Scarecrow Returns

A BLINDING FLASH lit up the southern sky.

What followed was a sight the likes of which neither Schofield nor Champion had ever seen in their lives.

A dazzling, incandescent, white-hot body of air expanded laterally from the point where they had last seen the SS-23 missile. The blast flame expanded with shocking speed, at an exponential rate. And in a single, horrifying instant, the entire sky to the south of Dragon Island went from pale blue to flaming yellow-white.

The atmosphere had been ignited.

The Earth was on fire.