Something Happened on the way to Haumea
Posted on Sun Jan 30th, 2022 @ 8:48am by Ranger Blue
Edited on on Sun Jan 30th, 2022 @ 9:59am
1,129 words; about a 6 minute read
Mission:
Roll With It
Timeline: MD. Zero - 1400 hours
They say your life flashes before your eyes just before you die.
Ranger pulled back hard on the holographic controls, trying to steady the craft as it fell into the planet’s atmosphere. Sweat beaded on his forehead and dripped down into his eyes. He blinked.
“Remember your lessons, child,” Kars’h intoned. “You must center yourself and restrain the urge to anger. In your case, it leads to little more than repercussions at school and at home.
Ranger was sat, his legs crossed with his hands on his knees. He sighed heavily, with all the weight of a teenager before closing his eyes and resuming his breathing exercises. His eyes still closed, he said sullenly, “I thought we’d be starting with weapons training today?”
“You can not control your fists or your emotions despite many months of training,” Kars’h explained evenly. “Until you can learn to control your inner turmoil, you can not be trained to fight with either hands or weapons.”
“Reserve power is failing,” the computer voice calmly interrupted the memory. Ranger could now feel the rattling of the controls as he fought to stabilize the shuttle’s orbital descent. “Re-entry angle is not optimal for atmospheric re-entry. Speed increasing. Hull integrity is down to twenty-five percent.”
“Go to battery back-up,” Ranger grunted and his hands started to numb from the constant rattling of the controls. He was almost relived when the holographic controls returned to the panels, but that just meant he was in trouble.
“Reverse thrusters at my control,” he told the computer. Outside, he could see small panels beginning to peel back. “Reverse all on my mark… mark!”
The shuttle’s descent evened out to improve his odds, but not quite to optimal. The dark void of space started to give way to the thin line of atmosphere and then the bright flare of heat as the shuttle caused friction against the air molecules.
“Deploy atmospheric braking flaps,” he yelled over the increasing roar of the atmosphere against the hull and strained metal of the ship.
“Unable to deploy. Backup power insufficient,” the computer replied, the voice sounding odd as it too was losing power.
Blink.
“Why would you possibly want to join the Rangers?” Diego asked, flabbergasted. “I was there for the earliest of their years. They’re a mass of pirates, raiders and disgruntled former Federation citizens. “Why can’t you just find work on the colony? We have plenty of jobs.”
“And no excitement. We haven’t even seen a Ranger here in over a decade…” he argued. “We need someone to help our colony too. We need new parts, new stock, new… everything!” Ranger said motioning around their house.
“It’s far too dangerous, mijo,” his mother argued. She stuffed more wood into the stove. “I won’t have you flying around the galaxy on some quest for things we are living without.”
“We were one of the advanced colonies at the edge of Federation space before they withdrew to their established borders. Now you’re cooking on a fire hob. We’ve got nothing left.”
Ranger was brought back to the present as the ship rattled and groaned. He turned his chair and moved to the back of the cabin. He pulled off the panels to his left and right, drew a deep breath and pulled the manual handles, releasing the braking flaps.
The ship’s descent immediately slowed and proved Newton’s first law, a body in motion remains in motion until acted on by an outside force. Ranger was flung forward violently until he crashed into the the seat he’d just vacated.
A searing pain, accompanied by a cracking sound, implied he’d just broken something. The fact the his left arm hung uselessly at his side confirmed his suspicion. Stars danced in the darkness that threatened to take his consciousness, but he shoved those sensations away. Focusing on the next task.
Stumbling to the aft cabin, he pulled the other manual handles. Pressing his back against one and placing his feet of the other, he pushed with all his remaining strength to deploy the atmospheric wing structures. With a click and a pop, the wings deployed, now sending him gliding over the planet.
He moved mid-cabin and pulled open the floorboard, accessing the sub-floor. He pulled the starboard handle and then the port one, dropping two packages to the surface of the planet.
Climbing into the cockpit chair, he swiveled it to find the pilot’s handle between his legs and a pedal at either foot. Doing some quick calculations, Ranger set his course in a slow circle. He hoped his calculations would put him on course to be near to either of the packages he’d dropped.
After about twenty minutes of gliding descent, Ranger could see the ground closing in fast. He set the course and locked the handle as he bucked himself in. The landing would be rough if the forest below was any indication.
The small speed shuttle hit the trees at full speed, slowing Ranger’s descent a bit more abruptly than landing in an open field. The cockpit chair jolted forward and Ranger felt a sharp pain in his right leg, below the knee.
Trees exploded as the shuttle hit one after another until it finally hit ground and slid to an awkward stop.
Laying on his right side, Ranger could see the angle of the trees, identifying that his shuttle had landed on its side. He unbuckled himself and dropped to his right shoulder. A surge of pain in his left shoulder was his first confirmation that he’d fractured his clavicle.
Using the manual release, the cabin opened and allowed him to drop to the dirt, still warm from the friction of his slide onto the planet’s surface. He pulled himself up, setting priorities. First the medkit, determine his injuries and make sure none of them were critical. Set the bone stimulator to repair the clavicular fracture. Determine if he had any other broken bones, he suspected a tibial and fibula fracture based on the pain in his right leg.
Running the scans, he found no internal bleeding. ‘Lucky,’ he thought. The tricorder confirmed his suspicions, fracture of his left clavicle and right tib/fib.
He’d have to spend a few days at the shuttle, recovering from his wounds, but he had the carcass of the shuttle to house his and the tools to set and fuse his bones.
After that, he’d have to figure out where he was… other than an M class planet on which he’d determined there was a Federation colony. Then it would just be a matter of getting there.
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