Legs shaking, Aurelia managed to stand and hit the power button on her breathing suit. The rush of filtered air past her ears was calming, and after several deep breaths, she took in her surroundings. The ground was not rocky or sandy, as she had assumed. The area around the dome, at least, had been carefully leveled and was hard-packed. Looking back at the dome, she saw only the black reverse side; she couldn't see in—just as when inside, she couldn't see out. There was nothing around her that even approached a road or a path, which made her assume she was not on the trafficked side of the dome. If resources and expeditions went out and back in, they certainly didn't seem to be doing so in this direction.

The light was dim. It didn't have the sharp quality of illumination in the dome or on Earth, but she could see relatively clearly. Then she looked up and gasped. All around her was the darkness of space, massive, empty and terrifying, and suddenly she understood why the dome was opaque. The thought of living surrounded by days of darkness was horrifying.

She closed her eyes and swallowed, forcing herself back into the moment. A deep breath, the feeling of the fabric of her suit moving. Opening her eyes, she scanned the horizon, looking for signs of the encampment Bryn had told her of. At first she saw nothing, but concentrating and looking again she thought she could see something far away to her right. That must be it.

With no trails to speak of, she simply walked towards what she hoped was the encampment. She was surprised at how easy movement was inside the breathing suit, and she realized that there must be something at work to combat the effects of low gravity and keep her pinned to the lunar surface. Interested in the makeup of the breathing suit, she tried running in it. She ran for a few hundred yards, and while the suit wasn't exactly sportswear, it wasn't cumbersome. The air filtration system seemed to keep up, even when she was gasping and panting.

Aurelia could clearly see the encampment now, a midsized portable dome on the horizon. She stepped up her pace a little, anxious not only to start the search for Nicholas but also to see faces again. The wide open spaces of the moon surface made her uncomfortable with a feeling that she couldn't quite describe. It was like being blind and deaf and dumb all at the same time, completely cut off. She had little experience with open spaces, nor with being away from other people, and wondered if the feeling she had was normal.

She began moving at a jog, feeling the slap of her bag on her back. It still took her twenty more minutes to reach the portable dome, however, and once there, she realized she didn't know how to get in. She wandered around the perimeter, which was about fifty or so yards wide, and eventually saw what looked like an airlock. Fine. That would do. But what? Knock? She took a closer look and saw a com system next to the door. It had only one button, so she pressed it.

She was surprised when no questions were asked. She pressed the com button again, and the first airlock hatch slid open. She stepped inside, the first door closed, and the second opened. She was about to step into the next chamber when a face appeared at the entry.

"Hood off." It wasn't a request. For a second, she struggled to remove her hood before remembering to power off the suit first. Uncovering her face, she could see that the man in front of her was holding a weapon, something like the stunner she had in her pack but bigger. "What do you want?"

He had a beard, gray and wiry, and was well-fed to the point of being stout, a belly overlapping the waist of his pants.

Aurelia took a deep breath. "I'm looking for someone, and I want information," she said bluntly.

He looked her up and down. "You alone?"

She nodded.

He lowered the weapon and stepped aside. "Come in," was all he said.

Hesitantly, Aurelia stepped over the rim of the airlock and into the dome. Inside, she saw tents scattered around and signs of cooking, clothes hung upon makeshift clotheslines. There was a group of men sitting in the center in a small clearing playing some kind of game with wooden balls. Piles of tokens on the ground indicated that they were gambling.

"Got a worker," grumbled Gray beard, walking into the clearing, Aurelia following.

The men looked up. They didn't exactly appear friendly—more grizzled, maybe—but they didn't look particularly threatening either. Mind you, thought Aurelia, I'm not especially threatening, myself. It wasn't like they needed to be worried about a lone girl.

"Bryn sent me," she said, her voice clear and sounding braver than she felt.

Gray beard nodded. "Sit down, then. Coffee?"

Aurelia almost laughed. She was in a portable dome in the middle of Mare Nowhere, breaking the law and away from anything she'd ever known, and he was offering her coffee? Not trusting herself to speak, she nodded, and a hot cup was soon thrust into her hand. The men stared at her, their game abandoned, but said nothing. Gray beard was obviously their leader.

"Bryn got a message?" Gray beard asked, squatting on the floor next to her, a cup of his own in his hand.

Aurelia shook her head. She took a drink and was pleasantly surprised to find that the coffee was good, strong. "I'm looking for someone, and he said you might be able to help me."

"He did, did he?" Gray beard's massive eyebrows raised a half centimeter. "Who you looking for?"

"He's a clone. His name's Nicholas. Should have come this way a couple of days back."

