Cosmic Boom: Project Enterprise 9 by Pauline Baird Jones by Jones Pauline Baird

Author:Jones, Pauline Baird [Jones, Pauline Baird]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction, Romance
ISBN: 9781942583899
Goodreads: 58297448
Publisher: Pauline Baird Jones
Published: 2021-07-20T07:00:00+00:00

“Probe is entering the planet’s atmosphere,” Roy said in its “stating the obvious” tone.

The view went from tracking to video as the camera in the probe activated. It was much like an in-atmosphere approach, though this time Boom didn’t spike into the feed. Sporadic clouds gave glimpses of what lay below.

An ocean. A river snaking through green land toward that ocean. Green and brown expanding out from the many shades of blue.

Forests that might have been grand once. The trees were burnt sentinels, mute witnesses to some catastrophic event.

The probe was both showing a view and gathering data, so he didn’t have a chance to see if there were any hopeful growth at the base of the trees.

Now there was a range of mountains rushing in, so fast he felt his stomach drop. The lines of ridges were rocky, stark, but not so desolate as the tree line had been.

The probe seemed to dip on the other side of the crest, angling down toward their first signs of civilization. The skyline could have been a city on any of the planets they’d visited, or avoided in their travels, except it wasn’t.

Somehow it looked and felt off. He was unsure why. Sporadic cloud cover intermittently blocked the view.

The probe deployed its drones as data continued to scroll down the side of the screen. Thanks to his enhancements, he could track both data and visuals, though he found the visuals more compelling.

The data stated what they knew. The planet was habitable, so whatever had caused the damage to the trees had not damaged the atmosphere. He switched to the drone view that was on a track that would take it over the city.

The resolution was impressive. But then, most of the Garradian tech was impressive. That’s why everyone wanted it.

The drone almost appeared to follow a road or highway, though it could also be the most direct route toward the dwellings he’d glimpsed from the probe view. Nature was erasing the signs of civilization, or so it looked to him.

He’d been on planets some years after a war or natural disaster and they’d looked like what he saw now.

Ahead, he saw that the structures were oblong in shape, tapering to sharp points on top where they stabbed into the gray sky—a sullen sky that hung like a shroud over the city.

That was curious.

There was a sun and it had been hitting the ocean side of the mountains, but now the drone had to dip down below the low-lying cloud cover to keep the video coming.

“A big city,” Tiger muttered.

“Very big,” Hedy agreed.

The view sharpened abruptly as the drone dropped even lower, focusing in on a street running between two smaller buildings.

“Is that…” Tiger’s voice trailed off.

Boom wasn’t sure what to ask either. The figures moving down the street—there weren’t many—were humanoid, or so they seemed. They didn’t move like humans he’d encountered.

There was a jerkiness to them, as if they were ill or damaged and they emitted a faint, blue glow.

“How can

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