18

For a moment Control looks like a child who fears a scolding, and you're afraid she won't approach no matter what you say. But at last, seeing your confidence, the robots seem to remember who and what they are. One makes the dash up to the statue, standing so close that you can feel the thump of her mechanical heartbeat where her arm touches yours. She regards the statue for a long time, then reaches into her jacket and pulls out an old and faded sepia photograph. A middle-aged Dr. Sabbatine sits at a desk covered in robot parts. Control? Her precursor? Then your eyes are drawn to the metal hoop behind the doctor, which crackles with electricity. Its resemblance to the fallen stone ring of the statue is inescapable, but you're not sure what it could mean. You glance at Alexius, who seems equally baffled.

Alexius examines the photograph, lost in (for once) silent contemplation. But at last he hands it to you. Control lets you keep it.

You resume your journey, making excellent time until the road breaks apart into stones and roots. Once again you find yourself amid trackless jungle and ancient statues.

"Serpents," Therko says, flinching away from the statues as if they could poison him.

"As the Bridge Keepers maintain the waterways," Vecla says, "the forest tribes once maintained these, for the return of the ophidians. But endless warfare has depleted their numbers."

"Maybe that's for the best," Alexius says.

Control has nothing to offer except complaints about the pollen and humidity, which interfere with her systems.

But after several more days you look down upon a small village of roughly built huts. An idol rises from the village's northern end. Occupying the top of a small hill surrounded by a thorn hedge, it is man-shaped, with two carved eyes and a third, bigger eye on its forehead. That eye is a huge golden wheel.

"I like it when it's easy," Alexius says, studying the cog.

Then warriors burst out of the woods to surround you.

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