The Scanners weren't always on time, but they weren't usually quite this late. 

    "You don't think one of the Donegan boys would have done something, do you?" Pauline asked, gently rocking Linnea in her arms. "I mean, even for them, that would be foolish."

    "It would be suicide," John said softly. "They know that."

    "Don't worry," Alexander said. "They'll get here. And if anyone did do anything, the City will just send more later."

    "Dad's right," John assured Pauline. "It's not like the Drones would just start executing people tonight or anything. They'd see that the reports weren't coming in and they'd handle it. I'm sure they've run into problems before. At the very least, weather probably delayed them any number of times in the past."

    Pauline frowned, but she took a deep breath and didn't say anything more. She continued to rock her baby girl, occasionally whispering "shhh" noises even though the child was sound asleep.

    Alexander looked around at the assembled crowd. Every year, it was a little smaller than the year before. He estimated that there were still close to a thousand people spread haphazardly around the Convocation Terrace, but this was his forty-seventh Census and he could remember a time when the crowds were so large that even on his father's shoulders he couldn't see from one side of the gathering to the other. 

    He understood Pauline's nerves. He suspected John was just as nervous, but was trying to hide it as best he could. Without the Scanners to confirm the identities and number of the population outside the City, the Presidium would have no way of knowing which outliers were citizens and which ones were potentially hostile.

    Of course, some of the outliers are both, he thought before he could push the idea away. None of the outliers were exactly supportive of the City; that's why they lived outside of it. But some of the more antagonistic outliers -- like the Donegan boys and their families -- would choose burning the City to the ground rather than ignoring it, had that been a realistic possibility.

    Back when John was born, Alexander remembered, the Scanners had been late that year as well. Aria had held the baby in her arms much like Pauline was doing now, waiting tensely to make sure that his birth and lineage were confirmed and recorded. Outliers needed to be on the registry, or they risked execution by Drones mistaking them for unidentified enemies. As it was, every year there were rumors of a Drone killing an outlier who was wearing a mask or had been disfigured in an accident. Alexander didn't believe the rumors, though; Drones were programmed to subdue and test DNA before resorting to execution, and the stories were always from "my cousin's friend's uncle" or some other unreliable source like that.

    But when you're holding a new baby, he thought, logic doesn't really come into it, now does it?

    "Do you want me to take her for a bit?" he asked.

    "What do you think, Linnea?" Pauline cooed to the squirming baby. "Do you want to go see Grandpa for a little bit? Yeah?"

    Almost as soon as she had handed the pink-cheeked, bright-eyed girl to him, Alexander noticed a stirring at the edges of the crowd several hundred feet away. He squinted but couldn't make out any details. I'm too young for my eyes to be quitting on me, he grumbled to himself.

    One of his nephews -- he always struggled to remember their names since Bryce and Suzanne had so many children -- came running from the area where the older children had been playing together. "The Scanners are here!" he yelled.

    A rock-hard, leathery hand clapped on Alexander's shoulder briefly. His father, James, seventy-three and seemingly made of calluses and steel, raised his voice. "All right, Ravell family. Let's line up and get this bullshit over with."

    The generations of family quickly assembled themselves into a reasonable approximation of a straight line. With only one son, one daughter-in-law, and two grandchildren, Alexander had his lineage arranged much faster than either of his brothers. Bryce, the oldest of the siblings and technically his half-brother, had to bark and gesticulate to tame his twelve -- or thirteen? Alexander couldn't even count them all as they continued to shuffle themselves into line. He marveled that Suzanne, mother of all of them, looked as lovely and calm as ever. The only child Alexander had ever raised was John, and that had taken so much of his energy; how could even two parents handle a brood so large? Especially when Bryce had started so much later in life than Alexander? He wasn't even a grandfather yet, despite being past fifty with an oldest daughter who was twenty-one.

    Samuel, a year younger than Alexander, had his hands full with his four boys. As Alexander watched them, he realized that much of the interaction was playful. The boys weren't actually misbehaving; they were just rambunctious. "Ornery," as Alexander's father used to say.

    Not like the Donegan boys. They were something else entirely. Vaguely, Alexander wondered if they had shown up to the Census at all. If they had finally made good on their threats to dodge it entirely, it would turn life upside-down in the region as Drones investigated their disappearance.

    The massive Scanners rolled on their treads along the paved paths that made up the wagon-wheel shaped Convocation Terrace. A few dozen yards away from Alexander, one of the gleaming mother-of-pearl machines focused its gun-barrel-shaped cameras on the Veldmar family. Each individual followed protocol, holding their face steady for the scrutiny of the device and placing one finger inside the slot for the minimally invasive blood draw.

    "Trenton Veldmar, son of Ronald Veldmar, deceased, and Grace Martin Veldmar, deceased," the nearby Scanner intoned in a voice almost, but not quite, human. "Patriarch of Veldmar family. Scan confirmed."

    The Veldmars had a large enough family that it would be a while before it was the Ravell family's turn. Alexander continued watching the Census activities even as he noticed his father walking up to him again. The older man remained silent as they watched Alexander's half-sister take her turn.

    "EmmaRose Ravell Veldmar," the Scanner announced. "Wife of Trenton Veldmar. Scan confirmed."

    EmmaRose's oldest child and his family stepped forward. "Well," James said, "here it comes."

    "Doesn't get any easier knowing it's coming, does it?" Alexander said.

    James shrugged. "Least this way you can prepare a bit."

    Alexander heard the disapproval in his father's voice, and he wasn't sure if it was aimed at the Census procedure or at him. Of all of the five Ravell "children," Alexander had always had the bulk of his father's time and attention, and the bulk of his discipline. He rolled his shoulders to ease a little tension. "It still seems unnecessary," he commented.

    "Of course it's unnecessary. All of this is unnecessary. We can handle ourselves, and this is a load of City arrogance. It's bullshit."

    "Where's Mom?" Alexander asked wearily.

    "Bryce is keeping an eye on her up front," James said.

    "Dad, Bryce has a whole horde of his own to keep in line."

    "They'll keep in line."

    "Dad, Mom needs..."

    "Bryce is handling it."

    She's not even Bryce's mother, Alexander wanted to say, but he knew better than to antagonize James.

    The Scanner was focused on Trenton and EmmaRose's oldest grandson, Arden. 

