Sidereal Quest

by E Robert Dunn

  As Pod 4 struggled for air space, moving along the rotating planetary surface, high-speed avalanches of hot ash, rock fragments, and gas moved down the sides of the disintegrating plateau volcanoes as the steep edges of their domes broke apart and collapsed.

  Where once the crew had made history on this planet, now only dissolving topography reigned: the bluffs where Nicraan eased Retho through the last throes of his Ka-tela resembled yielded waxworks, Lunon’s gravesite was nothing more than lenient mounds of oozing basalt, the everglades where BeeTee had sacrificed its life for Capel now steamed with slag, the conifer forest well-site where a territorial theropod tyrannosaurid had stalked a water-hunting away team now pooled with scoria…all gone, now nothing more than smelted refuse.

  Major Nicraan banked the podship through great, columnar roils of smoke and increasingly frequent bright energy discharges. Pitching the saucer sharply upward, Matasire narrowly avoid a spectacular airborne conflagration, then angled back obliquely away from the collapsing southwestern gulf’s coastline.

  “Warning,” the onboard’s ever-present heralding chimed in. “Perimeter alert. Approaching surge of pyroclastic phenomenon temperature registers one thousand, five hundred noches Heit and is moving at one hundred to one hundred, fifty kiloretems per node.”

  In the parabolic presentation bowl of the astrogator the area of concern was up for inspection. Retho instructed the topographic display to zoom in on the image and tapped the ledge-mounted keyboard, calling up a blur of mathematical calculations.

  “Got something,” he called out.

  Moela asked, “Using spherical trigonometry?”

  Retho nodded and kept his concentration on the holographic display as spherical triangles coalesced, captioned by a set of coordinates that began to blink steadily. “Scans show a relative safe ascension area to the north side, four point two kiloretems away,” he said, gripping the astrogator for support as the podship pitched.

  On the central command console projected a three-dimensional holograph of the planet, a globe. A series of spherical triangles flashed in a flight path.

  “Punch it with everything we’ve got!” Capel screamed through gritted teeth at Nicraan, feeling every breath he took hurt his chest. “Activate all shields!”

  “Got it!” Matasire said, his fingers clicking on the interface controls before him.

  As the crescent-shaped beachline of the supercontinent’s gulf spun under the podship’s prow, an energetic wall of a dilute mixture of searing gas, rock fragments, and gritty dust stretched toward the podship. The wind peppered the Pod with thousands of small impacts that clicked and clattered on its exterior shields, cutting off the view.

  "Okay, everyone! Let's get going," Nicraan chimed out as he nudged a double touch-sensitive keypad control on the exec console.

  In the dusky light, the podship rocketed through the orange-ebon skies and smashed through the sound barrier with an ear-tingling sonic boom. In its wake, it left, momentarily, concentric ribbons of vapor that displaced the ever-rising plumes of disturbed obsidian smoke.

  There were suddenly a series of large latitudinal earthquakes across the breadth of the giant continent. The ground swelled, being uplifted. One earthquake finally broke the layer of rock that held the super volcanoes’ magma in. The sandy plain below the rising Pioneer was disintegrating beneath its ascending hull like stale bread. The never-ending desertscape shuddered and split apart, tumbling bits and pieces of itself into a yawning pit -- and all the pressure the planet could build up in 640,000 cycles was unleashed in a cataclysmic event. Magma was flung 50 kiloretems into the atmosphere. Volcanic ash began to coat places as far away as the supercontinent’s western shore. One thousand cubic kiloretems of lava poured out of the volcanic magma chamber like ascending fingers of fire that formed rising stalks of incandescent rushing light resembling columns that supported a roiling faux roof of ash, molten stone, and pulverized ore, enough to coat the whole of the supercontinent with a layer 5 centiretems thick. The explosion’s force was 2,500 times that of anything experienced on the planet before. It was the loudest noise ever heard by the Aidennians.

