Ellie walked into the kitchen at the back of the house where she found most of her housemates busy making dinner and talking over the events of the day. Her eyes rested fondly on the little girl playing next to the fireplace, and for a moment she lost herself in the memories of how her pride and joy had come to be. But she soon roused herself, there was too much to do, too much to take care of before she could rest and think.

"Murron, darling, could you run up to the blue room and air it out a little? We might have a guest for a few days."

"Yes, mama."

The others looked up curiously, so she plowed right on. "Lottie? There's a traveller outside who might be staying with us for a little while. Go out and see if he wants to stay. Give him the blue room."

Lottie, now 18, shot her a curious glance, but obeyed without question. Ellie was glad that Lottie had been too young back then to really be interested in what was going on, but she supposed that with the appearance of Luke, she might start asking questions. She turned to the rest of her friends.

"I guess Gel already told you that someone came to see me. He's, uh, somebody I used to know, but I haven't seen him in half a lifetime. He doesn't know about anything that happened..." she hesitated "... to me since he left. I don't want you lot to tell him anything about me, or about Murron, all right? If he asks about how we came here or about what happened in the last eight years, be my guest and tell him what you like, but I forbid all of you to mention Murron with a syllable."

They all stared at her, wide-eyed and dumbstruck. Ellie was not usually one to issue ultimatums like that. It was Gel who recovered first.

"Sheesh, Ellie, you make it sound like we're the biggest gossips in the world!"

Sam burst out laughing and laid his arm around his girlfriend's shoulder. "I guess Ellie hasn't forgotten what you used to be like, huh?" he chortled.

Gel tried, and failed, to look offended. "Oh come on, I was 15 back then, I grew up a little, you know." At Ellie's sceptic look, she grinned. "I did, seriously! Do you see any pink on me?"

Patch and Dee laughed at this, and so did Darryl. They all remembered too well the pink-and-glitter creature that had walked into the house six years ago, and who had grown up into a moderately sensible young woman. It had been Sammy who had knocked some sense into her over the years, and ever since the two had begun sharing a room, the old silly Gel only resurfaced very occasionally.

"Seriously, though," Darryl started, "what's up with that guy that has your knickers in a twist?"

Ellie shot him a calculating glance. "I'd rather not say. I don't know if he's even staying the night, I just... wanted to make sure nobody said anything. The past is best left untouched, you know that, Darryl." At that, he shrugged and continued plucking the chicken he had in his lap. "And that goes for Murron, too, mind you. As far as you lot are concerned, he's just a traveller who stopped by for a day or two, and you know nothing else."

Dee and Patch looked at each other, but did not speak – they knew each other's thoughts too well to need words. But they were all curious to see the stranger.

Meanwhile, Lottie had tracked down Luke, who had ambled off towards the orchard in the falling darkness.

"Hi. Ellie told me to find you and set you up with a room if you want to stay the night. I'm Lottie, by the way."

"Hello, Lottie. I'm Luke." He squinted at her in the half-light, only seeing dark hair and dark eyes, not much more. "Yes, that would be very nice. I'm glad you'll let me stay, if it's not too much trouble."

She laughed. "Oh, not at all. Our house is big enough for one or two extra people, and we'd never make a traveller leave this late in the day. The forest is not a good place to spend the night."

"Oh, I wouldn't mind that, I'm used to it – but a bed sounds mighty nice right now."

She must have heard the longing in his voice. "Gosh, you make it sound like you haven't slept in a proper bed for ages. Haven't you?"

He laughed, a small, mirthless sound. "Oh no. I've been wandering up and down the country for years, and not a lot of people offer beds to strangers."

"Well, we do. Come on, I'll show you up." She grabbed his hand and guided him through the trees that were now shrouded in shadows, back towards the house. He could hardly see the way in front of his feet, but she seemed to have eyes like a cat – or a very good sense of direction – and landed him on the front porch without hitting a single obstacle. There, she let go of his hand, and walked into the house with him, up the stairs, along the corridor, and into the last room on the landing, which was lit by a few large candles.

A little girl was just plumping the pillow on the large bed. She had to be about six or seven years old, with blonde hair and eyes that reminded him of somebody, though he could not tell of whom. She was dressed in simple, deep red, and wore black tribal markings on her temple, just like Lottie and Ellie and the girl who had first met him had worn.

