Ghost of Jupiter (Jade Saito - Action Sci-Fi Series Book 1)

by Tom Jordan

  Before long, he began getting bold with the controls, swerving the ship up and down and side to side to get a feel for its pitch and yaw rates.

  “Saito,” Marco said. “What’s your status? Looks like your attitude controls or gyro is acting up?”

  She and Tommy laughed out loud together. “No,” she replied. “Just letting Tommy fly a little.”

  “Watch it,” Marco scolded. “Your ship is in rough shape. We need to get you to the station as fast as possible.”

  Jade shushed Tommy, patting the air with a gloved hand, so that they’d stop laughing before she replied. Once they’d calmed down, she responded with a terse, “Understood. Saito out.” Then they resumed their snickering. Tommy flew a straight course toward the Keillor asteroid.

  Jade had forgotten what it was like to have a sincere friend around. Two years of solitary flights in the endless black had stolen the memory of how warm it was in the company of friends. She was finding a new appreciation for Tommy’s enthusiasm, intelligence, and light heart. Despite everything awful that had happened, she enjoyed working with him. They were a natural team.

  As Tommy approached their destination, Jade watched tiny rock fragments streak past the cockpit. Some of them dinged what remained of the canopy or were cast aside by the life-support field, which threw up harsh flashes as it made contact with the minute objects. Eventually, pieces large enough to be detected by the ship’s instruments began to appear on her map. After an episode of Tommy weaving between volleyball-sized rocks, she noticed that the distant ones were growing increasingly large.

  “Looks like Keillor is in an asteroid field?” she asked.

  “Right,” Tommy said. “Keillor is the king of the asteroid field. Biggest one, right in the middle.” His suit’s comm system added a touch of static after each transmission.

  “Somehow I figured it was out here on its own. I guess I should take back the controls since I’m familiar with the ship and he’s a little injured.”

  “Agreed,” Tommy said as he relinquished the controls. “Last thing we need now is more ship damage.”

  Jade had to decelerate and thread between large asteroids as she drew closer to their destination. The approach from this angle was toward the system’s star, which was shining somewhere ahead through the asteroid field, so the asteroids were mostly visible as outlines or bright edges with most of each rock cloaked in darkness. Jade continually lowered her speed, relying more on her holomap than her eyes. She subconsciously tightened her muscles every time she thrust vertically or laterally to avoid an asteroid she couldn’t see but her computer told her was there.

  Jade entered communications range and Tommy prepared for their arrival.

  “Keillor Control, this is Ghost of Jupiter requesting docking clearance. Class-two landing pad,” Tommy said after opening a channel to the control station.

  “Ghost of Jupiter, you are approved for docking on pad Bravo Two-Niner,” replied a woman’s voice in a clipped, efficient reply. “Stand by for your docking window.”

  “Thank you.” Tommy drummed his gloved fingers on the seat arm while they waited.

  “Ghost of Jupiter, this is Keillor Flight Control.”

  “This is Ghost of Jupiter. Flight Commander Thompson speaking. Go ahead.” Tommy winked at Jade, and she snickered.

  “Your docking window opens in sixteen minutes. Transmitting nav data.”

  “Understood. Thank you very much. We’re, uh, having some mechanical issues. Can you put us in touch with a repair station? And can we possibly speed up that landing window?”

  “Ghost of Jupiter, you can find ship services within our information hub. Be aware that you must read and agree to follow all station rules before connecting your ship’s computer to our network or disembarking from your vessel. Severe penalties apply if you fail to comply with this notice. Also, landing timetables are not negotiable.”

  “Okay, uh, Ghost of Jupiter out,” Tommy said.

  “She was a friendly one,” Jade said sarcastically.

  Tommy had already begun the docking procedure. A course-guide hologram floated in Jade’s field of view, but indicated that their assigned dock was on the far side of Keillor.

  “Hey,” Jade said, one side of her mouth turning down into a thoughtful frown, “you’ve been watching the life support, right? How much time does the field have left?”

  “Forty-two minutes, Captain.”

