“That’s weird,” Feri’Andi said as she made her way through her many displays, flipping from screen to screen with a blurring pace.

“What’s weird?” Lihandii slowed the ship’s approach toward the planet. Any hesitation from Feri’Andi was a source of concern for her.

“Well, I’m not picking up any ship or shuttle traffic right now. It looks like there might be some low-altitude shuttles, but they’re really slow. That wouldn’t be weird, considering how primitive the civilization seems to be, but I’m picking up strange signals all over the place in hypenet. We only just discovered hypenet, what, two hundred years ago? Something’s wrong with that. Also,” she added, “There are oodles of small artificial satellites in the uppermost parts of the atmosphere, but only one of them is manned.”

“Wait,” Lihandii stopped her from continuing, “You’re trying to tell me they developed advanced computerized technologies before space travel? That’s just backwards. She gave the planet a look that she usually saved for when Feri’Andi had just done something sneaky. “What are you hiding, you strange planet?”

“There’s more,” Feri’Andi continued. “There are all sorts of massive stoneworks all over the planet already, but they’re the oldest buildings here, and I’m not picking up any signs that the people here have technology even remotely close to primary lifters.”

“Well, they’d have to have primary lifters,” Lihandii protested. “We’ve got to find out more about this planet. What do you think? Should we go ahead and head down.”

“Not just yet,” Feri’Andi said, consulting another screen. “I’m picking up some freaky high levels of nuclear radiation in a few spots. I think…” She moved further down the screen with her eyes. “Yes, it’s definitely weaponized.”

“Weaponized?!” Lihandii almost shouted in her surprise. “What do they plan on doing with nuclear weapons if they can’t even leave their own planet? Blow each other up?”

“Actually,” Feri’Andi cut in, “it looks like they may have done that in several spots already. There are signs of old nuclear fallout in a few areas. It doesn’t look like there’s been anything in the past few decades, though.”

“You expect me to feel better flying to a planet with people that use nuclear weapons on themselves,” Lihandii stressed ‘themselves’, “just because they haven’t done it in a few decades?”

“Well, we can’t really turn back now. We need to go down to make a proper report. And someone put that navigational beacon out on the edge of the system for a reason. That was our technology. I doubt these idiots have even made it past their own moon. They sure couldn’t have put it out there.”

That was true enough. Lihandii pondered that thought for a while before making her decision. “Alright, I’ll fly us down, but you’ve got to find me a safe place to land. I’m throwing on all the stealth systems, even Plug Nine.” Feri’Andi gave Lihandii a surprised look.

Plug Nine was an emergency system to be used only when high risk was in place, and one can’t risk someone else looking out a window or up in the sky. It had a nasty habit of stalling TMDS drives, too. “Are you sure that’s a good idea, Lihandii? Do you really want to go through atmospheric entry with Plug Nine on?” It was a reasonable concern. About twenty years later, after all, another Valkyr would, in fact, stall its TMDS due to overtaxation from the Plug Nine system during entry. Fortunately, Valkyr 52 had more than one pilot.

“That’s what you’re here for, Feri,” Lihandii said in a matter-of-fact tone. “I’m going to handle flying us down until entry temperatures subside, and you’re going to manually manage the Timids power distribution as best as you can to keep us flying until we’re through. Do you think you can do it?”

Feri’Andi gave Lihandii a look that belonged on her own face. “Please,” she said. “I’ve been doing this just as long as you, you know.” She flexed her arm in an attempt to show her figurative strength. “I’ve got this. Just let me figure out where we need to go first.” She started a flurry of motions through her controls, her eyes flitting from one screen to the next as she observed air traffic and found what seemed to be military bases and landing strips. She needed something near a population area of a decent size without flying them too close to someone who might shoot them down if something happened to their stealth systems or in case the natives had another out-of-place advanced piece of equipment that they shouldn’t have yet.

Lihandii, in the meantime, went through the various stealth controls, activating every system she thought would be
useful. For good measure, she also made sure she could shut them off in an instant and switch to weapons without skipping a beat in case anything went wrong. Finally, the only system left was plug nine. Lihandii closed the blast shields for entry as she entered the final commands for activating Plug Nine. “I’m ready,” she said, as the system gave the signal that it was fully activated.

“Me, too,” Feri’Andi said as she tapped a few more controls. “I’m transferring the navigational instructions over to you now.” Lihandii checked over the displays that had just changed on her screens. After a few seconds, she gave the signal with her hand that meant she was prepped. “Alright, give me a second to bring up the power controls.” Feri’Andi flew through the controls as she went through the necessary protocols to manually control power distribution. When the screens were all ready, she flipped her controls, revealing a second control array designed for system maintenance. “We’re good to go.”

Lihandii and Feri’Andi exchanged smiles as the Timids roared into life, their hands steady on their respective controls. “Alright, then,” Lihandii said. She punched the throttle forward manipulating the controls fluidly as she brought the ship into the proper course for atmospheric entry. “Let’s go check this place out.”