The beach

J.M. Varlet

Description

Yvernia. Crowning the volcanic rocks of the island of a distant planet, the high walls shelter this gigantic city. A protectionist community has prospered there for years in luxury and technology, far from the gaze of the galactic authorities. Those who are excluded must live on what they can find, or on what they are given. They are condemned to survive on the other side of the fortifications that defend the city against the whims of nature and undesirables. Only one place allows them to have dry feet : a strip of sand a few hundred meters long covered with makeshift shelters. Its inhabitants call it « the Beach ».

Sujets

• Fiction
• Science Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Les Éditions du Net
• Date de parution: 27 février 2023
• Nombre de lectures: 1
• EAN13: 9782312131283
• Langue: English

Extrait

The beach
J. M. Varlet
The beach
LES ÉDITIONS DU NET
126, rue du Landy 93400 St Ouen
Du même auteur
The beach (one volume)
Colony: the first ones (nearly edited in english)
Colony: the natives, complete edition (not translated yet)
Colony: the renegades, complete edition (in progress)
© Les Éditions du Net, 2023
ISBN : 978-2-312-13128-3
To the Women in my life
Foreword
Oh, don’t worry, I’m also one of those who immediately turn the page with the words « foreword » on it.
However, for those of you who haven’t already done so, let me say this little (very little) thing.
While social inequality is increasing every day, how many children around the world seem to have no other destiny than what is on their horizon?
These lives are automatically dedicated to the struggle for survival at all costs. Life even without pleasure, but life, even if it means death.
And then, curiously, sometimes, in the darkness, a spark of hope springs up. A shooting star in a dull sky that attracts glances and towards which faces turn. How many people are surprised to think: « Why not me? »
I believe deeply in hope. It is the strength that allows us to shake up certainties, overthrow tyrants, change the course of a life, overcome illness…
I once heard that when there was no hope, you would die.
I remain convinced that there is always that fragile little ember that glows faintly in our hearts, that voice that whispers tirelessly and pushes us forward: « What if…? »

