"Yeah." Pause. "And...if they launch ships off in another direction, I'm not sure if we wouldn't think they were coming at us. And...we wouldn't pick up on the signatures until shortly before they got to us."

The ground slowly begins to flatten out. There's a stream here or there as they enter the river valley in earnest; a few areas lack the big trees that have dominated the woods thus far, and there are signs that the area that they're entering may have been logged within the last few decades. It's not a huge area, but it's noticeably different from most of what they've seen so far.