Tycho punched into the atmosphere of Orion VII much faster than he had expected and
cursed under his breath as dozens of warning alarms shrieked in protest. All over the cockpit of the battered old Cutlass displays flashed red diagnostic reports of critical system errors and pending module failures. Everywhere he looked his shields were failing under the assault of pressure and heat from the friction of his high speed entry. Flames began to appear, licking along the nose of the Cutlass and up towards the cockpit window, barely kept at bay by the now failing shields. Great spider webs of electrical discharge sparked and danced as the shield generator began to lose its battle against the high speed re-entry. Battling the controls with one hand, Tycho reached out with the other and frantically began to re-route power from the aft shields to the front of the Cutlass. He knew that the now exposed rear of the ship would take damage, but damage was repairable and modules could be replaced. Dead pilots, however, can't fly ships, and burning to death sounded very painful. Both hands back on the controls, He immediately slammed the throttles in full reverse, trying to slow his ship before too much damage was done. After the pickup, he still needed to get the ship off this planet, and back into a system where he could make repairs. Besides, he would much rather hide from the UEE than the Vanduul. The UEE took prisoners and occasionally bribes,
the Vanduul took neither.
Yet another caution message on his HUD calmly informed Tycho that his rear shields had now shut down, and both engines were overheating. The first icy tentacles of real fear began to wrap themselves around him as he watched the intake temperature sensors switch from overheating to critical temperature overload. With a giant shudder and a groan of warping metal, the Cutlass veered violently to the right as the port side engines fail-safes were tripped and shut the engine down. Luckily the engines had done their job and the ship was now slowing enough to reduce the atmospheric friction to an acceptable level. Flying a Cutlass on one main engine was no easy task however, and Tycho fought the sway and roll of the ship all the way down to the ground.
Tycho had meant to enter the planet’s atmosphere faster than normal, attempting to avoid detection by roving Vanduul patrols, but in a system abandoned by the UEE there were no guarantees of safety. Not, however, that the UEE could be considered 'safe' for a smuggler, regardless of a legitimate compliment of cargo or not. The UEE customs and security officers were an ungrateful and arrogant bunch of pricks, in Tycho's opinion, wielding their power to perform a ship search without a warrant like it was a power supposed to be abused. They didn't seem to realize, or care, that that vast majority of affordable food on many planets was the food smuggled in by enterprising pilots and daredevils.
Nursing the wounded ship carefully towards the abandoned landing site, Tycho deployed the landing gear and gingerly eased the Cutlass down. With a satisfying thunk the ship made even contact with the ground and came to rest. Only after the creaking and groaning of the stressed hull subsided did Tycho allow himself to breathe a sigh of relief and slump slightly in his seat.
“Well that could have gone smoother.” Malaak muttered as he shrugged off his harness
and pulled himself up out of his flight seat. “I'm going out to see how badly you've screwed us.”
As Tycho began the shutdown process he couldn't help but chuckle to himself as his humorless partner in crime yanked the cockpit door open and stepped out onto the wing. Tycho had first met Malaak years ago when, as a Hornet pilot for the UEE, Malaak had been his chief flight engineer. Over time they had developed a mutual respect for each other that turned to a stronger friendship than either one of them could have guessed. When Tycho's tour of duty had been completed and his discharge papers filled out, he had suggested that they stick together in civilian life and Malaak had readily agreed, on the condition that the entire ground crew came with them. Not seeing any problem with that, Tycho had happily conceded to his request and offered them a job. Either way he was going to need a maintenance
crew that he could rely on, and nothing made better sense than a team he
already knew inside and out. Wrench and Alice had been more than happy to tag along for what was sure to be more exciting than working as part of a military maintenance crew in peace time.
Tycho even owed Wrench and Alice a debt of gratitude for finding them a serviceable Cutlass for sale. Alice had been beaming from ear to ear when she informed Tycho of the Cutlass sitting in a military impound yard waiting to be auctioned off. She had even begun to laugh uncontrollably after they managed to secure the ship for an extremely low price on account of it refusing to power up. Tycho had been less than amused as he had spent his entire stockpile of credits on acquiring the ship that the two mechanics had sworn was a good deal.
“Dammit Alice!” Tycho growled “It doesn’t matter how cheap it is if it won’t fly. All we own now is a giant pile of scrap.”
Laughing Alice replied “Oh but that's the best part Sir! I knew we didn't have enough credits for a good ship, so I, uh, kinda encouraged Wrench to sneak in last night and break it just a bit so we could get a better deal.”
“Break it?” Tycho asked eying her suspiciously “Break it how exactly?”
“I have no idea Sir” said Alice trying her best to stop laughing “All I did was distract the security guards long enough for Wrench to sneak in and rearrange a few key power couplings. He swears it's only a little bit broken.”
Just at that moment the engines on the Cutlass roared into life and a smiling Wrench poked his head out of the cargo bay door.
“We are good to go Sir!” he yelled to Tycho, and seeing a furious looking auctioneer marching towards them, pointed at him and added “And, uh, we better get going, as in right now!”
Looking to where he was pointing Tycho, Malaak and Alice exchanged a quick glance and without a word started sprinting for the slowly raising cargo door.