I used deepl to translate this book, in order to share it with more people. If you find the sentences strange after that, please consider my « damn » French accent in a humorous way.
Friendly
J. M.
F IRST PART : Hurricane
Countdown
3…
A jolt threw the small man against the metal bulkhead of the ship as he struggled through the brightly lit gallery.
Romuald Schmitt was wearing an orange suit covered with stains. The polished steel ring that was supposed to allow a quick and efficient locking of the helmet was bothering him, he spent his time refocusing it around his neck. Barely in his thirties, his handsome face was framed by brown hair with white streaks. Long enough that his bangs disturbed him when they passed in front of his eyes, they would have deserved a combing. This evening, it was not a problem, because they stuck to his forehead covered with sweat.
The suit, when closed, could regulate the temperature, but his helmet was still in the tactical pc, at the other end of the corridor, and he had come far enough that he didn’t want to go back for it.
And then he felt like he was suffocating with…
A sound of falling behind him, followed by a rolling sound, informed him that, in any case, the helmet had just fallen and rolled to an unknown destination, according to the shaking of the « damn » device.
Despite all that was going on around him, he wasn’t really afraid. He had that unconsciousness that comes with being too focused on your own task to think about anything else. And his mission at the moment was to fix the mechanical problems of the « Liberty », the rest did not concern him. Besides, he was not short of work and, since their departure, he and the pilot had been constantly confronted with a chain of incidents.
He grabbed as best he could at the pipes that ran along the ceiling to avoid falling, and didn’t let go until he reached his destination: the cockpit door.
With a grunt, he crushed the electric opening button with his foot. It was not flexible, however, and he owed his salvation to the solidity of the pipes that allowed him to hang himself, despite serious squeaks of protest.
The door slid away from him to the left.
The cockpit had three comfortable seats side by side behind the large control console that sloped back toward them like a table.
The multitude of controls and switches competed with the number of LEDs and screens that lulled the place into a warm atmosphere.
On a sort of platform, behind the three seats, was a fourth chair, with its own control desk.
The commander’s place.
It was empty.
And for good reason: the Liberty had just been completed, equipped and armed. The shipyard, urged on by the client, had dispatched two men to deliver her to Yvernia, her home port, where her crew was waiting. A pilot and a mechanic. That was the minimum… in good weather.
All the technical panels were flashing and illuminating the room from all sides to the ceiling.
Along the front wall, about a meter in front of the control panel, the thick 50 cm high glass went from one edge to the other following the shape of the huge control panel.
The middle seat was occupied by Timothy Fergusson, a slim man in his thirties, dressed in dark pants and a light beige t-shirt. Under his armpits and back, sweat rings were visible amidst the black marks left by their last tow. The two men had known each other for many years, and often spent time together between flights. Exceptionally, the lap belt was tightened around his athletic waist to keep him in his seat. The chair swiveled and tilted on its axis to dampen the pilot’s fidgeting at the controls.
– How’s it going in there?
– About the same as usual Rom’.
– That bad?
– Well… it sounds like that funny noise you heard earlier was a part of our heat shield being blown away…
– Wait Tim’, this device is new! It’s just out of its trial period and it’s going on a mission for Tyclon. Maybe it’s normal, it was already making a noise it seems…
– Well, now he doesn’t do it anymore…
A long and increasingly loud creaking noise made the whole ship vibrate. A dull shock and then a sort of detonation put an end to it. The patrol boat began to pitch more and more.
Timothy got carried away, clutching the tubes, still in the doorway.
– On the way back I catch the team that took care of this shield and I hang them with their guts!
– At the rate we’re going, I think the heat shield will be the least of our worries. Tim, this damn storm is going to tear this thing apart, we need to get back to space!
– It’s too late now. The remaining parts of our shield are hanging down the hull and slowing us down like airbrakes. We’re running out of speed, we can’t go back up. Go check if everything is okay in the other compartments instead.
The man in the suit shook his head vigorously from right to left.
– Certainly not! This is the best way to get something on the corner of your face right now! There are boxes of more than five hundred kilos behind. If they get around, it’s too late, too bad!… And if there was a problem, our « friend » in the hold would have already informed us through the intercom.
They exchanged a knowing look, pursing their lips crookedly. They didn’t like what they had been told to do when they left: a last-minute load, with a grumpy-looking guy as a bonus to make sure nobody got too close. They couldn’t even find out what it was, they could only get information about the weight so they could organize the cargo. The mobster caricature was left with the crates, much to their relief. At least the rest of the ship was all theirs.
Romuald continued.
– And then with all the shaking anyway, I’m unable to move. Even the gravity generator can’t compensate for the G*! If I let go of these lines, I’ll be flying through the ship.
(*G: acceleration of gravity)
The pilot barely listened to him and looked worriedly at one of the gauges in front of him, whose luminous numbers were decreasing rapidly. This meant that the ship was going down fast, really fast.
Too fast.
– Don’t stay there… close the door… Wait, do you have a cigarette?
The plane swerved violently downward, as if a giant had just slammed it on the roof. Romuald’s feet rose up and he was almost pinned to the ceiling. Then he went down again, holding on with his hands. The pipes he was holding onto creaked, and then one of them gave way.
The man toppled over against the metal partition, crushing the left side of his face with a sort of muffled groan. The second pipe dropped in turn.
– And shit…
Each of the cut tubes projected a dark, greasy liquid, jerking as Timothy pushed the controls.
At the dull shock of the mechanic’s fall, the pilot turned for a brief moment to see the bottom of his companion’s shoes.
– But what are you doing back there? My controls are getting stiffer and stiffer… I told you to close that door!
With a firm gesture, he pressed a button, hidden behind a safety cover that he opened with his thumb, to switch the device to « safety » mode.
The mood lighting went out and the door slid open in front of Romuald. His whole field of vision was plunged into a red halo. He rolled and swore towards the other partition, carried away by a sudden left-handed heel of the aircraft.
This mode isolated each compartment in a watertight manner. From then on, the doors could only be opened mechanically, from the control boxes above each of them. Red letters, « safety light », shone on their face and now provided the only illumination of the sinking ship.
This mode of operation also had another interest: it made it possible to put all the power of the energy generator at the service of the pilot, with the detriment however of the artificial gravity generator. It was this last one which made it possible to neutralize the effects of weak gravity, or to walk normally on the ground, even if the apparatus was on the side or upside down.
Timothy turned his attention back to the panicked altimeter, whose readings of the smaller units were too fast to follow with the naked eye. The hundreds of meters were decreasing at a rate of nearly two per second. He tried to mechanically look through the windows in front of him, where huge drops were crashing down before trickling down the outside.
It was horribly dark and nothing appeared in the lines of light of the powerful projectors. From time to time, a huge bluish lightning bolt zapped the sky, without any noise.
With a hoarse whistle that became deafening, the 160-ton