    "Well," said Alexander, unconsciously echoing his father, "here it comes."

    Arden stuck his finger in the blood draw slot. Alexander watched him take a deep breath to steady himself as the camera focused on his face. Two months earlier, Arden had lost an eye in an accident in his parents' barn. His face was distinctly different from its appearance a year earlier -- more than the average change expected from normal aging.

    A short burst of siren sounded from the Scanner, and instantaneously two prongs launched from below the camera, striking Arden in the torso. The burst of electricity through the wires cut off any sound the boy may have intended to make, and he fell to the ground, convulsing and losing control of his bladder and bowels.

    Some sort of mechanical trigger released the wires from the prongs, which stayed embedded in Arden. Slowly, like worms disappearing into the dirt, the wires spooled back into the Scanner. While they were doing this, another panel opened in the front, and a bristling row of guns aimed themselves at the prostrate boy.

    EmmaRose trembled, watching her beloved grandson still twitching on the ground. The camera continued to study his face, and the blood draw panel's lights flickered on and off as it worked on processing his identity. After forty seconds, with no change in its uncannily not-quite-human voice, the Scanner announced, "Arden Veldmar. Child of Howard Veldmar and Beryl Griggs Veldmar. Scan confirmed. Permanent damage noted and updated."

    The row of guns folded back into the Scanner's front panel, and the next child stepped up to be examined. Howard and Beryl scooped up their son, and EmmaRose rushed to them with the towels they had brought along to protect Arden's modesty as they cleaned him up.

    A quarter of an hour later, the Scanner had turned to the Ravell family. By tradition, all of the completed families throughout the Convocation Terrace waited until everyone was completed. There was no rule keeping them there; no stipulation in the Census laws that outliers had to stay in attendance throughout the day. Alexander didn't even remember ever questioning it. This was his community. He was part of this. Not the City.

    "James Ravell, son of Bartholomew Ravell, deceased, and Lilith Carson Ravell, deceased. Patriarch of Ravell family. Scan confirmed."

    Alexander watched as his father carefully guided his second wife -- Alexander's mother -- to stand in front of the Scanner's camera. He took her hand, as gently as a man his sort could, and guided her finger into the blood draw slot. The look of uncertainty on her face bothered Alexander, but he was glad to see that she still had enough of her memory to know that she trusted James.

    The brief poke of the lancet caused her to shriek, far out of proportion to the miniscule amount of pain she could have felt. But Alexander knew that her response wasn't one of logic. There was little logic left in her. Her nearly vacant eyes sought ought James, and upon finding him next to her, she leaned into his shoulder and breathed shallowly.

    "Elise DeMar Ravell, wife of James Ravell. Scan confirmed."

    Carefully, James coaxed Elise away from the Scanner so it could continue its annual job. She looked around blankly, forgetting almost immediately about her momentary fear.

    "Bryce Ravell, son of James Ravell and Rose Piper Ravell, deceased. Scan confirmed."

    Alexander monitored his own small tree of descendants while keeping one eye on Bryce's family going through the scans. After Suzanne, their children filed through one by one. Alexander listened to their names, promising himself he would do a better job keeping them straight in his head, but by the time it got to the ninth child he was already forgetting the order.

    His turn came soon.

    "Alexander Ravell, son of James Ravell and Elise DeMar Ravell. Scan confirmed."

    It's probably noticed that I have a lot more gray hair, he thought as his son stepped forward.

    "John Ravell, son of Alexander Ravell and Aria Keenan Ravell, deceased. Scan confirmed."

    "Pauline Seno Ravell, wife of John Ravell. Scan confirmed."

    "Vincent Ravell, son of John Ravell and Pauline Seno Ravell. Scan confirmed."

    Nervously, Pauline held Linnea out for the camera while John carefully and slowly took hold of a single finger to insert into the slot for a blood draw. "New birth," he announced firmly.

    The camera swiveled and refocused repeatedly, getting the best view of the baby possible. The clicking of the lancet was drowned out by the immediate protest of the awakened infant, who thrashed in her mother's arms.

    "Name," the Scanner demanded in its toneless voice.

    "Linnea Ravell," John said. "L-I-N-N-E-A."

    The lights on the blood draw panel flickered intensely and Alexander could hear the usual whirring from the machine that came along with any analysis of new blood.

    "Linnea Ravell," the Scanner finally announced. "Daughter of John Ravell and Pauline Seno Ravell. Genetic identity confirmed and stored. Congratulations. Scan confirmed."

    "Well," said James, startling Alexander, "she's on the damn list now."

    "Dad," Alexander sighed, "it's a minor inconvenience."

    "I haven't seen them Donegan boys," James drawled. "If they make it so the Drones come into my house looking for them, I'll find them and kill them myself."

    With your eyes, Dad, Alexander thought, you might not see the Donegan boys if they paraded twenty feet in front of you, naked with sparklers in their hands. Which, he realized, was exactly the sort of thing those idiots might do just for fun. But he had to admit that he was worried, too. Anyone who didn't comply ran the risk of screwing up life for everyone in the region until compliance was forced.

    By agreements and regulations, the City didn't require much of them. The Census was really the only really intrusive activity that was mandatory, and it was always announced well in advance (along with all of the reminders that it was designed for their security, to protect them from unknown foreign threats, and that even those outside the City were "valued citizens" of the nation).

    But the outliers resented any City claims to authority over them. The only reason most of them complied with the Census was the threat of the Drones: militarized defense devices that were supposedly intended to contain those vague, mysterious foreign threats. The City insisted that the absence of these foreign threats ever being seen by an outlier or City-dweller proved that the Drones were effective as deterrents and active defense tools. The outliers believed that there were no foreign threats that would actually be deterred by simple Drones, and that they were used purely to enforce cooperation among the outliers themselves.

    Alexander often wondered what the point would be, if that were true; why would the City even monitor them by Census, and enforce that through threat of death, if that was the only thing the City wanted them to do? Why not just leave them alone to live their own lives? Even if the Drones were needed in case of some half-witted "rebellion" by people like the Donegan boys, those same Donegan boys wouldn't even feel the need to rebel if the City would just let them be.

    It was only logical. There had to be foreign threats.

