THE VROL TRILOGY Read Online Free PDF Page B

velocity, and
started chugging toward the planet of his ancestors. His ship had
been going a paltry forward velocity of Mach 7 when it entered into
of side space, and he needed to arrive within hours, not months.
With the fusion-ion drive at full he would arrive at Earth in one
standard day - much faster than it took Earth's first and only
explorers to Mars, who spent three months on a cramped vessel, only
to tragically never make the return trip home due to an unexplained
accident that resulted in a total loss of life.
    As the hours passed he occasionally
went to the galley. He got snacks and was diligent about hydrating,
not knowing what the water situation would be like on Earth. For
all he knew, the planet would be a dustbowl or an apocalyptic death
ball. When the Machu Picchu reached Earth's Moon he jumped into the
pilot's chair and started preparing for atmospheric entry,
analyzing his readouts on weather patterns and other assorted
critical data. All reports came back positive - it appeared that
Earth had a stable weather system, and it was winter in the
southern hemisphere where he was targeted to touch down, so pollen
levels would be low.
    Half-way between the Moon and Earth he
programmed his re-entry angle vector and paid careful attention to
his early warning systems for any sort of defensive satellites and
ground-based systems, detecting none. In fact, there were no radio
signals at all - just static on all frequencies. That told him one
of two things - either that humanity was extinct, or that they had
completely lost all technological capabilities. He took no chances
and prepared for both scenarios. Another oddity he noticed was that
there were incredible amounts of space junk that formed a sparse,
inconsistent ring around the plant. Feeling he had little time to
analyze these foreign objects, he blasted through them as he made
his way towards the planet below.
    The Machu Picchu screamed into Earth's
atmosphere at a faster rate than any previously-known vessel ever
had before, simply due to the fact that technology had advanced so
much throughout the centuries.  He made an effort to slow down
as much as possible, remembering that there were untold numbers of
flying species on Earth, and he had no desire to massacre scores of
innocent, airborne animals on re-entry.
    He slowed the Machu Picchu down to a
respectable Mach 1.5 over what his nav charts called the Pacific
Ocean, cruising at about 9,000 meters above sea level. As he was
coming in high, he turned on his ground cams and recorded while he
approached the Peruvian coast, specifically over what was the
capital city, Lima. Curious, he slowed his ship down, as the
computers had not detected any form of areal defense, and lowered
to only 75 meters above sea level on the coast.
    As he approached the foggy
shoreline, he saw the ruins of what appeared to have been a large
commercial center, built on a cliff overlooking the ocean.
Magnifying in, he saw there was still lettering on buildings,
although quite faded. The largest lettering said Larco Mar , and showed
well only because it was constructed out of what appeared to be
concrete or stone, but some of the smaller buildings had signage,
like HaRo k C fé ,
with some letters missing.
    Lidar (laser radar) systems detected no
large fauna in the area, so he dropped his landing gear and set
down on a street outside of the commercial area. The atmospheric
drive's concussion waves buffeted the street and blew out chunks of
pavement as the ship touched down, the landing pads sinking a few
centimeters into the pavement.
    Max was amazed that the street had even
held together on landing, as it was most probably not designed to
withstand so many metric tons of weight in such a small area.
Shutting down engines, but leaving primers on in case of an urgent
departure, he unstrapped from his chair and did a final readout of
air conditions outside. He was surprised that they were fine, with
just a touch more pollen in the air