Voyage - The Final Warning (Chapters 34-36 And Epilogues)

[JK_Kerbineer]

WOOOH! Finally!

That was almost  worth the wait!

[obney kerman]

YES! YES! YES! YES!

 

Cheng is nice now? Inconceivable!

[53miner53]

2 hours ago, JK_Kerbineer said:

WOOOH! Finally!

That was almost  worth the wait!

Who are you kidding, it WAS worth the wait!

[RoadRunnerAerospace]

ITS ALIVE!!!!!!

[JK_Kerbineer]

12 hours ago, 53miner53 said:

Who are you kidding, it WAS worth the wait!

Yeah, but he ended on the ULTIMATE CLIFFHANGER!

[Ultimate Steve]

4 hours ago, JK_Kerbineer said:

Yeah, but he ended on the ULTIMATE CLIFFHANGER!

What do you expect? I am ULTIMATE STEVE!

Oh, and if you think that's a cliffhanger, just you wait...

[KAL 9000]

1 hour ago, Ultimate Steve said:

just you wait...

 

Edited October 29, 2017 by KAL 9000

[JK_Kerbineer]

On 10/29/2017 at 1:53 PM, Ultimate Steve said:

What do you expect? I am ULTIMATE STEVE!

 

The "pun" was intended. 

[53miner53]

Was it the ULTIMATE PUN?

[obney kerman]

On ‎5‎/‎3‎/‎2017 at 9:17 PM, Ultimate Steve said:

 

Little did I know that day, that those four measures would not only change the word, but multiple worlds.

I can read music and... wow. I know what this is. Don't click the spoiler if you don't want to know.

Spoiler

This is your only warning. Do you want this spoiled for yourself?

Spoiler

The KSP theme song.

 

 

Edited December 11, 2017 by obney kerman

[Ultimate Steve]

3 hours ago, obney kerman said:

This is your only warning.

This is your final warning,

Totallynotapun

[obney kerman]

3 minutes ago, Ultimate Steve said:

This is your final warning,

Totallynotapun

Quickly edits comment

[53miner53]

*bump*

[obney kerman]

5 minutes ago, 53miner53 said:

*bump*

https://www.google.com/search?q=pokemon+revive+card&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiN0vnSq7_YAhUq4IMKHa8eCIkQ_AUICigB&biw=1536&bih=716#imgrc=XIZzkjALRvJY7M:&spf=1515104351307

[Ultimate Steve]

One of my few New Years' Resolutions was to do a chapter of this per month. It's the very next thing on the list once I get back from Ohio. So, not dead! Just semi-permanently dormant.

[Just Jim]

44 minutes ago, Ultimate Steve said:

One of my few New Years' Resolutions was to do a chapter of this per month. It's the very next thing on the list once I get back from Ohio. So, not dead! Just semi-permanently dormant.

Hibernating... hehehe 

[Laythe Squid]

On 8/14/2017 at 11:52 AM, KAL 9000 said:

CI'I CEDZ KZUBTH, JLH'B PF?

I can't figure this out. If anyone knows something, tell me.

[Laythe Squid]

On 8/13/2017 at 11:46 PM, Ultimate Steve said:

"THIS GALAXY IS GOING TO BURN! THE END IS NEAR! PREPARE YOURSELVES FOR THE FINAL HOURS OF THE ONLY WORLDS WE HAVE EVER KNOWN!""

Ivnvnyvi: ivzorgb rh zm roofhrlm, gsv fmrevihv rh z sloltizn, yfb tlow, ybv! 

[Laythe Squid]

.. ...- -. ...- -. -.-- ...- .. ---... / .. ...- --.. --- .-. --. -... / .-. .... / --.. -- / .-. --- --- ..-. .... .-. .-.. -- --..-- / --. ... ...- / ..-. -- .-. . ...- .. .... ...- / .-. .... / --.. / ... .-.. --- .-.. - .. --.. -. --..-- / -.-- ..-. -... / - .-.. --- .-- --..-- / -.-- -... ...- ---. / .-.-..

[Ultimate Steve]

Okay, this one took me a while, I apologize... But there's a pretty important moment in there, so hopefully it was worth the wait!

 

 

 

Chapter Thirteen - Little Speck of Pollen

Spoiler

The following conversation has been translated into human English, although due to the nature of such events, most of the true meaning has been lost in translation. The original language was several orders of magnitude more practical than anything else we've ever heard of.

