The dark, scarred, bulbous hulk of a Buzzard-class Transport rocked through the void of Terran space. Alone. It’s four primary engine coils burned white hot, in contrast to the cold darkness of the surrounding abyss. The roar of the engines was felt throughout the ship, as it made its way toward the Danthor System.
This one ship was running. It had seen combat, not by choice. The nose and dorsal sections of the transport were charred black, pitted, and pimpled from the acidic spray that had eaten away some of the armor plating. The laser cannons mounted on the ventral sides of the transport were nothing more than melted chunks of metal. The domed upper surface of the transport barred a hole, roughly the size of a small hover car, with jagged edges. Every so often an object would float out and crash against the side of the craft, then drift off into oblivion. Crews could be seen inside trying to salvage what remained following the vicious attack.
Moving to the undersurface, the darkened side was largely intact, save a deep gash into the offload compartment. After sustaining an impact with a mutalisk, an overlord has tried to dock and board the transport – unsuccessfully. No cargo had been stowed there, but the Confederacy marines waiting valiantly had destroyed the overlord and it’s cargo of hydralisks and zerglings. At a price, of course. The entire squad had been lost. The rest of the underside looked rather clean, and the landing gear, were, undamaged, as the pilot and her crew hoped to set down on Danthor IX. The remains of a Confederacy contingent were digging in on the plant’s arid surface, but only for protection from the elements. Danthor IX was known as one of the most brutal environments in the entire Confederacy. Not even the Zerg tried to assault the planet. Far too many were lost due to exposure. What creatures had landed quickly succumbed the blowing sand, biting winds, and high temperatures of the tri-solar system.
Up in the cockpit, Captain Jamie “JJ” Hawkers locked in the final trajectory and approach vectors to Danthor IX. Although an outlying planet, it was just inside of a large asteroid ring that shifted position with the orbiting suns. Landing would not be easy. Her copilot, Captain Johan Akesen, checked on the remainder of the confederacy soldiers, while the remainder of the transport’s staff rushed about the cramped interior of what remained of the bridge.
“Private Culmers, seal all doorways and activate viewport armors,” came the terse command from Hawkers as she sat in her command chair, located back towards the far end of the bridge. Her chair, as with all others, hung from the ceiling, and allowed it to be swung around, and move to various stations located along the rear side of the bridge. A gentle rumble was felt throughout the ship, as armor sheets slid down over all cargo hold and quarters viewports, sealing them off from the outside. Doing so now, Hawkers swiveled around and disengaged the EBC-locks that allowed Sean Culmers to close off all the doors. She glanced up to quickly scan her hazel eyes across the bridge, backlit in a pale yellow glow from the alert lamps. Numerous faces were staring at her, many with fear in their eyes. EBC-locks down and sealing off the viewports and doorways, this was not standard re-entry procedure. Doing so meant only one thing to the crew – their captain was scared. And Captain Jamie Hawkers was most definitely not scared.
“I don’t want to risk a blowout, ladies and gentlemen. We’re bein’ safe with in-atmosphere flight. I don’t want to risk loosing more of my ship,” she spoke into her headset, as it transmitted through the intercom system throughout the ship. When the EBC viewscreen came up red, and slowly dropped to green, Hawkers glanced forward. Private Culmers threw her a convincing thumbs up, as if to say “we ain’t loosin’ any more good guys today.”
“All doors have reported sealed and intact. We’re stable at 86 percent hull integrity, and both manned, remaining cargo holds have reported all present and accounted for,” spoke Akesen as Hawkers swiveled back into position. After reaching to the ceiling and locking her chair in place for descent, she listened as Akesen finished his report.
“… hold 1 is completely evacuated. Cargo Hold 2 has 100 percent atmosphere, and all systems are in the green, except hydraulic for their door. It’s yellowed down to 73 percent, and I have sugge-”
“That’s too damn low,” asserted Hawkers as she brought up the hydraulic power screen. To her dismay, she did notice that all the foodstuffs, remaining weapons and other supplies located in Cargo Hold 1 would have to be pried reinforced.
