-It's high time to begin, sister, - said the commander to his flight engineer.
-Yes, brother, - she answered, carrying out his order, and added: - You know, sometimes I wish we were semi-civilised... But we are civilised. So we have no bombs and no permission to wipe out this mess...
The sound of her words died away in complete silence of spaceship's control room. In this moment ship's belly cracked. It was not an accident, but the direct outcome of the commander's order.
From the gap in ship's armour, a small object appeared. This cone-shaped thing was a lander. It dived into the atmosphere to learn the planet in every aspect.
The first settlement they saw was a small village. Some simple dwellings encircled the well.
The well dried up a long time ago. This place had no life. There was nothing to do here, nothing to explore. Nevertheless, the lander spent the whole day there, flying around, observing, gathering information.
There was morning, then evening, the first day.
The next day the lander moved to another settlement. It was a small town: one big building in the centre and barracks around it. The large building was similar to smaller ones, except one distinctive feature. It had a high chimney.
Like the village of the first day, this town was round shaped and dead.
There was morning, then evening, the second day.
The next day the lander visited a relatively big city.
Its general structure was similar to other settlements: there was a residential area around a source of water and energy. But regarding any detail, it was completely different. The central structure here was separated from the living area by a great distance and the outer circle consisted of multi-storey buildings.
The lander found some traces of water. Locals used to pull it from the air and to store in small canisters. Some of these were full even now.
But there was nobody to drink it. All of the inhabitants left trying to escape deadly radiation.
The well-protected lander carefully studied the domed building.
It turned out to be a nuclear power plant. After groundwaters were pumped dry, an immediate solution was to catch the moisture from the air. It worked, but it took a lot of energy.
In this city worn out reactor leaked putting the end to local history.
There was morning, then evening, the third day.
The fourth site lander explored looked like a depot. There were many water tanks protected by a wall. This place had life.
However, the people in the orbit discovered no interest to this fact. They avoided any contact. Their drone remained invisible and undetectable, but all-seeing.
In fact, here was nothing interesting. Just a depot for stolen water and for means to squeeze it from unlucky neighbours.
There was morning, then evening, the fourth day.
The next object was completely different. It resembled a buried spaceship. Most of it laid under the surface. The tip of this spherical thing had some sensors and other means of protection.
It had life too. But it was entirely isolated. A drop of water never came out.
The lander could contact the inhabitants through the object's armour, but did not even try.
There was morning, then evening, the fifth day.
On the sixth day, the drone found a pyramid. It also had life. Surprisingly civilised life. Locals get energy from the sun and wind. Water they extracted from the air. They synthesise everything: from vegetables to meat.
They answered willingly to the signal, transmitted via the lander.
There was morning, then evening, the sixth day.
By the seventh day, the lander finished its work. It returned to the orbiter and rested from all its work. The contact was established. Now inhabitants of the pyramid had a hope to save their planet with some extraplanetary help.