“You sure?” I went on peeling the label off my water can. It had taken me six months to develop my technique to separate the trash of the drink. I wish I could say the same about dealing with tourists. “Half the people want to get off planet the moment they see it, the rest don’t even want to leave.”

It was a lie, of course. Everyone wanted to leave, some just don't realize it right away. Since I inherited the trailer of a travel agency I'd seen all sorts: young, old, fat, slim, crazy, calm… Looking at things there I could put them into two categories: people who had trouble with the law and tourists. Often it was difficult to tell which was which.

“I'll pay your feel, plus expenses,” she said. Throwing a bundle of notes on the table. All bronze, not the credit currency the three systems used. “And I'll double it if you take me there right now.”

“Nuh-uh.” I pulled off the label with a final swift tug. In a way cans and tourists were the same: both were necessary for me to survive and I had a tendency of removing the paper from them in order to be happy. “It will be dark if we go there and you don't want to be there when it's dark.”

“Oh.”

Please don't offer me double, I wanted to say. I would have if she were anyone else. For some reason I had a feeling that would only encourage her. Taking a sip from my water I casually glanced at my potential client: five foot five, long curly hair, thin as a pin from a discount factory, holstered with a gun the size of a miniature rocket. I almost felt pity for her coming here, almost. The last time I felt pity towards someone I had nearly ended up three fingers less.

“Look, It’ll be easier if—“

“Two silver!” She there another paper clip on the table. “Two silver and a handful of bronze. Would that do?”

I nearly choked. That was a lot of money. Not as much as the gold clips movie characters flaunted around, but enough to make me last for half an year, entertainment included. I could tell it was her final offer, I could also tell I would be a fool to say yes.

“Okay.” I grabbed the money. It felt comfortably heavy. That was the good thing about metal infused notes, they gave a sense of reality. You could do anything with them, especially on the fringe. “Just let me gear up.”

The moment I put the money in the safe I knew it was a mistake. Only the desperate would want to go there at night. Then again, if it wasn’t for the desperate I'd have to go back to my old trade.

“Is there anything you need to do before we go?” I took out a zapper from the drawer, along with a couple of additional batteries.

“Yes,” she said almost in whisper. I looked at her arching a brow. “Where's the bathroom?”

I'd heard pretty much everything since I took over this place. Jokes, threats, explanations that would bore a petrified cat. This was the first thing that made me chuckle. I pointed to the corridor behind her. The girl thanked me and rush down it, almost as if I'd leave without her. Unexpected behavior to say the least.

“Sunny Jim,” I said into my communicator. “I'm taking a client, so you better get here and keep an eye on things.” I knew he wouldn't be awake until next morning, but as long as he was here in case another client passed by, it was all good. People rarely came to a small outpost such as this, even with the lure of the Valley, I rarely got more than two clients per week.

It took her five minutes to finish whatever she was doing. I grabbed my coat and glasses and lead the way to the garage. She followed silently. Not a talker. That was good.three quarters of the people I drove would tell me their life story, as if i gave a shit. I didn't know them nor did I want to. Besides the stories were all the same.

“You have any electronics or anything metal?” I glanced at her over my shoulder.

“Just this.” She tapped on her revolver. “Would it be a problem?”

“Not as long s you don't overuse it.” I went to check my truck’s charge.

I always kept the battery fully loaded, just in case case, but better safe than sorry. Once some rodent had drained half of it by chewing a cable to death. Bad for the rodent, almost bad for me when I ended up stranded halfway the distance to the Valley. Sunny had come to rescue me back then, and he couldn't stop talking about it ever since.

“What do I call you?” The battery indicated was a maximum. Enough to go there and back and slightly more.

“Sam,” she replied standing beside the truck door. “Sam Kelvin.”

“Sam.” Was that a Mrs or a Miss? I didn't see a wedding band on her finger, but then not everyone wore those. “You know what you're getting into?” She nodded twice. “Well, hop on, then.”

It was late afternoon when we started the trip. It would be hours before the white sun sank beneath the horizon. That would leave Sam lots of time to admire the planet’s vast and vibrant landscape: thousands of variations of rocks. When the Southern Block had terraformed the planet they probably expected a hundred percent return of their investment. Instead they had gotten a worthless hunk of rock and source of copper. Great from a local perspective, as far as interstellar investment was converted, however, it was the worst decision in modern history.