    The Scanners finished with the last of the Ravell sons -- Samuel, his wife Lyric, and their four boys. Alexander watched Lyric momentarily. She was Aria's younger sister, and at times there was so much of Aria peeking through in her face that it made his soul ache. Almost twenty years had elapsed since Aria had passed away, and Alexander felt pangs of guilt any time he realized that he had started to forget things about her. The way her laugh led to a graceless snort; the feel of her hands on his chest when they kissed; and he had even discovered that he was no longer positive of the accuracy of his memory of her eyes. He remembered them as greenish, but sometimes wondered if they had really been blue, like his son's were.

    Eventually, every family had been counted and confirmed. There had been a few more electric shocks around the Convocation Terrace, all expected by the outliers. There had been a number of births in the past year, and several deaths were recorded and affirmed by witnesses. Alexander never understood why births and deaths were handled at the Census, but marriages (and the divorces, exceptionally rarely allowed) had to be reported within a month. There was a metal post at the center of the Convocation Terrace, and changing the setting of two switches on it would somehow summons a Courier -- a smaller, flying version of the Scanners whose only purpose seemed to be recording marital transactions -- to come and gather the information to take back to the City. He remembered asking his father about it as a boy; James's only answer had been "bureaucratic bullcrap."

    The Scanners rolled back towards the distant City, and the outliers began to trickle away, headed back to their homes and their farms and shops, determined not to lose too much more daylight. There was always work to be done, outside the City.

    On the dirt path that led back to his carpentry workshop, Alexander encountered his younger sister, Willow. She was storming along muttering to herself. He smiled; he was used to her getting worked up about things, and was almost entertained when she blew off steam. She could curse creatively and with flair, but watching her contain herself when children were around was always worth a laugh.

    "Okay, Willow," he said, lightly pushing her shoulder to knock her off balance. "What's got you steaming today?"

    "Patriarch," she spat. "I'm so sick of that. You know women had more rights and recognition before the Calamities?"

    "I know," he nodded, instantly regretting having asked. Although he felt like he understood her anger toward the City's policy regarding the definition of families as extending from a Patriarch, it wasn't really relevant on the outside anyway. There were plenty of women running their own lives in any way they saw fit among the outliers. The terminology and categorization used by the City for its Census was just a matter of words and organization.

    Willow herself was clearly the head of her own family; her husband, Loren, was pleasant enough but had the personality of distant fog -- present enough to be noticed and far away enough to be ignored. Although Loren's father was officially the Patriarch of the Madison family, he also had a tendency to submit to whatever whim his wife had.

    "Decisions shouldn't be left up to the men," she growled.

    They're usually not, around you, Alexander thought. Then, it struck him what her statement could mean.

    "Wait," he said, grabbing her upper arm to stop her from storming off. For a moment she glared at him like she was ready to take him on in a fight -- which he had no doubt that she would win. Then she sighed and stepped off the path to talk with him quietly.

    "Loren's father is considering joining the City," she whispered.

    "What?" Alexander asked, blinking in confusion. "Why? Why would he do that?"

    "Because he says he's tired. He doesn't want to work any more, and he doesn't want us to have to support him."

    "That's... that's ridiculous, though!" Alexander protested. "He's not sick, is he?"

    "No!" Willow snapped. "That's what's so frustrating - he doesn't seem to have any good reason. He just said he's tired of working for scraps, and he wants a 'better life.' He apparently doesn't care how much shorter it will be."

    "So, wait. What are you going to do?"

    "You know the City's rules. You join the City as a family, or not at all. And it's up to the Patriarch."

    "You can't go to the City!" Alexander said. "Willow, they kill you in there."

    "I know what they do in the City, Alex," she said. "I'm not going. I'll get out of the family."

    "Divorce?"

    "Loren wouldn't consent to that," she said. "All of a sudden, he's decided that he should have the final say on our marriage status."

    "So you've talked to him about it."

    "Yeah. He won't grant a divorce, and if his father goes, he goes."

    "And if you don't go..."

    "Then I'm an illegal," she said. "A threat."

    "Drones."

    Willow huffed. "Yeah. The City kills me if I go, and they kill me sooner if I don't."

    Alexander couldn't think of anything to say in response. Willow shrugged and walked away. He watched as she plowed through the departing crowds. It was unthinkable; to lose his sister to the City, because someone decided he was tired?

    A far-off bell pealed, causing everyone to turn toward the sound. There was an emergency of some sort. The signal, two long peals and three short, indicated that anyone except children and whoever was needed to stay behind with the children should assemble back in the Convocation Terrace. Alexander frowned. We just came from there, he thought. Why would we need to go back?

    Faster than they had departed, the extended community of adult outliers rushed back to their prior spots, awaiting information on what disaster warranted an assembly. Alexander waited impatiently until a man he recognized vaguely from a battery shop on the other side of the river stepped to the center of the podium and held up his hands for attention and silence. A few other outliers pushed and pulled a large tarp-covered dolly to a spot near him.

    "I apologize for interrupting your busy days," the man in the center announced, his voice carrying well. "Most of you knew the Donegan brothers..."

    "Knew?" yelled a woman's voice from the midst of the crowd.

    The man gestured helplessly at the dolly. Squinting at it, Alexander saw that despite the multiple tarps, there was a small stream of blood making its way out onto the ground.

    "They're all dead," the man said, his strong voice fading. "And this may not be an emergency, exactly... but with all of them gone, there's no Patriarch. We have to decide what to do with the bodies."

    The small tinker's bell on the door to Alexander's carpentry workshop sounded weakly, and Alexander grimaced. Weeks earlier, one of his workers had slipped while carrying a nearly-completed dresser frame past the door, and the bell had been slightly crushed. Alexander kept intending to get another bell, but he hadn't had any other specific reason to make a trip across the river to the Canavere family smithy. Reluctantly, he considered the fact that he might have to pay for the services of the next courier wagon. It was a small fee, but it bothered him to have other people do things for him that he really could do himself.

    Setting down his bevel gauge, Alexander leaned to the side to see around a set of shelving (that needs to be refinished sometime soon, he thought). The face that greeted him with a timid smile was Nolan Madison -- Willow's father-in-law.

    "Mr. Madison," he said, using his professionally courteous voice. He rose from his stool and unconsciously brushed at his apron in case of sawdust.