“Transfer some auxiliary power to try and clean up the system. We’re gonna need to get those doors open when we land.”
“Yes, ma’am!” came the enthusiastic reply from first mate David Freeman, the ships engineering officer. Freeman was the newest bridge member, after his superior had died during the Zerg ambush. Now-deceased Colonel James Hickory had also been the invasion task force’s engineering commander. Freeman had been his protégé. Freeman went ahead and flicked through his computer, routing power through.
“Power transfer complete Cap’n. It’ll hold,” Freeman smiled up at her from his station below and to the left of Hawkers.
“Good. Culmers, how we doin’ on time?”
“Excellent, ma’am. Asteroid field plotted out. Pilots Cassidy and Greauher are standing by. Forward viewport activated.” Culmers pulled a lever and set its lock in place. An electric thrumming echoed through the ship, as the heavy rolled armor shimmered up and away from the transteel bridge viewport.
Ahead and directly in front of the viewports, Pilots Sarah Cassidy and Jonathan Greauher were finishing preparations for descent into the rapidly approaching field and rigging the ship for atmospheric descent and landing. Cassidy finished buckling into her 8-point harness first, put on her holographic headset, and began rapidly speaking into her mike.
“Attention all hands! Attention all hands! Rig ship for immediate atmospheric descent! All crewman report to emergency stations! Passengers, restrain yourselves and get ready to ride! Engineering, bring radial, lateral, and landing thrusters online!”
Reports echoed through the emptying corridors on the ship as men and women ran to their stations, prepping for emergency descent. Thruster status readings popped onto Hawkers’ screen, but she paid little attention. They were all green.
“Culmers, get on the horn. I want those troops on surface to know we’re coming. Lock in the bearing to NavComp and prep for landing at their starport.”
“Roger that, Cap’n.”
As Culmers got on the radio to contact the Star Traffic Controllers at the spaceport, Hawkers took a moment to relax and let her crew go to work. The viewport still showed points of light as long streaks, being that the jump engines were still engaged, bringing the crippled Buzzard-class transport as close as possible to the asteroid field and the system.
“Disengage jump engines ... now!” shouted Hawkers as, up front, Greauher threw forward a lever and a few switches, cycling it from “Jump” to “Interstellar.” Engineering responded in turn, and the huge behemoth of a transport shuddered as the bridge crew saw the points of light materialize and Danthor system come into view.
“Cassidy and Greauher on it, ma’am,” was the automatic reply as the two pilots went to work immediately. They adjusted various switches and rapidly tapped their computer control pads, the LED screen flickering, and then bringing up the radar to search out the supposed NavBeacons left out by the Terran force that was already on planet.
“Cap’n, we have positive ID on NavBeac 17-2.b,” Greauher sounded out after a few minutes of searching, “ETA places us downtown in three-zero minutes.” The bridge crew simultaneously breathed a sigh of relief. No NavBeacon meant no guidance through the asteroid field. Their already damaged ship would have been chewed up, and possibly would not have made it.
Culmers raised his head and swiveled out from his control station to face the entire bridge crew. “We have contact! They got word of our fleet’s fate. They didn’t even know we made it out. Everyone has been granted personal quarters and fresh food and hot baths!”
Cheers went up from the crew. They had been running from the depths of Zerg space for approaching 43 hours. 84th fleet, a surgical strike fleet, had set out for Mar Sara more than three weeks prior. The Zerg, however, had detected the fleet and set an ambush with the fleet’s objective in sight, literally. The entire fleet was massacred. None of the corvettes, carriers, or even the mighty battlecruisers survived. Eagle 7, Captain Jamie Hawkers’ Buzzard Transport was the only ship that anyone on board believed has survived. They blasted out of the center of Zerg space and ran like crazy. After a few hours, they came out of jump, and realigned for the nearest Terran system that could sustain their craft. Danthor IX was 34 hours away. Although it was a new colony, it was rapidly growing to support the Confederacy’s war effort.
“Good news, Private!” shouted Hawkers. “All of you – three days shore leave when we touch down. Rest up and get well. We’ll get my tub home together!”
