Robin’s mood hit rock bottom.

Once again he was in a location with so much ambient and static energy in the atmosphere that his passive sense was going haywire. He felt like lying in a nest full of little bugs that ran all over his body.

On top of that, now the mission was finally about to begin and on their first meters they started stumbling already. This plateau was meant to be a safe location, the safe location to be exact. How the hell did they come here only to find everything in shambles?

‘What if the Hubble had landed here before the earth gave in?’ Wild thoughts distracted him from thinking straight.

“Oh shit, are you sure this is the right pace?” Landom interrupted Robin’s spiraling mind after he entered the bridge.

“Of course I’m certain. What do you think I am doing here?” Happy complained.

“The report clearly marked it as a secure place, damnit.”

“What now, Robin?” Niu asked as she held the Hubble stable in hover.

“We need a new landing spot and contact Keran to update him on our position.”

“The research team’s earliest arrival will be in 11 hours. In this region we can open a channel for communications only if they are close by. Shall I head away from the valley for now?”

Robin pondered the best course of action until Landom shook his head and stepped closer to the window.

“Can you first send the drone to inspect the cave-in?” He asked.

“What are you looking for?”

“Nothing in particular, maybe it’s just the inspector in me that wants to know more.”

Not seeing any arguments against it, Robin left for the hangar and activated the BWT drone. While he sat down with closed eyes to jack into the video-feed, ROMAS was on its way to the surface.

It left the Hubble through the elevating platform and quickly descended into the hole.

* Interference due to the storm detected

* Range severely reduced

Robin watched as the drone descended into the darkness below. All around them was rock everywhere. Soon, ROMAS had to switch to night vision to give Robin some sight.

While he wasn’t an expert in this kind of stuff, he assumed it was a natural cave that must have collapsed some time ago. He couldn’t make out anything interesting down here and didn’t even know what he was looking for in the first place.

After descending for about minute ROMAS stopped the drone.

* Maximum range reached

Robin inspected their surroundings once more. Above them he saw the bright hole where the light from Goya was entering, below him was a dark abyss, too deep even for the residual light amplification of the drone’s camera.

“Could you reach the bottom if Happy lowers the Hubble’s altitude?”

* No, about 50 meters would still be missing

“Okay. Switch to thermal vision, please”

Immediately the video-feed changed from grayscale to a mix of blue in different shades.

* No heat-sources detected

* No anomalies detected

* Assumption: Cave naturally collapsed no longer than 12 hours ago

“So recently? Wow, we were really lucky in misfortune. Thanks for your service. You can come home, okay?”

Robin canceled the stream and went back to the bridge to share what little he had found out.

“All in all, we actually got lucky that we didn’t use this spot for landing, right?” Alena said and Robin once more failed to read her mood due to her always cold, piercing glare.

“I’m inclined to agree.” He nodded but Landom once more shook his head and fidgeted with his hands.

“What is it?” Robin asked.

“Nothing. It’s just strange that the report didn’t mention the cave below the plateau. They made scans of this place and should have noticed it.”

“Maybe they also had trouble with their scanners?” Niu suggested.

“Unlikely, I’m easily able to get readings up to 10 meters into the earth. If you missed a cave under these conditions that would be a major blunder.” Alena explained while she checked her scanners again.

“Where did we get the report from? The UAS?” Robin asked.

“No, we got it directly from Keran’s people. It was part of the information package for this mission.” Landom said.

“Huh, I’ll have a talk with him about this, okay?”

“I don’t want to interrupt this talk, but I need to know where I should park the Hubble. Flying and hovering on planets with a proper atmosphere and a solid gravity is quite fuel-intensive. We can’t just hang out here and wait for them…” Niu finally switched the topic.

“Right.” Robin agreed, “Alena, find us a new place as close by as possible.”

It took her only a few minutes of scanning and analyzing until she found another landing zone for the Hubble.

“It’s about 8 km to the north. Not perfect but there is some kind of clearing in the forest over there.”

“That will be a hell of a walk. Landom, adapt your plans for a longer hike to the artifact’s location.” Robin groaned. If the rest of the reports were to be believed, going through this forest won’t be a walk in the park. Flora and fauna both were classified as medium to high threats.

“Waiting around any longer won’t do us any good. Happy, let’s go.”

