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Space Voyage #1


TheBigDog

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It turned out that matching up with her airlock was unnecessary. As soon as we got within 100 meters of LLanea's shuttle or spaceship -- it looked like a bivalve mollusc shell, about 20 meters across -- a flicker of lights on the hull announced the opening of a hatch. A humanoid figure in a deep maroon pressure suit slipped out and placed its back against the ship. It raised a gun, pointed it right at us, and FIRED!

 

We all three gasped. One of us said, "oh, ****!".

 

A projectile, came our way at a liesurely enough pace that we could see it. It was obviously under some sort of guidance for it turned slightly to avoid missing us. As it neared our ship, puffs of gas slowed it down so that when it hit our hull, there was just a "thud". It was trailing a cable no thicker than a yoyo string. The slack suddenly disappeared.

 

"Hey, guys? I think she's coming over here. Open our outer airlock hatch. Hurry! But first, JQ, throw one of your bots into the airlock so we can get a good look at her. Just a precaution, you know."

 

We were all elbows and knees. I looked out the window. The motionless figure of LLanea was still holding the "gun" -- apparently it had a reel and motor and it was bringing her to us.

 

There were mechanical noises. TFS was busy at the command console. A thud and several bumping sounds. More mechanical noises. I looked at the monitor. The image from the bot showed the helmeted figure drifting lifelessly in the airlock. Air pressure was up to max.

 

We looked at each other, and by silent consensus opened the inner door. Carefully, we figured out how to take her helmet off. And then we did.

 

TFS said it first. "She's pretty!"

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I shook my head as I slowly regained consciousness. Where was I?

 

It slowly came back to me crash...., escape pod...., stasis.... I was in an escape pod coming out of stasis. Was a rescue ship near? I hit the status panel. What the ...... this was no rescue ship. The panel showed an unidentified alien ship. Well they had better be friendly as I have no way to deal with any hostile aliens.

 

I hit the panel sending a standard rescue signal damn :doh:

 

They would never get the standard signal this was an alien ship. I quickly hit the panel again sending a wideband graphic and text rescue signal. I hit the controls of the pod setting it to get within 1.5racls (3km) of the alien ship.

 

At least that should get their attention.

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Well, it has been a busy day.

 

No sooner than we had LLanea strapped down and sleeping comfortably (well...if she were human, she would be), then our comm boards go crazy. A minute later, TFS cries out, "Hey! There's another clam shell ship coming up!"

 

Two hours later, we had TWO aliens in our taxi and it was indeed rather crowded right now. I had a sudden desire for sardines on Melba Toast.

 

Both aliens were injured. Both appeared to be sleeping. Both had faces the color of Dreamsicles--a very pale, creamy orange color. Their features were 90% humanoid, and within what we would call "pretty" or maybe "cute", without being anime-cartoonish. There were some funky little things on either side of their noses and their earlobes, uh, were beyond description for the time being. Their hair was a spot-on imitation of the fur of a two-toned orange tabby housecat. Very soft to the touch.

 

JQ asked me to squeeze our pressure suits into the airlock so we would have some elbow room. Just as I was finishing, TFS hollered, "ENGAGE!" I had ten seconds to pop out of the airlock, throw the door switch, grab a seat, and hold on.

 

Sometimes I wonder if those guys even know I'm onboard.

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I squeezed my yougest son as hard as I could, never wanting to let go. . . again. But my arms were empty. Looking up I saw the earth fading away into the distance, then the outer planets and the sun itself faded away. I closed my eyes trying to make my son come back. I could see my wife and children sitting in an unfamiliar room; they were arguing. One called me a criminal, one called me a deserter, one called me a hero, and one could not remember me at all.

 

My wife let then fight while she told stories about me to the youngest. They were about me, but they were not ME. My other son's chimed in with the best and worst of their memories of me, each spinning in their own image of what I had done. I was no more to my youngest son than a fictional character being argued about by some fanatic book club, and a collection of pictures of me holding him when he was too young to remember. The debate turns into an argument and shouting ensues. My youngest is crying now, trying to cover his eyes and ears, to block out the noise.

 

Above it all I get a sense of his mind speaking to me. His face turns to a window looking at the night sky, then looking through his eyes at the sky I see a bright light trailing into space. "Good-bye, daddy," I hear him say as he waves at the light. And the sadness in his mind says to me "I only remember saying good-bye."