Another elated cheer went up, but was quickly silenced with a harsh glare from the crew’s captain. Everyone went back to work, preparing for descent.
Hawkers readjusted her straps, and handed control over to Captain Akesen. She leaned back and sighed quietly. Akesen assumed command and then let Cassidy take over up front. She was a good pilot, and even Hawkers watched in surprise as to how easily Greauher and Cassidy guided the ship through the asteroid field. Most all the bridge was quiet, with the two pilots and co-pilot of the ship occasionally calling out navigation vectors.
“Sarah, call the ball. Line is set at 237 mark 8.”
“Roger that. Jon, set nose elevation to 4.7 degrees.”
“Yessir! Ladies and Gents … We’re home! Final prep set … lower blast shield, Culmers.”
“Yes, ma’am!”
The crippled transport whined as the shield returned to it’s position over the bridge viewscreen. It was, however, replaced with a camera view from the nose. Everyone on the bridge braced themselves as the transport hit the upper edges of the ionosphere.
***
The massive freighter broke the ionosphere, and a thundering roar grew as the ship began to shake itself apart. It nosed down, and then slowly changed from a long, slender transport into a streaking ball of fire as some of the blast shield began to burn away. The engines cut out, and the transport began its free-fall. The rapidly building atmosphere began to violently shake the spacecraft. Chunks of metal sheared off of the gaping holes along the underside and amidships, but no new holes appeared. The hull was solid and remained intact.
The transport began to rock violently as it encountered standard upper atmospheric winds. And then, with a loud roar, even louder than the flying craft, the engines reignited, pushing the ship down towards the planet surface that was still miles below. Even from the upper extent of the atmosphere, Danthor IX looked lifeless and barren.
With loud bursts, the radial thrusters began firing in a series of controlled brakes. The transport swapped nose for tail, and was suddenly falling backwards, with the engines still firing, slowing Eagle 7’s descent. The huge rocket motors burned in the atmosphere, with the noise stinging in the air. Earsplitting roars ran through the ship, as if it was being torn apart. Slowly, slowly, the ship began to slow, before veritably teetering on tumbling out of control. Thrusters fired, bring the nose down quickly, and landing brakes engaged, still miles above the surface. With the main engine still firing, huge cones of gas and flame appeared all around the belly of the giant transport, as the ship struggled for control.
Finally, control came. A few miles from the surface, all the burning subsided, and the transport took off. It continued in a controlled descent, until it was only a few hundred feet off the ground. Its engines propelled it up along the edge of a ridge, and then away as the ship banked into a hard turn to port, and to line up with the now visible lights of the landing zone.
The initial signal beacons were sighted, and the main engines of the ship were cut to one-third. Large, rectangular panels raised, with a clanking and grinding sound, as squat landing gear were deployed all along the edge of the underside of the craft. Lateral thrusters fired, bringing the freighter’s movement to a slow pace. Main engines were cut out, as hover vents along the underside also joined in the thrusters in leveling and smoothing the landing.
***
The bridge was a flurry of activity. After almost loosing a large section of the hull when they were hit by a large gust of wind, Hawkers had called for Cassidy to cool her hot rod flying. But now, everyone was finishing landing preparations. The blast shield had been raised, as had all others along the sides of the craft. Radio chatter was lively, as the tower controller was guiding Eagle 7 into a landing. Two ground crew members were guiding the craft with large batons into its landing zone.
“.. –ger that. We comply. Stand by … slowing … held.”
Hawkers leaned back as Akesen finished landing the gigantic transport. Although the reply to Cassidy was too quiet to hear over her headset, Hawkers knew it was good. She unbuckled her restraints as she slouched into her command seat, exhausted. Everyone was clapping and cheering, but Jamie Hawkers closed her heavy eyelids, smiled, and whispered “Thank God we’re home.”
A slight thumping sound and a gentle jostle signaled the ship had touched down. Hovervents and thrusters went offline, and then the main engine coils shut down. Their high-pitched metallic whine died slowly, and the ship reverberated the echo throughout.
“Good job everybody. Let’s get some rest,” were the only words Hawker needed to speak.
