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Planetfall
I was jolted awake from cryosleep to a cacophony of noise. The alarm claxons of the Unity were blaring, the ship was shuddering and creaking, and there were sounds of conflict echoing down the steel corridors. Bedlam reigned.
Harried specialists were moving down the line of cryocells opening each and muttering a few words as the occupants came groggily to their senses, just as they had said to me:
"Come on, we haven't much time - the Unity is disintegrating. We have to get to an escape pod."
I hurriedly sponged off the ammonic gel that had encapsulated me in my sleep, willing my muscles to life and trying to accomplish in a few short minutes what would normally have been an hour or so of acclimatization to normality.
"Everybody out to pod 6" came the yell. I frantically looked around for my parents - there they were, with my two younger brothers, Chandra and Javed.
We hastened to the escape pod with the rest of the UN medical and specialist contingent. I saw Dr Lal there - I had met him and his lovely wife Pria several times on Earth as they were friendly with my parents. He was clearly upset and seemed on the verge of losing control of himself, alternately sobbing over some private grief and then straightening himself up and ushering us into the pod.
No sooner were we strapped in to our acceleration couches than the explosive bolts blew and we were rocketing down to a planet.
On the descent, Dr. Lal briefly told us what had happened, and that we represented one of eight factions that had decided to separate and head independently for Chiron, an earth-like planet orbiting Alpha Centauri's twin suns. He was distraught over something, more than just the breaking up of the mission's lofty co-operative ideals and the UN's role in the colonization of the new planet.
On the descent those with an external view saw one of the escape pods explode as we reached Chiron's upper atmosphere.
We extended our glide wings, and the braking baffles deployed, landing us on the side of a large hill next to a sea. There we built our base, appropriately called UN Headquarters.
Ok, I should tell you a little bit about myself. I'm Tazeem Gavaskar, 16 years old (actually I guess I'm 56 now, after 40 years in cryosleep) and my mother is the Scientific Officer attached to the UN medical team. Dad is an equipment engineer, and both are friends of Dr. Lal's. My brothers I've already mentioned.
While our base was being built, Dr Lal dispatched scouts to survey the terrain around our landing site, and they returned quickly with a rover vehicle that had been jettisoned in an automatic landing pod from the Unity. One told a horrid story about a native life form he'd encountered in a fungus patch - luckily his reflexes had been good and he was able to kill it outright. He'd brought the husks back to base for us to see, but told us that the pain in his head had been excruciating as the mindworm (that's the name my mother gave it) had attacked him.
There was sufficient materials from the landing craft to enable a second base to be contemplated, so Dr. Lal cut his small force of loyal followers in half, and sent them to a nearby river fork that the scouts had identified as being a likely site for a future base.
I had been assigned to Dr. Lal's personal staff as a general housegirl, responsible for cleaning duties and general tidying up around his office and living quarters. I soon found out what had made him so distraught. Pria, his dear wife was dead, assassinated, he believed, and he was becoming more bitter by the day. His behaviour was increasingly erratic, but he was our acknowledged leader and it was up to us in his household staff to support him in every way.
A department meeting was caled, to be presided over by my mother, with all the senior staff attending. research was the subject.
Mother spoke: "I have broken possible research into four categories, and we have to concentrate our efforts into one or more of these research streams. To try to research all four simultaneously would dissipate our meagre resources to the point where nothing might be achieved."
After a vote, we elected to simultaneously research pure science and building infrastructure, so the scientific staff were again divided into two streams, and set on their tasks. Mother opted to lead the pure science research team.
Next day I was tidying around Dr Lal's desk when his vidcom crackled to life:
"Pravin, Rahul here, come in please". I looked around - I had last seen Dr. Lal some hours ago. I flicked the transponder toggle:
"Tazeem Gavaskar here, Dr. Lal's assistant. How can I help?"
"We've made contact. Nwabudike Morgan wishes to talk to Dr. Lal"
... to be continued.
[This message has been edited by Googlie (edited June 01, 1999).]
