Candace couldn’t help but notice that Dr. Lenz was constantly fidgeting beside her. As if she wasn’t nervous enough already, she had never landed on an actual terrestrial planet before. She had always intended to visit Earth at some stage, “the cradle of humanity” but had never gotten round to it. There had been so much to see in the Solar System. He had personally requested that she was to go on the lander with him, she hadn’t decided to thank him yet. They were accompanied by six other marines plus the pilot. All, except Dr. Lenz were armed with heavy laser cannons and ultra dense armor plating.
They would be the first of ten landers on the planet. The atmosphere had been scanned, it was breathable. They were on their way to a desert area around the equator. The planet very likely contained life but this was not a biology excursion. They were to establish a parameter and then send a probe into the crust to obtain Negativum, which was vital to faster than light travel. For unknown reasons, to date it had only been found on terrestrial worlds where life had at least once existed. A huge statistical anomaly.
The lander started to rattle. They were entering the atmosphere. It was time for her to take charge of the situation.
“Right marines, you know the drill. Once we land we need to create a perimeter with defensive strong points. The mission is resource extraction but no harm must come to Dr. Lenz.”
Candace saw him squirm. He didn’t like being placed above others, an admirable trait.
Then they landed with a thud. The overhead green light began flashing and the hatch began to lower. The first thing to hit them was the putrid smell of rotting eggs from the methane rich atmosphere. The sky was crimson and the land mostly rocky. The laser felt light in her arms from the low gravity.
“Take up your positions!”
It was flat, there were no good defensive point but they could see reasonably far into the distance through the murky atmosphere. There were no signs of life apart from the odd dark leafed tree here and there. However some of the other landers had found themselves surrounded by giant herbivores who were throttling down pockets of dense vegetation.
Dr. Lenz got straight to work and began assembling the probe. Once she was confident, the situation was secure, she went to the scientist.
“Well that went well so far Dr. Lenz.”
“You can call me Herbert. Let’s just get this done and get out of here.”
“My name is Candace. What makes you so nervous?”
“Just different theories I heard over over the years. What sort of predators hunt these large herbivores we’ve been hearing about and why are there none around here?”
It wasn’t a nice line of thinking but she nodded in agreement.
Hours passed. The probes had now penetrated the crust, acquired their prize and making their return.
Then the first sign of trouble came over the comms.
(To be continued)
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