Tinker, Trader, Soldier, 'Splorer

Musings and adventures of CMDR Athena Jones

[cubeo-rising-blog]

Starting fresh

I made the decision by rolling a d20 according to the rules on this forum post: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=107694

My final roll was 3, so CMDR Orion Starbard is officially dead. I’ll start over with a new character, CMDR Athena Jones. 20 years old, Athena lost both of her parents to pirates when she was four. She was raised by her fairly wealthy grandparents. At 18, she joined the Pilot’s Federation, and at 20 she was accepted and given her license and her Sidewinder. Whereas Orion Starbard was motivated to support Aisling Duval because he perceived her as weaker than Arissa, thus making smuggling easier for him, Athena genuinely supports Aisling’s policies, including the abolition of Imperial slavery. She’s reckless, adventurous, aggressive, and hot-headed, but she’ll never smuggle or trade slaves, narcotics, or tobacco.

I’ve updated the appearance of the blog, given it a new URL, and tagged old posts with #Orion Starbard.

[cubeo-rising-blog]

Gone

Pilot’s log: 25 September 3301

The chances of anyone reading this are slim. My name is Orion Starbard. I’m a member of the Pilot’s Federation. Let this be a warning to all pilots, never fly drunk. I was recklessly flying through this ring to get some nice pictures and accidentally smashed my ship into one of these chunks of ice. Canopy breached immediately, automatic ejection system saved me, but now I’m stuck in this escape pod 26.000 light years from civilization. Perhaps someone on their way to Sagittarius A* will pick up my distress call. In the meantime, I’m activating cryosleep.

I guess I wasn’t worthy.

OOC: I haven’t decided whether or not I should reset my CMDR. I don’t like how you can just jump back to the last place you docked, even if it’s twenty-six thousand light years away. On the other hand, I was still pretty close to Sagittarius A*, only about 150 light years, so I suppose it’s possible for Orion Starbard’s distress signal to be picked up and for him to be rescued.

[cubeo-rising-blog]

Pilot’s log: 21 September 3301

I was distracted and got too close to a neutron star today. Frameshift drive emergency shut down, I heard cracking as Urania warned me “Canopy compromised.” There’s no visible damage, so I should be fine for now, but I need to be more careful.

After scanning a bit over 150 neutron stars (by my estimate), I’ve decided to turn back toward the core. I was planning on surveying more neutron stars than that, but I feel drawn back to Sagittarius A*. It’s difficult to judge depth with the sky sometimes. It always seems to feel like all the stars are the same distance from us, on some great celestial sphere. But here in the core, seeing stars in front of the Milky Way, they seem like motes of dust suspended in a sunbeam - three-dimensional, fluid. I can almost see them moving as though they were tiny particles following Brownian motion.

[cubeo-rising-blog]

Pilot’s log: 20 September 3301

While scanning neutron stars, I found one with an M-type star orbiting it some 35 kLs away. This star had two Earth-like worlds, two terraformable water worlds, and three terraformable high metal content planets. These are the first Earth-like worlds I’ve found so far.

I wonder if there was some creature down there, looking up at my ship streaking across the sky as I circled its planet.

Universal Cartographics reference:  Stuemeae WY-Y D1-2836

[cubeo-rising-blog]

Scratchpad: 19 September 3301

Stuemeae-sector neutron field (edge of III-Neutron Field/NF East-Alpha?) -> Sagittarius A* get new scan, fucking DSS was disabled

Sagittarius A* -> Great Annihilator -> Scaulo-Systimbu Stellar Graveyard (ref SCAULO IL-Y D6 115)

Sight-seeing: Green Crystal, Celestial Rainbow

Ignis -> Roncevaux Crossing -> Solitude -> Beagle Point

Make way along Carina-Sagittarius arm to Lower 4th Quadrant, cross to Orion Spur. See Orion Molecular Cloud on the way home.

Get home by Jan 3302?

Sell enough data to outfit Urania for combat, do undermining for Li Yong-Rui until rank 5, sell remaining data.

