Before I set out for the commune, I did a few rounds and checked in on people. I spoke to Rayna and got a few members of her tribe all working with different goblin work crews. Most of them needed to return to someplace called Storage and retrieve families, but she assured me they would return before evening fell. She offered the idea of working with the gobbs, saying it would help her people get to know the area anyway. Apparently gobbs work better with a hobb breathing right down their necks, so spreading out a hobb manager force boosted their productivity by an impressive amount. I steered them clear of Spider City for the moment but planned out the afternoon’s construction and made sure we were stocked up on d’jhz. After that, I briefly checked in on the mordren and got a small shock. Doofus was in there with him, cuddled up against his side.

The mordren was snoring softly, the drugs he was on having the lovely side effect of knocking him out. I motioned at Doofus to get away from him, drawing a strange look from the BlueCleave hobb who was guarding the shed with a plasma rifle. Doofus glanced up at my snapping fingers but huffed out a sigh and flopped back to ignore me. As I watched, the mordren seemed to sigh and settle further into his sleep. I glanced between the mordren, the hobb on guard duty, and Doofus before shaking my head. “Just make sure he doesn’t hurt Doofus.”

The hobb nodded, eyes wide and serious. I left him to it and went to check on Molls. She had slipped out sometime, without being noticed. I thought of running down to check on her at her site, but then remembered that going in there rarely ended well for me. I had to ask her more about those screens and BuyMort data, but for now I’d just leave her be. We had time now that BlueCleave was here, and the Church had accepted us. I could just swing by the next time I had a BuyMort question again. I was sure that would be soon. Instead, I loaded up my shotgun, strapped on my bandoleer, and headed out to the golf cart.

I swung it by Phyllis, still laying in the driveway. She was fine, and cranky. The metal plates had receded back into the mech, but parts of her were now implanted with metal, and one side of her head had been shaved. She was rocking the latest fashionable cut, as a nonagenarian, and I had to tease her about it slightly. “Hey there, Philly, is your head at all chilly?” I snickered.

“Yes it is, Tyson,” she snapped, not looking up. “And I can’t even wear a hat because the metal is still connected.” The metallic additions to her body were small and looked like they may be docking ports for her armored suit. Either way, I was just glad her skull wasn’t still fractured, and both of her eyes focused on me during our brief conversation, even if they were glaring. “You want to fuck off instead of teasing me about it?”

“Can do Phill! Sorry!” I must have still sounded too cheerful as I pulled away, because she took a half-hearted swipe at me with her free arm, scraping Mr. Sada’s driveway.

The hobbs on gate duty swung it open for me and I was out in the Arizona midday sun, settling into the idea of enjoying a nice drive in Mr. Sada’s golf cart. The time on my psychic phone said eleven-thirty in the morning, and I tried my very best not to sink into despair as I watched the spinning wheel of my people’s demise while the death toll ticked up rapidly. It wasn’t just depressing, it was terrifying. Most of us were now already dead, and it kept moving faster. I thought about it, wondering how hard all of this affiliate stuff was and if I was up to the task of running it and keeping us alive, let alone bringing down BuyMort. And, as always, the ad algos kicked in to give me a helpful hand.

Something popped up in my vision, just outside of Mr. Sada’s main gate. Normally I would have swiped the ad away, but this was from the same affiliate that had sold me the starfish suit, and that grabbed my attention. I pulled over and parked the golf cart on the side of the road just outside of the compound. A glance over my shoulder confirmed a hobb on the wall keeping an eye on the cart.

A quick swipe allowed me into the storefront, this time using the ad-space virtual reality. I was back in virtual, my mind transported to the dusty and broken shelves from which I’d gotten my starfish as my body slumped in the golf cart. Above me, through gaping holes in the ruined ceiling, shone the few remaining stars of another universe. My interest grew several octaves in a moment. Whatever ad I’d just gotten, if it was from the starfish place then I was almost certainly going to be making another purchase from this strange, dead affiliate.

