It did not occur to the Pyramid on Mount Everest that a Component might be directing its actions. How could it?
Perhaps the Pyramid on Mount Everest wondered, if it knew how to wonder, when it noticed that different criteria were involved in selecting components these days. If it knew how to "notice." Surely even a Pyramid might wonder when, without warning or explanation, its orders were changed—not merely to harvest a different sort of Component, but to drag along with the flesh-and-blood needful parts a clanking assortment of machinery and metal, as began to happen. Machines? Why would the Pyramids need to Translate machines?
But why, on the other hand, would a Pyramid bother to question a directive, even if it were able to?
In any case, it didn't. It swung its scythe and gathered in
