Desperately, in this crazy 'rodeo ride', Jack tried reaching the control panel, then at 100 meter's his fingers slam down on the control to fire the air jets. Their thirty second burst fires with a sudden jolt, as the Aaltar is thrust from a falling to a stalling action. The noise was horrendous, yet the 'rodeo ride' appears to calm. “Work, bloody well work’”Jack shouts, his fingers sore with being clenched so tight he holds onto the control chair. In those few seconds the decent was like a crash in slow motion. Noise of structure under stress, shaking, creaking, breaking, it was everywhere as the retro action of the air jets sends a powerful and final vibration through the Aaltar like thunder so loud it hurts your ears. Jack braces himself for a pessimistic, optimistic destruction, muttering in his head, what he thinks is the countdown. “Nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three―“. Then as the roar of the jet’s ceases there is a sound like surreal silence, just a few seconds, enough to craze the nerves, then followed by a thunderous noise from everywhere, like the Aaltar was being hit with a million stones, which was then followed by several hard bumps that feel like you are in a bouncy castle made of tin. There is a slow tilt, followed by some horrendous reverberation, then as the payload rests on the Martian surface, only a faint shuddering as a sound of bending internal mass, groaned with a noise so eerie it defies recitation but sounded like mechanical pain.
There was then a kind of silence inside, just outside noises, like external debris was falling, small noise on the Aaltar. Then there was the lingering in his ears of the thunderous noises as the craft had fallen to the surface, noise that seemed to linger for many seconds after. There was another tilt which throws Jack out of his chair, just as he shut down the Aaltar systems for safety reasons. For a moment it seems as if the impact has caused serious weakening while stress is still bending the Aaltar and it's precarious scrap heap structure. Jack sits on the floor listening, waiting unsure if he should move. Then suddenly there was nothing, utter silence, complete and deafening silence. However inside Jacks head, mental noise was messing the reality of the minds adjusting to the expectation he associated with this unnerving silence, then the reality dropped in, he was on the Martian surface, still alive.
Then for some inexplicable reason an air jet began roaring beneath the fallen mass, causing a rocking motion of the Aaltar structure, kicking out volumes of surface dust into a sandstorm, from every gap exposed, beneath the Aaltar and its falling mass clouds of debris was thrown into the air. Jack had attempted to stand up inadvertently pressed the control that appears to have released a final emptying of a retro jet. He hits the control again and kills the air jet, then nothing, total unconditional silence. Silence only disturbed by Jack hearing his heart pounding. “Man that was crazy ride.”Jack declares, lifting himself back into his chair. “Does that mean we've made it, we dam well made it!” As he grabs a hold of the control desk he stands, his legs hurting like their on fire, but other matters need attention, “Need to check if any of this mass is working,” he says as he rubs his legs, at the same time he looks at them.”God what on Earth has happened to my legs, there bleeding?” Outside the Aaltar, faint rain like sounds are heard, as clouds of falling Martian dust, thrown up by the second blast of the air jet. As Jack manages to stand, despite the tilt of the Aaltar, he walks towards the far end of the control console in an attempt to check what systems are working. Though the tilt of the Aaltar, leaves a lot to be desired he reached across to run a test, suddenly the whole structure moves again, his own change of position had changed the balance of the Aaltar. There is a creaking, along with some loud external sounds like falling rock or debris of a kind, then another tilt, quite unexpectedly bringing the Aaltar almost to an even plain. Jack nods in approval. In the lower section, a muffled alarm has been set off, despite the fact Jack had shut the systems off. “Hells bells.”He shouts as he hears it. The alarm is an automatic life support status check, if its muffled, your alright, if it was a full blown with flashing lights then you would need to resort to breathing apparatus. “Not bad the way they designed this vessel, they got it dead right. Thank god for business investments, they made this baby like it was gonna last.”he mutters.
His legs hurt, though his moving them around, along with the return of gravity has eased the pains. Right now he is busy re-establishing internal power, if its possible, as it appears some fail safe systems have dropped out. After he resets them, he runs a damage status check. On the floor, his bottle of amber nectar has fallen off its shelf, now it rolls under Jack as he pushes his control console chair to one side, lifting a circuit breaker cover, he spots his bottle of 'Jack Daniels'. “Oh My lovely friend, there you are, not now maybe later.”He tells the bottle, as he returns it to its home under the console.
