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continued to drive, “the carbon dioxide of Mars’s atmosphere must have reacted with a substance on the clear coating, turning it into an acid. … Hold on. I have to talk to Steven.” Rawling called up the main dome on our field radio.
    While Rawling was patched in to Blaine Steven, I kept my eyes on the monitor, only half listening to Rawling’s report.
    â€œWe’ll relay all the video images immediately,” Rawling said to Steven. “It appears the artifacts had some sort of self-destruct timer. Everything was destroyed, but we’ve got it all on video.”
    On the monitor, the first box exploded outward.
    â€œCan you back up a few frames and go to super slow motion?” I asked Dad.
    As Dad clicked back a few frames, Rawling continued to drive and speak into the field radio at the front of the platform.
    â€œPlease confirm by calling back when you receive the satellite relay,” Rawling told Blaine Steven. “I don’t want to imagine the worst, but if anything should happen to us on the way back to the dome, I want to know that copies of the video footage are safe with you. What we saw down there was absolutely incredible. This can’t be lost to the rest of humankind.”
    Again, I was barely listening to Rawling. I was watching hard for the source of the explosion. Because the digital video scan was advancing frame by frame, in the first instant of the explosion I was able to see the first bloom of bright light in the bottom rear of the black box.
    â€œStop,” I told Dad. “Back it up again. Two frames. Then hold.”
    â€œYes,” Rawling was saying. “Unfortunately, there’s no other evidence but the video feed. Once you have it, you’ve got all that we’ve got. But it should be enough to convince the Science Agency committee that something incredible is here. Somehow those aliens had the technology for anti-gravity and perpetual motion.”
    I wasn’t sure if I saw on the monitor what my mind thought I saw.
    â€œWe’ll be back as soon as possible,” Rawling said. “See you then.”
    â€œStop!” I shouted, suddenly afraid.
    Rawling hung up the radio speaker.
    â€œBut I’ve got it stopped,” Dad said to me. The frame was frozen on the monitor.
    â€œNo,” I said. “Stop the platform buggy! Now!”
    There, on the monitor, in the back corner of one of the black boxes, was a small, gray, plastic box with antennae.
    If I was right, that little gray box on the monitor had triggered the explosion that began in the next frame. And it was just like the one I’d seen on the axle of the platform buggy when I fixed the tire.
    How long did we have until it exploded beneath us?

CHAPTER 21
    Whoever this is, you are mean and nasty and rotten to pretend you are Tyce Sanders. Respect the memory of his death. Get off his computer and leave it alone. He was a true space hero. And he was my friend. I miss him very much. Please do not send me another e-mail.
    I stared at the screen of the mainframe computer on the platform buggy. We were parked about five miles from the dome, behind a range of short mountains. It was the middle of the day, and I’d sent Ashley an e-mail on this computer about 10 minutes earlier.
    I grinned at Ashley’s return message. I could picture her and her mad frown as she banged at her keyboard. I was glad to read that she liked me.
    I hit Reply. All the dome’s computers were set up with an Internet system that let scientists and techies send each other e-mails.
    The reply box appeared on my computer screen.
    Ashley ,
    It really is me. I know that everyone under the dome thinks we’re dead. And my guess is that Blaine Steven announced it, right? But we’re alive. It’s important you keep this secret. Please e-mail me back and tell me that you will help.
    I pressed Send.
    Rawling and Dad were snoozing on the platform beds behind me. Taking turns, they