The descent was the kind that shoved Ayna’s stomach up into her throat. And the knowledge of where they were probably wasn’t helping.

The airlock lights flickered a bit now and then, at slightly shorter intervals as they plunged further into Andan’s blighted atmosphere. Mental images of thruster failure and a horrible crash intruded into her mind. The ground didn’t count as a predator, and she really hoped it wouldn’t all end like that.

Kiris wasn’t showing any overt discomfort, although her stillness hinted at a very deliberate effort to keep it that way. Bers seemed to be doing just fine. But then he was a man who brought an axe to a gunfight.

“Thirty seconds!” came Gaylen’s voice over the intercom.

There was a screen on her left that showed the surface beneath them, but Ayna had quickly learned to ignore it for the sake of her stomach.

“Does anyone mind if I run to the toilet?” Ayna asked, hoping for a bit of levity.

No one replied.

The G-forces that were brutalising their bodies took a sudden violent lurch as the Addax shifted direction.

“Ten seconds!”

Ayna touched her pack and pockets, making quadruple-sure that she had everything.

“No hesitating when the door opens,” Kiris stated firmly.

“None.”

“Mm!”

The stop swayed them all on their feet, into each other and the wall.

“Now!” Gaylen shouted as the outer lock opened.

Ayna was in the front and leapt out.

She dropped little over a metre before her feet slammed into a solid surface. The other two followed immediately and someone bumped into her before everyone gained their balance. The door was closed remotely and the Addax roared back upwards. Bers and Kiris watched it go, but Ayna focused on their surroundings.

It was all quite a sight.

The old battle cruiser had made its final landing just off the coast, and waves slapped against one side while the other faced land. More wrecks lay scattered about on either side, either submerged to some degree or smashed. Ayna supposed emergency systems had softened the cruiser’s landing just before giving out.

Spread out on every side were the shattered remnants of the First Civilisation; grand spires fallen down into rubble and covered with vegetation, or poking out of the intruding sea. Plenty of worlds still had standing ruins, but she’d never seen them untouched like this. What an incredible era that had been. Supposedly, they’d even created the lanes within the Other.

“Anything?” Kiris asked and unslung that scattergun from her back. Bers adjusted one of the straps for the cutter.

“Nothing immediately concerning,” Ayna replied. “There are some flying creatures here and there, in groups, but they’re on the small side.”

She pointed to the bow of the ship.

“Do you see that one?”

Kiris and Bers peered ahead. But the sun had set and what most people considered darkness had already fallen.

“What?!” Bers asked.

“Some bigger, winged thing seems to have a nest there,” Ayna explained and took in the long-necked, beak-faced creature. It was sitting, but she estimated it to be almost human-sized, and it was watching them quite intently.

“I see a... mound,” Kiris said.

The creature flared its wings and let out a shrill yell, startling both her companions.

“It’s trying to warn us off,” Ayna said.

She tested the layer of organic matter that had gathered on the ship’s hull, found it stable enough, and then began a slow walk.

“Our spot is this way.”

The animal yelled some more as they got closer.

“Do you mind shooting it?” Kiris asked, looking unnerved. Ayna supposed she dealt with people more easily than the wild.

“It’s more scared than we are,” Ayna assured her. “And blood might attract something more dangerous.”

“Fine.”

The ship was about four hundred metres long, and the chassis was entirely intact. Jaquan’s selected spot for the cutting was in the middle; a small hatch used for outside maintenance. Getting through the hatch itself would be a simple matter of poking the cutter at the four right spots, but being on a battleship it was covered by a shield. Getting through that would take some effort.

If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

Bers loosened the straps and set the gas tank down. It landed with a heavy thud that put Ayna in mind of her earlier attempt to lift it.

“Well!” the man said and readied the nozzle.

“Wait,” Kiris said, and then leaned down and pushed against the shield.

It didn’t budge.

“Just checking,” she said as she rose. “So we don’t waste time needlessly. I was once called across a city to break a lock that turned out to not be engaged.”

Ayna didn’t indulge in a chuckle. She just looked away as Bers slid goggles down over his eyes and unleashed the gas with a hiss.

“People,” she said.

“What?” Kiris said, and Bers halted with the gas flame right over the shield.

“Off in the ruins,” Ayna told them. “They’ve noticed us.”

“I suppose a ship coming down from the sky is going to be big news here,” Kiris said. “Let’s keep an eye on them. Bers, let us know if you need help.”

“Mm!”

The man got to work. Ayna strolled towards the edge facing land, and Kiris followed.

“What do you see?” the Chanei asked as they came to a stop.

“What do you NOT see? I’m not really good at estimating it with non-Dwyyk.”