I glanced at Sam as we left the small settlement patch. She seemed unusually calm. Possibly I would be too if I carried so much firepower. Her gun didn't seem to be for show, and the way she was holding it I could tell she was used to the weight. It was all but normal. Nice people didn't pay people like me silver more just like that.

“There's no name,” she said all of a sudden.

“Huh?” I almost hit the brake.

“This settlement. It doesn't have a name,” she repeated. “Why?”

“It used to be called Marcus Aurelius.” I put on my glasses. “Never took on. People tried to rename it to Valley Point, but not hard enough. Guess it was just easier to refer to it as something near the Valley. The colony, the outpost, the settlement… take your pick. The official name is still used in documents. Not many would buy property here, though. The suitable cities are on the other side of the planet.”

Sam fell silent again. For five minutes I drove on, pretending not to mind. Soon I found I had questions. Maybe it was human nature. If people would talk I'd do everything possible to shut the, up. If my client was silent, however, I'd get curious.

“So, what's your deal?” I gave in.

“Excuse me?”

“Everyone who wants to see the valley has a story. What's yours?”

“For two silver and a handful of bronze, I'd expect to keep mine to myself.” There was no malice in her words, just plain facts. Facts never cut it for me, though.

“Adrenaline junkie? Thrill seeker? Journalist?” Upon saying the last she chuckled. “You know that cameras can't capture the Valley, right? A lot of people tried once. Before I took over the business whole crews would come from offworld, hoping to hit it big. Most quit, a few stayed. The movies could be found in some boring library archive or other. They were so boring the networks wouldn't even touch them with a lead glove. I think I have a copy on one of the devices at the office.”

Silence again. A searcher, she had to be a searcher. Every now and again someone would come here, hoping that the Valley would give them a glimpse of secrets untold. To be honest I had no idea if it was true or not. One person managed to change his life around and become the seventh richest person on the planet. He'd still send me a card with eleven bronze notes every year—the amount he had initially hired me. Had I know he'd make it big I'd have asked for more.

The truck jumped slightly as drove over a large patch of rocks. Even with the “booming” tourist trade there still wasn't enough money to build a road. There wasn't need either. This place wasn't like Earth or the old planets. Here things only came naturally. Pour all the money in the world and the efforts would still disappear in a matter of days. We had no GPS or concrete roads, or even an adequate weather service. And yet off worlders kept pouring in.

“Have you seen it?” Sam asked after a while. “The Valley, have you actually seen it?”

“A bit,” I lied. “I usually let the clients go and wait by the truck. Only time I go on is when one of them doesn't show up. How far are you thinking of going?”

“All the way.” she smiled—the smile of someone who didn't have a care in the universe. It wasn't the first time I'd heard someone say that. There were many desperate and the determined people, yet Sam seemed different. She still seemed like a tourist from head to toe, but she no longer reeked of desperation. “Will you be my guide?”

“Guide?” I laughed. “For two silver? Not a chance.”

“It was a bit more than two silver,” she corrected. “And I'll give you more once it's over.”

Now it was my turn to remain silent. Clients would rarely ask me to serve as a guide. When they did I'd often refuse. Only this time, I decided otherwise.

“Tell me your story,” I said. “Then I'll think about it.”

“Is that a ‘yes’ think about it?” Sam leaned back.

“Maybe.” I replied, even if we both knew I'd already agreed.

“I want to see what's it's like at the end. Everyone has how the Valley changes your life, yet so few have ever done it. It's not about the money either. My sister had lots of money, but never been bought a flight to here.”

The “had” didn't sound too positive, yet I didn't interrupt her. There would be time to ask that story later. For now I was busy following this one.

“I kept dreaming about it for years, then one day something clicked.” Sam snapped her fingers. “And that's it.”

“That's never it.” I looked ahead. The white sun was touching the horizon. In less than an hour I'd have to turn the headlights on, possible zap a few critters that came too close. “There's always something more. Someone died, someone cheated you, there's something you want to get…” I paused for a moment. “Or someone. People don't just come here.”

“Maybe, but that's all I'll say for now.”

Teasing like some goddamned “free to use” service. The was no reason for me to get worked up about it, but I did. I knew id never get to hear the rest of the story. The Valley would change her, it changed everyone. People didn't realize that traveling here was part of the valley’s allure. The rumors about what it offered extended its reach beyond the planet, beyond the star system, even into every household with a computer screen. Sam had started her journey into the Valley the moment she had bought her ticket to get here. From hereon it was mostly downhill.

