“Caught you at a bad time?” Williams asked. The lady smiled and shook her head.
“This thing is always in need of maintenance, you just caught me on my break, that’s all. Glad to see that you made it safely to the gate,” she said.
It was common courtesy to wish a fellow traveler a safe journey, or congratulate them on a successful one, after all, space was unpredictable, and even a bog-standard takeoff could result in the fiery deaths of the crew on board. It was a fact that Williams preferred to gloss over when the thought popped into his head.
“Thank you, Miss. Is it safe to go on through?”
The pretty blonde smiled. She wasn’t used to being called “Miss.” The men on board the station orbiting the jump gate had many names for her, but Miss wasn’t one of them.
“Yep, it’s safe to go through. We’ve scanned the jump route, and it’s clear of any obstructions. Should take you no longer than four and a half minutes. You know the drill. Strap on up, sit back and try and not be sick!”
Williams smiled.
“Thanks, guess we’ll see you on the way back.”
The blonde nodded, grinning and the transmission ended. Williams got the engines ready, and lined the nose of the ship up with the middle of the jump gate. He turned to his crew, nodded his head, and made sure the straps were tight around his chest. The others did the same. Williams took a few extra seconds to eye up the recruit and gave the kid a thumbs up. He shrugged at Williams and smiled.
“She was hot,” he said, giving the commander a thumbs up. Williams nodded his head and turned back to the controls.
“Okay guys, this is it. For those of you that are first timers, this is going to suck. It’s going to feel like your guts want to make friends with the ceiling, so make sure to hold them in place,” Williams said, a slight smile finding its way onto his usually stern face.
Williams breathed in deeply and then exhaled slowly as he pushed the warp speed icon. Suddenly, and very suddenly indeed, the ship was speeding toward the purple mass. Within a few seconds, they had entered the gate.
And the rest was a blur. Literally. Blurred colors rushed past them as they travelled at such unnatural speeds. The five of them held onto their lunches to the best of their abilities, but by the time the jump had ended, most of it would probably be on the floor.
Chapter Four
“Second Earth”
“Are you seeing this?” Gustoff said, turning around toward the gawking elderman behind him. “There’s something here. Something hard!” he said, flailing his arms about like a mad man, which wasn’t doing his case to be heard much good. The elderman and most of the people in the settlement already thought of him as a mad man as it was.
“Step away from it!” one of the elderman shouted.
“I will do no such thing!” Gustoff remarked.
The crowd grew annoyed. An audible murmur of resentment ran through them as they stared at the mad scientist.
“You don’t own this land! Aston did. And Aston was a close friend of mine! So, I have a right to be standing here!” Gustoff shouted. April was still watching from afar; she didn’t feel like annoying any of the elderman today. She’d done enough as it is already by getting Gustoff involved. She was contemplating whether that had been a good idea or not. In hindsight, seeing the way the man was reacting to everything made April think that maybe she’d jumped the gun a little.
“Get away from there!” another one of the elderman shouted. But Gustoff wasn’t listening. Instead, he turned back around and started thumping on the invisible object. With every strike of this closed fists, a loud clanging sound could be heard. Gustoff could feel it, he could hear it, but he couldn’t see whatever it was. And quite frankly, Gustoff was terrified of it.
“This is a holy site. You have done nothing but prove to us that this is an act of God. It is faith. The physical formation of faith. Can you not see it?” another of the elderman said.
“That’s the problem,” Gustoff uttered, “I can’t see it.” He thumped on the invisible object once again, but as if on cue, the moment his balled fist touched the transparent object, it showed its true form. Gustoff jumped back in awe. Standing in front of him, hovering slightly off the ground, was a space ship. Scorched black by burn marks, it sat over the rubble, making Gustoff and the others scramble in unison. A few screams could be heard. One of them came from April. She watched as Gustoff and the elderman got as far away from the now visible space ship as possible. They took massive strides back, yet, they didn’t take their eyes off the mechanical monster that was just yards away from them.
“What the heck is that?” Gustoff asked himself, quickly forgetting the books he’d read about space ships. Books that landed on his planet in crates.
“That is not a thing of God, that is a thing of the Devil! Get the weapons!” an elderman shouted.
Gustoff’s eyes widened as a panel on the side of the spacecraft opened. Plumes of smoke and heat fired out of the panel, and then a silhouette appeared. A silhouette that looked familiar in form.
“It’s true, it’s really true!” Gustoff shouted at the top of his lungs as the elderman ran about like headless chickens. “We’re not alone!” he said, the fear he felt earlier now gone and replaced by a feeling he’d never felt before. But whatever that feeling was, it was a good one.
But then the fear came back. Within a second, everything stopped dead. The elderman ceased running about. The people watching stopped screaming, and Gustoff stopped smiling.
A loud bang had made everyone freeze. Then a gunshot. Echoing in Randy’s ears. He blinked a few times. Swallowed hard, and dropped to the floor.
Everything went black.
***
Commander Williams and his four-man crew, five including himself, smash through the other end of the jump gate. The sudden difference in speed jars them as they come to what seems like a sudden halt, but in reality, the ship is still moving.