I was jolted awake from cryosleep to a cacophony of noise. The alarm claxons of the Unity were blaring, the ship was shuddering and creaking, and there were sounds of conflict echoing down the steel corridors. Bedlam reigned.
Harried specialists were moving down the line of cryocells opening each and muttering a few words as the occupants came groggily to their senses, just as they had said to me:
"Come on, we haven't much time - the Unity is disintegrating. We have to get to an escape pod."
I hurriedly sponged off the ammonic gel that had encapsulated me in my sleep, willing my muscles to life and trying to accomplish in a few short minutes what would normally have been an hour or so of acclimatization to normality.
"Everybody out to pod 6" came the yell. I frantically looked around for my parents - there they were, with my two younger brothers, Chandra and Javed.
We hastened to the escape pod with the rest of the UN medical and specialist contingent. I saw Dr Lal there - I had met him and his lovely wife Pria several times on Earth as they were friendly with my parents. He was clearly upset and seemed on the verge of losing control of himself, alternately sobbing over some private grief and then straightening himself up and ushering us into the pod.
No sooner were we strapped in to our acceleration couches than the explosive bolts blew and we were rocketing down to a planet.
On the descent, Dr. Lal briefly told us what had happened, and that we represented one of eight factions that had decided to separate and head independently for Chiron, an earth-like planet orbiting Alpha Centauri's twin suns. He was distraught over something, more than just the breaking up of the mission's lofty co-operative ideals and the UN's role in the colonization of the new planet.
On the descent those with an external view saw one of the escape pods explode as we reached Chiron's upper atmosphere.
We extended our glide wings, and the braking baffles deployed, landing us on the side of a large hill next to a sea. There we built our base, appropriately called UN Headquarters.
Ok, I should tell you a little bit about myself. I'm Tazeem Gavaskar, 16 years old (actually I guess I'm 56 now, after 40 years in cryosleep) and my mother is the Scientific Officer attached to the UN medical team. Dad is an equipment engineer, and both are friends of Dr. Lal's. My brothers I've already mentioned.
While our base was being built, Dr Lal dispatched scouts to survey the terrain around our landing site, and they returned quickly with a rover vehicle that had been jettisoned in an automatic landing pod from the Unity. One told a horrid story about a native life form he'd encountered in a fungus patch - luckily his reflexes had been good and he was able to kill it outright. He'd brought the husks back to base for us to see, but told us that the pain in his head had been excruciating as the mindworm (that's the name my mother gave it) had attacked him.
There was sufficient materials from the landing craft to enable a second base to be contemplated, so Dr. Lal cut his small force of loyal followers in half, and sent them to a nearby river fork that the scouts had identified as being a likely site for a future base.
I had been assigned to Dr. Lal's personal staff as a general housegirl, responsible for cleaning duties and general tidying up around his office and living quarters. I soon found out what had made him so distraught. Pria, his dear wife was dead, assassinated, he believed, and he was becoming more bitter by the day. His behaviour was increasingly erratic, but he was our acknowledged leader and it was up to us in his household staff to support him in every way.
A department meeting was caled, to be presided over by my mother, with all the senior staff attending. research was the subject.
Mother spoke: "I have broken possible research into four categories, and we have to concentrate our efforts into one or more of these research streams. To try to research all four simultaneously would dissipate our meagre resources to the point where nothing might be achieved."
After a vote, we elected to simultaneously research pure science and building infrastructure, so the scientific staff were again divided into two streams, and set on their tasks. Mother opted to lead the pure science research team.
Next day I was tidying around Dr Lal's desk when his vidcom crackled to life:
"Pravin, Rahul here, come in please". I looked around - I had last seen Dr. Lal some hours ago. I flicked the transponder toggle:
"Tazeem Gavaskar here, Dr. Lal's assistant. How can I help?"
"We've made contact. Nwabudike Morgan wishes to talk to Dr. Lal"
... to be continued.
[This message has been edited by Googlie (edited June 01, 1999).]
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