For the next two hours, Jack checks every system function. Of course he has several problems, if least of all, survival smack in the face of a hostile environment. So each factor is a matter of careful thought. He looks out of a dirty control window then ponders,“Whoever is looking out for me, even if I need to pee, at least I can breath and I am grateful.” his humor hides his fears as he switches on all the systems that are operational. It has surprised him, all bar five items, show up as 60% working integrity. The five in-operational locations are two solar panels, one already off-line as it was ripped to shreds in the decent, another lost in the decent. air jets, liquid fuel cells, and that was because they were used. External camera, four, disconnected perhaps gone. The data display also identifies external damage to the Beacon, still operational but out off line. Jack gives a healthy sigh, then he reads it all. “I cannot believe it so far.” he says as he switches on camera one, curious of an external view. There immediately on the screen an unfriendly rock strewn terrain, looking like a place he recalls in Afghanistan on Earth. He was there ten years ago, servicing the giant Solar generation plants, updating the electronic software. A huge twenty thousand mass solar array site, generating a fifth of the countries energy. He enjoyed the Afghan hospitality, and what he can see outside brings back a flood of memories.
As he looks out on the Martian landscape, he rubs his hand across his face, “Wonder where the nearest bar is, that Daniels not going to last me long.” he jokes, but there is an urge to take a walk outside, but he knows that is out of the question, anyway it helps to think like that. He feels cold, so he slips on a thermal jacket then he begins to download the details from the on board Mars Epi-multi scan. It all seems to take far too long, probably the small dish is clogged with Mars dust, so Jack disregards the data, believing it to be flawed. He is a bit annoyed, because he has no idea where he has landed on the planet, he had wanted to find out if he was near the underground water reserves, in some areas they are accessible. He may have to consider it. With water reserve on a short time line, it is imperative he organize himself. Then there is the body waste, he will have to devise a system, one that is both ecologically viable, as well as no health risk. There is also the use of energy, cuts have to be made, two solar panels are plenty for this section, but the charging rate has dropped lower, that could be a panel is not facing the right direction. He thinks to himself as he attempts to view the direction of them through camera six, with dismay, he observes that both are bent, one may not be able to move. Still he decides that one might move with a bit of persuasion. With a little nervousness, he instructs a forty degree anti-clockwise turn. To his total surprise with quick obedience, it does, the solar arm turns, full tilt into the best view of the sunlight. With immediate results, the charging rate rises by 54%, after a short study of the other panel, he opts for an attempt to move that one, however as he sets instruction for a ten degree turn, clockwise, he errs on the side of caution, “No leave well enough alone, that is an outside job!” It was then he decided to see what options he had on board for setting up some communication with Earth, “I am making myself too much at home here, they can come and get me as soon as they like.” So the next few hour’s were pent listing the available resources he has. Soon the Martian day started to close, not unlike an Earth day. The dust in the Martian atmosphere created a vivid sunset, not better than the ones on Earth, there's less of the Sun here. Of his resources, he found he had two micro-wave transceivers, they were a parting gift from Garth Mullion, state of the art devices fresh from the Taiwan Electronics Fair. Garth bought them here about two years ago. But Jack was not allowed to use them on the Aaltar, apparently the internal micro-wave they used affected the data received from the Martian surface via the Epi-multi scan. But now Jack is more than pleased, saying to himself, “ Garth, May I thank you. Who knows I might even be able to call home.” He removes one from its package, switches it on, its batteries are in good shape, little over half charge. With a curiosity, he presses the scan button. The frequencies run through the search mode, then to Jacks surprise, pausing on two locations, though not stopping just scanning those locations, then the search scan continuing. He was puzzled as each time, a momentary pause on those two locations, as if there was a reason. So curious was Jack that on a third run of the scan, he decides to store those two frequencies, always curious and always optimistic, then he laughs saying, “No, it couldn't be? a local take-away.”. Then he reads the accompanying information inside. His purpose to know the frequency range the unit’, he might be able to tap them into the NASA Rollover satellite frequency, “You never know might leave a few words someone to mull over.”
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