The Chronicles of Aallandranon - Episode One - Ant-Lion (9 page)

Jonathan returned to Rawi
’
s terminal and went to
the power grid once more.
“
Sam, get ready to
power on the thrusters on my mark.
”
He rerouted power to the
ship
’
s
maneuverability quadrant. Half the terminals in the room went dark
on everyone.

“
Shields dropping fast! Radiation levels
sustained.
” George
yelled.

Jonathan ignored him.
“
Now, thrusters to
full.
”
The motion of moving forward very quickly took the ship.
They began to accelerate toward the planet though it still looked
far away.
“
Everyone but me and Sam, get to the
Freighters.
”

“
Good luck, Jonathan.
”
William said. Jonathan glanced over
his shoulder and caught William
’
s eye. They held one
another
’
s attention for a moment before William entered the Flight
Dock.

“
We
’
ll reach maximum speed in
thirty-seconds.
”
Sam said.

“
As
soon as that happens, Sam, you can go.
”
Jonathan
said.

“
Yes sir.”

Clara
and Ryan shook Jonathan
’
s hand and disappeared through the doors to the
Flight Dock.

“
Acceleration at maximum.
”
Sam took off his headset and
descended from the third floor to the second.
“
Good
luck.
”
He clapped Jonathan on the back and left through the doors,
leaving Jonathan alone on the dimly lit Bridge.

“
Evacuation in fifteen minutes. Board your vessels at
once.
”
Adams said over the communicator. There was a small
explosion from within the Flight Dock, but Jonathan
couldn
’
t worry about that right now. The reactor was shot.
Jonathan directed the remaining energy to life-support and shut
down all the other decks it was feeding except the Bridge and the
Flight Dock. The next ten minutes went by slowly. Adams announced
that they would be leaving in five minutes. Their distance from the
planet seemed unchanged.

“
Ready to take the reins, Jonathan?
”
Adams asked over his
communicator.

“
Affirmative. Get going guys, and make sure someone follows
me down.
”
Jonathan said. They only took three of the large carrier
Freighters and a few Hawks, leaving all the other birds locked in
the Flight Dock. As soon as he heard the last Freighter disembark,
Jonathan wired the terminal Rawi had been using to draw power from
his Manica-Band. He was still drawing energy from life-support to
power it, but this way he didn
’
t have to manipulate the
computer against its better judgement to allow him to use the
scanner.

He triangulated the most isolated part of the
planet. He wanted to set her down without anyone seeing them,
without anyone asking questions if that was possible. There was a
continent that was inhabited, but only primarily to the south. To
the north, Jonathan found a cape where setting down would be far
easier. Once he figured out where he would go, he disconnected the
band and collapsed in the navigator seat where Ryan had sat
earlier. He gazed out the window at the blue ball in the distance,
and waited.

9

After
drifting to sleep for a few minutes, Jonathan hoped that when he
opened his eyes everything would have been a dream, that he was
laying in his bed in his room next to Elizabeth. He saw the all too
familiar crack in the window. The planet seemed a little larger. He
was freezing, but it didn
’
t matter. Jonathan
snagged one of the hundreds of remaining emergency kits hidden
under every seat and terminal on the ship. Each one had basic
repair utensils, bandages, wraps, disinfectant wipes, gauze and
tape, antibacterial ointment, and three chocolate Grum
bars
–
a
nutritional six-hundred calorie meal that would become
Jonathan
’
s daily bread in the event that he
couldn
’
t find food.

After
he chewed through a Grum bar, he dumped the medical kit and packed
it with the bars from the other medical kits he found. He packed
some of the medical and repair equipment that he
didn
’
t
already have built into his Manica-Band. Once the kit was full,
Jonathan dropped it in the co-pilot
’
s seat and put away the
rest of the kits so he didn
’
t trip on them if he
needed to get to the core for some reason.

Since
the reactor had died, the core was pretty much just sitting there,
bathed in its own perpetual energy. It would survive the next
three-hundred years assuming it remained undisturbed. After that,
it would power down until it was no longer
active
–
the best scenario imaginable for something so dangerous.
Any other situation involved the obliteration of everything within
nearly a light-year
’
s circumference. It was difficult to imagine that the
explosion his core could generate could cause more damage than the
black-hole where they entered this strange solar-system. It could
very likely cause its own black-hole, especially if its destruction
reached the nearby sun.

Looking out the window from the Core Hall, Jonathan could
see the sun. It was a bright yellow dwarf, not unlike their own. It
made him think about how many elements must come together in order
to make a world habitable
–
part of why
it
’
s
taken mankind so long to find anything else. How did they get so
fortunate? If the black-hole had taken them somewhere random,
thrown up a map of the whole universe and picked a position, what
were the odds that the position chosen would be in a solar system
with a planet just like Earth and a sun identical to
Earth
’
s?

“
Like winning the lottery on the first try, and betting that
you will beforehand.
”
Jonathan said aloud.

