The Descent

Chapter 3 - Breakthrough

Tanner, in the middle of an extensive monolog about navigational systems, realized that Denton wasn't paying attention and stopped mid-sentence.

"Hey, Denton, are you still listening?"

"I think I know what the coordinates are for."

Tanner paused and his holographic image appeared to lean closer. "I'm listening."

Denton pulled up a map of the Descent paths. He overlayed the map with the coordinates Tanner had found. They were close but not an exact match.

"The desert destination, I'm pretty sure it's the landing zone for the Descent pods."

"The Descent pods? Really? I didn't realize they landed in the desert."

"Safety reasons. If anything ever happened, a high-speed impact would be a disaster."

The color of Tanner's face drained. "So, the new coordinates are aimed right at the crowds..."

"That's right. The casualties would be catastrophic."

They both sat in silence for a few moments taking in the imminent disaster brewing before their eyes.

"Tanner, we have to figure out which pod this patch is for. Can you get the official paths for all the pods and compare them to the desert coordinates?"

"Why all?"

"Each pod has a different path. Another safety feature. If one fails or ends up with a problem, a crash wouldn't endanger the landing zones of the others."

"Alright, alright. Give me a sec."

With Tanner silent and focused on finding the data they needed, Denton left his desk and walked over to the observation window in his office. Although his office assignment wasn't what he had requested, the view wasn't terrible. Sure, he didn't have the greatest view of Proxima b, but he could see the Descent Hub in the distance. Somewhere in there, in the middle of preparing for one of the most dangerous sporting events in the universe, one of the pods had been sabotaged. A pod racer was in danger. One of them would impact with the planet's surface within the Olympic Stadium and not land at its designated landing zone in the desert. He shook his head. It would cause havoc, not to mention a public relations nightmare for the organizers. Denton didn't even want to think about the diplomatic implications.

Denton had a hard time understanding who might want to cause such a disaster. What was the point? What could there possibly be to gain from killing hundreds, if not thousands of innocent people who only wanted to have a good time and enjoy the games? Maybe that was the point. There was no articulated reason, just chaos for the sake of chaos.

"Ok, here we go," Tanner said. "I've compared all the official pod paths to the coordinates in the patch. There's only one that's the same."

"And it is?"

"The Vanquisher."

"The Vanquisher? Are you sure?"

"Am I sure? Of course, I'm sure. I did a cross-reference search in the code of the patch, and I found an abbreviation of The Vanquisher name embedded in the code. VNQSHR. I'm sure."

The Vanquisher. Denton felt a chill run down his spine. Not only was The Vanquisher the most popular pod on Proxima b, but it was also piloted by one of the best pod racers on the planet. No, the universe. Jarell Osprey. Although he had never met him, he felt as though he knew him as a friend. Obsessive was a word his friends threw around whenever Jarell and The Vanquisher came up in a discussion.

The continuing Olympic commentary suddenly caught his attention. The fifteen-minute countdown had started. The racers had to be in their pods, strapped in and ready to deploy at the fifteen-minute mark or they would be disqualified. It was almost a mini-race before the race. Once the racers entered the pods, the hatch for each pod would be sealed until the race was complete. No access was allowed. The countdown also meant that Denton only had fifteen minutes to stop the disaster.