CHAPTER EIGHT: PORTALS

Lou looked like he was ready to vomit. The memory of all that blood gushing from the raider messed with his head. He killed a man. Just pulled his sword out and sliced into him, no mercy.

Talia noticed how contorted with disgust Lou's face was. "You alright?" she asked.

He shook his head.

"What's bothering you?"

"I killed that guy yesterday."

"Is that why you've been so quiet?" Argus asked from the driver's seat. "That ain't something to feel bad about."

"I've never killed anyone before though."

"You should get used to it, mate. It was either you or him."

The Jeep bounced as the next town became visible around a bend. It had a river running through it—the first body of water Lou had seen so far in Blockland—with a water millwheel dipping into it. Unlike Quad, which was something of a hamlet, the town they approached seemed to have a population in the hundreds.

"What is his place?" Lou asked.

"Undeshire."

Along with the river, the town had another thing Lou had yet to see—paved roads. Up to this point, the only roads he had travelled on were made of dirt and sand. Undeshire broke that precedent—its streets were made of asphalt, bordered by thriving shops and restaurants, and leading away into neighborhoods.

"I'm not particularly a fan," said Argus. "Places like this almost never get zombies. Quad is like a buffer—they catch all the undead before they reach here. I'm out of my element this far into the Empire."

"How far into the Empire are we?" Talia asked. "Anywhere near the capital?"

"Of course not, the capital is still over a thousand miles away." He laughed. "You've got a long way to go before you start to see anything regal."

Argus drove into town and stopped along a curb, outside of an inn. The building was three stories tall and built from dark brown wood, with rows of clean windows lining its sides. It looked like an enormous log cabin, with a modern roof that started at one end of the building and reached up into the air at the other.

"I'll see if they got any rooms for us," said Argus.

Talia reached into her pocket and produced a little cash. She offered it to Argus, who accepted. Lou would have liked to chip in, but he had no Blockland currency on him—he didn't even know what kind of currency was used here.

"I, uh," he stammered.

"It's alright. I'll cover you." Argus walked into the inn and approached the front desk. Lou watched him through the glass doors.

"You don't have any money?" Talia asked.

"No."

"Why not?"

He didn't have an answer. "I don't know."

Argus saved the conversation from going any further by marching out of the inn, triumphant. "We got a room," he said, and pulled the car into a parking spot. The three of them walked up to the unit they would stay in that night, and found it was furnished with a theme. Much like how the exterior of the building looked like a giant log cabin, the room was decked out with furniture of varying chocolate and taupe colors.

Talia wasted no time plopping herself down on the sofa and turning the television on. Lou took a seat next to her as she flicked through channels, coming to rest on a family network.

"I'm gonna head out," said Argus. "Scope out the area, see if I can find Narkis's buyers."

"See you later," Lou waved. Argus walked out of the room and started down the stairs. Lou turned to Talia. "So is this a good place to play After School Special?"

She thought about it for a moment. "Nope."

"Why not?"

"I'm telling you, After School Special is the single greatest song ever made. When you hear it for the first time, it can't be in some dinky hotel room. It's gotta be somewhere special."

Lou accepted that and leaned back into the couch. A commercial came on the television, with blaring trumpets and the sound of hammers beating on bricks. It was an ad for the Builder Union, which he had never heard of.

"What's that?" he asked.

"The Builder Union? It's a labor union . . . for builders." She paused. "Don't tell me you don't know what a builder is."

"I don't."

"Jeez Lou, where do you come from? Builders are responsible for all the houses and shops in Blockland. They build everything out of bricks."

"So, could we become builders?"

She laughed at the idea. It was ridiculous.

• • •

Argus walked into the bar with a charming smile and his hair fixed as neatly as he could make it. He wasn't here to drink though—granted, he would have some alcohol—but that was not the top priority. He was here in search of intrigue about the zombie trafficking ring Narkis had been supplying. Bars were where people became their most loose-lipped, and faced with a handsome brute like Argus, the women would surely talk.