  “Okay. That’s plenty of time. And the crate?”

  “Eighteen hours. Ish.”

  “Hang on,” Jade said. “I have a thought. Ghost to Rebel Star. Are you there, Marco?”

  “Yes. Everything alright?”

  “Everything’s fine. I just wondered what the plan was for unloading the cargo. Is there a way you can contact the people who placed the bounty? Tommy says we’ve got eighteen hours on the crate timer.”

  “Don’t worry,” Marco said. “I’m already on it. You just get on a landing pad safely. Let’s get Tommy’s injuries checked out.”

  The asteroid itself emerged from the darkness ahead. It filled nearly the entire canopy. Square docking platforms dotted the surface of the mammoth planetoid and shadows played across its pockmarked exterior.

  “Check it out!” Tommy said. He looked up at Keillor, transfixed.

  “I’m going for a close pass on the way so we can have a look,” Jade said. She swung the ship in closer to the surface. An inspection of the landing platforms revealed that, while they appeared solid, they each contained four to six individual pads. A freighter landed on one of the platforms and then sank, descending within the asteroid. The platforms had bright, gigantic floodlights. Those lights, navigation beacons, and the running lights of ships coming and going turned the otherwise-dark asteroid into a flashing hive of activity.

  The aspect of Keillor that impacted them the most was its monstrous size. It looked more like a rogue moon than a chunk of rock, yet its position within this asteroid field and its potato-esque shape gave away its true identity.

  Tommy studied a hologram of the rocky body floating in front of him. “This thing’s so large that its gravity is affecting the surrounding asteroid bodies,” he said. “Huge radius, huge mass…it’s huge!”

  “It’s valuable, right? That’s why there’s a settlement here?” Jade said.

  “Yes. It’s an X-type asteroid. Heavy metals. This big guy is full of the good stuff. Platinum, ruthenium, iridium, you name it. That’s why they have an entire city way out here on this thing. They have big tech markets, too. Cheaper to manufacture here away from big-government oversight.”

  They continued to skim the asteroid, looking upward through the canopy roof and marveling at Keillor’s size. They pointed out other ships when they spotted them. Jade was struck by how the ships were tiny dots dwarfed by the asteroid, like insects around an enormous hive.

  “Pilots out here only have to transport finished goods, and can avoid tariffs and import restrictions,” Jade said. Her background in cargo-hauling work made her aware of how valuable these metals could be and the way it affected economics. “If I had the right licenses, I could probably fill my hold with exports and make a decent profit here. But my financial problems have led me here to this wonderful new career instead.” She immediately regretted the sarcasm that saturated her words.

  “It’s not all bad. We’re able to work together, at least.” Tommy’s warm smile was undeniably genuine. “I’m grateful for that much.”

  Jade nodded. “I’m sorry, you’re ri—”

  The view of the asteroid outside the canopy spiraled as the ship bucked beneath them. The lights and holos flickered, throwing the cockpit into strobing fits of light and darkness.

  “What the hell was that?” Jade said.

  “I don’t know,” replied. “Did we hit—” The lights and holos continued their erratic flashing. “No, no, nothing around—”

  “I can’t see what’s going on here with the holos flashing like—”

  The
lights and hologram interface stopped their blinking and stayed on. Jade glanced side to side, her hands hovering above the controls.

  “Did you do that?”

  “Not me,” Tommy said. His fingers danced on the keypads on his flight seat, and he reached for the keyboard mounted at an angle on his right. “Hang on.”

  Jade worked the flight stick, throttle, and pedals. She reoriented the ship to their prior course toward the landing pad, bringing the asteroid back into view. Everything seemed normal, and the ship responded as she expected it to.

  “Reactor is fine,” Tommy said. “Looks like maybe a problem with capacitors, or power conduits. Some systems are just receiving erratic power. That’s not good. I guess that head-on collision did more damage than we thought. We should get a full diagnostic when we dock.”

  Jade was about to ask whether the power problem would affect navigation when Tommy let out a long, drooping, “Ohh.”

  “What?” Her heart sank.

