The vale stretched before them, scarred and uneven, remnants of the collapsed structure sprawled like the cadaverous remains of some unconceivable beast. The morning air was cool, crisp, carrying the faint scent of rain and earth, a transitory memorial that the world outside the agony still was, still breathed. Maya, gripping the tablet tightly against her casket, felt the faint palpitation beneath her fritters, nearly like a twinkle trying to match her own. Each step they took over the jagged terrain was conservative, measured, as if the earth itself might betray them, revealing some moping tendril of the living structure they had left