by Grey Lanter
“I don’t really know. Some type of… pull… is trying to hurtle us down to the surface.”
I grabbed a hook of rope, which was designed to allow commanders to stay on their feet. I felt the downward tug. There seemed to be a huge suction coming from the surface of the planet. Noiseless but powerful. Madigan strained to keep the shuttle steady.
“Never seen anything like this, sir. I don’t know what’s going on.”
“I’m going to take a wild guess. Gravity.”
“Gravity, sir?”
“Yes. I’m guessing the planet has some control over its gravitational pull. I could be wrong but that’s about as good an explanation as any. Captain, can we withstand this?”
“For now, yes. If it gets much stronger…”
“Head ups, Captain. Full speed. Maybe it will have less power the higher we go. The more distance we put between it and the shuttle, the better.”
“Yes, sir. The increased pressure is putting a strain on the engine and using our fuel. That three days plus estimate is no longer operative.”
“Kinda figured that. We’ll worry about that later. Take her up.”
“Yes, sir.”
I held onto the cord as the shuttle angled north. The engine clearly strained to put distance between it and the ground. I was ready to say a prayer for technology when the noise diminished and became a quiet hum.
“Captain Hobbs? Give me the status of the other three shuttles.”
“All looks good, Major. The engines are straining but we are making progress and miles. The pressure seems to be less the higher up we go. So what do we do when we reach our limit?”
“I don’t know. I’ll think about that and call you back,” I said. I glanced at the pilot.
“Captain, talk us to the height where we can still breathe.”
“Yes, sir.”
I called Altamonte and told him to come forward. There wasn’t much room in the pilot’s cabin but he squeezed in.
“Ed, you told me the natives here headed north to the ice pack to get away from Gaia. Did you see any evidence it worked? Was that an effective strategy?”
He nodded. “To a degree. We found dead bodies. But bodies that were not gulped down by Gaia. That’s proof the tactic worked. We’re dealing here with a planet, Logan, and we’ve never seen or experienced anything like this before. The normal rules we know don’t apply. We have to go from experience and you know the rule on that.”
“Experience is a hard school but a fool learns in no other.”
“And there’s a lot of fools in graveyards,” Altamonte said.
“That’s not exactly encouraging.”
“We have to go by the experience of the natives here. I’m guessing there was something that gave them the idea that Gaia’s strength might be undercut by the North Pole. For whatever reason, it was more difficult for her to split ice apart than regular dirt. There were other bodies up there we didn’t bring down. But that’s the key. Bodies. They were on the ground but the planet didn’t open up and eat them. And there was no reason not too, except maybe she doesn’t like frozen food. So we could survive that, at least for a while. But I don’t know how long we could remain there in safety. Forever, maybe but we would have to worry about dying of the cold.”
“We can’t stay in the air forever. But my concern is, even if we could land on the North Pole and stay there for a while, the gravitational pull might be stronger closer to the surface. It could be too strong for us. Possibly we couldn’t get the shuttles off again.”
“Something to consider.”
I radioed the commander of the Sherman. Captain Tiara Simmons said she was monitoring our situation. I was sure she would be, but it was nice to have verbal confirmation.
“Logan, I have convened all our engineers and scientists and they are searching for a solution. They haven’t come up with anything yet but I have confidence they might find a way out of the predicament. I already notified the Federation that there is no way they could send any colonists to Jardoval. They will begin the evacuation of Titus but they'll take the colonists to some other planet. I also asked them to dispatch cruisers that hold transport ships so we can lift you off. But it’s going to take about two weeks for them to get here.”
“Yes, and I’m not sure we have two weeks.”
I sighed. The shuttle hummed as it headed north. I’ve never liked cold climates. I’m a native of the South. But this time a few tons of ice could save our lives. I looked over at Altamonte. His grim countenance stared at the savage ground.
“Ed, there were areas on the planet that were used as, shall we say, sacrificial plots. Much like the pagan rituals of old, correct?”
“Yes.”
“Were those the only places where the planet could rip open the ground? Or were the sites arbitrary?”
“Arbitrary. I don’t know anything about geology, sir. I imagine she or it could split open the earth whenever it wanted to, at least below the polar caps. Possibly she couldn’t in the mountain ranges. That might be more difficult. But we’re guessing, sir. No one has ever seen anything like this before. We don’t have any roadmaps.”
