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As the party exited the bower, Blake grabbed Abe from behind. The two of them alone remained in the bower. Blake pulled his pistol and tapped it. “Be ready,” he said. “Something ain’t right. I don’t know what it is, but just be ready, okay?”

Why not tell the others?

Abe nodded, and patted his breast where he kept his pistol.

“Can you pull that in a hurry?” Blake asked. He was looking into Abe’s eyes with intent.

Abe struggled to unzip his shell layer, then unzipped his puffy coat layer, then unbuttoned a mid-layer shirt, then struggled to find the pocket of his second base layer. “Uh…” he said.

“Put it in your shell layer pocket,” Blake said.

At that moment, the air was rent with something that sounded like a tractor-trailer engine gearing down on a highway near a big city exit, followed by the outburst of six men laughing hysterically. Blake and Abe rushed outdoors, where they were confronted by a large, dark purple cloud hanging in the air, a slightly embarrassed-looking Sano standing nearby, and all the men doubled over with laughter. “Watch out! Careful!” one of them said to Blake and Abe. “Do it again!” someone else said. “Can you do it on demand?”

Sano squatted down carefully, hinging her pelvis back and out away from her, she grunted in concentration, lifted one leg, and ripped another one. Blake and Abe joined the fray of laughter. I’m going to pass out. Stoic! Don’t pass out! Oh, my God, why is this hilarious?

“Watch out!” Sano said, suppressing her own pretty giggles. “The breeze is moving them!” Both clouds of inky purple began to drift and disperse. The party scattered to safety, despite the weakness of their laughter's inebriation.

Blake was the first to collect himself, wiping tears from his eyes. “Well, Sano, that’s a superpower I think we all envy, and you’d prefer not to have, unless I’m completely wrong.” Sano gazed without speaking. She came near to Blake and adjusted her clothing to make ready for the hike. Blake cast a glance toward Abe. Abe nodded and collected himself. The rest soon followed suit.

“We shall not divide the party, this time,” said Blake. “This is for all of us, The Unexpected Companions, a companionship that is growing by the day, it seems. Let’s keep an eye open for threats, and let’s protect each other, okay? As such a large group, we’re more easily spotted by the bad guys.”

“And the good guys,” said Meredith Donaldson.

“In this conspiracy, there are no good guys,” Blake said.

Lars was fiddling with the radio. He took up his place beside Abe as they walked, handing over the directional Yagi antenna. “No signal,” he said. “Nothing, not a thing. When I turn the squelch down, I get atmospheric noise, but no signals. I think the other party is gone.”

“That was quite a storm,” Abe said. “I wonder if Mother Mountain got rid of them for us.”

“Huh,” said Lars. “Magic.”

And so they walked in a bright, sunny, day, utterly unmolested. Blake peered toward the sun. “It’s still in the south,” he said, “but it’s getting higher off the horizon.”

“I wonder what day it is,” said Jason.

“How many days have we been on this mountain?” Umezawa asked.

“Do you fellows have any idea what day it is?” Lars asked, directing his question toward the bionics.

Perry Tuck opened up his mouth to speak, then cocked his head toward Lars, saying, “You know, I can’t remember. How odd.”

“Huh,” said Lars. “Magic.”

The conversation turned to food. Umezawa said, “I’d kill for some potato chips.”

Lars said, “Fresh lettuce and tomatoes for me.”

Blake said, “A loaf of bread.”

“We have literal pounds of flour and oil,” said Meredith Donaldson. “No yeast, though.”

“Yeah but with the propane, we can easily make Bannock,” Blake said.

“Not without baking powder,” said Lars.

“Yes, you can,” said Blake.

“No, you can’t,” said Lars. “You have to have something to make the flour rise.”

“It’s still Bannock without it rising.”

“Listen, Blake, it has to rise, and it won’t rise.”

“That’s what she said.”

The teenage boys laughed.

Lars said, “Blake? Buddy? Did you just make a funny?”

Blake maintained a blank countenance, scanning the trail for sign. “Maybe,” he said.

“Anyway,” said Perry Tuck, “we have baking powder, so, yes, we can make it rise, Lars.”

Lars sighed, “That’s what she said.”

“Oranges, too,” said Meredith Donaldson. “We have crates of oranges.”

“How many people were you planning to feed?” Blake asked, still scanning the area ahead. Abe felt a little anxiety come with that question.

“Oh,” said Meredith Donaldson, “government surplus, you know.”

“I thought you didn’t work for the government,” Blake said.

“We don’t,” Meredith Donaldson said quickly. “We work for Royhahn, which is that Chi-Can partnership. They have access to government surplus. It’s how we get durable goods, like guns, ammo, machinery, vehicles, shelters, clothing, and the like, so why not perishables?”

