Defying Mars (The Saving Mars Series) - By Cidney Swanson Page 0,81
straight a shot—when flashing red lights lit up the comm screen at her brother’s station.
“Hermes!” she swore, ignoring the distraction.
“Sorry, Jess, but this is important,” said Pavel’s voice. “Ethan says my aunt has just launched an entire fleet of ships and they’re heading your way.”
In the moment it took to listen, she lost her perfectly angled entry.
“Shizer!” she shouted.
She had to enter upon a different trajectory now. Cursing, she hammered in a series of calculations.
“Uh, Jessamyn?” asked Pavel’s voice.
“Can’t talk,” she screamed at the communications array. “This is going to be a very rough landing.” Hastily, she determined a new angle of descent. This angle was steeper than her desired one, but it would only get worse if she hesitated.
“Ares and Aphrodite,” she murmured, “This is going to be one hot ride!”
“Jess!”
She registered his anguish, but she could spare no tender words.
“We talk if I land this thing!” she shouted. This was no time for sentiment. She settled into the cool and calm space in her head where she became one with her ship. She was tough as Mars ice. And just as cold, cold, cold. This was no time for distraction.
“Galleon out!” She cut the comm.
~ ~ ~
“Ethan,” said Pavel, trying to steady his voice, “Tell me you know where she’s coming in.”
Ethan’s hands flew across his holoscreen. “I have her new touchdown coordinates. I have a lock on her craft.” He frowned. “She is slowing insufficiently.”
“She has no fuel,” muttered Pavel. “No air. She’s not even wearing a g-suit, for the love of—”
“Calm yourself,” Ethan said, interrupting him. “My sister has been a remarkable pilot all her life. If the Galleon can be landed safely under these conditions, Jessamyn will do it.”
Pavel nodded. Look who was talking. Was Ethan freaking out in the claustrophobic confines of the ship? No. He was doing his job. Pavel would do his. But in his mind rang out, like a ceaseless prayer, please please please please.
~ ~ ~
Jess keyed in the order for the forward thrust burns to slow her the moment she hit seven and one half kilometers above Earth’s surface. She scheduled two to maximize efficiency: first she would slow herself to two hundred kilometers per hour, then, as she reached three kilometers above her landing target, she would do another burn, slowing her craft to just under thirty kilometers per hour.
“Then we land vertical using hover boosters,” she whispered to herself. Although that was assuming she had fuel left. The Galleon was rated to land at speeds of up to fifty kilometers per hour on Mars, but landing at such a speed on Earth would be dangerous—the ship weighed more here than on Mars.
“Never mind,” she muttered, her fingers dancing upon the nav-screen, inputting the command sequence.
But something very, very unwelcome showed up as she ordered the second fuel burn. The Galleon returned a message—a grim fact that wouldn’t go away no matter how many times Jess repeated “never mind.”
The Galleon requires additional fuel to follow this command.
Jessamyn’s heart froze.
Additional fuel? She had none.
~ ~ ~
Pavel had never been more glad he’d insisted upon a fast ship. The trio sped toward the coordinates Jess sent after cutting vocal communication. He’d angled the ship slightly north, flying over a peninsula off the Puget Sound and out over the Pacific. Wallace was muttering, either to himself or to a Divine Being; Pavel couldn’t tell. Pavel had tried to hail Jessamyn one last time, but she gave no response.
He didn’t think he could bear finding her on Earth but no longer among the living.
And he began to pray too.
36
AN INFINITY OF MOMENTS
“What do you have?” Jessamyn asked herself as she sat before the nav-screen, staring at its unwelcome message. “Come on, Jaarda. What do you have?”
Not enough fuel for braking, that was for certain. Jess could see the ship decelerating as she descended, but she wasn’t losing speed fast enough. The heat shield was complaining, operating at levels over its intended tolerances—not unexpected considering she’d had to use a steeper angle of descent than was advisable. In six minutes, her first—and perhaps her only—burn order would commence, slowing the Galleon to two hundred kilometers per hour. But she couldn’t land at that speed—she could only crash at that speed.
Trying a few other requests for more modest thrust burns, she quickly found that the best the Galleon could do was to reduce her speed to one hundred eighty kilometers per hour prior to impact. “Splat,” she muttered.