Haven

by Vincent E. Sweeney

  “Fellow men and women,” the Governor began. “We have arrived at our new home.”

  At this announcement, the crowd roared with applause and cheers of triumph. The Governor raised his hands slightly to quiet the crowd, and then proceeded.

  “My advisers tell me that whatever we collided with came up too suddenly for the sensors to make an accurate analysis of it. We believe it was a small meteorite or comet moving too fast to see coming. And as we all know, we have had complications with such things in the past.” The Governor paused quietly for a moment. “I know that none of us has ever seen a planet before. I know there may be many surprises and hardships that will confront us at first, some of which we do not yet realize. But I also know that the human race is apt to survive!”

  The crowd again broke free with howls of approval and agreement.

  “We will thrive once more as a species!” the Governor concluded, as the crowd raved on.

  Stephen leaned close to Mandel’s ear and shouted. “Are we going to ride in the shuttles or hike on foot when we go scouting?”

  Mandel shrugged his shoulders and shouted back, “I have no idea!”

  The Governor raised his hands again before continuing. “Commander Lee of Military Branch is currently arranging a scouting party to survey the area and seek out any possible places of settlement for us. Until the scouts return, it would be in all of our best interests if we stayed within the area. Parents, I implore you not to let your children wander too far off. Noon meal will be served as usual in the cafeterias onboard the vessel. But I encourage you all to enjoy your meals outside. Thank you.”

  Another round of applause ensued.

  “Ok, that’s it,” Mandel declared, nudging Stephen in the direction of the boulders. “Let’s go.”

  As the two continued to make their way over to the Governor’s group of advisers, a sudden alarm sounded, piercing the ears of everyone in the field. As they all clasped their hands over their ears, a pair of ancient, squeaking doors began to spread slowly apart on top of the ship’s hull. The alarm ceased abruptly while the doors continued to open, and all the people shielded their eyes from the sun as they gazed upward in curiosity. When the doors finally clanged to a stop, a shrill, ear-splitting scream rose steadily higher until a pair of rocketshaped shuttlecraft emerged from the bowels of the ship, soon to be joined by a second pair. The four shuttlecraft soared gracefully above the crowd and then, one-by-one, landed in a row at the edge of the open field.

  Mandel and Stephen both stared on with wide grins on their faces.

  “Awesome,” Mandel finally said.

  “Let’s go,” Stephen said.

  With raised hands, the Governor stopped the two boys at the base of the boulders. “Where are you guys going?” he asked.

  “You said we could go with the scout party!” Mandel exclaimed.

  “I know, I know,” the Governor reassured. “But you better do everything they say down to the letter.”

  “Yes, sir,” both boys replied.

  “Alright then,” the Governor continued. “Go see that man driving the cart over to the shuttles to get your equipment. That’s what he’s hauling.”

  The boys looked out onto the field and saw an ox-driven metal cart heading towards the landing area.

  “Got it,” Mandel said.

  “Be careful,” the Governor commanded, with a serious gaze in his eyes.

  “Yes sir!” they both shouted back as they ran off toward the cart

  The Governor smiled calmly while he watched the two boys go. He turned around only to find himself face to face with Commander Lee, who had an intimidating glare spread across his rugged face.

  “Yes, Michael?” he urged, his smile quickly fading.

  Michael motioned past the Governor to the two young men running across the field.

  “I told you this might be a very dangerous excursion,” he began, obviously struggling to maintain a calm composure.

  “Yes,” the Governor replied.

  Michael shifted his body in discomfort. “And you’re allowing your son to come along?”

  The Governor suddenly displayed a face of disappointment and nudged his way past the Commander.

  “Oh, come off it, Michael. I trust you and your men entirely. I know you’ll look after the boys.”

  Michael’s eyes bulged. He stalked angrily towards the Governor, who was now walking away.

  “They will be in the way,” he said.

  “I’m sure they won’t,” the Governor shouted back. “They’re very well-behaved young men.”

  “Well-behaved young men who will get in my way,” Michael retorted.

