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"Yeah I’ve done it"

Tally grimaced and looked out the"Okay, I shouldn’t have asked"

He ca his hands on her shoulders "It’s a what people will do to survive," he said

She sighed "I know"

Theoverlooked a side street, partly protected froroundcars stood half-buried, their blackened fraainst the white sand

She rubbed the handcuff bracelets still encircling her wrists "The Rusties sure wanted to survive Every ruin I’ve seen, those cars are always all over, trying to get out But they never seem to make it"

"A few of them did But not in cars"

Tally leaned back into his reassuring war off the chill of the desert

"It’s funny At school, they never talk much about how it happened - the last panic, when the Rusty world fell apart They shrug and say that all theirup, until it all collapsed like a house of cards"

"That’s only partly true The Boss had some old books about it"

"What did they say?"

"Well, the Rusties did live in a house of cards, but so shove No one ever found out who Maybe it was a Rusty weapon that got out of control Maybe it was people in some poor country who didn’t like the way the Rusties ran things Maybe it was just an accident, like the flowers, or sos up"

"But what happened?"

"A bug got loose, but it didn’t infect people It infected petroleuot infected?"

He nodded "Oil is organic, made from old plants and dinosaurs and stuff Soh the air, and when they landed in petroleu It changed the chemical composition of the oil Have you ever seen phosphorus?"

"It’s an eleht?"

"Yeah And it catches fire on contact with air"

Tally nodded She reles and talking about all the tricks you could do with it But no one ever thought of a trick that wouldn’t kill someone

"Oil infected by this bacterium was just as unstable as phosphorus It exploded on contact with oxygen

And as it burned, the spores were released in the sot to the next car, or airplane, or oil well, and started growing again"

"Wow And they used oil for everything, right?"

David nodded "Like those cars down there They et out of town"

"Why didn’t they justwalk ?"

"Stupid, I guess"

Tally shivered again, but not from the cold It was hard to think of the Rusties as actual people, rather than as just an idiotic, dangerous, and sos down there, whatever was left of the in their blackened cars, as if still trying to escape their fate

"I wonder why they don’t tell us that in history class They usually love any story that makes the Rusties sound pathetic"

David lowered his voice "Maybe they didn’t want you to realize that every civilization has its weakness

There’s always one thing we depend on And if someone takes it away, all that’s left is some story in a history class"

"Not us," she said "Renewable energy, sustainable resources, a fixed population"

The two purifierspinged, and David left her to get theing the food over "The weakness could be an idea"

She turned to take her EggSal, cupping its warmth in her hands, and sa serious he looked "So, David, is that one of the things you thought about all those years, when you i invaded? Did you ever wonder ould turn the cities into history?"

He sets clearer every day"