Rocket Girls: The Last Planet Read Free Page B

This is the spaceship Rambutan . Can anyone read me?”
    “Spaceship?”
    “Think it’s some kind of prank?”
    “Wait, what if it’s those high school girls—”
    “That’s it. Answer them!”
    “ Rambutan , this is Tokyo Control. Give us your current altitude, rate of descent, and target destination.”
    “Our current altitude’s 18.4 kilometers and we’re coming down at about...two hundred twenty meters per second.”
    “Whaa—?” The flight controller gaped. “Eighteen point four kilometers, that’s about...sixty thousand feet, okay. And the velocity’s in meters per second, so, uh...”
    Sweat beading on his forehead, the flight controller mashed the buttons on his calculator. Not only were the units totally different than the ones he was used to working with, but the numbers were higher by such a degree of magnitude his years of experience weren’t doing him a bit of good. “Er, Rambutan , what’s your splashdown target?”
    “Our target was off the eastern coast of Africa, but we got the timing a bit wrong.”
    “Okay...so you missed Africa, and that’s why you’re here in Japan?” The controller shook his head. “Where are you headed right now?”
    “I’d tell you if I knew. We’re kind of in freefall here.”
    “Freefall? Wait, so—what?” Tossing his headset to the desktop, the controller began furiously scratching his head. “Chief! What the heck am I supposed to do with a spaceship?”
    “Give me that.” The chief grabbed the microphone. “ Rambutan , you’ll be in Atsugi Base airspace momentarily. I can’t guarantee you won’t be knocked out of the sky by a land-to-air missile.”
    “But Solomon should have contacted all the major airports and military bases!”
    “We didn’t hear anything.”
    “What about the other airports?”
    “No idea. We are looking into it now.”
    “That won’t be quick enough. Could you contact the U.S. military and the Japan Self-Defense Force for us?”
    “Will do.” The chief turned to the flight controller for central and northern Japan. “Get word to the U.S. military and the SDF right now. I don’t care how you do it. Call every number you got.”
    “Right away.”
    “I’m not sure the Americans are going to like this much,” one of the other controllers said.
    “I’m sure they’re already tracking her. And if they thought she was a missile, they’d have contacted us by now—or shot them down.”
    “ Rambutan to Tokyo Control, we are at nine kilometers. We just deployed our main parachute. Our position is a little to the west of Tokyo, I think. Our GPS map isn’t very detailed.”
    The flight control chief glanced at his radar screen. They had slowed to eight knots per hour.
    “ Rambutan , you’re right over the city of Ayase, in Kanagawa Prefecture. I understand you can’t control your descent?”
    “Affirmative. We’re dropping at about ten meters a second now. Hope we find some water to splashdown in.”
    “I’m not sure you will. You might even hit Yokohama. Want us to send out a rescue crew?”
    “Yokohama...”
    The voice over the speaker stopped abruptly. There was a brief moment of silence before Yukari spoke. “Yes, please. In Japan, I’m guessing that would be the police’s jurisdiction?”
    “I’m not sure we even have protocol for dealing with spacecraft, but I’ll let the Kanagawa police know you’re coming.”
    “Thank you.”
    “Good luck, Rambutan . Tokyo Control out.”
    Matsuri’s eyes were glued to the periscope. The periscope tube ran through the middle of their instrument panel, down into the floor and through the hull, where it opened into a fish-eye lens.
    “Whoa! Look at all the houses! I’ve never seen so many!”
    “What about water? Can you see the ocean?”
    “No. Oh, there it is. Pretty far off, though. Wow! What’s that big tower?”
    “Landmark Tower, by Yokohama harbor, probably.”
    “Aren’t you from Yokohama, Yukari?”
    “Actually, yeah.”
    Of all the places