by George Deeb
The medical team had thought it certain she would lose her eyesight, but Toisae decided to try something that came to her as she worked on the motionless body. The whites of the eyes were now completely dark red from the blood vessels that had been torn apart and leaked into the eyes. She removed the intra-ocular fluid while the blood vessels were being repaired. The fluid was highly contaminated with loose blood cells, and Toisae instructed the computer to deconstruct those blood cells and then remove the constituents from the fluid. After the vessels in the eye were again carrying blood in the normal manner she replaced the fluid, and hoped for the best.
Lower arms and legs, down to the fingers and toes changed from dark purple to a bright red as blood again began to nourish her body. Bruises all over her body slowly faded. She began breathing on her own again. Her eyes danced under her eyelids as the nerves in her brain were repaired. Her joints, which were still swollen stiff, now showed all the necessary structures to work again when the swelling was gone – one of the things her body had to do on its own. There were things that had to be left to the normal healing process. The list went on and on. By the time they were finished, del Rio was surviving on her own. When they carried her to the shuttle for the flight back to Earth for long term care and rehabilitation she looked like she was eighty plebals overweight due to the overall swelling.
That was the face Toisae remembered – the round and bloated one. Now she looked at a series of photographs that showed a time lapse of the woman's face from then until now. She would not have recognized del Rio today as being the person she operated on. Going to the end of the record she looked at the general health status. Strength and stamina were better now than when she was first assigned to the base. It must have taken unbelievable determination and will power to push herself to achieve this level of fitness in such a relatively short time. Even more surprising was del Rio's request to come back to the moon and her old job. Toisae found that very impressive. She spent some time reviewing the psychological evaluations which all looked very good. At the end of del Rio's record she appended her recommendation that based on review of her physical and mental evaluations there was no contraindication to del Rio being given her old posting.
6
January 2014
Kalinor Gorheel-sil-Planna sat in the command chair on the bridge of the battle carrier Eowaar. It had taken a long time and a lot of work to get there. He had devoted himself to the service of his planet, and had placed his life at risk many times, as the various scars on his body attested to. He loved this ship as any living creature could love an object. For a machine designed to destroy and kill the Eowaar was esthetically a work of art. She was beautiful in all her functionality! Equipped with the latest weapons and technology, the Eowaar was regarded with fear and awe throughout the known galaxies. Fear if you were an enemy, and awe if you were being protected by her. She was a technological marvel. She was designed to survive.
The Eowaar was still a relatively new vessel by military standards - just twenty decitans old - but construction of larger and more powerful vessels were already in progress. She also had scars on her body. During her short existence the Eowaar had been in forty-three skirmishes (her attackers had to be the most stupid of peoples), thirteen battles (decisively won at the cost of many 'dents and scratches'), and one inter-galactic war which had seen several pieces of her superstructure blown off and the lives of many good people lost. Even with huge pieces of her missing she was able to continue to fight and provide life support and protection for those still alive within her – and destroy the enemy. Planna was as proud of her as he was of his own record. He had even more pride in the thirty-five thousand member crew of the ship, most of which had been with her throughout her battles. At this time in the Eowaar's existence she carried a mixed crew made up of the older, tempered by experience, and the younger, highly motivated. But it was the lives of those that had been lost that conditioned his pride and boosted Planna's sense of caution. Space could be a dangerous place - and there was a lot of space in all the known galaxies. There was more of it, still unknown, in the universe.
This time they were not on a mission of conflict but on a rescue (hopefully) mission. A commercial mining ship had been missing for decitans. This was a rare occurrence these days, as ships had many ways to let people know where they were, or call for help. But the Orysta had filed a mission plan for the Vialactea galaxy, which was mostly uncharted with an indigenous species that had not yet achieved space travel. This galaxy had no communications relays or established outposts. Although it was not one of the largest galaxies in the universe, it was large enough to make finding a nardle in a ploon seem like a very easy task.
When the Orysta was first declared overdue, the mining company immediately sent out a Search and Rescue ship to find out what had happened. They knew the flight plan of the Orysta, and had no doubts about finding her. But when they drew near this galaxy and found no emergency beacons they knew something very bad had happened. They searched for the decay trail from the ships propulsion system, which should have still been detectable, but found it had stopped suddenly part way into the solar system. That, and the total lack of beacons lead them to believe the ship had met with a catastrophic failure. They were faced with two options. The first was to continue on to the planned destination, which would take a very long time at the slower than light speeds they were legally required to travel at in the system. The second option was to return home and mount a much larger search operation consisting of many more ships. They could do this and return here in less time than it would take to get to the moon of the third planet. With many smaller dedicated search vessels, which would not be speed restricted, they could search the complete solar system in a very short time. They saw the second option as the only real choice.
