“That’s far too big to be a machine,” Ahmed said from behind them. “Something with that many moving parts would have to be partially deadtech, like a bakkie. It would require constant maintenance.”

“What do you know about it?” Safiyah said. “Our people were greater than any alien, once. It was the catastrophe on the moons that sent us down here too early. Only a portion survived. Imagine how different things would be, if the world had been fully formed when we colonized it, and our people here in full strength? It would be us out there in the stars spreading our knowledge to those aliens. Not the other way around.”

“Sounds like an excuse to me,” Nyx said.

Safiyah narrowed her eyes. “What’s that?”

“Sounds like a pretty story lazy rich people tell themselves to justify not doing a goddamn thing to change the world.”

“And what exactly are you doing to change the world, little fly?” Safiyah said.

“I just cut off heads. Never pretended to be anything else.”

“Come,” Khatijah said. “Before they send out the dogs.”

“The dogs?” Ahmed said.

“I don’t get the impression the people here are going to be any more welcoming than their friends back there.”

“Blood and fucking,” Nyx said.

“I generally prefer it the other way round,” Safiyah said lightly.

Nyx watched the structure. It pulsed slowly, as if it were breathing. “Can you cut us into that thing?” she asked Safiyah.

“Certainly. But there’s bound to be a guard. We’ll need a distraction.”

Nyx glanced behind them, where they had left the intact bodies of the Aadhya… and Eshe.

“I can give them a fucking distraction,” she said.

Despite Ahmed’s protest, they went back to where they left the bodies and buried them. If Nyx couldn’t cut off their heads for fear of drawing the sand, she’d rather something else took care of them.

“You can control them?” she asked Safiyah. “When they come back up?”

“I cannot see all futures.”

“Can you or fucking can’t you?”

“It’s likely,” she said. “But you’ll need me to cut open Bomani to get inside. As soon as I do that, I’ll lose control of them. After that, Kage will need to bring them down, or they could turn on you.”

“Then let’s finish this shit,” Nyx said.

Once the bodies were buried, they walked back to the edge of the forest, and began the long hike toward Bomani. Nyx pointed them to a jagged rise overlooking the hold; a good vantage for a sniper.