The electric tractor sat humming softly, fully charged, its battery a indicator glowing a calm green. Robby had bolted the solar panels from his house into a rough canopy over the cab. Ugly sure but it was functional and solid. It was very him. Behind it, the big wagon sagged slightly under the weight of everything he owned, lashed down with rope and scavenged straps.

  Robby stood a short distance away, spear resting next to a tree, staring at the dugout one last time.

  Steve waited beside him, a sledgehammer resting against his shoulder.

  “Best we collapse it,” Steve said. “Safer for wildlife. Don't collapse on someone later from lack of maintenance.”

  Robby nodded but didn’t answer. He wasn’t really looking at the dugout anymore, he was looking at his childhood fade away.

  Sarah came jogging back from the treeline, arms full. Literally full. Snares dangled and clinked together, twenty… maybe thirty of them. She looked absurd, half-buried in wire.

  Steve barked out a laugh. “How many did you set, kid?”

  “Not enough,” Sarah said, grinning. “Every one of them’s empty. Guess the animals knew today wasn’t the day. So it will be rations for lunch unless you want to get to Robby’s freezer buried in the pile.”

  Robby finally turned away smiling.

  He walked to the old car, the one that had brought him here in the first place. He opened the door and gently placed the journal inside, setting it in a plastic box to protect it from the rain, like it belonged there. Some things were meant to stay behind.

  From the glove box, he took out the pictures.

  His mom.

  His dad.

  Nina.

  He slid them into the leather binder he’d made for his OmniPad. Thick, stitched by hand, scarred in places where he’d messed up and fixed it again. He tucked the binder into his jacket and zipped it closed, fingers lingering there for a second longer than necessary.

  The sun was up, bright but weak. It was late fall now and the air had its typical bite to it. He told himself he’d waited for the harvest. That was the excuse. The truth was simpler and harder. A small part of him had still hoped his parents would show up at the last second. Step out of the trees. Wave. Say they were sorry they were late.

  “Daylight’s burnin’, Robby,” Steve said, not unkindly.

  Sarah glanced at the sky. “Almost nine. Half the day’s already gone,” she added with a chuckle.

  Robby sighed. “Okay. Okay. Just… just don’t drive too fast. My tractor’s slow.”

  “That’s exactly why I want to start now,” Steve shot back. “It’s gonna take most of the day to get there.”

  Steve and Sarah climbed into the car and pulled out onto the road. Dust kicked up behind them. Nina was mewing safely inside a box Robby had made for her in the back of the vehicle.

  He thought for a moment about Trixie, he had half expected her to show up to see him off. Robby climbed onto the tractor, started it up. The electric engine hummed quietly, steady and dependable. He eased it into gear and followed.

  Sarah had handed him a radio before they left. Their voices crackled back and forth as they drove.

  They went around Ravenholt instead of through it.

  “Less eyes that way,” Steve said over the radio.

  Robby didn’t argue.

  About halfway through the trip, his gaze drifted to the horizon. The closer to Ravenhold you got, the more the greener mountain area slid away toward a mix of where the desert and grass collided into scrubland. He could see for miles into the distance when he crested each hill.

  Over one hill he saw the aircraft graveyard that stretched out in the distance horizon. Tens of thousands of airplanes parked wing to wing in sandy scrubland. Rusting. Silent. A fossil record of a world that had once assumed it would always have time.

  Silvercreek came into view hours later.

  The old town had been all but abandoned the night of Starfall, too many fires and not enough hands to put them out. Too many bad memories for a lot of people. What remained now was scavengers, defense emplacements and memories of what once was.

  The new settlement was rising near the dams that still provided power. Between two of the smaller reservoir dams, a massive flat expanse was being cleared, leveled, and filled with concrete, stone and steel.

  A rocket launch pad. Several of them.

  The former parkland and surrounding farms were being torn down and reborn. A river cut through the center of it all. Walls were going up built with scavenged metal, repurposed timbers, anything that could be hauled, cut, welded, or nailed into place. Crews worked everywhere. In the center, “the green”, was where any future festivals or market trading was to happen.

