Cascading Echoes

Galorndon Core

Michael Burnham watched a thunderhead forming in the distance, dark and foreboding. She turned to see her team trekking across the planet's barren, black terrain. The landscape was alien—littered with arching, stacked, and pitted rock formations that looked like obsidian sculptures, shaped by wind and lightning over eons. The jagged structures cast distorted shadows over the cracked earth, a splintering surface crisscrossed by fissures spreading like fractured glass.

Scattered among the rocks were fulgurite formations—bizarre, crystalline pillars created by lightning strikes—that added an eerie beauty to the harsh environment. The forest of protocrystalline spires, topped with mushroom-like crests, gave the place an otherworldly feel, unlike anything Michael had ever seen.

Galorndon Core was devoid of life. No sound, no movement—just silence, broken only by gusting wind or the distant crash of collapsing rock formations. The vast emptiness felt oppressive, the unnatural quiet gnawing at the mind. Michael cursed the electromagnetic interference disrupting her EV suit's heads-up display.

"That storm is moving faster than I thought," Michael said, hearing static-laced feedback through her comms. "Still glad to be here, Tilly?"

"My god, Michael... I mean, Commander, this place is incredible," Tilly replied, her voice filled with wonder as she navigated the rocky terrain with the help of Vothi'Cha, whose long, thin digitigrade legs made him particularly adept at finding safe routes.

"I wouldn't have guessed you'd be excited to see a planet without flora or fauna," Michael said, amused.

"Plants and animals fascinate me because they're complex and alive. But rocks? Rocks are amazing too," Tilly explained, her enthusiasm bubbling. "These formations are like something out of a dream."

"Or a nightmare," Vothi'Cha clicked, his universal translator glitching momentarily. "On Phaeacaia, our rocks and plants... I'd show them to you one day, Tilly. The view here... morbidly depressing by comparison."

"I'd love that, Vothi," Tilly said with a smile.

Michael, hearing their exchange, mused aloud, "Despite the weather, the interference, and the potential for madness, this isn't the worst planet I've seen. Gamma Trianguli VI is beautiful until you encounter its dangers. At least here, everything is out in the open. But we need to pick up the pace before this storm becomes more of a problem, and I'll be damned if I let Ash's team beat us checking in with Discovery."

"The tunnels are about two kilometers ahead," Tilly said, checking her tricorder. "If Quilik and I can establish a dimensional lock, we should be able to communicate via the mycelial network."

"Starfleet believes it's worth it," Michael replied. "The devices can't be disrupted like traditional communications—they're more reliable than subspace."

As they moved forward, circumventing rock formations, Michael reached the edge of a cliff that descended into a deep fissure. The trench cut across the landscape, with similar cracks stretching toward the horizon.

Vothi'Cha climbed down effortlessly, his long limbs carrying the team's sling packs. He anchored a drop line to a rock structure, allowing Michael and Tilly to descend safely. Once at the bottom, they reattached their gear and pressed forward, hiking through the fissure, its walls lined with crystalline glass hollows.

"Tilly, we have less than two hours before that storm's on us," Michael warned, listening to the intervals between lightning strikes and thunder.

"The wind has shifted several times. The temperature's up by ten degrees already," Tilly noted. "We could be in the path of a tornado."