There was no sound, there were no dancing images. The dust on the shelves looked like ice crystals upon closer inspection. There was even a giant crack in the middle of the store, as if an earthquake had torn into it. But, at the back, on a plasti-steel kiosk slanted sideways and half-fallen into the crack running down the middle of the store, a screen flickered to life. An image.

AFFLQWST - YOUR AFFILIATE’S GUIDE TO GREATNESS IN THE EXCITING NEW COMMERCE SYSTEM, BUYMORT.

I frowned. The product appeared to be an installable addon for my BuyMort interface. BuyMort had a policy that read like stereo instructions about those. It summed up to Buyer Beware, as far as I could tell, I only skimmed it. For all I knew, the app could be a virus, something that would invade the software contained in my head and flame me out, repurposing me into some sort of BuyMort living sentient spam bot. Somebody’s empty headed mortie-farmer.

But that could work, if it involved destroying BuyMort. From what I could tell, our affiliates had that vague and lofty goal in common.

Out of the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of something on the shattered and dust-covered shelves and I made my decision. Boxes and boxes of the starfish suits remained in the place, wherever it was, and no one knew about them despite their obvious and tremendous power. This affiliate had been almost destroyed at some point in the far distant past, I was sure. It sounded like it might have come into existence before BuyMort. And that meant that whatever this thing that I was being offered was, I wanted to have it.

I walked to the kiosk and touched the screen with my finger, feeling a bit of static discharge despite the fact that I wasn’t actually there with my real physical body. And the screen changed. It flashed dark, then back to light.

WELCOME TO THE TESLAK COOPERATIVE. A REPRESENTATIVE WILL BE HERE TO ASSIST YOU SHORTLY. IN THE EVENT THAT ASSISTANCE IS UNAVAILABLE, FEEL FREE TO INSTALL AFFLQWST FULL PACKAGE AT PRICE OF (FUCKING DESTROY BUYMORT.)

I stared at the flickering screen. The busted up kiosk wasn’t helping their case, but my starfish and, let’s face it, that strange and wonderful price were hard character references to ignore. Especially since I was beginning to suspect that this place might be some sort of really important secret.

“Good morning, sir!” A high, clear voice sounded as light particles stuttered into place, showing a ghostly image of a person. The man, who I was in no way certain he was, stood behind the counter with his arms behind his back. He wore a scarred, stained, and burnt heavy apron over a set of expensive looking dress clothes.

Then he vanished. I blinked and looked around, but the lights reappeared a second later. “Good morning, sir!” He said again. “I see you are-you are-interested in our amazing AFFLQWST app.”

The image stuttered again, and I could see a tiny projector in a cracked part of the ceiling doing its best. “Yes,” I said to the projection.

He smiled wide, took a breath to speak, and then blinked out entirely. After I waited for a second, he returned. “Good morning, sir! I see you are interested in our potent Afilli-Quest app.”

I stared at him, not responding as I waited for him to glitch out again. The projection held steady and stared at me. This gave me a moment to inspect the man, who I was increasingly unsure he was. Humanoid, with slightly longer arms and legs than us, and very delicate facial features. His hair was silken, long, and decorated with floral tresses woven delicately into thick beads near the base. His ears were also slightly lower placed than a human’s would be, and longer compared to his eyeline, but the tips were hidden from sight by his hair. The voice was decidedly masculine, so I kept my assumption to male.

“Would you-would you like to know more about the app, or are you ready to-ready to confirm your purchase now?” He asked me finally, after I stared at him for a few minutes.

“What can you tell me about the Teslak Cooperative?” I asked.

“The Teslak-the-the-the Teslak Cooperative is a proud sponsor to the affiliate of the future!” He excitedly waved a hand behind himself, and the projector spun up further as more light began to pour into the area behind the counter. It started to form a massive metropolitan skyline as he moved to showcase it. The motion repeated. Then he began to flicker, and stutter before it all blinked out. I waited for a few seconds, wondering if it was broken for good, before the original projection returned.

“Would you like to know more about the app-more about the app, or are you ready to confirm your purchase now?” He asked.

“Why is the app’s name spelled that way?” I narrowed my eyes to watch.