  Robby took it all in as they rolled closer, it seemed more alive here. He’d be staying with Steve and Sarah for a while, at least until he finished building his own place. Their home was a massive rebuilt trailer near the green. It wasn’t pretty but it looked reinforced and cared for.

  They arrived with about two hours of daylight left.

  The place was busy. Noisy. Purposeful.

  It felt different than Ravenholt.

  Here, people moved like they still believed tomorrow mattered.

  Like they hadn’t given up yet.

  Robby parked the tractor beside the massive rebuilt trailer and killed the engine. The sudden quiet felt strange after a full day of motion. He climbed down and went straight to work.

  Tarps were checked first. Pulled tight, retied, corners weighted down with scrap and stone. He adjusted the solar canopy so runoff wouldn’t pool. Then he checked the freezer, hand resting on the casing until the indicator blinked back at him.

  The battery was still good so the meat inside would remain frozen. He had filled any remaining space with ice and wrapped the freezer with the insulation from the dugout walls to trap in the cold. Satisfied, he headed toward the trailer just as Steve was stepping out.

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  “So,” Robby said, casual but hopeful. “What’s for dinner?”

  Steve grimaced. “Rations.”

  Robby stopped. “We’re at your home now, certainly we can do better than those fake food packs?”

  “Everyone gets flour, synth-protein,” Steve said. “Then you pick a dessert pack. High vitamins, minerals, all that.”

  Robby scoffed. “That’s depressing. No wonder you visited me so much. Wouldn’t you rather have fish? I can open the freezer easy enough.”

  Steve shook his head immediately. “No. Not yet. People will smell it. That kind of thing spreads fast and it causes problems. Everyone’s on rations till we get the food supply settled out.”

  Robby didn’t like it, but he nodded.

  Inside, Sarah was already rummaging through a cabinet. She shook a tin, then another. “We do have oatmeal. And brown sugar.”

  Robby’s eyes lit up. “That works.”

  He slipped his boots off at the door and left them outside. His boar-hide armor followed, laid neatly beside his bow, arrows, and spear. Everything placed with intention. He kept his knife, though.

  It rode heavy and solid at his hip. The new one. Cleaner lines, better balance. Almost a foot of steel with a polished razor edge and a boar tusk handle. His old knife was still packed away on the trailer, but this one felt… right.

  A knock came at the door.

  Steve answered it to reveal Mayor Duncan and one of the town guards.

  Duncan was a big man, older, broad in the shoulders with a friendly face that looked like it smiled more often than it frowned. He greeted Steve warmly and handed over a small pouch.

  “Payment for the latest grain shipment,” Duncan said.

  Steve nodded, opened the pouch, counted quickly, then separated out several copper coins and handed them to Robby.

  Robby opened the pouch on his belt and dropped them in without comment.

  Duncan watched him for a moment. “So this is one of the farmers? Bit young, isn’t he?”

  Steve snorted. “Don’t let his age fool you. You’ll get the short end of a trade, I assure you. He already got me once.”

  Sarah laughed. “Oh, he definitely fleeced you on that first deal.”

  Kevin, the guard, had been eyeing Robby’s knife. “Nice blade. You buy that in Ravenholt with all your earnings?”

  “No,” Robby said shortly. “Made it.”

  Kevin blinked. “Mind if I take a look?”

  Robby hesitated, then unsheathed the knife and handed it over hilt-first.

  Kevin turned it slowly, inspecting the edge, the balance, and the handle. He whistled under his breath.

  “Damn fine work. If you feel like making another, sign me up. What’s the handle made of?”

  “Boar tusk,” Robby said. “From the first one I killed. With a spear.”

  Kevin looked up sharply. “You killed a boar… with a spear?”

  “Yeah,” Robby said. “It got its licks in too, though.” Before anyone could stop him, Robby dropped his pants just enough to show the long, jagged scar running along the outside of his leg.

  “Robby! Pull your pants back up!” Sarah yelled, barely holding in her laughter.

  “I got underwear on, it’s fine,” Robby said, unfazed. He pointed. “Right there. Had fishing line, so I sewed it up. Didn’t do a great job.”

  Kevin stared for a second, then shook his head slowly. “Kid… you’re something else.”

  He handed the knife back as Robby pulled his pants back up. “You want part-time work while you’re going to school? I’m sure we can find something for you at the fort.”