  His head dropped into his open palm. He rubbed his eyes. “Our life-support field is now showing twelve minutes remaining.”

  An annoyed sigh escaped Jade. “So it will run out before we’re supposed to dock?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well…that’s not gonna work.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Alright, alright. Let’s think a little.”

  She looked out the canopy at the enormous asteroid hanging before them, its surface sparsely dotted with landing pads, elevators, and floodlights. She tapped a button on her console. “Keillor Flight Control, Ghost of Jupiter. Come in, please.”

  “Keillor. Go ahead, Ghost of Jupiter.” The voice was a man’s this time—a different operator. Hopefully that would help.

  “We’re having mechanical issues up here. Our canopy is broken and the life-support field is the only thing keeping us alive, and it’s about to go down. This is an emergency situation. Can we move up our landing? We have eleven minutes left here.”

  “Understood, Ghost of Jupiter. I can get authorization for an exception if this is an emergency. Would you like to use the direct corridor rather than wait for an elevator pad?”

  Jade’s and Tommy’s eyebrows shot up. They locked eyes. “Yes, please.” Tommy pumped a fist.

  “Stand by, Ghost of Jupiter.” She and Tommy frowned at one another, then Jade watched the life support countdown timer as she waited.

  “Ghost of Jupiter, Keillor Control.”

  “This is Ghost. Go ahead.”

  “Ghost of Jupiter, we have a freighter entering the corridor, so it’s going to be full for a while. I moved up your window. We’ll give you a pad right away, but it’s going to take at least ten minutes for your descent into the hangar from the surface.”

  “That’s…” Tommy said. “We have ten minutes on our life support right now. We need to land and get to safety immediately.”

  “I would advise you to put out a general distress call, given your circumstances.”

  “Can’t you send a rescue ship?”

  “Ghost, we can do that, but it’ll take at least twenty minutes for rescue to launch and get over to you.”

  “Okay. We’re coming. We’ll figure something out. Please keep our pad clear.”

  “There’s something else, Ghost. You are ordered to disable all defensive shielding prior to landing.”

  Jade and Tommy looked at each other, their faces screwed up in confusion. “Our d-field isn’t engaged,” Tommy said.

  “We are detecting an energy field in effect on your vessel. Per Keillor law, you may only land if all fields are offline.”

  Tommy rubbed his injured leg, scrunching up his face against the pain. Jade pointed at the sparkling life-support energy field reinforcing her cockpit. Tommy nodded.

  “Oh!” Tommy said. “Flight Control, that’s the life-support field we’ve been talking about. It’s not a combat shield or scan inhibitor or anything like that. Please, we’re running out of time here.”

  “Ghost of Jupiter, Keillor law dictates that no vessel may land with an active energy field. This is to prevent the concealment and smuggling of dangerous or forbidden goods. Energy fields can interfere with our customs scans and are strictly forbidden. Again, you may only land if you disable your vessel’s shield.”

  “But our ship will decompress if we do that.”

  “Be advised that if you try to land with an active energy field, you will be fired upon by automated turrets and pursued by our security force.”

  Tommy breathed a frustrated growl and slammed his fist against the chair’s armrest. “Stand by,” he snapped.

  Jade had already started raising her hands in a questioning gesture. “What do they expect us to do? We have to land!” They would be completely exposed to the vacuum of space without the life-support field. They wore their exo suits, but would everything else work properly without atmosphere? Would they survive the force of decompression?

  “Okay. Let’s…let’s think about this again. There’s nowhere else we can make it to in time to land. We need to land on their pad since we can’t use their direct corridor.” She pressed a finger to her pursed lips and frowned. “Mmm. We might be able to squeeze between the corridor wall and that freighter, but judging by their friendliness they would probably take action against us.”

  “Yeah, gun action,” Tommy said.

  “If we do nothing, we’re going to run out of time and be exposed to space. Can we make that work? We’ve already got suits on, thanks to you.”

  Oddly, he didn’t respond to the praise. He swept his arm through the air at the assortment of green menus, icons, maps, and models. “Holos won’t work without atmosphere.”

