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'Let me get this straight.'
Una's expression is almost comically earnest as she looks at La'an. 'What do you need me to clarify?'
La'an takes a breath, deep and slow. 'You're suggesting we should take shore leave while we're in orbit here.'
'Yes.'
'Actually leave the ship in the hands of others.'
'Others who we've trained and trust.'
'And then we would go down to the planet and go into a cave. By choice. You complete hyperspanner.'
'Not just a cave. The Trans-Spectral Opaline Caverns of Khay-Daya.' Una's face turns dreamy. 'It's so beautiful. Didn't you like at the images I sent you?'
'No,' La'an admits. 'I saw the words shore leave and cave and thought you were losing your mind.'
Una fumbles with her padd for a moment before handing it over. 'Look. You can't tell me that isn't beautiful.'
La'an scrolls through the images. 'Okay. It's pretty.'
'Understatement.'
La'an sighs and hands the padd back. 'You really want to do this?'
'I really do. I'll go either way. But I'd like you to come with me. It's their midsummer celebration. They discovered the caverns thousands of years ago when their sun god forsook them and the outside world was too punishing.' Una looks up from the padd. 'More recent investigation suggests it was a really severe solar storm coinciding with their summer solstice. In the equatorial regions it would have been borderline uninhabitable under those circumstances.'
'Cheery stuff, then.'
Una turns back to the padd. 'They believed that their creator had come down to protect them all and wrapped themself around all who gathered, since the crystal deposits looked like the creator's scales.'
'Scales?'
To her credit, Una looks faintly apologetic. 'Yeah. Their creator god is, um, a snake.'
La'an shudders. 'And the Khay-Dayans? Are they… reptilian?'
'Oh, La'an. No.' Una tosses the padd down and wraps her hands around La'an's shoulders. 'I wouldn't spring something like that on you.' The jumping pulse that Una can feel through La'an's uniform starts to settle. Una waits.
'All right.'
Una looks at her, incredulous. 'Really?' Her hands drop to her sides before scrabbling on the console for the padd again.
La'an shrugs a shoulder. 'You're right. It looks beautiful. But I also want to see how dorky and excited you get. That's always fun.'
Una grins. 'If that's what takes to get you in the shuttle, so be it.'
La'an narrows her eyes at her. 'Is there something wrong with the transporters that I somehow don't know about?'
'Of course not. The caverns are just in a region that has tricky atmospheric conditions. A shuttle's safer than risking demolecularisation.'
'Fine. Tell me what to wear.'
La'an knows that Una's a good pilot. A great one, even. But the 'tricky atmospheric' conditions that make transporting difficult also apparently make manoeuvring the shuttle more of a mission than La'an had realised she'd signed up for.
'You can handle this, right?' La'an's hands are gripping the console in front of her. 'This is fine?'
'Uh huh.' Una's eyes are fixed on the view screen, knuckles white. 'Fine.'
There's a clunking sound somewhere beneath them, followed by a flicker of the lights. 'Una, is–'
The lights and all other systems unceremoniously shut off. There's a moment where it feels like somehow, all natural explanations aside, they are going to remain suspended in the air. And if sheer willpower could have that effect, they would.
The angle of their approach gives them time enough to manually fasten their harnesses before the shuttle skims across an impossibly tall canopy of alien trees and slams into the side of a mountain.
La'an dreams of the cavern. Dreams of walking through the heart chamber, the ceiling almost too high to see, the walls shimmering with colours she can see and vibrating with the promise of those that she can't. There's nobody around, not even Una, but there's a draw forwards. The space is so massive that she can't really see the end of it, but as she walks, step by step, she gradually realises that the walls are starting to close in. But she can't stop. She keeps moving forward, unable to turn back, to call for help, to do anything but keep moving forward as the ceiling presses down and the walls press in and the space is so small that there's barely any light. And soon she is ducking, crawling, and the only rainbow light is in shards that are on the ground and cutting into her hands and her knees and she should have known, she should have known.
And then, when she can move no further, when her shoulders are locked into place and her head curled into her chest, she cannot even sob. So she waits. Waits for help to come, or the end.
Una dreams of the cavern, of keeping two steps behind La'an as she moves through the vastness of the space, taking it all in. It's never ending, this walk, this place – and even though the shining walls are still impossibly far away, Una can feel a sense of rising pressure, of an invisible sense of entrapment that slows La'an down first. Una pauses as La'an falls to her knees and crawls, then continues to follow her slowly, ever slower, until La'an is completed curled in on herself and Una lowers herself to drape across her back. There's no sign that La'an can feel her or hear her as she murmurs in her ear things that she has never said but has long needed to. And together, they wait.