He turned and suddenly was in front of a dark chalkboard. “The mysteries of marketing are many, and magnificent! Today we’re going to navigate the intense processes of market research and trademark law when trying to find the perfect name for YOUR affiliate!” He barked cheerfully, before the projection snapped out and reset. When he asked me about the app again, I was ready with a serious question.

I thought about it this time before answering. “Will this app help me kill BuyMort?”

The projection snapped and changed. The light in the room with the projection became red instead of soft white, and his appearance was altered significantly. In place of his fine clothing, the man wore regal looking silver armor, pitted with old weapon strikes. He also had a sidearm strapped to one hip, and a series of tools in a belt across his waist. His hair was chopped short on one side, his ear there a stump of scar tissue. A dramatic burn scar ran down his neck into his breastplate. When he spoke, his voice was a growl. “AFFLQWST was designed for use with the BuyMort system. I have altered the app to be a weapon against it. If you know how to use it.”

The light flickered again, and the man changed back in an instant. His apron, fancy clothing, and well-groomed hair were all back, and the ambient lighting around him was soft white again. “Are you ready to confirm your purchase-confirm your purchase now?” The hologram stuttered.

“No. What do I call you?” I asked.

It changed back to the red light background, and this time, he was bleeding. He leaned forward on the counter, gripping what looked like a blood-stained jewelers hammer. His forehead was split open, and charred bone glinted from beneath the wound. He dripped a measure of bloody spittle onto the counter and grinned at me before growling a single word, “Specter.”

Fuck it. Consider me sold. I pushed the screen again and two options appeared before me. INSTALL or CANCEL. I felt myself take a deep breath back in the dusty Arizona breeze, and I selected INSTALL. All at once I was back in myself, yet another app icon in my vision. Specter, and the relic storefront he operated, were gone.

I looked around, surprised that none of the bored hobbs or surly gobbs nearby were having the same emotional reaction I was. My heart was beating rapidly, and my hands gripped the steering wheel so hard my knuckles whitened at the top. Nobody else knew. Just me, BuyMort, and my new friend Specter. And BuyMort appeared to be so stupid that it was helping me find these purchase options, based on my desire to destroy it. Perhaps it was confidence, but it didn’t feel like confidence. I grinned and gave myself a moment to investigate the app. It opened to a light-gray screen, filled with large, plain text.

AFFLQWST VERSION 18.1.03 KARDEDKORN BUILD 2983.

WELCOME TO AFFLQWST, USER. THANK YOU FOR YOUR PURCHASE OF AFFLQWST. OUR AFFLQWST HELPER APP IS DESIGNED TO ACHIEVE MAXIMUM PROFITABILITY IN THE BUYMORT ™ COMMERCE SYSTEM BUT WILL FUNCTION WELL IN ANY VARIETY OF COMPETING SYSTEMS. I SEE THAT YOU HAVE BEEN AFFILIATED WITH BUYMORT™ — LINKING TO EXISTING ACCOUNT.

COMPILING . . . . .

AFFILIATE ACCOUNT LINKED. MEMORY SCAN SUGGESTED. APPROVAL REQUIRED.

This was crazy. The way it operated felt loose and quick, less shiny and more complicated. But it instantly felt more trustworthy too, like that friend who always tells the truth no matter how much it might hurt. I willed it the approval and saw the screen blink several times.

TASK: FUCKING DESTROY BUYMORT

THE CURRENT CONDITIONS OF THE AFFILIATE ARE UNTENUOUS AND DIRE. BUYMORT COMPETITORS ARE REMORSELESS. AGGRESSIVE. DANGEROUS. QUEST SUGGESTION IS AS FOLLOWS:

VISIT THE COOPERATIVE. SEEK AUDIENCE WITH DIRECTOR.

PROBABLE OUTCOME (99%) : ALLIANCE WITH TESLAK COOPERATIVE.

