It was very bright daylight now. And there it sat. There could be no mistaking it.
Alien.
Surely it must be an insect. Only cockroaches looked like that. Or beetles. No, cockroaches.
But there were no cockroaches that big. Not thirty feet long and ten feet high and maybe twelve feet side to side.
A horrible brown color. And smooth.
Jonnie had stopped, the lead horse bunched up behind. The thing was sitting squarely in the middle of the wide path. It seemed to have two eyes in front, slitted. There was nothing like this on the plains or in the mountains, and he had seen nothing like it in the Great Village center. It looked new, with very little dust on it, and shiny.
He felt it was alive. There was something about it. Yes, alive. Not inanimate metal but a living thing. Then he saw wh
