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Tania glanced up froet any crazier

"Good thing we’re so far away," Natalie said

"Cheers to that," Tania replied They toasted with apple juice in hard plastic cups

Natalie grinned at her friend "Feeling any better?"

"The healing power of having work to do," Tania said "Just need to keep busy"

"Speaking of," Natalie said, checking her watch, "we should have our pictures in soon"

"Not long now," Tania said She’d set her tiht?"

"None," Tania said with a half s and Marcus will be annoyed I bumped the their task was easy enough"

Natalie looked around them and dropped her voice even lower "What do you think we’ll find?"

Tania shrugged off the question "You know I don’t like to speculate"

"Oh c’mon, hon, humor me"

Tania set her fork down and folded her ar look at her friend "I suppose youabout it"

"You first, then"

Natalie wiped her iant passenger ship, full of their people"

"What?"

"Like the Mayflower or soy never failed to lift her spirits

"I mean it," Natalie said "Think about it First they sent the Elevator, gave us a way to get up here Then they sent SUBS, forcing us to get up here Survival of the fittest, right?"

"Go on," Tania said

"They give us a chance to vacate, plus one city to survive in as a token offer Maybe they can’t breath in an ative us ed "Maybe they can’tflaw in this idea," Tania said

"Do tell"

"Why give us a chance to leave? Why kill ninety-nine percent of us but stop there?"

Natalie’s grin faded Her eyes raced back and forth "Okay, enough of my idea, what’s yours?"

"I don’t like to speculate"

"C’mon!"

"I’ll tell you what Neil thinks," Tania said "He thinks they’re corew so

A few minutes later, their watches beeped in unison

"There’s our pictures," Tania said

Natalie hesitated

"What’s wrong?" Tania asked

"It’s just … I’m not sure if I want to know anymore"

Tania took her hand "Nonsense We’re scientists True discovery is a once-in-a-lifetihttime forest feel with the arrival of dawn on the planet’s surface below The overhead lights now siht Tania preferred the way it looked at night Noas just a white hallith green carpet

Natalie swiped her badge to open the door, and Tania breathed a sigh of relief at the sight of an eiant multiscreen setup in the back room the far end of the lab Natalie went for the center console seat

"I’ll drive," Tania said, guiding her aside "The data is keyed to my account"

Her assistant took the direction in stride and moved behind the chair to let Tania sit

"Let’s see e’ve got," Tania said She entered her passphrase and waited Natalie placed a nervous hand on her shoulder

The aging computer took several seconds to respond, and then another ht’s sky survey On the screen before them, a panoramic map of the cosmos appeared

"I used the Japan and Hawaii data," Tania said, "to calculate the likely vector the first Builder ship would have taken Adjusted of course for changes in Earth’s, and our solar systehted a section of the star chart, and hundreds of sradually filled in with a se "The yellow squares are the pictures we took last night The rest are old"

"There’s a lot of yellow," Natalie said

"It gets worse," Tania said "For each yellow square I took a sequence of six ies," Natalie said "What if rote a progra could knock that out in his sleep"

Tania shook her head "We’ve got one already, rather sophisticated But it sucks up all the compute resources, which would really set off some alarms"

"Damn"

"I know Let’s save that for a last resort"

Tania selected the first yellow box and an ocean of stars filled the three screens Other than subtle variation in color, they all looked the sae and opened another

Natalie frowned in concentration "Can I drive for a second?"

Rolling her chair aside, Tania watched as Natalie stepped forward and leaned over the keyboard She worked quickly, her fingers a blur With each tap the view shifted into a new configuration

A minute later Natalie stepped back "Try it now"

Tania rolled her chair back to the hted, a cluster of five adjacent boxes lit up as well They all expanded at once, evenly spread across the giant displays

"Tap there," Natalie said, pointing

Tania did, and the next iain to see the third "Brilliant," she said

"Not as much detail, but we can look for movement more easily"