User:Cesrate/The New Future/Laythe ascend

After a bath, I walk to the window. The room temperature is comfortable. Quark City, the first colony on Laythe. Rather than calling it "city", it's more like a village. The majority of the building is made of concrete and bricks, and the thermal coatings are inside to keep the room warm. There're also a geothermal station and several bases landed from orbit, like the Picker Base B-5 landed there just a few minutes before the C-2's landing (C-2's place is about 40 kilometers eastward) yesterday, aiming for nuclear fuels.

The Picker B-5 is the "artificial gravity partner" of Picker C-2. During the past 150 days B-5 and C-2 was attached to the VASIMR stage by fifty-meter-long ropes, and as C-2 is a little heavier than B-5, the rope for C-2 is a few meters short. C-2 and B-5 were rotating during the travel like binary stars to simulate a comfortable gravity, and their barycenter is VASIMR stage, the thrust provider. Quiet neat, isn't it?

Well, as B-5 is mentioned... From the news, there was a breathtaking interlude when it was executing the final descend. After the deployment of parachutes, one out of the six airlocks of heat shield was failed to release. In such an emergency, the commander promptly ordered to fire the descending engines to their rated thrust. The heat shield turned over with the effect of engine exhaust and the failed airlock was twisted, but the shield was still hanging there. Then when approaching the Quark City, the airlock suddenly broke. The shield dived fast and hit the ground heavily. The residents were pretty scared although it didn't hit Quark City.

"Space flight isn't safe, though..." When I'm talking to myself, the door bell rang, it's Stephen.

Having changed clothes, I'm now having tea with him. There are a few tea bushes in greenhouses, and drinking the tea reminds me of Kerbin. Stephen talks about the mission.

The mission to Vall... It's a secret. Although the picture of Nightingale Satellite has been made public and caused a shock. The pictures came from Nightingale Satellite shows a group of unexpected geometric shapes on a plain of Vall. This thing had not been discovered until some bored fan-boys noticed it. KSA kept trying to pursuade people that's most likely to be a mapping error, but on the other hand, ten days before, the closest unit, us, got the command to discover it.

And that's why we landed on Quark. Three hours later, we will be armed to the teeth for the exploration.

"I'm quiet worried. What about you?"

"We will do this." Said by me with confidence, at least seemingly.

"Yes, we trust you." Stephen seems to be a little relaxed now. "And... nice dress for you."

"Well... That's good..." I have no idea on how to respond for a while.