Free Ellie Quin Book 01: The Legend of Ellie Quin by Alex Scarrow Page A

seconds.
    It started to blink silently.
    For a full two minutes she watched the space vessel as it slowly traced a line across the sky. She knew enough to know that if it could have received the signal the onboard navigational system would have already noted it and logged the co-ordinates. She turned off the navset to conserve its batteries. If the signal had been detected then there was a fair chance the ship might detour and investigate or dispatch a smaller surface ship to go and take a look.
    Never underestimate the pulling power of salvage rights . That was something Dad had once said whilst he’d been checking the navset’s power supply.
    *
    A light blinked on his navigation dash. Aaron looked down at it, it was an emergency beacon. The signal only lasted a minute or so, but it was enough time for him to register the point of origin. He adjusted course slightly, it was only fifteen miles north-east - the distances he was used to travelling, that wasn’t exactly out of his way. And anyway, legislation on New Haven still permitted the universally accepted forty percent salvage law. Aaron rubbed his rough hands together and smiled.
    ‘Bonus time.’
    He swung the shuttle round to a north-easterly course. The terrain ahead was as flat as a table top, sun baked clay with scattered rocks as far as the eye could see. Aaron was cruising at fifty feet. He decided to bring her up to get a better view of the area ahead. He could be looking for anything, something as small as a crashed or broken down personal transport to a shuttle the same size as his. He pulled back on the yoke and the rust-colored ground beneath quickly fell away. The altitude display showed one hundred and eighty feet. That was enough. He leveled off and started to scan for an early visual; a distant column of smoke; an impact scorch trail. Something. He checked the logged co-ordinates of the beacon, it was just over ten miles away.
    *
    Ellie watched in disbelief as the orbital freighter continued across to the southern horizon’s darkening sky and flickered momentarily as it finally exited the planet’s upper atmosphere.
    ‘What about me?’ she muttered indignantly.
    A wind was beginning to pick up and she shuddered. The nights could get very cold out in the open. Very cold. Once again she reminded herself what a sad specimen she was for not preparing properly and bringing something more substantial than the clothes she had thrown on this morning.
    Then a small light on the recycler’s battery pack winked on.
    ‘Oh..great.’
    It was the low charge warning. She wondered how much stored power was left. Another half hour, or another minute? She decided to try her luck with the air. The wind was cold, it could be an oxygen pocket. She tentatively pulled the mask away from her face and took several deep breaths. A minute passed before she began to feel dizzy and nauseous and hurriedly pulled the mask back on. She frantically scanned the sky and the horizon.
    Nothing.
    She pulled out the navset again. This time she was not quite so worried about its battery life, the way things were going it would probably outlive her. She turned it on and set it down on the ground beside her. She lay down in the dust and turned her head to face the little black box. Its one green blinking light was a strange comfort in the gathering darkness.
    The sun was breaching the horizon, swiftly on its way down and out of sight. Ellie watched as the amber circle undulated and rippled like a slick of oil on water as it descended from view. Over the space of five minutes the peach after-glow it left faded and the golden ribbon emerged like the king of the night sky, and one by one, like loyal subjects, the stars followed it.
    Ellie thought of Sean. He’d probably be in New Haven right now, boarding a shuttle to take him to the huge mother-ship in orbit. What a fantastic experience that was going to be for him. To see through a viewing bay, your whole world and everything you have