  The livid glow of magma haloed the circular science vessel as the viscous lava surged from beneath, rocks fell, clattering hollowly as the earth cracked and breached open further. Great hexagonal columns of basalt split away from the ground and collapsed in massive chunks into cleaving bedrock. The slab on which the Pioneer Pod had rested for a cycle and a half fractured further and began to sink; the rising magma swallowed its base.

  Fierce heat of the lava gusted up around the escaping saucer. Other hemorrhaging cracks opened like aged parchment lines, engulfing twisted, stilted gourd-like warty trees that exploded into flame and smoke, swallowing the area's streams, gushing more superheated steam skyward. The roaring outside was deafening now. Inclined slightly upward, the pearlescent Pioneer 4 began to move steadily forward. The speed of the desperate podship was increasing exponentially as the antigravity’s negative effect on the planet’s gravity spat it away from the planet’s core. Matasire tried to tune out the ear-splitting cacophony as he used the podship’s sensors to navigate through the ash-filled mid-day skies.

  It’s all a matter of simple, applied aerial physics, Matasire told himself as he leaned forward in his flight seat to stare at the flight displays. A rushing shadow fell across his peripheral vision, he glanced over and out, his eyes widening.

  Knotted black clouds converged ahead. The approaching inland sea’s bedrock bucked and lurched, and the watery bay became stormy, stirred from deep below. Waves crashed into one another, building higher and higher and stampeding toward the coastline.

  Below and ahead, the entire western inland sea poured down through a fissure in its shattered bed, falling at inconceivable depths toward the planet’s core like a primal flood; fire meeting water with devastating affects -- geological power meeting hydro power. An endless battalion of cannons fired shot after shot as hot noxious fumes broiled up from the fractured seabed trench and the disappearing water. An estimated thirty-six hundred retems down, the inland sea’s alpelagic zone was exposed.

  More aquatic eruptions vomited plumes of neon blue lava, strangely altered minerals from the unstable core, as the core pressure was released. A gargantuan wave crashed over the top of the jagged mountainous cliffs that separated the shoreline from the leeward mainland, sending up spume and mist all around. Ironically, Nicraan saw a rainbow cast by the suns’ bright light through the brobdingnagian spindrift.

  Whirlpools, some being two hundred retems wide, appeared without warning in the rushing water, churning out extreme tides … like serial killers emerging from the depths. The vortices sucked down the epipelagic zone in classic hydrodynamic form as falling dense salt water dragged into light fresh water creating centrifugal forces. The power of the funnels grew stronger as the maelstroms navigated over deeper water; displaying hungry throats that roared with vengeances. At one hundred and fifty mets per node, disturbed concentric waves were sent out to crash as kiloretem-high tidal waves on what seashores remained, sowing more death and destruction on land.

  Waterspouts, giant pillars of silvery foam, whirled about, careening toward the beachline. The spouts circled like predators searching for anything to devour. An assault of tsunami waves obliterated the small gooseneck of land connecting the barrier peninsula to the mainland, turning it into a temporary island before it disappeared into a watery grave.

  The catastrophe continued.

  An archipelago of coral ridged basaltic islands rose on the rushing watery horizon. Placid in appearance, this islet arc contained over 130 active volcanoes. Plumes of smoke could be seen rising over the coned peaks until suddenly the volcanic chimneys culminated in colossal sequential explosions that blew the island chain apart. Like earthen engines, they vomited forth molten sulfuric acid-laced chyme aimed skyward.

  While the podship aerially skidded to avoid the disintegrating isles’ lava bombs, half of the main isla
nd’s erupting volcano slid into the ocean. The impact of pyroclastic flows coming off the flanks of the island displaced large volumes of water and generated a massive tsunami. An indicator icon on the flight board brought Nicraan back to task and he flipped the ship and hit the thrusters, sending the podship arcing through a high-gee parabola, up and away from the plummeting slabs of more colliding tectonic plates, detonating chain of islands, and away from the colossal waterfall of the falling sea.

  Retho was never idle. Calling up a tactical display as a side image on the active astrogator, he bent closer for a better view of the readout. It was happening, the volcanic updrafts plowed into the coiled sphincters of marine and terrestrial cyclones, and the integration was not smooth. The heavens had become a site of mass destruction… a vaporous cataclysm that rivaled any mythological clash of gods.

