Then the whole world turned glaring white as the light from an explosion swamped Blade's vision. The ground heaved under him, and a massive fist of shock-driven air picked up him and Riyannah and slammed them against a tree. For a moment Blade's world was black instead of white, and the roar in his head drowned out the roar of the explosion.

As Blade's hearing returned, he heard trees going over, branches falling, and chunks of metal pattering, clanging, and crashing down all around him. Something small hit him in the shoulder, searing through the cloth of his tunic into his skin. Something larger bounced off the helmet he'd wisely left on. Blade lay where he was, covering Riyannah with his body, until things stopped falling. She was sprawled on her back, unconscious but apparently unhurt. He shifted his weight off her without rising and looked toward the open ground.

He could barely see it. Where the Menel machine had been was a black crater pouring up smoke and surrounded by grotesquely twisted pieces of blackened metal. Some were larger than a man.

The four Menel were only scattered patches of ash, with a few recognizable bits here and there. The soldiers hadn't been so lucky. They'd been alive when the blast struck them, and some of them still were, crawling blindly around and making animal noises. The two troop carriers lay on their sides, broken and burning. The smoke from them mixed with the smoke from the crater to lie like a sooty fog across the battlefield.

Blade got to his feet and started gathering his equipment. He was sure there was nothing more to be learned here, and he was even more sure he didn't want to stay around here any longer. Each act of violence he met in this Dimension seemed to be bigger and bloodier than the last one. Sooner or later he'd meet one big enough to swallow him up. A lone man had no place in a battle against the Menel, at least not when he didn't know any more than Blade did now.