“Yeah,” said Blake. “Makes sense.” He didn’t say much else for the rest of the hike.

“More clothing, too,” said Meredith Donaldson, continuing. “And blankets, and all sorts of gear along those lines.”

“They were setting the three of you up for a long haul operation,” Lars said.

Perry Tuck said, “Well, not just the three of us. They were rotating us in and out.” There was a long silence as the party digested that.

Meredith Donaldson broke the silence. “Yeah, I don’t think you were supposed to say that.”

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

“What? You like being a slave to a couple of communist governments?”

“Of course not,” Meredith Donaldson said. “Of course not.”

When the day came to an end, they arrived at the place where the smaller reconnaissance party had paused only two days before. “We’re going to have to split the party,” said Abe. “I’ll have to command two trees to make enough room for all of us.”

“Why can’t we make our way to that little grove where we took shelter last night?” Blake asked.

“Do you know where it is from here in the dark?” Abe asked.

Blake peered into the gloom of the mountain. “These dang southern sunsets, I swear. We’re a month out from the equinox, and we still can’t see diddly on the western edge of the mountain. I tell you what!”

“No one has night vision, yet?” James Thurgerson said.

“Negative,” said the bionics. The teenagers likewise indicated that none of them could see in the dark.

“Oh well,” said James Thurgerson. “It seems like the nanotech will start working that out in one of you. I mean, isn’t that an obvious technology for survival? Night vision?”

“Maybe your makers aren’t all that bright,” said Blake.

“Another funny!” Lars said. “Get it? Bright? Night vision? Ha! Good one, chief!”

That’s a little over the top, don’t you think, Stoic? Blake is right: something important isn’t right, but he himself is off. So is Lars. What is happening, here?

“This reminds me of Season 2 Episode 2 of The Morose Alpaca,” he began.

“Not right now, Abe,” said Blake.

“No, seriously,” Abe said, powering over Blake’s objection. “Abigail is leading Nami around a mountain, only it’s in a tropical part of Okinawa, but it gets dark there about the same time every day, and…”

“Okinawa isn’t tropical,” said Jason.

“Yes, it is,” said Abe.

“It is not,” said Jason.

“Well, in the manga it is.”

“It’s subtropical,” said Lars, “like Florida.”

“Yeah,” said Abe, “and mountainous. It rains a lot, so everything is green and warm almost all year around.”

“What, in real-life, or just the manga?” Jason said, sneering.

“And in the anime,” said Abe, indignantly. “As I was saying, Abigail and Nami were circumscribing this gigantic tropical mountain…”

“Subtropical,” Jason said.

“…this gigantic subtropical mountain…”

“If you let him finish,” said Blake, “we’ll be done with it sooner.”

“Fine,” said Abe. “Never mind.”

“No, no,” said Lars. “I’m so bored right now. Go on.” Lars put his arm around Abe.

“Well, hurry it up,” said Blake, who was increasingly hard to see as the light faded. “We need shelter.”

“Oh,” said Abe. “No problem.” He made a command, and two nearby spruce trees obeyed.

Blake said, “Okay, Jim, Perry: you two and Sano and Jason and Lars, you all take one tree. Me and Abe, Meredith and Ume will take the other tree.”

“Oh,” said Sano.

“But I want to hear the rest of Season 2 Episode 2,” said Lars.

“Yeah, me too,” said Umezawa.

Abe beamed in the dark. “So anyway,” he said, “Abigail and Nami lost their bearings, you know, the way mountains do that to you—I must say, now that I’m experiencing it, the anime writers were really careful to maintain authenticity. I mean, of course they would: it’s a great anime from a great manga.”

“A josei, right?” Lars said.

“It’s a fusion,” Abe said with the same indignation still left over from Jason’s ripostes. “They lost their bearings, and they sat down in the dark. Nami began to cry, see, and despite Abigail’s best efforts to stop her, Nami was crying noisily. ‘You’ll attract something bad!’ Abigail said, but Nami was so scared she couldn't stop herself. Sure enough, Irakusa, the wood nymph of nettles, found them, casting a spell of prickly darkness on them, but at the same moment, Yashashikuma, the mountain bear spirit, also found them. Well, when she saw Irakusa, she roared and thundered, calling upon the mountain spirit. Irakusa laughed at Yashashikuma…”

“Ya-shashlik?” Lars said.

“No, not your shish-ka-bob from the halal cart in Manhattan,” said Jason, with some indignation of his own. “It’s a Japanese name for a great big gentle bear: Yashashi-kuma.”

