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In fact, the Builder didn’t return to its Miss Universeany hu entered the house as a swarm It churned between the two-by-four bars in three strea room
Michael herded the children into a corner He offered himself as a hu, Carson returned to her husband’s side They both held Urban Snipers, which could stop cold a charging bull--but couldn’t halt a Builder
The swar, exploring the li about what to devour next
Intuition see rooht be attracted to ht be the first to die
Chapter 64
Deucalion and the Boze snow A straightaept down from the crown of a hill behind the into falling white flakes, all the whiteness flowing into a darkness that at this reat dark for walls of sohs not yet fully flocked, the faint scent of them alh the blanketed pave that no one lived along these twenty-four ht lay as quiet as if, back in the day, the Cold War had turned hot, ato a world where the only significant noises were of occasional seis water, and wind
"Where?" Deucalion asked the replicant whose arripped
"Directly north, into the forest at least two hundred yards Three hundred ht be better"
"Take the step with me," Deucalion said, and transported them into the forest
Gloriously wild and vast, yet intiht be a cathedral by day, though it was a series of chapels by night This must seem to be a blind-black wilderness to the replicant, but to Deucalion it was an array of cha one into the other in every direction, the air scented and flavored by the natural incense of pines and alpine firs Because during the day little sunlight reached the forest floor, no brush obstructed, and until the weight of the lihs to bend sufficiently, only flurries of flakes found their way through the evergreen canopy to plant sain, and the replicant said, "Down"
Deucalion stared at the earth underfoot until he sensed solid strata, dense and deep … but then hollow spaces farther below, a kingdoe chambers
"Turn with me," he told the replicant, and in the turn they stepped out of the chapel forest and into a long corridor hite walls and a gray floor
The silence here was more profound than that in the woods above, as if the queen had long abandoned this hive, her workers and her drones swar in her wake
Within a few breaths, however, Deucalion knew he had arrived in Victor’s lair: Victor Leben now, clone of Victor Helios--in spite of all aliases and all eras, Frankenstein forever The telltale scent that ca at all of sweat and blood He smelled instead the damp stone walls of the old windreat man’s first laboratory in faraway Europe, the ozone created by leaping electric arcs between the poles of arcane and primitive ered even after the moment of successful reanimation His maker roamed this vault of secrets, near and nearer
"Kill ave hiently to the floor
The screa feet overhead were of no concern
Addison Haorked with Erika in the living roo sofas and armchairs and footstools, which would serve as beds, to open more floor space forblankets, towels, heavy winter coats, and other iteot to know each other Addison could remember no other woman hom he ever talked so easily, in whose company he had felt so comfortable He was not a ladies’ man He was to Don Juan what tinfoil was to silver leaf Yet this beautiful woman so enchanted him that he chattered away, less self-conscious than he had ever been with one of the fairer sex
A multitude of footsteps thundered down the back steps, toward the kitchen, acco
Erika’s beauty was of course the first thing that dazzled him, but soon her looks mattered hardly at all when compared to her many other qualities She was calm and competent, seemed to know just what to do at every moment, as these bizarre events unfolded She had an air of worldliness, as though she had traveled everywhere and seen everything, but at the sa coentle but notof tiny bells arose in the downstairs hallway
Addison found Erika to be deeply layered to such an extent that she wasyet rematic, he didn’t know She inspired in hi about this woman was recondite, remote from ordinary perception, almost mystical
Beyond the archway, Jocko appeared in the downstairs hall, in one of his fourteen belled hats, leading a conga line of children, so the other thirteen hats "Step to the left, step to the right, forward hop, hop Step to the left, step to the right, forward hop, hop Pirouette!"
Erika paused in her work to watch the procession Her gentle smile was a curve of kindness, sweetly maternal Addison wanted to kiss that smile, not just Erika but that smile, to taste and to receive the serenity of it
Jocko reached the front stairs and started to climb "Three steps up, one step back, slap your butt cheeks--whack, whack, whack! Advance three steps, now retreat one, snorting like a pig is fun, fun, fun!"