Kuno tells Vashti the story of how he escaped to the earth’s surface through a ventilation shaft and stayed there for a short time, fascinated by the natural world around him, before being drawn back underground by the Machine’s Mending Apparatus. When she arrives in her son’s room, angry at him for making her undergo such a worthless trip, he tells her that he has been threatened with “ Homelessness”-a form of execution in which the victim is placed on the earth’s surface without protective equipment, killing them. Onboard the air-ship, Vashti is distressed by the need to talk to and touch other people, and she is entirely uninterested in the natural scenery below.
She reluctantly decides to travel on an air-ship to the other side of the world where her son lives. Later, Kuno tells Vashti that he will not talk to her anymore until she comes to visit him. Kuno criticizes Vashti for worshipping the Machine as if it were a divine being. Kuno wants to visit the earth’s surface (which is now apparently incapable of supporting life), a desire that Vashti, who is perfectly content living underground with the aid of the Machine, doesn’t understand. She doesn’t see the point of visiting him, since they can communicate just as easily through the Machine.
In a future human society, everyone lives in separate, underground rooms, where all their needs and wants are provided by “ the Machine.” One day, a woman, Vashti, receives a call from her son Kuno asking her to visit him in person.
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