    "Oh!" the older man said, his eyebrows raising. "I'm sorry, I didn't realize we had met?"

    "Alexander Ravell," he said, extending a hand for a shake. "My sister is Loren's wife."

    "That's right," Madison said, "I did forget. Good to see you again. Good to see you. How are you?"

    Alexander endured the resulting small talk, all the while studying Madison's face. He kept a static smile and seemed to have trouble maintaining eye contact with Alexander, pulling and twisting at his own fingertips as he glanced all around the workshop. Eventually, finding what seemed to be a natural break in the conversation, Alexander asked, "What can I do for you today, Mr. Madison?"

    "I may be in the market for a, uh... large wagon. And some crates or, uh, trunks. I suppose."

    "Well," Alexander said slowly, "there's a significant difference between crates and trunks."

    "Oh," Madison nodded. "Okay. Yes. Of course."

    "There's also a significant difference between 'I may be in the market' and 'I'm definitely in the market' for those items."

    "Yes, well. Yes. I'm just looking into value. For bartering."

    "If you're definitely in the market," Alexander pointed out, "and you want new crates or trunks, I'm the only source for hundreds of miles. If you want second-hand ones, there would be no hard feelings whatsoever. You could advertise for them and it would certainly be less costly than bartering with me directly."

    "That's very honest of you, sir," Madison smiled, and for the first time it reached his eyes.

    "Rather be honest up front and not waste time later. Now, in terms of the wagon, do you know what dimensions you're talking? Flat or enclosed? Fitted with seats or purely for cargo?"

    Madison's bland expression returned. "I, uh... I don't exactly know. Yet."

    "Well, let me take it back a step, then," Alexander said, not unkindly. "Why exactly would you need a wagon and some crates or trunks? If I know what you're planning to use them for, I could make better recommendations."

    Madison pondered for a moment, his eyes darting around and his fingers working each other even faster. "Well," he said carefully, "my family and I -- all the generations -- are considering taking a bit of a journey."

    Does he actually think that's a subtle answer? Alexander thought, amazed. He says it as if I'm going to interpret it to mean that they're going to relocate to another region.

    "So you would need plenty of storage space for clothing, tools, and gear."

    "Yes, exactly."

    "And a significant amount of seating. How large is your family now?"

    "Total? I think we're somewhere around thirty, including all the grandchildren."

    "Seating for that many in a wagon, plus storage space; that could be challenging. You might be looking at two wagons."

    "I see. Yes. That does make sense," Madison said, his brow starting to furrow.

    "And I assume you'll want it enclosed with a venting channel for the Flatlands."

    "Yes, that would be..."

    Alexander scowled as the older man trailed off, realizing that he had admitted the direction of travel by acknowledging the Flatlands. The rugged plain lay in the long journey between the settlement and the City. It was the only way to get there.

    Madison's meaningless smile was gone. His face was carefully, passively neutral. "There's no rule against it," he said.

    "There shouldn't have to be," Alexander said spitefully. "If you choose to move to the City, you are sentencing your entire family to death."

    "Don't exaggerate it," Madison replied firmly. "You get a full life."

    "Until you're seventy-five."

    "That's..."

    "And then the Presidium decrees that you are now 'no longer socially or economically feasible to maintain,'" Alexander quoted. 

    Madison stared at him for a moment. With the older man's eyes no longer darting around the room, Alexander could see a quiet sort of shrewdness in them. He looked not like a man thinking so much as calculating. With a sigh through his nose, Madison walked to the door and turned the heavy lock.

    Without changing his expression, Alexander reached casually under the counter to his left, locating by feel the handle of a heavy claw hammer. For a brief, heady moment, he wondered if he was about to promote Madison's oldest son to Patriarch.

    "Do you know," Madison asked, his voice sounding more certain than Alexander had ever heard it before, "that there is a small operation that smuggles goods from the City?"

    "I've heard rumors," Alexander said, "but I've never seen proof."

    "No," Madison said. "I imagine you wouldn't."

    Alexander stopped short of demanding to know what Madison meant by that, but he decided the older man would rather talk than become aggressive; he took his fingertips off of the claw hammer.

    Continuing, Madison said, "Nothing large can get out. But there are former outliers -- ones that have moved to the City -- that try to send back messages and small items on the Drones."

    "What do you mean?"

    Madison shrugged. "Exactly what I said. If you ever captured or disabled a Drone, and you opened one particular rear panel where you would normally find secondary power cells, you might find all sorts of small things. Technology. Food. Medicine. Messages. All of it intended to go to very particular places, where these Drones are programmed to land without notifying the City -- just long enough to be unloaded."

    "Are you saying you've captured a Drone?"

    "No," Madison laughed sharply. "Not me. The Donegan boys."

    Alexander huffed. That sounded like something those idiots would have tried.

    "The young one -- I don't remember their names -- the young one had been out hunting for game in the Far Woods to the west, almost the whole way to the next settlement, and he saw it happen. A few weeks later, he and his brothers brought one down and destroyed it."

    "Destroyed a Drone?" Alexander scoffed. "The Donegan boys."

    Madison peered at him thoughtfully. "You've never seen their arsenal," he decided. "They brought it down, opened it up, took out everything they found, and destroyed it."

    "It would have squirted a message back to the City."

    "I have no idea if it did or not. But apparently, they were able to figure out how to repeat the accomplishment. Quite a few times. For the past year and a half, they've been bringing down and looting about three drones a month."

    "I'm not seeing what this has to do with your decision to get your family killed."

    "You know my second son? Ernest? He used to run with the Donegans, and they approached him about bartering some of their spoils. Ernest never had much head for bartering, or for keeping his damn mouth shut. He came to me for guidance. I went to the Donegans to see what they had to offer. I didn't expect much. Those boys are -- were -- foolhardy and useless."

    Madison reached into a pocket and pulled out a thin, flexible piece of some kind of plastic about the size of the palm of his hand.

    "Have you ever seen one of these?" he asked, handing it over.

    Alexander examined it, shaking his head. "I'm not sure," he said. "It doesn't look like much."

    "No," Madison nodded. "But I remembered that my grandfather used to have something a lot like this when I was a boy. I used to play with it over and over until the power finally gave out."

    "What does it do?"

    "It's a moment," Madison said, taking it back gently. "Hold it flat on your palm like this... and press the top firmly."