  The sonic barrage was enough to give the frantic crew pause. The bowport could have been framing any geotic battlefield.

  “Retho!” Matasire called out. “Talk to me!”

  On the astrogator display, atmospheric displacements blinked and retreated in random blossoms all over the parabolic bowl, with the glowing, jagged line of the podship’s course dancing back and forth through it. The navigational computer had inserted a black marker at the podship’s current position, and a dotted line showing how far the ship’s sensors had tracked a projected escape course.

  The lieutenant touched the projection diodes controls, and the image on the display flickered and rebuilt itself, flickered and re-grew again. “Are you reading tornadic storms ahead?” he asked Matasire.

  Nicraan nodded once, shortly. “Adjusting our course,” he said.

  The Pioneer responded to the major’s commands. Out the bowport a configuration of vaporous ribbons and flashes of cloud anger lashed and flared against the blackness like so much wildfire. It gave a chill in the pit of each Aidennian stomach. Before the hurrying podship unfolded the most magnificent yet most terrifying thing ever seen; the cloud bottoms bulged down like teats. Circulation formed in each one, probed downward, snaking right and left – then swept this way and then that way, moving across mets of air in rapid heartbeats.

  As the podship dropped down and starboard, a surge of unseen wind energy splashed against the hull like a careless wave. The funnel cloud had a strange, gliding motion, as if it were a sinister, questing appendage.

  “Storm density increasing by twenty percent …” Retho’s dark eyes were riveted to the astrogator’s sensors. “… twenty-five … “

  Neither pilot needed the lieutenant’s recitation to feel the growing fury in the tropospheric distortion. “Hold on!” Perezsire called out.

  The crash of a storm swallowing the podship whole competed with any blast from the thunderclouds or volcanic eruption, but it was a welcome, familiar violence that lifted the crushing dread from the Aidennians’ hearts even as it battered their tiny craft. As it chewed at the podship’s shields, it made a continuous series of dull thuds, like automatic artillery pieces pounding away in the distance. Thrashing flares of lightning fire writhed across the bowport, whipping their taxed shields like living tentacles as electro-plasma rocked and shook and pitched the Pioneer 4 in warning of what they would face should they stray too close to the heart of that fury. It was a power Matasire already respected well, and one he didn’t plan to abuse. Weaving carefully between the grasping tendrils, he counted the heartbeats since the podship’s insertion, and smiled.

  Then the opportunity he knew would appear, did. Nicraan aimed the podship neatly through a tear in the funnel cloud hardly large enough to take it. “I’m feeling daring,” he shrugged, enjoying the luxury.

  Retho inserted the real-time visual feed from the astrogator’s sensors to the command consoles; it granted both pilots the privilege of watching without interrupting their work. It was worth having the chance to sneak a look, Perezsire admitted. It helped Nicraan wrench the podship sideways – to avoid the skirt of electrical fire biting at the Pioneer 4’s belly. It also deflected a hungry tentacle that swelled all too quickly into a searing blast of light and spinning debris aimed for the podship’s upflung nacelles.

  “Course plotted through these tornadoes,” Retho announced. “The storm activity is widespread in this vicinity; therefore, our course will be an indirect route.”

  Matasire waited for the telltales on his panel to blink acceptance of the computer’s control, then touched their confirmation icons in acceptance of the navigational data. Despite constant punishment, tough ole Pioneer 4 was still standing up to the torture of atmospheric attack time after time.

  Commander Capel gripped the arms of his flight chair and endured another shattering energy punch on his podship’s shields. In his periphery he saw sparks blow forward from the environmental console behind him, but he didn’t turn to look at the vacant station. BeeTee …

  "Prepare for G's," Nicraan said, hitting several additional stabilizer contact points. "And, here we really go." As he pushed the podship upward, a tremendous clamor filled the air as the tornadoes were left far behind.