Gray beard looked at the men around him, almost as though he were asking permission, then he gave a curt nod. "We've seen him. What of him?"

"I need to talk to him. But first I have to find him."

Gray beard sighed and sat fully on the ground. "What you want might not be easy."

Aurelia drank again, letting the warmth of the coffee fill her. "It's important," she said. "Or I wouldn't be here."

Gray beard laughed at that, a deep, rumbling sound. "You don't exactly look like you belong among the likes of us."

"Will you help?" He didn't seem like a bad guy, but there was definitely something going on here. A factor she couldn't put her finger on.

Again, Gray beard looked at the others. "We're a group," he said. "We have to decide together."

Really? So she had to persuade a whole handful of men to help her. Fantastic. The lack of sleep was beginning to get to her, despite the coffee, and she was getting cranky. "Fine," she said, standing. "I guess I'll go back out there and, you know, walk around the entire surface of the moon until I find him."

"Sit down," Gray beard said. "I didn't say we wouldn't help you. But first we need to know why. Who are you, and why do you need this friend you're looking for?"

Hmmm. Decision time. She could, of course, tell them lies. Make something up. She could also tell them the truth, that she was part of the resistance. She wondered which story would make them more likely to trust her. Taking a gamble, she went with the truth—or at least part f it.

"I'm in the resistance. The friend is one of our operatives who thought he was in danger and came out. I'm here to bring him back. His life is safe." For the second or two of silence that followed her words, she cringed, hoping she wasn't about to be arrested or beaten or anything else.

Gray beard was studying her. "The resistance," he said, nodding.

He turned to the other men, and one by one they nodded too.

"It's good you decided to tell the truth," Gray beard said to Aurelia. "We're traders. Lying and negotiating is what we do. We would have seen straight through you. Hungry?"

Aurelia realized that she was starving. She indicated she was, and Gray beard gestured to one of the other men, who left and came back moments later with a bowl of steaming stew. Aurelia ate, forcing herself not to gulp the whole bowl down.

"There's more where that came from," Gray beard said. "Now, let's see. Nicholas. Yes, we've seen him. Clone, right?"

Aurelia nodded, her mouth full.

"But he had no numbers on his wrists, no scars either, by the looks of things." The other men had turned back to their game, losing interest in the girl in their ranks. There was the soft clacking sound of the wooden balls they played with, accompanied by the hum of their conversation.

"What do you know about out, girl?"

The question took her by surprise. Swallowing, she shrugged. "Not much."

"Thought not," said Gray beard. "There's more here than you think. There are settlements, for a start. Might even call them towns at this point. Plenty of people came out at the start, when the dome was finished, I mean, and plenty more come out here now. Out out is the only place where we can get away from what happens in there." He jerked his head in the vague direction of Lunar City.

"And you're allowed to be here?" Aurelia asked, scraping up the last of her stew. "I mean, no one tries to stop you or anything?"

Gray beard laughed. "We're not worth it to them," he said. "Not enough of us, and we're not taking anything from them, so they don't care too much. 'Course, that's only as long as we behave ourselves and don't rob from their scientists and whatnot. But we've got our own way of doing things here. Seems to work. Life ain't easy, but it's not as hard as it was."

"But . . ." started Aurelia.

"Yeah, I know," said Gray beard, scratching his head. "We're all supposed to be criminals and brigands, right? Fact of the matter is a fair few of us are. But there are plenty more who aren't. It's tough to go it alone here, which there's got to be some kind of cooperation. No good going around robbing and killing people who might be of help to you when you need help, you know?"

"I guess," she said. From what he was saying, there was a whole other world in this harsh environment.

"Not that it's completely safe here; it's not. But we do the best we can. Besides, no one else wants to be on this side of the dome. No reason to decamp us all. We'd only make trouble in the city, so it's better for everyone if we're here."

His rationale made sense. Why not let a handful of people live on the surface? If nothing else, it would make scary stories about criminals and brigands more realistic, and those stories presumably kept the law-abiding inside the main dome. "What's all this got to do with Nicholas?" she asked, putting her bowl on the ground in front of her.

"Your little clone friend might have got himself a problem," said Gray beard, thoughtfully. "Anyone else, I'd tell you to head over into the next settlement and look for him. But this Nicholas, well, he looked like a clone but didn't have no numbers or scars, which makes him look a bit suspicious, if you know what I mean. People here might be different, but it don't mean they necessarily like different. At least the kind of different so different from the difference that they know."

Aurelia tried to get her head around the repeats, but she thought she saw what he was getting at.

"Where do you think he'd be, then?" she asked.