“Well, I see the waves beneath our feet...” Kiris leaned out, to a slightly alarming degree. “I see the coast, I see the outlines...”

She indicated the city.

“And a little bit of movement. Do you really see it all as I would in daylight?”

“Near enough, at least.”

“And these are really all buildings?”

“Oh, yes.”

“It must have been quite a sight...” the Chanei said with a hint of dreaminess that felt surprising coming from the dour woman.

“Yeah.”

Ayna did her best to mentally reconstruct the skyline, puzzling together the thin, towering spires and wiping away millennia of wear. She’d seen actual reconstruction models of First Civilisation cities, with all their seemingly impossible angles and defiance of gravity. It really must have been amazing.

“I saw an interesting documentary once,” Kiris mused. “About how coming up in the shadow of fallen greatness has affected modern humanity.”

“Yeah,” was all Ayna could think to say.

It really had, now that she thought about it. All this power and advancement and knowledge, lost in the Big Flash. Whatever had held up these awesome structures had failed along with everything else the Firsts set up. More than one religion insisted it had been divine punishment for hubris.

“I notice you’re being a lot more serious than usual,” Kiris said. “And it started the moment we jumped out. It was like a switch being thrown. And I’ve noticed this in other Dwyyk. It’s a touch uncanny, really.”

Ayna thought her words over for a few moments. Some cultural aspects one just took for granted.

She shrugged.

“You don’t joke around in the wild, when there’s danger of being eaten. You do that when you come back home, and everyone is in one piece.”

“That makes sense. You know, I’ve heard zoologists sometimes visit that lethal world of yours.”

Ayna allowed herself a little chuckle, even as she continued to scan surroundings near and far.

“Oh, yes. I met a group when I was about ten. It was the first time I understood just how loud every other type is.”

“I suppose those researchers look like stumbling children,” Kiris said through a sardonic smile.

“They certainly do. And those who won’t hire locals to guide them just hover above the trees in crafts. Or get eaten.”

Down below the locals were emerging from the beach-side ruins.

“Here they come.”

Kiris lost her distant look and hefted the gun a bit more firmly. Ayna saw her peering ahead, trying to make the people out.

“Have you seen those null-world horror movies?” she asked. “About people crashing, then being preyed upon by feral humans?”

“Hasn’t everyone?”

“I suppose it isn’t fair, but then they aren’t likely to see the movies and lodge complaints.”

“No. No, they’re not.”

It was just a shame that the circa two dozen people who gathered on the beach looked so much like the stereotype. Their clothes looked pieced together from disparate parts. One person was missing an arm and another limped, and most of them carried spears.

“Do you know how far spears can be thrown accurately?” Ayna asked.

“No.”

“Me neither.”

The one on the centre of the group, in the most impressive ragged robe, shook a long staff on which various ribbons and noisemakers were attached. He shouted in a rapid-fire fashion and his comrades seemed to repeat select sentences of whatever he was saying. Ayna tried straining her ears to catch words over the sound of the waves and the wind, hoping to find a similarity to a known language. But no. If survivors of that space battle had integrated into the local society, they weren’t here.

“What do you think they’re doing?” she said.

“Worshipping the spirits that came from the sky? Cursing the demons who came from the sky? Telling us that we’re trespassing? Warning us of some great danger?”

Kiris shrugged.

“If I could see them properly I might be able to make a more educated guess.”

“I know we shouldn’t just write them off as savages, but they do sound passionate about whatever it is.”

“If I were down there I would be shouting ‘Take me off this planet, please!’ with all my strength.”

“Yeah.”

Ayna looked over the ruins. She imagined being stuck here, generation after generation, on a world that was never going to see any technological development. A world cut off from the galactic network, living savagely, in ignorance.

Then she cut those thoughts off, because until the Addax made that second ascent it was a real possibility for her.

“Aha!” Bers shouted, and they turned to find he’d cut all the way across the shield. The man then lay down, pressed his feet firmly against purchase on the battered hull, and pushed.

The shield and Bers both groaned as the heavy metal inched aside, but by the time they’d reached him to offer what help they could he’d gotten it almost all the way off.

Ayna put her hands on the big block of metal and a few seconds later it slammed down on the hull. And there was the hatch itself, protected from the elements all these decades by the shield. Bers fired up the cutter again and began poking it at the spots Jaquan had explained to all three of them. He seemed to have done this kind of work before.

There was no particular feel to the air that came up as they opened it. The ship had been punctured in multiple places, after all, and so connected with the outside atmosphere.

Ayna started by peeking down and listening. Then she held the crossbow in her right hand while descending the short ladder with the aid of the left. The corridor looked entirely unremarkable.

Down on the beach the locals kept up their noise.

“Well?” Bers said.

“Nothing,” she replied. “Let’s do this.”