Underground Pass

[Omi]

Even on the best of days, Nauru was no great holiday destination. In fact, it would have been lucky to ever crop up on any list of note, being little more than a backwater planet with scorching deserts and an unpleasant atmosphere that happened to have some semi-important stuff in orbit.

Or at least, that was what everyone thought. Everyone but her, Koftik and Ravis, perhaps. Not that Komachi knew who Koftik was, even. Some sort of local guide? It wouldn't really matter, anyway - he was Tal's contact, not hers. He could handle all of that end of things, and she'd handle hers. Right now, that meant finalising her descent, since she was coming in far too fast, even for Nauru's rather pathetic excuse for an atmosphere.

The Anki flares its lateral thrusters, the nose coming up sharply as the whole freighter groans in protest. Her red-hot descent turns into more of a lukewarm glide, the ship's velocity peeling off like a banana being disrobed as she guides it down in something vaguely resembling a standard final approach.

Where am I even going, anyway? Her comrade's coordinates didn't seem to denote anything in particular. In fact, as the planet's surface grows in detail below her, it just looks like a hell of a lot of sand. What little civilisation Nauru bore on its surface looks to be hundreds of miles of, if not thousands. Fortunately, she'd crammed weeks of food, water, and other essentials into the back of her trusty little freighter - as well as a few distinct nonessentials. Some of them had just been too cool or too nice to have around to leave behind, though. Hopefully, she wouldn't come to regret that.

After a few more minutes of painstaking descent, the sandy, windswept surface finally resolves itself into something vaguely interesting. A mountain - more of a hill, really, and fairly unimpressive - rolls out from beyond the horizon, and as the Anki homes in on the precise location she'd been given, that's about all she gets. It's about the most desolate looking thing she's ever seen. Doubtfully, Komachi checks her nav computer, receiving only a happy-sounding beep of confirmation in reply.

I guess this is the place, but... geez, is this really the place?

Shrugging mentally (physical ones weren't advisable at the helm of a ship, after all), the ex-Chrysanthemum sets the Anki down with a final little thump, wincing as the freighter lists noticeably against the shifting sands. That would make taking off a pain, but at least she hadn't wound up crashing.

Now, there was just one thing left to do. Reaching across to her left-hand console, she keys in a few precise presses on the screen. The Anki's comms array sputters into life, tuning itself to the desired transmission frequency and encoding in less than a microsecond.

"Ravis," she says, not quite able to keep the uncertainty out of her voice. "I'm... here? I think."

With some trepidation, she stares out of the viewscreen, her eyes running across miles and miles of burning, dark orange sand. Nauru already sucked - and it probably wasn't going to get any better.

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