SIDEQUEST: GROW IN AFFILIATE RANK, SIZE, AND POWER. DEFEND THE LIVES OF AFFILIATES AND GATHER ALLIES. ACQUIRE SOURCES OF FOOD, WATER, AND POWER. (COMPLETING THIS WILL ENSURE A BETTER REWARD UPON COMPLETION OF PRIMARY QUEST.)

Well, it wasn’t an amazing start, seeing as these were all things I was going to do anyways. But I was pleased with that start. It wasn’t feeding me bullshit ideas and it wasn’t asking for anything or flashing me ads. And if it could give me advice that I couldn’t think up on my own, something to stop this purge of humanity, it was absolutely worth it. I smacked the wheel and got started on my little road trip again. Gotta feed everybody. Important task.

Thinking of the deaths again cast a bit of a pall on the drive, but I did see some beautiful countryside. Almost all of it entirely empty. The only thing that gave me pause was a small herd of what appeared at first glance to be horses. When they crossed the road a good distance in front of me, however, I could see much more clearly. They were some kind of running, wingless wasps. Something I assumed a failed attack on some BuyMort pods had produced.

The herd of five were far enough in the distance that I felt safe, and they were galloping away from me. But I still got a decent glance at their hindquarters. A bulbous tail flopped around, a cluster of wicked stingers flexing in and out of the tip like claws. They ran on six powerful legs and were managing to move what looked like twenty-five miles an hour or more at a casual loping pace. Their heads were bulbous as well, with huge, multifaceted eyes wrapped around either side, and large dangling antennae. Hazy lines of yellow, brown, and orange color striped their bodies.

Is the countryside getting nasty? Are pests invading your home world? Why risk your life needlessly on long, needless trips over increasingly desolate land when you can hitch a ride with Roberto’s Rotors! Trained helicopter pilots with combat experience, simply download our app, choose a place and time, and the nearest chopper pilot will come to pick you up. It is as easy as picking up your phone. Morty cost dependent on location, weather conditions, and distance of travel. 4.5 stars.

I flicked the ad away but kept it in mind for some future research. It wasn’t a bad idea after some serious morties started coming in. I glanced out at the monsters again. Once they were far enough away, I started rolling the golf cart again.

I had checked the distance to the commune, Sundew Valley Foods, but I was still worried as the cart’s battery drained. It should make it back without much of a problem, but I would be low on charge by then, especially weighed down with food.

Still, it gave me comfort when the commune appeared on the horizon as my needle crossed sixty-five percent charge. It was a good-sized area, surrounded by a strange wall. It looked like old used tires, filled with sand, and stacked high. Even from the outside, I could see that the wall was a gently sloping hill all the way around the inside of the compound.

I approached from a slight hill in the road and could see that they had used the hillside that supported their security wall as a place to garden and grow food. Vines of carefully cultivated tomatoes grew alongside great swatches of hardy wheat and purple barley. Dotted around the inner wall I could see plots of farming for cucumbers, melons, peppers, pumpkins, beans, and several others I couldn’t identify as I drove up to the crowd outside their gates.

Several vehicles were present on either side of the road and gates, and I noticed a patrol of very well-equipped hobbs keeping an eye on the scattered group of people, especially those near a small shack at the gate where a group was present. There seemed to be some kind of argument happening, and one of the bigger hobbs present stepped forward with a hand on their holster when a voice was raised. I stopped the golf cart a safe distance away, but hobbs in armor were already on their way toward me, weapons at the ready.

I exited the cart and raised my hands slowly as they approached. One of the two approaching me stopped and pretended to not watch me with his weapon in both hands while the other put a big, fake smile on their face and stepped up with one hand on their holster.

“Hello guest,” the hobb grunted at me. “Need to check weapons with me. Please.”

I nodded slowly and unslung my shotgun, before handing it to the hobb. He visibly relaxed and accepted my weapon, while checking to ensure the safety was engaged. When I didn’t offer it, he grunted and pointed at the bandoleer of ammunition. With a shrug, I gave him that too. He squinted at the starfish suit, but I waved him off. “That’s a medical thing, it’s embedded in my body.”

The hobb gave me a long look over, focusing hard on the metal across my hands, before nodding and waving me on.