    He demonstrated, and suddenly the plastic turned from a charred gray color to what looked like a window into another world.

    "It's a television?" Alexander said, his jaw dropping. "A working television?"

    "Only a moment," Madison explained. "Listen."

    Alexander leaned a little closer. A beautiful, smiling young blond woman was on the screen.

    "Hi, Sal," said the woman. "I hope you get this. I had to do a lot of favors to find the people who could get this out. Not like that, so stop being gross. So -- yeah. The City.

    "Sal, it's so different from what we thought. I mean, we used to think it was all robots and factories and everyone wearing the same color clothes or whatever. Like it was going to be some soulless, joyless place. Sal, it's not that at all.

    "Here's what I've learned. For one thing, there's no Patriarch status in here. I mean, there can be, I guess, if you want, but it's not mandatory like it is out there. It turns out that the only reason they even instituted the Patriarchy in the first place was to make it efficient for the Census to determine who was an outlier citizen and who was a threat. That's not just rumor, Sal, I met one of the women who records the Census data, and the City doesn't even care about what outliers do out there. Other than the Census workers, they really don't even think about us.

    "Huh. I said 'they.' I keep forgetting that I'm one of 'them' now.

    "But I can't really say that 'we' don't think about 'you.' Because I think about you all the time. I think about how hard you're fighting for survival out there. How you'd sometimes come home with your hands bleeding from the scavenging work in the landfill. How many times I had to pretend that I didn't catch you crying at night, because you never would have talked to me again if I'd tried to comfort you. How much it hurt me to see how lost you looked when I married Jamin. And how I cried, so hard, when we left in the middle of the night and I couldn't say goodbye to you.

    "Sal... I really think you'd love it here. The people are friendly. Everyone I've met is friendly. And I think it's because they all have what they need, and then some. They really do, Sal. There are no scavengers. There are no poor. Everyone has a place to live, everyone has enough food. There are enough jobs to go around to make sure everything functions smoothly. The Presidium has this whole system in place where you get tested for your talents and skills, but also for your interests and your passions, and you get assigned a job.

    "I know that sounds maybe a little... I don't know, fascist? But, Sal, I haven't found anyone who doesn't at least like their job, and most people love theirs. And if your interests and your talents don't line up, there's training. You can try to learn how to do what you want to do. For free!

    "There are no shortages here. It's a system, yeah -- but the system works!

    "I mean, it's not paradise, you know. I haven't seen it personally, but I know there's still crime here, and some pollution and stuff. But Sal... Sal, I haven't been hungry once. I haven't had to worry about whether or not a deep cut might lead to gangrene, Sal -- there's medical care here.

    "And there are rules about not communicating with outliers. That's... I don't understand that rule. I guess maybe the Presidium still thinks outliers are dangerous or something, and they're afraid someone will tell something secret that could hurt them -- us -- or, I don't know. It doesn't make sense to me. But we're not supposed to, so don't tell anyone you got this. If you got this. I don't think you can send anything back to me.

    "I know it's going to be a long time until you're a Patriarch, Sal. There's Dad and Uncle Lane and Grandpa between you and having the chance to choose whether you want to stay an outlier family or commit to the City. Because you can't get back out, Sal. It's a one-way choice. So unless you make that choice, when you get the chance, I won't ever get to see you again."

    The woman on the screen started to cry. She reached out a hand and the screen went dark.

    Alexander looked up at Madison in wonder. He'd heard about televisions, but it had been a couple generations since the last one in the settlement had worked at all. The assumption was that the City had developed some other technology that rendered the old broadcasts outdated. He'd heard about handheld gadgets, too, but those had stopped before the televisions did, back in the original Calamities.

    He knew they were theoretically possible, and even probable within the confines of the City, but he'd never seen anything like it before, and it was almost like watching magic.

    The woman's accent had surprised him, too. He had never spoken to anyone from outside Riverbend, and he had no idea where she could be from.

    "That came out of a Drone?" he asked needlessly, at a loss for words.

    Madison laughed humorlessly, sliding the device back into his pocket. "The Donegan boys had no idea what it was or how to work it," he said. "I got it for a few jars of pickling spices, if you can believe it."

    "You had no idea what would be on it."

    "Had to be important enough for someone to smuggle out," Madison shrugged.

    "So you believe it?"

    Madison peered at him skeptically. "You think it's propaganda?" he asked. "If the City wanted us all to move there, they'd order it. They'd send the damn Drones after us with orders to kill anyone who didn't jump to it."

    "You know what the City is capable of," Alexander said quietly. "But you still want to go there."

    "Capable of killing us all? Yeah. Any time they want. Or they can make the rest of my life a lot easier."

    "And shorter."

    "So what do you want when you get to my age?" Madison asked, grimacing. "Thirty, forty more years of barely getting enough food for the family? Of fighting the weather, the growing wild areas, and the rot until you're feeble, and then fighting more because you don't have a choice? Or fifteen guaranteed years of reasonable comfort?"

    Alexander didn't answer.

    "I want a roof that doesn't leak," the older man went on. "I want a treatment for these hands. Look at them. They're twisted like tree roots. They never stop hurting. Not for a minute. I want to see what it's like to not worry about the winter."

    "What will you think when you're seventy-four?" Alexander asked.

    "How do I know I'll make it past seventy-five out here?"

    "Someone in your family could."

    "I'm done discussing this now. Don't say anything to anyone, will you?" Madison asked with a sigh. "You know what people get like when word gets around. Hell, you were ready to pick a fight yourself."

    "Willow doesn't want to go," Alexander blurted.

    Madison breathed deeply; Alexander could see that he was instantly aware of the problems and ramifications that brought up. Finally, he said with a nod, "I'll talk to her and Loren. See if we can't reach an agreement of some kind. Just keep it quiet and get me some quotes on the wagon and the trunks."

    He turned and walked away, unlocking the door and seeing himself out without another word. 

    Alexander sat for a long time without resuming his work. It was only a couple hours later, when he was smoothing down the edges of a fresh-cut panel that it occurred to him to wonder who Sal was, and if he or she had been expecting to receive a message.

    On his walk home from his workshop -- a short, ten-minute stroll past a few other important settlement artisans -- he noticed his half-brother Bryce sitting alone on the front step of his fishing supply shop. A jar of clear liquid was in his hand, and he looked haggard and pale.

