Freight

Part 2(b)

"What?" MARI asks as the lights in the cabin turn back on. "Wait, no... That has to be some sort of malfunction caused by the impact."

Adam points forward out the bridge window. "Then why am I seeing it too!? There's a goddamn planet out there!"

As the ship drifts out of the purple haze, spinning in circles, it is clear as day. Both Adam and MARI can see a large, blue-green planet that gets larger every time their ship's rotation brings it back into view.

"That's impossible! There was nothing mapped here when we jumped." MARI pauses. "There's still nothing mapped here! I'm looking now, this planet is completely off the grid. But look! There are oceans, clouds, vegetation, it might even be habitable. How could this planet be undiscovered? It's well within the Alliance's probe network..."

Adam reaches forward and pulls back the same red lever he pushed before, giving control back to MARI. "Priorities, MARI! We're going to discover it right now, and I'd much prefer we're alive when we do. Can you do anything?"

The bridge goes silent for a few seconds before MARI speaks again, a renewed sense of optimism in her voice. "I think I can. But without the drive core, I'm going to have to vent all the extra air we have so we can straighten out and slow down. It's our only source of propulsion before we break the atmosphere. Once we do, I'll be using the last of our reserve power to use our jet engines to guide us down. If I do all that we'll be stranded, but we have a chance."

"Well, it's either that or simultaneously becoming the first human to discover, and die, on this planet," Adam says. "So, go for it!"

"Perfect. I'm launching that probe so someone might be able to find us here," MARI says.

A low, rumbling hum reverberates through the panels of the bridge as MARI spins up her jet thrusters, pushing out any remaining air from all sections outside the bridge. The force is strong enough to slow their rotation. Out of the bridge window, Adam's gaze locks on the planet with which they are going to collide, which is now close enough to cover almost the entirety of his view. As they approach, the rumbling transitions to a full-on shaking as the atmosphere starts burning from the friction of the ship making entry. Tongues of red-orange flame curl around the glass, obstructing Adam's view.

"Okay get ready for a jolt, Adam!" MARI bellows over the noise. "As soon as the atmosphere is dense enough, I'm throwing all our reserve power to the air thrusters."

Adam digs his fingers deep into the leather armrests of his chair as the g-forces increase. "Hey, we might actually have a chance here! You've got this MARI!"

"We do! I've calculated we have approximately a 24.45% chance of survival," MARI responds.

Furrowing his brow, Adam looks upward as if he were side-eyeing MARI. "...Thanks, but maybe that's the kind of thing you can keep to yourself next time."

"What are you talking about, I thought this was exciting?" MARI responds with a sarcastic drawl.

Before he can quip back, Adam's jaw locks shut as the air thrusters kick into high gear. MARI's adjustments with her rudders in the planet's thick atmosphere slows the ship down. The flame over the bridge windows dissipates, revealing the mountainous, forested surface below. Without the full power of the drive core, MARI can only make a gradual course-change toward a river valley. Passing over a mountain range, they just graze its snow-covered peak.

MARI shouts as loud as the volume will allow, still barely audible over all the noise. "Brace yourself!"

Adam presses his head against his seat, tightening every muscle in his body as they careen toward the valley below. It's in this moment that he begins thinking about how much he now longs for another boring, uneventful voyage to enjoy with MARI. "Is this karma?" he asks himself, suddenly open to the concept he had rejected through most of his life.

Adam ponders these karmic consequences, punishing him for his lack of appreciation of a simple life. His thoughts don't distract him for long before his head whips forward as they make impact with the planet's surface.

He struggles as the g forces start playing a violent game of tug of war with his consciousness. It's as if he's clinging desperately to the other end of the wet rope to keep his mind in his control. With the loudest sound he's ever heard, the thick bridge windows crash into pieces. The debris slices into him as a cloud of dust envelopes everything around him.

The ship slides across the forest floor, cutting down trees like blades of grass. After what feels like forever, the ship comes to a sudden stop at the base of a mountain. Concussed and bloody from glass and debris, Adam summons all the strength he has to reach for his harness and unclip himself. His wheezing calls for MARI go unanswered.

Clutching his ribs, wheezing as he presses his free arm down to get out of his seat, he crumbles to the floor. His eyelids are heavy, and it's everything he can do to keep them open. Lying motionless, he slides in and out of consciousness, lacking the energy or optimism to continue his desperate calls for MARI.

After several attempts to push himself to his knees, his rubbery limbs fail him each time. He surrenders his limp body to the cold steel floor of the bridge, allowing smoke from the damage below to fill his lungs. With all his remaining mental energy, he laments the fate he had once dreamed of. He'd always held the romantic notion that he would one day meet his end as a lost adventurer in the depths of the galaxy. Forced to confront this reality, he finds himself unwilling to resign to it.

Through his swollen, squinting eyelids he takes one last look at the bridge he's called home for four years. Covered in dust, devoured by flame and crushed in like tinfoil, it still looks as familiar to him as his childhood bedroom. That is to say aside from one thing that doesn't quite fit, in the corner of his eye as he finally loses consciousness. In all his time on this particular bridge, he had never seen two feet which were not his own.