Hopefully they will be able to come up with a better plan after they meet with Keran and his team.

***

Ten minutes later, Niu skillfully landed the Hubble on a small clearing in the midst of the thick rainforest. With no more than 50 meters of tree-free area, she needed to be extra precise when she brought the big ship down to the ground. The four vertical thrusters blasted their flames downwards, burning away the undergrowth below them.

“Let’s hope we didn’t start a forest fire just now…” Robin mumbled and observed their surroundings. Enormous trees, more than a hundred meters tall, reached into the sky. On their trunks sprouted moss and fern, from the treetops vines came down, winding around smaller trees below, like snakes around their prey. The underbrush was a mix of wide growing bushes with huge leaves and young trees that were fighting for the little light that found a way through the tops above. Everywhere dead tree trunks lay around, littering the ground along with dropped fruits and small puddles of water.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

After the successful landing, the crew met in the conference room. Robin had just finished reporting why there was a change of plan.

“Nothing is ever easy with you, isn’t it? You can’t just do it the normal way, right?” Patience complained, “Now we are just sitting on our asses and will wait or what?”

“That would be my suggestion, yes. They should arrive here in 10 or 11 hours and when they find the hole where the plateau has been before, they should start searching nearby.”

“Will they even be able to find us here?” Timothy asked and Robin passed the question on to Happy with a wave of his hand.

“Well, normally not, no.” She said with a shrug, “I’ll broadcast a welcome message with maximum strength to get their attention, but they still have to come close or be lucky and find us with a scan. I’ll make sure our radio-footprint glows like a Christmas tree to everyone in range.”

“What’s the backup strategy?” Landom asked.

“We’ll wait until tomorrow morning, which is in about 20 hours on this planet. If we couldn’t get in touch with the other team by then, we’ll head out to the monolith on our own.”

“While I’m not against this idea, I want to once more mention the fact that this will be really dangerous. Don’t underestimate the nature on this planet. You always dreamed of seeing wild animals, right? You will meet lots of them here. Believe me, they will come looking for you in hope of a quick snack!” Sevastian remembered with an unusually serious face.

“I understand.” Robin said, “However, we literally traveled through the galaxy to get here. I’m not going back without at least attempting to reach the artifact. If the situation is too much for us to handle, we will immediately pull back, okay?”

He looked from Sevastian to Alena and Landom. At the end of the day, those three were in charge of security concerns.

“Fine for me. Much of the danger comes from poisonous insects and snakes. Our suits will be able to protect us from those. The bigger predators will be fought off with good old guns. The report mentioned that many animals here have a natural resistance to energy based attacks but not like a mutation. Instead it’s more like an evolution due to generations living under these constantly recurring storms. If you shoot twice, energy guns still do their job as intended - make it three times if you wanna be sure.”

“Great, then it’s decided. Now, off you go!” Robin ended the meeting and shooed them away, “Prepare for the hike, eat your fill and rest until new orders arrive.”

After the others had left, Robin found himself alone with Landom who had remained in his seat.

“What’s bothering you?” He asked the man.

“You remember our talk about making decisions and being a good investigator?”

“Sure, you told me that one has to follow his instincts from time to time.”

“Correct.” Landom said, “And right now, my instincts are screaming at me that something is off. I can’t put my finger on it, but my guts are churning nonetheless.”

“You have a bad feeling about the impending excursion?”

“No, I think it’s more about the mission itself. I want to go back to the plateau and take a look around.”

“You just explained to me that it isn’t safe out there 10 minutes ago and now you wanna go on a sightseeing trip?” Robin laughed but Landom didn’t budge, “Ah come on, really now?”

“I’ll take the Melody II and fly there. It’s a short trip with the ship and the plateau is located on a mountain and not in the middle of the forest. There shouldn’t be a problem. Just in case I’ll take Alena and Patience as support, okay?”

Robin thought about it, but found no objections.

“You just wanna play around with the Melody, don’t you?” He scowled and conceded.

***

Half an hour after Robin had given his okay, the Melody II shot over the treetops like a flash. It was her first trip after the disaster in the Mystic Sea and it nearly seemed like she tried to show off her best side. The wind never pushed her off course and each turn was done with grace and stability as if the ship was trailing on a hidden guiding line.

“Nice ship!” Landom cheered as he piloted the racing ship towards the mountain in the distance.