    "Everything okay?" Alexander asked. He and Bryce had never been close, but family was family and Bryce looked even more terrible than a man with a dozen kids should.

    Bryce looked around and then gestured for Alexander to take a seat. He offered him the jar. Alexander took a short sip; it was moonshine, but a sweeter and gentler version than he was used to.

    "Good stuff," he commented.

    "I'll get you some," Bryce replied absently.

    "What's going on?"

    "Can you keep a secret?"

    I don't know if I've been told a secret in years, Alexander thought wryly, and now two in one day?

    "Sure," he answered.

    "I helped with the Donegan boys' bodies," Bryce said.

    "I figured you would," Alexander nodded. Apart from being a sturdily built man, one capable of carrying heavy loads, Bryce often volunteered for work that most others didn't want to do.

    "It was definitely the Drones that killed them," he said.

    "Was that ever in question?"

    Bryce shrugged. "I guess not really. But we confirmed it anyway. The wounds weren't anything we could make with our weaponry, and we pulled a couple weird-looking... I don't know, I guess they're still bullets... out of each of them before we realized how pointless it was to do that."

    Alexander nodded in understanding. "A really rough job, huh?"

    Bryce took back the jar and slugged back a mouthful before answering. "Sure, but that's not the problem."

    "Okay?"

    "I've done this a lot, Alex. I know what I'm looking at."

    "And?"

    "Those boys had been dead for a couple days before the Scanners even came," Bryce said, his voice hushed but intense. "Why are the Drones killing registered outliers instead of subduing them?"

    The next day, after negotiating the bartering price for the two wagons Alexander convinced Nolan Madison that he would need, as well as the trunks that would double as seats and even partially as walls, it was necessary to assemble the materials. After giving his employees and apprentices explicit instructions for the day's work, Alexander set off across the river for the Canavere family smithy.

    He had hitched a medium-sized wagon of his own to a horse borrowed from EmmaRose. In his experience, Emidio Canavere almost always had everything that Alexander needed in stock in his giant "warehouse," which was primarily made of several ancient plastic storage sheds that Emidio's grandfather had reclaimed from somewhere. There was no way the Canaveres actually smithed all the metal pieces in their massive collection, but it hardly mattered. Alexander knew he'd be returning to his shop with some new tools, the extra hinges and drawer pulls he'd need, the pieces necessary for him to finish the tricky construction of the wagon wheels, and a replacement for that damned flattened bell.

    He pulled the wagon to a stop at the edge of the Canavere's compound, which was practically a settlement of its own. Emidio was Patriarch of the largest family Alexander had ever heard of. Although he wasn't sure of the exact number, it was rumored that his compound held over a hundred of his descendants and... descendants-in-law? The term didn't matter to Alexander so much as the fact that he wasn't sure where they all came from. Despite the size of the family, he had never heard of anyone he knew marrying into it, although he had known several Canavere daughters and granddaughters who had married out.

    Alexander was used to dealing with a grand total of four of the Canaveres. Emidio, the Patriarch himself, was usually responsible for interacting with customers. Two of his sons, Nazario and Prudenzio, were the fairly silent muscle who would move the items from warehouse to wagon; neither ever seemed to break a sweat or struggle to remember where the items would be. Finally, Teofilo, who Alexander thought was possibly a nephew, always seemed to be hanging around and making things cheerful, even though he never seemed to actually do much of anything. No one ever complained. It was almost like he was the smithy mascot.

    Alexander tied the horse to the hitching post and reached into his pocket for his purchase list. He walked into the front room of the smithy, where business was transacted, and immediately felt the difference between the cool, breezy day and the edges of oppressive heat that radiated from the actual smithworks in the back.

    "Alessandro," Emidio said, his thick gray mustache adding to his smile. "I was starting to think you'd fallen into the river, or moved to the City. Why have you left me so lonesome for so long?"

    Alexander laughed. "I had to make my visit something special, Mr. Canaveres."

    Emidio reached out a hand for the list. Looking it over, he asked a few cursory questions for clarification, nodding and writing down notes as he went. "Okay," he nodded. "This shouldn't be a problem. Is all this for you, or do you have a client?"

    "Are you trying to figure out how much to get in exchange?" Alexander teased.

    "Oh, you say such mean things, Alessandro," Emidio said, feigning wounded pride. "Just for that, the price is going to go up."

    The men easily discussed terms of their barter, reaching a complete agreement in a matter of four minutes. Emidio began to write it out by hand, and he whistled sharply. Nazario and Prudenzio -- Alexander could never remember which was which, as they were both tall, swarthy men with similar faces -- came in within moments and looked over the list of items. Without a word, they nodded to each other and set off to the "warehouse" to gather the ordered items.

    Alexander waited politely for Emidio to finish writing up the terms of their agreement. Emidio only ever wrote it up once, signed it, and handed it over to the other person -- and to the best of Alexander's knowledge, he had never failed to remember the exact terms they had agreed upon. With some other shops, the standard method was to write the information in triplicate, have each party sign each page, and divide them up -- one to the seller, one to the buyer, and one to be stored by a neutral shopkeeper selected by them both as a permanent record in case of dispute or error. Emidio frequently complained about such shops. "We're not part of the damned City," he'd protest. "We understand how to choose to take care of ourselves and our settlement."

    Alexander thought he was right. Anyone caught threatening the well-being of anyone else in the community immediately faced opposition from the rest of the settlement. It was often subtle, or implied, but it was generally effective. Alexander couldn't think of a time when an argument between two outliers had not been settled before it became too dangerous.

    He then remembered what Bryce had said about the Donegan boys.

    That sort of violence was unsettling, to say the least.

    Emidio signed his name with a flourish that in no way helped its legibility. He handed the paper over to Alexander and said, "There you go. So -- what's the gossip about on your side of the river?"

    "Well, mostly it's about the Donegan boys."

    "Those boys were nothing but a nuisance!" Emidio said, tapping his ramrod-straight finger on his countertop to emphasize his point. "They're lucky that the City killed them before somebody who knew them did. Why anybody put up with them is a mystery to me."

    Alexander kept his opinion to himself. They had never been his favorite people to have around -- loud, rude, dirty, and crass -- but they were by far the best hunters in the settlement, and they had never been stingy with sharing with people in need.