[cubeo-rising-blog]

Where the neutrons grow

Pilot’s log: 19 September 3301

I left Sagittarius A* a few days ago. Before I left, I transmitted my ship’s logs to CMDR Samwell Drakhyr, who has taken over the Buckyball Racing Club. The BRC has organized numerous unsanctioned (and sometimes illegal) races over the years. They currently have a standing challenge for fastest time to Sagittarius A* from Sol or Wolf 359 by ship type. CMDR Drakhyr sent me the blurb when he posted the results for the last week:

In the midst of the pack, the times for best Cobra mkIII continue to tumble. After Cmdr Max Sterling set the ball rolling three weeks ago, finally taking Cmdr Michey's long held position on the "Top Time by Ship Type" board, others have risen to the challenge. Veteran A* runner Cmdr Mangel was next up to the plate, Back to Basics becoming his third ship to make the run, and the first Cobra to make the run in under a day, with a time of a little over 19 hours. Unfortunately, Mangel was only able to hold on to the spot for just over four days. While he was still enjoying the sights in the galactic core, a new entrant in the form of Cmdr Orion Starbard in the good ship Urania was setting off from Lomas Orbiter. This celestial wandering singer made very good time in his first run, establishing a new record for the Cobra mkIII of 18 hours 45 minutes. Well done commander!

I’m quite proud of this result, and proud of my ship. She exceeded expectations in every way.

When I left Sadge, I headed above the galactic plane and to the East, but still within the Stuemeae sector. Explorers call these areas “neutron fields” for the vast quantities of neutron stars that can be found there. They lie in the galactic halo, about 1000 light years above and below the core, and offset from the core along the bar by about the same distance. About 1000 light years wide, they extend a long way away from the core. Considering how much Universal Cartographics pay for data on stellar remnants, you can imagine they’re a popular target for profit-minded explorers.

That said, there’s plenty of data to go around in this area. Every system I’ve come across so far has been marked “undiscovered” in my nav computer. I can only speculate on why UniCart pays so much for neutron stars, but it’s certainly not their rarity. If I had to, I’d guess they’re studying the data to help improve terraforming technology. I’ve seen several gas giants with life that shouldn’t exist with all the background radiation in this area.

Oh, and I found out along the way that my detailed surface scanner had been disabled almost this entire trip. I’m kicking myself for that one. I’ll have to swing back by Sadge again to get a better scan before I go home.

[cubeo-rising-blog]

Into the black

Pilot’s log: 17 September 3301, supplementing 15.09.3301

I was so relieved when I finally made it to Sagittarius A*. The trial was finally over. I had been deemed worthy. Metta wasn’t there when I arrived, but I didn’t even notice. I was so exhausted, I dropped out of supercruise several AU from the black hole and retired to my cabin. I guzzled an entire bottle of champagne and cried myself to sleep.

Hell, it’s been so long since I’ve really cried. Probably not since Regina died three years ago.

Anyway. I woke up to a proximity alarm the next morning. CMDR Metta was right on top of me. It never fails to impress me how big an Anaconda is. Sitting right on top of me like Metta was, the ship spans your entire view.

CMDR Metta hailed me, “Welcome, commander. We’ve been expecting you.”

I strapped myself into the pilot’s seat of my Cobra, nervous as hell. Yesterday’s trip was still fresh on my mind. The distance I had covered was a poignant reminder of just how small I was. “I’m ready for the holy ritual.”

“Very well.” Metta ejected a canister of Centaurian Mega Gin. “The canister is ready for you to sacrifice to the Black Hole.”

It felt right. I don’t know why, but it felt right to do as CMDR Metta suggested. I ran up Urania’s throttle and smashed the canister. “Why did I do that?” I asked him when it was done.

“I can’t stick around,” he said, “so I’ll explain briefly. We sacrifice alcohol to Sadge to keep him sedated so that he won’t visit his wrath upon us.”

Don’t ask my why that made sense, but it did at the time.

“The tradition comes from an old Earth superstition regarding the volcano god of the Hawai’ian people.”

“I see.” It kind of made sense. I didn’t question it, anyway. But I didn’t really see.

CMDR Metta jumped, leaving only a high wake signature behind.