“Man, that was bumpy!” the recruit said as he held his breath, attempting to suppress the urge to vomit. Luckily for him, he managed just fine. Williams on the other hand wasn’t fairing too well.
“Christ,” he said, hunching over the command center, resting his elbows on the cold metal. His spacesuit simulated the temperature of the surfaces it touched, or brushed up against, to protect the material from rapid degradation, in turn, protecting the occupier’s health and well-being. It was a nifty feature, but in practice, a little useless. It’s not like any of them were going to be doing any space walks in their suit, they were just a precaution. Actual space suits were a lot bulkier, and a lot more expensive.
And expense was everything when it came to commanding an Earth Army Space Mission. For that was what this was. Sanctioned by the powers that be. For the greater good. Yada yada yada. All Williams wanted was for the mission to go off without a hitch. He didn’t really care about much more.
“You okay there, boss? You look like you’re going to hurl!” One of the crew said to him.
“Nah, I’m sure he’s fine. He’s a commander, remember!” The recruit snarled, a smile on his face.
Commander Williams swallowed, sighed and turned to his team.
“You know that Commanders can be sick as well, right recruit?” he asked.
“Of course I do!” the recruit responded.
A smatter of sniggering could be heard, but Williams ignored it, swiveled back around in his chair and did a systems check.
“All good on my end,” one of the men assigned to diagnostics said.
“Yeah, looks good here too,” Williams replied.
There was a brief moment of silence as the men got their bearings. Coming out of a jump gate may appear instantaneous, but unfortunately it carried a rather long lasting side effect. Nausea.
“Is it normal that my eyes feel like they’re about to bulge out of my head?” one of the men asked.
“It is if you have eyes the size of yours,” the recruit retorted, to yet another smatter of
laughter. These men were obviously quite pleased with themselves, flying through a jump gate into another galaxy usually had that effect on most men. But Williams knew how serious this was. He knew that the time for messing around was not now. But he didn’t want to come across like a hard-ass. He knew that this mission was dangerous. That teleporting into another system, let alone another galaxy, wasn’t the safest of things to do on a Friday evening. A very many different manner of things could and would usually go wrong. Leaking fuel cells. Broken coms. Unaligned radar. Inexperienced crew. Those were the things that any Commander took under consideration when flying into deep space. But then there were the things that no commander wanted to think about.
Asteroids. Comets. Solar flares. Stellar winds. And most worrisome, misinformation, miscalculation or misguidance. All three of those things would not only bring a mission to a stop, but the lives of the crew in peril. Any of those things could be the downfall of them. It only took one mistake to not make it back home. There was a lot of real-estate between them and planet Earth.
“Wow,” someone said in the back. Williams almost immediately turned to him, expecting some bad news, but was greeted by the four of his men staring out of the port window. A look of wonder was on their faces. A slight blueish tinge was creeping through the window, and caught the Commanders attention. He turned his head and his expression soon matched theirs.
“That’s the planet?” the recruit asked.
“No. That’s just a planet,” Williams said, a little disappointed. It looked like the sort of place he’d want to visit. Maybe next time.
“How long until we reach the Orion?” one of the men asked.
“An hour. Maybe two. I’ll crank the speed up, but we aren’t warping. I don’t know the lay of the land around here, so risking it doesn’t seem like a great idea,” Williams said.
The crew mumbled in agreement.
“It’s beautiful around here. You think there are many humans?” The recruit asked.
“Humans? What do you mean?” another man asked.
“You know, flying about, on missions?”
Commander Williams turned to his coms and flicked a switch. A radar popped up, and he redirected the parameters.
“There are currently seventy-two authorized missions going on in this quadrant. The nearest one is ten thousand light years away,” the Commander said.
The recruit frowned.
“Guess any back-up is out of the question, then?”
Williams nodded and put his hands on the flight controls.
“Sit back and relax gentleman. This part of the journey should be a lot less bumpy,” Williams said, settling into his seat.
“Let’s hope you’re right about that,” the recruit replied.
***
Staring up at the sky, Gustoff felt a heavy pain shoot across his chest. Sweat was dripping down his face as he attempted to breathe. But every time he inhaled, a tightness constricted around him, making him gargle for air. The sky above was blue and clear. He watched the clouds slowly move from one side to the other. All the while, the sound of shouting came in and out of focus. People were screaming around him. He saw a few legs stride past him. They were backing away from something. Making haste while bellowing at the top of their lungs. It was pure pandemonium. Gustoff was confused and didn’t quite understand what was going on. He knew he was dying, but besides from that, he didn’t know much.
His brain had gone completely blank. One minute he’d been standing, and the next he’d hit the deck in agony. At first, he didn’t remember the silhouette, the space ship or the invisibility cloak that had concealed the aircraft from the settlement. Randy also forgot about Aston’s house. The debris, and the beginning of this nightmare. But what he didn’t forget about was being shot. It came back to him in a flash. A hot flash. Like a poker sticking into his chest. He gasped again, trying to stay awake, but a blackness was surrounding him. It was enclosing him. Covering him. Choking him.
