Page 40 - Adam 2

factories.
Now he stared. “Oh,” he said. “What happened?” “Quiet,” hissed Linden.
Runa turned to him and put her finger to her lips. Dawn was breaking, a red sky glowing to the east, and
its light poured and pooled over the remains of the city. Shattered houses; rubble, spikes of raw metal pointing at the sky; drifts of old material fluttering in the morning breeze. Everything was blackened and hollow, squares of empty windows with the glass blown out, weeds reclaiming the stones. Most of the buildings were either partly or wholly destroyed. The gardens were flooded. The castle walls were still intact, but within them a smooth metal dome covered the old castle buildings.
Everything was silent.
Adam stared at the dome, and the flood lake, and the
wreckage. His image-recognition systems stuttered as he tried to make sense of it. This wasn’t the same city. How could this be the same city?
“This way,” hissed Linden, and crept away. Adam followed. They were halfway up the side of a steep hill at the other end of the city centre from the castle. Further up the hill, on his left, he could see the tower where he had lived. From the outside, it still seemed quite strong, although its paintwork and decorations were chipped
32