He
had been alive for thirty-nine years and he
’
d never thought about
religion, fate, or destiny. It all seemed so pointless to him, but
there was something more going on. What of William and his dreams?
What premonition had scrambled his mind to the point of blind rage
when they were in the Core Hall? Jonathan didn
’
t know, and part of him
didn
’
t
think he would ever get an answer.

Sitting there in the quiet of space as his fellow travelers
followed the Enigma, Jonathan thought of Elizabeth. He recalled how
everything had gone wrong, how the water had slanted in the glass,
how the wall had torn away and how quickly she
’
d disappeared into the
nothingness that had become her tomb. Their mortality within the
confines of the universe was like a child
’
s plaything; the great
and ruthless nature of existence, without worry and without care.
All things begin and therefore all things must end. He recognized
the absolute reality that his body would decay to powder, to
nothing. And what of the consciousness that so desperately desires
to save itself, to continue and exist at all
cost?

“
Maybe it
’
s just a glitch in the system, the idea that
we
’
re
special, that we
’
re anything more than everything we
are.
”
Jonathan leaned back in his seat and surveyed the planet.
He could see two moons orbiting its aqua-blue color. Once they got
closer, he would be able to distinguish the water from the
continents.

Being
alone with his thoughts had become difficult. He
didn
’
t
want to think about all the people who
’
d given themselves for
this mission, all the people he had let down because he
hadn
’
t
the foresight to prepare for a spontaneous black-hole that gave no
indication or warning of its existence. Jonathan tried to imagine
how it worked, see the physics behind it. The ship read nothing. If
it had detected so much as an anomaly it would have alerted the
entire crew. The speed at which the black-hole had appeared was
also a dead give-away that it was a force well beyond their
comprehension.

He
thought about something his father had shown him when he was
younger. Matthew Tabith had owned one of the last farms in the
International United States that wasn
’
t owned by the
government. No matter what price his family had been offered,
Matthew and his father and his father
’
s father, and so on,
never sold the twenty-two hundred square acres that contained
generations of family crops
–
at least not until
Matthew died and Jonathan signed the deal for 45 billion dollars.
It wasn
’
t much but that
’
s how he launched Pediteptim. Although he knew
his father would never have gone for the plan while he was alive,
Jonathan often wondered if his father would approve of his
life
’
s
decision to abandon the family business to chase his
dreams
–
which of course now felt like a huge mistake, but before
the black-hole.

Jonathan was fascinated by nature as a child. He would
become immersed in the world of insects. Ants were his favorite,
until he met the ant-lion. With his magnifying glass device, he
would follow lines of ants as they carried food back to their nest.
Every now and then, a line would cross a barren stretch of land
covered with tiny potholes. The critters would weave on the dunes
between the potholes, but those that fell inside were immediately
swallowed up by the predator waiting beneath the surface. His
father once took a twig and ran it along the wall of the
ant-lion
’
s sand trap until the thing began spouting puffs of dirt,
frustratedly trying to get whatever was in its proximity. Jonathan
would spend hours playing with the antlions, goading them to come
out and eat what was not there. Or he
’
d observe ants plummet
to their demise as the hungry thing earned its
feast.

He
imagined the space around their solar system like that, riddled
with unstable antimatter pockets that could spawn a black-hole at
the mere passage of matter in its presence. Jonathan almost
couldn
’
t believe he didn
’
t anticipate such a
devastating event. The theory had been explained to him plenty of
times. They were lucky to have survived at all. He wondered if in
some weird way they were meant to survive, that the black-hole was
actually some kind of interstellar gateway that needed only the
correct vehicle to navigate its brief passageway.

The
ship rumbled, startling Jonathan awake. His terminal had gone off.
He was still ice cold as the cool of space began to breach the
walls of the Enigma. Life-support was beginning to wane and peter
out. The planet appeared as a baseball in the distance. They were
getting closer. He calculated that, at present speed,
they
’
d
reach the planet in twenty-four hours as it circulated on its
trajectory around the sun.

He
passed in and out of consciousness. Once he caught himself
examining his Manica-Band. He recalled the incident that sparked
his need to design the device. It had happened shortly after his
first presentation explaining the function and usage of Pediteptim.
He was on his way to his car in the car garage when he noticed
someone following him. It was night out, and the man with the
mustache and beard was wearing sunglasses. Jonathan had always been
suspicious of introducing a technological advantage to society, so
he ran to his car, hearing the bullets from the
man
’
s
gun ring out through the carport as he unlocked his car and slid
in. The man ran out of rounds, but by the time that happened,
Jonathan was in his car driving forty-five miles per hour down the
ramp. The moment he heard the first gun-shot, he realized that he
was going to have to create something that would protect him. One
assassination attempt meant there were more to
come.

However useful and amazing the Manica-Band would become to
him, as he was soldering the inner workings of the device to the
circuit-board, Jonathan vowed never to introduce the band to the
world. The moment he did he would be vulnerable again. Someone
would figure out how to get around its defense function, or use it
to harm others. Everyone would have one and it
wouldn
’
t be an advantage. There were six more attempts, and all of
them ended with the perpetrator running out of ammunition and
fleeing the scene. Each time Jonathan got a good look at the
person, it was someone different.