He chose a woman by the bar and walked up to her.

"Bartender, two beers for me and this fine lady," he said. Any woman in their right mind would have slapped Argus across the face and fled from the strange man, who reeked of burly cologne meant to mask sweat, but not this woman. She was under the influence of alcohol, and her judgment was so impaired that he seemed like an honest guy here to buy her another drink. His musk was mesmerizing, when it should have been revolting.

"Hi," she said. "I'm Anne."

"Anne. Nice to meet you." Argus accepted the two drinks from the bartender and gave one to her. "I'm new in Undeshire," he said after taking a sip. "Not very familiar with the place. Anything I should see while I'm here?"

"My bed." She laughed, flinging spittle from her lips. She was drunker than Argus thought. "I'm kidding. One thing you need to know about me is I'm hilarious."

"You sure are. But really, is there anywhere I should stop before I leave?"

"No sweetie, this town is boring as hell. There's work though."

"Really? And where would that be?"

"Warehouse district," she said, and turned away briefly to down some of the beer he bought her. "Now gimme a kiss," she ordered as she turned back to him. But Argus was gone, out the bar and down the street. The people doing illegal things, the ones who were up to no good, always brought work with them. If there was work by the warehouses, that's where he found find the zombie ring.

He walked on a sidewalk bordering the river. The warehouse district was in clear view on the edge of the waterway, with concrete docks and massive storage buildings lining it. It didn't take long to find the warehouse the zombie traffickers were using—it was guarded on the outside by men with pistols.

Argus found a ladder on one of the adjacent warehouses and climbed up to its roof. From there he leapt onto the building the zombies were held within, and looked down through a skylight. The security inside was much tighter, with the guards now armed with rifles and shotguns. They stood around a group of large shipping containers, which Argus figured must be what they stored the zombies inside of.

His suspicions were confirmed when one of the guards walked over to a container, opened up the small window in its side, and chucked a piece of meat in to feed the zombies.

Argus grinned, knowing this would be a piece of cake.

• • •

"My parents raised me to play the violin," said Talia. "It was too classical for me. I started playing the synthesizer instead, but they told me to stop. They thought it was a waste of time."

"That's crappy."

"Yeah. I guess it was a waste of time after all, since they got rid of it. All that practice down the drain."

"You're out on your own now though. Couldn't you buy another?"

"Synths aren't cheap. What about you? Did you have shitty parents?"

Lou shook his head. "My parents were good."

"Where did they raise you? Must have been far away in some dark basement dungeon for you to not know what a builder is."

"I'm from Manhattan."

"Never heard of it."

"I wouldn't expect you to, it's not even in Blockland. It's somewhere else entirely."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

The door was thrown open and Argus walked in. "Found the traffickers," he announced. "There's not that many of them—eight or so. They won't be hard to take down if we're stealthy. Are you two gonna give me a hand?"

"What, kill them?" Talia said.

"Well we ain't gonna have a tea party with them, little lady."

"I'll pass."

"Me too," said Lou.

"Looks like I'm gonna have to do this one on my own then, right?" Argus moped. "Yeah, it's gonna be me all alone out there, just me versus eight other guys." He shook his head in disappointment. "I even paid for the room."

"Argus, we don't want to help you kill anyone," Lou stated.

"Oh no, I get it. You don't need to tell me a second time." He started for the door, but before closing it, turned back to give them one final message. "But Lou, you'd better get used to killing. You won't last very long out here if you don't." Then he left.

"What was that about?" Talia asked. "Did he just try to guilt us into going with him?"

"He did it to me the first time we met. I ended up going with him on a zombie killing spree. It was horrifying."

Lou thought back to that night. He remembered how happy Argus seemed when he blew through the mound of zombies in his Jeep, then finished off the leftovers with a shotgun. He wondered if the man would find as much delight in clearing the warehouse.

