“Get to the window,” Pav said.

Before Rachel could even speculate about what might be going on, the door opened. It was Xavier, looking sweaty and out of breath. Under his arm he carried two mesh bags filled with gray balls the size of oranges.

“Time to go,” he announced. “And you’re welcome.”

“What’s going on?” Edgely said.

“The guards seem to be falling asleep,” Xavier said. “But they won’t be out for long.”

“Where’s Zeds?” Rachel said.

“Playing Sandman to a bunch of other guards.”

Emerging from their jail cell, they saw a pair of human guards flat out, unconscious. One of them had collapsed on a table, knocking a lamp to the floor. “They look dead,” Yahvi said. She didn’t sound especially concerned, just curious.

“This stuff really puts you out, I think,” Xavier said. “I hope so. It’s supposed to work on humans and Reivers.”

They all ran for the nearest stairway, passing another guard and an entire THE trio who had been laid out. They stopped at the door to the stairwell.

“I think someone’s coming up,” Tea said.

Pav turned to Xavier. “Give me one of those bags.”

Xavier handed it over. “Just make sure you hit something, so they burst.”

Rachel gathered Yahvi, and Tea grabbed Edgely. All four dropped behind a nearby desk as Xavier opened the stairway door and Pav threw one, then two balls through the opening.

There was a shout. Xavier slammed the door.

Everyone waited. Rachel’s heart beat so strongly it made her shake.

“We should wait for the gas to clear,” Xavier said.

“How long?” Rachel said.

“Only a minute. It mutates when it’s exposed to air, supposed to be harmless then.”

“What is it?” Edgely asked.

“‘Neo-fentanyl,’ they say. Sound familiar?”

“Not to me.”

Tea said, “And how did you get it?”

“Made it, of course,” Xavier said. “At the same time we were turning out new pieces for the Ring. When I uploaded those specs to Keanu, I just wrote on them, Give me something to knock people out.” He hefted the bag with a grin. “I wish I’d had this when we landed in India!

“We should be good now,” Xavier said. “Let’s roll.”

It was a quick trip down two flights of stairs to a loading dock, where several vehicles were parked. There were no guards.

Pav was in his element, running to a green sport-utility vehicle and opening the door. Not finding what he wanted, he moved to the next, then a third. “Keys in this one!”

“No,” Xavier said, pointing to a gray van. “This one.”

They ran toward it, and Rachel could see that there were items in the back end: a printer and three cartons of Substance K.

“Sorry,” Xavier said, “but I stopped here before getting you.”

“Smart move, I hope,” Rachel said.

The vehicle was big enough to hold them. “Everybody in,” she said. She headed for the shotgun seat, then stopped. “All right, a basic question . . . who knows how to drive?”

“Me,” Tea said.

“Good,” Rachel said. “I never learned—”

“Me neither,” Pav said.

“And I’m out of practice,” Xavier said.

They had just closed the doors when Yahvi said, “Zeds isn’t here!”

Rachel knew that. She also knew that if any of them were to get off Earth, they had to leave this place now. She feared that the Ring was about to ignite, frying everything for kilometers around, and that they were already too late.

“We’re going,” she said.

Tea started the engine.

“You can’t!” Yahvi shrieked, throwing herself at Rachel from the backseat.

“We have to go now!” She turned to her daughter. The look on her face must have been savage, because Yahvi retreated as if pulled from behind.

Pav put his arm around her.

The van pulled out.

Emerging from the loading dock into the bright desert sunlight, Rachel wished for sunglasses.

And directions. “Which way?” Tea said, steering them out of a parking lot. A train station lay in front of them. An asphalt road led to the right and one of the giant vehicle staging areas.

A dirt road ran to the left, hugging the base of a hill. “Left!” Rachel said. “The vesicle came down north and east of here, right, Yahvi?”

Yahvi blinked again. “Yes.”

“Are you linked?” Xavier said.

“Not really,” she said. “I hear bursts, words.”

“It would be great if Zhao could vector us in.”

The dirt road was bumpy but well traveled, and it took them along the south and east side of the Ring mirrors. Rachel found herself trying to look up at the brilliant squares suspended atop their towers . . . now and then, as the van turned, she saw the huge spire of the central projector.

It appeared to be lit, as if ready to fire.

Then the hill to their right gave way to flatter ground . . . and a clear view of a staging area filled with hundreds, possibly thousands of tanks and other invasion vehicles. Some of them were moving around the edge of the area, kicking up faint geysers of dust.

The others saw it, too. “Oh, shit, what if they start chasing us?” Edgely said.

“I think they’re too busy with their invasion,” Pav said.

“You hope,” Xavier said.

Tea gunned the van, subjecting them to teeth-rattling bounces. “Sorry!” she said.

“Don’t worry,” Rachel shouted. “Keep going.”

She looked out her window, seeing nothing but stark, bare rocky peaks now.

Where was the vesicle?

They drove in silence for another fifteen minutes, passing through rugged canyons and across two different dry washes. Finally Tea said, “I make it a dozen clicks,” she said. “Any ideas?”

“Other than keep going?” Rachel said.

“There!” Pav shouted.

Rachel saw it then, too . . . In a high desert meadow was a giant white sphere thirty meters or so across, maybe twice that high, sunk two thirds deep in a field of yellow stalks.

It was rotating slowly.

“End of the road,” Tea said. The road continued parallel to the vesicle, then turned back to the north and west.

They stopped and got out. As they did, Rachel saw that a truck had pulled over on the other side of the vesicle. A family of what looked like Native Americans huddled there, fascinated and probably terrified, too. “Get away!” she shouted, waving her arms. But they didn’t move.

“I hear them!” Yahvi said. “It’s Sanjay!” She bounced up on her toes. “He says to wait, that the whole vesicle is going to expand or something.”

Rachel remembered that rainy night in Houston, her need to see the recently landed Object because it was a link to her father, then lost somewhere on Keanu. How, as she and Harley and others had watched, the giant blob grew and grew, its skin becoming just porous enough to absorb them all—

“All right,” Rachel said. “We have some decisions to make.” She was torn by conflicting emotions but struggled to be the leader. She couldn’t believe that her visit to Earth was ending, especially since nothing had gone as planned or expected. There was so much left to do! But no more time. “We’re going,” she said, pointing to Pav and Yahvi and Xavier. “Tea?”

The tall, striking, blunt, sometimes goofy ex-astronaut had tears in her eyes. “Take me with you. I have nothing here.”

Pav hugged her.

“Colin, what about you?” Rachel said.

“Love to take you up on the offer,” he said. “But I have a family.”

“I understand.” She hugged him, realizing that it was their first physical contact of any kind . . . which seemed inadequate, given the man’s importance to her and her family. To Tea she said, “We should give him the keys and let him get away.”