That was a question for later if at all, Alex decided.

He had a bit of a history of getting lost in his own head. Whenever he was stressed, he would disappear into his thoughts, circling around the problem or the negative emotions until it threatened a bout of depression, or worse. And that was just normal, everyday worries. Not this existential, Ship of Theseus nonsense.

It was a common enough problem that he had pills in his medicine cabinet for just such an occasion. His medicine cabinet back home, that is.

Absent pharmaceuticals to temper his anxiety, the best solution was just to not think about it. And the best way to not think about something was to do literally anything else.

With that in mind, Alex snatched up his satchel and stowed his account and status books inside. The ax joined the two books inside what amounted to a real-world bag of holding. Or maybe he ought to think of it more like a Scott Pilgrim style Hammerspace.

“Axespace." Alex chuckled, correcting his own thoughts. Before the day was through, he planned to circle around to the north and experiment with some logging. Even still, he knew that wasn't his only reason for bringing the ax along.

He just felt safer with a weapon on his person. Hard to blame him.

The trip from his farm and it was still weird to call it his farm, to the village of Blue Hills proper, was remarkable only for its eventfulness. The road between the two was little more than a smoothed down dirt path, with some of its dips and rises covered in gravel to aid in traction. It looked well used, as expected for a path that Marie claimed to traverse on a daily basis, with just a bit of wild grass creeping in on its edges.

At the roughly halfway point of the trip, the path diverged with a signpost 'helpfully' indicating the alternate fork as North Route 1. Something to investigate for another day, to be certain. But for now, he had to keep his focus.

His first sight of the village itself came as he crested the ridge of the largest hill that separated it from his farm. The height allowed him a commanding view of the whole area and, to his surprise, it was looked almost exactly as he had envisioned. In a day of chaos and uncertainty, it was nice to be right about something.

The village proper consisted of eleven buildings, built scattered in a small valley created by the surrounding hills. Roughly half of them circled a cobblestone town square at various intervals, with the rest dotting the surrounding area on the other side of the small river, whose bend ran a shallow L shape through town.

Some buildings were easy enough to pick out, even at this distance, with three, in particular, catching his eye. Marie hadn't been joking when she said her house was bright red, though he might have chosen the word offensively rather than bright. Not far away was a slightly larger two-story building that was positioned in a place of prominence around the town square, which he guessed to be city hall.

The last of the three was distinctive only in how wrong it was. Marie's house felt brighter than the sun to look at, but it was still an older looking wooden structure, its sloped roof and paneled windows giving the feeling of timeless architecture. The whole village was picturesque, like something out of a photograph of the 1950's.

All except for that god-awful McMansion smack dab in the middle of town. A bit of flat-roofed, thoroughly modern architecture with dark grey siding, enormous picture windows and a two car garage in a town that otherwise didn't appear to know of the existence of cars, let alone have any.

There were also other houses like his that rested outside of the tight-knit cluster that formed the village itself. To the north of the town, a few houses dotted lakefront property next to a currently empty pier. Even further west he could make out the clock tower he'd seen originally as well, set apart from the village itself on the far side of the river.

Behind him, he could see the tip of a building protruding from the Indigo Forest, and another three in the foothills to the south of his homestead. Including his home, he counted twenty-two building in total, a more sizable number than he'd expected, given the low population Marie had told him about.

With the whole village arrayed out before him, the remainder of the walk into town was tinged with a sort of impatience that, amusingly, reminded him of a loading screen. He could see everything, could they just get on with it already?

Fortunately, it wasn't much of a walk at that point, and before he knew it, the dirt path gave way to a smooth cobblestone pathway. And that was when he saw them.

“Hey! That's mine!” The little blonde boy yelled, chasing haphazardly after an older one who could only be his sibling. His arms were flailing for balance in that way only an awkward child ever did. If Alex had to guess, the younger boy might be six or seven, the older somewhere around nine or ten. The girl who put a stop to their particular fight though? Definitely a teenager.

"Okay, enough you little brats!" The girl shouted as she snagged the older boy by the arm. He squirmed and struggled for a moment before, at last, giving up under the withering stare of the older girl. "Now give that back to-" Her train of thought was derailed as she finally noticed Alex standing just up the road from her. The girl blushed, her posture stiffening somewhat as she turned to face him. "Oh! Hello! You must be Alexander?"

At first glance, he wasn't sure what to make of her. A creature of contradictions, with a fashionable and very traditional girly summer dress conflicting with the half shaved, half teal dyed hairstyle. She had only the most cursory of girl-next-door makeup but also had three piercings in her visible left ear. There was a mature look in her eyes, but those same eyes rested in a face that couldn't be older than fifteen. A rock-star Sunday-school teacher was the first thought that came to mind. It was hard not to laugh.

“Alex, usually.” He replied with a smile that faltered slightly as he watched the two young boys look his way, then quite literally retreat behind the flowing yellow skirt of their senior. “Did I do something wrong?”