That's when Lou realized just how dangerous Blockland was. Hordes of zombies harassed the land while the populace relied on sociopaths like Argus to protect them. And the opposition was even worse—bloodthirsty raiders like Narkis fed tax collectors to the undead, and loved every minute of it.

Maybe there was truth in what Argus said. Maybe Lou needed to learn to kill.

• • •

Argus would need alcohol. He always needed it when he had to kill other people. Zombies weren't a problem, they were mindless beasts, shells of the thinking people they once were. Killing them was fun. But people—people who had memories, friends, and hobbies—that wasn't easy for Argus. As much as he loved the thrill of his job, that one part was always hard for him.

He walked into the bar—a different one than before, he didn't want to run into the woman he left behind earlier that day—and spotted a familiar face. Sitting at a stool was Nikki, an old friend he remembered from his early days as a zombie hunter. The last time he saw her was a few months ago at a guild meeting, since she was still in a position of power at the Zombie Hunter Guild, but apart from that they didn't see each other frequently enough. He was pleasantly surprised to see her.

"Nikki!" he said, patting her on the back and taking a seat. He waved to the bartender for a drink.

"Argus?" she smiled. "You're a sight for sore eyes. How are you doing?"

"Mighty fine. You?"

"I'm alright."

"How's Provo? Where's he at?"

She took a long drink, preparing to deliver the next line. "Provo's dead."

"Bad joke. He's in the bathroom isn't he?"

Nikki knew this was going to be a painful conversation. She downed the rest of her drink and motioned to the bartender for another one. "I'm not kidding. He's dead."

"He's . . . dead?" It dawned on Argus that Nikki might not be kidding around.

"Yeah."

The bartender put a couple drinks in front of them. Argus chugged his while Nikki worked at hers steadily.

"What happened to him?"

"We were caught off-guard by the tax collector. We didn't have enough money. I guess the example they set with Grant needed to be renewed, so they did Provo in."

"Bastards."

They drank for a while. Nikki looked miserable while Argus became filled with rage. Provo was a good man, twice the zombie hunter Argus was. That's why he and Nikki had to retire so early—Argus had been at the hunt longer than them, but they did their jobs so well that they had no more motivation after a few years. They deserved to settle down and not be bothered, but now Argus saw they weren't given that.

"Why did you come to Undeshire?" he asked.

"They took our house, too."

"Fuck that."

She took a sip. "I know why you're here. That zombie ring. You're here to bust it." As a guild leader, she knew as much about the trafficking as Argus.

"That's right." He looked over at her. "You should come with me, for old times' sake."

"I don't know. I'm a bit sick of killing right now. Those people are doing something terrible, but they have families. Some of them might be husbands."

"Who am I talking to right now? Wasn't it you who told me the only good zombie profiteer is a dead one?"

"How long ago did I say that, a decade?"

"Yeah, but it's still true. You remember how fun it used to be. We'd go in, guns blazing, and clear the place. Then we'd get a nice party at the guild and a bonus would arrive in the mail."

"That was a perk."

"Do you remember what we would always say? Our catchphrase?"

"Of course. No one at the guild says it anymore, it's such a shame." Nikki was visibly in a better mood. A smile crossed her face, and for the first time since Argus walked in, she didn't give her drink her full attention. "Eat shit. Wasn't that it?"

"Yep. Eat shit."

She took one more sip, then she was finished. "Alright, you've convinced me. This might be the beer talking, but let's go."

Lou and Talia were walking into the bar as Argus and Nikki were walking out. Argus, with an urge to kill in him, shook Lou in excitement.

"You heard the news?" he asked.

"The news?"

"Shit's back on the menu." Argus roared in laughter and passed them by. Then it was Nikki's turn.

"Hey there Lou." She grinned and made a grunting sound.

"Are you alright?"

"I'm great. Just making a fresh batch of shit." She, too, laughed with a murderous fury. Then she was gone, and the bar grew silent.

"How do you know these weird-ass zombie hunters?" Talia asked him.

