Authors: Mark Henrikson
“What’s our status?” Hastelloy asked his first officer.
“Shields, propulsion and communication are completely fried, but we still have power. Our momentum will carry us to the third planet in about two days.” Gallono reported.
“Well thank goodness, because here I thought we might be in a bit of trouble,” Tomal stated angrily.
Ignoring Tomal’s comment, Hastelloy asked, “What’s the status of our adversary?”
“The Alpha ship is
adrift with no power except emergency life support. They have no weapons or propulsion either,” Gallono replied.
Hastelloy was quite sure he knew the answer to his next question already so he decided to make light of it to let the news hit the crew with a softer landing. “Be a good man and tell me they’re on a collision course with the star in this system and face an imminent and scary demise.”
“I could tell you that, but then you’d be a little shocked running into them on the planet’s surface,” Gallono answered with a touch of gallows humor. “The fact is, their ship is five miles off our right side and is also headed for the third planet. They’ll land approximately one hour ahead of us.”
“Naturally. It’s been that kind of day for us so far hasn’t it?” Hastelloy said while rubbing his face with the palm of his hands.
“You got that right,” Gallono added. “About all we can do to each other now until we land is make scary faces out the window. I’ve already got dibs on the view screen in the mess hall, so find yourselves another spot.”
Chapter 11: Make it a Soft Landing
“
Captain, the Alpha
ship just entered the planet’s atmosphere,” ensign Valnor reported.
“Well, let’s see how good their pilot is then. With any luck, at that speed and with the back third of the ship blown off, they won’t be able to control their entry,” Gallono stated. “Hope for the best, but plan for
the worst right Captain? What is our next move?”
“Let’s just see where they end up,” Hastelloy responded while looking over the shoulder of his science officer at the sensor display. “We still have some time before we attempt our own tenuous crash landing.
“They are trying to hit a moving, rotating landing site while traveling at over 200 miles per second with nothing but emergency thrusters to adjust their course. If they come in too steep, they will plow into the planet. If their approach is too shallow, they will bounce off the atmosphere and hurl through space never to be heard from again.”
“Even if they do make the perfect entry, they will probably burn up in the atmosphere with the damage they have sustained. I must conclude they will not survive this,” the science officer stated firmly.
Walking over to Valnor sitting at the helm, Gallono replied with a playful tone. “Careful there Tonwen, minus the extensive structural damage to the ship, you just described our situation as well. If you keep it up our expert pilot here might get a little nervous.” He gave the ensign a reassuring pat on the shoulder. “You did take the landing on a planet at high speeds with no propulsions systems course in the academy didn’t you?”
Taking the commander’s lead Valnor responded in kind. “Of course I did. It was right after the course on flying through an enemy ship at ramming speed to cause its destruction. I believe Captain Hastelloy was the guest instructor that day weren’t you sir?” He glanced at his commanding officer; obviously hoping the humor was well received.
It was. Hastelloy was happy to see the crew keeping things loose and not letting the severity of the situation get the better of them. He hated to kill the mood, but he had to deliver the bad news. “The Alpha ship has landed.”
“Already?” Gallono asked.
“They came in at a steep angle to let the nose of their ship take most of the heat during reentry. With unbelievably perfect timing, once they got through the upper atmosphere, they flared out to a flat trajectory about ten miles off the ground and let the friction of the lower atmosphere finish the job of slowing them down,” the Captain continued. “There was no explosion when they finally touched down so it looks like they survived. I must say, that was the second best piece of piloting I have ever witnessed.”
“Good lord. What was the best landing you ever saw then?” Valnor asked.
“You should know ensign, it’s the one I’ve visualized you making about an hour from now,” Hastelloy said with the utmost confidence.
Gallono whistled softly. “That must have been one hell of a light show to see from the ground. Where did they finally land?” he asked.
“They set down near a river delta on the northern most tip of a continent along the equator,” Tonwen reported. “According to my findings, the largest concentration of species Sigma is nearby. They could not have picked a more damaging place to land from a cultural contamination point of view.”