The systems are still off in the shuttle when they wake – first Una, then, while she's still getting her bearings, La'an. La'an return to consciousness is immediate, wide-eyed, frenzied. 'Una!'
Una swallows gingerly as she unbuckles her harness, illuminated only by phosphorescent strips clinging to the last of the light. 'I'm okay. I think. You?'
La'an nods, and it hurts less than it should after being in a shuttle crash that knocked both of them out. 'Pretty sure.'
'I have no idea what's happened to the shuttle but…' Una prods at the console. 'It's dead dead.'
'Manual release on the rear door should still be operational. They were checked last week.'
'Great.' Una sighs. 'Could have done with one of those shuttles with an actual viewport instead of a screen so we could see what we're stepping out into.'
'It might just be the shuttle systems,' La'an says, despite optimism not feeling like something she should risk at this point. She scrabbles for a tricorder. 'Dammit.'
'Yeah, I figured.' Una exhales. 'Okay. Well, between our genetic peculiarities hopefully we stand more of a chance of not immediately dying. That's a plus.'
'Yes, travelling with the genetic superiority of an Illyrian is the only reason I spend time with you,' La'an agrees, deadpan.
A half-smile crosses Una's face and she shoves La'an gently. 'Let's see what's out there. Suit up – even the powered down versions will give us a bit of protection.'
'I know,' La'an groans, following Una to the back of the shuttle. 'I'm security.'
'And I'm still in charge, so you'll have to put up with it.'
La'an rolls her eyes. 'Sure, chief.'
Una's hands are gentle when she checks over the seals on La'an's suit. 'All good.'
'Let me check yours?' La'an asks, reaching out.
Una thinks about what she whispered – or didn't – to La'an while unconscious. And then tries now to when La'an's careful fingers brush her neck. 'Thanks, I think that's all good.'
La'an steps back, and thankfully doesn't seem too rebuffed by Una's peculiarities of the moment. They are, after all, in a difficult situation. Una lets a breath out and holds out a hand. 'We need to stay close if things are dark or dangerous out there.'
Behind her visor, La'an swallows. 'Makes sense.'
Una pulls the lever on the manual release with her free hand, and the stairs descend slowly. There's no immediate catastrophic pressure shift or visible gases, which is promising. Just a faint illumination around the edges of the hatch until–
'Whoa.'
The shuttle is on the floor of a cave. A cavern. A cathedral-like space that makes La'an dizzy when she looks up into its spiralling and shimmering roof.
'Is this?' She turns to Una, who seems equally spellbound.
Una slowly shakes her head, letting go of La'an's hand. 'No. I mean, yes, it must be. But it's so much bigger.'
'Another cavern in the network?'
'Everything I read said that they had looked for centuries for other caverns in these mountains. So that they could examine the material and see what uses it could have, since the only cavern they knew about had far too much spiritual significance to take apart.'
La'an looks behind them, at the shards of crystal littering the cavern floor beneath the shuttle and their feet. 'Looks like we got a head start on scientific sacrilege for them. Probably good. Nobody likes to be the first person to destroy sacred relics.'
Una is quiet, looking around. She seems entranced, caught in a spell, which gives La'an pause. She taps her shoulder. 'Una.'
Una turns around slowly, raising her visor. 'Sorry. I just… it's so beautiful. More than I imagined. The holos were beautiful, but so full of people and noise and here it's just… quiet. And the cavern. And…' She wavers. 'You.'
La'an sees something in her eyes that she's never quite seen before. 'Sorry,' she says, fumbling for the right response. 'I didn't mean to clutter up your view.'
Una shakes her head. 'No. You don't. You never do.'
They stand there for a moment, uncertain. Una is the one who clears her throat. 'Well. I think that I maybe heard some kind of noise from that direction. So maybe we head there.'
'Could be a giant snake.'
'Could be people.'
'Better than standing here, I guess.'
'No,' Una says. 'Not better. But we can't just wait.'
La'an nods slowly. 'I guess you're right.' She pauses. 'Could be dangerous though.' She reaches and takes Una's hand again. 'We need to stay close.'
Una smiles and nods, and they walk into the sparkling unknown.