The Termino Tangle

“Admiral Gator, orbit insertion in 20-mins,” said a voice behind his back.

Admiral Gator didn’t bother turning around. He had done these missions hundreds of times and the crew churn was very high. There were new spacemen all the time. Some remained on every captured planet, others eventually got drafted to other missions or desk jobs, but mostly just got killed from their own incompetence. Space was unforgiving and remembering the name of every idiot who didn’t understand that was just too much trouble. His muscles stiffened. “Scan the surface. I don’t want any surprises when we get down.”

“Yes sir.”

Admiral continued to stare at the large grey planet that was growing bigger by the minute. This was supposed to be his 100^th capture since the Last War, the most any other Admiral had achieved under the Final Emperor. Hundredth and the last one. Then he would hang his boots and settle on a decent Jupiter view Villa at Ganymede. He could have chosen any of the thirty thousand colonized planets across the Galaxy but there was some sense of nostalgia associated with the home solar system. A sentimentality that most of the newer generation could never understand. But there was another reason for his choice… at Ganymede he would be far away from the Emperor who controlled his vast Empire from Magellen – a rocky super-planet near the center of the Milky Way Galaxy. If there was one thing more unforgiving than the space, it was the megalomaniac dictator who had just won the whole galaxy.

When the underling had left, he poured himself a glass of fine Europa whiskey. Fermented by rare microbes under a thick layer of ice gave it quite a unique taste. Frankly, he didn’t like it much, but the privilege was just too prestigious to let go. One of the so many little things that put underlings in their place.

The errand-boy was soon back with a portable-visor in his hand.

Can’t these guys not be efficient for once?

He was a young lad… probably fresh out of the academy. Too young for his own benefit… movements too flail and words too unsure. Admiral wondered if he’d survive through to the end of the mission. Despite himself, he felt like talking to this one.

Admiral motioned him to come closer to his private bar. “What’s your name, boy?”

“My name is Kritu, Sir. Charon born.”

Admiral’s glass halted mid-way. “Charon born?”

The young guy blushed. His eyes turned to the floor. “Yes Sir. My Dad was a prisoner and my Mom was one of the Law Enforcement.”

“That’s not what I meant.” Admiral felt sorry for the boy. Charon’s prison colonies were one icy-hell, one of the worst places for a kid to grow up. “Do you want a drink?”

“Thank you, Sir,” said the boy, a little surprised at the unexpected kindness from the Admiral. “Alligator will be in orbit shortly so maybe I shouldn’t.”

“First mission, eh?”

The boy nodded.

“Good for you. You must be enjoying the view then.” Admiral downed his wine and closed the bottle. “Once you have been to as many as I have, things start to get a little boring. Same old, same old.”

“I wouldn’t know that, Sir. I studied your mission logs during my training. They are the stuff of legends.”

“Those logs aren’t half of what we went through on those planets, son. Anyway… do you have that scan that I asked for?”

“Yes, Sir.” Kritu extended a visor towards the Admiral and iterated a what was no-doubt, a practiced speech. “The planet is Type-C. Uninhabited. Rocky surface with size 1.2 R-naught. Gravity 1.4 gees. 20-hour days. There has an environment but no breathable oxygen, our neutrinometry suggests some mineral deposits under the surface --”

Same old, same old.

“Understood.”

The boy shuffled his weight from one foot to another in uncomfortable silence.

“There is one more thing, Sir.”

“Yea…?”

“That grey thing is some kind of organic mass. Planet wide.”

Admiral sensed a tinge of worry on Kritu’s voice. “Don’t worry. I have seen stuff like that before. It’s like moss and easy to exterminate. But in space… I don’t want make any assumptions… Alligator will land with all stations ready and EVA only after complete environmental report.”

 “Yes sir. I will pass the message to rest of the crew. What do you want to name it, Sir? I mean the planet.”

“Ah… I almost forgot about that. Well, this is my last mission, so it should be something appropriate. Ah. I have it. Let’s call it Termino.”

“I will update the catalogues, Sir.”

“Do that. And wake up the ground team. We may have to rendezvous with the natives and they might be hostile.”

###

Admiral hated looking at groggy faces of ground teams, they were always confused for a considerable time after the thaw, and invariably asked that stupid question:

“Which year is it?” Captain Shemira asked.

“Don’t sweat it, Captain. You shall soon find out.”

Admiral inspected the rank of soldiers. He saw one of them stealing a glance of the grey-planet -Termino - that now filled almost the entire field of vision. Alligator was firing its thrusters in preparing for a soft landing. Admiral bellowed, “Get to your stations. Let’s cleanse this planet swiftly. No firing without my command. Let’s get over with this. Understood?”

“Yes, Sir,” all the soldiers said in unison.

“For the Emperor,” he shouted.

“For the Emperor,” a dozen voices replied.

Admiral settled on the Rendezvous Panel designed specifically for capturing missions. Various screens played to him each and every piece of information that could help him to make crucial decisions. As the Colonization Ship Alligator closed the distance to the grey blob of the planet, he focused on one particular screen that gathered the EM feed. IF the natives were spacefaring, they’d trying sending radio signals to contact the ship. And he’d reply with a barrage of EM bombs (to make them deaf), followed by Fusion bombs (to make them dead). Sure, it made Terraforming a little trickier later, but the Emperor didn’t distinguish between a planet and a dead planet. And so, neither did he. Survival of the fittest was nature’s law and primitive species must give way for the more advanced ones. But he was spared this effort when no contact attempt was made. He shut the lid containing the trigger.

“Prepare to land,” he said.

“Copy that, Admiral. Preparing for landing. Target landing coordinates twenty-three degree north, forty-six degrees east. ETA twenty-one minutes.”

Same old, same old.