“Hey, no. I’m not leaving my cart out here, look at all these people.” I waved an arm at the gathered vehicles.

The hobb shook his head. “Vehicle secure. Hobbs guard! You go inside.”

I blinked at them a few times, but the second hobb did now appear to be guarding my golf cart, instead of guarding against me. With a shrug, I walked up the road and approached the now empty shack beside the gate. The gate looked new, and heavy. It was some kind of dull metal and looked very thick at a glance. The shack beside it was a strange sight in comparison. The planks of wood were all mismatched, and gaps showed in its structure. Bright pastel paints adorned the rickety structure, creating a myriad of small stories in the accumulated artwork.

An older woman with a squat face and long gray curls greeted me from directly beside the shack, waving and smiling. She wore a big frumpy crocheted hat, snugged down around her ears. It was filled with vibrant colors and matched her smile perfectly.

“Hi there sweetie! It’s so good to see you, can I come over there and hug you?” She held out her flabby arms as I approached, and I couldn’t help but smile. Nobody was this nice to me ever. I decided to agree to the hug and went in for it with a smile of my own. She leaned in and squeezed me, but quickly pulled back to look at my chest. I opened my jacket for her and shrugged.

“Sorry, I forget about that thing sometimes. Really need to upgrade it to be less bulky soon.” I shrugged at her. “Saved my life though.”

Her bottom lip curved up and she pouted in agreement, before turning me by my elbow to face the gates and slipping her arm into the crook of my own. The gates slid open silently, splitting in the middle to expose the entrance into the commune. I couldn’t help but notice the hobb that fell in behind us, as she clicked a stopwatch.

“We only have an hour, sweety, so let’s get you over to Lee so he can have his fun with you.” The older woman laughed and stepped out from beneath the fortified entrance wall into the sunshine on the other side. She swung her arms wide and twirled in a circle, and I stopped for a moment to take in the commune.

It was a giant oval, the shape of an egg. A hill that formed this side of their defensive and privacy wall surrounded an open flat area filled with various structures. All over the walls were crops. Several gardens were built into the sloping hills, and my initial impressions of how much food they were growing fell very flat. Over a dozen people worked the gardens, in a variety of dress. They all seemed to be putting on a happy face but looked nervous to me. With the crowd growing outside their walls, I figured out why. They were timing visits and not letting people stay. The people outside their walls didn’t have any place to go.

My guide led me toward the tallest building in the compound, which was three stories high, and appeared to be made from garbage. All of the buildings did, actually. It made me stop and stare for a moment, to my guide’s amusement. She just watched as I looked around and took it all in. The building’s primary construction material appeared to be old tires filled with sand, exactly like the wall outside. Each of the buildings had a small hill it was built into, I noticed as I looked at them all. Then I realized all the hills were facing in the same direction. Each building had a flat metal rooftop with raised sides for catching rain, and each of them led into independent cisterns built into the buildings themselves.

For the walls not directly attached to the hillside of each building, a mixture of bottles and cans were used in combination with concrete. Empty glass bottles stuck out from walls to catch the sunlight and cast a million different colors across the entire area. As I stared, I saw a baker hauling my favorite bread out a stone oven in the shade of his own building. It was exactly the same, down to the little yellow tie he used on the bag.

Once I gathered my senses again from the bizarre environment, I continued following my guide. She led me through an open courtyard and around a concrete fountain, to a large wall of bay windows set into more garbage and concrete walls.

She stopped with her hands on the doorknob and glanced over her shoulder at me. “Be prepared, it’ll be a little hot in here at first. Once we get through the greenhouse, it’s nice though.” All I could see behind her was a wall of green.

We entered the first room and a wall of wet heat hit me as I stepped inside. The roof was sloped overhead and bubbled with yet more windows. In rows populating both sides of a narrow walkway on either side were huge plots of black soil filled with tropical fruit trees. I could see ripe bunches of bananas hanging on one side, and papaya and mango trees on the other. More gardens with a variety of tropical food items were built into the structure of the building as we walked further, taking a set of concrete steps embedded with tiles and bits of pretty stone or glass. It led up through the greenhouse to the second floor.

