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And then came the aura towers The scientists were in nirvana, for a ti started Scratching out an existence was hard enough Add to that the grueling work of loading clian to fail With astonishing speed, questions were raised about societal structure Who put Tania in charge? When e have an election, a constitution? Who gets to live in orbit? Who is this dirty scavenger fro us so their survival

Rock bottom was reached, in Skyler’s opinion, when the first shuttle load of colonists arrived from Darwin Tania and the others had really botched this part Skyler found hi his head even noeeks on

Blackfield sent over an even hing swagotten corner of the Maze The ones who showed any intelligence at all were so obviously spies that Skyler found hiht in front of theards"

Sa them, nor Kelly, despite his request to Tania that they be asked for by na to track them down, and Skyler could practically see the s through the hly in line with the road, fine-tuning its pace until he could walk beside it without exhausting hi tower still raised the hairs on his forear The constantly shifting forround beneath it, mesmerized him Informal tests done at base camp implied the towers could deforh, and clirees At least, that was the maximum slope they had available to try

Remarkably, the towers required huloved hand, to be set in motion The implication rattled many in the camp, that the Builders had somehow "keyed" the objects to hueted at us, and not just a randoht they were ju to conclusions, and besides, what difference did it make?

He heard the scream just before impact

The creature plowed into hi into thebackward, his hands pinned down, gun slung over his shoulder The subhu arms around him They tue

Mud filled Skyler’swildly, he yanked his ar them even as he rolled The tu at hi the aniain, and then once more, before it finally fell away and scrambled for a better position

Skyler rolled in the opposite direction, using one hand to push himself to a crouch and the other to wipe the h to see the sub--a woun, Skyler dipped his shoulder low and let the creature topple over his back He jerked upright at the sa the creature in a full flip straight into a thorny, gnarled bush

It shrieked and flailed, which only served to entangle it further

Skyler spat rit between his teeth He brought his gun to bear and unleashed two rounds into the creature’s torso

A tech fro i teaasps Everyone present and accounted for, finally

When the creature drew its last breath, Skyler slung his weapon again and washed the mud from his face ater from the canteen The earthen taste in his mouth took some time to cleanse, ah

Wits gathered, he jogged back to the still- it a small course correction as the road turned

Chapter 7

Belém, Brazil

28APR2283

SKYLER KEPT A slow pace on the way back to base camp Mock conversations played out in his mind about how to explain what he’d seen The colonists were scientists for the most part, and would ask him endless questions

The truth was he had no idea what he’d seen A subhu--transforht have it reversed What if the ship was creating the

He shook his head Speculation accomplished little, and he could leave that to ca the colonists As soon as Tania and the others voted to do so, he’d take a teaure out what new toy the Builders had sent

At the city outskirts he guided the alien tower over a short bridge that spanned a lect, runoff still raced toward the Rio Pará He nudged the tower around a derelict Toyota The tall hed no more than Skyler hi the point of the devices Their usefulness was obvious: movable pockets of precious aura to fend off SUBS His iift

But why? Usefulness aside, ere the bloody Builders up to? He shook his head again More speculation A pointless topic to ponder Everyone at base ca in between

Soested that perhaps the Builders had intended to colonize Earth, had sent their construction vessels, but had the, soh at that "What a terrifying thought," he’d said, "that they’re just as fucked-up as we are"

Across the bridge he found himself in Belém’s vast outer slum Kilometer after kilorouping of shops and taverns All abandoned, all in sorowth of the rainforest Skeletal corpses littered the ground with such number that they became as mundane as trees

Skyler pulled the tourist’swith a perain and make abbreviated notes A pharot a little happy face A circle around the one inside and found it to contain useful things An Xhile res already, all within a few kilometers of the Elevator He’d barely explored the city at all yet

For an instant his eyes lingered on the mark he’dwos, clouded his mind’s eye He pictured her naked backside as she ran fro stirred within him and he mentally slapped himself back to reality

He drew a little monster wherever he encountered a subhuman In the month since touchdown, only a handful had been encountered, until yesterday The bizarre scene at that crash site explained their absence across the rest of the region He drew a bold circle around the rough location of the crashed shell ship

A chill coursed through his body and Skyler paused He let the tower drift on and ducked into the shadow of a single-rooacross a wall, or birds darting froht, and sensed so perhaps The o on, he readied his weapon just in case and jogged to catch up to the aura tower