Four thousand IGT search vessels, which are funded and maintained by the signatories of the IGT, were missioned for the search. It didn't take long. The wreckage was found scattered throughout the rings of the sixth planet. There was nothing big enough to be identifiable as the mining ship, but the materials were unmistakable and there was enough of them. Traces of fuel and some parts of the thrust conversion chamber were found. The conclusion was that there was a destructive event so violent that the ship was shattered as it broke apart. The pieces either traveled into or were pulled into the rings. No bodies were found. No intact escape pods were found. The Orysta was the only ship with a flight plan to this solar system.
Families of the crew members were notified and mourned their loss. Life went on as it will. Decitans later the truth of the Orysta was learned, purely by accident, when a gang of pirates made the mistake of attacking a prototype of the newest (and most secret) IGT multi-role fighter interceptor. The new ship had amazing range, armament, maneuverability, computational capabilities, and a highly classified sensor array – and none of it could be seen from the outside until the ship configured itself for battle. The prototype executed its operational test flight fully armed with all systems operational, with a highly trained and combat experienced pilot. One pirate support ship and nine attack ships saw it as easy prey – they were wrong.
By the time IGT support vessels had arrived all nine attack vessels had been destroyed and the mother ship disabled (if you can call being blown open disabled). Seventeen unconscious pirates were taken into custody. The penalty for piracy is summary execution, but several of them tried to bargain for their lives with the story of the Orysta.
These pirates were part of a larger pirate organization that had been hiding at the outside edge of the Vialactea galaxy, knowing that no one traveled there. After a successful attack on another mining ship in a nearby galaxy, they had killed the crew thinking they would plunder the cargo and be rich - but the cargo hold was empty. They stripped it of equipment and ended up with a battle damaged and barely operational cargo ship which was of little value to them. That was when they detected emergency beacons from a vessel in distress. They suspected this was anot
her mining ship, and maybe this one had a full cargo load.
As they followed the trail of beacons they picked them up and disabled them, not wanting the signals to attract any defense forces to the area. The trail of beacons pointed to the moon circling the third planet, so that's where they went. After spending almost half a vheen searching that moon they still couldn't find the ship. They really wanted that cargo, whatever it was. That's when their leader came up with the plan to throw any rescue vessels off the trail. They would blow up the damaged cargo ship they had, sending the pieces into the rings of the sixth planet. Anyone looking for the Orysta would find the debris of the other ship and make the obvious conclusion. That would end the search. Then when they had more time, the pirates would come back and do a more thorough search of their own.
The captured pirates were still executed of course. Not to do so would be to commit suicide by IGT law. The pirates knew that. But what man with nothing to lose isn't going to try to save his life, no matter how futile the attempt. No one in the interconnected galaxies had the right or the authority to allow a pirate to live – no one!
Now that the Eowaar was in the planetary zone of a non-signatory solar system she was required to travel at slower than light speeds, this also per IGT law. There were no navigation aids or up to date charts of the area. Planna had over twenty-three hundred intercept craft on board, and all but seven were presently operational. He would have to personally talk with his maintenance chief about that. Not that having only seven ships down was bad. Most other commanders ran with a much higher percentage of inoperable interceptors. But the one-on-one would serve two purposes – letting the man know that Planna was aware of everything on his ship, and keeping a personal connection with one of his most important subordinates. The maintenance chief had to be kept on his toes, but he also had to be kept happy as well.
Those much smaller ships did not have to restrict their speed as they flew. He ordered fifteen hundred of them to begin a grid search of the system while the Eowaar traveled directly to the mission destination. That left enough interceptors on board to protect the Eowaar in case they ran into an unforeseen problem. The interceptors were small, fast, and well equipped to defend themselves and they could stay on mission for long periods. If the Orysta was forced to change its destination his interceptors would find her – but it would be slow. It would take a lot of time. He didn't know if the crew of the Orysta had that time – or even if they were still alive. This was going to be a very long mission.
Planna had made a promise to find out what had happened to the Orysta, good or bad. He meant to keep that promise. He studied the three dimensional depiction that floated in front of his eyes. Normally used to track events in a battle, the chart now showed this solar system, its planets, their moons, and any object larger than a man's head. It also showed the present position of all of his interceptors, each with an ID tag indicating the type of ship, its operational condition, system coordinates, and lastly the names of the crew members on board. There was a lot more information associated with each interceptor but those pieces of information that weren't vital at the moment were not displayed. As each crew transmitted a report the miniature depiction that represented their ship turned bright blue to catch the viewer's attention. Planna saw several turn blue, and knew the strategy team was analyzing the transmitted data before informing him of it. So far they had not notified him of anything that seemed important.
