Phoenix Flight

                 

The Phoenix warped through space while Travis looked out of the window. Warping was a relatively new technology for those aboard the ship Phoenix. It was aptly named with the hope that humans could make Earth reborn from its ashes on a new planet. Travis didn't really understand how warping worked. Someone explained it once as getting to the top of a tree, but instead of climbing all the way up, you bent the top of the tree down towards you. How that related to space he didn't know.

"Kat, how far are we from Huron?" The name of the newly discovered planet was for the Great Lakes back on Earth. It was apparently riddled with small lakes of fresh water according to initial scans.

"We are about an hour out sir. It should appear in front of us any minute." Indeed after quickly looking back outside the front viewing window, Travis could see a sphere growing in sight. It was much larger than Earth. Huron was about twelve times more massive than Earth, which meant it had about seven times as much gravity than they were used to.  Without that gravity the lakes would have evaporated long ago with the weak atmosphere of the planet. Apparently the planet lost its magnetosphere eons before which protected its atmosphere. Luckily gravity kept all the water near the surface, which was what their new Earth needed.

"Prepare to land," Travis called over the intercom system, "Our reconnaissance mission will begin as soon as possible. Make sure your suits are set for the increased gravity to the correct ratio. We need to send a report back to the General before the end of tomorrow without delay."

The ship entered the atmosphere missing the burn up they were used to when landing on Earth because of the lack of air on Huron. The largest lake seemed the most likely spot to start their mission from. On board there was only a crew of twenty people. Other ships were looking throughout the Milky Way for similar habitable planets to act as a new home.  Travis wanted this mission to be the "winner." He wanted to be known as the man who discovered the human race's new planet. Maybe get a city or even a country named after himself.

"Open the dock and then start filtering out. Stay together as a group." Their suits were built to push up on their muscles as much as gravity was pulling down so they felt no difference to Earth's gravity here.

"Should I stay on the ship to watch everything?" Kat asked nervously looking outside the front window.

"No one is here to take anything. We don't have to worry about locking up. You can't come all this way and not walk outside Kat. You may be one of the first people in human history to walk on our new home planet. Now lets go!" Travis walked towards the door leading outside and stepped out on to the first new territory since Titan was made into a base. 

The ground was solid rock underneath a thin layer of silt. The surface was almost too smooth to their eyes. No mountains in the distance. No canyons. The only marks on the ground were the thousands of lakes in every direction and one small mound at the foot of the lake they landed closest too, probably from some wind erosion. The company walked towards the nearest lake with no one straying to far from the group. The dirt went straight to the edge of the lake. It strangely looked like any lake back home, without any of the plant growth around the edge. The only thing that was different was how calm and still it appeared, probably from the increased gravity pulling down on it. It was eerily quiet which only increased their nervousness at being in a new environment.

"You getting any interesting readings Ben?" As head of science on this expedition it was Ben's opinions that mattered most on the trip. If he deemed Huron a worthy place of investigation, many more scientists would be sent here to make a final decision about the planet as a habitable area. It had to be worth it if they were going to spend the time and money building a livable planet with a viable atmosphere.