As the light receded, Mara felt cool night air dance across her face, and she shivered. She stood outside the transceiver node building on top of Rocky Butte, looking at the roof, now capped with scaffolding where the dome had once been. She could see the dull glow of a new sphere suspended in the middle of the metal framing, dangling over the hole the explosion had left in the building’s hexagonal roof. New satellite dishes—if that’s what they actually were—had been installed at the outer edges of the building.
From this angle on the ground at the back of the building, she couldn’t actually see the roof itself or the hole in it, just the light that poured upward from inside the building. The wind carried voices and sounds that she was sure came from there—probably construction workers or