You know what? Getting all this on record has just made me even more confused. Computer, delete log.

Deleting log.

[cubeo-rising-blog]

Fucking high metal content planets look too much like Earth-likes sometimes. Guess I shouldn’t expect much life this close to the galactic core, though. Too much radiation. Really pretty planet, though.

[400billionstars]

CQC Beta is taking all my flight time right now. Got to say its a lot of fun!

[cubeo-rising-blog]

Or it would be if matchmaking would work properly.

[cubeo-rising-blog]

Into the black

Pilot’s log: 16 September 3301, supplementing 15.09.3301

Where was I? Closing my eyes... Jump after jump, getting harder and harder each time. The thing is - all this - I knew I was imagining it.

If you know you’re mad, are you really mad? I don’t know, I’m not a philosopher. I’m a smuggler who was stupid enough to head out into the black in search of fame and glory.

It eventually went away, though. I came to my senses about 6.000 light years from Sadge. As I approached, I was contacted by CMDR Metta. Normally I would ignore another pilot, or at best simply acknowledge their existence and continue on. However, my recent experience still left me in a bit of a fragile state of mind, and Metta reaching out to me like that was an important gesture in my eyes.

Maybe you haven’t heard of Metta. Everyone who goes to the core knows about him, though. Metta is the leader of a strange, but probably harmless cult which considers the supermassive black hole some sort of deity. I always laughed about the idea of worshiping a black hole, but something about deep space changed that for me. When I gazed too long into witchspace, I found it gazed back at me.

When CMDR Metta hailed me, I responded, “I am honored by your invitation. I look forward to finally meeting the Custodian of the Celestial Temple.”

“We are ready for you to perform the holy ritual when you arrive,” was his terse reply.

[cubeo-rising-blog]

Into the black

Pilot’s log: 15 September 3301

I’m starting this log to help cope. There’s a piece of classical Earth literature I love which contains a quote: 

"Space is big. Really big. You just won’t believe how vastly hugely mindbogglingly big it is. I mean you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist’s, but that’s just peanuts to space."

I made the push out to Sagittarius A* all at once. 25.900 light years, 18 hours and 45 minutes. Urania performed beautifully, exceeding all expectations, but her pilot let her down somewhat. I’d just like to make a record of what happened to me on the way.

Flying a ship long-distance for nineteen hours straight is brutal, jump after jump after jump, fuel scooping after each one. After 3.500 light years boredom sets in. Every star looks the same, it’s just M-type after M-type after M-type. Give me a god damn O-type, or even an A-type - hell, I’d even take a methane dwarf at this point to break up the monotony, for fuck’s sake! Every once in a while you’ll run through an H II region and UniCart’s stupid navigation computer will string a bunch of protostars together on your route. They look just like M-type stars, but you can’t scoop them. Often, I was so bored that I was flying essentially on automatic and wouldn’t notice I wasn’t scooping anything until Urania started shouting at me that she was overheating.

After eight hours, I was still less than 10.000 light years towards the core, already exhausted, and was starting to despair of how far I had left to go. Each jump became more difficult than the last. I flew too close while scooping. I made mistakes and was forced out of supercruise more than once. I was on the verge of a mental breakdown each time I ran into a protostar or brown dwarf and had to reroute. And then I started seeing things.

It started, as I imagine it always does, with a vague feeling that I was being watched. I was crossing the void between the Scutum-Centaurus Arm and the Norma Arm when I noticed it. Shortly after, I hit a string of methane dwarfs and couldn’t shake the feeling that I was being mocked. As I continued, I noticed how much like an iris the spacial distortion when you’re about to jump into hyperspace looks. This was enough to convince me that something was watching me, mocking me.

I started closing my eyes every time I jumped. Each time I entered that Eye, I was trespassing. I could see faces in witchspace. I could feel Them watching me, judging me, and it made me sick with anxiety. Maybe I wasn’t worthy enough to reach the Core. Maybe I should turn back before my ship was destroyed for my hubris, for the crime of thinking I was prepared for the unknown, for going where I wasn’t wanted. Maybe if I closed my eyes, they wouldn’t be able to see me...