Chapter Three
WHEN THE TRUCK finally reached the top of the meandering track, they came to a flat area in which the only habitable structure was a low and featureless building made of yellowish concrete. It looked like a field station bunker, and one that had been there for a long time at that.
Beyond, on the flat mountaintop, was an installation consisting of many tall rods, pointing at the sky like a bed of nails. These nails were incredibly tall, reaching almost out of sight and casting long shadows over the surrounding landscape in the weak sunlight. They were arranged in bundles set three by three in frames each about twenty metres across. There was a walkway around each frame at a few metres above ground level. Fabio counted nine such pads.
Just as there wasn’t another place like
