“Most of ’em got books,” Henry said.
“Electricity?” Martin asked, looking down at the lanterns.
“We have batteries and a few generators,” Darla said, “but only for special occasions.”
“What about solar panels?” Martin asked.
“Not any we know how to use,” Henry said.
“I could help with that,” Martin said.
“You can?” Darla exclaimed. “That must be your thing!”
“My thing?”
“We all have a thing here,” Darla explained. “Like Henry is the guy who hunts and protects us. And I’m the girl who drives and … decides. So you’re the guy who knows about solar panels. That’s why you’re here. Don’t you see?”
“Okay,” Martin agreed. It sounded fine to him. After all, people were supposed to have jobs.
They walked quietly for a while as Martin surveyed the houses and storefronts. Even in the dark, he could tell this town was different from the others he’d visited. The shutters and signs were straight. Displays in windows, consisting of pumpkins and corn husks and mason jars, were all clean and orderly. The roads were clear. The grass was cut. This was a home, or as close to one as he had ever encountered.
“That’s the Smash Factory there,” Henry said, pointing to a storefront with a giant hammer painted on the window. “Raul did it up a while back. If you’re angry, or just plain bored, you can go on in there and bust things up. TVs, flower vases, car windshields, that sort of stuff. It’s good for a laugh.”
“And that’s Gina’s Joint,” Darla said, pointing to a house painted with swirls of neon green and pink. “It’s all kaleidoscopes and tie-dye and glow-in-the-dark hippy garbage. Avoid it if you get dizzy, but if you ever want any Roman candles or bottle rockets, then Gina’s your girl.”
Perched on top of a small hill, overlooking the town square, was a tall yellow house with a sharply slanted slate roof. A boy on its front steps caught Martin’s eye. A burning torch was in his left hand. His right hand was petting some sort of striped animal that was sitting patiently by his side. Martin didn’t recognize the boy from the church.
“What about him?” Martin asked, pointing. “What’s his thing?”
“That’s Nigel,” Henry said, grabbing Martin’s hand and lowering it. “His thing is he does whatever the heck he wants and we give him whatever he wants. It’s ’cause he talks to animals. Probably talking to that stupid tiger right now.”
“Do the animals talk back?” Martin asked.
“Well …,” Darla said, cocking her chin.
The house Martin picked reminded him of the houses on the island. It had gray shingles and a matching pair of gables. The ocean was miles off, but there was a creek that ran through the backyard with a calming whoosh.
“A bold choice,” Darla told him.
“How so?” Martin asked.
“You’ll find out soon enough,” she said with a sly smile. “I don’t know. Maybe it means something. A fresh beginning.”
Henry snorted, as if he couldn’t care less, and Darla let out a quick, jabbing laugh. They left Martin standing alone at the front door.
In almost every room of Martin’s new home, there were shelves full of books. In the garage, there were tools, covered in a thin film of dust. In the kitchen, there were canned goods stocking the cupboards. What Martin found most intriguing, however, was in the basement.
The basement consisted of one scanty low-ceilinged room with brick walls and a concrete floor. Candles in glass vases decorated ledges, and trunks, and wooden crates. A Ping-Pong table, with a stack of boxes on it, was pushed into the corner. From the pictures on the boxes, Martin could see they held kits for model cars and boats and trains. Against one wall was a grimy plaid sofa with a woven wool blanket hanging over its arm. On a coffee table, in front of the sofa, was a miniature house, cut in half to show its innards.
It was a dollhouse, or that was what Martin assumed. Only it didn’t look like the dollhouses he had imagined. The rooms inside weren’t reproductions of kitchens or bedrooms or parlors. They were all the same room, decorated in the same way, over and over, three floors of three, nine rooms in all. They had minuscule candles in glass vases, baby Ping-Pong tables pushed into their corners, grimy toy sofas. They were shrunken duplicates of the room Martin was standing in now. The only difference was that in every room except for one, there was a single glass bottle on the coffee table rather than a shrunken dollhouse. In that odd room out, the coffee table was empty.
Martin still had the bottle Kelvin had given him. Gingerly, he eased his fingers over the toy furniture and set it in its rightful place on the tiny table.
Martin slept in a giant bed on the top floor of the house, and he woke when the sun angled through an octagonal window just above the headboard. Downstairs, he opened a can of beans and then went out to the back porch and ate them for breakfast as he watched the creek. He had expected Darla or Henry or someone to stop by, but after a couple of hours and no visitors, he slipped on some shoes and headed to the front door to go for a walk.
Two large plastic jugs, each filled to the top with water, were waiting on the front step. A note sandwiched between the jugs read:
To get you started—Trent
In the distance, a boy pedaled a bicycle down the street, towing behind him a small red wagon filled with more jugs. Martin couldn’t catch up with the bike, so he opted to walk in the opposite direction, toward the town square.
The next person he came upon was a lanky girl with cropped blond hair and a tight outfit made from synthetic fabrics. She was jogging at a steady clip, heading straight for Martin.
As she approached, Martin waved. “Top of the morning,” he said.
Maybe that wasn’t the thing to say in this neck of the woods, because the girl didn’t slow her pace. As she blew by him, she raised four fingers.