"Hey, Murron. This is Luke, our guest." The child smiled at him, and walked over to the window to close it. "Luke, do you want to come down and have dinner with the rest of us, or would you rather rest?" Lottie asked.

"Oh no, thank you. I think I'll just grab some sleep while I can, I don't want to be a bother."

Murron and Lottie both laughed. "You wouldn't be a bother, we hardly ever get visitors, and like to hear the news when we can – but if you'd rather sleep, we'll pester you about the goings-on in the rest of the country tomorrow. I'll set you up with some breakfast first thing in the morning." With that, Lottie turned and walked out, but Murron lingered. As he set his knapsack into a chair, Luke took another look at her, and saw her watching him with curious eyes.

"So you're Murron, are you? How old are you?"

She drew herself up as tall as she could. "I'm seven. How old are you?"

"I'm twenty-eight." He laughed as he saw her eyes grow as large as saucers – hardly anybody around here was older than twenty-five. "Pretty old, huh?"

"Oh, my mama says it's not polite to call people old. And besides, she says there are no old people any more – people used to be much older" she scuttled closer, confidingly, "some people were even fifty or older!"

That drew the first genuine smile out of him. "Yes, I remember that. But that was a long time ago – and it'll be at least another twenty years until there are fifty-year olds again."

"Yes, and there'll be grandparents!" She looked thoughtful. "I've never had grandparents, but my mama says that one day, when I have children, she'll be a grandma, and it sounds like so much fun!"

He actually laughed at that. "Yeah, grandparents are great."

"But I have an aunt and a lot of uncles, and they're a lot of fun too. Only I don't see them very often, 'cause they live on a farm near the city, and that's ever so far away" she motioned with her little arms to show how far.

"Have you ever been to the city, Murron?" he inquired.

"Once, I think, but I was just a baby then" she said with a superior face, indicating how much more mature she felt now. "I've always lived here, with my mama and Dee and Patch and all the others."

"That sounds like fun. Do you like it here?"

"Oh yes!" she grew animated. "I help in the gardens and play with the babies, and sometimes Lottie takes me for rides on the ponies. Only sometimes I wish I had a daddy to play with." Her face clouded over.

"Don't you have one?" It was a stupid question, really. So many children these days had no fathers to speak of, and could call themselves lucky if they even had a mother – there had been so many children born out of foolishness, abandoned by their fathers, left with mothers who were children themselves, and who could barely take care of themselves, much less of a tiny creature that needed one's full love and attention.

„I don't know who he is. When I ask mama about him she tells me not to bother, and says that he won't come back. The only thing I know about him is that I look like him."

"Well, that's not very nice, to leave you and your mama alone."

"No. But it's all right, because I have mama, and Darryl is almost like a daddy to me, too. He taught me to read and everything!" She was smiling once again, full of pride of her recently acquire accomplishment.

"That was kind of him. So you like to read?"

"Very much, but I can't do it very well yet. I'm getting better, though! I'll read to you sometime, if you like!" Her face shone full of eagerness.

"I'd like that very much. Thank you, Murron."

"Well, I'm going to leave you now. It's dinnertime, and mama says never to be late. Good night, Luke!"

"Good night, little one."

And he threw himself onto the bed, falling asleep almost instantly.

Downstairs, at the long kitchen table, the house's other inhabitants were each dealing with the arrival of the newcomer in their own way.

Dee was calculating how much more bread to bake to accommodate an extra mouth.

Patch was asking himself whether Ellie's old friend had some medical knowledge to share.

Darryl had listened intently to Murron's description of the stranger and was busy deciding which book she ought to read to this very interesting guest who was so gratifyingly interested in her abilities.

Sammy was wondering whether the traveller could help with the potatoes, which wanted harvesting.

Gel was trying to decide whether the visitor was reason enough to look for a new outfit, so as to show him that even though they were country folk, they weren't quite without style.

Lottie pondered whether they might have a few spare clothes that might fit him, for she had noticed the worn elbows of his sweater and the dreadful state of his shoes.

