"Adams & Eves"

"Adams & Eves"​

With his typical urgency, the Captain entered the shuttle repair bay of the Distant Ventures, the only compartment aboard the passenger transport with enough deck space to accommodate the entire 112 member crew at one time. And with his typical abruptness, he announced, "The mission is doomed. We have no choice but to perform an emergency landing on Trachen IV."

He went on to explain what the rumor mill had pretty much already disseminated: the explosion they had suffered in the engine room a month earlier had eliminated any possibility of them reaching their destination, the Human colony on Trachen III.

"We have no choice but to attempt an emergency landing," he continued. "We will fill the Passenger Pods with colonists and supplies, with one Crew Officer per Pod to lead the group once they are on the ground."

The Captain ran quickly through some basic safety and survival procedures, as another Senior Officer and her three assistants made their way through the group handing out thin Survival Manuals -- printed, not electronic -- that they'd begun producing when it became obvious that a landing was likely.

The Captain gestured the Executive Officer front and center, saying, "Each of you has an important choice to make. I want you to understand that we will accommodate as many first choices as possible ... but..."

The XO pointed to an ID scanner box sitting upon a table near the repair bay's forward entrance. "As you leave, swipe your ID and make a choice of assignments. The options are..."

He lifted a small card before him and explained the options available to the dying ship's Crew...

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Frank Dent hadn't gotten either his first or second choice of assignment.

His first choice had been to remain aboard the Distant Ventures. Ten Crew members were going to stay behind in an attempt to keep the ship alive and in orbit for as long as possible. Those remaining would attempt to maintain communication with those who descended, giving them Intel or advice when available.

His second choice had been to descend to Trachen IV with what the XO had called "Tech Teams". These were made up almost exclusively of Crew Members with special and valuable Technical Ratings -- skills -- that would be put to use building a permanent settlement intended to support as many surviving castaways as could reach it.

And that, of course, was the rub: the Passenger Pods could not be navigated but instead would simply fall to the planet on what ever course they were sent. It was generally agreed that most of them would reach the surface intact, but without the electronic guidance that would have come from Colony Flight Control on Trachen III, the Pods' descent paths would resemble those of arrows loosed high into the sky during gusty winds.

They might land within sight of one another, or they might land thousands of miles apart. There simply was no way to know.

Frank's third choice -- the one he got -- was to be a Team Leader for a Passenger Pod. He would descend as the only animated person, and once he reached the surface, he would reanimate the 20 passengers that had been in cryogenic stasis since even before leaving the Earth System. Once every one -- or at least every one who survived -- was conscious and reoriented enough to travel, they would make their way toward one of the settlements.

Frank looked about his berthing compartment and realized that he'd be leaving all of this in three days when he boarded his Passenger Pod.

That was, of course, unless he took the fourth option that had been given to him. He could commit suicide. Frank had laughed when he'd first heard that that was an option, but in just the 30 hours since the XO laid out the choices, more than a dozen people had already drank the Kool-Aid. One of his best friends -- at one time a lover of his -- had taken this route, telling him, "I prefer a painless death to what awaits us down there."

Frank couldn't even imagine killing himself. No, he'd rather risk burning up in the atmosphere, crashing into pieces on the surface, being devoured by a wild creature or eaten from the inside by a vicious microbe, or even being captured by the indigenous Trachen before he'd end it all with a little pill.