  “I hadn’t thought of that.” She sighed, her shoulders drooping. Fatigue seemed to choose this moment to catch up with her. She let go of the controls and Ghost floated along its course. “So, what do we do?”

  He looked out the starboard canopy. She could just see his cheek through the curved visor of his helmet.

  “Hang on.” He navigated through menus in front of him that Jade couldn’t read from her own seat. “Okay,” he said. “I’m gonna lay out a plan. A very sketchy one.”

  Jade took a breath, attempting to center herself. “Hit me.”

  “One. We have to kill the life support field to land. We can’t disable it directly due to a safety protocol. That means we have to restart the ship’s computer.”

  Jade closed her eyes and hissed out a sigh. She would have rubbed her face if she could. Restarting the ship’s computer would take a few minutes, during which time they’d have no control over Ghost. Tommy knew this.

  “Okay,” she said. “What’s step two?”

  “What do you mean? There is no step two.”

  “Then that’s it? That’s the whole plan?”

  “Well, pretty much, yeah. I guess step two can be for us to land and get snacks and coffee.”

  “So how will we navigate? How will I know velocity and distance? What happens if Ghost doesn’t reboot because the startup safety checks fail? And how will we avoid other ships and micrometeoroids?”

  He held up his hands. “I do remember saying it wasn’t a very good plan.”

  “What if w—”

  She looked up as the ship lights flickered and strobed. The beginning of a warning alarm sounded and was cut off by a rush of whooshing air, audible even inside the exo suits. Within half a minute, the noise faded as though it was connected to a volume control lowered to zero.

  “I guess that’s it for the life support,” Jade said. “Now we can skip the reboot, correct?”

  “Yeah.” Tommy looked at her. “How are we going to find the pad and land safely?”

  “I’ll fly by sight. We can do this.”

  “We? Why are you smiling like that?”

  She made her best attempt at a confident, winning smile. “Flight Commander, I have a special task for you.”

  “Not feeling comforted,” Tommy said.

  Chapter 18
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  Tommy gripped the handle, floating in position next to the access ramp at the rear of the ship, awaiting Jade's command. All he could hear inside his helmet was his own breathing and the team’s voices. Strapped into her seat, Jade’s head bobbed while she explained their situation to Marco and Henning—Ghost was drawing near to the landing back, and they'd handling docking by sight. Henning had insisted on picking them up, but that would leave Ghost of Jupiter floating free in an asteroid field—not a good idea. While neither of the other guys seemed happy with the plan, they couldn’t fault her logic or find a better way. She’d also updated the Keillor flight-control station, and the flight controller had confirmed Ghost of Jupiter was still cleared to perform an emergency landing.

  “All set, Tommy?” Jade’s voice purred in his ear. He couldn’t think of a sound he liked better than her saying his name, and he was still thrilled at the chance to fly on her ship. It was an extension of her personality, and being aboard made him feel closer to her. This chance at a rekindled friendship was worth all his recent trouble. His shoulder and chest ached and he needed more pills, but he knew he’d get some proper treatment soon.

  He promised himself he wouldn’t drift apart from Jade this time. They’d work together and he’d regain the fortunes that had found him in the past year.

  “Okay back here,” he answered. “But I still think you’re crazy.”

  “Yeah, well, we need a little crazy right now. Let me know when you’re in position and I’ll start the descent.”

  Tommy sighed. He wasn’t looking forward to this.

  “Okay. I’m ready as I’m gonna be. I think you owe me dinner for this, Captain.”

  Jade laughed, a lilting, delightful sound. “I can agree with that, Flight Commander. Okay. I'm starting the descent now. Hang on.”

  Tommy gripped the metal handle welded to the hull and tensed, expecting to bounce around the open access-ramp frame like a pinball as they moved. He took comfort in the ratcheting strap, pilfered from Jade’s cargo bay, that connected one of his exo suit’s attachment points to the metal handle embedded in the hull, but being connected to the ship only by a synthetic polymer cargo strap was a new and uniquely unsettling experience.