It took Anna half an hour to locate the house the old man mentioned. The gate to the fence was open, so she openly approached the doorstep of the small but nice home. It had a finely manicured lawn and a cute little white picket fence running its perimeter. She was a little confused by the ten foot tall robotic Abraham Lincoln standing guard on its doorstep, however.

Robot Lincoln handed her a single red rose, and wouldn't stop getting in her way until she took it. Afterwards, it produced a second to the same end. The cycle repeated until Anna held half a dozen of the damn things in her hand.

“I swear to god, if you don't quit with the f*cking roses, I'll put an end to the god damn union myself,” snapped Anna.

She hadn't really expected a response to her threat, but Robot Lincoln stared back for a number of seconds before slowly crushing the rose in its fist, and threatened to unleash the full might of the north upon her. She probably would've found the whole situation funny if not for the oversized hatchet which suddenly appeared in the mechanical ex-president's bulky hand. And the way its eyes turned red, and seemed to follow her every movement.

Anna rang the doorbell twice in quick succession, sending constant half-glances over her shoulder at the disgruntled presidential robot. Robo-Abe lowered the hatchet to its side in slow-motion. She shivered.

A few uncomfortable seconds later, the door swung wide to reveal a tall black man dressed in the finest of black suits. His dark but graying hair was cropped close to the scalp. He sported a rather large nose, hung over a pair of lips pressed tighter than a homophobic guy's ass cheeks at a gay bar.

"Yes, may I help you?" the butler asked.

Upon closer investigation, Anna couldn't decide whether he looked old or young. If it hadn't been for the graying hair, he could've passed for someone in his thirties.

“Is this the residence of a Charles Bellesemer?” Anna asked.

The man nodded. “Master Charles is occupied with his lunch at the moment. I’m Alex Dufresne, his butler. If you’d just- Abe, no! Knock it off. This is a guest.”

Anna jerked her whole body in time to catch Robot Lincoln backing away, once again lowering its hatchet.

“The hell’s up with this damn robot? Not that a ten foot tall robot Lincoln standing guard and handing people roses on a porch is strange at all.”

Alex crossed thick forearms over an even thicker chest, shaking his head with disappointment. “You said something about the union didn’t you?” The look on Anna's face gave it away. He sighed. “You shouldn’t have done that. Anyway, if you'll follow me inside, we can get you out of any immediate danger.”

“Wait,” Anna paused, holding up a hand. “Are you telling me this... thing, would’ve actually tried to kill me?” She backed into the doorway, never taking her eyes or protective outstretched hand off the bot.

Alex shrugged, closing the door behind them. “Now, what business do you have with the young master, miss...”

“Dunkirk. Anna Dunkirk. And well, I'm here because I met Charles on the street earlier. Let's just say the encounter was...” She rolled her head, “confusing, and I'd like to clear a few things up.”

Alex looked her up and down before offering a servile smile. “Well then, Ms. Dunkirk, if you'll wait here, I'lI go and fetch him.” After receiving Anna's nod of assent, he took a shallow bow, then exited into the hall opposite the front door. He rounded a corner into another hall, and his footsteps faded into the distance.

Anna cast her head about the small living room. It was lavishly but impersonally decorated. A leather couch so deeply red it was almost black was pushed against the leftern wall, beneath a window bearing cloth curtains of the finest make. The couch looked nice, but also unused. It was bookended by wooden tables of such intricate design Anna figured she wouldn't be able to afford even one of them with a month's worth of her salary. The tables were bare, save for a single picture frame resting at the center of each table, with the original photo of some couple gazing into each other's eyes in staged romance still affixed inside. A chair and loveseat matching the couch were spaced throughout the rest of the room, looking just as new and untouched as the couch. As if no behind had ever been thrust upon them.

She realized she could no longer hear anything at all. No footsteps, no voices, not even the soft hum of central air conditioning. It was still, quiet, and a little unnerving. It'd already been a few minutes since the butler had left, and it seemed more than a little suspect he'd yet to return. The house could've been no more than two thousand square feet, tops.

Also: the simple fact there was a f*cking butler.