Lou shrugged. They sat down at a booth and ate some bar food—greasy fries and pizza—while Argus and Nikki's firefight took shape in the distance. At first they heard a couple gunshots, but from there it progressed to a full-blown shootout. A couple of people outside ran into their homes and hid, but no one in the bar cared. Out here, where grass was sparse, frontier justice must have been the norm.

A while later the zombie hunters returned. Their weapons were put away, it was the proper thing to do, but it was obvious they were the sources of carnage. They had done their best to clean themselves up, but they had spots of blood on their shoes and their skin was flustered.

"How did it go?" Lou asked as they came and sat down at the booth.

"It was a breeze," Argus stated. He grabbed a handful of fries and discarded pizza cheese, then devoured it all. "You guys wanna head back to the inn?"

"Sure."

"Alright. Nikki's gonna be staying with us by the way."

• • •

They returned to the hotel room and found the television had been left on. Lou sat down on the couch to continue watching it, and saw the commercial for the Builder Union was playing once again. Though this time he noticed something that had slipped past him in his first viewing. In the bottom right corner of the ad were three overlapping tools—the hammer of the builders, but also a wrench and a print gun.

"Talia," he said, and pointed to the onscreen tools, "what are those?"

She stepped over and caught a glimpse before the commercial ended. "The wrench is for the Eventer Union, and the print gun is for printers," she explained.

"How do you know this stuff?"

"It's pretty common knowledge. But my dad was an eventer when he was young."

Lou had another question for her. "What's an eventer?"

"Do you really not know? They event bricks to do stuff," she told him, but his face just became confused. "Oh, come on," she said. "They can turn bricks into trampolines. Or lights."

"Can they make portals?"

"Portals?"

"Like, portals to other worlds."

She said nothing. Argus and Nikki, who had been at the other side of the room fixing drinks, also took a moment to let his question float in the air. Talia broke the silence at last. "Uh, I don't know. That's a weird question."

After that, everyone went off to sleep. Argus and Nikki shared one of the bedrooms, with Nikki in the bed and Argus on the floor. He had insisted she take the more comfortable spot, since she was grieving over the loss of her husband and needed as much rest as possible. Talia took the other bedroom, and Lou slept on the couch in the front.

Lou was the first one awake the next morning. He had enough time to eat a light breakfast, go to the nearest library, check out a few books, and return to the inn before anyone else got up. He brought with him some informative material about the history of building and eventing, so that he could learn more about these crafts that seemed so essential to Blockland.

He read that building was a combination of architecture and landscaping. Builders were responsible for flattening land and erecting whatever structures the populace paid for—residences, storefronts, forts, parks, and factories, for instance. Every building in the world was made by them. They acquired their job titles by attending specialty schooling and earning a builder's license.

A license wasn't the only thing builders needed to do their job though. A hammer was required to break misplaced bricks, which were put down using a 'brick tool'—something unique to Blockland, it seemed. The brick tool was a handheld item that could spawn stored bricks and place them in the world.

Eventing was much more interesting to Lou though. There was nothing like it back in Manhattan, because like the brick tool, it was only found in Blockland. Eventers also had to attend a specialty school to get their eventer's license and tool of the trade—the wrench. By wrenching bricks, eventers could create wondrous chains of events that performed various functions. An evented brick could kill anyone who set foot on it, or launch people into the air, or spawn a stream of bullets, or burn people, among hundreds of other tasks.

In one of the books about eventing, Lou learned that new events were still being discovered in modern times. To him, the power of eventing was nothing short of magic. Printing, however, was much more mundane. Printers used their print guns to affix decals on the faces of bricks—an unremarkable practice even in Manhattan.

Argus emerged from his room as Lou wrapped up his reading. He noticed the stack of books on the table in front of the sofa and asked Lou about them.

"Pay a visit to the library this morning?"

"Yeah. I've been reading about eventing and building."

Argus stepped into the kitchen, only separated from the living room by a countertop. "What got you interested in them?"

