Solar Storm

• Sam Hutchinson, Grade 56
• Short Story
• 2017

John Sikicker is the head of Project Earth 2. John and his crew are trying to find a planet capable of sustaining the people of Earth.
"John" said Commander Sam, "We are entering the Bostikii universe.”
"Thanks," said John, politely.
"However Sir, a solar storm is approaching... Fast," said Commander Sam.
John replied, "We have been through this before."
"But Sir, this is a category 11 storm," said Commander Sam in a panic.
"Let's not panic" John said calmly.
"Sir, Sir it's here and its worse than expected!" he shouted, blinded by the immense flare of the sun’s rays.
The ship immediately started malfunctioning and they were drifting through the darkness of space without communication to guide them.
John and Commander Sam managed to start the emergency power, which meant they had three hours to fix the ship.
Commander Sam suggested that the solar power on the ship must have overloaded during the solar storm, he said, "John if we can get to the solar panels and release the extra power, we will have enough time to charge them again so they can run the ship home."
"Sir," said one of the crew members to John. "The gravity generators will turn off in 30 minutes and we will all be floating around the ship in zero gravity.”
Another crew member overheard and said, "That sounds like fun."
"Fun, fun? This this is serious," replied Commander Sam. "In zero gravity, our toilets are not equipped to retain the human excrement, commonly called poo that is in our septic tanks. The volume of excrement is at near maximum levels, we should be home tomorrow. If the systems are not back up in 30 minutes, we will be swimming in poo!"
John said, "We have a limited amount of resources but we must focus on getting the systems back up in 27 minutes, you just wasted 3 minutes talking about poo, let's go."
Commander Sam and John rushed to the power generator, the damage was worse than they thought. They took a couple of minutes to decide on a course of action. They shut the septic tank lever to block any flow back up the pipe. They released the power trigger, which discharged the excess power outside. This left them in complete darkness for a few minutes before the solar panels adapted and re-engaged.
John said, "We are back in business crew; let’s get back to steering this ship home, I'm looking forward to having a burger!"
"What a relief," thought Commander Sam!