“Yeah,” said Abe, “Yashashikuma didn’t take kindly to the wood nymph’s scoffing, so, with a single swipe, he tore all the nettles off Irakusa's dress, which broke the spell of prickly darkness, and forced Irakusa to run away. Yashashikuma breathed her warm breath on Abigail and Nami so that the two of them became very sleepy. They curled up together beneath a huge tree, which turned out to be the sister tree to the Sakishima Sappanwood Tree.”

“The what?” Lars asked.

“It’s a natural wonder,” said Jason. “It has above-ground roots that look like wavy walls, like a maze. It looks like the Guggenheim, except more intricate.”

“Yeah,” said Abe. “I’m sure the anime is fictional and all, but it’s such a beautiful scene, the way they drew the dawning of light on the mountain. I think they spent some real money on the CGI effects: the bear roaming around, protecting the two sleeping figures. The sun slowly dawns, and its orange and pink light begins to permeate the mountain-forest canopy, adding a coolness of green, with sparkles of magic all around, of course.”

“Of course,” said Lars.

“But it’s so beautiful when Abigail wakes up, smiling, with Nami still snoozing on her chest.”

Sano sighed, and went inside the tree.

“It’s a lovely image,” said Lars. “One to sleep by.” He disappeared into the same tree as Sano. Everyone disseminated to their assigned trees and promptly fell asleep. They awoke to another glorious dawn.

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By the dawn’s early light they could see how close they were to the little grove. “We’re not too smart ourselves, are we Blake?” said Lars.

“How dare you,” said Blake. “I mean, how dumb would it have been to try to find that in the dark, on a mountain, near a sheer cliff?”

“No, I mean, how we thought we had to make our way back in that blizzard.”

“Oh, come on,” said Blake. “How were we supposed to know that the mountain would be angry with us?”

“Well, and also it takes more than a day in pure, unalloyed sunlight.”

“Fair enough,” said Blake, “but we don’t have to be that smart to be smarter than the CI-fricking-A, now do we?”

Lars laughed. “You’re quite the optimist, aren’t you?”

“So far, so good, right?”

Lars shook his head.

The party reunited. Abe saw that Blake was counting, accounting for everyone. He said, “Everyone sleep okay? No troubles? No weird dreams?”

“I had one!” said Umezawa. “But I’ll keep that one to myself.” Jason elbowed Umezawa in the ribs.

Blake rolled his eyes. “Okay, me and Meredith will be the advance scouts. We’ll make our way to the bottom of this grove, and you all follow quietly. Lars, keep them back about thirty yards, and watch my signals. Got it?”

Lars nodded.

“Why me?” said Meredith Donaldson. “Perry is our leader.”

“You afraid of something?” said Blake. “I ain’t gonna try no funny business. You seen what Jim done to me. He’s not even your generation, am I right? You're more advanced than him, aren't you?”

“Well, I mean, it’s obvious you split up the bionics because you don’t trust us,” said Meredith Donaldson. “So, like, we don’t trust you.”

“What?” said Perry. “The guy could have put a bullet through our brains while we were unconscious!”

“I’ve been living with him for days on end,” said James Thurgerson. “He could have turned me out and made it easy for you to collect me.”

“Fine,” said Meredith Donaldson. “But why doesn’t he trust us?”

“Would you?” asked Perry Tuck.

Meredith blinked and cocked his head to one side. He looked to James Thurgerson. James Thurgerson returned his gaze without a word. “No,” he said. “I suppose not, but I still don’t like it.”

“You don’t gotta like it,” said Blake. “Consider this a test of our friendship.”

“Yeah,” said Jason, “like a hazing ritual to let you into The Surprise Companionship.”

“The Unexpected Companionship,” Umezawa corrected.

“I like that,” said Lars. “You know? I do. I like it. I didn’t like it before, but Jason is right. It’s a hazing ritual. Everyone we meet from now on has to do something crazy that Blake dreams up, as an entry fee to The Unexpected Companionship.”

Perry Tuck laughed and said, “Sounds good. Let’s go, Meredith. Let’s get the stuff and make tracks to our freedom. Blake is a trustworthy fellow.”

Blake led Meredith Donaldson through the sloping spruce grove. Lars counted their paces. “That’s close enough,” he said. “Let’s move out.” And they began to descend the slope. As they neared the bottom edge of the grove, they saw Blake and Meredith get down on their stomachs. Lars hesitated until Blake turned and gave them the okay sign. “They’re just taking precautions,” he said. “When we get to that spot, we’ll do the same.”

When they arrived at the spot, they stopped, stunned. In the distance below the cliff, a huge boulder was where there had not been a boulder a couple of days before. “I think that’s on the camper-trailer,” said Perry Tuck. "Wow." They got down on their bellies and began to crawl forward.