    "Everyone's wondering what exactly they did to be executed like that."

    "They didn't go to the Census!" Emidio barked. "The one thing the City makes us do in exchange for our freedom, and they just didn't show up."

    "The Drones have the same memory as the Scanners," Alexander pointed out. "They should have recognized their faces and moved to subdue instead of kill."

    If that's what happened, he thought.

    "Maybe they just got to be too much trouble for the City," Emidio suggested. "Rumor has it they were interfering with Drones."

    "What?" Alexander scoffed, hoping he seemed sufficiently surprised and skeptical. "First of all, who said that? And second, how exactly were they supposed to accomplish that?"

    Emidio shrugged. "It's the rumor."

    "Well, then, you know more about it than I do."

    "So what else is going on over on your side of the river?"

    "Nothing much to speak of."

    "Oh? Who's surrendering?"

    "What do you mean by that?"

    "Alessandro," Emidio sighed, lowering his voice, "you need hardware for ten wagon wheels. Do you know who used to make wagon wheels centuries ago? The smiths. The smiths were the wheelwrights. It is not an easy job. You want to make ten of them, and with all these hinges -- you're making two traveling wagons. The only reason you would take on two at once, my friend, is because you have one customer who needs them both. And one customer needing two wagons is relocating a family. I know you're not moving to the City. So, tell me. Who is surrendering their lives to those fascists?"

    Alexander sighed. He should have anticipated Emidio figuring it out. "It's really not my story to tell," he said.

    "Well, whoever it is," Emidio said, "screw 'em. If they want to let the City kill them, they are getting exactly what they deserve. You drive this bargain hard, and take everything you can from them, so we can keep it here, where we need it."

    That, at least, Alexander had no quarrel with. "I did," he assured Emidio.

    While waiting for Nazario and Prudenzio to return, they continued chatting about minor news from both sides of the river -- who was expecting a child, who was ill, who was struggling or succeeding with various ventures. Emidio had a funny story about a nearby clothing shop that had a few birds somehow make it into their storage unit and the havoc they had created by chewing on laces and ribbons; Alexander didn't know the shop owner, so the impression Emidio did may have been wildly inaccurate for all he knew, but it was still amusing enough to have him exploding into laughter.

    Eventually the brothers returned and nodded silently to Emidio, who said, "Okay. Your wagon is all loaded up. What other business have you got on our side of the river today?"

    "Nothing, actually," Alexander said. "I just came to see you."

    "Ohhhh, I bet you say that to all the boys," Emidio joked.

    "Hey," Alexander said, a realization hitting him, "where's Teofilo?"

    Emidio's face didn't fall so much as melt. He inhaled deeply through his nose and blew it out through narrowly open lips. "That news," he said, "didn't make it across the river, then."

    "Oh, no," said Alexander. "What's going on?"

    Emidio opened his mouth, but his jaw quivered and he closed it again. Tears welled in his eyes, and he turned his body away from Alexander, resting a hand on the edge of a doorframe and then lowering his head against the door.

    Alexander looked at Nazario and Prudenzio. "Did something happen to Teofilo? He's not... he's not dead, is he?"

    The brothers looked at each other, almost guiltily. The one who was slightly taller responded in a voice much like Emidio's. "Not yet. But he will be."

    "Why? What happened?"

    The shorter one frowned, and said simply, "DRAVS."

    Alexander had never been anywhere in the Canavere compound other than the smithy and its storefront. The houses looked less like the salvaged and rebuilt residences that made up most of the settlement, and more like houses that had survived the Calamities and had been carefully maintained for the decades since then. They looked simultaneously old-fashioned and far more modern than any other house Alexander had been in.

    The taller of the two brothers -- the one Alexander now knew was Prudenzio -- had offered to take him to see Teofilo. "He doesn't get a lot of visitors," he had said. "It's like people think it's contagious or something."

    Alexander understood. It wasn't so much that people were afraid that it was contagious. Everyone knew that it wasn't. It was more that people were scared of what they didn't understand. No one knew how you contracted DRAVS, or even what kind of disease it really was. There was no cure; there was no real treatment. Some of the symptoms could be mitigated, but it was degenerative by nature. It was a death sentence with no reprieve.

    Prudenzio had explained on the walk to the house Teofilo shared with his mother Savina, Emidio's late brother's widow, that in this case the disease had progressed very rapidly. Although he had experienced the first symptoms only two months before, he was no longer able to walk and had a great deal of difficulty speaking clearly. 

    "Have you ever seen someone with DRAVS before?" Prudenzio had asked. "I mean, really up close?"

    "No," Alexander had admitted. "I've heard about it, but that's all."

    "Yeah, well. You don't have to go in there, you know."

    Alexander hadn't responded, but his stomach clenched slightly. He knew how much Prudenzio and Nazario loved Teofilo, just from the way they had always interacted in front of him. And now Prudenzio was almost encouraging him not to go in to visit. It was almost as if he was scared of his own cousin.

    Prudenzio had opened the front door to Teofilo's house without knocking. "Zia Savina," he had called out. "Teo has a visitor. Alexander Ravell." And immediately, Prudenzio had walked away.

    Now, standing inside the doorway and removing his shoes at the gentle request of the raven-haired woman in front of him, Alexander started to wonder why he had come after all. Did Teofilo even really remember him? Was it that important to the sick young man to have any visitor, or would this just reinforce to him that the only people coming to visit him weren't his family or close friends, but merely a polite business acquaintance?

    Savina wore the look of someone in need of at least a week's sleep. Alexander wondered if trying to sooth Teofilo's symptoms was a round-the-clock effort, or if what he was really seeing was the weariness of preparing for an imminent loss. If maybe Teofilo's death would be more of a release for her than a sorrow at this point. She had been preparing for it for two months.

    And his disease was progressing fast. Other people suffered for years before reaching the phase Teofilo was in now. There was no way to predict the pace of DRAVS, although the order of progression was well-known by this point.

    Savina guided Alexander to a dimly lit room. He could see a motionless bulk of blankets on a small bed pushed into the corner. There was a faint odor of something unpleasantly resinous. 

    "Teofilo," she said gently. The blankets shifted and she tried again. "Teofilo. Alexander Ravell is here to see you."