“Great that you like it! Now stop the slaloming and hurry up, this is fucking uncomfortable.” Patience shouted from behind, her temper already flaring up right after the start, “No offense, Alena!”

“None taken.”

While Landom had his fun flying the Melody in the front, Patience and Alena were cramped together on the seat for the copilot in the back. The ship was only made for two people, so they had to improvise a bit.

“We will be there in a minute, no need to lose your cool!” Landom laughed, not letting Patience dampen his mood.

When they reached the plateau a short flight later, he slowed down the ship and circled a moment to look for a place to go down.

“I’ll have to land further up the mountain or down at the bottom where the jungle begins…”

“Up we go!”

“I thought as much.”

Carefully Landom pushed down the Melody, managing a smoother landing than he had expected after such a long time since his last flight.

“Alena, you take the front and lead us down. Patience, you take the spot in the rear.” Landom ordered and hurried them down the mountain. He didn’t want to stay here any longer than necessary. The mountain’s slope was bare of any trees and only had little shrubs here and there. With Alena’s enhanced eyesight there was nothing they had to worry about.

Quickly the team followed a small creek that brought water down into the jungle and after only 20 minutes they finally reached the hole in the plateau. They stayed clear of the edge and instead began to prepare a rope for Landom.

Patience put down the two huge loops she was carrying while Landom embedded a hook deep into the rocky ground and Alena monitored their surroundings. When everything was done and the officer had the rope safely connected with his suit, he arranged a weapon on his back and crept forward foot by foot.

“Okay, I’ll be down quickly. But coming back up here will take some time. Even with this little thing, 230 meters is quite the distance.” He said and pointed at his ARA, the Automatic Rope Ascender, “I won’t be in range for near field communications, but I’ll open an external channel as soon as I find something or am on my way back up, any questions?”

“Nope, good luck.” Patience said and looked at the other woman who just shook her head.

Without further ado, Landom continued to the edge of the hole. He feared that more of the earth would break under his feet and pull him down abruptly, but nothing like that happened.

Slightly leaning forward, he took a hesitant look into the depths but couldn’t make out any details. After taking another calming breath, Landom threw one last glance at the two women who would secure the area until his return and then let himself drop into the unknown. The ARA instantly slowed his fall, making it a gentle descent. Even so, Landom still needed a moment to calm his racing heart before he finally turned on the flashlight and inspected his surroundings.

“I’m too old for this shit! What did I even think when I agreed to accompany Robin on this mission? I should have known better after our trip to Gaunus. That man is a magnet for trouble…”

Slowly descending deeper into the seemingly endless pit, Landom continued his rambling while trying to find anything suspicious. However, he quickly had to agree with Robin’s analysis of the hole. Everything he saw suggested that this was a natural cave and he found no evidence that anyone had tampered with it.

“But why do I have this nagging feeling in the back of my head?” He wondered when the bottom finally came into view. He stopped the ARA and adapted his position to get a better view. With his flashlight he searched the whole ground below him. Everywhere was rubble from the caved-in ceiling. Huge rocks, lots of earth and occasionally a green branch of a buried bush here and there.

After he made sure it was safe to walk down there, he reactivated the ARA and dropped to the ground.

“What am I doing here? Damn…” He grumbled but continued his search. He even dug out a few of the branches but did find nothing that would explain the bad feeling he had.

“They’ll tease me about this forever, won’t they? Ugh…”

Suddenly he saw something glint in the cone of his flashlight. At first he thought it was just another rock, but when he stepped closer to inspect the place, his face lost all color.

“Oh shit!” Quickly he hurried back to the rope and grabbed the communicator.

“Alena, do you read me?”

“...” Only static noise came as a response. Landom’s pulse rose even further as he tried to contact the woman a second and a third time without any response.

“What is going on there? Fuck!” He threw another glance to the thing between the rocks and began to reattach the rope to his suit. Just as he activated the ARA to get out of the cave, the communicator finally established a connection.

“Landom?” He heard Patience’s voice, dripping with annoyance.

“What took you so long? The situation is quite serious, we might have a problem here…” He shouted while the ARA began to pull him up.

“Funny that you mention that, we might have a problem here too-” She said before she suddenly began to yell, “Fuck! Shoot! Alena, don’t stop shooting!”

After that, the connection was cut again.