 

I opened my eyes and sat up with a jolt. I am soaked in sweat, all of my muscles are sore as through I have been in a fight that lasted for days. As reality sinks into my soggy brain I realize that I cannot sit up. I am restrained. I hear someone in the room. Turning my head I see it is a familiar looking young man. He is pressing a syringe into my IV. An older man is behind him. They look very familiar, but I don't know them.

 

"I have to get up! I have to tell my son!" I struggle with my restraints. The men step back from the bed, fear is in their eyes.

 

"You're going to be all right, BD. Relax, you need to rest while your body heals. You are safe and sound on the Prophesy."

 

I shake my head to try and shake off the meaninglessness of those words. My heads feels like it is splitting with pain from the motion, but the meaning returns with the pain. That is Janus in the room behind the tech who is administering some medicine to me. I take a deep breath and focus straight up at the ceiling. There is a mural of the Prophesy in orbit around the earth, with the other planets in the distance. And it all comes back to me. I take another deep breath. I can feel my body relaxing as my mind returns to my own control.

 

"Janus, how long have I been here?"

 

"About 22 hours and 55 minutes, BD."

 

For a moment I wanted to chuckle at the typical precision of his answer. I closed my eyes and took another breath. I did not open them again. I just laid in the bed and breathed.

 

"Inform me when he wakes up again, we need to get him up to speed with the new developments."

 

"Should I remove his restraints, sir?"

 

"No. We don't want to risk him getting up and walking around in this condition again."

 

What new developments? My pain was fading, my muscles relaxing. My mind returning to the here and now. I was coming back to reason and control again, and it felt good. I just wanted to lie in bed and think.

 

"Janus," my voice sounded weak and tired, but clear, "call Pyro up here so we can talk. I feel up to it."

 

There was a slight pause. "Sorry, BD, that is going to have to wait. The sedative we just gave you is going to knock you out in just a few minutes. Pyro is off ship. That is the new development that I will be speaking with you about when you are ready."

 

"Excursion... " but even as the word is leaving my lips I am asleep again, whisked off to dreamland by the chemicals so rudely forced into my system. What dreams might come now?

 

Bill

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  • 3 weeks later...

I became aware of my surroundings a few seconds before becoming concious, another very handy feature of my evolved physiology, my senses detected a small space, like a rather large storer (closet). There, i sensed movement, as i bacame more concious i feigned sleep in order to gain more inteligence on my situation, people speaking in a language unknown to me. With nothing more to do i dropped the rouse and opened my eyes, light, not blindingly bright but enough to take my eyes a few seconds to re-adjust, a few seconds later there was murmering and a tall indistinguishable shape crossed into my feild of vision, after a moment of intense thinking i realised it was a person. The person was still talking in soothing tones but i did not know what they spoke of...Gersan! where is it? i tried to lift my tired limb and reached for the small necklace hopefuly still around my neck, there, i breathed a sigh of relief as my fingers came into contact with it. The small section of metal on the intricate design which activated the universal translator was thankfuly undamaged.

 

The person had seemingly given into my resolve to move they still hovered close by, for this i was greatfull as i had no idea how long conciousness would remain, head injuries were funny that way (lol how much of an earth saying is that? i haven't even met you guys yet and you're already corrupting me). As the blue glow eminating from the device got stronger the strangers words became clear,

 

"lie down, you've been onconcious for a while. Can you even understand me?!"

 

"Yes"

 

The starnger seemed taken aback by that statement, i assumed that he had been trying to commmunicate with me for a while, but with my still fuzzy mind i could not distinguish his language without the help of my Gersan.

 

"'bout time" he looked to the side and then i realised the he was not alone, his companions stood over to the side of what i pressumed to be their ship or a trasnporter, one sitting next to the hood and the other over a limp figure lying on one of the benches, my eyes opend wide, it couldn't be..."You still with us?" My attention was drawn back to the stranger, he was looking at me with a concerned gaze, i felt compelled to answer as i also had questions.

 

"indeed, am i to assume you answered my distress call?"

 

"Yep that's us" he spoke cheerily proud of his accomplishment, something which my race had not felt in millenia, emotions could be dangerous, the great war was fueld on them so we decided to rid ourselves of them. Perhaps if these beings turn out to be intelligent i will attempt their way of life, see where it leads. Now i had questions of my own.

 

"who is that?" i pointed towards the heap of blankets huddled next to the hull of their ship, a distinct shape of a person but my sensored had only detected three on their transport, i dare not hope...

 

"We dunno, was hopin' you could tell us" he seemed genuinly puzzled at my question and i began to stand, the stranger seemed to be warey of my movements , as though i may fall at any moment....or try to kill him, i hoped he thought it was the former."i don't think you should be doing that just now missy, ya' just woke up"

 

I paid his advice little attention, on my world we recovered quickly, a strong race bore through years of war and will.

