The TV set boomed. As Brittany S. Pierce made her way down the great empty apartment building's dust-stricken stairs to the level below, she made out the now familiar voice of Mercedes Jones, chortling happily to her vast, world-wide audience.

“Okay, folks! Time for a brief not on tomorrow's weather. First the Eastern seaboard of the U.S.A. Mongoose satellite reports that fallout will be especially pronounced toward noon and then will taper off. So all you dear folks who'll be venturing out ought to wait until afternoon, okay? We'll be back in just a minute with the rest of the weather report and then I'll have a lovely little song for you before I bring out my next very special guest – ”

As Brittany knocked on the apartment door the television died immediately into nonbeing. It had not merely become silent. It had stopped existing, scared into its grave by her knock.

She could sense, beyond the closed door, the presence of life. She imagined the inhabitant of the apartment engulfed by a haunted, tongueless fear, retreating from her – pressed back to the farthest wall of the apartment in an attempt to evade her.

“Hey,” she called in a loud, and hopefully reassuring, voice. “I live upstairs. I heard your TV. Let's meet, okay?” She waited, listening. No sound and no motion. So far, her words had not pried the person loose. “I brought you a cube of margarine,” she said, standing close to the door and raising her voice to penetrate its thickness. “My name is Brittany S. Pierce and I work for the well-known animal vet Mr. William Schuester. You've heard of New Directions Animal Hospital, I'm sure? I'm reputable. I have a job. I drive Mr. Schuester's van.”

The door swung open. Standing in the doorway, wearing a disgruntled expression, was a handsome man with messy, chestnut hair, defined cheekbones, and eyes a swirl of blue and green. Slouching, he was about the same height as Brittany, so she calculated that he was perhaps an inch or two taller when standing fully upright. “Fine. You wore me down. What do you want?” he snapped. His voice was husky with disuse, but a bit higher than she expected. It soothed some of the venom of his words.

“Just to meet. You're the first other person I've seen in the building in years.” And that was no fun, she well knew.

“So you're the only one in the building?“ he asked, eyeing her suspiciously. Brittany nodded and the newcomer sighed heavily. “Just my luck,” he muttered. “I pick what's probably the only building in this damn town that's not actually abandoned.”

“But it's good to have neighbors,” Brittany insisted. “I mean, I know you might not believe me because I've been living here alone for a long time, but trust me, I know from experience how awful it can be.” She peered past the man into the apartment and saw a room in disorder. Suitcases lay here and there, opened, their contents half spilled onto the littered floor. But this was natural, he had barely arrived. Brittany's eyes focused back on her new neighbor. He had straightened his posture and stood with his arms crossed. Caught by surprise, the man wore pajama bottoms and nothing more. He was thin, but muscular. Brittany allowed her eyes to rove over the contours of his biceps and down toward his tapered waist. Realizing her mouth was open, she closed it with a snap and looked at the floor.

Brittany had always had a healthy sexual appetite. Unfortunately, it had been harder and harder lately to find anyone to satisfy it. For a long time, she relied on her co-worker Puck. But she found his smugness humiliating to initiate anything with him. And he hadn't initiated anything with her in months, not since he started offering bonus services to the female clients when he picked up or delivered their artificial pets.

Still holding the margarine awkwardly, she felt a bit hurt that he had not accepted her offering. It was classy, an authentic pre-war ritual, and he hadn't even seemed aware of it. She stood in the doorway for a moment, desperately trying to think of a way to break the silence. “That Mercedes Jones is incredible, don't you think?” she asked at last. “I think I've downloaded all of her songs.”

“She's a singer?” the man asks after a pause. At Brittany's surprised expression he bit his lip as if savagely angry. Evidently at himself.

“Do you not know Mercedes Jones? You had her TV show on just now.” It seemed odd to her that this man had not heard of one of the planet's most famous television personalities. “Where did you come here from?” she asked curiously.

“I don't see why that matters,” he said haughtily, drawing himself up to his full height and letting his arms drop to his sides. He looked into her eyes and something he saw there must have eased his concern. His body visibly relaxed and he said dismissively, “I'll be glad to receive company later on. When I'm more settled in. But right now it is out of the question.”

“What? Why?” Brittany asked, puzzled. Everything about him puzzled her. Maybe, she thought, I've been living here alone for too long. I've become strange. They say chickenheads are like that. The thought made her sad. “I could help you unpack. Help you arrange your furniture.”

“I don't have any furniture. These things,” he said, indicating the apartment behind him with a sweeping gesture, “aren't mine. They were here when I got here.”

“Oh, okay. Packing light, I guess?” she said awkwardly. “But some of these things won't do.” She could tell that at a glance. The chairs, the carpet, the tables – all had rotted away. They sagged in mutual ruin, victims of the despotic force of time. And of abandonment. No one had lived in this apartment for years. The ruin had become almost complete. She couldn't imagine how he figured on living in such surroundings. “Listen,” she said earnestly. “If we go all over the building looking we can probably find you things that aren't so tattered. A lamp from one apartment, a table from another.”

“I'll do it,” the man said. “Myself, thanks.”

“You'd go in those apartments alone?” She could not believe it.

