The Ship Who Saved the Worlds by Anne McCaffrey; Jody Lynn Nye

Author:Anne McCaffrey; Jody Lynn Nye
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Science Fiction
ISBN: 0743471717
Publisher: Baen Publishing Enterprises
Published: 2003-12-01T05:00:00+00:00

The second planet from the sun, behind a scorched clay rock and an insignificant asteroid belt where an unstable planet used to be, was large and beautiful and wet. As she swept into orbit above the equator, Carialle read her spectroanalysis monitors and discovered high relative humidity, due to a respectably thick and variable cloud cover in a nitrogen/oxygen atmosphere.

"I'll have mold galore, and possibly rust in my drawers when I lift off."

"Don't worry, lady," Keff said, cheerfully. "If TE's cousins have the magic technology, they can keep you as dry as you want."

"Oh, I want, I want," Carialle said. "That's one application of the technology I would look forward to using."

Within minutes, Carialle had picked up the signal from the landing beacon on the largest landmass in the planetary-northern hemisphere. She oriented herself to it, following a great circular route that would pass directly over it.

Beneath them, peeping through the cloud cover, half a dozen small continents floated on the surface of a vast, blue-green ocean. Small, blue ice caps appeared, then fell off to either side of the globe as Carialle descended. As the clouds parted, they could see how very green the low-lying lands were. Small Spot and Long Hand looked positively awed. They had never imagined the existence of so much water. Hazel-brown islands dotted the seas like freckles. Carialle opened megachip memory to record every detail and gave full visuals to those in the control room.

There was some minor particulate matter in the atmosphere, probably a sign of industrial activity, and creating a beautiful sunset half a world behind them. She caught the occasional sunspark as tiny airborne craft speeding below her reflected the yellow star's light. The whole scene reminded her of any one of hundreds of the Central Worlds, but everything was in such small scale compared to those in a human settlement. Her sensors told her that the flyers were only a meter square by less than two meters in length.

"How could we not have known they were here?" she wondered aloud.

Keff, never moving his eyes from the screen, shook his head slowly from side to side and clicked his tongue in agreement.

"This is the race, all right," Keff said, happily.

The partners' dream had always been to discover a sentient race equal to humanity in technological advancement and social development. There was no doubt about the well-established civilization below them, and their guests were living proof of the culture's prowess in space exploration.

The globe-frogs became agitated as the ship neared the stratosphere. Carialle picked up signals that were almost certainly what was arousing their senses.

"Take a look at the readings for the enormous power source down there," she told Keff. "Much larger than the Core of Ozran. The frequency hash is even greater. I'm reading controller codes in tiny bandwidths that I doubt could sustain what's necessary for one of the older amulets. Your machines will undoubtedly need tuning," she told Tall Eyebrow.

"It is true," he said, placing his long fingers on his belt buckle.

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