I sat with Lee at the edge of the world.

Our feet dangled over the lake shore - or where the lake shore used to be - by the Adler Planetarium. The planetarium, with its powerful telescope, was being retrofitted as a kind of surveillance station. It also served as the Construction Squad's base of operations. Brigg was inside arguing about our options with the British engineering team over the radio. So far, we had considered constructing a bridge, or some sort of gondola to get across the gap to London. Other options were trying to find some sort of aircraft, like the Russians had. But there were too many unknowns; too many pieces of information we were still missing.

The most obvious question was: where were we? But it was too big, too vague for anyone to answer. So we broke it down into smaller questions. Was there an atmosphere? If so, how big was it? Was it around us, or around all of the cities together?

If it was the second, then an aircraft like a helicopter or a jet could take anyone across the Void and to other islands. But if each island was surrounded by a micro-atmosphere, as Lee called it, then anything relying on air for lift - AKA, most flying machines outside of rockets - wouldn't be able to maneuver outside of the micro-atmosphere. That would explain why the Russians hadn't sent their jets over - for better or worse. Because there was no air for them to fly though outside of their “island.”

"It makes sense," Lee said, "but I'm not a physicist. I can't begin to guess how we'd get from one rock to another. It would literally be rocket science, right?"

"I guess so," I said, "but let's focus on the small problems. We've got three days to get supplies to London or they'll-"

"Die. Kick it. Yeah, and so will we?" Lee said.

"What do you mean? We've got enough food for, I don't know... A long ass time."

"Food, sure," said Lee, "but in case you haven't noticed, Lake Michigan is gone. There's no water except for what's in the city right now… and if I overheard Moira correctly, it’s not a lot. Water goes a lot quicker than food. If we fail... it's best not to think about a few thousand people dying of dehydration."

A few thousand. Since the sign went up on the Sears Tower broadcasting that people were still alive in Chicago, smaller tribes had come out of the woodwork and joined up with Moira's budding alliance. She'd dubbed herself Emergency Executive, which, as far as I could tell, was something like a dictator but supposed to be less scary. She ruled the Sears Tower with a stern hand, which had become kind of like a miniature city in itself.

"But can't we... I don't know, filter our pee or something? Water doesn't just go away, it's not like we're destroying it, despite how gross that sounds," I said.

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"Maybe - if we can capture it," Lee said, grimacing. "But what if some water evaporates? Where does it go? Does it become a cloud, and then rain here? Is there a water cycle? Or does it just float off into the Void? And how does gravity work? I mean, it's definitely here, we're standing on the ground, but is there a planet beneath us with a larger field of gravity? How come all of the other cities are facing the same way? If it's arbitrary, I mean, if there's no up or down... There are just too many weird things that work in our favor... it's almost like..."

"Like something put us all here. Something intelligent and incredibly powerful," I said.

Lee frowned. "Don't tell me you're siding with Briggs about the aliens," she said.

I had to laugh. "I'm not, I'm just getting the vibe that you might be questioning... a more rational explanation."

"We only know what we know," Lee said, "which is jack shit. Should we pull up the sensor? It should be time."

I looked down. For the last hour, we'd been repeatedly lowering and raising a sensor attached to a rope, taking measurements for oxygen. The "sensor" was really just a piece of paper doused in a chemical that turned green in the absence of oxygen. That would at least tell us if we could survive between Chicago and London, out in the Void. We attached a thermometer, for good measure. The basic idea was to determine if we'd need space suits to cross between cities, or if the Void could support life.

After a good fifteen minutes of cranking, the sensor came back up: the strip was still white, meaning there was still oxygen at a "depth" of almost 2,500 feet. Right now, it seemed like the micro-atmosphere theory was failing.

"That doesn't make any sense," I said, "if there's atmosphere from here to Moscow, the Russians would have flown over to us by now."

"Maybe something else is stopping them. Or maybe we're missing something. Look, I know this was supposed to be a last resort, but I think it's time we kill Timmy."

I groaned. "I know. I know. But I'm not happy about it."

We both turned to look at a small cage next to our equipment. Inside was a brown and white gerbil we'd found in an abandoned pet shop. The gerbil looked at us innocently.

I sighed. "Alright, Timmy. Are you prepared to be the first living creature to enter the Void?"

"Oh god," Lee said, "it's just like when the Russians sent that dog into space."

"I feel bad for the dogs in Moscow right now," I said, "they're probably going the way of Timmy."

I tied the rope around the gerbil cage and began to lower it off the edge of Chicago.

"If he lives, then at least we'll know we can cross to London without suffocating or freezing to death."

"I don't think we'll need to wait for those results, Peter," Lee said. She sounded exhausted. I looked up from the hamster cage that slowly descended into the abyss.

"Why?" I asked.

Lee was staring through a small telescope.

"Because right now, I can see a person zip-lining from Moscow to Beijing. They've already linked up."

I ran over to the telescope and looked through. Like she said, there was a thin black line connecting Beijing and Moscow, and the unmistakable shape of a human gliding down it.

"Shit," I said.

It was like the space race all over again. And we were losing.