Quoted By:
"You're— you are the beetles." It's building rapidly. "You are the... I got beetles in my coat, once. Anthea wouldn't let me... the beetles..."
"Lottie?" the man says.
"I think I have heatstroke," you mumble, and puke a quart of black gunk onto the pavement.
*
Your nails are painted, you notice: you are staring wanly at your hands. Gil supported you all the way to a bench, where he sits, decorously, as far from you as he physically can. He isn't exactly Gil. It's some other man's body, no question about it, taller and brawnier and darker-haired and badly nearsighted— but there <span class="mu-i">is</span> a whiff of Gil about him in the chin. Or the nose, maybe. It's weird.
"Where are we?" you say.
"Um..." Gil twists his hands together. "I-I-I don't... I sort of left to find you as soon as I... some kind of festival?"
"No, I mean—" You gesture. "The manse?"
"I-It has to be. This is just Type II shit. And there's no way we— I-I-I'll eat my goddamn hat if we're <span class="mu-i">really</span> two or three centuries back in the— you haven't noticed yet?" You're staring. "Look!"
You follow his finger to the horizon line, then bolt to your feet. You take a couple steps out to confirm, then pace back in the opposite direction. It's still there. It's just how it looks.
Past the horizon is <span class="mu-i">land.</span> Not ocean, not the greyish dredged-up imitation you saw occasionally on the Pillar: lush, green, rolling land. Real land. Well, not real land, it's not— you're not actually— but <span class="mu-i">real land.</span>
"I-I-I haven't gotten the chance to ask the year yet," Gil says apologetically. "But I-I don't know if I'd be able to convert it to post-Flood if I did, so..."
"Uh-huh," you say. <span class="mu-i">Land.</span> "But why— <span class="mu-i">why?</span> What the hell does Namway have to— I guess the facility was in a sewer? From before the Flood? But we're not in a sewer. Did they, what, test gooplicates here? That seems like a lot of <span class="mu-i">effort</span> to—"
"I-I-I don't think it's Namway." Gil fidgets with the arm of his glasses. "I think it's something else."
"We're <span class="mu-i">in</span> Namway," you say.
"I-I-It doesn't match them. And I-I don't think some testing ground would be Type II, that's a lot of hassle and upkeep and..." Gil trails off. "I don't know what would do this to us, but I-I-I think there has to be something. The big stone place was all religious, and this is all religious..."
"Barely. You know the temple's right over there, right?" Now you point. "Up on that hill. Pretty sure it's the same one. <span class="mu-i">Pretty</span> sure the door's still in it... I don't know why that'd move. If we're lucky, it goes somewhere now, but—"
(3/4)
