"What, like, a boulder, or something manmade?"

This is the point at which an angry-looking man arrives carrying a shotgun and with his three dogs barking at his heels.

“Take them. I want no more of your money. You’ve had your guinea’s worth. Take them off with you!"

Terrence holds his hands up. Oh shit.

ahahahahaha fuck

On the one hand: What money? On the other hand: Now is really not the time to point out they haven't paid him.

And one day, he will have a life where no one ever threatens him with a gun and he doesn't need to put his hands up and stare down angry farmers.

Oscar holds his hands up. "We mean no harm!"

Now seems like a great time to pretend to know what's going on. Yes. They will take them off with them. Once they know what they are.

"You've ruined my life!"

"Sir, we're - we're new. What do you want us to take?"

This negotiation would be so much easier if he knew what the hell was going on.

"I don't believe we've met? If someone is giving you trouble, we'd be happy to help." Well, no, but angry farmers don't need to know that.

The man seems a little calmer, but he continues to brandish the gun.

"The stones!" he says. "Ever since you people left the stones here, none of the crops have come up well. Swollen, sweet, and rotten, for the whole acre around."

"That sounds like an awful problem. How many are there?"

"Nine."

The... the giant stone thing? He wants them to take away nine giant stone things? By themselves?

Terrence glances at Jing Yi, ready to follow his lead. Jing Yi seems like more of a natural here.

"Well, that's more than we thought."

Terrence was expecting, for instance, no stones.

"Did one of the people who put them there perchance look like," and he gives a reasonable description of Roby.

"Yes, he did!"

The man gestures emphatically with his gun. The dogs are barking around his feet.

At some point it would be very nice for him to put that down.

"Ah. He's--" a client? acquaintance? "--someone we're trying to rein in."

"Well, REIN HIM IN BETTER. I'm going to get some fucking dynamite," the man says, heedless of propriety and the teenage girl nearby.

Terrence sighs, also pretending like this kind of thing happens to him all the time and doesn't faze him. He is So Very Unfazed. "Sorry to barge in on you, sir. Do you mind if we look at it and the others? We can see about getting a crew out here to help take them out."

He raises his gun and fires at the monolith in the copse.

There is an awful shriek from above.

Jing Yi is very sensibly on the fucking floor now.

"If you want to blow that thing sky high," Sal says unthinkingly, "be my guest," and then any further words are cut off by a soft shrieking sound from his throat that he cannot control.

Oh God.

Byakhees stand more than six feet high with a wingspan of fifteen feet or more; they have ribbed exoskeletons, long toothed heads something like a horse’s skull, and chitinous claws on all four limbs. They are a mottled green/black color with pinkish brown wing surfaces.

They shimmer a little bit like they don't quite belong in this world.

If you've seen the black whistle, you recognize it as what's depicted on the whistle.

If you're Jing Yi, you recognize it from your dream.