They crest a broad, gentle ridgeline; Randy had forgotten that they were moving uphill. The air suddenly becomes cooler and moisture condenses on their skins. When the whistlers and the crickets pause, it be comes possible to hear the murmur of a stream down below them. The next hour is devoted to slowly working their way down the slope towards it. They cover a total of a hundred meters; at this rate, Randy thinks, it should take them two days, hiking around the clock, to reach Golgotha. But he keeps this observation to himself. As they move downhill he starts to become aware of, and to be taken aback by, the sheer amount of biomass that happens to be above them—forty or fifty meters above them in many cases. He feels as though he’s at the bottom of the food chain.