"That house was never built by human hands!" he said, a cold prickling at the base of his scalp. He had suffered from the prickling off and on for a full hour. He could still taste the strong coffee he'd downed at a gulp before rising in haste at the end of an uneasy meal.
He was sorry now they'd returned to the ship without waiting to say "hello" to Tommy, fresh from his harvesting chores. Tommy was the brightest member of the family. Perhaps Tommy knew more than the others—or could remember better.
"Not built by human hands! But that's insane, Ned." Cynthia's face, shadowed from below by the cold light of the instrument board, was harsh with concern. "The materials came from Earth."
"They did," Ned acknowledged. "Grade A plastics—the best. And a good engineer can build almost anything with malleable plastics. But not a house without seams!"
"Without—seams?"
"Joints, connections, little rough places," Ned elaborated. "Inside and out that house was smooth, all of a piece. Like a burst of frozen energy. Like—oh, you know what I mean! Surely you must have noticed it!"
"There were other colonists," Cynthia said. "Some of them were engineers. They've had time to work out new constructive techniques."
"They've had time to disappear. Why did the Sweeneys act so funny when I asked them about the other colonists? Why did Clifton refuse to look at me? Why did I have to drag the answer out of him? 'Oh, we spread out. Enough land here for all of us—' Does that ring true to you?"
"They didn't want us to stay together!" Tommy Sweeney said.
Ned leapt up with a startled cry. Cynthia swayed, her eyes widening in stark disbelief.