  “The fort?” Robby asked.

  “Protects the town,” Kevin said. “Just outside the main gate. You passed it on the way in.”

  “I’m starting there soon,” Steve added. “Trainer.”

  “Drone controller,” Sarah said, raising her hand. “Someone has to keep you boys in the modern era, or you’ll start stabbing each other with sticks like Robby.”

  “Well,” Robby said seriously, “it worked on the boar and people aren’t much different than that.”

  Duncan laughed. “I think you’re going to have your hands full with this one.”

  Steve shrugged. “Nah. He practically raised himself. Like a big chicken.”

  Robby shot him a sideways look, clearly failing to see how that made any sense.

  They finally sat down to eat.

  Oatmeal and brown sugar. Sarah pulled some items she had in the fridge, prepared the night before they left. Noodles with a tomato sauce plus she cooked protein patties in some of the boar lard. Robby decided it smelled good enough to try some of the fake food as well.

  Conversation drifted to walls being finished, keeping looters away from the shipyard. The fort expanding. Patrol rotations. The urgency of educating the kids, not just reading and math, but spaceflight, systems survival, and how not to die when the ground disappeared beneath their feet.

  Robby listened quietly.

  Dinner bled into evening, bowls scraped mostly clean, the light outside fading into a cold orange glow. Someone turned on the TV mounted crookedly near the ceiling, a scavenged flatscreen wired into the trailer’s power grid.

  The image flickered, stabilized.

  Sarah immediately leaned forward. “Oh! This one.”

  Duncan glanced up from his cup. “You’re not serious.”

  “Dead serious,” Sarah said. “Pre-AI cinema. Professionals. Writers. Directors. Actors who actually acted instead of being sliders in a menu.”

  Duncan snorted. “You’re romanticizing it. Post-AI films were better in every measurable way. Infinite variety. Personalized pacing. Emotional tuning. You didn’t watch a movie. You experienced it.”

  “Experienced chaos,” Sarah shot back. “There’s no binding consistency. Everyone’s watched a completely different version of TimeKop 3K. Nobody can even agree on the basic plot.”

  “That’s the beauty of it!” Duncan said. “You had the official prompt, the canonical seed number…”

  “...which nobody used,” Sarah interrupted. “They randomized it. Or tweaked it. Or rewrote half the prompt because they thought they were clever.”

  Steve grinned quietly, staying out of it, as if this was an argument doomed to repeat till launch day.

  “You could alter tone, character focus, dialogue density,” Duncan continued. “You could grow with the story. And if you didn’t like a scene! Boom! Regenerated!”

  “And then the AI got a major update,” Sarah said sharply, “and every seed got scrambled. No one even knows what the original intended version was anymore. Not even the studios because the official version always seemed to get accidently deleted.”

  “That’s evolution.”

  “That’s a historical crime,” Sarah said. “It’s pure chaos. Art needs a spine. A fixed version. Something two people can argue about accurately.”

  Duncan folded his arms. “I liked knowing that my version was mine.”

  “And I liked knowing the actor didn’t wake up different every time I watched the movie,” Sarah shot back.

  Kevin laughed. “I’m pretty sure I watched TimeKop 3K where the villain was the protagonist’s daughter.”

  “That’s not even remotely canon,” Sarah said.

  “There is no canon,” Duncan replied smugly.

  They went back and forth, voices overlapping, gesturing at the screen like it had personally offended them.

  Robby watched them for a moment.

  Then he looked down at his OmniPad.

  He’d never seen a movie, not that he remembered at all. Not pre-AI. Not post-AI. The argument didn’t even make sense to him. Stories were stories. You learned from them, or you didn’t. The idea of watching something just to… watch it, felt strange. He pulled up schematics instead.

  Battery efficiency curves. Structural load tolerances. Notes on composite reinforcement for walls. He adjusted a few numbers, thinking about his future house, about snow load, about wind. The adults kept arguing in the background. Robby tuned them out.

  To him, this was what safety sounded like. People arguing about things that didn’t matter because, for once, they could afford to.

  He studied quietly while the world argued about movies he’d never seen, in a town that still believed it had a future.