Pacing in front of the door, Anna was once again struck with the feeling of being watched. She looked over each shoulder in turn, before approaching the window adjacent to the door and flipped up the silk curtains. She leapt back at the sight of Robot Lincoln hunched over, grinning and holding its hatchet a few inches away from the window. The words The North were painted sloppily across its shaft. In red, no less.

“Please don't antagonize him any further, Ms. Dunkirk.”

Anna jerked and saw the butler standing in the mouth of the hall.

“I wasn't. It just felt like...” She shook her head. “It's nothing.”

Alex nodded. “Yes, yes. Nothing indeed. The young master is still occupied with his lunch, but he has graciously invited you to join him, if you would be so inclined.”

Anna said, “Yes please,” before following Alex into the hall across the room.

The hall was clean, pristine, and barren. And for a while it seemed to shrink around her, before seeming to grow even larger than it had been before. It was an absurd idea, she thought. It had obviously stayed the same dimensions. But something was different, somehow. She just couldn't place a finger on it.

A few minutes later, Anna grew apprehensive and asked, "Is this just one of those houses that seems a whole hell of a lot bigger on the inside?"

Alex shrugged noncommittally, and said, "Something like that. The dining room is just a bit further." True to his word, about thirty seconds later the hall ended in a single door, which Alex opened and stood to the side of. He offered an, “After you.”

"Thanks..."

Anna stepped through into a grand room with a high vaulted ceiling. Underneath a large chandelier was a fully functional fountain at the center of the room, complete with twin naked and winged babies pissing spirals. It was flanked by a pair of spiral staircases which led to a second level a good twenty feet up. The floor was tiled with heavily polished and intricately swirled patches of marble reflecting the chandelier's light in a way that it made the floor look as if it was covered in shallow water.

No way in hell could this room fit inside the house I entered.

Anna stopped, turning to face the butler. "That ceiling's a good thirty feet up there."

"Your powers of observation are most keen, Ms. Dunkirk." Alex's tone was cordial and friendly, though there was something mocking tucked away in the faint twinkle of his smiling eyes. "Now, if you would, the young master is just on the other side of that door over there."

Alex pointed towards a set of double doors on the right-hand side of the room. The doors had to be at least fifteen feet tall, and half as wide. Worcestershire Room was emblazoned on a strip of burnished wood suspended above it.

Anna sighed, following the butler across the room. Alex stopped at the center of the doors and locked his shoulders with a hand in the center of each, pushing them both open at once with no visible effort. They swung out with a sort of elegance Anna had never imagined a door capable of achieving. The dining room beyond was large enough to fit the entirety of the house as she'd observed it from outside.

A long wooden table was positioned in the center of the largely barren room, beneath an extravagantly prismatic chandelier. Charles was seated at the far left end of the table, eating something from of a plain white bowl while reading a book.

The rest of the room was empty, however, save for a mural spanning all four walls. Anna's eyes traced the perimeter, taking in the most peculiar painting she'd ever seen. It seemed to be a kitchen sink of bastardized versions of every famous painting she could think of. Just to the left of the door was what appeared to be the Mona Lisa giving The Scream a blowjob to the backdrop of Starry Night.

Anna couldn't help the grin that followed.

“Anna!” Charles shouted from across the room, rising to stand at the end of the table. “It's so good to see you again so soon! I was just wondering whether or not I'd ever have the pleasure of seeing you again, when good ole Alex here shows up and informs me you'd come calling at the door. Imagine my surprise!” He slapped his thigh for some reason. “But where are my manners? Come here, come here! Take a seat, there's plenty of food. Have you eaten yet?”

Anna shifted her gaze from the very confused pair of American Gothic amidst a plethora of melting appliances, to the man she'd been searching for the past hour or so. She was more certain than ever he was her ticket to continued employment.

“No, I haven't. In fact, I'm starving.”

She approached the table and Charles motioned for her to take a seat at the edge nearest him. Alex followed to intercept her path, pulling the chair out with a bow as she reached it. Anna took her seat, watching Charles return to his.

“So I have to ask: what the hell's up with this place? The house looked no bigger than a family of dual fast food workers could've afforded. How in god's name could this,” Anna looked from one side of the room to the other, “fit inside that house. I kind of feel like I'm going crazy here.”

