Echoes

[Vicho Deivis]

Under the dirt

The wind howled like a wounded beast, ripped by the passage of the Celestra across the sky. Many pilots usually say that they fly in the planets atmospheres like a leaf in the wind, and who knows; maybe some of them actually flight like that. But this one was more like a brick in free fall.

-You are pale Doc, you need to relax. Look outside, many on Pecos would kill for this view.

Jacob McGregor didn’t answer. He was more worry about determine whether the ship was shaking or was only him. A conversation, that he overhead while was drinking some fake Liberty beer without alcohol at a Pecos’s Bar time ago, about some maintenance problems on the Celestras due to atmospheric flight than Yuma’s landscape. A beautiful view by the way, the rainforest seethed of life and that was obvious even at ten kilometers of altitude.

-Starting approximation … Heeeeehaaaaaaaa.- The brick on free fall analogy suddenly turned a bit inaccurate. A crazy animal on fire falling from the sky prove to be a better one. Jacob was too old for this kind of trip. – We will be at the LZ in twenty minutes. Maybe we should turn on the inertia dampers so the Doc can dress for the occasion. What do you say guys?

-Yeah sure, why not? – Replayed the co-pilot. The gunners and the navigator were like two children who have just a devilry. The entire crew was having fun were having fun at his expense.

-No.- Sounded the voice of the Engineer trough the internal communicators.- If the port side stabilizers doesn’t break now we will not have authorization for change them at least for another week.

-Bad luck Doc. Hang one, we almost… COME ON DOC!!! The bags are under your seat.

Two days ago the life of Jacob Mc’Gregor was far less exciting. He was one of the few archeologists in Coronado. Witch in practice means to be a university professor for forty students and occasional seminars to teenagers, while expected that someone in the Military gave his approval for an expedition to the wreckage in Jericho, the only ruin to study on the system. In other words: Nothing, a desk job while he struggle to not be left behind by his counterparts in the Universities of the big Houses.

He had lost the count of how many projects for that he had send over the years and nothing. But one day, less than seven hours ago, things changed. A letter from the Military that instead of: “We understand the value of this place and the potential benefits that the secrets of this site could bring to the Republic. But unfortunately tight now we don’t have the resources for such enterprise” said something about schedule a meeting would have been the most logical response, or maybe a call. Instead he got two men with black jackets and sunglasses of the Colonial Intelligence Service at his doorstep. A few hours later he was in space going to Saba’s Shipyard without a clue of what is going on. “We will explain everything when you reach your assigned installation” they said. Six hours he still had no clue, he was covered with his own vomit and his life was in the hands on six mad persons who think that have a malfunction in middle of a flight was a good idea. This is not the way that an archaeological expedition should be. Besides: Why Yuma? Even a kid knows that the mysterious alien ship is in Jericho. Is the best keep secret, some photos of the orbital surveys even reached the Neural net.

-And here we are, see that smoke over there? Between those hills covered with trees. That’s our LZ, six more kilometers. - Only a pilot would notice it at that distance, but there it was. Like an oil slick in a paint when you knew what to look.

-Why there is smoke? - Ask Jacob, any excuse to drag his attention away from the fact that the ships had descended more than 10.000 meters in twelve minutes was good for him.

-Because the Gaul bombarded the place yesterday.- The chuckle of the gunners confirmed that was a joke.- Those are our multi-purpose marines doing some gardening. The best way to keep these damn plants in check is to burn the camp surroundings once a week… Also helps to find the camp, the CIS insist on keep radio silence. The radio waves travel farther than smoke.

-How they control the air traffic?

-How many ships you see flying nearby? The construction site of our new floating home is on the other side of the planet. Hang on, commencing final approach.
Almost with elegance, the ship slowed down and finally stops above a small landing pad hidden in the forest. Jacob feels the inertia pulling out of the seat and later against it while the Celestra maneuvered to a vertical peaking. With even less movement than an elevator stopping, the Celestra turned off its engines and anti-gravity fields and leave the one off the landing pad in charge by suspending the ship a few centimeters above the ground. But his stomach wasn’t in condition to really appreciate it.

-A nice landing for our guest, we don’t want he start his first day working with the C.I.S. like that, someone help him. I will help to unload cargo.

The air gave the impression it can be cut with a knife, but also was strangely energizing at the same time. Despite the heat, humidity and irritating smoke this was real air. The IMG was right when they say that Pecos is barely habitable, this was air of a real live planet. The oxygen abundance cured his sickness better than any pill.