Lars hesitated and said, “You know, Sano, Umezawa, why don’t you two count thirty and then follow after us? Something about all this is just not right, and I don’t like it that we’re so close together.”

And so it was: Perry Tuck, James Thurgerson, Lars, Jason, and Abe became a second wave, while Sano and Umezawa became a relief party. The second wave continued following Blake and Meredith Donaldson, who were nearing the edge of the cliff.

Abe saw that Blake spoke to Meredith Donaldson, who pulled ahead of Blake a tad. Blake pulled his pistol. Abe heard a familiar thundering sound. Meredith Donaldson made a sign with his hand and rolled forward off the cliff. Blake shot at Meredith Donaldson, following him down with the muzzle of the pistol. Suddenly, Blake contorted his prone body and shouted back to the second wave, “Goddammit, Jason! You’re too close! Turn off your superpower!”

A helicopter appeared, beating the air with its rotors, drowning out every other sound except the whine of its motors. Blake raised his voice enough to be heard by the second wave, “Never mind! Keep it up! Keep the force field up!” He rose and began to run.

The entire party rose with Blake, turning to run, but not before every single one of them saw unmistakably, painted on the interior firewall of the helicopter, the stylized red maple leaf of Canada, only it was shaking hands with the yellow star of China. This helicopter was a much more sophisticated war machine than the one Lars shot down, but even so, when it opened fire, its spray of bullets was halted by Jason’s nanotech-controlled mind. The cannonade continued, a ripping sound with utter terror in its firing, but it was all so much sound and fury, the apocalypse of evil rendered utterly impotent.

The gigantic 50-caliber machine gun’s lead bullets fell to the ground like so many hailstones, while the minigun’s smaller, but still terrifying, bullets fell harmlessly, bubbling and murmuring as they gave off their heat to the cold of the mountain air. When he looked back, Abe saw the same astonished expression on the pilot’s face, as well as on the two other men, as they aimed and fired from the open door with smaller semiautomatic rifles. He also saw Meredith Donaldson reemerge over the cliff’s edge. He was signaling to someone above and to the left of them.

Another man was racing toward them on foot, and he was carrying a knife. He was about to cut the party off from the cover of the spruce grove. Abe wheeled around and ran back to join Blake. He saw that Meredith Donaldson had already overtaken him and was about to bring him to the ground.

Now, Stoic. Now! Unleash!

With fury, with all the fury he had seen in Sano, in Lars when he shot the helicopter pilot, in James Thurgerson when he survived the crash, and with all the fury he had seen drawn in fantasy manga and anime, as silly as it seemed to think, the cartoon expression of real human anger—with all that fury, including the fury in the futility of unrequited love for Sano, Abe unleashed himself on Meredith Donaldson, leaping, using the slight elevation of the slope before the cliff to his advantage. All his weight, such as it was, fell upon Meredith Donaldson, who caught Abe in his arms.

At least you’ve distracted him, Stoic.

Blake was able to unleash his own fury with a solid thumping of Meredith Donaldson’s groin. Not one, but two swift boot kicks caused Meredith Donaldson to gasp for air and loosen his grip on Abe. Blake pulled the trigger on his pistol, but the chamber and magazine was empty. Cursing, Blake threw that pistol to the ground and reached for another one, but Meredith Donaldson had already recovered. He swept Abe aside and punched Blake in the head.

Abe tried to rise in defense of his friend and leader Blake, but he slipped on loose gravel. He flailed wildly, trying to find something solid for his hands, but everything seemed against him. There was no tree to command, and the mountain was not his guardian. Gravel filled his mouth so that he couldn’t cry out. He saw, while he hung in awkward desperation to the cliff’s edge, his feet dangling--he saw the other bionic coming to Meredith Donaldson’s aid. Behind that bionic were James Thurgerson and Perry Tuck, who was shouting something about freedom from slavery.

Abe coughed to expel dust and snow crystals from his lungs. The spasm forced him to let go, and he fell.

There. A pitched battle. Those are the best. Two overpowered robots versus two overpowered robots, just like in Gundam. You haven’t watched Gundam in ages, Stoic, because it’s childish, isn’t it? Feel that? That’s the sensation of falling. That’s the abyss opening up. It’s about to get real dark real soon. Don’t worry, Stoic. You’ve teased yourself that you were ready for this for a few years now. Remember how when you were sixteen you refused to comb your hair for a year, and you bought five of the same shirt so that it would look like you never changed your clothes? Because you were certain in your stoicism? Here it is, Stoic. Why are you screaming? What good is that going to do? Who is going to help you now? Be a stoic, Stoic. Embrace the nothing.

A great darkness washed over Abe.

And he began to dream.

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