“Ha ha ha.” Charles made a broad sweeping gesture with an arm. “Anna, let me ask you a question.”

“Okay, go.”

“Where exactly do you think you are right now?” Charles picked up a bowl from the table near him, scooping something into it from a black pot before holding the bowl out for her.

“Where do I think I am? God.”

Anna grabbed the bowl and looked inside to see ordinary shells and cheese. She placed it on the table in front of her.

“This room looks bigger than the entire house. The hell's up with that?”

The grin Charles flashed reminded Anna of a young school boy attempting to curry favor by demonstrating some pointlessly trivial skill.

"Charles, dim the lights," he said and the room darkened. "Pull up a model of the house on Wilson." A semi-transparent model of the house she'd entered appeared a few feet in the air above the center of the large table. Charles swiped his hand sideways and the model rotated accordingly. "This is a rendered three-dimensional model of my house on Wilson, the one you entered through."

Anna looked from the image to Charles and back a few times. Her gaze finally settled on Charles.

"Is that a hologram or something?"

Charles bared his teeth in a wide grin. "Well, that would be an acceptable way to refer to it. I developed the technology a few years back for something, but that's another story in and of itself. I can get to it later if you want." He nodded once before speaking to himself again, "Charles, pull up a model of my estate relative to the house on Wilson."

A dozen feet or so above, and slightly to the right of, the image of the house, another image appeared. A towering mansion resting upon a large disc, with a house identical to the one she'd entered attached to its front.

Charles said, "A few years ago I had this idea. I'd previously created a system that could scan a three-dimensional space, and map the specific materials and composition of everything within the scanned space. Using that data, it's then possible to automatically recreate a perfect replica of whatever was scanned, down to the quantum level. I used it to create replicas of a few of our servant's homes. Then, using another sort of spacial mapping technology I invented, tied the entrances and exits of their original homes to the replicas I'd created. Whenever they looked in a window from outside their home, they'd see into the replica home."

Forcibly, and with much apparent difficulty, Charles stymied what was sure to have been an explosive round of laughter.

"Whenever the servants went through the front door of the real home, they would end up inside the replica house. Whenever they looked out a window from within the replica, they would see what was outside of the original. It was perfect. None of them even realized the joke I'd pulled on them."

He finally lost his composure. Hilarity ensued.

Anna was at a loss.

On one hand, this man was clearly disturbed and insane. On the other, those holographic images were very much real, and there was no way in hell these last two rooms could've fit inside that tiny ass bungalow.

"So you're telling me that when I walked into your house, I was unwittingly teleported to a different yet identical house, connected to this mansion somewhere, somehow?"

Charles subdued his mirth with a, "That's more or less the gist of it. But don't let it distract you from eating. You haven't even touched your lunch yet. If you don't hurry, it'll get cold."

Looking down at the bowl of not-quite-steaming shells swimming in a yellowish-orange sauce, Anna sighed, picking up the spoon next to the bowl. She took a bite. It tasted like a dollar fifty or so. Eaten with a spoon likely exponentially more expensive.

"So assuming I believe your story, where exactly are we?"

"Where are we? We're in my home. Although to be fair, this was actually my dead brother's personal estate from before he was disinherited. This room in particular was specifically designed to match his personal tastes.”

Anna's gaze fell back to the mural enclosing the room, at a section depicting a pair of dogs sitting at a round table adorned with cards and chips. The canines watched gleefully through a window as another pair of dogs pushed the Vitruvian Man down a steep hill, over what appeared to be a royal flush he'd acquired through cheating. Though exactly where he'd managed to hide the extra cards for his sleight of hand was anyone's guess.

Anna rubbed the bridge of her nose, feeling the beginnings of a headache coming on.

Calm down. This is everything you could've dreamed of and more.

"I meant where is this house," she clarified.

Something clicked on in Charles's expression. "Charles, complete the-"

"And who the hell is this other Charles?"

"Oh, that's just the name I gave to the computer system controlling my home and helicopter. It stands for Charles's Household Automated Remote Listening and Execution System. It can understand and carry out requests in over one hundred different languages."

"And... let me guess: you can speak all hundred of 'em." Anna felt a little overwhelmed.