    The blankets were gripped and pulled from underneath, revealing a head resting on a pillow facing in their direction. "Mr. Ravell?"

    Alexander tried not to react, but his mouth went dry and he swallowed, hard. His eyes hadn't fully adjusted to the darkness in the room, but his ears were working fine. He had heard about this symptom of the disease, but until he heard it himself it had been nothing but a story. Teofilo's voice sounded like two distinct voices speaking in sync with one another -- one normal, and one high and raspy. People said it was because DRAVS somehow affected the vocal cords, but Alexander had no idea how any of it worked.

    "It's okay," the weird double voice said. "You can turn on the light for a little while."

    Savina looked at Alexander, seemingly for permission. Confused, Alexander shrugged and nodded. It was her house; why would it matter to him about the lights?

    She flicked a switch on the wall -- now Alexander knew their houses were made before the Calamities -- and two lamps brightened, illuminating the room.

    His shoulders slumped and his lips parted. He had never seen anyone who looked like this.

    The first sign of DRAVS was always the same - a small purplish spot in the cornea of one eye. It often looked like a bruise or a burst blood vessel at first, but if you looked very, very closely you could see that it extended outward in fractal spirals and curves. It always grew larger as the disease progressed.

    Teofilo's eyes were completely purple, and the skin around his eyes revealed thin purplish lines just underneath, as if tendrils were spreading over more than half of his face. His hair was gone, including brows and lashes. He was skeletally thin, and as one of his hands pushed out from under the covers, Alexander could see that it was fully wrapped in bandages stained with some amber-colored substance.

    "My God," he said involuntarily.

    "Pff," Savina said, exiting the room. "Dio non esiste."

    "Non è vero, mamma," Teofilo said, before coughing violently. He gestured toward the nightstand by his bed. Understanding, Alexander found a glass of water and helped the young man to take a drink.

    Teofilo settled back down on his pillow and sighed, panting slightly. "You came to see me?" he asked.

    "I came to barter with your father," Alexander said honestly. "But when I heard you were ill, I wanted to stop by."

    Teofilo laughed weakly. "Ill. I like that. Everyone here uses the word 'dying' instead."

    Alexander fell silent. He wasn't sure how to respond to that, and he couldn't think of another topic of conversation.

    With a thin smile, Teofilo asked, "You've never been around DRAVS before, have you?"

    "No, I haven't."

    "Well, I'm honored and disappointed to be the first one you see, then. I don't know how I look anymore -- I assume you can tell that I've gone blind now -- but I imagine it's got to be as disconcerting as I sound."

    "Don't worry about me," Alexander sputtered. "I'm... I'm..."

    "Leaving this room alive?" Teofilo said wryly. "Yeah, Mr. Ravell, here's the thing. I know I'm going to die. My legs don't work. I'm blind. It's hard to breathe. My hands -- well, you see the bandages? My hands leak, Mr. Ravell. And it's like tree sap. And they hurt. There's nothing on me that doesn't hurt. At some point, when you know you're going to die, you really stop thinking about how much worse it could get, and you just kind of accept that all you can do is wait. So, yeah. I'm going to worry about you, because trying to make you feel a little bit better is something I can at least pretend to control."

    Once again, Alexander could think of nothing to say in return.

    Teofilo frowned. "Talking about what it's doing to me -- that made you uncomfortable. I'm sorry."

    "No, not at all," Alexander lied. "I've heard of what DRAVS does to people."

    "But you've never seen it," Teofilo said. "It's a little different, isn't it? Did you know my father died of DRAVS?"

    "No," Alexander admitted. "I never met your father."

    "Vasco Canavere. I was eight when he got it. I watched him get sicker for almost three years. I know what it's like to see it."

    "I'm sorry."

    "It was a long time ago, Mr. Ravell. But I think this is even harder on my mother than losing my father was. I've gotten this bad in less than three months. She didn't have the same kind of time to get used to the idea."

    "You never get used to the idea of losing a child," Alexander suggested.

    "Yeah. That's probably true." His sentence ended with a new coughing fit; even the vocalizations in his coughs came out in two distinct voices, and Alexander's skin crawled.

    Savina came in quickly and helped Teofilo sit up a bit more. "I think maybe he needs to rest again," she said, glaring at Alexander as if the coughing was his fault. "Go wait for me at the door, please."

    "Bye, Teofilo," he said, feeling guilty at how quickly he left the room. Some of the coughing had resulted in bloody spittle on the sick man's chin. Some of it had been purplish.

    He waited, fidgeting, until Savina closed the door to Teofilo's room and approached him. "Thank you," she said, not sounding like she meant it. "You're the first one to visit him who is not a relative."

    "Of course," Alexander said, not quite able to meet her accusatory gaze. "If there's anything I can do..."

    "When my husband was dying, a lot of people said that. I always said the same thing -- it's DRAVS. Nobody can do anything."

    "I'm sorry. No one should have to lose anyone to DRAVS; especially not two. And especially not a child."

    "There is something you can do for me," she said, refusing to acknowledge his weak attempt at sympathy. "You can take a message."

    Stammering with surprise, Alexander said, "Of course. Just... where and when? I'm happy to help."

    "South. To the foothills. The Passageway settlement."

    "Passageway?" Alexander blurted without thinking. "That's... with respect, Ms. Canavere, there's a messenger service that goes there once every two weeks. I'll be happy to arrange..."

    "You're his friend," she said. "You will take the message yourself. I don't trust it to anyone else."

    It was over eighty miles to Passageway. Even with the healthiest horse he knew of that he could borrow, it could easily take him two days to get there and two days to get back. He was looking at almost a week of being gone from his shop and his family. He knew they could deal with it, but it was a hell of a lot for anyone to demand of him as a favor.

    "Where's the message?" he asked reluctantly, considering that he might still arrange, quietly, for the messenger service to deliver it for him. Maybe he would talk to Emidio about the situation, just to make sure his decision wouldn't somehow damage their work relationship.

    "It's not formal," she said. "Nothing written. I don't want it to risk interception."

    The service is very well-guarded, Alexander thought, trying not to consider the potential cost of hiring them.

    Then Savina told him what the message was, and to whom it was to be delivered.

    Damn it, he thought.

    I'm going to Passageway.