City Out of Time. William Robison III
of these things, his eyes were drawn to a giant structure almost exactly dead center of town – near the river, but not at a vantage point that Lanz would have seen it before.
It looked to be a cross between the Roman Coliseum and the Tower of Pisa. It was round and had many columns supporting its outside walls, but it was also tall – several stories tall at least – and open at the top. Lanz tried to imagine what it was that he was seeing.
“That,” said Celeste without any prompting from Lanz, “…is the Pan Forum.”
“The Pan Forum,” Lanz repeated. “What is it?”
“Archaeologists believe that it was a gathering place for time travelers from as far back as Roman times,” Celeste explained. “Travelers would arrive here out of a sandstorm or some such – using their powers to travel sometimes without even being aware of doing so – and meeting others of their kind here. It became a meeting place, a market, a town square before there was a town. It is the only indigenous structure here in the entire City. Everything else was built by the Founders in the early 1940’s.”
“Can we get a closer look?” Lanz asked. “Something without this building in the way?”
“Yes,” Celeste said. “There’s a viewing platform on the other side of the school. I’ll show you.”
“Wait,” Lanz replied. “This is a school?”
“High School,” Celeste noted. “But don’t worry… school’s out today.”
“Wait… why?”
“Spring break,” Celeste replied. “Come on.”
She went to the left of the school and there was a path there that sloped down past the school and past the school’s main courtyard to a playing field. The field was a multi-purpose field that was just wide enough for a football field and stands on one side. Currently, it was striped for Lacrosse. On the other side of the field, the City stretched below them – a view unhindered except for a single viewing platform.
Celeste ran across the field like a school girl and Lanz jogged after her to keep up. The second she reached the platform, Celeste walked straight to the edge and looked down at the City below. Even from quite a distance behind Celeste, Lanz could see that she really loved the view. Eventually, once he caught up to her and looked over the edge of the platform himself, he could completely understand why.
The City stretched below them without filter. There was nothing before them – no power poles, no TV antennas. Nothing blocked their view. Below them, the hill sloped down at a steep angle until it just reached the bottom, then it eased into the relatively flat George Washington Boulevard that ran along the entire base of the mountain. It was quite a view.
They didn’t say anything for a number of minutes. The hot air of the afternoon drifted upward and created a slight breeze that was the only sound they could hear except the distant humming of a functioning City. The sunlight gleamed off the towers of the downtown area and Lanz imagined that his apartment was out there somewhere.
In the mid-afternoon of a lazy Wednesday, Lanz finally understood that there was something special here in this City; and it wasn’t time travelers or crazy socialist economics. There was a sense of peace and tranquility here. It floated over the town and it permeated its every surface. Lanz began to feel right at home.
“I love this view,” Celeste said. “The first time I ever came here, I found this spot. There wasn’t even an observation deck here yet. The City was a little smaller, but its outline was already there. Somehow, I fell in love with it. It felt like home.”
“Yeah,” Lanz agreed. “I know what you mean.”
“So you’re going to stay?” Celeste asked.
It seemed like such a crazy question, but then Lanz remembered that right now he was missing classes at UNLV and that he was due to go back to work on Friday. His rent was due in a week. He had a credit card payment and bills to pay. The real world felt so distant. Its patterns felt so foreign and wrong. But part of Lanz felt dirty for abandoning all those responsibilities at once. Sure, he’d been ready to leave Las Vegas for good… but he would have gone back, probably. Unless… unless he found something better.
“I don’t want to just be another cog in a giant machine,” Lanz said. “I want my life to make a difference to somebody, somewhere. As long as I feel that I can do that here… I’ll stay.”
Celeste turned away from Lanz and looked towards the far end of the City, but then her hand came up to her eyes and she wiped them.
“I hope you never lose your idealism and passion,” she said, without turning towards Lanz. “I hope you never change.”
Lanz put his hand gently on hers and she turned around to look at him.
“What about you?” Lanz asked, “Have you lost your idealism and passion?”
“I’m not sure I ever had any,” she said, and without another word, she started to walk back towards the trolley stop.
Chapter Eight
The City
Later the same day - Relative
Lanz almost forgot that he had a brand new apartment waiting for him. The new apartment building looked like any other apartment building (tall, blocky, large glass windows, lots of chrome and faux marble in the lobby) except that it appeared to be unaffected by the ravages of time and big city existence – no sign of pollution nor graffiti.
Lanz took the elevator up to the eighth floor and stepped out into a long plain hallway with doors branching off on either side. He looked right and saw his apartment about two doors down from the elevator. There was a key ring jutting out of the lock with an envelope attached to it.
The door looked heavy, but it opened easily enough. The lights were on inside the apartment and Lanz could see that there was already furniture in place. He started to back out of the room thinking that someone else must live here, but stopped when he recognized his vintage first print Star Wars poster hanging on the wall in the stainless steel frame.
Lanz looked down at the plain white envelope attached to the key and saw that it was addressed, “TAC BLDG #809, LANZ FRANCO.” This appeared to be the right place.
“Hello?” he called out, but there was no reply.
Lanz laughed and walked into the apartment and looked around.
The main entry hallway had two closets off the entrance – presumably one for storage and one for hanging coats.
To his left, just inside the door, was the kitchen – stove, refrigerator, microwave, too little shelf space. There was a faux granite bar over the sink on the side opposite the stove that Lanz guessed was supposed to be the dining area. It opened the kitchen’s view into the living room.
Just past the refrigerator was a short hallway with two doors at the end of the hall - his bedroom and bathroom.
Beyond the short entrance hallway, the apartment opened out into a large living room which had a huge window as one wall. His apartment looked south over the river.
His computer was already set up on a desk, and most of the desk clutter from Las Vegas was recreated almost exactly. Lanz went to the desk, rifled through the stack of bills, junk mail, and the odd postcard he’d received from an ex-girlfriend who was stationed in Iceland. Was everything there?
He opened the desk drawers and began to pull out useless papers and junk that he’d stored in his desk in Vegas. The amount of effort that had gone into bringing his Vegas life to the City was evident, and prompted further searching. Finally, after a few minutes he found what he’d been hoping to find – the velvet box he’d been given in Iraq.
He opened the clasp and found things exactly as he’d left them – his Bronze Star Medal had its ribbon folded neatly on the velvet background. Lanz pulled the medal and the velvet