  At this, Governor Hedrick turned and walked back toward Michael, stopping only a few inches from his face.

  “Look here, Michael. I know my boy won’t be under your feet near as much as you fear. And if he is, tell him politely to step aside.” He began to walk away again.

  Michael’s face seemed to flare. “Politely step aside!” he shouted.

  At this, several people turned to watch the confrontation silently.

  “You have no concept of what you’re doing here, do you?” he continued.

  Governor Hedrick noticed the people watching, and he quickly came back to Michael.

  “Look,” Hedrick began, in a harsh whisper. “My boy wants to see this area firsthand. I am your superior, and you will do as I tell you! So I tell you, he is going with you.”

  The Governor turned and walked away from a furious Commander Lee.

  Michael looked around and saw his daughter watching from among the crowd of murmuring onlookers. He quickly turned and began marching towards the shuttles.

  Stephen and Mandel eagerly rummaged through the metal crate packed with documentation equipment: visual imaging devices, audio recorders, freeze-frame cameras - enough equipment to keep the boys well-entertained while the shuttle crew quickly loaded and checked gear and supplies. The site was a hum of activity.

  With arms loaded full of equipment, the boys walked toward the lowered loading ramp of the nearest shuttle.

  “I wonder if we need to store this gear while we’re in flight,” Mandel said.

  Stephen shrugged as they entered the shadows of the dank shuttle, nudging their way past busy mechanics and soldiers. “I guess we should ask whoever’s in charge,” he suggested.

  Suddenly, both boys felt a firm grip on their shirt collars, and they were shoved harshly toward the wall. They collided with a short folding bench embedded in the paneling and were obliged to be seated. By the time they could turn around, Michael was already in their faces.

  “Sit,” he commanded casually. “Don’t get up.”

  Both boys quickly nodded, and Michael glared at them for a moment. Then he turned away, leaving them in stunned silence.

  Out of the slant-windowed control tower onboard the crashed ship, a quiet, solemn figure stared out over the landscape without really seeing anything. He was alone in the room, and aside from an occasional blip or whir from one of the numerous computer consoles, the station was quiet. He held a cup of some steaming beverage in his right hand, and thoughtlessly swirled its contents over and over with a circular wrist motion. He wore a snug fitting uniform with an insignia on one shoulder that bore a depiction of some three-dimensional hydrocarbon molecule.

  “Simon,” another man said as he entered the control center.

  The silent man snapped out of his daze, and then turned his head to see who was calling him.

  “Yeah, Art?” he replied.

  “Sorry I’m late. I was taking a look around outside,” he said.

  Simon took a sip from his mug. “Ah, that’s ok. You haven’t missed anything.”

  Art came up beside his superior and sighed as he joined him in staring out the window. “So, do we have all the systems back up?”

  “Mm, most of them. We still don’t have visual on any of the lower decks,” Simon said. “And the air circulators in C-pod aren’t working, but that wh
ole area’s empty now anyway. Engines are totally offline. They’ll never work again. Whole heating system’s out. Lights are out on seven decks…”

  Art furrowed his eyebrows. “What is working?”

  Simon smiled and raised his mug. “The kitchen.”

  “That’s good,” Art said, chuckling a little. “Ah, it’s kind of bogus, isn’t it? Us being stuck here working while everybody else gets to go play?”

  Simon resumed his intent stare. “Yeah… bogus.” He took another sip of his drink and felt a drop slip off his lips. He looked down to see it spattered on his white name-badge. He swiped his thumb across the bold letters that read, “Simon Carlisse.”

  3

  The first shuttle rose high above the open field, the whine of its engines piercing the serenity of the countryside. It hovered, and turned to face the east before blasting off at high speed across the coast. A moment later, the second and third shuttles bolted off to the south and north. The countryside was once again at peace, for a moment. Finally, the fourth and last shuttle emerged from the foliage and turned to the west. With its white-hot engines blaring, the shuttle bolted off along the coastline, away from the afternoon sun.

