Empyrean Iris

Chapter 13

Half of the world was on fire.

Thick black smoke billowed into the atmosphere adding a hellish cast to the fiery red halo of atmosphere.

Captain Vir seemed quite calm for a human that was flying himself towards a class A-1 death planet.

With a steady hand he reached out to engage the comms array, "A136 this is Harbinger-2 clearance code 1125 niner niner 6 on special loan for the Galactic Assembly requesting docking, over."

"Harbinger 2, clearance accepted, please follow landing vectors to docking. Please be advised, strong convection winds reported on your vector, please acknowledge."

"Acknowledged A136, proceeding to descent."

"Did he say...... convection advisory? What does that mean? Are we in danger?" Krill asked, shifting nervously in his seat.

One of the marines turned to look at him, forced to yell over the roaring sound as they entered the upper atmosphere. "Because one side of the planet is always on fire, and the other side in the dark, the movement of the cold air and the hot air can get pretty violent."

"Then why are we going!" He demanded, his voice barely under a squeak.

"Relax, if you're the best surgeon in the galaxy that makes the captain the best pilot. We'll make it through."

That seemed pretty presumptuous for a man that probably couldn't tie his own bootlaces without supervision, but Krill wasn't exactly in a place to argue. He was at the mercy of this human and his flight skills whether he liked it or not.

His displeasure was only heightened as they cut into the middle atmosphere. All around them, the walls of the shuttle screamed and rocked. Violent areas of low pressure sent them plunging downward and then shooting back up as the two air temperatures fought violently with each other.

The metal hull of their ship screeched and groaned. Flames licked up around them as the captain pulled the shuttle into an angled entry. Krill felt the world drop out from under him thrown against the harness as they plunged from the sky. Around him the marines whopped.

He screeched a high pitched keening noise, which was so far past human hearing that they probably didn't even notice

The ship curved slightly to the right as the rain outside the window began to pound even harder.

"Hold on everyone." The captain ordered, and the marines braced themselves against their seats.

The ship slowed even further towards the point where Krill could feel the ship being buffeted back and forth by currents of air. They stayed there for a moment, before beginning their descent. Outside the window, he caught a glimpse of a barren blackened landscape streaming with silver ribbons of smoke as rain fell from the sky, and then the tunnel closed up around them, and they were lowered deep into the earth.

There was a loud whirring sound, and the water on their windows began to quiver and evaporate.

A few minutes passed, and then the weight of their shuttle found purchase on the ground, and the captain cut the engines. "Well, that was fun."

Krill glanced at the humans, "Why was it raining? Half the world was on fire."

One of the marines glanced at him, "Lots of hot air, lots of cold air, low pressure causing rain showers. Come on, you're a genius, you should know that."

"Genius and omniscient are two completely different things. Genius Refers to my ability to learn and understand things quickly, not my ability to suddenly and randomly know everything about the weather."