MARCH ON

"March On" by Charles E Brown

Upon direct orders from the United Interstellar services we continued to send out the reconnaissance drone in hopes these hi tech machines would somehow locate and recover essential supplies like food and water back at the crash site, something is killing our drones, finally after hours of silence the ZX7 returned to us hoovering out side the window the deadliest of our combat drone fleet drifted around our disabled ship, after several attempts to communicate with it, we failed, it seemed different, watching us, a red blinking light indicated the lethal machine was armed in combat mode watching us waiting for something, while the black planet's acid like atmosphere continues to eat away at the walls of our space shuttle, we're all marooned here, only God knows where, no one is talking anymore, hope is fading, you can see it in the eyes of the crew members, Captain Vance Forbes II commanded the United States first ever deep space shuttle jump mission, and most likely the last, Forbes doesn't know where we are, we lost communication with NASA same time the massive solar flares showed up knocking out our orbital navigation systems, sending us spinning blind into deep space at light speed, roughly we have three months of life support to find where the hell we are, and what in God's name is wrong with that damn drone out there, we are running out of time and options, Bishop Winston the 2nd in command drew the short straw "it should only take me a couple of hours to find the supply compartment that separated when we crashed down" he spoke calmly into the microphone taking deep breaths inside the large glass space helmet, "remember Bish" Jessica likes to call him "first sign of the drone you high tale it back in here you got it?" Jessica the crew's medical officer held each side of Bishop's helmet looking deep into his uncertain eyes "got it" he replied "your suit will protect you from the atmosphere for about 10 hours so don't stop to sight see, we will be monitoring your vitals so I'll know" she wanted to lighten the mood of his mission, Bishop smiled big from deep inside the helmet then placed his gloved hand over his chest he spoke playfully "Jessie now you know my heart only beats for you darling" about that time Captain Forbes walks over and hands Bishop one of the untested electromagnetic pulse rifles "I hope you won't have to use this, think of it as a condom of sorts" his attempt at humor failed miserably, especially coming from him the one person who didn't want Bishop on this mission for various reasons, Jessica was the main one, she hid her feelings for Bishop from everyone except Forbes, who suggested drawing straws in the first place, making sure Bishop a well educated black man got the short one. "Best be on my way" Bishop cracked through the helmet microphone, the crew members helped the bulky astronaut to his feet, everyone except Forbes "ok Bish listen to me" Jessica gets serious looking at him "right now there's no sign of the ZX7 so we have a small window once you get to the supply compartment activate the distress beacon and grab as much supplies you can carry" fighting back the tears she rubs her hand over his helmet "and God speed!" Forbes slaps Bishop on the backside interrupting their moment, she turns away so no one sees her tears fall marching over to the control panel searching her soul for answers to what she was feeling turning on the outside cameras she looked for the malfunctioning rouge drone while Bishop made his way slowly down the latter, he marched with a dead pulse rifle and all their hopes Bishop bravely marched towards the wreaked supply compartment unknowingly being followed by the malfunctioning ZX7.