Space Bandits 4: Giant Encounter
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“Give me a location, Jude,” I said. We had just jumped through folded space, unguided. I assumed everything arrived together, since any other arrangement and we’d all be dead.
“Negative, sir,” Jude said back.
“What do you mean ‘negative’?” I asked.
“I have no clue where we are. Gravity mapping gives me nothing. No communications on any frequency. We’re lost, sir,”
“No, we’re safe,” I said and smiled. It was true, the police had no idea where we were. We had stolen 9.5 teraliters of H2O from TransAqua shipping company, and gotten away clean as a whistle.
“Listen up crew,” I said over radio to the entire, mostly vacant ship. Rudy and Guile heard me from the bottom deck and Mick from steerage, “We don’t know where the hell we are, but I do know we got away with it!”
“Yahh!” Mick said, alone. The rest of the crew cheered.
“But we’re not out of the woods yet. Lets get back in our ships and figure out where the hell we are,”
The crew used the freight ship as an outpost to explore their new location in space. The ships ran on He-3, a helium ion that can be used to create a sustained nuclear fusion reaction, the same process that creates energy in the sun. It was normally found in abundance on gas giants.
Me and my crew were well stocked for survival. We had enough fuel to power our ships for a week. If we dipped into the freighters fuel tank, a month. Food would run out before the fuel did. We had enough water to support millions, forget about the 6 people lost in space. We were ready to explore and reconnect with civilization.
Jude used a gravity mapping technique to find all sources of gravitational flux near their position. With extremely sensitive equipment, all gravity pulling on a weight, no matter how insignificant, is registered. Given enough time, she would have a rough 3-D map of their position. Mapping at the speed of light, Jude kept me updated on any potential fuel sources or civilized planets, preferably wealthy ones.
A week afte the jump, Rudy and Guile had just tapped the freighters fuel tank, when I received a message from Jude.
“Sir, I found something big,” she said through static.
“I’m on my way,” I said. I made my way to the communications tower on top of the freighter, “What is it, Jude?”
“Sir, it’s a gas giant. I finally found the mass pulling on everything in this area. It’s about Jupiter sized,”
“Outstanding. I will have Rudy and Guile check it out, keep it up Jude,” I said and walked out of the Comm-station. I grabbed the radio off my hip and relayed the message. My men refueled and went to explore the new planet. Back in the main bridge, I sent the orders to Franky and Mick who were already far from the freighter.
“We read you sir, new coordinates confirmed, stand-by,” replied Mick.
I patiently waited until my men arrived at the planet. I could see their position on my terminal. A 3-D hologram projected in the middle of a 5 foot wide cylinder. I saw tons of dust and tiny specks orbiting a huge globe, and two little white dots with code-names and verification IDs flying towards it. Franky and Mick were the first to arrive at the planet.
“No signs of life, sir, no comm, no visual activity. It’s a dead planet,” relayed Mick. At this distance our messages were delayed a few minutes.
“Alright, Mick, go into low orbit and scan the upper atmosphere. We are looking for He-3 and any organics,”
“Affirmative, sir,” Mick replied. He followed out the orders and fifteen minutes later I received, “Sir, we found something, some thing.”
“What is it, Mick?” I asked. No response, “I say again, what is it, Mick? Do you copy?”
“Sir, we are nearing the planet now,” it was Guile on the other ship, “What are our orders?”
“I lost radio with Mick. Do you have comm or visual?” I sent back.
“Negative, sir. There is a lot of magnetic interference coming from the core of this planet,” Guile replied.
“SIR! Get Guile and Rudy outta’ here! This planet is, is alive! Ahh!” A frantic message from Mick came in.
“God damnit, pull back Guile, now!”
“My god, sir, Mick he’s, his ship, it’s gone, sir. Mick and Franky, they’re both dead.” Guile relayed. He had already pulled back a safe distance, but he was witness to the giant planet moving to consume his companions ship. It was as if the planet had a mind of it’s own and could move itself through space. Imagine Jupiter moving through space like a fly through your room. “Sir, it’s coming for us, what are our orders?”
“Get back to the ship,” I ordered.
“It will follow us,” Guile said.
“I am aware of that,” I replied.
“Copy that, sir, ETA 10 minutes,” Guile said.
Jude and I scrambled to warm up the freighters engines. We now had 7 minutes to do what normally took 20. We went to steerage. Jude was frantically pushing buttons on the command module keyboard. 6 minutes to get the engines functioning. I left Jude to finish that task, while I ran to the bridge to check on Guile. He was 3 minutes out and the planet was right behind him.
“Jude, we gotta go, now, what’s the status–” I began to say over radio, but I was pushed back into my chair as the engines kicked on.
“Fully functional, Sir,” she replied.
“Excellent work, get up here,”
I steered the huge freight away from the incoming planet. Guile was behind, but catching up. We were at full speed. Guile’s nimble ship landed on mine as we sped away. He secured his load and both crew members came aboard. The massive freighter was being pulled into the planets strong gravity. I readied the jump engines, but without Mick we could not override the safety measures. We were doomed. I told the crew to brace themselves, this could be it, the end. The planet gained. It’s gravity was pulling on us inside the freighter now. We could feel doom sucking us in.
“I don’t want to die, I don’t wanna die, I don’t wanna die!” Jude was crying.
“Shut up will yah! The Cap’n has got us outta tougher spots,” Guile said.
“Strap yourselves down, this is gonna be one wild ride,” I said.
