I don’t remember much about the descent through the upper atmosphere. I think I kept my eyes closed the whole time. It was only towards the end, as we were spiralling down to land, that I looked over the pilots’ shoulders at the smoking ruins of a once-verdant world. Ash pattered against the shuttle’s leading edges, threatening to choke our engines. Embers swirled like fireflies. And everything on the ground was black and burned. In places, the soil had been scoured back to bedrock; in others, the charcoal stumps of once-mighty trees stood against the smoke like crudely vandalised grave markers.

Our target was a supply depot set into the base of some cliffs on the side of the continent facing the prevailing winds. We had received radio signals from survivors, and had high hopes that the winds would have carried the majority of the fallout inland, away from the rocky beach that housed the bunker’s camouflaged entrance. Nevertheless, we were all wearing protective suits, and armed in case of trouble. We had heard reports of deluded or deranged soldiers firing on rescuers, unwilling or unable to accept the end of hostilities.

This time, though, we were lucky. The squad of marines huddled beneath the cliff were Outwarders like us, and they were in no mood for a fight. They knew what had happened, and they were just as shocked as we had been. More so, I guess, having felt the force of the explosions through the rock beneath their feet, and felt the world itself convulse with the fury unleashed against it.

They were sick and injured, and desperately in need of decontamination. Their gratitude at our arrival was tired and mostly unspoken, but it was there and it was sincere.

We took them back to the Nightingale for treatment—the single largest group of survivors so far recovered. And over the weeks that followed, I got to know some of them. And then later, when I left the service to join the House of Reclamation, one of them came with me. She said that she’d follow me anywhere, that she owed me her life, that if I hadn’t kept the shuttles running she would have died in that bunker. We often disagreed, but I was glad of her company.

Her name was Alva Clay.

* * *

When I returned to the Trouble Dog, I found a young man standing uncertainly at the bay door. He had a heavy bag slung over his shoulder and a suitcase by his feet.

“Excuse me,” he said. “Are you Captain Konstanz?”

I looked at his bright orange overalls. “You’re the replacement?”

“Preston Menderes.”

“How old are you, Preston?”

“Twenty-four.”

“When did you graduate from medical school?”

“Last year.”

“Do you have any field experience?”

He blushed and rubbed his eyebrow with his thumb. “Six months as an assistant on the Happy Wanderer.”

“A liner? What were you doing, curing headaches and hangovers?”