Read The Man Who Ended the World for Free Online

atop a heap of scrap and discarded appliances. There's a microwave, a washing machine, a hair dryer, assorted sheets of metal and rusted wheels. It looks like it might come crashing down on top of Clarissa at any moment. 
    He darts to her side, still crouch-running, and says, Careful, I think it might --
    Clarissa grabs the microwave in both hands and shakes it violently.
    To Henry's amazement, it doesn't budge. 
    I knew it, she says. 
    What did you know? Please be careful.
    It's totally safe, she says. Look.
    He scoots forward and looks where she is pointing. 
    See it? she asks.
    See what? 
    The welding marks. 
    Where? 
    Henry, she says, exasperated. Look. Here. 
    He follows her finger. She touches a lumpy ridge of metal that seems to connect the microwave to the washing machine just below it. 
    You're right, he says. What does it mean?
    It means, she says, that someone wanted this to look like a pile of junk. But it's really just the shape of a pile of junk. 
    But why would you do that? 
    You would do that if you wanted to hide something, Henry. 
    Like... a secret room? 
    Like a secret room, she says.
     
     
     
    •   •   •
    In school the only thing Henry can think about is secret rooms. He gets a library pass from his history teacher, who is happy to write it, since Henry usually just draws offensive reenactments of historical scenes on his desktop during class, and goes off in search of books about hidden spaces. 
    He inadvertently missed his next class. He stumbled across stories about secret passageways in ancient monasteries, and hidden tunnels beneath the White House grounds, and speakeasy storage rooms hidden behind movable walls, and asylums with secret basements and "treatment" chambers. 
    After school he waits for Clarissa to appear at his window. She starts to climb inside, but he shoulders a bag and says, Let's go. 
    They wait at the fence for nearly an hour before Henry works up the courage to go inside again. 
    What did you try last time? Clarissa asks. 
    Nothing that worked, he says. I tried prying the trunk open with a pipe, but it didn't work. I tried going through the back seat. I tried using the trunk latch under the dashboard. Nothing happened.
    What did you bring? 
    He opens the bag and shows her. 

 
     
     
     
     
     
    The Man and His Dream
     
    During one of their early planning meetings, Steven ate lunch with Tomas on the roof of the Nucleus headquarters in Mountain View. He had already hired Tomas to build the space station, but they were still figuring out how many floors it required. 
    Tomas didn't yet know how big the project was going to be. 
    That afternoon, in the warm sun, they ate savory crepes and sipped imported beer, and Steven asked, Do you read much science fiction? 
    Tomas shook his head. I wish I had the time, he said. 
    There's a book, Steven said, about a probe discovered in space. It's passing close enough to Earth that we send men to examine it. The whole thing appears solid from the outside, but on the inside, it's a microcosm.
    A microcosm, Tomas had said, dubiously.
    Right. The men open it up and the whole probe is hollow, and there's a whole environment inside of it. There are mountains and oceans and weather systems and everything. 
    That sounds pretty cool, Tomas said. What happened to the men? 
    It doesn't matter, Steven had said. I want you to build that for me. 
    A space probe? 
    I want you to build exactly that environment, Steven repeated. But I want you to build it half a mile beneath the Earth. 
    I don't know if I can do that. I don't even know if that's possible.  An ocean? Weather? 
    I want the closest thing possible. It can't be that hard. 
    •   •   •
    Steven reflects on that conversation as he watches the sunset behind the trees. The branches wave gently in the wind, rocking to sleep the birds that have nested there. There's a slight chill in the air, the kind you feel just before an evening rain. 
    And indeed it