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eyes. I’ll break away from the shield to our right and try a long shot.”
    â€œJefe!”
    â€œYou have a better idea?”

    â€œAt least let us pull the shield farther out there into the lawn. You would not be so close if …”
    Still in the shadows, the chigger hopped sideways off the fountain rim onto the lawn. Vierho jerked up the handlight, bathed the creature in a blue-white glare.
    â€œO, Dios, Jefe! Shoot it!”
    Martinho swung the sprayrifle around to bear on the new position, but the shield slot prevented a full swing. He cursed, grabbed for the control handle, but before he could swing the shield, a section of lawn the size of a street man-hole lifted like a trapdoor behind the chigger and in the full glare of the handlight. A black shape with what appeared to be a triple-horned head emerged partly from the hole, sounded a rasping call.
    The chigger darted past the shape and into the hole.
    The crowd was screaming now, a noise compounded of rage, fear and feral excitement that filled the air of the Plaza. Through it all, Martinho could hear Vierho praying in a low voice—almost a chant: “Holy Mary, Mother of God …”
    Martinho tried to push the shield around toward the creature in the hole, was stalled by Vierho trying to pull the structure backward. The shield twisted around on its wheels, exposing them to the black shape there as the thing lifted another half meter onto the lawn. Martinho had a full, clear look at it there bathed in the beam of the handlight. The thing looked like a gigantic stag beetle—taller than a man and with triple horns.
    Desperately, Martinho wrestled the sprayrifle from its shield slot, swung it toward the horned monster.
    â€œJefe, Jefe, Jefe!” Vierho pleaded.
    Martinho brought his weapon to bear, squeezed off a two-second charge, counting to himself: “One butterfly, two butterfly.”

    The poison-butyl mixture slammed into the creature, enveloped it.
    The creature, its shape distorted by the spray-mix, hesitated, then lifted farther out of the hole with a rasping, grunting sound heard clearly above the crowd screams.
    The crowd fell abruptly silent as the thing towered there, a shell-backed monster—green, black, glistening—at least a meter taller than a man.
    Martinho could hear a sucking, gasping sound from it, an odd wet noise like the sound of the fountain with which it competed.
    Carefully, he again aimed the sprayrifle at the horned head—point blank range—and emptied the charge cylinder: ten seconds. The creature appeared to dissolve backward into its hole with eerie extensions and protrusions fighting the sticky butyl.
    â€œJefe, let us go away from here,” Vierho pleaded. “Please, Jefe.” He swung the shield around until it again stood between them and the giant insect. “Please,” Vierho said. He began forcing Martinho back with the shield.
    Martinho grabbed another charge cylinder, slammed it into his rifle, took a foamal bomb in his left hand. He felt emptied of every emotion except the need to attack that monster and kill it. But before he could draw his arm back to throw the bomb, he felt the shield buck. He looked up to a solid stream of liquid driving down on the shield from the black creature in the hole.
    He needed no urging as Vierho screamed, “Run!”
    They fled backward, dragging the shield.
    The attack stopped as they drew out of range. Martinho stopped, looked back. He felt Vierho trembling beside him. The dark thing in the hole sank slowly backward. It was the most menacing retreat Martinho
had ever seen. The movement radiated a willingness to return to the attack. It sank from sight. The section of lawn closed behind it.
    As though that were the signal, the crowd sounds picked up all around the Plaza, but Martinho could hear the fear in the voices even when he couldn’t make out the words.
    He threw back his face shield, listening to the words