“Four miles to go,” she grunted.
Four miles to go? Figuring out local phrases was sure to be a chore, Martin thought, but there was no point in stressing over these things. Martin was the new guy, and it was the new guy’s job to make mistakes, to learn. So he simply chose to move on.
He paused only when the yellow house from the night before came into view. Nigel wasn’t anywhere to be seen, but there was a collection of animals grazing and lounging in the yard. There were chickens and goats and cats and a few other creatures that Martin couldn’t figure out. He wondered why they weren’t scurrying off, as animals tended to do in the wild.
In the corner of the yard, a group of dogs were collected around a giant replica of an ice cream cone. It was at least eight feet tall, the sheen of it indicating fiberglass construction. The cone had a waffle-print design, and the ice cream was three scoops of three different colors—red, white, and brown. Martin had seen pictures of ice cream cones in a cookbook before, but he had never realized that dogs had such an interest in them. Their noses were glued to the thing.
“Git!” Henry commanded as he stepped out of some bushes, waving a stick. The dogs scattered, and Henry tossed the stick at the biggest one to make sure he didn’t contemplate turning back. Reaching into the bushes, he then pulled out a long nylon duffel bag, which he set next to the ice cream cone. He gave the scoops of ice cream a push from underneath. They detached from the cone and flopped backward on a hinge. It made sense to Martin now. This was a container.
Henry bent down and unzipped the duffel. From inside, he started pulling body parts of an animal: legs, torso, head. It was a deer, a moderately sized doe. Unaware or unconcerned that he was being watched, Henry deposited each piece into the cone, and when the bag was empty, he circled around and pushed the scoops of ice cream up. The hinges creaked. The scoops fell back on the cone. The container was shut. Henry grabbed the duffel and slipped back through the bushes and headed toward the town square.
Martin decided to avoid Henry and continue his explorations by turning down a narrow side street. It was quiet and pleasant, and th
e only other person around was a boy walking purposefully toward a narrow dirt trail that led into a thick patch of trees. Martin followed. It was easy to catch up, but he thought it best to keep his distance.
About a quarter mile down the trail, the boy angled off through a thicket of bushes, then stopped next to a rocky ledge. In the side of the ledge was a dark rectangular hole, framed with wood. The boy set something down next to the hole and bowed his head. After a minute or so, he turned back around.
“Oh, it’s you,” he said to Martin. “I thought I heard some sort of a ruckus.”
“I’m so sorry.” Martin started to back away.
“No, no, stay,” the boy yelled. “I want to yak it up for a sec.”
Martin recognized him as he got closer. It was the olive-skinned boy named Felix, the one who had been jotting down notes in the church. The night before, in the dark, Martin hadn’t gotten a good look at most of the kids. For instance, he hadn’t noticed that Felix’s hair had been cut away in the front, and that he wore a dark band around his forehead where his bangs might have hung. Sticking out from that band were spools of string, screwdrivers, pens, and tiny lightbulbs.
When Felix reached Martin, he grabbed him by the wrist and said, “Wanna see what I’ve been working on?”
Martin shrugged.
Felix started pulling him back toward town. “Yes, oh yes! You will most definitely want to see this. Let’s log on. What do you say? We’ll log on and I’ll show you the finest Internet the world knows.”
—— 6 ——
The Web
The door to Felix’s house was painted black. Near the top, there was a heavy iron knocker in the shape of a field mouse. Below the mouse, two words were written in green paint.
Username
Password
“You’ll need to choose a username first,” Felix explained. “It could be anything. Last name and first initial. Maybe people call you Scooter or something. Who am I to judge?”
“Will Martin work?” Martin asked.
“Well, it isn’t exactly original, but it also isn’t taken,” Felix said with a thumbs-up. “What about a password?”
“Alarm clock,” Martin said without thinking.
“Spell it so I get it right.”
“A-L-A-R-M C-L-O-C-K.”
“All as one word?”
“Two words.”
“Any capitals? Do you use a zero for the ‘o’? You can never be too careful.”
“Just alarm clock,” Martin said. “As it’s spelled.”
“Okeydoke. Can’t say I didn’t warn you.” Felix retrieved a nub of a pencil and a key from his headband and pulled a small block of wood from his pocket. He hurried off a few quick notes. Then he placed the key in the door and pointed at Martin. “Try it,” he said.
“Try what?”
“Knock on the door.”
“But you’re out here with me.”
“Just knock.”
So Martin lifted the mouse and struck it against the door three times.
“Username?” Felix said in a deep voice.
“Excuse me?”
“Username?” he said again.
“Oh, yes … Martin.”
“Password?”
“Alarm clock.”
“Logged in,” Felix said, turning the key and shouldering the door open.
Felix’s home wasn’t a home at all. There was no furniture or decorations or anything to make one think this was a place to burrow, to sleep, to live. Thousands of strings created jagged checkerboards and drooping nets and twisted vines that covered the bare hallways and rooms. Each string was connected at both sides to blocks of wood that were either set on the floor or hung on the walls. Writing was scribbled all over each block.