 

"i must see."

 

"Hey, how come you can talk now, you didn't seem to get what i was saying earlier?"

 

"The Gersan acts as a communication device, recognising commonalities in lanuage and discovering the rest through the Tressan, i believe it would be similar to your artificial inteligance, though not sentient it can learn and grow like Life Beings"

 

"oh...ok" was the only response i got for a few seconds "i'm pyro by the way"

 

"my kind call me Llanea" and hopefuly that is Kaleshwar, though i did not speak the last part aloud. I made my way over to the still form with 'pyro's' companion watching over them far more steady on my feet now and my injuries already healed i made good time and the face of the unknown being came in to view. It was him. A member of the communications team and a friend i had thought to be dead. This was going to be an interesting mission. "and that is Kaleshwar"

 

 

---------------------

now if you'll excuse me i'm off to make a dictionary to keep up with all the *coughs* made up words i'm using

 

*goes away singing "rescue me" you know what song i mean*

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  • 1 month later...

To: Prophesy Crew

From: TheBigDog

Subject: 1st anniversary of launch from earth orbit

 

Crew, we are approaching the end of our first year in space. We are going to be working with our documentary crew to do do a special commemorating this event. During the next week I will be booking interviews with all crew members. A list of questions will be sent to each of you as part of the documentary process. Look for that in the mail shortly.

 

I am hoping that we have completed our construction of God's Eye in time for the first anniversary. We are about a day behind schedule, but we are formulating a plan to send a second workforce to the site to get back ahead of schedule. To accomplish this we will be leaving the orbit of Ganymede in two days to rendezvous with the construction team. We will be on site with the team for 18 hours before moving on to our next destination, Europa. At Europa we will have probes sent to the surface for scientific sampling, and we will leave a command module in orbit running those operations. The Prophesy will then move to Callisto, where we will perform similar operations to what we are doing at Europa. On the anniversary of our landing on the Moon, we will have simultaneous EVA on both Callisto and Europa.

 

It is my goal to have clear photos from God's Eye of the Gliese 581 system planets on the first anniversary of our departure from earth. And have live broadcast from two moons of Jupiter on the anniversary of our visit to the moon. This will be a busy three weeks. Lets have some fun with it.

 

TBD

 

*** CONFIDENTIAL MEMO ***

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I can never remember the name of the orbit, but I am not a scientist; I am a dreamer, and I am living a dream. I have surrounded myself by scientists so that I get to dream, and they get to make it real. In the end everyone on the crew is living the dream. For some of us it is less like work than it is for others.

 

My rough times are over. A couple months have passed since my collapse or breakdown or whatever you want to call it. A few days of forced rest seemed to get my mind, body, and spirit back into game shape. Suddenly everything was clear again. I did not make the dream of the Prophesy a reality in ten years by reacting to others. I did it by painting the dream, and the way to regain control is to get pack to the fine art of making imagination and reality become one.

 

On March 15th we broke orbit from Io after a stay that was far too long. Io almost killed the Prophesy. I had gotten so absorbed by the scientific mission that I had neglected the Prophesy’s role as dream-maker. The lull in the dream was enough for the leeches back on earth to get their hooks in and try and steal the Prophesy for themselves. By law they have; but as they say, possession in nine-tenths of the law, and as long as I have the Prophesy; I am still in control.

 

That brings me back to the name of that orbit; I can never remember what it is called. It is a distant orbit of Jupiter where one orbit of thee planet takes the same time as Jupiter orbiting the sun. In the constant shadow of Jupiter; that is where we are assembling God’s Eye, our large-array-full-spectrum-space-telescope. A kilometer in length with 24 one-meter instruments, each is the optical equivalent of Hubble. When completed, it will provide views of distant worlds and of the first moments of the universe.

 

The engineering of God’s Eye is extreme to say the very least. It was designed in parallel with the Prophesy, and it was the first mission planned way back in 1996 when this whole thing was a drawing on a whiteboard in my basement. On April 1st we unloaded the “kit” that is God’s Eye, along with the God’s Eye Assembly Command Module (GEAK Mod) designed specifically for the construction and tune in phase.

 

On April 20th we left the construction team to do their work and made our way toward Ganymede. We took a very elaborate orbital path and along the way we managed to put GeoSats and ComSats in orbit of both Europa and Callisto. They are busy doing the work of making detailed maps of the surface, atmosphere, and even subsurface conditions on the two large moons.