  Moving sharply skyward and accelerating steadily, the Pioneer 4 left behind the patchwork supercontinent’s desert caldera’s gouty fluidic abscess. The glowing saucer once again leapt away from the scabbed and uninviting face of the planet. Magma geysers resembling stellar coronas burned an intense blue-white light burst from the incandescent surface, reaching out to capture anything within their grasp. From the western edge of the fractured landscape, a roaring wall of fine-grained pyroclastic material composed of tiny particles of explosively disintegrated old volcanic rock, new magma, dust and cinders reached for the saucer as powerful winds clutched at its tough alloyed skin, neither slowing the podship nor altering its course.

  Capel murmured an encouragement to the podship as it raced along at high mach speed while under siege; the sturdy science vessel heaved itself forward while its shields sparkled in destruction’s grip. Something large and dark resembling a planetary crust fragment smashed into the shields of the desperate podship from portside. Sparks shot out of the upper command apse’s panels, alighting on the pilots’ shoulders. A quick glance at the command consoles’ displays confirmed what the sparks had announced.

  “Shields are down by thirty-seven percent,” Perezsire said.

  “Life support and main power systems are showing extreme duress,” Dara warned, her console’s boards alive with yellow telltales. “We’ve got to get out of here; we can’t take this unstable atmospheric pressure much longer.”

  Matasire remained silent as he pushed his controls. Everyone onboard felt the saucer craft shudder slightly as it continued to rise through the crushing weight of atmosphere.

  Capel's attention was fixed on one gauge. He scanned the co-pilot instrument panels, ignoring the murk-filled bowport in favor of the images on the holoset monitors set into the panel below it. "Fifty kiloretems and ascending. On course. Orbital insertion in five point three micronodes. Antigrav now at two hundred and fifty megawatts and delivering ten gees of acceleration."

  "Sounding good," Nicraan murmured, watching the holoset before him. Two sine lines overlapped pleasingly on the viewer. "Crossing the stratopause, entering stratosphere. Boost antigrav toroid by point seven-three. Engage artificial gravity in five point three micronodes. We should be at 1/20th of planetary gravity and through the mesosphere by then."

  "Elevating antigrav by point seven-three," Retho announced and then brushed his fingertips over his control interface. He then tabbed several timer contact points. A series of countdown bleeps became a background din on the haute air of the flight deck, and then the ship seemed to stumble and then lurch forward.

  Capel Perezsire's stomach protested as the gravity of the little world receding behind them gave a full, unforgiving pull. Nicraan vectored wildly as he aimed the podship at a spinning funnel of smoke, not caring what it was, because at the other end of the tunnel he could see the stars.

  It was when the Pioneer 4 shot
upward through the conduit of vapor that he realized he had taken everyone inside a crumbling cyclone. He let the adrenaline rush sweep him as he weaved and pirouetted the podship through the windy vacuole toward the lights at the end of the tunnel, a starry sky.

  Retho's gaze danced from one readout to another. A slight discrepancy appeared, and he hurried to correct for it. "Unequal thrust reading. Vector alteration needed."

  Obligingly, Nicraan nudged a RCS contact control, watched his viewer with satisfaction as a digital needle crawled back to where it belonged.

  "Compensation affected," Retho reported. "Holding steady now. We're set. Ten retems to terminal atmosphere. Looks like we’ll soon be in the clear.”

  Capel was beginning to believe they'd make it without any trouble when a violent tremor ran through the flight deck. It sent unfastened articles and the frantic thoughts of the crew flying. The tremor lasted only an instant and wasn't repeated.

  "What was that?" Capel Perezsire wondered aloud. "Report, Moela."

  "Having some trouble down in Engineering. Computer is assisting, but I need help."

  Retho asked, "What's the trouble?"

  "Starboard quad's overheating."

  “Warning,” called out the inboard computer. “Podship velocity decelerating four retems per micronode. Orbital insertion delayed by one macronode and increasing…”

  Suddenly everyone’s stomach was in his or her respective throat. The podship began to plummet planetward, its phosphorous glow dimmed. Not too far below, magma throats yawned open eager to swallow the desperate saucer.

  “We’re falling!” Dara screamed, her grip on her console board tightened as she fought g-forces to slam her into the overhead ceiling works.