“Get some sleep,” I suggested. “There's nothing to see after dark. I'll wake you when we get there.”

She never said yes, but was asleep in ten minutes anyway. Meanwhile, I switched on the lights. Driving at night wasn't a peaceful experience. The local fauna want huge or carnivorous, but annoyingly attracted to all things plastic or rubber. Scientists were still arguing why. Some said it was the dinosaur remains remains in the oil that was used to make the plastic—an interesting theory that was a hundred percent wrong but made for great speculation. Just like the Valley. No one knew a thing about it. There was lots of speculation about it, several businesses, my own included, was built on speculation, facts, though not so much.

I reached for my pack of chewing gum. It was the best way to fight boredom. Beside me, Sam had fallen asleep, hand on her gun. There was no telling what the Valley would bring her. Statistically, all but five percent changed after seeing the Valley, only one in four found what they were looking four, and of them a mere tenth accepted it. What statistics didn't tell was that the five percent died as a result. There was no changing if you were dead, but that made for a bad slogan. “Visit Uncanny Valley, we almost guarantee you won't kill yourself as a result.” That's why I didn't like firearms—they made things too easy.

“Shit!” I hissed under my breath. I had forgotten to take my music player. During the day that was no problem. At night, it means five hours of boredom surrounded by darkness. After thirty minutes I stopped looking about for critters. After another thirty I hoped some would show up. If it were day I could probably see the mountain peaks get closer.

Thunder echoed in the distance. Probably another storm the weather report had missed. I didn't particularly like storms, but they did their part. No chance of rain, of course, not so close to the Valley.

Morning couldn't come any slower. By the time the first rays of the sun hit the car, I thought I'd spent a decade driving. I looked at Sam. She was sleeping comfortably in the passenger seat. No point in telling her that I'd spent the night driving at quarter speed. I shook my pack of chewing gum—one stick left. I guess that made things easier.

“Hey.” I shook her. “Sam, we’re here.” She yawned then turned to the side, attempting to wrap herself around her gun. “Sam!” I said, louder.

This time she opened her eyes. I could tell the nap wasn't comfortable. She definitely wasn't used to it.

“Take this,” I offered her the last of my chewing gum. “Not exactly breakfast, but the next best thing.”

“Not hungry,” she yawned again, stretching an arm.

“Right.” I put it in my pocket. “Want some water?”

“Is that it?” She looked in the direction of the Valley. From here it seemed nothing more than a crack in the mountain face.

“You expected something more?” I checked my zapper. “Just messing. It gets different further in. They don't call it Uncanny Valley for nothing. Come on, let's go.”

I got out of the truck. Sam did the same a few moments later. In retrospect maybe I should have opened the door for her. Then again, there wouldn't be any point. She'd already paired me with everything she had, and I certainly wasn't going to see her ever again after today. Not her in any event.

We started walking. The rocks felt sharp despite my reinforced soles. The settlement shrink had explained the phenomenon with long complex words. All I remembered was near the Valley the mind starts to work funny. I'd seen veterans start bleeding as they walked because they had twenty year wounds reopen.

“How far have you gone?” she asked, catching up to me.

“A third mostly,” I explained. “The half once.”

“So you never reached the point of no return.” She nodded with the smug expression of someone who thought they knew it all. I didn’t have the heart to tell her there was no “point of no return.” It was just another made up concept, coined by the media. “Have you wondered what it's like?”

“Once.” I shook my boot. It felt like I had a pebble inside. Or maybe I was just imagining things. “Come on.”

I went through the crack first. At this stage it was barely enough for one person to pass. Sam followed close behind. I could feel her tension. Any more and she'd draw her gun right now and start shouting on sight. Most tourists were anxious at this point of the journey. I picked up the pace. The mountain walls around us made the path seem like a passageway. With each step we took I could hear Sam get more and more anxious. I turned around to try tell her to calm down. Before I could speak she smiled and brushed me away, saying everything's fine. I knew better, bust nodded and went on.

Every now and again there'd be scribbles on the walls. Written by people who'd found what they'd been looking for. A name here, a set of initials there, each had put everything on the line achieve their dreams. No mention of all the ones who didn't. When is tarted the business I considered building a small marker on which to put the names of all the people who came to visit. Seven years in and all I had was a incomplete list somewhere in the office. If next year was as slow as this maybe I'd give it some more thought.

“Get ready,” I said. “We’ll be in the clearing soon.”

“The clearing?” Sam asked.

“It's what I call it. You’ll see.”