  Onboard, the noise of the engines prevented calm conversation, and Michael was forced to shout his orders in the cockpit.

  “Keep us low to the ground, Lieutenant,” he commanded. “And set the long-range sensors to detect a mass of metal. We’re looking for our sister ship.”

  “Yes, sir,” the pilot shouted as he adjusted switches.

  Michael looked back into the cargo bay of the shuttle, where all his men sat with wondrous expressions on their faces as they stared out the portholes. Michael could not help but grin when he saw the only two men not looking out the windows.

  Stephen and Mandel both stared directly at the floor, unmoving. They were still clutching bundles of equipment in their arms, and were keeping from being jostled around by pressing their feet against the securing hooks imbedded in the floor. They had not even moved enough to fasten their safety-harnesses. Michael grinned even wider as he unfastened his own harness. He walked slowly back into the cargo hold, unnoticed by the rest of the men. He kept from being thrown to the floor by grasping onto a series of handholds that were fastened all over the ceiling. He stopped directly in front of the two boys, and leaned close to their faces so he wouldn’t have to shout. He felt they were scared enough already.

  “You can relax now. I won’t kill you today,” he said, casually.

  Both boys relaxed by exhaling, possibly for the first time in an hour.

  “Stay out of the way while we’re operating here. And keep to yourselves unless you have something important to say. Got it?”

  The boys nodded and said “Yes, sir,” simultaneously.

  “Alright then,” Michael concluded. “Stow that gear.”

  “Yes, sir,” they replied again.

  When Michael returned to his seat, he turned and looked back into cargo hold. His grin returned as he watched the two youths fumbling with their equipment against the motion of the ship.

  The trees below were only a massive green blur as the shuttle raced along the continental coastline - its belly only a dozen meters above the treetops.

  Two hours after the western crew started their search along the coast, the shuttle landed in another large field to allow a break for the men, most of whom retreated into the nearby woods to relieve themselves. The shuttle had stopped in an area much like the one in which its mother ship had crashed, overlooking the sparkling blue ocean. The field consisted of shin-high grass mixed with a species of wheat that one of the soldiers, a specialist in the field of botany, had collected samples of to bring back to the ship for analysis.

  Michael was standing at the entrance to the shuttle, surrounded by a group of soldiers.

  “We need to sweep a little bit inland so the scanners can cover more ground area,” Michael was saying. “The way we’re going now, we’re scanning several kilometers of just ocean. That’s wasted bandwidth.”

  A shamed crewman looked downward as he nodded, and replied, “Yes, sir.”

  Stephen and Mandel were waiting patiently when the crewmen stepped aside, leaving them in Michael’s line of vision.

  He sighed quietly. “Yes, gentlemen?”

  Stephen stepped up. “We want to know if it’s alright to climb that face and get a better view.”

  Michael looked past the two men to a huge rock wall, which led to a plateau above, and directly in front of, the shuttle. The peak blocked their view of the countryside beyond.

  “I don’t care,” Michael replied. As he began to turn and leave, he was stopped by a slight cough from Mandel, who nudged Stephen.

  “Something else?” Michel asked.

  Stephen bowed his head slightly. “The thing is…” He was forced to stop out of humiliation.

  Michael was annoyed. “What is it?”

  Stephen closed his eyes. “We need our equipment. It’s locked in the overhead.”

  “So, get it,” Michael commanded.

  “Along with the key,” Mandel finally added.

  Michael said nothing. He merely rolled his eyes as he walked back up the loading ramp, into the cargo hold.

  “There,” Michael said, as the storage lid clanged down. He put the master key back into his pocket. “I knew you would be a nuisance,” he added, nudging his way past them.

  “Sorry,” Mandel mumbled, sarcastically.

  “What was that?” Michael asked, turning completely around.

  “Sorry,” he repeated, as convincingly as possible this time.

  Michael paused a moment. “Uh huh,” he finally concluded. He walked out of the cargo hold and stepped back into the sunlight, cursing under his breath.

