Marooned on Giri Minor
"Those buildings look a little too ramshackle for my tastes," you say, "but from what I can tell some of those shuttles still look intact."
"I agree," Commander Andrade says.
By now the Girian sun is at full power, and even with the dusty sky it is quite warm in the shadeless desert. It's not so much the direct sunlight that scorches you, but the reflection off the dry ground that makes it feel hot on all sides.
You scoot down the hillside into the valley and follow the dry riverbed toward where the shuttles are parked. You have no idea where they came from until you get close enough to make out the details on the hulls. After 200 years of exposure to the dust-laden wind, much of the paint has been blasted away, but enough of the markings remain that some of your questions are quickly answered.
"Starship Andromeda, registry RLNT1864," Andrade reads.
"These must have been from the ship that came to rescue the colony," you say.
"I think I'm familiar with the story," she says. "The surviving colonists were deranged. They tried to take over the Andromeda and maroon the crew here."
"Did they succeed?" you ask.
"Almost. The old Starship Ursa Major tracked the Andromeda down, but the colonists refused to surrender. They destroyed the Andromeda, and themselves with it."
"Then these shuttles are probably all that remain," you say.
While Commander Andrade scans the grounded fleet with her WristComp in a search for a salvageable comm unit, you climb aboard one of the shuttles. The control board is rotted and useless, and the seats are shredded. The condition of the main compartment can be best described as squalor; it appears that many generations of desert critters have been using the shuttle as a den. You step back outside in a hurry before you have a chance meeting with the current resident.
"Starman, over here," Andrade calls out. You find her standing next to a craft where the hatch remained closed. "Help me with the door," she says. "This one looks promising."
Surprisingly the shuttle still has a bit of power left, because the hatch starts to open automatically for you. When it stops part way, you use the manual lever to try and force it open. Despite so many years of neglect, the hatch finally complies and opens all the way.
The inside of this shuttle is in far better shape, probably because it has been sealed shut until now. Andrade zeroes in on the control station. "I think this will work," she says. "The transmitter is shot, but the unit itself looks just fine."
"Do you think if we extracted the comm unit from this shuttle, we could hook it up to that tower back in town?" you ask.
"That's exactly what I was thinking," the commander says.
It takes an hour to dismantle the control panel and extract the comm unit. Despite some minor corrosion, Andrade seems pleased with what she sees. For good measure, you identify the power cell that somehow kept its charge and take that too. Both components fit in your rucksack--but only after you eat the second NutriRation. You take a sip of water, but there isn't much of that left, either.
It takes half an hour to hike up the riverbed into the ruined town, where the buildings still stand only because they were constructed of plascrete and polysteel. The insides look gutted by the wind, with what had been the colonists' furnishings left in tatters.
The comm building is easy to find by virtue of its 50-meter-tall tower. Miraculously, it has withstood both the seismic shock of the planet's shift and the two centuries of howling wind that followed, but the question remains: can it still be used to transmit a distress signal to the Fifth Fleet?
The polysteel door to the comm building is rusted shut, and using your body to force it open is not an option with your cracked rib. But you find a large chunk of plascrete and rebar, and a couple hits with that is enough to bust your way inside the building.
"I agree," Commander Andrade says.
By now the Girian sun is at full power, and even with the dusty sky it is quite warm in the shadeless desert. It's not so much the direct sunlight that scorches you, but the reflection off the dry ground that makes it feel hot on all sides.
You scoot down the hillside into the valley and follow the dry riverbed toward where the shuttles are parked. You have no idea where they came from until you get close enough to make out the details on the hulls. After 200 years of exposure to the dust-laden wind, much of the paint has been blasted away, but enough of the markings remain that some of your questions are quickly answered.
"Starship Andromeda, registry RLNT1864," Andrade reads.
"These must have been from the ship that came to rescue the colony," you say.
"I think I'm familiar with the story," she says. "The surviving colonists were deranged. They tried to take over the Andromeda and maroon the crew here."
"Did they succeed?" you ask.
"Almost. The old Starship Ursa Major tracked the Andromeda down, but the colonists refused to surrender. They destroyed the Andromeda, and themselves with it."
"Then these shuttles are probably all that remain," you say.
While Commander Andrade scans the grounded fleet with her WristComp in a search for a salvageable comm unit, you climb aboard one of the shuttles. The control board is rotted and useless, and the seats are shredded. The condition of the main compartment can be best described as squalor; it appears that many generations of desert critters have been using the shuttle as a den. You step back outside in a hurry before you have a chance meeting with the current resident.
"Starman, over here," Andrade calls out. You find her standing next to a craft where the hatch remained closed. "Help me with the door," she says. "This one looks promising."
Surprisingly the shuttle still has a bit of power left, because the hatch starts to open automatically for you. When it stops part way, you use the manual lever to try and force it open. Despite so many years of neglect, the hatch finally complies and opens all the way.
The inside of this shuttle is in far better shape, probably because it has been sealed shut until now. Andrade zeroes in on the control station. "I think this will work," she says. "The transmitter is shot, but the unit itself looks just fine."
"Do you think if we extracted the comm unit from this shuttle, we could hook it up to that tower back in town?" you ask.
"That's exactly what I was thinking," the commander says.
It takes an hour to dismantle the control panel and extract the comm unit. Despite some minor corrosion, Andrade seems pleased with what she sees. For good measure, you identify the power cell that somehow kept its charge and take that too. Both components fit in your rucksack--but only after you eat the second NutriRation. You take a sip of water, but there isn't much of that left, either.
It takes half an hour to hike up the riverbed into the ruined town, where the buildings still stand only because they were constructed of plascrete and polysteel. The insides look gutted by the wind, with what had been the colonists' furnishings left in tatters.
The comm building is easy to find by virtue of its 50-meter-tall tower. Miraculously, it has withstood both the seismic shock of the planet's shift and the two centuries of howling wind that followed, but the question remains: can it still be used to transmit a distress signal to the Fifth Fleet?
The polysteel door to the comm building is rusted shut, and using your body to force it open is not an option with your cracked rib. But you find a large chunk of plascrete and rebar, and a couple hits with that is enough to bust your way inside the building.