 

When we finally arrived at Ganymede it was May 4th, my 39th birthday, and we proceeded to do everything but send men to the surface. Between the collections of satellites orbiting the four large moons and unloading God’s Eyes and the GEAK Mod we have emptied more than two-thirds of our equipment from the massive cargo bays. We have had a near constant task of rearranging the load in the bays to keep our linear balance in tact. Since we left Io it has been the most hectic pace any of the crew have ever experienced, and it is the happiest I have seen them since we broke orbit from the earth. The higher I have raised the expectations of the crew, the harder I have worked them, the better they have performed. The idle time between Earth and Jupiter had lulled us into too slow a pace. Our focus began to wander and we stopped pushing the limits and trying to do more. Now that we are pushing our limits we have the edge back again. Damn, it’s great to be alive!

 

And that brings me to my plans.

 

We can do more. We are going to do more. And all the world is going to stand in awe of our accomplishments.

 

The plan that I have just ordered has a one hour window for error over the next seventeen days, with every crew member working eighteen-hour shifts to make it happen. It will require the most aggressive maneuvering of the Prophesy yet and not a moment of rest. In seven days we will put out a command module with a crew of eight to assist with the construction of God’s Eye. We will immediately swing back into orbit and place our second command module with a pair of landers and a crew of eight in orbit around Europa. Then the Prophesy will proceed back to Callisto.

 

On June 1st, while we are between Europa and Callisto, the crew at construction site will be broadcasting our first images from God’s Eye. These will be images of the Earth-like planet recently discovered the Gliese 581 system. Our estimation of the capabilities of God’s Eye predicts that the photos will be nothing less than mind blowing. Our pictures of Gliese 581c will be on par with earth-based photos of Mars. This will be a major news item on earth. For me it will be like that first firework on the Fourth of July; the one that goes up all by itself and lets the eager crowd know that the show is about to begin.

 

On June 2nd we will release the detailed maps of the major moons of Jupiter including software that allows people to do virtual tours, similar to Google Earth, only with greater detail. A team of folks back on earth will be working around the clock adding content and scientific explanation to the maps. This will all be free, and will take the science community by storm.

 

On June 4th we will land two vehicles on Europa and another two on Callisto. As the world watches we will do an EVA on Callisto and drive snow-cat around the surface of Europa. Two days later we will begin the ice-boring project on Europa in search of liquid water and signs of life. This project will hold the interest of the world for the next two weeks with daily press conferences about new discoveries from the surface of the ice moon while the Prophesy goes out and collects the construction crew from the God’s Eye site.

 

By the time we have returned to Europa we will have one more card to play, a map of Gliese 581c in about 2 kilometer resolution. Our spectral analysis will be good enough to make some very specific statements about that planet’s atmosphere, temperature, weather, and potential ability to support human life. Excluding the discovery of life on Europa, this will be the finale of our exploration of Jupiter. God’s Eye will be just beginning to explore the universe; it is the key to our knowing where to go when we finally decide to leave this solar system and search for new homes in the great mystery of space.

 

The payoff will be taking the upper hand in the PR war back on earth. It is not really a war; it is a game that I have already won. In chess I would be calling my win in about a dozen moves, but I want my opponent to think that they are still in the game. Playing it out will take skill and patience, but the end is already written.

 

Now it is time to play the game.

 

TheBigDog (T+352)

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  • 10 months later...

It seems like just yesterday my crew and I were in LEO preparing for our journey. The shakedown mission to the moon had gone flawlessly, with our demonstration of the vast research capabilities of the Prophesy eliminating any remaining doubt and criticism of our bold mission. The spectacle our external fission combustion engine lighting a streak across the night sky of North America was a light shining on the bright future of mankind. Two weeks later we made our final close pass over the earth as we left lunar orbit and used the earth to slingshot us toward Jupiter.

 

The quiet after the storm of our beginning was almost deafening. With the constant thrum of the engines keeping us accelerating at a steady 0.022g we were making quick time through the void of space. Our documentary crew was busy telling the story of life on board the ship, while our crew settled back into the routine of life that had been interrupted by the commencement of our exploration.

 

The Prophesy is a stunning work of engineered art. Built entirely through private funding during ten years of what can only be described as a miracle of human genius, she carries a crew of 100 on a mission to explore our solar system. She is designed to be self sustained for a virtually unlimited amount of time. Her only theoretical limit is her main reactor/generator which maintains her artificial gravity (spin) and has a predicted unrefueled lifespan of 102 years.