“Sorry Valnor, I have to revise my prior statement. That was the absolute best display of piloting skills I have ever seen. On top of the difficult entry, they hand picked their landing site and hit it right on the mark. This was no coincidence. The Alpha weren’t content to simply put down on dry land anywhere on the planet. They needed to get the local population involved in this fight,” Hastelloy said, while not entirely able to hide his admiration of the feat.
“But why would they do that? Species Sigma might be hostile to them,” Valnor naively asked.
“That’s a possibility,” Hastelloy answered, “but not a likely one. Think about it. A giant ball of fire descends from the heavens and lands right next to a primitive civilization. Then out step these magnificent beings who possess weapons of unimaginable power. My best guess is the local population will run and hide. The real purpose of their landing site choice is to thwart my attack plans.
“Had they landed in the middle of nowhere we would simply bring our people out of the Nexus and assault them with many hundreds of times their numbers. Our victory would’ve been a certainty. Now that the planet’s indigenous population has come into play, the council’s noninterference directive must dictate our actions.”
“Are the council directives standard reading for Alpha combat officers now?” Gallono asked rhetorically while looking like he was ready to kick in his workstation. “They use our rules of engagement against us at every turn. First the no attacks without a collector ship in the assault force, now the noninterference directive for inhabited planets. Why don’t the politicians in the council tie our hands behind our backs while they’re at it?”
Before his first officer could really get going, Hastelloy interrupted. “I think that resolution is up for a vote next week, in the mean time we have our orders. Valnor, can you use the thrusters to adjust our descent so we land on an island in that sea just above the Alpha’s landing site? It looks like there’s one about 50 miles off the coast that will work well.”
“I can, but why would we do that?” Valnor asked. “This landing will be tough enough without adding the extra difficulty of having to a
im for a tiny island; plus that will put us farther away from the Alpha and delay our attack.”
G
allono lent his support to Valnor’s argument. “He raises some valid issues sir. Once we land we need to go after the Alpha right away. If we’re stuck on an island it will take more time to construct a boat capable of carrying us to the mainland. By that time, who knows how well entrenched the Alpha might be.”
“Valnor, put us down on the island I indicated,” the Captain ordered with a hint of frustration in his voice. “Your point is well taken, but the council directive for landing on an inhabited planet
couldn’t be more clear. If it is controllable, we are to put down in an isolated area to eliminate any chance of Neo scale cultural contamination. Species Sigma is not seafaring yet so the nearby island is the appropriate landing site, regardless of how inconvenient it might be for us.” Expecting this statement to be the last of the discussion, Hastelloy began working feverishly on the data pad in his hand.
Tomal finally took a break from his brooding to add his opinion on the matter. “I have to agree with the rest of the crew, Captain. Designing and constructing a boat capable of navigating that distance will take several days, maybe even a few weeks. Giving the Alpha that much time to establish their defenses is not wise.”
Tonwen also had an opinion he wished to share on the matter. “If you are worried about Neo scale contamination sir, I am quite certain that will have already been accomplished by the Alpha landing so close to species Sigma. Landing closer so we can take immediate action seems a more prudent course to take.”
Before the Captain could respond, Gallono stated with all seriousness. “I don’t know Valnor. The ship feels a little ou
t of control to me. I think we will just have to follow our current course and land right next to the Alpha ship. I don’t think there is much we can do about it, do you?”
The frustration in Hastelloy finally came to a boil. In this situation he didn’t like the council directive any more than his crew, but he would follow it. The fact that his crew felt free to question his orders was the last straw. “Gentlemen, you are under the mistaken imp
ression that I am asking you for a favor. Your Captain has ordered you to land on the closest island, Valnor, now do it!”
As the helmsman immediately acted on his orders, Hastelloy paused to survey the bridge and get a feel for the crew’s state of mind. The mood was obvious; the ‘because I said so’ justification of his order was not going to be enough.
Hastelloy couldn’t blame his crew for needing to hear more. Harking back to his childhood he vividly remembered never being impressed by that type of explanation from his father, and he imagined it would go over no better now as a grown man.
