“This is suicide,” said Falconi. He grabbed Kira by the arm and pulled her toward an open doorway in the nearest building. “This way.”

“Stop!” shouted Koyich. “That’s an order.”

“Bullshit. I’m not under your command,” said Falconi. Nielsen followed him, and also Trig and the Entropists. After a moment, Koyich had no choice but to order the Marines to do the same.

The ground level of the building was tall and lofty. Soaring pillars divided the space at regular intervals, a forest of stone trunks that branched as they approached the ceiling. The sight reminded Kira, with almost physical force, of her dreams.

Koyich stormed over to Falconi. “You pull a stunt like that again and I’ll have them pick you up and carry you.” He jerked the barrel of his blaster toward the Marines in power armor.

“That’s—” Falconi stopped as the noises outside grew louder. Kira saw movement in the street they’d just abandoned.

The first Jelly crawled into view: a tentacled squid, similar in form to the ones Kira had encountered before. Following it were several more squids, a lobster-like creature, a chomper, and several more forms she’d only seen on the news. White, orb-shaped drones darted about over them, and farther back, she spotted some kind of segmented vehicle flowing across the rubble-strewn street.…

At almost the same moment, the Jellies and the Marines released clouds of chalk and chaff, hiding each other from view.

“Go, go, go!” Hawes shouted.

Laser blasts and gunfire erupted, and a chunk of masonry exploded out of the pillar above Kira’s head.

She ducked and ran, staying close to Trig’s exo. Explosions sounded behind them. Falconi turned and fired his grenade launcher, but Kira didn’t look back.

Their only hope now was speed.

The two Marines in the lead lowered their metal-clad shoulders and smashed straight through the wall in front of them. Another empty room followed by another wall, and then they burst out onto a narrow street.

“Keep going!” Nielsen shouted.

Kira looked for the Entropists and saw them dimly through the swirling chalk: ghost-like figures nearly doubled over, hands outstretched. “This way!” she called, hoping it would help guide them.

Together, she and the rest of the group sprinted across the street and into another building. This one was smaller, with tall, thin corridors barely wide enough for the exos. With every step, the machines scraped flakes off the mossy walls, showering the floor.

The Marines continued to bull forward, breaking past every barrier. Future archeologists, Kira reflected, weren’t going to be happy with all the damage.

They passed through a room with shallow, pool-shaped depressions in the floor—Kira remembered the scent of perfumes and the sound of splashing water—then an arcade with large, broken tubes of some transparent material extending upward along the walls—bodies rising through space, both pairs of arms outstretched for balance—and then they broke through onto another street, wider than the first.

The buzzing of drones grew louder, and Kira saw threadlike flashes of superheated air as lasers punched through the clouds of chalk surrounding them.