Finally, Ellie was lost in contemplations about the aftermath of Luke's departure, eight years ago. She wasn't listening to any of the conversations around her, but thinking back to that time of uncertainty, when Luke had left, Jack had been taken, and the Technos had waltzed into the city and claimed it for themselves. She had been so confused back then – Jack's capture by the Technos had nearly sent her over the edge. She shuddered when she remembered how she had first planted a bomb in Ebony's hotel, then tried to strangle her in her sleep – only much, much later she had realized that it was not just the loss of both men in her life that had driven her to those desperate measures. Her hormones had been going crazy – little Murron had not yet made an official announcement of her arrival, but Ellie's body had already noticed its little housemate, that much was for sure. Of course, nobody had known – not Ellie herself, nor anybody else, and it was only a month or so later, at the Techno camp, that she noticed the changes in her body, and particularly, her appetite. She had been spared of morning sickness, thank heaven, and had never really paid attention to her periods, so really, she only understood she was pregnant when her belly began to grow and Murron began to show definite signs of life. She might have rejoiced over the fact, had she been at the Mall – she had always wanted children, and knew that everyone at home would have been happy for her. But there, in that awful camp, pregnancy was a curse – cages full of strangers gawking at her protruding belly, and only a handful of sympathetic guards who gave her some extra rations, while the large number felt that virts deserved no more than their allotted food, expecting or not.

She was finally roused from her thoughts by the sight of Murron nearly drowning in her pudding, having fallen asleep at the table. Hurriedly, she cleaned her brood up and transported her to bed, only to toss and turn for hours in her own bed afterwards. She felt stuck between a rock and a hard place – Luke was bound to find out about Murron sooner or later, and wasn't it better if he heard it from her than someone else? But was there no way of just sending him back on his way without telling him a blessed thing, so that they could all go back to the simple, peaceful life they had lived for the last few years? They didn't need an extra hand on the farm, not really. And she definitely didn't need anyone else who claimed her love – Murron got all of that, and she had none to spare for bedraggled creatures of her past. Finally, she firmly put all those thoughts out of her mind, deciding that no matter what, she would find no answers that night. Perhaps the next morning would bring better counsel. For starters, she would make sure that Murron was safely out of the way by sending her off on a long ride with Lottie – it seemed best not to invite any direct questions by having her hop around the place.

The next morning found a well-rested Luke tucking into a breakfast tray he had discovered next to his bed – Lottie had been true to her word and had provided him with some fresh bread, fruits, and a large cup of tea. As he chewed his sandwich, his mind was revolving around Ellie – what would she be like today? True, she had shouted at him to leave yesterday, but then she had asked Lottie to set him up for a night. He wasn't sure whether that meant that she was not as angry as she had seemed, or whether his tired-out state and the lateness of the day were the only things that had moved her to allow him shelter. He had half a mind to pack his few things and slip out quietly without being a further burden when a knock at the door interrupted his thoughts.

"Come in!"

The girl that had welcomed him yesterday peeped around the corner. "Good morning! I realized I never introduced myself yesterday. I'm Gel."

"Hi, Gel. Sorry if I frightened you last night with my mysterious act. I'm Luke."

"I know. So you're an old friend of Ellie's, huh?"

"Yeah, you could call it that. I thought she might not want to see me, so that's why I wouldn't tell you my name before."

"Oooh, that is mysterious indeed. Why would she not want to see you?"

"That's a long story. I'm not sure it's appropriate for me to tell, especially seeing how I was right and Ellie isn't too keen on me being here. I was actually just about to pack up and leave."

"No, you can't!" she exclaimed. Seeing his surprised look, she added, more gently: "Don't worry, we're not planning on keeping you against your will. It's just that there's a rule in this house that visitors have to share at least one meal with all of us, to tell us all the news. We don't get too many travelers around here, so you wouldn't deprive us of our treat, would you?" She looked at him with such pleading eyes that he relented immediately.

"Well, if it's all right with Ellie..."

"Oh, Ellie won't mind, I know. From what she said last night she was a bit surprised at seeing you here, but now that she's slept on it she told me that you could stay for a while, if you wanted to. Sammy's already really excited, he's hoping that someone will help around the farm a little, Patch is so useless with farmwork, and Darryl is busy mending the fences." All that came out in one long breath, and at the end, she nearly gasped for air. "Sorry. I get excited about strangers, too. It's a leftover from when I was younger and obsessed with gossip." She winked at him.

"So tell me, Gel, who lives here? I've seen a few faces, but I'm a little confused. What kind of a place is this, actually?"

"Well, Dee and Patch found it – they used to be Mall Rats, but they left the city just before Ram fell to find a place out in the country, and they sort of wandered around for a while before they stumbled across this place. So there's Dee and Patch, and their little daughter Maya and their son Niko, and Sammy and me and Murron, and Darryl, and of course Ellie and Lottie."