But Charles shook his head. "I've never taken the time to learn anything other than English, though I'd like to some day. Why do you ask?"

"Why do I..."

Anna was on the verge of exploding. She took a deep, calming breath.

"Do you really have to ask?" Charles looked at her, his face a mask of confusion. Anna shook her head. Sighed. "Tch. Why go to all the effort of making it understand that many languages when you can only speak English?"

Charles brushed off the question with a shrug and a bashful look. Anna couldn't decide whether this man was a genius or an idiot.

"Whatever. Just... continue."

Charles nodded. "Charles, complete the scale model of the city, along the same axes as the house on Wilson." In an instant the table was overtaken by a scale model of the entire city, the disc-mounted mansion they were supposedly inside of suspended above it. "That's where we are," he said, pointing to a flashing red dot that had appeared at the interior of the floating holographic mansion. "About half a mile above the city."

Anna blinked. Repeatedly.

"You're pulling my leg here, right?"

"Not at all. What reason would I have to lie?" He looked honestly perplexed by the concept.

Anna palmed her face, sliding it from brow to chin. "I dunno. You keep talking about your jokes. Just thought you might be trolling me for the hell of it.”

Charles cocked his head. "Trolling you? What's that mean? Furthermore, I fail to see how making any of this up could even be construed as funny. Additionally, the most important rule of any good joke is that you never explain it. I made an exception earlier today in order to clear up our little misunderstanding, but..."

He may not understand how humor works, but in a way, that's almost too perfect.

Anna took another bite of her now-lukewarm lunch. "So you expect me to believe this house is somehow suspended over the city, and yet, somehow, no one has ever so much as caught a glimpse of it in the sky?"

"Is it really so hard to believe?"

"Yes.” Anna took another bite of her shells. “Yes it most certainly is."

Charles pushed back from the table and stood up. "Charles, raise the lights and dismiss the model of the city." It was made so. "Well, I suppose I can maybe understand your confusion. Plus, now I have the opportunity to show you something I think you'll really like."

He began walking towards the other side of the room, stopping after a few feet to face Anna, beaming.

"Well don't just sit there, come on!"

Anna wondered where this degree of enthusiasm could possibly be coming from. She took another bite of her quickly congealing pasta before rising to mirror Charles' stride as he resumed walking alongside the table.

"So where are you taking me?” Anna asked. “You got a petting zoo, complete with unicorns, and pegasuses, and the like?"

Charles looked at Anna as if she'd said the single most ridiculous thing he'd ever heard.

"Anna... you know those sort of things aren't real, right?"

"It comes as a real shock, to be honest."

Anna's sarcasm was rewarded with a grin.

Once they reached the end of the table, Charles made for another set of double doors on the wall to the right of the ones she'd entered through. Though just before opening the doors, Charles stopped and turned to face Anna.

"Wait a minute. Earlier when you asked me if I was... were you..." he stared shyly into Anna's eyes. "Were you trolling me back there?" His cheeks flushed, taking on the deep crimson hues of rampant embarrassment. "Is that what that means?"

"Yeah, yeah, we'll go with that," Anna replied dryly.

The embarrassment vanished as Charles' face lit up. "Excellent!" He pushed open the doors, motioning for her to pass as he said, "After you.”

Anna stepped through into a wide but narrow room. A line of small round tables and comfortable-looking chairs ran its center. Intricately patterned curtains hung the entire length of the far wall.

"Charles, retract the curtains," said Charles.

The faint hum of motors picked up as the curtains split along the center, retracting to either side to reveal a set of paneled windows spanning the full width of the wall. Just outside was a wooden deck covered by an awning. A large, glimmering pool of water stretched out from beneath. Grass greener than any Anna had ever seen ran the water's edge, and the few trees peppering the landscape were fuller and more perfect than any she'd seen before. A small river branched out from the far end of the crystalline pool, flanked by twin trees like something from an enchanted forest. Beyond that, the stream of water simply ended at nothing but the crisp blue sky, marred only by the occasional puff of white and wispy cloud dotting the expanse.

Sure as shit: they were on a floating ass island in the sky.

Next Chapter: Chapter 5