Once we stepped through the next doorway, it was a different world entirely again. I didn’t feel any air movement or see any vents for air conditioning, but it was somehow comfortably cool inside the structure. We walked through regular looking household hallways and passed extremely normal looking living spaces as we walked. The kitchen and TV room stood out to me as interesting, in their 80’s drab, but the office we entered was downright lavish.

My benefactor for the day was seated behind a large oak desk in a spacious library that was filled floor to ceiling with hardcover books. I felt like I was stepping into a great egg, but the curved walls were all bookshelves. Based on how much my Howard the Duck paperback had gone for, I was pretty sure this was a gold mine. Still, I sat down gently in the carved wood chair across from the desk. The gentleman behind it thanked my guide and she promptly left. Then he turned and fixed me with ice blue eyes.

He was older, with shock white hair tied back in a ponytail, and a walrus mustache, but his blue eyes were clear and sharp as he sized me up. At that moment, I got it. They were assessing the neighbors. This entire ploy was to get people who lived in the nearby area to show up for some free food. Then, the compound guards would perform a thorough assessment of our weapons and vehicles, and the hippy king here could feel us out to see if we were dangerous or not. As all of this clicked in my head, I smiled and relaxed. I had been a little nervous before it all made sense.

“Hello. I’m Lee, and I run this commune. Affiliate now, I suppose!” He puffed out his mustache and sat back in the chair. “How you gettin’ along with BuyMort?”

I raised my eyebrows and nodded. “Like a house on fire. You guys seem to be doing okay.”

Lee frowned but nodded. “Aye. The abundance of foodstuffs, and lack of our usual markets has us a tad flush at the moment.” There he stood and approached a nearby window, looking out over the compound. “No such thing as wealth here though, it all goes into sustaining or growing life.”

“We only have an hour, Lee. You wanted to make sure the neighbors aren’t a threat, right?” My chair creaked as I leaned back in it a bit, making me promptly lean forward again. “That’s what the free food is about. Get a good look at the neighbors, see how dangerous everyone is? Maybe make some friends.”

Lee didn’t respond right away. He looked at me sharply but stayed by the window. After a moment of uncomfortable silence, he nodded. “What’s your name, son?”

I nodded back and stood up. After I walked over to the window, I stuck my hand out for him to shake and looked him in the eye. “Tyson. Nice to meet you, and I appreciate your hospitality.” I looked out the window with him for a quiet moment before continuing. “Sorry for calling you out. I get it, I just don’t like the games. I’ve developed a talent for deciphering dishonesty. Seemed like a critical survival skill in 21st century America.”

Lee looked at me hard again, but then nodded. His mustaches swayed as he moved back to the desk and motioned for me to sit across from him again. I did so, and he nodded again. “Right. Yes, that is what I am doing.” His demeanor changed. Lee was still relaxed in his chair, but the look on his face and the way he fixed me with a hard stare changed things significantly. “I need to understand the threats to my people, and that means meeting the neighbors.”

I nodded slowly.

“So. Who are you? Where you come from? What’re your plans for the immediate future?” Lee leaned forward and stared at me. “I appreciate being able to be open about this, by the way.”

I shrugged. “I used to manage the Happy Trails Campground, a little closer to Phoenix. Still living there now.”

Lee produced a map from a desk drawer and unfolded it between us. He scanned it with a finger before pointing at my park's location. “Right here, ain't it?” When I nodded, he circled the area and marked it with a note.

“We have no food, but we’re working on turning the place into something livable. Planning on working the land. Living.” I shrugged after I finished. My thoughts hadn’t gone much further.

“Right.” Lee nodded, blinking. “You all dug in yet? Walled up? Land wasps in the area.”

My brow furrowed. “Yeah, I saw a pack of them, those things look terrifying. We’re working on some fortifications and have a security team much like yours.”