"Proceed," declared Z.

"Eight thousand and seventy six celestial bodies containing life were found in this subsector," replied Y. "Of those, two hundred and thirteen are at intelligence level 4 or above. One hundred and two have become spacefaring."

"More of the usual, then," replied Z. "I fail to understand why you are taking my time. I am the (untranslatable position of medium authority), do not use my time without need."

"The scan revealed that eighty seven to ninety of these intelligent species depending on the counting method have formed an alliance and control an entire galaxy."

"This is highly unusual. War would have done them in eventually."

"Not these ones. This appears to be the highest implemented level of alliance we have seen in this sector for several (untranslatable length of time)."

"Big deal. Burn the planets, sweep away the stars. Fuel the experiments. They most likely have nothing to offer."

"Z, sir. X himself has spoken. The scan was taken to level three. It appears this cluster has actual genes to offer."

"This is irregular, yet X has spoken! Elaborate, Y."

"The Kerbals. They are abysmally stupid in their way of thinking as are all the others. However, they keep trying over and over with little to no loss of enthusiasm. They have persistence, to degree 29."

"Degree 29? That is certainly quite a score."

"And easily meldable into the code of all the slaves in sector 5282. Our own data? We have no need for such a simple gene, even if it is somewhat rare."

"The Illasticonians. They have the ability to (untranslatable precursor to an advanced untranslatable technology) degree 7. Not amazing, but usable."

"Two in one galaxy? This never happens!"

"And finally, the humans. They're somewhat intelligent, but they have stupidity to degree 53."

"Ouch."

"Not useful whatsoever, but their ability to overcome the stupidity is important. They are spacefaring, after all. And we may be able to reverse engineer the gene to refine our scanning procedures to another hundredth of a percent - if we can scan for stupid, we can scan for smart."

"Y, tell the (untranslatable group of untranslatable members of a species) to begin burning the sector immediately."

"No, Z. We have orders straight from X."

"Orders from X? This is incredibly irregular."

"The galaxy is also set up in a way that we can use the stellar alignment to generate (untranslatable valuable particle) with only minor repositioning of the stars. We have millions of these experimental generators set up already, if you recall -"

"If I recall? I assure you, I am Z. I recall."

"Noted, Z."

"Your code is faulty, you have shown signs of questioning. If it wasn't for the fact X bestowed this information upon you, you would have been deactivated already. Continue."

"It would be worth it to not burn the system and use it for generation instead. But it needs to be wiped - and X has determined that we might as well take time to enslave the creatures of the system so they can maintain the generator rather than wiping them. It could be done easily."

"Understood, please continue," said Z.

"And X has determined that the most effective way to do this would be to do a slow invasion at intelligence/technology level 12."

"Twelve?" asked Z incredulously.

"Do you dare question X?"

"No, I was... surprised. Maybe I am becoming faulty as well. We phased out surprise (untranslatable length of time) ago."

"But yes, a slow invasion at ITL 12 and we will be able to utilize them at maximum productivity. Any higher, we will shock them out of their morale, any lower and they will think they can beat us and rebel, which will cause us minor annoyance. The full plans have been sent to you by X."

"Acknowledged, Y. Prepare the invasion. It will sure be... interesting using such primitive technology."

"Indeed. It shall be ready in (untranslatable small amount of time), Z. Pathetic. They are still unaware that we know about them... going on about with their daily lives as if they can hide. As if they can run. As if their way of life can survive."

 

=====================================================================

 

"MOVING DAY!!!" announced Marie Joyfully as she turned on the lights all over the ship. I sat (well, floated, we're in space, remember) in my sleeping area (was going to type bed, but again, we're in space) trying to get a bit more shut eye.

"Wait, that's today?" asked Jack. "Why do we need to -"

"Physics!" joyfully exclaimed Cheng as he flew down the hallway disconnecting some of the docking cables, and closing hatches.

"What he means," said Alonya as she followed Cheng, double checking his work, "is we don't have enough fuel to complete this mission, so we're jettisoning the unneeded parts of the ship so we can get home!" There were to loud "CLUNK"s, presumably as two segments detached. Sure enough, I looked out my window and saw the Kerbin ascent ship and the Laythe lander, attached to the RCS tug floating away. I scrambled out of "bed."

"Wait!" I shouted. "Don't we need the Laythe plane still?"