-Professor Jacob? - A soldier was expecting him outside. A young man, probably with less than a year in the military, no visible rank insignias but probably that was because he haven’t see many soldiers wearing de “fresh uniform” around Pecos or in starships. Jacob answers with a nod. - Private James Ryan. Follow me, Senior-agent Goldberg want to talk to you.

Jacob wanted to ask about what was happening but Ryan cut him off pointing the way with a gesture that admitted replicas. The mysterious camp surrounded by all the secrecy was in fact a small collection of prefabricated structure and some military tents surrounded by burned land and with very little personal.

-So, how long have you been here?

-Goldberg wants to be the first that makes the introductions to the new scientist of the project. I can’t talk about what we do here and how we do it.

-Sorry.

-Come, Goldberg is inside. - Ryan walks into one of the bigger tents and salutes someone inside. - Private Ryan reporting, Professor McGregor as arrive.

-Private, dismiss. Get inside Professor, don’t be shy. And close the entrance. - The rustic nature of the tent contrasted with the holoprojector in the middle of it. It was the only source of light inside with a projection of the camp and its surroundings, blue for the terrain and green for the camp. Trees appear in darker blue and it was represented with a level of detail that allow to see branches and leaves and even some animals caught walking, flying, jumping from a tree to another, whatever they were doing when the satellite or ship made the survey. The burn perimeter around the camp wasn’t highlighted but it was clear as a scar.

-Welcome to Project Phoenix. I hope you had nice flight.

-Like a leaf in the wind. When you will tell me what is going on?

-I guess that is time. But first, what do you think?

-Well. - Jacob take a deep breath while put his ideas in order. – There are only three real buildings, the bigger have a communication array on the roof so I guess the other two are an armory and the infirmary. The standard colonial outpost since… hum, forever. An observation outpost is pointless with Sabah shipyard and the Carrier Malachite in orbit, so you found something.
“Back on my young days I was an archeologist specialized on the exploration of space… You found a ship?”

-Not bad. - With a hand gestures, Goldberg raise the projection of the camp some centimeters and with others add something big highlighted in red, buried deeply near the camp. - Before start the construction of our future new home, we made some basic mining surveys. The IMG didn’t were very meticulous, probably because they soon find out the problems related to have a colony here. Or they did and don’t wanted to show us their findings, who knows?

“We take measures of the gravity at a local level to search for heavy metals and some field’s prospections on the places that show potential. That was how we found this.” - He pointed the object.

-The contours… what is the resolution of this projection?

-Not as good I would like. Each cubic centimeter of the vessel image corresponds to 3 cubic meters. It has three hundred meters long and an average of 70 meters of diameter. Like a small cruiser.

-But isn’t complete. - Jacob pointed at one ends that looked very irregular.

-That’s what we believe, but we haven’t found any secondary crash site. - With other move of his fingers Goldberg raises the scale to show more terrain. Now it was clear that the camp was in a valley between two mountains, with a third almost outside the projection. - Our technical didn’t finish the animation ready so follow my finger.
“The ship fall with an angle near of 50º thought here, one of our geologist says that first hit tangentially the Mountain Ak456 but the marks of the supposed impact are too eroded to confirm his claim. Others suggest another path slightly different, with an lower angle. In any case it crash hard here, at 500m/s, above our current location. And then fall mountain down to here. Time latter half of the mountain collapsed over the wreckage burying it under 30 meters rubble. Probably the terrain was unstable after the hit.”

-Incredible, worthy of a Libertonian movie. No ship that I know about could survive a landing like that without be disintegrated and this one looks in good shape all things consider. So… why am I here? I’m not only have been more than two decades without a real archeologist work, also I worked on the field of human remains. There weren’t many alien’s remains in Crayter to study.

Goldberg couldn’t completely hide a smile. Something on what Jacob said sounded very funny to him.

-No, there wasn’t. And you are right again. No human ship could survive that. - As someone who shoos a fly, Goldberg ended quit the projection and pass to tablet mode. – Or that was what we believe before us dig our way to the hull and saw this. The big building is not only our communication array, is our cover for the digging site.

He opened a footage file and slid to Jacob so he could see it better.

-It… it can’t be…

The photo showed a partial emblem in a steel wall, the mythical Phoenix in black and yellow under an arch of stars.

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