I flicked Captain Simmons again. He responded immediately.
“Captain, I’d like for your scientific and engineering teams to check out the ice caps on this planet, both the north and south Pole. Estimate the size of the pack and then figure what type of explosive power it would take to melt them.”
“Melt the Poles?”
“Yes. The planet may be able to open the earth but if there’s no earth to open we might be able to render it harmless, at least for a while. How can a planet split water? That’s gotta be a little more difficult, wouldn’t you think?”
“It might be. I can have our people start researching.”
“I assume whatever type of bombs we drop would have to be surgically used. I don’t want the ice disintegrated, I just want enough heat to melt the caps and increase the size of the oceans. Maybe there’s enough ice to cover the entire planet.”
“That might be possible, Logan. But even if it is, you still don’t have a place to land.”
“One thing at time. First we do what we can to neutralize the planet. Maybe we can find a nice island to land on. It wouldn't be akin to Ed’s Jamaica Two but it might be enough for us to survive.”
“We’ll see what we can do,” Simmons said.
“Good. You could also have them check if the shuttle could last long enough to fly up to the Sherman. Just on the off-chance that we could survive the voyage.”
“I will, but I wouldn’t put much hope in that, Major. The shuttles are designed for traveling on a planet. They’re little better than mobile tractors or transports. I don’t think you’d get halfway here. They’re not designed to escape orbit.”
“Yes, but we have to cover every possibility.”
“I’ll get back to you when I get some answers from the science team.”
“Thanks. Oh, one other thing. Do a geological survey of the planet. See if there are any weak fault lines, any earthquakes ready to happen. If there are some weaknesses in the crust or in fault lines we might be able to cause some cataclysmic earthquakes. If we can divert the planet's attention on keeping the surface in good shape, it might leave us alone and give us a chance to get off alive.”
“Good idea.”
“Also, check any volcanoes that might blow. Some lone crater might be ready to erupt. Those can do a lot of damage. I remember what Krakatoa did to Earth. A few explosions like that and the planet should be kept busy doing damage control.”
“We’ll start immediately. A topographical map of the planet shouldn’t take long to complete. We might be able to give Gaia more than she bargained for. If we’re fortunate, there might be more than one volcano ready to blow.”
“We can hope.”
I glanced toward the pilot.
“How’s the gravity pressure?”
“It has diminished some, Major. Higher than it should
be but not the pressure we felt before.”
“Perhaps the planet wants to bring us down but doesn’t want us to crash. That would deprive it of a meal. There wouldn’t be bodies for lunch if we slam into the ground. Not even crumbs. I’m guessing that’s why she’s easing off on the gravity. Ed, go back and break out our thermal ice suits. I think we may need them.”
“Yes, sir.”
CHAPTER 11
Since there was no seat, I eased down the wall until my butt hit the floor. The pilot swerved for some reason and I tipped to the left. I sighed, pulled out a cigar and stuck it between my lips. I flicked a lighter and moved the flame to the tobacco.
I hated to admit it but I was out of options. I had no idea what to do next. The military is great for options and variations. Every type of action, no matter how unlikely, is often planned out in strategic war games. Of course, it’s easier with computers nowadays. Just program in any type of scenario and the computer will play it out. And often will bring interesting results. But this scenario has never been played out. The enemy wasn’t aliens or an opposing army, but a planet. A very disagreeable planet. If she won the struggle, I hoped we'd give it indigestion.
Our only chance was the long odds hope that the cruisers would somehow get to us in time I guessed our best chance was to live in the Arctic regions. We had our thermal suits, which could provide us with protection from the cold. We had enough supplies to last a month. Plus we could probably hunt a few Arctic animals to provide even more food. And if we could cause some earthquakes or cause a few atomic blasts of volcanoes it might keep the planet too occupied to hunt us.
It might…
“How long before we get to our destination?”
“We still have two hundred miles to go, sir. I suggest you sit back and enjoy the journey.”
“Easier said than done.”
“I think this is the reason they pay you the big bucks, sir.”
“No amount of money would be enough for this mission.”
Smoking the cigar I came to a decision, although it had nothing to do with the life-or-death issue at hand. I decided I would retire. Altamonte was wrong. I didn’t need this hassle. I could retire and not worry about the state of the solar system or the galaxy. I could read, play golf, watch baseball and have a good time with Astrid. We had money enough to take it easy for the rest of our lives.