“You're not a very good guide, are you?” she laughed. There was no pretense or mockery, just pure unadulterated laughter. For a moment I considered stopping here and taking her back to the settlement. The chances of her finding what she wanted were low. The moment we went through the passage there’d be no turning back. “Maybe you need some more practice?”

“Sure I do.” The moment was gone. “Mind your step, it's a bit slippery here.”

Once we entered the clearing Sam’s face lit up like a supernova. Nothing I could say or do could change her mind now, not until she reached the mid point. What I saw as a field of stone spikes her mind interpreted as a marble forest. The Valley had that effect on people, and unlike what the brainiacs thought, it was consistent. The passage was always a passage, the clearing was always a forest.

“This is the Valley?” Sam asked, rushing past me to the nearest “tree.”

“Part of it.” I tried not to sigh. Always the same question time and time again. One day I was going to start answering before the clients asked me. Not today though, Sam deserved that much. “It gets different later on.”

“They are so beautiful.” She slid her fingers down the solid surface. “What made them?”

“Heck if I know. Some say this whole place was a huge cave before something blew the top off, and these are just the stalagmites that remain.”

“But you're not convinced.”

“Does it matter what I think? They are here, that's what’s important.” The silence let me know that she wouldn't let me off the hook so easily. “I've never stalagmites changes so much the further in you go. That and half a dozen other reasons. It's possible in theory, but is way too much of a coincidence.”

“You know, I envied you.” Sam kept smiling.

“Huh?” This wasn't something I'd heard before. Usually clients keep telling me what a loser and coward I am to not have gone through the Valley myself. Most are careful to phrase it in a way that doesn't seem offensive, but when you look at the meaning that's what they are telling me. “How?”

“I get to see this once and that's it. You- “ she pointed at me “-bring someone new here every week. You get to see part of the Valley every week as if it was the first time.” She turned back towards the piece of rock and tapped it with her hand. “And you get to keep two two silver and change for it.”

I snorted. There was no other reaction befitting such a statement. A few seconds onward we moved on. Who could Sam be so optimistic? The Valley broke those the fastest. The further we went, the more Sam’s fascination grew. Every few minutes she'd ask me to stop so she could admire a new “tree” far prettier than the last. With each step my sank lower.

“You sure you want to go on?” I asked as we approached the end of the clearing. “You don't have to cross the Valley today. Don't worry about the money, I—“ I stopped. She was looking at me as if I were a vulture come to feast on her favorite pony. “I mean…” I avoided her gaze. “Don't go. There's no problem the Valley will fix that you can't fix on your own.”

She shook her head. It was hopeless already. The only thing we could do is move on. Maybe it was fate that we reached the end of the clearing when the sun was at its highest. The mini album one third. This was the perfect place to stop. If the journey ended here the clients would have seen all the best there was. Everything would have been so much simpler. Yet they never did. The human drive to see something just a bit better kept always found a way to push them forward. I had tried asking then, I had tried warnings, threats, persuasion. They'd always ignore me. One had tried to kill me thinking I'd cheat her out of something magnificent, only to try to kill me again once she had seen what followed. We still spoke once every few months.

“Is that a house?” Sam rushed out of the clearing. The creepy had begun. “You never told me people lived here.”

“No one lived here…” I lied. It didn't matter though, I was just wasting my breath. “The Valley plays tricks on your mind. You're seeing what you want to see.”

“Why would I want to see houses?” Sam asked without even looking at me. “I never wanted to have a house. If anything I wanted to live in space.”

“It's a metaphor.” I said under my breath. Thankfully she never heard me. “I call this place the Mock Hills. They mock your senses.” No. That wasn't it at all. This was the place at which the Valley started to mock you. Unlike before each step would show the ugliness of everything and before people knew it they would be surrounded on all sides.

“Okay. Shall we go on?”

I hesitated. I rarely came this far. I rarely entered at all. It Sam wasn't who she was I would have remained outside until it got dark and only then gone in to search for her. Optimism was the worst thing to have in a place like this, bat for the client and bad for myself.

“Come on. How bad could it be?” Sam urged.

“Very,” I responded, but moved forward. It was mistake, a huge mistake. I could see it clearly, yet there was some small part of me that still hoped she'd turn back.

We went on. Sam was leading now, with me staying well behind watching for signs of changing. And surely enough soon they began to appear. Talking was the first to go. Her questions, her casual painter were slowly replaced by silence.

“You doing okay?” I asked, but the only thing I got were grunts.

