"I'll never talk shit about Martian Engineering again," Sabatine said as the assault boat settled onto the beach. It was one thing to know that an assault boat should be ok after decades under salt water, it was another thing to see it rise from the ocean and settle onto the beach as though it were fresh out of graving dock. Well not quite. Sea creatures had colonized the hull, coral and barnacles encrusted the lower portion of the hull, most of it was dead now, killed by the waters as they boiled beneath the plasma jets. It gave off a nauseating scent of burnt lime and boiled shellfish.

Sabatine waited a few seconds for the landing site to cool then walked over into the shade of the landed assault boat. It was boxy twenty five meters from nose to tail and almost as broad across its down swept wings. Three of the four ordanace pods were still attached, the body of an eel flopping lifelessy from one of them. That was good, though Sabatine wouldn't want to risk firing them without a full survey of the munitions. She conducted a quick inspection of the external fittings. She wouldn't have certified the bird as air worthy no matter how much the deck officer was willing to pay in chits or booze. Still, she didn't have to take it up into the void, just had to get it 400 clicks back home.

"Open the bay!" she called to Tiber and a moment later was rewarded by a hideous groan of tortured hydraulics. Sabatine reached up and grasped a corroded release handle and pulled hard. The lever depressed with a crunch. The assault boat quivered then there were two sharp bangs as the clearing charges went off and the rear ramp crashed down. Sea water, silt, and sea life poured out in a sludgy wave that crashed onto the atol. Assault bolts were built to land troops and provide close air support. Explosive charges were built into the hatch linings to free them in case the hatch bound during combat damage. It seemed they worked just as well against decades of corrosion.

"Everything okay?" Tiber called in evident concern.

"Never cracked a boat under fire? Lucky, lucky," she called as she walked through the miasma of cordite smoke. The interior of bay was dark and lightless, hung with half rotted crash webbing and barnacle encrusted weapon racks. It smelled dank and fishy now, but it was really going to stink in a couple of days.

"How does it look?" Tiber asked, climbing out of the cockpit and sliding down to the ground beside her.

"I'm hoping you have bleach back at your place," she sighed.