“Hmm? Oh, no.” She shook her head vigorously. “We just don't get a lot of strangers. James, Jarred, be polite and say hello.”

The two boys were reluctant at first, but the girl was having none of it. She stepped aside, to leave them with nowhere to hide, then nudged each forward by the shoulder for good measure. Even then, only the older boy was willing to meet his eyes, as they mumbled their hellos in unison.

“You'd think I was asking them to eat their vegetables rather than greet their new neighbor." The teenager shook her head and rolled her eyes as she walked towards him, her hand offered before her. "I'm Sandy. Pleasure to meet you, Alex."

“Likewise.” He responded, finding her grip to be surprisingly strong for such a slender girl.

Sandy studied him for a moment as they shook hands. Then, apparently satisfied that he meant what he said, she smiled widely. “I wasn't sure what to expect when they said that Pip had a nephew who was taking over the farm.”

“You knew my uncle then?”

She laughed, a hand sweeping over her shoulder as if to encompass the whole village. “Everyone knew your uncle! Not exactly a big town.”

“Pip's nephew?” The youngest of the boys had retreated out of view behind Sandy when she'd approached Alex, but he was peeking out now, blue eyes cautiously observing the newcomer. “He doesn't look like Uncle Pip.”

“Uncle?” Alex repeated, his eyebrows narrowing.

“Oh, don't worry about that we're not...” The girl laughed at the implications, vigorously shaking her head. “Your uncle was one of our mothers best friends. He was around so much when they were little that she just started calling him Uncle Pip.”

He nodded in reply, a hand scratching the back of his scalp. "Well, that is a relief. Not sure I could handle finding out I had any more distant family today."

“Honestly, it isn't like there is much of a resemblance between us anyways.” The girl playfully reached up to touch her wickedly styled green hair. “I think most people would safely rule us out as being related.”

“What's a 'resemblance'?” James asked.

"A resemblance is when you look like someone else," Sandy replied patiently to her younger brother.

“So like how your hair makes you look like Evie?” The boy asked again. Alex could almost hear the gears turning in the child's brain as he tried to put together a string of logic that was anything but logical. “Is she our sister too?”

"What?" This from Jarred, the older boy giving his younger brother a shove of annoyance. "No, you dummy!"

“Aww...”

“Jarred!” Sandy snapped. “Don't say that about your brother.”

“But...” He started, only to think better of it as he melted under his sister's intense stare. “I'm sorry.”

“Don't say sorry to me.” She insisted.

"It's okay!" James said, throwing an arm around his brother what quickly turned into a full-on hug. Like the village, the three were picturesque. So perfectly sweet that it made Alexander's teeth hurt.

“So you're on your way into town?” Sandy asked, a light blush creeping across her cheeks as she realized she was stating the obvious.

“First time, yeah. Thought I'd get the lay of the land, particularly if I'm going to be here a while.” He nodded. “Things around here are... well they are taking some getting used to, to put it lightly.”

“Hmm? How so?”

Alex paused. The question was innocuous, but it was one that had been rumbling around in his mind since he'd left the farm. Did the people of Blue Hills realize how weird everything was? Or was it all somehow normal to them. Would he look like an idiot, or perhaps worse, a crazy person, if he asked about things that were basic knowledge to those who'd lived there for years.

The way Marie had talked so casually about the bag and the storage chest suggested that it was the later. But there was really only one way to be sure. “Well, like, take this bag for starters.”

Sandy giggled mischievously. “Let me guess, you've never seen one like it?”

“To put it mildly.” He nodded. “How did you know?

“Mom has a story about Unc... about Pip, that she likes to tell. About how he didn't know how anything worked when he got here, and she had to walk him through everything.”

“Wait. So my Uncle wasn't from here? Originally, I mean.”

Sandy shook her head. “Not as far as I know.”

Well, that was certainly good information. Though in retrospect it was rather obvious. After all, as far as he knew, his father hadn't ever talked about this place. And he would have if he could have. Alex's father bragged about every little thing that happened to him, a man who lived in his youth when he couldn't cut it in the present.

“Good to know.” He admitted, before pivoting back to the conversation at hand. “But you don't think it is odd? The bags, I mean.”

Sandy cocked her head to the side. “Why would I?”

“Because it is a literal magic bag!” He insisted incredulously. “There isn't a thing like this anywhere else on earth.”

Sandy laughed. “Speaking of resemblances, you are exactly like Uncle Pip. And not just in how you look.” It looked like the young woman was doing everything in her power to keep from breaking down into gales of laughter as she waved a hand in his direction. “Come on, I'll introduce you to my mom. She'll get a kick out of this.”

Alex raised an eyebrow.

“And she'll answer your questions!” The girl said, trying to mollify him even as she sniggered. “Don't be a baby. It isn't far.”

Alexander didn't like being laughed at, who did? But at the same time, if their mother was the one who had helped his uncle through the transition when he arrived, who better to talk to for some answers. Inquisitiveness overcame pride, and at last Alex sighed. “Fine, lead on.”