Saturn's Return

It's time you knew

Captain Laika Barker of the N.S. Saturn is on trial for the incidental murder of her sister, Lieutenant Belka Barker, after a failed mission leads to the younger commanders land-locked abandonment on a uninhabited planet passing through an astrological hell-storm. Before Laika's final sentencing a message from the dying planet is patched into the trial's broadcast: Belka's distress signal, days after her desertion and assumed death.

Ruling for the more favorable option of removing two thorns at once the Galactic Council charges Laika with returning planet-side to find Belka hours before the planet's doomed course to gain her freedom, or die in the process and be redeemed of her mistakes.