Weekend Special Short Tales California 2.3 Chapter 5

 

5.

Benz with his overall unzipped heard the call to land the ship on the moon. He had then proceeded to his station at the Engine Chamber and leaned to look at the console. He has five vid screens to read the numbers that told him how the engine was responding. I did say he kept the ship at its best condition given the age and the amount of travel flights. Despite the workout, the ship was in very good hands of the veteran Engineer who had less than adequate tools to work on his previous cares at the military. He had during the battles, salvaged the needed components to get the crafts then at the hanger to be deployed.

Benz once told his aides, if it does not fix, attached it with the fast glue to the edges, and pray harder that you could live with that act.

“It is not science at works but arts to make it workable.” Benz told them. At his age, despite the advance in medication, he had neglected to treat his eye sight. He had placed on the specially fitted googles to take the readings. He was checking on Tiffany’s calibration and frowned. There were slight distortions on the readings from the main thrusters. He was sure that he had tuned the torque and pistons to the correct settings before the flight. He checked the logs and saw there were no changes in the reports until two hours ago. It was altered the settings. He picked up the communicator to speak to the Captain.

“Captain, I have….”

“Not now. If you can fix it, do it. I have to retrieve the container. It’s on the moon.” The Captain replied.

At that moment, Tiffany the ship was entering the moon atmosphere which in most cases was thin but that one was heavy with a thick deep atmosphere. The scanners picked up a variety of gases and the descent of the ship caused frictions that ignited the gases. The ship was protected by the reinforced hull with the heat exchanger plates and shield plating that deflected the heat. The Captain did not turned on the force field shield for that was to protect the ship in the case of an attack by hostile parties but it also took up power consumption.

“Benz, I am registering temperature at the starboard.” I had called in. It was my task as the navigator to monitor the ship integrity and with the junk we were on, every reading needed attention.

Benz moved from the console to the warp core and then passed it to the coolant console. He saw the starboard reading and compensated with the re-routing of the coolants from the rear which was not so badly affected by the heat. The reading on the starboard dipped and he got his thanks from me.

I saw the coolant had worked and sighed with relief.

Not for Benz though. He was checking the heat exchanger plates and noted the deterioration of the sets at the starboard. He had reported it earlier to the Captain but was told to stay with it.

“We are not landing the ship on any surface. We will use the shuttle to travel to the surface. And more to it, I need to check on another alert nearby.”

Benz took to his usual checks on the engines wobbling on the walks when the ship shakes on its entry. It was the usual with Hagar and Hagen. They were at the bottom level at rear end of the ship checking the Shuttle. The Shuttle was an oblong designed craft where the front housed the glass cockpit for the single pilot and the foldable seating for four at the rear. It held the engine above the hull with its single thruster and the bottom of the hull was the ski plates. The entry to the shuttle was by the rear doorway that opened downwards. The other exit was the detachable cockpit glass upon emergencies.

The shuttle held four environment suits with the breathing apparatus and survival kits that held the dry rations and medic kit with the flare tubes. There is the affixed lamp on the left shoulder while the head piece was a half sphere glass cover with the communication antenna on the left. The communication unit was built into the head piece. The lamp was on the right side of the head piece to give extra light to the wearer.

And in the case of hostility as the norm of the Earthlings, there was the rack of five blasters and two rifles with the extra clips of energized ammo.

“Do you think we will get to pillage?” Hagen looked at his brother. It was in their genetic makeup and they still valued the ancient ways.

“I have polished my battle axe for the task, and my shield is ready.” Hagar smiled. He held up the ancient weapons to show his brother. “I have also our ancestor’s knifr; the plain single edge knife and mallet.”

“Skol!” Hagen called out their ancestor battle cry.

“Shut up!” I heard their enthusiasm and I was fucking upset. So, I spread my mood across. “Get the grappling attached. We may need it.”

The grappling was an add-on tool that can be affixed to the front of the Shuttle. It was a set of a hard extension that reached out at over ten feet and at the end was the metal tentacle fixture with the three pronged grips that worked like a set of fingers. At the center of the grip was the drill that allowed the pilot to punch holes on the surface. It may lift up to half a ton.

“We are through the atmosphere.” The Captain called out.

“Benz, I want the diagnostics done. We had a tougher than expected ride. There is something not right with the engine. I can feel it.” The Captain reminded the Engineer.

“Ich weiß davon, Hauptmann.“ (German for I know of that.) Benz replied in his native tongue. He was agitated as it was.