"You can do so much with events. And did you know they're still finding new ones every day?"

"No. I don't pay attention to the blue-collar industries. They're all a bunch of snobs."

"Well, these snobs could be my way home. Any idea how I can get in contact with some of them?"

Argus laughed. "Whatever it is you want them to make, they'll charge you an arm and a leg for it. That's assuming you have the money to buy the land, and a permit for doing event work." He stirred a cup of coffee and sipped it.

"Well . . . are there any alternatives? I could pay them under the table."

"Sure. The Empire has hundreds of slaves who know how to build and event. We could always liberate one of their labor camps." Argus scoffed. "Seriously though, I don't mean to hurt your feelings mate, but an under the table payment would cost even more."

The bedroom doors opened up, and Nikki and Talia stepped out.

"What's all the noise?" Talia asked.

"Argus, your voice goes through walls, you know," Nikki added.

Lou stood up from behind his mountain of books. "We're going to liberate a slave camp."

"No, no," Argus said. "Lou's kidding. We aren't going anywhere near a slave camp."

"Why not? The slaves there have the tools and experience we need. You said so yourself."

"Shit, it was a joke. Every camp has armed guards, and we don't even know where they are. The Empire has never disclosed their locations. They could be rumors for all we know."

"Uh," said Nikki. "It would probably be a major crime too."

"Well that's a non-issue. We've committed plenty of crimes."

"If we don't save some slaves, then how are we supposed to get any tools?" Lou asked. "It's not like I can afford to commission some myself."

"Hold on." Talia put her hands out for him to stop talking. "Am I missing something? What do we need these tools for in the first place?"

"So I can get home."

"Where is your home? You act like you don't know anything about Blockland. You didn't know what eventing and building were until I explained them to you." She paused. "Lou, where are you from, exactly?"

He knew they would have a hard time believing him. He was afraid of telling them that he wasn't from Blockland, that he was from a whole other place—a place that was bound by different laws of physics, chemistry, biology, and seemed to be fundamentally different in composition. Everything in Blockland was built from connectable plastic bricks, but back on Earth things didn't fit together so well. People were made of flesh, which was made of cells, which were made of atoms. Lou didn't want to explain atoms to them—he barely understood them himself.

But he told them anyway. "I'm not from Blockland," he admitted. "I'm from Earth."

"What?"

"I get that it sounds crazy, but believe me. I was born in New York and moved to Manhattan. Then one day I was in Blockland, and I don't know how I got here, but this isn't where I belong."

"So what you're saying is," said Argus, "you're an alien."

"I don't know if that's the right word. I guess so?"

Argus and Nikki looked at each other. "Yeah . . ." Argus looked at him like he was insane. "Lou, that's some weird shit. If you're kidding, you should tell us now."

"I'm not kidding."

"Then I'll see myself out of here. That's some crazy talk if I've ever heard it."

"Me too," said Nikki. "Wait for me, Arg."

The two zombie hunters walked out of the room. Lou wouldn't see either of them for a while after that.

"Do you believe me?" he asked Talia.

"Not really. You have to be crazy for thosetwo to walk out on you."

"Well, I'm not making this stuff up. I promise."

She shook her head. "It's a wild claim."

"I guess it is, but it's true." He felt uncomfortable, embarrassed almost. So he changed the subject. "Are we still going to the capital together?"

"I'll keep going with you on one condition. Don't talk about this weird stuff anymore. I will leave if you freak me out."

He nodded in resignation. "Alright. I'd probably die out there without you, anyway."

They left the inn later and pressed toward the capital. Lou knew Talia was more suspecting of him now, and probably wouldn't feel safe around him for a while. Argus was clinically insane and not even he wanted to be near Lou.

It would be a long time until they reached the capital, but when they did, questions would be answered. Lou felt like a stranger here, but in a few weeks' time, he would be less alone. He would make important friends in Chrome Capital, and they would bring him closer to getting home.

But until then, the world was a harsh and terrifying place.