st think the place was still alive,
instead of crumbling around our ears._

The windows of the distant houses were dark, unglassed holes, but the
sunlight made the masonry clean and shining. To Blackie, the ragged tops
of most of the buildings were as natural as the tattered look of the few
people he knew. Beyond, toward the center of the city, was real evidence
of his race's bygone might--a vast jumble of shattered stone and fused
metal. Queer weeds and mosses infected the area, but it would be
centuries before they could mask the desolation.

Better covered, were the heaps along the road, seemingly shoved just
beyond the gravel shoulders--mouldering mounds which legend said were
once machines to ride in along the pavement.

Something glinted at the bend of the highway. Blackie peered closer.

He swarmed down the tree from branch to branch, so lithely that the trio
below hardly had the warning of the vibrating leaves before he dropped,
cat-footed, among them.

"They're comin'!"

He shrugged quickly into his stained jacket, emulated in silent haste by
the others. Vito rubbed his hands down the hairy chest left revealed by
his open jacket and hefted one of the clubs. In his broad paws, it
seemed light.

They were quiet, watching Sid peer out through narrowly parted brush of
the undergrowth. Blackie fidgeted behind him. Finally, he reached out as
if to pull the other aside, but at that moment Sid released the bushes
and crouched.

The others, catching his warning glance, fell prone, peering through
shrubbery and around tree trunks with savage eyes.

The distant squawk of a jay became suddenly very clear, as did the
sighing of a faint breeze through the leaves overhead. Then a new,
clanking, humming sound intruded.

A procession of three vehicles rolled along the highway at an unvarying
pace which took no account of patches or worn spots. They jounced in
turn across a patch laid over a previous, unsuccessful patch, and halted
before the felled tree. Two were bulldozers; the third was a light truck
with compartments for tools. No human figures were visible.

A moment later, the working force appeared--a column of eight robots.
These deployed as they reached the obstacle, and explored like colossal
ants along its length.

"What're they after?" asked Mike, whispering although he lay fifty yards
away.

"They're lookin' over the job for whatever sends them out," Blackie
whispered back. "See those little lights