Short story: For the March 2011 challenge, Failure is not an option. . .
By Stefan Seitz
Captain Michaelovich stood and stared, utter horror griped his heart like a cold fist as he felt the tremors of shockwaves. He saw a single tear running down his cheek at the reflection of the transparent aluminum, through which glowed the soundless explosion like the fires of Dantes hell. Too numb to feel anything at first, his inner soul felt like a vacuum, sucking all his feelings out of him. “Captain…” the voice of his Andorian XO pulled him back to reality and from the anxiousness written all over her face. She felt that more than the obvious must be wrong with Ivan Michaelovich. Something on a personal level.
“Sit-rep!” Michaelovich said hard pressed through his teeth, his face a mask. Wondering what the hell just happened, Lieutenant Patricia McNeel replied, hand pressing the Feinberg receiver to her to her ear sorrow and shock was reflecting on her ebony features: “Captain we’re receiving a distress call from the colony. An accident must have happed!” She stared at him: “Oh my god. It seems the power plant from which the Fukoshima drives, has partially melted… and gone off!” Cold sweat was running his neck as Michaelovich thought about his grandfather who had emigrated to Fukoshima nearly 5 decades ago, to follow his heart as he had found a life-lasting soul mate in Sodaka. Like Jing and Jang their life paths had met and seemed to transpire in harmony, luck and lasting peace. Often to Michaelovich this life in tranquility and harmony with nature that farmers of Fukoshima lived was inunderstandable for Michaelovich who was used to live on a daily basis in the hi-tech environment that was a starship. Now he remembered vividly, the bitter feelings coursed by countless arguments Michaelovich had had with the old man. After falling in love with Sodaka, old Ivan had come to Fukoshima to live a simpler life, the life worthy of an old man earned through a life of hard work, as he used to say. So as he had met Sodaka who loved to feel natures pulse in its pure form and thrive from the energies of its beauty, it had seemed perfect… and it was for a time. Then the mighty energy-lobby back home found its way out of the backwater colony and despite its native beauty, it was decided a power plant must be built for the enrichment of the standards in the colonists daily life, despite also of the heartfelt, tearfully and emotionally peaceful protests of the population. So the power plant was built with pomp and fanfare and as reported with the highest security standard up-to-date tech could buy… so an accident would be a statically impossibly and in case that would still happen, secondary fail safes would instantaneously fill the first and second row of containment. But now the final blow came when Lieutenant McNeel announced: “Containment has failed, if only partially. X-rays are free in the atmosphere, nuclear particles already of the scale!”
Ivan sat on the veranda and his eyes glittered as he beheld the vista of the picturesque dusk, as the sun sunk again the fields of bamboo and rice, filling up the ground with the last warm rays of another day what seemed to be paradise… or maybe haven on earth, well soil. From behind the chair he sat in Ivan felt the presents of the woman he loved with all serenity, she came like a soft breeze barely noticeable and soft. Her arms around his neck, he felt her soft hair, smelled the known fragrance as he inhaled deeply. He sighed: God has graced me with luck! And then it came the one thing that so long had natured his fears, cold like the Siberian winter, silent like the Sable-tooth-tigers long gone on its hurt… and yet with a deadly inevitability.
“Status!” Michaelovich said still overwhelmed by the rush tempo of tragic events, playing out before him. “The cloud of x-rays isotopes is traveling fast in the direction of the populated area!” McNeel said reading sensor scans and probability statistics, lost to him as his heart cried out a single word: Grandpa! “
“No sir that out of the question” said Thriss, Michaelovich’s XO with all certainty.
“But I must go down there!” Michaelovich said bleating, sorrow in every single word.
“Sir you can’t. Its like Dantes Inferno down there. You can’t do a single thing except to get yourself killed.”
With sentence Thriss had without knowledge triggered a nerve and Michaelovich, stoic when acting with conviction and decisiveness if a decision had been made, lost it all. He sank to the ground and borrowed his face, borrowed his dignity and lost the strength and faith to make a difference. And this was his greatest failure, because it paved the road to all that came next… till the end.
