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It's been 32 years since the founding of the National Space Agency and kerbalkind's foray into space. A first fateful journey into interplanetary space, a momentous first step oh Jool's crown jewel, a self sufficient Mun base, a first spark of fusion opening the gates to the ice giants, a fearless descent into the clouds of Eve and a lonely outlook from the shadow of Plock, the Kerbol system has been thoroughly explored. Talks of colonizing Laythe and making kerbals truly multiplanetary are on the table but the Agency's goals of pushing the frontier ever further now align with another organization: Intervision. Data from the sprite program provides 2 candidates: Cercani, a 3.2Ly K5IV with 5 known planets, 2 in the habitable zone; and Nova Kirbani, a 4.3Ly G2V-K1V-M4Ve trinary with 4 known plants around the latter, 1 in the habbitable zone. The decision will be made for them by the reception of the PRP-2611 signal from the second planet of Cercani. The agency veterans that will be joining this mission are: Jebediah Kerman - Chief Pilot >Duna|Jool|Urlum Bob Kerman - Chief Scientist >Duna|Jool|Sarnus Bill Kerman - Chief Engineer of surface operations Valentina Kerman - Reserve Pilot and partner of Jeb Aiko Kerman(F) - Prodigy pilot >Sarnus|Urlum|Plock|Moho Piko Kerman(M) - Scientist under Aiko Miki Kerman(F) - Engineer >Jool|Sarnus Lupond Kerman(F) - Scientist >Jool Melming "Honeydew" Kerman(M) - Engineer on the Duna mission where he crashed the lander into Ike. Founder of the Mun base. Haifurt Kerman(M) - Pilot >Neidon Danfry Kerman(M) - Fearless scientist that returned from Eve. Also joined Haifurt to Neidon Elibur Kerman(F) - Scientist >Urlum Alming Kerman(F) - Scientist >Urlum Gracal Kerman(M) - Engineer >Urlum Zhandar Kerman(F) - Scientist joining from Intervision From Helion Base lifts the HMS Endeavour, powered by a J45 Fresnel drive, it lifts off under the power of its afterburners With a payload of 200tons and a top speed of 550km/s it will arrive at Cercani in around 6 years. Approaching Cercani, starting deceleration burn After achieving orbit, Valentina wakes from cryosleep to inspect the ship and plot an intersection with Disole, the Duna-like moon of the superkerbin Pequar. However she discovers an anomaly, the Endeavour had started its deceleration burn too early, causing it to arrive a year late. It relied on luminosity to measure its distance however the agency had somehow missed that Cercani was not main sequence, but a subgiant with luminosity compared to Kerbol and ancient beyond measure. Since the system was also much bigger as a result, Valentina will reenter cryosleep as it will take over a year to intercept Pequar Puquar and Disole Arrival While Disole is being scanned for resources, Aiko decides to take a makeshift spaceship and be the first to land on an interstellar body. C3 is a small asteroid inside Pequar's rings which is rich in exotics but lacks all volatiles. This mission will prove to be more than just bragging rights Skimming the atmosphere for argon. Until the base is established the only fuel sources available are argon and the polymers brought from the Mun Resource scanning reveals that Disole completely lacks exotic minerals, as well as being quire metal poor. C3 does however have a lot of exotics. The colony will have to import its exotics from offworld. Fortunately not many exotics are required, a single shipment can produce 10 times the specialized parts carried by Endeavour The habitat truck begins its descent. While most modules have landed withing loading range of each other, the goal of not landing at night requires a shallower less precise descent Crew arrives at Disole colony. Nearby is the cargo retrieval truck and far in the distance is the exotic minerals drop pod. The crew will spend a while building the bays of the processing plant until it works at full capacity. At that point it will start building apartments for the rest of the crew, half of which is still in cryosleep. A name for the colony has not yet been chosen. Disole has been chosen as the colonization target due to its low gravity, thick rich atmosphere and large available land. Specifically its atmosphere contains about 12% O₂ likely left over from past water being lost to space; which will allow lifting material back into orbit via spaceplane. It also contains trace amounts of methane which make fuel production much easier. It is by no means breathable and is poisonous in fact but its much more hospitable than Vessa with its dissapointingly anoxic, sulfurous atmosphere. The crew in orbit isnt sitting idle however. With plenty of leftover materials it starts to produce probes to scan the nearby planets. Troni is first due to its fast orbit. This is what the ancients imagined Moho to be, and its high proximity to Cercani might make it a good location for producing antimatter Landing wasnt planned but with plenty of sunlight, the engine proved capable, except for crash landing here. It was the last destination at least To be continued... ✶●●●●●●●●● ✶●●●●●