“Deploy the distress beacon,” barked the man at the helm, sitting on a seat slightly larger and higher than the rest. Beside him sat his copilot. Behind them sat three people strapped tightly into their seats. Sparks shot out from an electrical panel far back inside of the spaceship. While they did not see it happen, it was vital to their immediate future. It was the gyro-stabilizer unit and it had stopped working.
“No sir. Distress failed to instantiate,” replied the woman seated beside him.
“Does anything on this damned ship work?” the captain said angrily.
“Captain, we’ve got Earth 7 within range if we can vector 11.74 and 171” said his copilot.
“Do it,” yelled the captain. The copilot poked the hologram in front of her. Then she got an all blue image.
“Shit,” she replied. “Navs went down. I’ve got no way to tell if we changed course correctly. Visuals look like a success, but can’t trust that. Not until impact.”
Then there was a large puff of smoke, it came from the hologram in front of them. Not real smoke, mind you, just hologram smoke indicating that the control systems for life support were failing. It was some clever design engineer’s idea of a smart-assed way of indicating system failure way back during the system design phase. The design team chuckled for quite some time after coding it into the system. The next highest-voted alternative to indicate system failure was a big red stamp slightly askew, reading KAPUT.
The captain and his copilot looked out the front window of their ship and saw off in the distance the small dot that was Earth 7 approaching rapidly.
“What does that mean?” the captain demanded to know, pointing at the second hologram.
“I’ve no idea,” she replied. “Does anyone know the meaning of KAPUT, K-A-P-U-T? Speak up.”
“It means ‘broken,’” replied a man sitting behind them. There were tears in his eyes and his face was contorted by his fear.
“I don’t want to die drifting out in space,” said one of the men in the seats behind the captain.
“I’d rather die slamming into a planet,” replied the copilot cynically.
“My brother still owes me a lot of money. Selfish. Always has been. Mother encourages his behavior.”
“Dillon. If we survive this, I’m going to hunt you down and kill you. You said this bucket was in perfect condition. Just a little dispute about ownership,” said the captain.
“Historian, give me a report. Quick,” demanded the captain.
“Earth 7. Colonized 2,500 years ago by one million prisoners from Earth Primus. Memories wiped and left to develop. 92% famine loss. Quarantine planet. Hasn’t met any of the contact criteria. Current population about twenty-six million humans. Still subject to wars. Ending their second dark age. Scientific level is primitive 3.”
(All planets in contact quarantine are called Earth and given a numerical designation).
“Great. If the crash doesn’t kill us, the natives will,” said the worried man seated next to the historian.
In the distance, Earth 7 became larger. The central continent of Panju was distinguishable from the blue oceans surrounding it.
“We’ve lost manual steering,” reported the copilot.
The pilot spoke up in a loud, clear voice.
“Everyone, we’re probably going to die when we hit the surface of the planet. But just in case we don’t, I want you to turn on your PPS (personal protection suits) on low. Do it now. Turn it up until it bumps the person beside you. And remember to protect your head. Put your hands around your head to prevent being shaken to death.”
“I don’t want to die,” said the historian calmly. “I never finished my first mission,” he complained.
“I never got to tell my mother I forgive her,” said the nervous man beside him.
Sometimes it’s the tiny things. And it was like that for the occupants of the old, broken spaceship of disputed ownership. There was a very slight bump, a soft nothing of a bump, as something very small struck the spaceship. But a small thud had large consequences, and the spaceship, formerly right way up in a universe without a right way up for anything, this same spaceship began to slowly roll over ever so slightly. It was like a very slow Ferris wheel or the landmark in London, on Earth 5.
But slow is not the way of the universe, and the pleasant London Eye ride gave way to things slightly more dramatic as the speed of rotation began to increase. Most of the crew passed out before it reached 200 RPT (rotations per tox. A Tox is a minute, a Tix is a second. Don’t worry, you get used to it.).
And it didn’t take long before the rotations passed the point of survival for the humans inside. They were splattered across the interior by the ever-increasing centrifugal force. But first they would be strained through the microfiber of their personal protection suits, leaving behind only their skeletons still sitting upright and strapped in. The rest of them, the softer bits, migrated according to the laws of physics until their remains, after seeping through the crevices and cracks, finally came to rest as a brownish-reddish-gray goo much like the finest smooth plaster, pressed hard against the inner hull of the ship.
When the spaceship entered the atmosphere, it was rotating in excess of one million times per tox. At this speed, its form would be impossible to distinguish, and all that could be seen was a bright white light coming from rapidly revolving exterior lights. These lights were one of too many components of the ship that, despite the dearly departed captain’s complaints, actually exceeded the manufacturer’s recommended operating conditions. And this would prove to be a significant problem.
Oh, dear.