by Daniel Day
At 35km above the surface of South America, the spacecraft continued at maximum force pushing away from the Earth’s surface.
“Disengage thrust,” Reyes said in a strained voice, keenly monitoring the relative impact speed.
“Impact Imminent,” ARIA said, continuing her alert, “Impact Imminent.”
At 15km above the surface of South America, the Vanguard auto-ejected Commander Reyes’ control seat, launching the human strapped in, away from the death diving spacecraft that plummeted tail-end first. The force of the ejection launched the vessel into a dramatic tumble that fell at more than 1,540 meters per second, about 3,444 miles per hour.
∞
Reyes choked as the thin air altitude decompressed his lungs while his control seat tightened the restraints around his chest making it even harder for him to gasp for air. He fell in a somersaulting tumble away from the falling vessel for 22,000 dizzying meters until the headrest blasted apart into an umbrella, catching enough air to deploy the built-in parachute that even he wasn’t aware had been there.
As the control seat stabilized into a gliding fall, Reyes found the control pulls that steered, sped up, and slowed the parachuting control seat. He reached up, still attempting to gasp air from the 45 meters per second wind blowing across his face and tugged on the two yellow handle pulls with dramatic force. The control seat leveled and began slowing its descent substantially. Still breathless and beginning to realize the effects of suffocation, Reyes forced air into his lungs gasping for whatever bit of oxygen he could extract from the wind beating across his face.
He looked down to both sides of his control seat and recognized a black plume of dust and smoke – that of his vessel impacting the Earth at more than 2,000 mph. A shock wave from the impact was still visible crossing the desert lands of the South American landscape.
Wind whipped past his face as he pulled the yellow and blue pulls from the right side while releasing tension on the left yellow pull and grasping the left blue pull. He turned the control seat in a dramatic curve toward the wreckage site, now falling at 5 or 6 meters per second, about 11 miles per hour.
He lifted his legs away from the bottom of the control seat and impacted Earth’s surface with substantial force, causing a disc in his vertebrae and two ribs to fracture while sending the control seat into a forward roll. The seat tumbled forward from the impact, causing the human to instinctively tilt his head to the side, away from the impact with Earth. His reactions were not as effective as he would have liked and his head smashed into the surface with a tremendous force, immediately sending signals of pain through his body. As the seat continued its roll forward, it landed on the backrest, entangling the control seat in the strings of the parachute and slid forward, grinding to a final halt.
Chapter Six
“Commander, you wanted to see me?” Captain Watson asked the Artakkian resistance Commander.
“Yes, how are you Captain?” she asked, as Watson slid the metallic storage bay door closed.
Without hesitation, Watson replied, acting as if she in fact did not know what the Commander was referring to, “I’m sorry, ma’am?” she said in a poorly executed confused voice.
“You know what I am talking about Captain; it is ok to mourn so long as the process does not interfere with your duties you’ve sworn to. We really need you, now more than ever,” the resistance Commander said, standing from her chair and making her way to the pile of scrap wood of a desk.
Watson leaned her back against the metallic bay door, “I am okay, ma’am. Really,” she said.
“You have no regrets? No sadness? Did you not love the Captain?” Leila, the resistance Commander asked.
Watson, a strong independent female, former Special Forces Operative of the United Intergalactic Federation turned resistance Operations Commander, struggled to keep her emotions at bay. She turned her head away from the inquiring Artakkian commander subconsciously telling herself, ‘what does she know?’ then quickly remembering, ‘everything’.
At the thought of the Artakkian staring her down with her dark, deep, black eyes, she could hold back her emotions no longer and reflection on the word ‘love’ opened her emotions into a full out festival of tears and sobs.
Leila had never experienced this type of emotion – no Artakkian has. She stood, eyeing the Captain pondering the natural thought of ‘what should she do’, an innately human connection between Earthkinds and Artakkians.
“Captain,” Leila said, “You must control yourself. I do not know how to react to this emotion,” she said, placing her long-fingered hand on Watson’s shoulder.
Watson felt the comforting hand and instinctively leaned into the Commander, grasping Leila’s waist and pulling her tight into her. She caught the Commander by surprise, but the Leila did not back away and instead wrapped her slender arms around the human and returned the tight gripping hug.
She continued sobbing, making unclear vocalizations about the deceased Captain Fox, marriage, life, and the military. Leila stood, maintaining a positive hug onto Watson, listening intently.
“Captain, what is this?” Leila asked.
“What? What is what?” Watson said, leaning her head back to face the taller Artakkian Commander.
“What do you call this? What we are doing,” she said, looking down into the Earthkind’s bright blue eyes.
Watson made a half attempted laugh, smiling, while tears still streamed her face, “ha, it’s a hug,” she said, planting the side of her face back into the Commander’s chest.
“A… Hug… Interesting,” the Commander said, now placing a hand innately behind the Captains tightly pulled back hair, “Does this make you feel better?”
Watson did not respond and only tightened her grip on the Commander, pulling what essentially could be the only love she had felt since Captain Fox had left Earth more than a month ago.
A loud banging on the metallic sliding bay door startled the two embraced in a hug and they quickly released each other. Watson wiped tears from her face and used a worn-out cloth found lying on the Commander’s makeshift desk to clean the snot beginning to leak from her nostrils.
The two adjusted themselves emotionally and professionally before Leila said, “Enter.”
Lieutenant Aiku and an envoy of ensigns from the communications, observatory, and operations desks entered the Commander’s tightly confined office space, “We found him!” Lt Aiku said, forcing a transparent tablet into the Commander’s hands.
“Who?” Watson asked, suddenly interested, maybe hoping that Fox had been found.
“I’m sorry ma’am,” the Lt said, half expectant of the Captain’s hope, “We found Commander Reyes. He’s somewhere in the Peruvian desert, but our Sat team have a pretty good idea of the location,” he continued, gesturing the tablet to display a transparent map that showed a fragmented image.
“Captain, collect your thoughts, we need an EVAC team on the move,” the Commander said, turning to Watson.
“Yes ma’am,” she responded receiving the tablet from the Commander, “Team 4?”
“Plus Prog,” she said, referring to the Adroitian mute pilot.
“Yes, ma’am,” Watson replied exiting the office through the opening in the group of ensigns, now moving from her way.
“Good job team,” Leila said, “Let’s get full alert up and start working an SAR team” she said to the Lt Adroitian, Aiku, “Also, have the First Officer deploy a ground defense of the facility”
“Yes, ma’am,” the Lt said, “You heard her, let’s get moving,” he said, turning to the tired looking ensigns.
“These four take a break LT, get another team up. I want full station effect minus these four. They’ve earned a break,” Leila said, before the group exited her office, sliding the door shut behind them.
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