 

Her main engines run on depleted U238 pellets with a P239 core. All of this material was gathered from standing nuclear waste, and the Prophesy foundation actually made a profit by cleaning this unwanted material. These are shot through a preparation chamber and out through a valve in the push plate where they are ignited by a pulse laser. As the pellet explodes/expands it is racing out the rear of the engine at extreme velocity. Its kinetic energy is transfered to the push plate which rocks cylinder forward. There are four cylinders/push plates that work in pairs. This keeps the thrust symmetrical while the engine is firing. Each pellet has a 0.46 kiloton yield and they are fired in pairs. The two stroke external nuclear fission engine can run at speeds which provide thrust as high as 0.1g, but the normal cruising speed is 0.022g. At this rate there is enough fuel to run the engine for 872 hours (almost 6.3 million pellets). This is another hard limit to the independence of the Prophesy as she explores space.

 

The crews live and work in very efficient quarters. The vast majority of the ships internal space is dedicated to agriculture. This provides oxygen, food and water filtration. She is as much a working farm as she is a high tech space laboratory. Orchards of fruit trees, fields of grain, even livestock that are carefully monitored for their contribution to the ecobalance of the ship. All crew members spend time working on a resource recovery team in addition to their scientific duties. Keeping the ship self sustained is critical to the mutual survival of the crew, especially when the ship finds itself years away from a return to earth.

 

The gravity section of the ship is the outer four rings. These are held to the center portion of the ship where the engines are located by long spokes. Each of the four rings is made of twelve sections that are tubes with a 15 degree bend, and each section has ten meters of internal space which provides one two or three levels, depending upon the needs of that section. There are 52 sections in all, with two of them being primarily living space for 100 people, and another three primarily scientific space. Command and control has its own section. The remaining 43 are agricultural. Gravity is maintained by spinning the ship on the axis of its engine. The generator spins an iron ring around a section of the center. The spinning of this iron rings generates electricity, and the counterforce of the spinning of the ring keeps the outer ring at a steady speed. on the top floor (closest to the center) the gravity is 0.94; second floor is 0.97 and bottom floor is 1.0. The ring is just over 200 meters in diameter and spins at 5 RPM to maintain the centripetal induced gravity.

 

Each of the sections of the Prophesy is floating on her "ocean". A water supply that supports all the weight of the living and agricultural sections. This simple use of physics prevents the ship from getting out of balance and removes concerns about the movement of crew and materials about the ship.

 

The center of the ship has three sections. The rear houses the main engines and nuclear pellets. The next section has the main generator and spin inducer. The front section is storage and the large work chamber knows as ZeroG. There are seven identical pill shaped sections; six surrounding one. The six contain masses of stored materials, mainly satellites and liquid propellant. This also includes orbital command modules where a small crew can work for several weeks, and the small group of wranglers and walkers. Wranglers are like a space fork truck. They have long arms used for grabbing objects in space. They are used to retrieve equipment such as satellites without having to maneuver the Prophesy herself too close to the proximity of these objects. They can work as teams to maneuver objects far more massive than themselves. Walkers actually scale around the surface of the Prophesy working their way from one hold to another. They carry crew modules to and from ZeroG, and they maneuver large objects out of the storage areas for launch into space or other use.

 

The mission began on June 1st, 2006. Since then the crew has explored the moon, the moons of Jupiter, and is now entering the Saturn system. The major project along the way was the construction of "God's Eye", a kilometer long optical array telescope with twenty-four synchronized imagers each with the equivalent capability of Hubble and the added ability to observe in the frequencies enjoyed by Spitzer. This majestic construction was done in the Lagrange point (L2) that lives in the constant shadow of Jupiter. This darkest place in the solar system will provide the optical quiet needed to take detailed photographs of the beginning of the universe, and extra-planetary systems. The next generation ship which will be built using the practical engineering lessons learned from the Prophesy will have the primary purpose of bringing brave men and women to settle on a new planet, a journey that will span hundreds or thousands of years. The Prophesy herself will never leave the solar system, although she will explore it for the whole of her useful lifetime. She may venture as far as the Oort cloud, but cannot go closer to the sun than half the distance to Venus, as she is not designed to withstand that much heat.

 

As the captain of the Prophesy my duties are primarily those of command. I was smart enough to surround myself with the world's brightest minds to build my vision. During the next ten years as we make our first exploration of the major planets I will be living history and cherishing every moment. The marketing of the Prophesy is perhaps more impressive than her engineering. The funds to build her successor have already been raised and all we have to do now is enjoy being rich for a while before we make the real historic leap; the leap to another world aboard the Promise.

 

BD (T+668)

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