“The bottom line is this,” the Captain began, “the council doesn’t want another incident to happen like when the Novi made first contact with species Alpha. When Captain Diaz was forced to land on the Alpha home world all those years ago, he had no idea what to do. His crew did the best they could, but in the end they were making it up as they went along, and the end result was a complete disaster.
“Here we are in the same situation. The only difference is our people have had 40,000 years to develop a guide on what to do in this circumstance. We have to trust the guidance of the directive rather than our own self-serving judgments. The directive has been debated by millions of scholars over tens of thousands of years. The five of us are not about to improve upon their thinking in the next few minutes.
“There’s too much at stake to improvise as Captain Diaz did at first contact with the Alpha. If we do things wrong here, we might plant the seeds for another hostile species to come after us just like the Alpha have done. The greater good for the Novi people is served by us following the directive to the letter.”
For good measure, Hastelloy stood up from his command chair, walked to the front of the bridge and turned around to face his men. After looking at each one of them in turn he leaned forward with his hands on top of the helm station.
“If following the council directive we all swore an oath to uphold is not good enough for you, then consider the situation from a tactical point of view. Landing farther away will allow us to hit the Alpha at a time and method of our choosing. They can only sit and wait for our attack. If we were to land right next to the Alpha ship we’d lose this advantage. They would know exactly where we are and be on top of us immediately. I prefer to attack at a time of my choosing when I’m certain I can win the fight. I refuse to assume a reckless strategy of jumping into an unknown situation and hoping for the best.”
As Hastelloy reviewed his crew again, it was as if he turned a switch. The slouching men with glazed looks in their eyes were replaced with officers sitting at attention with the spark of life glowing in their eyes. The confidence in their commander being guided by sound military thinking and not by politicians or scholars had returned.
The Captain paced back to his command chair satisfied there would be no more questions about his orders. “Now, let’s get this ship on the ground.”
“About that, sir, I’ve put together a landing program to get us on the island, I think. I know it’s my responsibility as the helmsman, and I am sorry to ask it, but I feel a bit out of my league here. Can you or Tonwen double-check my calculations?” Valnor asked.
“Of course. With a fully loaded Nexus and our own lives on the line we’re going to run this landing procedure through every check, and simulation we can come up with. Then we’ll do it all over again for good measure,” the Captain replied.
After spending the next half hour stress testing the landing program, Hastelloy was satisfied with the result. “Well done Valnor, your programming was spot on. The only adjustment we made was to keep us in a high orbit longer to lose our speed so our fire trail will be less noticeable and completely gone by the time we approach our landing site. That way the Alpha will have no clue where we set down and the risk of cultural contamination will be less. Please upload the sequence and begin the countdown.”
The Lazarus boldly
dove nose first toward the planet at the blistering pace of 200 miles per second. Just before entering the atmosphere, and a mere two seconds away from colliding with the planet’s surface, the thrusters beneath the front nose fired. The maneuver was just enough to throw the ship into a decaying orbit in the thermosphere layer. As the ship made contact with particles in the atmosphere, the outer hull ignited into flames.
The inferno outside grew more intense and began testing the limits of the heat shields as the craft descended into the mesosphere. At this point, the thrusters on both sides of the front nose fired in an alternating pattern causing the Lazarus to wobble side to side in an effort to bleed off speed more rapidly.
Valnor jumped in his seat as sparks flew from his console. “The hull temperature is out of control sir. Circuits are starting to fry all over the ship. We need to do something.”
“The dye has been cast E
nsign. There’s no turning back now. We can’t do anything until we reach our glide pattern,” Hastelloy stated in a calm, matter of fact voice. “Just sit tight, enjoy the show, and try not to get singed.”
Eventually the ship slowed from the friction of the atmosphere. The flames died down and the hull temperature returned to tolerable levels. The Lazarus entered the lower atmosphere and began a gliding descent to its landing zone. Just when Hastelloy breathed a sigh of relief, thinking the most treacherous part of their landing was behind them, the ship bucked to the side and dove nose first toward the planet.
Valnor sprang into action. “I’ve assumed manual control. We’re passing through a severe storm and have lost a lot of altitude. We might not be able to make our landing site.”