7
Second Lanor Giell-sil-Dhona was surprised by the alert on his HUD, indicating a power source on the surface of the fourth planet from this sun. The surprise turned to fear because the power level indicated was extremely weak. Then there was a second alert for another power source, also very weak. As his ship got closer to the planet he picked up more very weak power indications, and electromagnetic transmissions. His fear level elevated as he wondered if the Orysta had broken up and crashed on the planet.
His ship's defense computer automatically switched on the camouflage system, and there were more weak power indications and transmissions on his screen but this time they were orbiting the planet. As he approached close enough for visual contact he spotted one of the sources. It was a satellite. Then he spotted another satellite, and an alert showed for a third one. Then another – and another – and another. Now more surface power indications were alerting on his screen. 'Have the Vialacteans developed space travel?' Dhona wondered. 'And why are the power levels so weak?'
By the time he had circled the planet once he had found dozens of power indications on the planets surface. He realized what he was seeing now. This planet is the closest to the inhabited third planet. Just like in his own people's history, they were sending probes to study their neighbor and develop their space technology. As it always seemed to be, it was his luck to get what was probably the busiest planet in this solar system. All of these probes and satellites complicated his search. He had no way of knowing if the power indications were from a Vialactean probe or from a destroyed Orysta. He would have to enter the planets atmosphere and perform a low level search of the surface. Reflexively he touched the display screen on the communications panel, and a report of everything that he had discovered so far was sent to the Eowaar.
“High speed atmospheric entry configuration.” he said out loud.
He looked at the the surface of his ships wings and saw the protruding antennas and sensors withdraw into the structure of the ship, and cover plates slide into place to close the openings. Then the wings changed, shrinking in from the obvious extended airfoil shape to short stubs one third the size. His secondary weapons ports were now unavailable, though he wouldn't be needing them on this mission.
“Interceptor configured for high speed atmospheric entry.” said his ship's computer.
“Proceed to grid pattern search. Zero point one larn above ground level. Detect, identify and document all power sources.”
The interceptor took a nose down attitude while maintaining its present speed. It was only a couple of fracins until it made contact with the thinest part of the atmosphere. When it did the ship's engines reduced power and it slowly took a nose up attitude. Gravity was now playing a role and pulling the ship down at an accelerating rate. Dhona looked at his wings and saw the normally dark color of the ship's skin begin to heat up and glow orange. He wasn't worried about it though. The interceptor was designed to operate in a full power straight-in dive through the atmospheres of most planets they visited. But powered dives like that came with their own risks, and you didn't take that type of risk on a search mission. Parts of the ship glowed red now from the heat caused by atmospheric friction.
It would be another fifteen to twenty merlots before he was down to the requested altitude to begin his search. He checked the ground mapping display. Most of the planet was a rugged rock and iron oxide desert marked by volcanoes and impact craters. It did have large ice masses at each of its poles, but the atmosphere was too thin and cold to support liquid water. If the Orysta had landed here they would have run out of food a long time ago, and there was nothing on this planet to sustain them.
8
It had taken over two heelas but the search of the planet was complete. Dhona was tired and hungry. He looked down at the side pocket where he kept his flight kit and the energy cakes that pilots referred to as 'flight fuel'. They would get rid of your hunger, but didn't taste very good. You would think that in this day and age someone could make a better tasting energy cake. Dhona decided he would rather wait until he was back on board the Eowaar where the food was excellent. He checked his fuel. There was enough to get back to the ship, but with very little reserve. Having to spend all this time tracking down Vialactean probes and rovers angered him, but he had had no choice but to do so.
He was about to initiate a climb when he suddenly had an idea. It would probably get him into trouble with his squadron commander, but he couldn't resist. 'Now where was that nearby damaged rover that was still transmitting a signal?' he thought as h
e scrolled through the log that documented all the objects he had found. It only took a few fracins to find it, and placing his fingertip on the information he dragged it across the display screen to the icon for the navigation computer. Planetary coordinates immediately popped up on the screen. He touched the GO TO button and the ship smoothly banked and accelerated, heading for the location of the rover.
9
Dhona checked his ships systems as he approached the Vialactean exploratory vehicle. Camouflage was operational. Gravity Compensation was operational. Thrust vectors set to zero. He scanned the nearby area for other probes. There were none. As a precaution he activated the retention bands, which wrapped around his torso and legs and held him securely against his seat. He was now approaching at a crawl.
When he was in position he held his interceptor above and slightly behind the rover, and studied it for a while. He liked it. It was inactive at the moment, so this would be the ideal time to do something. Smiling with appreciation for the design, he understood what most of the systems on it were for. He could also appreciate what it had taken to get this machine to this planet, intact and operational. He remembered learning in school about similar systems his own people had constructed and launched into space when they began their explorations.
“Lanor Dhona, this is Eowaar control.” came the voice of the flight controller over the comm.
