The silence following the rig’s descent was worse than the roar of the steam. Kael was gone, and with him, the only heavy transport we had. I stood on the crumbling northern bank with Mara and a dozen stunned Scavengers. Across the thirty-yard expanse of the Lithium Run, Nix stood with the thousand "Uploads," their faces pale silhouettes in the thickening yellow fog.
"Leo!" Nix’s voice drifted across the acid, thin and desperate. "The bank is too steep! We can't get back across without the winches!"
"You have to keep moving!" I yelled back, my lungs burning from the sulfur. "Follow the Ghost-Trail Version 1 gave us! The refineries are two miles east. There are bunkers there! Go!"
Mara gripped her spear so hard her knuckles turned white. She wasn't looking at Nix. She was looking into th
