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“Welcome to where time stands still,
No one leaves and no one will.
Moon is full, never seems to change,
Just labeled mentally deranged.

                Metallica, Welcome Home

                The ladder is flanked on either side by yellow running lights just like the lights on the ground far below, and on the sky high above. I look down, my mind unable to process the immense distance down because of the darkness. For once, I’m glad the darkness is there. I’d hate to no how far I could fall.

                As we near the domed top, I can see a small landing. The memory of the hole I climbed through in the first bio-dome suddenly flashes back. Slate reaches the top ahead of me and pulls herself up. I follow just a few yards beneath her and collapse onto the landing across from her. Even though the landing isn’t more than ten feet across, it’s lit and flat, which is a rarity for my day.

                Slate sits against the wall for a moment, her eyes closed. I sit back as well, the exhaustion from the climb seeping out of me. As I sit, I feel a very subtle vibration. I look down at the platform, then at the space around us, but I can’t tell where it’s coming from. “What is that?” I ask so softly that only I can hear. Even though the words don’t echo down the ladder, the sounds drop like a handful of pebbles.

                Slate stands up and turns to the manhole-sized opening in the steel ceiling. At an angle, Slate reaches out for the handles and gets a good grip. “Brace yourself.” She warns with her teeth pressed hard together. I stare at her, confused.

                And then she opens the tiny door. And I understand what she means.

                The collision of sound and life is far more than I ever thought possible. Without even looking out the hole, I can tell that a gigantic world is right outside. I turn and look at her with wide eyes. But she doesn’t return my enthusiasm.

                She pushes the doorway open with a loud slam against concrete and scrambles through the opening. I throw myself through after her, unprepared for the sight that awaits me.

                It’s a metropolis.

                I’m crouching on the paved street of some deserted road in the middle of a giant city. Towering above me is a gigantic world of sky scrapers and buildings that reach up to the star-laden sky. The sounds of the nighttime life echo around me as the noise is deafening.

                I look over at Slate, but she grabs my shoulder and pulls me towards the side of the road. I go with her and the two of us put our backs to the brick wall. I feel dizzy as we stand there on the side of the building. The world is so tall; I can’t even begin to grasp which direction is up. I can’t tell for a moment if I’m leaning against a wall, or lying down on the ground.

                The buildings are glass and steel, rising up high. Angled points and ageless marble fill the skyline, while lights of all shape and color flicker like flames in a giant city-wide fire. I can hear the sound of cars and trucks and every manner of mechanical beast ever constructed by the hands of man; all while electricity buzzes and sizzles overhead as an infinite array of power wires and phone lines crisscross over the street above me.

                “Where are we?” I ask.

                “This is where I spent the last year and a half of my life.” Slate says, looking around the street, trying to get reoriented. “This is Bio-dome 3.”

                “This is a bio-dome?” I gawk. “It can’t be. I can see the stars.”

                “It’s an artificial sky.” She says, putting her flashlight into her backpack. “We’ve got to get off the street.” She walks past me and I dazedly follow. She leads me down past a variety of all-night stores, to the bend in the street. A dark alleyway smelling of trash and day-old food opens up before us. I’m already half way past it when I realize Slate started down the alley.

                “Slate.” I say, rushing to catch up with her in the low light of the alley. “What are you doing?”

                “Finding a place for us to catch our breath.” She says, walking around the corner of the alleyway. The buildings around us rise up for at least ten stories, while the hot air of the smoldering alleyway threatens to smother us.

                Slate finally sits down behind a dumpster in the closed off bend of the alleyway, leaving us alone. She looks around once, then sits down in the corner of the brick walls, laying her backpack on the ground next to her. She looks up at me. “Sit down.” She says.

                I sit down in front of her, laying my backpack down as well. “What’s the deal?” I ask.

                “Sam, there’s a few things you need to know about this place.” She says carefully. “Do you remember when I asked you how long things had been going on over in Bio-dome 4?”

                “Yeah. Why?”

                “You said it seemed like things had been that way for maybe a few days before you got there, or something like that.” She repeats in a quiet tone. “Well, things have been the way they are now for almost six months.”

                “What way?” I ask, getting frustrated.

                “First, you have to keep your voice down.” She says, her voice staying very calm. “And I want you to look up at the wall my back is against.” I look up, staring at the brick wall. “Do you see it?”

                I look at the wall, for a moment seeing nothing but the dried blood color of the bricks. But as I look, up close to where the first floor bleeds into the second, I can see some type of discoloration on the bricks. “I, I see something.”

                “Let me help you.” Slate says, clicking on her flashlight. She waves the beam over the discoloration. As the beam passes by, for a brief moment, a dull red symbol remains. As it fades into the dim light again, I can make out a curved line with three dots in the form of a sideways pyramid next to it. I look at her. “That’s a guidepost.” She says, her eyes even as she stares at me. “They put them up so that they can find their way around town.”

                “They?” I gulp.

                “The zombies aren’t the only monsters created by the Ever-After Project.” She says. “That’s why I was so interested when you told me about the blood types. Because that makes sense. Type B and AB. Type AB is really rare. And since it’s got the A influence in it, then they wouldn’t turn into full zombies, but they’d . . .”

                “They who?” I nearly yell.

                She looks at me, a simultaneously hard and sympathetic look in her eyes. “The vampires.” She whispers.

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