"Don't panic, we're just rearranging the various bits and pieces so they make more sense," said Marie. "We ran over the plan just yesterday, have you forgotten already?" Yep, she was right. I had forgotten the little details...

"Okay, next up!" announced Cheng. "Get rid of those empty fuel tanks and that RCS we don't need!" There was another, louder clang as the entire propulsion section separated from the spaceship.

I was a bit nervous at that point about completely detaching all of our fuel, but thankfully nothing went wrong and the propulsion section was quickly reattached.

The ship looked a whole lot stubbier and way less epic than it had before. Also, we were now down four docking ports, so we had to choose which of the landers/movers we wanted to keep.

We ended up ditching the missile, the ascent capsule, both extra fuel tanks, one of the two light moon landers, and the communications antenna. Fortunately, the antenna (even without a power supply for some weird reason) can function as a relay by itself. We jury rigged a smaller antenna to be able to contact the relay.

With those modifications, we're now prepared to go to Pol! Actually, we were pretty much at Pol. We had been putting off "Moving Day" for a while so we could enjoy the extra space a little more before the next big burn.

Mere hours after the move, we flew by Pol. I was actually doing some reading on Kerbal perception of the planets and moons earlier and I came across this thing called the "Dres Appreciation Movement" or something like that. It seems like Dres is actually a cool place, but for some reason everyone forgot about it and there was a big uproar about it...

However, looking at various statistics, it seems like Pol was (and still is) the least popular celestial body in the system, even before the Dres movement started, so why not a Pol awareness movement? I like Pol. It looks cool.

I mean, once you get up close, you're greeted with massive peaks and chasms everywhere, strange funguslike towers, and to top it off, there's apparently a mysterious invisible ground phenomenon (scary but true) which should make for several creepy stories and movies and stuff like that.

Yet it's still the most forgotten celestial in the system...

"Hey, guys!" shouted Jack quite some time later. "There's a blinky beepy alarm thing on the screen, are we about to explode or something?" Everyone turned to face him and the monitor.

"Oh, let's see... even better! We've found the anomaly!" said Marie. Everyone ran over to where she was standing, clamoring for a better look at the screen.

There was a chorus of congratulation as we had been trying to locate it for quite some time.

"Okay, shall we prepare the lander?" I suggested.

"Actually," said Cheng, "What if we did an EVA landing to conserve fuel? The Kerbals' jetpacks certainly do pack a punch as I found out on Tylo!"

"He's right," replied Jebediah (who had been oddly silent for a while) "Many EVA landings have taken place far across the system, especially in the early days of spaceflight. In fact, up until we put the space elevator up, EVA landings were standard procedure at Gilly..."

"Okay, then!" said Jack. "Who's turn is it for the monolith again?"

"Well," I said, "I got Vall, and Cheng got Tylo. Since we're having Alonya do Laythe, that leaves it to either you or Marie."

"Rock paper scissors?" suggested Valentina. "I hear it's quite the decision maker among the humans."

"Okay," agreed Jack. "Rock, Paper, Scissors!"

"Jack, that's dynamite, it's not really allowed..." said Alonya.

"I win!" proclaimed Jack. "She played Paper, the wick burns through the paper and the dynamite blows up the rest!"

"Actually, that's an ongoing issue with the official committee for that game, if paper snuffs out the wick or if the wick burns the paper," chimed in Bill. Everyone looked at him curiously wondering just how he knew such a pointless fact about a really weird human game. "What? I got bored and looked it up a while back."

"Okay," I said, breaking the silence, "How about no dynamite, best of three?" I always insisted on best of three, it gives me a slightly better chance of winning because I can scope out my opponent's strategy (if such a thing exists. Maybe it's just me trying to fool myself into thinking I can improve my odds).

"Sure!" said Marie. Jack also agreed. Jack played rock all three times, somewhat unsurprisingly, and ended up losing to Marie, who played paper scissors paper.

Brief rock paper scissors game over, let's actually talk about something space related!

Marie quickly exited the ship and proceeded to jet towards Pol so she would arrive in a reasonable amount of time. Our current orbital period was about 4 Kerbin days, or 1 Earth day. 12 hours is a bit of a long time to be in an EVA suit.

10 hours (and a quick nap) later, Marie approached the surface, sort of hovering to potentially avoid the invisible surface bug, which even Bob was a tad bit freaked out by. We're not allowed to know about most of the Kerbals' past space missions, but it's not hard to guess he had quite a run in with Pol back in the day.

