Finding Darkness

Chapter 38 Landing

"His approach vector is all wrong, and his fighter is refusing to allow Central to take control for the hangar entrance." The fighter line officer, Mike Brooks, shouted into the communications channel Joshua had opened to him.

"That's because he's not coming in controlled and slow. His onboard wants him down fast, not neat."

"But at that speed, he'll plow clear through the back wall. He needs to slow down." Reflexively Mike hit the crash alarm and threw himself flat on the deck.

Malachi's fighter, traveling almost forty times the speed of sound, had bled a significant portion of its speed during its approach, yet for some reason it hit the atmospheric shield with far too much speed. The shield, used to keep the air inside the hanger bay inside the hanger bay, was not designed to take an impact from the outside at any speed. When a craft left the hanger, the atmo shield, as everyone called it, spread over the craft much like a soap bubble passes over an object. Give the soap enough moisture, and almost anything can pass through without the bubble breaking, it just reform on the other side. Much the same with the shield, as the craft passes out of the hanger, the shield allowed it to pass then reformed on the other side, maintaining a seamless barrier.

But this was different. When Malachi's fighter hit the shield, it buckled inward. Having never been designed to take an impact at anything like the speed the fighter was traveling, it was like trying to push a piece of sandpaper through the same soap bubble. The shield collapsed, the resultant out rush of atmosphere carried everything that wasn't bolted down out through the gap. Within seconds, heavy emergency doors slammed down from overhead, locking into stanchions in the floor they filled the gap, preventing anything more from being swept into space.

In the middle of the storm stood Joshua, his feet embedded firmly in the steel deck. He watched as his brother's fighter hit the deck hard, its landing gear collapsing under the strain. Rolling off the stump of the front landing strut, the fighter fell onto its starboard side, shearing off the wing on that side. The remains of that wings dug into the metal of the deck, sending a cascade of sparks high into the air and starting the fighter into a clockwise spin that sent it towards the closest wall.

Seeing the danger, Joshua ran down the flight line. Closing on the decelerating fighter, he leapt high into the air. He came down on the craft's nose. Digging his fingers into the metal to anchor himself, he began to shoot out hundreds of tiny strands from his suit. Most no bigger than a pencil, each one found the floor and sunk deep. Soon the hanger bay was filled with another sound, this one the sound of metal tearing metal as the hundreds of strands were pulled through the hanger floor. The sparks rose and fire trailed after them as the none skid coating caught fire in their wake, but the piece of metal, because now that's what it more closely resembled than a fighter, was slowing. With the last slow, grinding revolution, Joshua knew they were too close to the starboard side wall to not hit it.

With enough speed bled off to make it possible, he called all the stands of his suit back in and jumped from where he was, onto the starboard side of the nose cone. The nose came around one final time and he kicked his feet out behind him and braced his hands. When his feet hit the solid wall, he pushed with everything he had. There was no telling what was inside the fighter that could explode with a heavy enough impact now. So with his hands leaving dents in the titanium casing of the nose cone, and his feet buckling the wall, he gave one last heave and the pile of junk that once was a fighter craft came to a juttering stop.

"Get the medical teams in here now. The atmosphere is stable, and have a fire suppression team do something about these flames." He looked up the flight line towards the blast doors to see a line of flames and jagged metal fragments. Both had been spewed from the apocalyptic slide of the remains of Malachi's fighter.

"I'm going to try and get him out." Jumping onto the cockpit's edge, Joshua looked down through the glass and nearly gagged. His brother was sprawled in the seat, his head resting on his shoulder. His suit had pooled over his right side, leaving the rest of his body uncovered.

Even his suit, though, couldn't cover up the blood. It was everywhere, covering the chair, the instrument panel. Some had even sprayed onto the cockpit canopy itself. Nothing was on the outside of the fighter. The flames had taken care of that, but by the placement of the blood, Joshua could tell there had been plenty on the outer skin of the fighter as well.

Reaching down with his suit, Joshua slid it under his brother, cradled and lifted him softly out of the cockpit. The Emergency personnel were just reaching the site with the floating medical bed so Joshua was able to place Malachi onto the spotless white sheets the instant the bed came to a stop.

"Get him to medical, now!" He roared from up on the fighter.

"What do you think we're going to do? Don't try to tell us how to do our jobs." Doctor Peters snapped back. Turning, the six of them ran after the hovering bed, now with Malachi strapped lightly to it.

"Captain, Malachi's on his way to medical. Anything you want done while I'm down here?"

"No, just get to medical as soon as you can. We have no idea what's going to happen during surgery with what he's wearing. You might be the only one who's able to help doctor Peters."

"Good point, sir." Joshua jumped off the fighter's nose, landing lightly, then jogged towards the entrance. There was no point in beating the medical staff to medical wing seventy four. So he set a nice slow pace, his legs almost floating over the deck. The three-mile run would do him good, because he had no idea what he would do if something went wrong with his brother. And since with his brother a lot could go wrong, he had to be ready for anything.