever see again. And a brother, that was willing to kill him to make sure he didn't.

Many miles away at sea, the storm overtook the only boat. Soon the waves heaved against the sky, tossing the frail craft. William and Elizabeth desperately fought to keep the craft afloat, but to no avail.
When the boat finally capsized, they were both already exhausted. As he struggled to tread water, unable to find anything to hold on to, William shouted above the din of the storm, unsure if Elizabeth could hear him from even the short distance that separated them.
“Don't worry, we'll soon be back in the lodge. Dieing doesn't matter. Remember!” He couldn't tell if she heard, or hear if she responded, but both of them tread water for far longer than they thought they were physically capable of.

Episode Twenty-Four: The Breaking Point

Three days after starting the lodge on fire, the explosions—that Troy still felt from the other side of the lake—stopped. The first night he had been unable to sleep; the ground shuddering with clockwork regularity.  His short sleep ended when the wind shifted carrying the smoke from the lodge to his small camp, and forced him to get some distance.
Luckily the blasts had thrown many supplies along with debris into the lake, and he was able to salvage a canoe, a tent, and other supplies that had washed up on the shore a safe distance away. He returned to his camp at the base of the cliff and once again began to wait.
For two days he watched the continual stream of smoke and flashes of light with a sick hollow feeling, eating little. Nothing he did in this place worked. The deal with Dean fell through. Because he told Dean about the horizon they would never be able to reach it. Destroying the lodge hadn't messed the computer up a bit.
Early in the morning on the third day the small vibrations stopped. When the sun rose the sky over the south end of the lake was clear. After crossing the lake in the canoe, Troy examined the wreckage. A pool of water filled a crater where the shed had been, filled with pyramids of of supplies. Everywhere else was covered in the reappearing supplies in various stages of burnt and burning. The stench was horrible. All signs of the lodge were gone, covered in ax heads, cooking pots, backpack frames, tent stakes, and other non-flammable supplies where piled high above the kitchen where Troy was certain a fresh bag of chips waited at the exact spot the shelf had been. Only when the dynamite had blasted its way to the lake and let the water in, the chaos stopped.
His phone rang.
“This is Troy Lombardi speaking how may I help you,” he answered, dripping with sarcasm.
“Don't worry. I haven't forgotten our deal,” said Dean on the other end of the line. “I probably should since you destroyed all the cameras.”
Troy was relieved that he only knew about the cameras.
“Yes, Mr. Lombardi, I will get you out, but I've run into a financial problem trying to arrange the details of your transportation and placement. I need you to give me access to one account that will clear up that problem in advance. Just one bank account and all the passwords to access it. I'll collect the rest later after you have your freedom.”
“I don't remember all of the passwords. That is why I made the website that has all the information.”
“I only need you to remember the password for one account. Surely you can do that.”
Troy hesitated, the situation was totally in Dean's control. The only account he could remember was one he used frequently to satisfy his expensive tastes and buy luxurious gifts. Every week the bank automatically transferred a million dollars into it; by now it was over ten million.
“After what you have done to me, how can I trust you to keep your end of the bargain after you get some money. No, you can have the money, but I come out of here first.”
“You have no choice.”
“No,” said Troy. “If you want my money, keep the deal. You have already stretched it by delaying for days. I can't trust you for a moment. I'd rather you killed me than repeatedly be fooled into giving you money. I have learned I cannot trust you and do not plan to. Every chance you get you'll swindle money out of me and never let me go.”
“I am holding a syringe with cyanide in it right now.”
Troy sat down in the ashes. His palms were sweaty. After opening his mouth a few times he finally gave up trying to respond.
“Now. Mr. Lombardi,” said Dean, “I believe we were discussing your bank account. Don't you have something you want to tell me?”


Disgusted with himself, angry at Dean, and more aware of his mortality than he had ever been before, Troy doodled with his fingers in the ash around him. For a few hours he watched the clouds, just as real, just as majestic, and just as unknowable as the real ones. The wind pulled and stretched, gathered and clumped them, slowly growing thicker and thicker. A drop of rain landed on the back of his hand. Another landed in the ash turning it to a bead gray mud. Sparse and irregular, moist spots began appearing.
Suddenly increasing in strength, the rain soaked his clothes and hair. Little rivulets appeared in the ash like the branches of a tree growing backward, many branches growing into larger trunks. Rising out of the receding ash, wire cages—the remains of cushioned furniture and mattresses—and shattered porcelain from lamps and light fixtures began to appear. The water and ash smeared against and soiled Troy as it passed him, then slowly began to clean. Clouds masked daylight. Thunder echoed around the valley walls.
With the elements raging around him, Troy felt himself washing away. All his ambition, pride, and fear gave way to the pouring rain that emptied his soul. Then, like the tangles of wire around him, he felt something stick, something he didn't know had even been there.

The water of the lake was rough, but Troy paddled on. The rain was cold now and struck his skin like nails. Visibility reduced and he would have been totally disoriented without a small plastic compass. He legs felt cold and raw. Twice he stopped to bail out water, but the second time did hardly any good. As he approached the North shore he abandoned the canoe and swam.
Water flowed down the stairs in little waterfalls, making the rock slick. Small rocks and sticks from rushing in the torrent ripped at his bare feet: he had kicked off his boots in the water. He ascended them carefully and purposefully. No longer would he wallow and fret. No longer would he let the impossibility of success torment him. He would go on. And when the end came, it would catch him chasing the horizon. Out in the world, where the businessmen still traded stocks, laborers clocked in hours, and the weatherman appeared on the news every night, no one would know. Lombardi incorporated would fall into someone else's hand, his giving up now or continuing to try wouldn't change that. Perhaps his father would know, but even that didn't matter. What matter was that he knew. He, Troy Lombardi, would never allow sorrow and fear ruin him. He would go on.
After he climbed about two thirds the way up, the wind shifted. Air from below thrust upward violently, throwing drops of water into his down turned face. He froze in his steps, then looked upward. The green tuft of grass stood over him, guarding the horizon. Unable to look down, he locked his gaze on the green grass and continued to climb.
A round pebble that he never saw, slipped underfoot and pitched him backward. His arms flung around wildly, twisting his body, trying to get a grip on anything. With his legs dangling in midair, he caught himself for a moment, but he knew his grip wouldn't hold. “I'll be back,” he told the grass, then dropped into the rain.