By Stefan Seitz
Captain Michaelovich stood and stared, utter horror griped his heart like a cold fist as he felt the tremors of shockwaves. He saw a single tear running down his cheek at the reflection of the transparent aluminum, through which glowed the soundless explosion like the fires of Dantes hell. Too numb to feel anything at first, his inner soul felt like a vacuum, sucking all his feelings out of him. “Captain…” the voice of his Andorian XO pulled him back to reality and from the anxiousness written all over her face. She felt that more than the obvious must be wrong with Ivan Michaelovich. Something on a personal level.
“Sit-rep!” Michaelovich said hard pressed through his teeth, his face a mask. Wondering what the hell just happened, Lieutenant Patricia McNeel replied, hand pressing the Feinberg receiver to her to her ear sorrow and shock was reflecting on her ebony features: “Captain we’re receiving a distress call from the colony. An accident must have happed!” She stared at him: “Oh my god. It seems the power plant from which the Fukoshima drives, has partially melted… and gone off!” Cold sweat was running his neck as Michaelovich thought about his grandfather who had emigrated to Fukoshima nearly 5 decades ago, to follow his heart as he had found a life-lasting soul mate in Sodaka. Like Jing and Jang their life paths had met and seemed to transpire in harmony, luck and lasting peace. Often to Michaelovich this life in tranquility and harmony with nature that farmers of Fukoshima lived was inunderstandable for Michaelovich who was used to live on a daily basis in the hi-tech environment that was a starship. Now he remembered vividly, the bitter feelings coursed by countless arguments Michaelovich had had with the old man. After falling in love with Sodaka, old Ivan had come to Fukoshima to live a simpler life, the life worthy of an old man earned through a life of hard work, as he used to say. So as he had met Sodaka who loved to feel natures pulse in its pure form and thrive from the energies of its beauty, it had seemed perfect… and it was for a time. Then the mighty energy-lobby back home found its way out of the backwater colony and despite its native beauty, it was decided a power plant must be built for the enrichment of the standards in the colonists daily life, despite also of the heartfelt, tearfully and emotionally peaceful protests of the population. So the power plant was built with pomp and fanfare and as reported with the highest security standard up-to-date tech could buy… so an accident would be a statically impossibly and in case that would still happen, secondary fail safes would instantaneously fill the first and second row of containment. But now the final blow came when Lieutenant McNeel announced: “Containment has failed, if only partially. X-rays are free in the atmosphere, nuclear particles already of the scale!”
Ivan sat on the veranda and his eyes glittered as he beheld the vista of the picturesque dusk, as the sun sunk again the fields of bamboo and rice, filling up the ground with the last warm rays of another day what seemed to be paradise… or maybe haven on earth, well soil. From behind the chair he sat in Ivan felt the presents of the woman he loved with all serenity, she came like a soft breeze barely noticeable and soft. Her arms around his neck, he felt her soft hair, smelled the known fragrance as he inhaled deeply. He sighed: God has graced me with luck! And then it came the one thing that so long had natured his fears, cold like the Siberian winter, silent like the Sable-tooth-tigers long gone on its hurt… and yet with a deadly inevitability.
“Status!” Michaelovich said still overwhelmed by the rush tempo of tragic events, playing out before him. “The cloud of x-rays isotopes is traveling fast in the direction of the populated area!” McNeel said reading sensor scans and probability statistics, lost to him as his heart cried out a single word: Grandpa! “
“No sir that out of the question” said Thriss, Michaelovich’s XO with all certainty.
“But I must go down there!” Michaelovich said bleating, sorrow in every single word.
“Sir you can’t. Its like Dantes Inferno down there. You can’t do a single thing except to get yourself killed.”
With sentence Thriss had without knowledge triggered a nerve and Michaelovich, stoic when acting with conviction and decisiveness if a decision had been made, lost it all. He sank to the ground and borrowed his face, borrowed his dignity and lost the strength and faith to make a difference. And this was his greatest failure, because it paved the road to all that came next… till the end.