I’ve known men, both in the military and in civilian life, who needed a constant challenge, and the more dangerous a challenge, the better.
Surprisingly, when they were not seeking danger, I found them very pleasant personalities. Usually extremely intelligent. But I was not one of them. I took up military work because I was good at it. And, truthfully, because at least for the first dozen years or so, I would have found civilian life extremely dull.
But not anymore.
Now civilian life looked wonderful. If I wanted a challenge, it would be the challenge of using an eight-iron to knock a golf ball a hundred and fifty yards onto the green.
Something buzzed and I realized Captain Simmons was trying to contact me.
“I’m still here, Tiara. What’s up?” I said.
“Major, I don’t know how we missed this. I guess because we weren’t looking for it and there were no indications it was around.”
“What is it? From the sound of your voice this may not be good news.”
“It may be good, bad or neutral. But circling the planet, at a surprisingly low altitude there is a space station or some type of space facility. It’s about fifty miles from you.”
“A space station?”
“That’s what I’m assuming. Not too big as space stations go. It appears to be operational but there are no life signs in it. I’m guessing it was abandoned a long time ago.”
“Can we get to it with the shuttle?”
“I think so. Fifty more miles up and the trip would be difficult, if not impossible. But it’s in a location I think you can manage.”
“That’s interesting. This is a primitive planet. There are not supposed to be any high space tech stations floating around.”
“Which is one reason we were not looking for it. It looks old, but very sophisticated.”
“Feed the coordinates to the pilot,” to Madigan I said. “Head for the North Pole, first. We’ll drop off squad members and then head for the station. I’ll take about a dozen men and check it out.”
Captain Simmons was still on the line.
“I have one more piece of news either. This isn’t bad or good news either. It’s merely… unique.”
“Jardoval is the planet of uniqueness. What do you have?”
“Our scientists have done some incredibly creative work and have come up with… with… well, it’s kind of like an EKG for planets.”
“A what?”
“An EKG. Basically a heart test for planets, not that planets ever needed one before but, as you pointed out, this is a unique situation. It’s basically a life signs test, sir.”
“Compliment the scientists for me. So what does the EKG show? Tell me the planet is old and decrepit and dying. That would make my day.”
“Sorry, sir. Your day is not made. The… er… heartbeat is fine, the life signs are healthy.”
“Well, shucks. Anyway, we’ll see what we can do about that. Over and out. Keep me informed if there are any additional medical studies.”
“Will do, sir.”
We landed about fifteen minutes later. All four shuttles came down within minutes of each other. Squad members scattered to set up the perimeter. I was glad we had our thermal suits. The temperature was fifty below, which sounds incredibly cold but was mild as Arctic climes go. But if you breathe in below 50 degree weather, the lungs freeze and you’re dead. With our equipment I figured we could increase the temperature inside the perimeter to a ‘livable' 20 below zero. I had seen twenty below in Wyoming back on Earth. It’s not comfortable but with supplies, decent clothing and provisions, you can survive, at least for a while. We could set up large tents and put a thermal heater unit in each one, with larger units on the boundary. It wasn’t a ski resort but we could last a couple of days, and maybe a couple of weeks.
I took Astrid as my second in command and named ten other soldiers to accompany us to the space station. I included Altamonte and Lts. Derek Wilson and Toni Winthrop. Both had a space engineering background. I was sure they’d find the space station fascinating. John Upton and Averill Smith were two of my toughest and best men. And of course I included Carmen. She gave one a sense of security, although she was the shortest member of the squad.
After we settled in our seats, the pilot took off. I had worried that, once down, the shuttles might not be able to lift off again with the increased gravity pull. But the takeoff went smoothly and we glided through the air. I wondered if the planet had reduced the gravity. It wanted us alive not dead and once a shuttle starts swirling down…
CHAPTER 12
When we soared close to the station I got up and walked to the pilot’s cabin. The facility one of Earth’s early stations. Round, with interconnecting corridors. It turned slowly in the black of space. Then something caught my attention.
“Do my eyes deceive me or is that a green light blinking?”
“No, sir. It’s a green light on one of the corridors, so to speak. Maybe that’s a welcome signal. Shall I move closer?” Madigan said.
