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Description
"As plans for the initial exploration of Meios were set down, it went without saying that all journeys to the planet would have to be automated; the conditions were simply too extreme to attempt any human landing. This required an entirely new outlook on mission elements - these would not be limited to data collection, but would ultimately have to be responsible for any task the researchers required. These would become not only their eyes, ears and hands to a pristine alien landscape, but could well become their first envoys to the sapient Meiosians."

Ponhatac Sakdeav,
Ministry of Xenological Resource Administration,
From Briefing Assessment A102, Ryear 9997

Perhaps the greatest technical challenge facing the Meios mission was the issue of moving samples offworld; escaping the body’s intense gravity would require magnitudes of power and acceleration that would tax even the most durable of materials, and even if a machine could be built to tolerate these extremes it’s quite likely that delivered specimens would not be so fortunate. The atmosphere was also a merciless enemy; its pressure would counteract thrust, and friction caused by drag could easily torch any launch vehicle.

The Transience aims to avoid all these problems by using the dense atmosphere to its advantage. It cannot launch from the surface unaided, but once loaded it signals vacuum balloon monitors to congregate near its position, and once massed they latch onto and carry the Transience high above the cloudbeds. Soon the atmosphere thins to something more earthlike, and the shuttle activates its turbofan engines to gain some lateral speed. Once it’s become fast enough the vacuum balloons detach, as these only serve to create drag by this point; the craft’s large wingspan allows it to achieve lift enough to remain airborne even in the face of Meiosian gravity. Bit by bit it accelerates, and when at last the shuttle reaches hypersonic velocities it engages its scramjet engines, boosting it the rest of the way to an impressive Mach 20, nearly 6.6 kilometers per second. This could carry it unaided into Low Earth Orbit, but even against mightier Meios the effort is not wasted; these jets can easily push it to the edge of the atmosphere, where it can at last engage its fusion rockets, achieving the final acceleration it requires to move into orbit.

Such a demanding role and its requisite battery of equipment lead somewhat necessarily to a specialized craft, and while the Transience could theoretically make deliveries in open space (with the proper fuel tanks added), it’s best suited as a surface-to-orbit courier. It carries life support, but this is meant only to sustain biological specimens during their trip to the Orbiter; indeed, as conditions on Meios are too taxing for any human occupants, all systems are automated, and there are no crew accommodations. The only deck is the cargo area, and this is built for ventral access once docked and clamped to the Orbiter – indeed, specimens are loaded from above into the Transience's opened top when it is aboard the carrier on Meios – but its contents can also be pulled out from a secondary docking bay at the front end of the ship.

Description
"As plans for the initial exploration of Meios were set down, it went without saying that all journeys to the planet would have to be automated; the conditions were simply too extreme to attempt any human landing. This required an entirely new outlook on mission elements - these would not be limited to data collection, but would ultimately have to be responsible for any task the researchers required. These would become not only their eyes, ears and hands to a pristine alien landscape, but could well become their first envoys to the sapient Meiosians."

Ponhatac Sakdeav,
Ministry of Xenological Resource Administration,
From Briefing Assessment A102, Ryear 9997

Perhaps the greatest technical challenge facing the Meios mission was the issue of moving samples offworld; escaping the body’s intense gravity would require magnitudes of power and acceleration that would tax even the most durable of materials, and even if a machine could be built to tolerate these extremes it’s quite likely that delivered specimens would not be so fortunate. The atmosphere was also a merciless enemy; its pressure would counteract thrust, and friction caused by drag could easily torch any launch vehicle.

The Transience aims to avoid all these problems by using the dense atmosphere to its advantage. It cannot launch from the surface unaided, but once loaded it signals vacuum balloon monitors to congregate near its position, and once massed they latch onto and carry the Transience high above the cloudbeds. Soon the atmosphere thins to something more earthlike, and the shuttle activates its turbofan engines to gain some lateral speed. Once it’s become fast enough the vacuum balloons detach, as these only serve to create drag by this point; the craft’s large wingspan allows it to achieve lift enough to remain airborne even in the face of Meiosian gravity. Bit by bit it accelerates, and when at last the shuttle reaches hypersonic velocities it engages its scramjet engines, boosting it the rest of the way to an impressive Mach 20, nearly 6.6 kilometers per second. This could carry it unaided into Low Earth Orbit, but even against mightier Meios the effort is not wasted; these jets can easily push it to the edge of the atmosphere, where it can at last engage its fusion rockets, achieving the final acceleration it requires to move into orbit.

Such a demanding role and its requisite battery of equipment lead somewhat necessarily to a specialized craft, and while the Transience could theoretically make deliveries in open space (with the proper fuel tanks added), it’s best suited as a surface-to-orbit courier. It carries life support, but this is meant only to sustain biological specimens during their trip to the Orbiter; indeed, as conditions on Meios are too taxing for any human occupants, all systems are automated, and there are no crew accommodations. The only deck is the cargo area, and this is built for ventral access once docked and clamped to the Orbiter – indeed, specimens are loaded from above into the Transience's opened top when it is aboard the carrier on Meios – but its contents can also be pulled out from a secondary docking bay at the front end of the ship.