ade this. He'll know better than I--"

"He was killed in the first cracking of the sky when a piece hit him.
Fix it, Dave Hanson. You claimed to be a repairman for such devices."

Hanson bent to study it again, using a diamond lens one of the warlocks
handed him. It was a useful device, having about a hundred times
magnification without the need for exact focusing. He stared at the
jumble of fine gears, then glanced out through the open front: of the
building toward the sky. There was even less of it showing than he had
remembered. Most of the great dome was empty. And now there were
suggestions of ... shadows ... in the empty spots. He looked away
hastily, shaken.

"I'll need some fine tools," he said.

"They were lost in moving this," Ser Perth told him. "This is the best
we can do."

The jumble of tools had obviously been salvaged from the kits on the
tractors in the camp. There was one fairly small pair of pliers, a small
pick and assorted useless junk. He shook his head hopelessly.

"Fix it!" Sather Karf ordered again. The old man's eyes were also on the
sky. "You have ten minutes, perhaps--no more."

Hanson's fingers steadied as he found bits of wire and began improvising
tools to manipulate the tiny gears. The mechanism was a piece of superb
craftsmanship that should have lasted for a million years, but it had
never been meant to withstand the heavy shock of being dropped, as it
must have been. And there was very little space inside. It should have
been disassembled and put back piece by piece, but there was no time for
that.

Another thunder of falling sky sounded, and the ground heaved.
"Earthquakes!" Sather Karf whispered. "The end is near!"

Then a shout went up, and Hanson jerked his eyes from the gears to focus
on a group of rocs that were landing at the far end of the camp. Men
were springing from their backs before they stopped running--men in
dull robes with elaborate masks over their faces. At the front was
Malok, leader of the Sons of the Egg, brandishing his knife.

His voice carried clearly. "The egg hatches! To the orrery and smash it!
That was the shadow in the pool. Destroy it before Dave Hanson can
complete his magic!"

The men behind him yelled. Around Hanson, the magicians cried out in
shocked fear. Then old Sather Karf was dashing out from under the cover
of the building, brandishing a pole on which a drop of the sun-stuff was
glowing. His voice rose into a command that rang out o