“Ayep. Our wall protected us from the dream storm, and those hobbs are life savers, no doubt.” Lee knocked on the map and pointed. “This’s us here. As a gesture of good faith, I’ll be happy to share what I’ve gathered so far.”

I scooted closer and squinted at the map. Outside of Prescott to the east was a large red circle around an industrial complex. I think it used to be a mine at one point. “Ignoring the implications of walled fortifications being such a high priority in my life, what’s this one?”

Lee glanced at it and sat back. “That’s the Dearth Conglomerate base. Their local headquarters.”

My phone was in my hand before I realized it, and I hesitated. I lifted it to him. “You mind if I take a picture? Those guys attacked us last night, we barely fended em off.”

His mustache twitched as he turned to face me. “I was wondering if that was you all. We were seein’ firebolts fly by overhead. Like reverse shooting stars, just exiting the planet man. It was somethin’ else.” Lee waved a hand at the map. “Please, feel free.”

I tucked away the information about fireballs for later. Seemed like Phyllis might have a lot more range on that cannon than I had previously anticipated. But I happily raised my phone to take a picture. The face blinked at me expectantly when the screen fogged into place. “Oh. Uh . . . I want to take a picture, can I still do that?”

The face glowered at me momentarily but faded away into the background of the phone. An outline of fog filled the screen with a typical smartphone’s camera app. When I clicked the picture button, the screen flashed and froze in place. The image shuttled itself to the side, and a folder opened to accept it. Once the folder closed, it showed a title over the top of its picture (gallery, 1 photo stored, 500 morties/month). My eyes bulged at the cost.

“Woah, this thing charges five hundred morties per month for a single photo.” I glared at my phone incredulously. It glared back, making the exact same face I was making. I pushed the button to dismiss it and slid the phone in my pocket.

“Oh yeah.” Lee chuckled. “Have you read the manual on MortMobile? It’s a god of some sort. Used to be a man, ran a space faring empire with the power of his mind. When BuyMort arrived, he fought it. Lost. Became enslaved to it as an ‘affiliate.’ Sad tale, it’s all in the manual. Not in those words, but if you can read corpo-speak, you get the picture.” He nodded as he finished speaking, lips pressed in a serious line.

“I have a god in my pocket right now?” It was the only thing I could think to say. “Doesn’t look like pasta.”

Lee laughed this time and sat back in his chair with his hands rested on his stomach. “Yep, we all do. An annoyed and bored psychic god whose job it’s become to connect all of us in the BuyMort system and remember all our pictures. He has a finite limit, thus the charge goes up the closer he gets to it.”

I blinked at that. “Well. I’m encouraged to get the photo the hell off my phone, so I guess the market is working.”

The older man across from me chuckled again, then snapped his fingers and slid open a desk drawer at his side. He produced a folded map and tossed it to me. “There. Copy it all to that when ya get home. If you delete the photo before the end of your pay cycle, it lets you off the hook for half of it.”

“Dang. Thanks for all the advice. I didn’t expect my phone service to be so complicated. Or ethereal.” I lifted the map in thanks and tucked it away in my jacket.

Lee shook his head. “My wife, Suzanne, you met her. She used to be a photographer before BuyMort. We learned all about MortMobile in a hurry, then just bought her an alien Polaroid and a lifetime supply of film. This one blows ‘em up however big you like though, it’s a great purchase.” He started nodding at that and leaned forward again to lean on the desk. “Great purchase.”

“Yeah. You guys are doing pretty great in all this. Food prices and all.” I waved my hand around me at the surroundings. “All of this seems perfect, and how do you get tropical fruit trees growing here so fast?”

He blinked and laughed. “No, son, you misunderstand. We were built up like this before BuyMort. This is an Earthship compound. We build self-sustainable domiciles, and I built up an organic food company from it. Local stuff only, but we got great reviews. The tropical fruit trees have been here for years. If you buy at Curly’s market on fourth, you’ve probably had ‘em before.”

I thought, hard. “You know what?” My hand flopped onto the desk, and I snorted a laugh. “I have, I always get my bananas there. The special organic ones. Really good, too.”

