A groaning, ripping sound came through the speedboat’s belly. The deck split down the middle and Yoninne was looking straight up into the morning sky—then down at the water. Around her timbers and planking flew in all directions. Finally she came to rest, hanging upside down from her harness. For a moment she swung gently back and forth on the straps. All was silent except for a faint drip drip drip somewhere behind her. From the marshy ground a meter below her head, scraggly brush thrust stiff fingers within ten centimeters of her face, bringing an odor of muck and decay.Yoninne pulled the harness release and the universe spun around her as she swung down onto the boggy ground. She staggered to her feet and walked dazedly around the wreckage.Dawn had come to the desert: peeking over the jumbled plain to the east, the sun turned the rocks and sand to tan and orange, the brush to dusty green.Very pretty. But the speedboat was an unrecognizable pile of junk. Bre’en had renged them into some kind of marsh.