“Gustoff! Look out!” he heard somebody shout. It was a familiar voice, but right at that minute, he didn’t feel like anything was that familiar. Everything felt foreign. Different. Like he was treading on unfamiliar ground. Experiencing something new. Uncharted land. A land filled with nothing but death and despair.
So this is what it feels like to die, he thought to himself.
But then all thoughts quickly vanished. And like the breath leaving his mouth in plumes as he lay on his back, everything evaporated into the air. Darkness settled in faster than he’d ever thought was possible. He was seconds away from passing out.
And then he saw the silhouette standing over him. The silhouette came into focus. A person’s face stared back at him. A person he didn’t recognize. The person looked worried. Regretful. A woman’s face stared back at his. Her eyes were deep with what looked like remorse. She bent down, and got closer to Randy. She had some sort of sack with her. She reached into the sack and pulled something out. But before Randy could see what it was that she’d pulled out of her bag, the darkness finally came and subdued him.
And in the darkness there was no escaping fate.
Chapter Five
Andromeda Galaxy
Commander Williams and his team exited Supercruise mode. The medium-sized ship slows down within a few seconds. What was blurred lines and blurry scenery before, soon becomes a planet and distant stars twinkling in the distance. The ship seemed to be stationary, but in reality it was fast approaching their destination. Within a minute or so, they’d be in orbit of the mysterious planet they’d been sanctioned to run a rescue mission on. The five-man crew gawked in awe at the size of the planet they were approaching. It looked marvelous. Big, blue and beautiful were three accurate words to describe the whimsical planet to their left.
“Not bad for a dwarf planet,” Williams muttered as he took his hands off the controls. He was famished. Hunger was setting in, and the need to rest was becoming overbearing. But whilst on an active mission like this one, sleep was very much for the weak. And the last thing he wanted to show was weakness. Not when it came to his ability to run a successful mission. The brass on Earth wanted a rescue mission, and that’s what they were going to get. Sleep or no sleep.
“Somehow boss, I think the guys back on Earth got it wrong. That ain’t no dwarf planet. According to my readouts, it’s anything but that. This sucker here is a bona fide planet! A big boy planet. Just like Earth…” one of the men said from the back. Williams nodded, looking out of his window, and admiring the view. It certainly was a big boy planet, that was for sure.
“Like Earth?” Williams said, thinking out loud, rather than making a substantial statement. He swiveled around in his chair and looked at the guy manning the scanners.
“Yeah, according to this readout here, the atmosphere is breathable. Without a space suit!” the guy said.
Williams rolled his eyes.
“Come on now, stop playing,” he said.
The guy ushered him over and Williams got up from his seat, made his way to the scanner and looked at the readings on the screen. The monitor flickered a few times as the low budget CRT screen refreshed.
“No kidding!” Williams chuckled, seeing the vital statistics of the planet on the screen. According to the database, this planet had yet to be discovered by Earth, and it didn’t have a name yet. Which meant that whoever discovered it would get the honors of naming it.
“What you going to call it, sir?” the recruit asked, thinking the same thing Williams was thinking.
“I don’t know. We’re not here on planetary exploration gents. We’re here to rescue some stranded souls. So we better get a move on,” Williams said, turning back around and walking toward his station.
“Well, at least we know that the air is breathable, and the survivors from the pod crash have some air to suck into their lungs while we shuttle down there,” the man on the scanner said. Williams grunted, agreeing with the assessment. It was good news that the planet had breathable air. Very
good news. The last thing that the commander wanted to do was risk his life and the crewman’s lives at that on a rescue mission, only to find that the survivors choked to death on the atmosphere when their reserves gave out.
“I’m picking up some heat signatures on the planet. I can’t really tell what’s what from up here, but I’m pretty sure it looks like organic life,” the guy on the scanner said.
“Organic life? Animals? Aliens? Alien animals?” the recruit said, fear making his vocal chords tremble slightly as he tried to get to grips with what he, and his crew were about to do.
“I don’t know. We’re way too far away to pick anything up of any value. We’d have to do a flyover, maybe get some satellite scans up on our screens. Get the lay of the land before jumping to any conclusions here.”
Williams grunted again. His patience was running thin.
“We’re not doing no such thing. Our job is to ping the pod, get its location, descend, grab the survivors, and haul them home. Leave the alien hunting to the geeks back home. We’ll report any strange findings, but as far as investigating the likelihood of actual life on the planet, I’m afraid that job belongs to somebody else,” Williams said.
“Somebody that get’s paid double than we do. I don’t know about you, Sir, but our paycheck better reflect the danger we’re putting ourselves in, come payday,” the guy on the coms said, to a murmur of approval.
“And there I was thinking that you ingrates did this for the love of the job!” Williams heckled, a smile on his face.
The crew started talking all at once. Most of them were saying how much they loved their jobs, and what a pleasure it was to fix other peoples messes for minimum reward. It made William smile. It was always the same story with most crews. If it wasn’t the boredom of the job, it was the pay. Fortunately, things were far from boring for Williams and his men. But the pay would still remain the same, no matter how thrilling the job may be.
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