And with that, Marie triumphantly faceplanted into Pol.

"OOOOOFFF!"

"What is this, Roblox?" asked Jack.

"What's Roblox?" asked Cheng.

"It's a - never mind. Are you alright, Marie?" I asked.

"If these suits can protect Cheng falling two dozen stories on Tylo, they can break my fall a tad bit on Pol!" she responded. We all let out a sigh of relief.

"Wait, those weren't the first human words on Pol, right?" asked Alonya. "We don't want a repeat of Vall."

"PROBABLY BECAUSE YOU'RE STILL SIDEWAYS!!!" Shouted Jack. Valentina stifled a giggle.

"No!" said Marie, obviously struggling (probably to straighten out her trajectory). "I bounced. Weird to think about that... But I said OOF after I was back in the air. So my first words are still up to decision... Almost there... And..."

"One small step for - OW!" she shouted just a second after she touched down. All four of the Kerbals burst into laughter. "Uh, Marie to Voyager, Pol appears to be slightly charged. That was quite a shock." The Kerbals laughed even more. I was about to say something into my microphone but Jeb motioned for me to hand the mic to him.

"Marie, this is Jebediah."

"I'm guessing you're about to tell me why this happens. Ow."

"Well," said Jeb, "The full explanation is very sciencey, but Pol's core is really weird and it has built up a static charge over time. The first probe to land on Pol sort of exploded very violently due to this static."

"Well, you could have told me I could have died!" she said, freaking out.

"Calm down, shortly after that we installed mitigators to limit the shock. Now, that's all of the shock you'll feel! It's still funny to see the reactions of people who aren't knowledgeable about the shock..."

"Wait," I interjected. "Why wasn't she shocked the first time she bounced?"

"Long story short, Pol's just plain weird," said Bob. "It takes a few seconds to begin the discharge. It's also theorized that this weird charge contributes to those weird spikes as well as the invisible terrain thing."

"There's going to be tons of plaques with that quote, isn't there?" asked Marie.

"Hold on..."

"And, done!" said Bill.

"Well, could be worse," said Marie. "At least I'm not Jack..."

"Hey!"

"Okay, Marie," I said. "Focus now. Our next goal is to find that anomaly."

"Right, anomaly which may or may not rewrite my entire brain. It's actually pretty dark here, how long until the sun rises again?"

"Days on Pol are about 41 Kerbin days or 10 Earth days," replied Cheng.

"Thank you, Cheng," said Marie.

"You're welcome."

"Looks like I'm searching in the dark..."

=================================================================================================

Several thousands of light years away, the Galactic Council was once again meeting. The room was full of the councilmembers arguing about how to deal with the impending threat of The Species.

"I need to tell my people," announced Representative Dar-Kal. Representative Dar-Kal was the representative from the Naz system. "I can't let them die without knowing."

"We mustn't tell anyone!" argued Representative Zawli, of Ganthax. "There must be a way out!"

"And what do you propose? Tell everyone they're going to die?" asked another.

"Tell loads of geniuses their going to die and they will find a way to live," argued Representative Dar-Kal.

"If you haven't noticed," said Representative Galactus the Cow, "We're up against a race so powerful they control an area larger than the observable universe. We should let the people die in peace."

"Easy for you to say, Representative Galactus!" argued Representative Zawli. "You're the last of your kind. You have no people to protect!"

"And that is not my fault!"

"EVERYONE SHUT UP!" shouted Representative Xanth through a device similar to a microphone. "If we argue with each other like we've been doing, we don't stand a chance!"

"Well, do you have any better ideas?" Representative Xanth was silent. Everyone kept arguing.

"If only there was a way out," called one voice from the crowd.

"We can't hide forever!"

"But war would be futile!"

"What do we know about war? We are a peaceful congregation of races!"

"The humans know the most and they still don't know how to go faster than light."

"We are all going to die!" Suddenly all of the lights shut off and everyone screamed.

=================================================================================================

"I found it!" announced Marie triumphantly.

"Yes!" shouted Cheng and I at the same time.

"I'm not going to touch it just yet, though," she said.

"Why not?" asked Jack.

"If these things can potentially rewrite my brain," she reasoned, "I want someone else on hand to get me out of here if things go wrong. We are in space, millions of kilometers away from help, after all."

