They’d mined the place of everything in it that could be sold on the market; and then they’d given up. But after that, the greenhouse rains had come. You could tell that the plant life here wasn’t at all used to the kindness of rain. The plants weren’t a bit better than humanity, really—just another ugly, nasty, acquisitive species, born to suffer, and expecting little.... But the rain had come anyway. Now the Texas High Plains were glutted with rain, and with rich, warm, carbonated air, all under a blazing greenhouse sun. It was Oz, for a cactus. Arcadia for mesquite. Every kind of evil weed that stank, stabbed, or scratched was strutting its stuff like nouveau riche Texas hicks with an oil strike.