“Why not?” he asked confidently. But a moment later he shuddered nervously, grimacing in awareness of saying something wrong.

Brittany said, “I've tried it. Once. After that I just come home and go in my own place and I don't think about the rest. The apartments in which no one lives – hundreds of them and all full of the possessions people had, like family photographs and clothes. Those that died couldn't take anything and those who emigrated didn't want to. This building, except for my apartment, is completely kipple-ized.”

“'Kipple-ized'?” He raised an eyebrow skeptically.

“Kipple is useless objects, like junk mail or gum wrappers or yesterday's newspaper. When nobody's around, kipple reproduces itself. For instance, if you go to bed leaving any kipple around your apartment, when you wake up the next morning there's twice as much of it. It always gets more and more.”

“I see,” the man said slowly, not knowing whether to believe her.

“There's the First Law of Kipple,” she continued. “'Kipple drives out nonkipple.” And in these apartments there's been nobody there to fight the kipple.”

“Uh-huh,” the man offered. He regarded her uncertainly. “Are you joking?” he asked at last.

“No, I'm completely serious,” she said, gripping his arm and looking directly into his eyes. “Your place. This apartment you've chosen. It's too kipple-ized to live in. We can roll the kipple-factor back; we can do like I said, raid the other apartments. But – ” she broke off.

“But what?”

Brittany sighed. “We can't win.”

“Why not?” The man stepped forward, eager to understand. Or so it appeared to Brittany. He was at least listening.

“No one can win against kipple,” she said, “except temporarily and maybe in one spot. Like in my apartment, I've created a stasis between the pressure of kipple and nonkipple, for the time being. But eventually I'll die or go away, and then the kipple will again take over. It's a universal principle operating throughout the universe. The entire universe is moving toward a final state of total, absolute kippleization.”

Brittany looked up into the man's eyes. In the dim light of the hallway, they looked more green than blue. They were standing so close she could feel the heat radiating from his body. “You're really pretty.” She heard the words leave her mouth before she could stop them.

She was about to apologize, but he grinned a lopsided, closed-lipped smile and said, “Thanks.”

Emboldened by his response she said, “I have to go to work pretty soon, but when I come back, I can help you with your apartment.” She bit her lip and looked up at him through her lashes. “Or maybe you could stay with me.”

“Oh, that's very nice of you, but – ” he started, backing up a step.

“There's plenty of room for your clothes and your empathy box. I should have everything else you need,” she continued, peering around him and into the apartment once more. “Where is your empathy box, anyway? Don't you participate in fusion?”

“I – I don't own one,” he stammered. At her shocked look he continued, “I mean, I didn't bring mine with me. I figured I could find one here.”

Brittany sucked in a shocked breath. “But an empathy box is the most personal possession you have!” she exclaimed. “It's the way you touch other humans. It's the way you stop being alone. But you know that. Everyone knows that. Mercerism even lets people like me – ” she broke off. But too late; she had already told him and she could see by his face, by the flicker of sudden aversion, that he knew. “I almost passed the IQ test,” she said in a low, shaky voice. “I'm not very special, only moderately; not like some you see. But that's what Mercerisim doesn't care about.”

“As far as I'm concerned,” the man said, a look of distaste distorting his features, “you can count that as a major objection to Mercerism.”

“I guess I'll go back upstairs,” she said, and started away from him, clutching the cube of margarine that had become plastic and damp from the squeeze of her hand.

The man watched her go with a neutral expression on his face. And then he called out, “Wait.”

Turning, Brittany asked, “Why?”

“I really do need your help. For getting furniture from other apartments, as you said. Also, I could use help with something else.” He strolled toward her, his upper body trim, muscles rippling and not an excess gram of fat. “You like what you see, don't you?” he gestured toward his body with a smirk. “You want me to move in with you.” He was standing right in front of her now and he reached out a hand to cup her cheek, running his thumb across her bottom lip as he leaned in close. He breathed against her lips, “I need to use your phone. I need to let my friends know where I am.”

“I, um, don't have a phone,” Brittany whispered, nearly forgetting the man's earlier insult as she felt desire well up in her again.

“What? How is that possible?” he asked, dropping his hand back to his side and taking a step back.

“They don't maintain any fiberoptic cable this far out from the city. And I can't really afford the cell phone charges on my salary,” she explained hurriedly.

“But you said you downloaded songs,” he insisted.

“Yes, at work. But when I'm at home I only have my empathy box to connect with others.”

“Oh,” said dejectedly, turning away and starting to walk back to his apartment.  As he walked, he muttered, “I guess I'm better off on my own, anyway.”

“Wait!” It was Brittany's turn to call out.

The man stopped, but didn't turn around.

“I think I could get a phone for you. Let me see what I can do. Maybe I can earn some extra money today,” she offered.

“What time do you get off of work,” he asked, over his shoulder.

“Six o'clock.”

“I hope you can get a phone.”

“I will do my best,” she said. He was reaching for the apartment door when she asked, “Did you get my name? It's Brittany. And I work for – ”

“You already told me who you work for,” he said coldly; pushing open his door.

“And your name?” she called as he stepped into the apartment.

He paused with his hand on the door. Just before pushing it closed he said, “Carson Phillips.”