  When the Commander was well out of earshot, Mandel piped up. “He’s a pain, isn’t he?”

  Stephen shrugged as he began pulling equipment out of the storage bin. “I dunno. There’s nobody else I’d rather have in charge of my security.”

  Mandel nodded. “Good point. He could still be a little nicer, though.”

  The boys carefully loaded the equipment into military backpacks.

  “Eh.” Stephen said, shrugging his shoulders. “He doesn’t bother me much.” Something else was on his mind. “Hey, how are we going to get up that wall?”

  Mandel grinned. “Way ahead of ya, buddy,” he said, as he zipped up his backpack and moved over to a crate of military supplies across the aisle. He began rummaging through the crate, and finally produced two odd-looking, long guns with belt-like harnesses clipped to their stocks. “Grapplers,” Mandel said to his puzzled friend.

  Stephen immediately glared at him. “We’re not allowed to be using this stuff are we?”

  Mandel shrugged innocently and smiled. “Military equipment… And we’re on a military expedition…”

  Stephen thought for a moment, and then began to smile as well. “Yeah…” he said. He zipped up his own pack and put it on his back. He then picked up one of the grappler guns and closed the bin lid.

  The boys slung the guns onto their shoulders and walked out of the cargo area. When they stepped out into the open, Stephen was once more awestruck by the natural beauty all around him.

  “It’s amazing, isn’t it, Man?” he asked.

  Mandel smiled. “That it is, Steve. Do you think we’ll really find the other ship here?”

  Stephen shrugged, and they began walking towards the base of the rock wall. “Well, we’ve followed the other ship’s original course perfectly, so unless they went off course somewhere along the line, they probably would have settled here too.” He looked out across the ocean. “I’d say it’s just a matter of finding them.”

  “What about ships after us?” Mandel Proposed. “I wonder if there were any, you know, behind us.”

  Stephen shrugged, not particularly interested. “Who knows?”

  Mandel shook his head. “Wow. We’ve finally got a home.”

  �
��Hehe,” Stephen chuckled. “We don’t have much choice. We can’t leave now.”

  Mandel smiled in return. “Yeah, I guess not.” He paused for a moment. “I think it’s a little hard to believe that we just happened to collide with a stray meteorite, though. That’s like, one-in-a-million odds.”

  “Well, what do you think happened?” Stephen asked.

  “I have no idea,” Mandel said. “I just think it’s a little incredible. That’s all.”

  “It’s happened before,” Stephen said thoughtfully, examining his grappler. He was unwilling to look his friend in the eye.

  Mandel unconsciously blushed a little. He had not realized what he was saying. “Yeah,” Mandel replied.

  Stephen and Mandel stood at the base of the plateau and looked up its enormous face with awe. Stephen shielded his eyes from the sun’s glare. “Wow,” he said. “You know, it looked allot smaller from back there.”

  Mandel nodded. “Actually, yeah. It did.”

  Stephen looked around. “Well what should we do?”

  Mandel shrugged and said, “We go on up.” He began fidgeting with his grappler controls.

  Stephen was astonished - amazed at his friend’s lack of fear, but he said nothing; he merely began looking at his own controls. “I guess so,” he said. Stephen noticed a white sticker on the side of the gun with instructions printed on it. “Ah, here we go,” he said. He slid his finger over the letters as he read them. “To activate, slide safety switch to ‘off’ position, and aim at target.”

  A sudden, explosive noise right next to him made Stephen jump. He spun around to see Mandel looking skyward, as an object with metal grasping fingers flew through the air, trailing a thin black cord behind it. The grappling hook flew past the top of the plateau, arced smoothly in the air, and began falling back downward. It landed on top of the plateau, somewhere out of Stephen and Mandel’s vision.

  “Nice shot,” Stephen said.

  Mandel smiled. “Thanks, bud.” He began to step into the harness attached to his gun.

  Stephen decided to follow his friend’s example and forego the instructions. He slid the safety button off and pointed the gun barrel towards the sky.