I hesitated, and almost turned back. But pacing the alleys made me feel like a spy – and I wasn’t ready to return to Akili’s tent, to the warmth of vis body, to the hope ve seemed to offer. Half an hour before, I’d seriously considered migrating to total asex – tearing out my genitals and several vital pieces of gray matter – as the panacea for all my woes. I needed to take a long walk, alone.

I headed out into the moonlit desert.

Whorls of trace minerals glittered everywhere; now that I’d seen a few of these hieroglyphs deciphered, the ground appeared transformed, dense with meaning – although for all I knew, most of the patterns could still have been nothing but random decoration.

The abandoned city was either in darkness, or hidden from view by the slope of the ground; I could see no hint of light on the southern horizon. I pictured a fresh swarm of the invisible insects scurrying out from their nest at the center … but I knew I’d be no safer back in the camp – and the things only killed for the spectacle of it, for the panic they instilled. Alone, I was less of a target than ever.

I thought I felt the ground shudder – a tremor so slight that I doubted it immediately. Was there still shelling going on? I’d imagined everyone leaving the city to the mercenaries – but maybe a few dissenters had ignored the evacuation plan … or maybe the militia had remained, in hiding, and the real confrontation had finally begun. That was a dismal prospect; they didn’t stand a chance.

It happened again. I couldn’t judge the direction of the blast – I’d heard no sound at all, just felt the vibration. I turned a full circle, scanning the horizon for smoke. Maybe they were shelling the camps, now. The white plumes over the city in the morning had been visible for kilometers – but shells meant for tents on bare rock would carry different charges, with different effects.

I kept walking south, hoping that the city would come into view – along with some sign that the pyrotechnic action was still confined there. And I tried to imagine myself living through the war – emerging unscathed, but cozily familiar with all the myriad technologies of death … offering – to the nets who didn’t care what I’d faked – footage complete with my own now-expert commentary on “the characteristic sound of a Chinese-made Vigilance missile meeting its target,” or “the unmistakable visual signature of a Peacetech forty-millimeter shell exploding over open ground.”