“We only have about five hundred websites,” Felix explained, “but I’m adding more every day.”
“I thought the Internet was something for computers,” Martin said.
“Well, duh,” Felix said. “But do you know any servers that are still operating? Plenty of laptops out there with batteries, but it isn’t like you can go to the café for some Wi-Fi.”
Admittedly, computers were an abstract concept for Martin. He’d read about them. George had told him about them. He imagined picture frames filled with constantly changing text and images, and he imagined the Internet to be the source of all that visual chatter. He never thought it could be something so organic.
“What’s written on the blocks?” Martin asked.
“Ah, more to the point at hand,” Felix said. Then he led Martin into a vast room with a large block positioned in the center of it. Hundreds of strings sprouted from the block, like hairs from a giant square head. Only about one quarter of the block was covered with writing. In the biggest letters, the word Xibalba was written.
“Think of this as your default home page,” Felix said. “You have the story of Xibalba here, and there are screws on any word where I made a hyperlink. The string tied to the screw is the link. So if you want to know about … ohh, I don’t know, the peanut roaster … then you grab the string and follow it to another block. In other words, the peanut roaster’s web page. Then that block might have links to lots of other blocks and on and on and on and on.”
“The Internet was once used to find missing people, right?” Martin asked.
“It was used to find naked ladies too,” Felix said, “but this version isn’t advanced enough for either. Apologies if I got your hopes up.”
“That’s all right,” Martin said. “I’m okay with this version.”
“Well, then try it out, why don’tcha?” Felix insisted.
Leaning over the large block, Martin began to read. The writing was small but clear. It appeared to be rendered in black pen, but there were chunks of the wood that had been sanded or shaved away and rewritten on in fresh red ink. Martin ran his finger over the indentations.
“Edits,” Felix explained. “No web page should be static. Certainly not. Certainly not.”
“Of course,” Martin said as he resumed his reading.
XIBALBA
The town of Xibalba was founded on the Day.
It is believed to be the only place where
humans currently live. Its name comes from
the Mayan people. The founder and first
resident was a boy named Kelvin Rice.…
The word was appeared freshly written in a sanded dent in the wood. There was a screw in the middle of the name Kelvin Rice.
“Is there more about him?” Martin asked.
“Use the string,” Felix said.
Placing the string between his finger and thumb, Martin began to follow its path. It required a bit of patience, as the string twisted its way around and over and under other strings, but Martin was in no hurry. When he finally reached the block, he found it hanging by a hook on the wall. He took it down and looked at it closely. It was about the size of a fisherman’s tackle box. Three sides of the block were covered in writing. The fourth side was basically a door, with a small handle and keyhole. He began reading.
KELVIN RICE
Kelvin Rice was the founder of Xibalba. He
lived here on and before the Day, but he
never told anyone what Xibalba was called
before the Day. By the time everyone else
got here, its signs had been destroyed, and
evidence of its past removed. Kelvin was
the only person in Xibalba who didn’t have
an Arrival Story, but he began the tradition
of sharing Arrival Stories whenever a
Forgotten appeared. He also created the
Ring of Penance and it is believed that he
had kissed upward of fourteen girls. He
loved eating peanuts, and Chet Buckley
cooked them for him in a peanut roaster
near his greenhouse. In the days following
the Collapse, it was decided that Kelvin
should be banished
for two months to the
Ring of Penance. Many loved the irony of it,
but Kelvin
A knock on the door interrupted Martin’s reading.
“Excuse me for a sec.” Felix made his way around the strings until he reached the door. He turned the lock slowly. “Username?” he said.
A voice came back: “You know who.”
“Username!” Felix insisted.
“You got island boy in there?”
“Yes I do,” Felix said, “but I will require a username and password. Rules are rules.”
The door flew open, knocking Felix to the ground. Henry stood there with a rifle slung over his back.
“Forgot my username and password,” Henry said. “How ’bout you email ’em to me?”
—— 7 ——
The Marble
“Martin!” Darla exclaimed, stepping into the room from behind Henry. “You’re out and about and surfing the web. Good for you.”
“Good morning, Darla,” Martin said as he hung Kelvin Rice’s block back on its hook.
“That Kelvin’s page?” Henry asked.
“It is,” Martin said.
“Beautiful,” Darla said. “Exactly what we came for.”
Henry hurried around the strings, his rifle dangerously close to getting snagged. Darla put a hand out to Felix and helped him to his feet.
“I cannot let any joker in off the street. Passwords are a requirement,” Felix told her.
“This is important, Fee,” Darla crooned. “Gotta understand that.”
“It’s always important with you, Darla,” Felix moaned.
“I’m an important girl,” Darla chirped.
“And, Henry,” Felix went on, “I’ve told you time and again, no guns in the Internet.”
“No guns in the Internet,” Henry mimicked in a high-pitched voice. He stepped past Martin and pulled Kelvin Rice’s block off its hook.
“We’ll need to get into Kelvin’s personal page,” Darla said. “With Martin showing up outta nowhere, we gotta see if this is another thing he kept to himself.”
“No can doozy,” Felix said. “Need a password and authentication in the form of a signed note. You know this.”
The Only Ones Page 5