The older man sucked his teeth and thought for a while. "I guess his best shot would be to try and find himself a small band, like us. A group of people who he can persuade individually to trust him. He'd be better off than trying to get into a settlement, I think."

"Did you tell him this?"

"Not in so many words, but more or less, yeah. Not sure he agreed, but he seemed to take it in."

"So if I'm looking for him, I should wander around finding portable domes? That isn't exactly what I was hoping to hear," said Aurelia.

"Yeah, guess it's not too helpful," said Gray beard. "Well, at least I can tell you which direction I last saw him headed in, and there are two or three groups around where he went, so you might get more info from one of them."

"Thanks," said Aurelia, meaning it. The food and coffee sat warmly in her stomach. If nothing else, she'd had a hot meal, and at least she knew what she had to do next.

"It was nothing," said Gray beard. "You safe enough out there? Got something to protect yourself?"

She remembered the stunner in her bag and nodded. She should take it out and keep it in one of the pockets of her breathing suit.

"Good. Ain't got a man to send with you now," he said. "Most have gone inside to sell and won't be back for a few days. Got a feeling you don't want to wait."

"I don't," she said. "And I should get going now."

Getting up, he offered her a hand and went with her to the airlock. "Don't forget your hood," he said, opening the first door.

"I won't. And thank you . . . really . . . for everything."

"It's just what we do out here," Gray beard. "Gotta help each other, or none of us will make it. Pass on the favor if you find someone who needs your help. Be careful. There ain't no monsters hereabouts, but there are some who would hurt you, so watch your back. It's only around a half-day walk to the camps I'll point you to."

After a quick lesson in star navigation so she knew more or less which direction to head in, he closed the airlock behind her. Putting up her hood and pressing the power button, Aurelia opened the outer lock and once more stepped out onto the lunar surface.

***

Aurelia had never spent so much time alone before, at least not when she was awake, and it amazed her how quickly she could become bored. Her entire life had been filled with work and training; boredom had really never been an issue before. But the constant crisp sound of her footsteps on the surface, the rustle of her suit, and the sound of her breathing lulled her into a state of half-consciousness. An incessant voice droned in her head; it mentioned the most mundane of things, and it talked on and on and on. She realized that if she had to spend too much time out here alone, she was probably going to go insane. Every now and again, the voice would mention something that wasn't mundane, like when it reminded her to get the stunner out of her bag and put it in her pocket. But for the most part, it merely chattered on. Her brain talked to itself, and the further she went and the more tired she got, the stupider the voice in her head sounded.

After hours of walking, she eventually spied something in the distance. Getting closer, she saw that it wasn't a portable dome at all but a collection of tents. Presumably, whoever stayed in them wore breathing suits at all times. Probably only stopped for the night. She knew it took time to charge a dome to full capacity, and even a portable dome could take a couple of hours before it was safe to be inside. She guessed in the short term, it might be easier to stay in the suits.

She quickened her pace, anxious to see faces again. Nearing the small campsite, she saw a few figures standing around, all in breathing suits. One of the figures walked towards her. Glad that she wouldn't have to enter alone into an already established group, she hurried until they met.

"Help you?" the figure said.

It was tough to tell inside the suit what he looked like, but Aurelia was sure her greeter was a man.

"I'm looking for someone," she began. She continued her spiel, giving him a description of Nicholas.

When she was done, the figure shook his head. "Not seen him," he said. "Sorry."

He didn't sound sorry, though. Aurelia shrugged and resigned herself to walking on to the next camp. "Thanks," she said over her shoulder as she left. The figure watched her.

Afterwards, she would curse herself for not looking behind her more often. With so much empty space, she'd assumed as long as she couldn't see anyone, no one could see her. Of course, if she wasn't checking behind, that didn't exactly mean anything.

She felt it before she heard anything. Something blunt and hard was shoved into her back, pressing into a kidney.

"Didn't say you could leave," a voice said behind her.

Immediately she recognized the speaker as the figure in the breathing suit she had spoken to minutes earlier. Her heart beating fast, she slid a hand into her pocket and grasped the stunner.

"I'm sorry. I . . . I didn't mean to be rude," she stammered.

"Come on back, then, and we can start over," the voice said, rough and cold.

"Sure."

Aurelia turned slowly, removing the stunner from her pocket as she did. By the time she was facing him, the metal device was already pointed at him. He eyed it for a second, long enough for Aurelia to press the trigger button.

She saw the metal pipe coming towards the side of her head but could do nothing. The last thing she thought before it hit her was that Elza had warned her that electronics didn't work out. Then everything went black.