"And how did all of you wind up here?"

He seemed to have asked the right question – it was obvious that Gel liked to tell stories. She took a deep breath. "Well, we all used to be Mall Rats – Lottie and Darryl came from Liberty, maybe you know the place, and they were only Mall Rats for a little while before Mega's virus. When that virus hit, we all fled the city on a boat, and wound up on a little island full of Techno prisoners for a while, where we found a bunch of old Mall Rats. We kind of wandered around for a bit, but pretty soon we heard that this whole virus thing had been a false alarm, so we went back to the city. Well, long story short, the Mall started to get pretty crowded, so when we had word from Dee and Patch about this place we set off again and ended up here, and we've pretty much been here ever since."

"I see. So there are still Mall Rats at the Mall?"

She nodded vigorously. "Of course! Amber and Trudy and their little ones would never leave the place, and so Ram and Jay stayed too, of course, and Ebony and Slade and Jack and Ruby are still there, too. Then of course, there's the farm, a bunch of old Mall Rats mostly live there now, Alice, Patsy, Cloe, Tai San, and Ryan, Lex and KC."

"There's a lot of names I recognize there. It's good to know that they're all safe. Amber was always good to me – she has a child, doesn't she?"

"Yes, little Bray is going on nine now, and Jay and her had a little daughter, too, Solaris."

"What about Bray, senior? Isn't he there any more?"

"No. It seems the Technos deleted him, like they deleted Jay's brother Ved. But Amber and Jay are very happy together."

"What about Trudy? Is she all right, too?" He thought back to the Supreme Mother – he wondered what she was like now.

"Oh yes, Brady is almost twelve now, and Trudy paired off with Ram, of all people. We were all a bit weirded out at first, but they're so cute together, we got over it pretty soon."

He considered asking about Jack, and what had become of Ellie and him – but he thought better of it, and veered for the safer route. "How come Alice isn't here with you guys? Back when I knew her, she and Ellie were pretty inseparable."

"Oh, you know, Alice has her farm close to the city, and Ellie and the rest of us wanted something completely new, so she stayed there, and we came here. She still visits though." Suddenly, she seemed to realize something, and eyed him sharply. "Look at me, jabbering away about old Mall Rats and what became of them, when really, I came here to see what you had to tell me! So out with it. You seem to have been pretty close to the Mall Rats once, though it must have been before my time, you know all the names so well. How do you know them?"

He had hoped it would not come to this. "Well... oh, all right. Do you remember the Chosen?"

"Those weirdos with the dresses and the Zoot thing?"

"Yeah, those. I came to the city with them. I... used to be pretty into that stuff. We took over the Mall, and tried to subdue the Mall Rats. Didn't work though, Ellie and Alice saw to that, thank heaven. I don't know what would have happened if they hadn't overthrown the Guardian, he was pretty off his rocker. Anyways, I'd been tossed out a little while before, and after they tried me for my crimes..."

Gel nearly bounced in her seat. "Ooooh, a tried criminal! How exciting! But they found you innocent, didn't they?"

He sighed. "No, they didn't. I did some pretty nasty stuff back then, in the name of Zoot, but Amber saw how sorry I was for it and decided that the best punishment for me would be to live with my guilt. So she set me free, and I hung out at the Mall for a while before leaving. Ellie still hasn't forgiven me for that."

"What, for hanging out or for leaving?"

"For leaving. We used to be very close – but I couldn't deal with what I'd done any more so I decided to run, and left her behind without really saying good-bye. I wrote her a note, though..." he looked sheepish.

"A note? Seriously? No wonder she hasn't forgiven you. That was a bitch move, mister!"

"Yeah, I know. We were very young back then, if that counts for anything."

"Maybe a little. But only because I remember what a total fool I was back then, so I'm more ready to forgive other people's stupidity."

"Much obliged, Gel. But I think I've gabbed enough. Do you know where I can find Ellie? I'd like to try and fix things with her as much as I can before I do that dinner-and-news-thing you've pressured me into." He smiled at her to show that he didn't really mind being pressured.

"Ah, you'll have to wait for a while with that. Ellie left for the south pastures early this morning, to have a look at the sheep, and I don't think she'll be back before the early afternoon."

"In that case, I guess I'll have to take you up at your offer and help... what was his name? Sammy? Around the farm for a while."

"Good boy. He'll be thrilled to have someone who'll dig up potatoes with him."