“Ifit is still there,” VB-35 said.
I took hold of the flight controls. My hands were clammy. “Let’s hope it is.”
As the lander entered the atmosphere, we sank into the pillowy pinkish clouds. The wings began to rattle,and the controls shook. I held them tighter, planted my feet, and eased the ship down through the atmosphere. The asteroids had knocked a few things loose after all. For a brief moment, all I could see was pinkish cotton, and then the ship broke through the clouds. The sun blazed, bright and golden, across a landscape of deep orange and cider rocks, the soil a rich purple.
Sian pointed to the ravine in question and the line of bright blue water cutting through the middle, and I followed it as he’d instructed. After a few minutes of flying, the shuttle shuddered again. The left side dipped.
I quickly pulled it back level, adjusting the thrusters, and checked the console.
“I guess we got hit harder than I thought,” I said, tapping a warning light just to make sure it wasn’t malfunctioning.
Sian grabbed ahold of a handle above him. His knuckles were white. “Is it bad?”
“Nothing worse than the trouble we’re already in,” I supplied, flipping two switches to divert power. At least, nothing I couldn’t handle fornow. When we landed, N2-0 needed to check on the ion accelerator. “Where’s the facility?”
“It should be coming up soon—there. Over there, the building with the glass dome,” he said, pointing toward a rather small building eaten almost completely by theyellow-and-green foliage around it. The research facility looked more than just a few years abandoned, and a sinking feeling tugged at my gut.
It didn’t seem like anything was left here, either.
I circled the building to find somewhere to land and then eased the shuttle down at the edge of the ravine.
I hoped I was wrong.
Sian was the first one out of the ship. The droids ambled down the ramp after him, both appalled that he hadn’t evencheckedthe atmosphere. It could have been poison for all we knew, but I wasn’t concerned about that. Sian wouldn’t take us somewhere without breathable air, and Noolaabsolutelywould not have gone running out if she couldn’t breathe. Poor thing. She was stir-crazy.
I rifled through the crates for a flare gun and tucked it into my belt. It wasn’t a blaster or anything, but it’d do in a pinch, and Iwasn’tgoing to get caught empty-handed again if the wildlife decided to eat us. Even though the planet was deserted, there were still creatures and plants and other dangerous things. Deserted didn’t meandeadand definitely didn’t mean safe.
“Arie, are you coming?” Veebee called from outside.
“Right behind you!” I hurried out of the shuttle and closed the ramp behind me.
The air smelled sweet and fresh, mixed with the crispness of salt water that blew up from the ravine below. The atmosphere was so different from the arid plains of Tatooine and Geonosis, not just in smell but also color and sound. It was a breath of fresh air to be somewherenotdusty for once. Nature had overtaken most of the research building, covering it in creeping vines of yellow and green, the underbelly of the leaves a deep shade of indigo. There was forest as far as the eye could see, spotted like fungus on the purple dirt.
The planet was beautiful—breathtaking.
“How could a place like this be abandoned?” I asked, feeling the ground. Even thesoilwas soft and smelled sweet.
Veebee replied, “For good reason. We just have not found it yet.” As Sian went to work prying the strange flowering vines away from the door, she turned to me and said a little quieter, “I do not trust this.”
“This planet or…” I shifted my gaze to Sian.
Veebee shook her head. “None of it.”
I sighed. “I know. Well, if we die, then it’s your job to make sure someone writes a very smutty version of my story someday. I want it steaming. I’m talking the kind of smut that’ll makeDaaricblush.”
“Daaric cannot bl—oh, I see. Well, now I kind of want you dead so I can read that smutty version.” Thenthe droid paused. “Would these scenes be with Sian?”
My mouth dropped open.Oh.“Well—I—um…”
“Ah.”
“Are you two talking about me?” Sian called, and with a grunt, jimmied open the door. “Because that’s rude.”
“No!” I quickly replied while Veebee—the traitor—said, “Yes.”
I glared at her. She shrugged.
He stuck his head inside. “Well, let’s all talk about me in here, yeah?”
