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outside, and he liked it.
"I believe my sister likes Lloyd," Kailash said.
"Maybe she likes being liked. Especially at this time."
"Surely so. He is too young to be artificial, and she appreciates that. His sincerity persuades her that she
is not necessarily worthless."
"So she is able to take off the reconciler for a while," Penn agreed. "I do prefer her without it."
Their power jumps soon brought them to the two thugs. They were lying against the trunk of a huge tree,
looking bedraggled. They scrambled up when they saw Penn and Kailash, bringing out their knives.
Penn proffered his canteen to the nearest thug. The man stared at it, then put away his knife and took it.
He unscrewed the cap and tilted it up, gulping the water.
Kailash offered his canteen to the other man. The reaction was similar. Thirst was a great persuader, after
two days in the endless daytime of the impervious wilderness.
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"Follow us," Penn said, gesturing. He knew they wouldn't understand his words, but would take his
meaning. They had already discovered that they could not eat or drink anything in the forest, or have any
effect on it; they were desperate to get out of it.
Penn and Kailash walked back toward the house, slowly. The two men followed. They did not try to
attack, surely impressed by the confidence of their rescuers. They didn't know that they couldn't hurt
Penn and Kailash; maybe they thought that if they killed these two, they would be forever stranded here.
They probably understood that the situation had changed, and their prior mission was moot.
Penn reached the boulder, and knocked. The door opened. "Follow me," he said, gesturing again, and
walked through. Kailash stayed back, to finish the procession.
Penn marched straight through the house, and the two thugs followed in single file. Llynn opened the
front door on Moscow. Penn stepped out, then stood beside the walk. The men emerged, spied halfway
familiar terrain, and lumbered down the walk to the street. Kailash came to stand beside Penn.
The men turned back to the house. Then they set down the empty canteens, waved, and walked down the
street.
"That was easier than I expected," Penn said.
"For me, too," Kailash agreed. "Vengeance was not necessary."
"They have been punished enough," Penn said. "I suspect they will seek other employment after this."
"If they tell their story, they will be regarded as lunatics," Kailash said. "I am not entirely certain that I
am sane myself, considering what I have recently encountered."
"This house is a considerable experience for all of us." But Penn realized that he liked it. His life had
become dull. That was no longer the case.
They went down to fetch the canteens, and returned to the house. Llynn closed the front door behind
them and reset the number. Moscow was done.
"The forest," Kailash said. "Is it truly infinite?"
"As far as we can tell," Penn said. "Llynn and I tried to explore it, and couldn't find the end. We think it's
thirty-thousand years ago, in Pennsylvania."
Kailash frowned. "Was there not an ice age then?"
"The ice age," Penn exclaimed. "The glaciers would not have been far away. How could such a well-
developed forest be there?"
Shree went to a living room shelf. "There is an atlas," she said, taking down a large book.
It was more than an atlas. It was a geological atlas, showing the lands of Earth back for millions of years.
They gathered around it, poring over its marvelous maps. They saw the progression of the continents,
forming into one or two monstrous masses, then fragmenting into the present configuration. They saw the
coming of the ice ages.
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"You're right," Penn said. "It couldn't be Pennsylvania. Not then."
"Where is this house, really?" Llynn asked. "I mean, it can be in Philadelphia, or Okinawa, or Moscow,
or anywhere. Is it just shuttling around, with no fixed address, or is it just the doors that change?"
Penn sat down. "I hadn't thought about that. I assumed the house itself was moving from site to site, but if
that's true, what about the back door, which doesn't seem to move spatially? Where is the house?"
"It does seem easier for the doors to move, than the whole house," Llynn said. "So the house could be
parked on one place, where the back door is, and the front door is is "
"A matter transmitter," Lloyd said.
"I agree," Penn said. "It would have to be a matter transmitter for the whole house, people included, if it
all moved. Much easier to handle just the people who pass through the door. Less energy expenditure."
"And the permanent site would have to be well protected," Lloyd said. "So the locals wouldn't get in and
mess it up."
"We're the locals," Llynn said. "So who made this house? We don't have the technology."
There was a brief silence. "Maybe the worms," Penn said at last.
"I don't think so," Kailash said. "There are too many things of human manufacture. There must be contact
with the human realm."
"Even the newspapers," Llynn agreed. "Someone must have subscribed to them."
The more they discussed it, the more it seemed there had to be more to the house than they had
discovered. "An empty house could not have stocked itself with human commercial food, clothing,
bicycles, car, television, computer, and all the related services," Penn said. "Also, it could not have
zeroed-in on our personal tastes."
"And summoned us," Kailash said. "There is a presence. A motive. A need."
"As though the house is alive and conscious," Chandelle said. "It is a mother house."
That made Penn nervous. "Or a very well programmed machine."
"Yet someone or something must have constructed it," Shree said, donning her headband for completely
rational consideration. "That care evidently continues, as evidenced by the changing numbers on the
plaque."
"So that consciousness must have a source," Kailash said. "Somewhere within the house."
"Gotta be something we can find," Lloyd said. "Maybe we just gotta look."
"Let's form teams and check every part," Llynn said, "until we find it. I'll go with Kailash."
But Kailash demurred. "Were I to be with you, I would be looking at you rather than the house," he said.
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"Then we would not succeed."
Llynn blushed, but could not deny his logic, though she suspected he had exaggerated the case. She was
the one who was distracted by him, rather than the other way around.
So the teams were formed by random selection: Llynn and Chandelle, Kailash and Lloyd, and Penn and
Shree. Obsidian had free choice.
Llynn and Chandelle took the upstairs to see whether there were any more offshoots like the attic. Lloyd
and Kailash took the downstairs, including the garage, to see whether there were any more items of
special equipment. And Penn and Shree took the cellar, which had not really been explored in detail.
The stairs led down to the furnace chamber. "Do you know," Penn said thoughtfully, "I've never been
aware of this house heating or cooling. It's always just right. Maybe this isn't a furnace."
"That concept makes me nervous," she said.
He looked at her. She was wearing one of the outfits from Llynn's room, a black blouse and gray skirt
with black shoes. She had evidently done some sewing, to let out the clothing to fit her fuller figure, but it
remained a trifle tight across the chest and hips. She was an extremely attractive young woman.
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