Relatively nearby, of course. She hadn’t been able to see it while floating out in space. She did see a distant sun, but it looked like a faraway star. So, she hadn’t thought about looking around for planets.
But this was a place that Alred had brought them. It had to be safe somehow.
They were silent, both exhausted, both hungry, both uneasy.
They were moving though. And just sitting there, tense as she was, Haven could finally feel the weight of the last day or more starting to drag her down. She was going to collapse soon, she knew. But she continued to hold on tight as she relied on Vytln to get them somewhere safe.
It took a couple marks of flying before Vytln finally said-
“Starting re-entry. I’m going to try to keep it smooth, but this shuttle isn’t built for a totally smooth entry. Not like the landing shuttle. So, it’ll be bumpy.”
“I’m ready,” Haven assured him, her free hand clenching on her belt straps.
It was bumpy, though not as much as she expected. Haven hadn’t been planetside since she left the Earth. She’d never gone through re-entry. Her only experience with it was movies and TV shows on Earth where it was an extremely turbulent, often very dangerous process. This was like turbulence on an airplane. She bounced and rocked around a bit, but it wasn’t super jarring.
At least, not until they landed.
The touchdown process, thanks to the shelter room they were towing behind them, was not a smooth and easy drop. It was a hard strike against the ground, then a rough and bumpy grind to a slow stop as she bounced in her seat, hitting hard against the seatbelt.
She hoped the others were okay. She hadn’t been in the shelter room. Vytln promised her they’d designed it to survive re-entry, but this seemed like a really hard landing. And after it was already compromised after surviving an explosion?
It took some time for them to come to a halt. And when they did, to her surprise, they were at an angle. She was pressing down into the seatbelt. She could push herself back against the seat, but they were definitely tilting.
“Where are we?” She asked, pulling at the buckle.
“I don’t know,” Vytln said, yanking his seatbelt away and getting to his feet. He grimaced and winced when he put weight on his injured knee. They had been weightless so long, it seemed he forgot how badly he’d injured it.
“Staying there,” Haven said, getting to her own feet. She stumbled a bit as well, also not prepared for her full weight to come back, but she gathered herself quickly. “I’ll check.”
“Haven, let me-”
He tried to stop her, but injured as he was, he wasn’t quick enough as she climbed the ladder up to the hatch. She had to use a button to force it open. Their space inside was still airless. But there was hard pop that pushed her down as air rushed in and her helmet display began flashing a whole bunch of new information at her. She ignored it, however, and she pushed the hatch up and out.
The bright, harsh yellow sunlight burned her eyes after so long in space. She grimaced as she climbed up. She sat on the edge of the ship and found herself looking out over a sea of golden red sand. It expanded in front of her all the way to the horizon. Smooth, tall, rolling dunes in every direction. Whisps of sand blown into the air by the passing breeze. A cloud of it trying to settle in their path after they had crashed through.
Behind them, a long trail was drug out in the sand. The shelter room was half buried. The evac pod and shelter room both smoking from the force of re-entry. The readout on the helmet informed her that the air was partially safe to breathe for a short time, but she didn’t take it off as she stared around.
Planetside for the first time in years. This was not how she imagined ever returning turfside.
“Okay,” she said, clenching her teeth, reaching deep and grasping for whatever energy and strength she might have left.
It was time to check just how bad off they were.
Chapter 53
Vytln
They’d all landed, alive, though they weren’t without injuries.
Besides Vytln’s knee, Alred’s core screen remained dark and, now that they were planetside, they could see that it was also cracked. When they got the shelter room opened and checked on the others, it was to find Rok with a head wound and more than a few bruises and scratches all over his arms. During the explosion, he had wrapped all four of his arms around Garnet, Grace, and Goldie altogether. They’d fit well in his huge embrace, but the force of the explosion had knocked them around in the shelter, and Rok had taken the brunt of the damage.
Not to say that he’d taken all of it. Grace had twisted her ankle when they hit the wall. During re-entry, Tanin and Sway tried to cover their mates, and Trove tried to cover Goldie. They hadn’t been able to keep them from being knocked around – especially on landing – so everyone had a few bumps, bruises, and cuts.
The shelter was designed to survive re-entry, but that didn't make it a comfortable process. Especially since they hadn’t been able to be warned inside the metal can so they weren’t awareit was coming until it was already happening. They could only brace at that point.
But they were alive. So it had done its job.
Rok was the only one with serious injuries. Goldie had bound his head with cloth she’d ripped from her skirt. His helmet was cracked, but it wasn’t compromised. He smiled as the twins helped him out of the shelter, but he needed both of their help to keep himself upright.
