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done and get off this thing before the winds kick up.”
    â€œWe’ll set out the sensors for the seismic experiment,” said Dr. Henderson. “They’re in that wooden crate in the back.”
    Stepping out onto the smooth, flat surface felt like stepping onto another planet. No desert, no dry lake bed, no other place on earth, could match the perfect, featureless flatness that stretched for miles. Nor was there ever a sight like the lacy wisps of powder-fine ice and snow floating steadily along in 43 ghostly, numberless hordes only inches above the surface. The movement of the powdery ice and snow was so even, so constant, and so vast, that the Coopers and Dr. Henderson couldn’t help but feel they were the ones moving. It was eerie, unnatural, and spooky. And none of them had forgotten that they were now walking directly on the back of the “sleeping lion.”
    The sensors were small, hand-sized transmitters designed to sense vibrations in the ground. Jay carried the wooden crate and Lila did the placing as they made a wide circle around the airplane according to Dr. Henderson’s instructions. They were wearing oversized jackets borrowed from the Togwanan army, for at just under eleven thousand feet, the atmosphere was much cooler. Thinner, too. Just a short run could make them pant for air.
    From where they stood, the airplane looked tiny and singular, like a gnat or a particle of dust resting on a tabletop. Beyond the airplane were almost four miles of laser-straight flat surface. The sight jarred the senses because it simply did not occur anywhere on the planet. Even the ocean on the calmest of days had a horizon because of the curvature of the earth. But the Stone did not curve out of sight in the distance— it just ended at a sheer, straight edge they could see in all directions. Jay was thrilled at the thought of hiking to the edge to look two miles straight down, but he knew there was work to do and little time.
    KABOOM! Dr. Henderson’s seismic blaster was like a small cannon held in a steel frame and aimed at the ground. When Jay pressed the detonator switch to set off the explosive charge, the device actually leaped a foot off the surface with Jay and Lila standing on it—supposedly to hold it down. Dr. Jennifer Henderson sat calmly in the shade of the airplane’s wing, her jacket collar up around her face to block the cold wind, tapping away at her portable computer.
    â€œWe should get an image in just a few seconds,” she told Dr. Cooper, who was looking over her shoulder. “The blaster sends shock waves through the Stone, and the sensors pick up the echoes. Then the computer interprets the echoes to let us know where the shock waves have been, whether they’ve passed through rooms or tunnels or different strata of rock. . . .”
    The tiny cursor was sweeping back and forth across the computer screen. Line by line, beginning at the top, it was weaving an image like a tapestry. So far the image was one solid field of black. Dr. Henderson started tapping some keys. “Come on, come on . . . don’t disappoint me.”
    â€œWoo!” Jay hollered as he and Lila hurried back to the plane. “That blaster was some kind of ride!”
    Lila was twisting her finger in her ear. “That thing hurt my ears!”
    They joined Dr. Cooper and looked over Dr. Henderson’s shoulder at the computer image. The black tapestry continued to form on the computer screen as she tapped a few more keys, muttering to herself and scolding the computer, “Come on, don’t give me that!”
    Finally, the seismic image was complete. Dr. Henderson leaned back, removed her hands from the keyboard, and sighed. “People, unless the equipment isn’t working properly, I’m afraid the results are disappointing. The Stone is solid. No rooms, no tunnels, nothing.”
    â€œNothing?” Jay asked, clearly disappointed.
    Dr. Henderson shook