Supernova Blitz

Chapter 19: To Some, Crumbs, To Us, A Feast

~Had I not the memories I have now, I know I'd find myself wondering what humanity imagined to find in the stars. When we left Earth, that was virtually all I knew; we were under attack and fleeing. I don't know how many little boys dreamed of tasting the cheese of the moon, nor how many little girls dreamed of beautiful, unearthly flowers and songs of amazing colors and sounds. I had no idea how many adults dreamed of encounters with the unknown, from the adventurous to the deviant. I had no idea how many of my fellow humans there once were.

I know now that the Grodurns shattered an illusion of superiority; an illusion that stated humankind was the most advanced and likely ONLY sentient life in the universe. Of course, we all know better now, but the day before the Grodurns arrived, those who believed there was other sentient life that we'd someday meet were in the VAST minority, including of those reaching for the stars.

What the commissioning of and deployment of the Tactical Exploration and Assault Unit showed us was a new and humbling lesson. Sentient life is NOT as hard to find as we imagined. Our deep-seated naïveté of the universe overlooked one fact obvious in hindsight; many of the ingredients to life, -and by extension, sentient life- are the same necessities we needed to find. The more we found in one place, the more likely an encounter was...~

Five moderately armed starliners and the mobile drydock Providence. The completed starliner has all of its own Grodurn-inspired, integrated equipment, such as artificial gravity, a jump drive, and beta cannons.

There was one hitch, though. Construction wrapped up three days late. Three days late AFTER the grace time granted from the jump. The best part is, it was Mr. Right's own fault. He got so far ahead of himself in pride and preemptive celebration thinking he completed a week early, he completely forgot to have the water systems properly purged, filled, and pressurized, as well as to charge and unlock the reactor startup and buffer capacitor banks. As soon as they jettisoned drydock power, the ship shutdown instantly. Both tasks took days each to perform, as well as the reactor startup.

So, even in spite of Captain Murdock's best subtle efforts, Mr. Right ended up costing himself the bet. His prized and priceless supercar is now Captain Long's. The eccentric businessman has been uncharacteristically scarce since the final commissioning, having yet to turn over the keys to the car.

Long doesn't really care right now. He IS a good organizer, but she's content with him being quiet. More important than the car is getting everyone divided out to be sent to the new ship; crew, civilians, and resources alike. MOST of the self-sustaining equipment is up and running at full capacity, but some of it still requires workers. Then comes the new ration calculations and construction setup for the next ship. This one, dubbed the Gaia, after the spirit of the Earth, will certainly be an ease on the burden, but is still far from 'enough'.

More important even than the crewing of the Gaia, though, is the mission about to launch. The fleet is in orbit over a planet with moderately high radiation readings compared to Earth, but still within acceptable mission limits. Its climate appears to be close to desert climate, though there are distinct climate zones like Earth, or should be. Scans and images from orbit suggest much of the planet's surface is desolate, in spite of distinctly different temperature, humidity, and precipitation areas.

The planet is of interest for a few reasons. There is an abundance of water, especially in aquifers below the surface, scans are picking up a lot of iron, nickel, and chromium, and there appears to be some form of plant life in or around the aquifers. Most importantly, though, at least one of the aquifers appears to be a nitrogen vent. Nitrogen is almost as crucial as oxygen for humans for many reasons, not least of which is diluting oxygen to a nice, safe ~21% zone to prevent spontaneous fires and explosions.