Sam’s hand slowly moved to her gun, seeking safety where there was none. She didn't move to inspect the “trees” or “houses” anymore, instead did her best to avoid them walking in such a way so as to be ten feet from each. A good tactic, yet pointless. Just as there was one clearing before the Mock Hills, there was another beyond, only it wasn't filled with trees. From the perspective of the objective mind the clearing was filled with rocky spires. Hey that wasn't what people saw.

“Did you kill them?” The question hit me like a bullet. I knew I couldn't avoid it, yet it hurt nonetheless. “Did you kill all of them?”

“They never were people,” I whispered. “They aren't people. Just pieces of rock that…” there was no point in explaining anything anymore. She suspected the truth. Either that or her brain had broke down completely. It was difficult to tell, but the result was the same. I took a step back. “Still not too late. It eggs worse further on.”

“Worse,” she forced a laugh even if her hands were trembling. “That's the catch, isn't it.”

It was. The real Uncanny Valley. The name wasn't chosen because of the geographical location, it was chosen because of the things it did to people. When the first settlers discovered it they had no idea what they had stumbled on. They marched through the wonderful forest of stone, past the cruet but homely houses, into a field of corpses—corpses made of stone their mind kept screaming that were real.

“How much more?” Sam asked, her voice cold and distant.

“I don't know, I haven't gone further—“

“How much?” she interrupted. She was gripping the gun with both hands now, holding it straight at my head. A little squeeze and brains would become part of the scenery and as my corpse decorated the Valley. Quite ironic, a living corpse among the fake. It had been attempted before. Twice my clients almost succeeded.

“This is the half point,” I said. “This is your point of no return.”

I saw her freeze. My muscles tensed up. I could see her squeezing the trigger, emptying her magazine in me until there was nothing left. She was a small thing, probably not sued to more than two shots. With that monster, though, even one was enough. My coat had a to illegal bashing, but with that much force I'd have a few cracked ribs at best. I meaner to the side ready to pounce. To my surprise Sam didn't shoot. She looked at me, the very same way she had back at the settlement, then she lowered her weapon.

“You can't see them, can you?” She tried to smile, but her stretched lips looked as eery and grotesque as our surroundings. “To you they are just rocks, piled one atop the other…without features, without meaning. Just rocks.”

“Yes.” It was over she had seen through me, she had seen through everything. “You don't have to continue. We can still go back.”

“Has… has anyone gone back before? You said you've reached this point. Did any of your other clients choose to go back?” She put the gun in its holster. I just stood there silent. “I thought so. No, I think I'll go on.”

I knew she would. They all did. The temptation was too great. She raised her hand half way, maybe to wave, maybe not, looked at me one last time, then turned around and started walking.

“It gets better after a while,” I shouted behind her. “As long as you reach the lowest point you can only go up after.”

No response. I watched her disappear in the sea of human-like corpses, only imagining the chaos that went on in her mind. To me they looked like chunks of stone—granite, marble, any other mineral that the pen pushers told me they were. I could not see the beauty or the horror of the things that surrounded me. Not like her, not like all the people who'd reached this far.

A slight gust of wind play through the Valley. The storm I had heard last night was approaching. With luck it would die down a bit by the time I got back in the car. If now I'd have to drive through it. Not the best use of my time or my money. Event storm means repairs and that cut into my profit. However, I could not go yet. There was one thing I had to see through even if it meant spending half of today’s earnings.

Two Silver she had said… two silver and a handful of bronze. It almost sounded philosophical. At some point in the future, someone in a crowded hall would explain the deep meaning of that sentence and how it came into being. Every single work would be a lie, yet people would clap and cheer, then go to buy each other a drink and continue their grey little lives. Now one would say that was the cost of a human life's. “Two silver and a handful of bronze—the equivalent of a single life” wasn't much of a slogan.

“Hello?” A female voice asked. “Are you the guide?”

I looked up. Twenty steps away Sam stood in front of me, but she wasn't Sam. She had the same clothes, the same curly hair, the same heavy revolver on her hip, yet she was someone completely different. Sam had gone through the Uncanny Valley hoping to find another world. This girl had come back from it.

“Yes,” I sighed. “I am the guide. Let's get going. It's getting late and I don't want to travel after dark.”

“Sure.” She smiled very much like Sam, but different. Just as I was. “How much will it cost me?”

“Let’s get there first.” I turned around and lead the way. “There’ll be time for that later.” If anything there always was time later.