The Kepler Incident by Saddletramp 1956

In 2108, the faster-than-light science vessel USS Kepler suddenly went missing. An intense search found nothing, and the ship, with all 50 hands, was listed as “missing.” Four years later, a single communications packet from the doomed ship arrived at Starbase One, in orbit over Earth. After verifying the signal source, Star Fleet Command dispatched the USS Enterprise, commanded by Captain Bill Jones, to investigate the situation. Upon arrival at Wolf 437, a red dwarf star with two planets, Enterprise found Kepler’s damaged drive section. Hoping that Capt. Stewart, the commanding officer of Kepler, had somehow managed to land the rest of his crippled ship on a nearby planet, Capt. Jones sets out. What he and the Enterprise find on the planet, labeled Gliese 486c, surprises everyone.