“Of course. Quality is king at Sundew Valley Foods.” Lee spread his arms wide and smiled.

“Well, I’m glad to be a customer again. I was hoping to set up some kind of regular shipment to the campground. We can pay. Our needs would be heavier until we got our own stuff up and running, but again, we can pay.” I trailed off as Lee started waving his hands.

“I can’t risk my people’s safety, we do not do deliveries. Those wasps nest around here somewhere, and it’s all we can do to keep ‘em from climbing the walls sometimes.” Lee knocked on the table. “We sell through BuyMort drone as well, but that involves the system then.”

I raised a lip and shook my head. “I can make the runs, we won’t need more than we can fit in the golf cart for a while anyway. Maybe a golf cart full every . . . two or three days?”

“Yeah, we can do that. What do you have to offer?” Lee wiggled his mustache as he cleared his throat and laced his fingers together on the desk. I could almost see him put the businessman back on.

“Oh.” I hesitated. “Um. Yeah, morties, mostly. We have a priest? She’s good at BuyMort advice if you want some of that?”

He shook his head. “We have one too. Took our only empty house, which puts us at capacity.” His mustache twitched again, but harder this time. It was absurd, but it made me feel like his mustache was upset.

“Ah.” I nodded. The crowd of people outside. He couldn’t let them in. “I am glad to see that the situation bothers you, Lee. Now that I understand it, of course.”

His brow furrowed. “And why is that?”

I shrugged. “You’d be a monster not to care.” A realization hit me, and I sighed. “Oh hell. I can probably help you all out.”

Lee frowned at me. “What’d you mean?”

“The campground is pretty much empty. We have some tents and air mattresses, stuff like that. Ten acres of land, most of which will be inside a twelve-foot wall by nightfall.” I met his eyes and shrugged. “It’s not perfect, we have some problems of our own, but it’s better than having to watch the wasps kill ‘em on the other side of your gates.”

He nodded immediately. “Or lose another guard tryin’ to stop that very thing from happenin’.”

I chuckled and shook my head. “I guess we may need more food than I thought before.”

Lee immediately reached across the table. “I’ll fill every vehicle to bursting now, and you can come back for another shipment later. We could do morties if you got em, or we can start an account for item based trade. Mind that I run a tight book if you go on credit with trades, but I’d be fair with all them folk over there. Won’t charge you much.”

“Gotta keep your own lights on, I get it.” I stood and stretched. “I guess we better go talk to em.”

Lee stood but reached across the table. “Thank you, Tyson. That solves my biggest problem for today.”

I shook his hand, firmly. “Hey, you’re feeding everyone. I appreciate that. Feel free to send any others who arrive my way as well.” I looked out the window again, noticing the walls of crops. “Speaking of food, how do you get water for all of this?”

Lee pointed at a smaller concrete structure. “Each of the houses has a cistern, and we have a master cistern system for the crops.” He shifted his hand, pointing to large, covered areas, where crops grew in partial shade beneath flat metal covers. Each cover had piping leading away, which matched the irrigation piping around their crop patches. “Most of the indoor crops get their water from the greenhouse humidity. It sweats all day into their own traps, which cycle the water throughout the building as needed.” He finished by indicating the door with an open palm. “There’s also a well for emergencies. We’re above a small aquifer here. Good clean water if you can get deep enough.”

His wife met us on the other side of the door and smiled warmly. “Well, that was fast. Good talk boys?”

Lee nodded vigorously, shaking his mustache. “Tyson here runs the old Happy Trails camp up the road. He’s taking our refugees.”

The woman raised both hands to her mouth and gasped. She appeared to be going weak at the knees for an instant before she lunged to hug me. “Oh, bless you, Tyson. Thank you. We were all worried sick.”

I weathered the hug and smiled politely in response. When she broke away, I nodded. Lee seemed to sense my discomfort, because he cleared his throat and when Suzanne looked at him, he motioned with an arm to the exit. “We’re about to go to the wall and address everyone.”

Suzanne clasped her hands and whispered, “Wonderful.” She fell into step behind us.