As Alligator decelerated, he was gently pushed back into his chair, the screen showing the visual feed of the planet flickered as the grey matter showing on it covered every pixel. At about 100-kms from the surface, the surface features started to resolve but it was like zooming in on a Mandelbrot set.

Twenty minutes later, Alligator landed softly on Termino.

“Touch-down,” declared the pilot. “Soft ground underneath.”

“Good job everyone. Ground team remain at your stations till you have a ‘Go’ from me. We will take a call on EVA once we have the primaries completed. Science team begin the scan and feed it to the – whatsthat?”

Scan was unnecessary. Even as Admiral Gator was finishing his last sentence, the visual feed was changing dramatically. In distance, humanoid figures were appearing behind the elevation of the surface. They seemed to be waving and charging towards the spaceship. Drat! Too late to launch the fusion bombs.

“Captain Shemira. Do you have a visual on natives at 2 ‘o clock? Clean it up.”

Captain Shemira yelled a series of quick commands to the gunners. A rain of fire descended on the planet. As Kritu brought another round of Europa whiskey for the captain, several weapons shot, launched, swept and burned the targets around them.

“Area is clear, boss. Eleven targets were eliminated.”

###

Soon, dozen figures in their spacesuits were descending from Alligator led by the Admiral Gator. Termino’s orange Sun had just risen in the east to begin its 20-hour day. As per custom long set in the history of space exploration, the General was the first one to set foot on the soft surface of Termino.

“Time 6 AM local, 21^st July of Year 1 of United Era, General Gator claims this planet in the service of the Emperor. For the Emperor.”

“For the Emperor,” came the reply.

Admiral looked around. As far as he could see there was grey nothingness for miles on end. There were no surface features to speak of and there was an uneasy quiet on the planet. It reminded him of a mass cemetery on his home planet.

“Set your clocks to the local time. Do the cleanup and set up camp alpha… I don’t want to spend a minute more than absolutely necessary in this grey hell -- what that annoying static?”

An electromagnetic disturbance flickered in his visors and simultaneously a cracking noise rang in his ears.

“Seems that Termino has a strong magnetic field captain and it is unstable.” Came reply from the science team that was still onboard Alligator along with the rest of the crew.

‘Unstable’ seemed to define Termino in other ways as well. The moss was mushy and the ground under them seemed to shake periodically like a heartbeat. The Ground team had to consciously pull-out their legs from the sticky grey substance that often climbed up to their knees. And after a brief effort it soon became clear that setting up a camp was impossible.

Admiral Gator gritted his teeth. Without camp, Termino wouldn’t be considered as captured. “Those natives… who were running to our ship… they must be living somewhere underground. Captain… can you check on their bodies for clues?”

“Sure, boss.” Captain Shemira waded her way through the thick moss to where the natives were shot dead. She looked around in confusion.

“There is not a single body here, boss… looks like that this moss gobbled them up.”

Captain looked around. All eleven soldiers from the ground team were, in turn, looking at him.

“Let’s explore the area where those natives were coming from. Kritu, I need a deep scan of Termino on all frequencies… keep an eye out for the source of this moss-quake and this static.”

They started walking east searching for any anomaly in the grey world that seemed planet-wide now. The walk was punishing due to viscous moss and 140% gravity. Periodically, they would stop to pull themselves above the moss that seemed to be rising. After about an hour, they seemed to have hardly away from their ship.

He then heard Captain Shimera on comms. She had patched the science team on a common channel where she was asking a weird question.

“Kritu, how many Suns does Termino have?”

“One.” Came a quick reply from Kritu.

Admiral bellowed. “Has the thaw made you stupid, Captain?”

“Boss, look.” Captain replied. Admiral Gator didn’t get it till she repeated loudly. “Just look at the Sun.”

Admiral’s turned to the sky and for a second couldn’t comprehend what he was seeing. Only a part of the Sun’s orange disk was visible in the eastern horizon.

And then it clicked to him.

The Sun was rising. “Again?”

He instinctively looked at his watch. 5:30 AM.

“How is this possible? What the f**k does this mean?”

Admiral Gator turned towards Captain Shemira for an answer and his eyes widened. The sight was horrid. The moss that was only sticking upto her knees, suddenly crawled up her body. Before she could say something, the moss poured through her open mouth. It then went above her head and covered her entire body. And then as suddenly the whole thing merged back into the ground leaving no trace of her body.

For a second, Admiral stood stupefied. Then he stuttered, “M… Mission abort. P… prepare Alligator for departure. Ground team... back to the ship... immediately.”

“Admiral, the sensors are going crazy in here,” Kritu shaken voice came in. “I did scans and there are massive EM pulses going under the grey layer.”

“Where exactly?” said Admiral, sweating profusely, and trying to run as fast as he could.

“Everywhere,” Kritu replied. “L… looks like a neural network that spans the entire planet… it is… it is… communicating. It’s… alive.”

They had hardly taken ten steps towards the Alligator when a massive moss-quake shook them. A grey Tsunami rose up like a monster mouth and gobbled up the entire spaceship. Mortal screams flooded the comms. As the wave washed over the ship, shrill screams were replaced by a deathly silence.

Gator found himself shaking with fear for the first time in his life… and perhaps for the last time. Few others were sobbing. He emptied his entire ammo on the ground as if trying to kill a ghost underground.

And then… he saw it. In some distance, a large aircraft was breaking through the clouds and was getting closer to the ground.

“Looks like an imperial rescue ship.” Someone said.

Before Admiral could give a command, all the remaining soldiers were running towards the rescue ship. All eleven of them.

Eerily, the ship bore the exact markings of the Alligator, Admiral noticed, way too late. A hail of firepower blasted through them and there were eleven bodies on Termino to feed the grey monster again.

Same old, same old.

###