=============================================================================================================================

Bill Kerman stifled a laugh as he remembered that all of the Kerbals' space stations, bases, and ships had been turned invisible rather than moved, and there was actually a large base just a few kilometers away.

"Bill."

"Yes, Jeb?"

"I just lost contact with the Council Chamber."

=============================================================================================================================

"Come on, Marie!" encouraged Alonya.

"Nope. I want someone down here in case something were to explode." After a few minutes of arguing, Marie showed no signs of giving in.

"Alright, we'll send someone down, then, probably in the lander so we can refuel the EVA packs," said Alonya. "Cheng, you're qualified." Everyone nodded. "Why don't you -"

"Actually," said Cheng, "I think I've done my fair share of landings. Hey, Ethan, how would you like to pilot the lander down to Pol?"

"I'm sorry, did I just hear that correctly?" Oops, said that out loud. Cheng just gave an opportunity to land a lander on an alien moon to a teenager from Illinois. I suddenly understand Marie's reluctance to touch the monolith. Old Cheng doing this would be less likely than me accidentally discovering a way to travel faster than light. Those monoliths seemed to have a tremendous capacity to change people.

"Yes, Ethan. Do you want to?"

"Do I want to? Is the sky blue?"

"Well, actually it's black right now," interjected Jack. A large grin grew across my face.

"Figure of speech, Jack! Here goes nothing!

I was flying my own spaceship. All by myself. I had dreamed of this moment for most of my life, and here I was. Orbiting above an alien moon in a lander named "John Cena," my synthesizer right beside me, preparing to land next to a mind controlling artifact built by an alien race.

In my dreams, the spaceship was bigger, though. Something like this:

But my little tin can is more than I ever thought would happen in my lifetime. Now, to not accidentally explode...

==============================================================================

"It's probably just a communications glitch, Jeb."

"Bill, this communication system is several hundred years old and has been improved using the collective knowledge of over 80 different species. I find it highly unlikely that it would break."

All of a sudden the communicator burst to life. "This is the Council Chamber, we are -" and it died once more.

"They are in trouble."

"No. That means nothing, Jeb."

"He sounded panicky!"

"Jeb, it will be fine."

===============================================================================

The lights at the Council Chamber flashed back on for a brief second and the plunged back into darkness to the screams of the occupants.

"We have arrived," proclaimed an ominous voice.

===============================================================================

"Ethan, I have visual!"

"How is my speed looking?"

"As far as I can tell, your speed looks spot on."

"Woah, that's a steep slope. I have a feeling I'm going to slide away if I don't land somewhere flat," I said. I think I sounded like the coolest guy imaginable, but inside I was panicking so badly, staring at all of the number readouts and maintaining a crushing grip on the control stick.

"Land anyway, we'll prop the lander up with something," she replied. I watched the coordinate numbers trying to get as close as possible to the anomaly. In retrospect I should have probably been paying more attention to the window, because suddenly I landed and the lander immediately tipped over.

"OOOOOWWWWW!" I said a moment later as Pol shocked me.

"Ethan?" said a panicked Marie.

"What?" I asked.

"You touched it!"

Oops. Did not mean to do that.

"Oops. I think the ship negates that, though. I did not experience the weird door effect."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, positive. On the plus side, the lander won't slide downhill now." I breathed out. I had done it. I had landed my own little spacecraft on Pol, something millions had dreamed about (not Pol in particular, though).

"Please still work!" said Marie as she stepped a little closer to the monolith. I put my helmet on and began depressurizing the cabin. A minute or two later I stepped onto the surface of Pol.

"Hi, Earth. And Kerbin. This is Ethan. I want to remind you all that, although, circumstances may be abnormal, well, stick together and make the most of it."

"Now that's a plaque!" said Alonya.

"You'd have to build a pretty big plaque for those words," chimed in Valentina. Marie got closer to the monolith and I stood a few meters back ready to catch her if the monolith threw her back like it had Cheng and I.

 

 

"Here goes nothing," Marie proclaimed. She took a deep breath, braced herself, and continued. "Interfacing with Pol Anomaly One in three, two, one!"

And then, strangely, as she pressed her hand to the dark emerald green surface, Marie was teleported to the top of the monolith. She stood there with a shocked expression on her face for a few seconds before staring upwards at Jool. She then raised her hand, thumb sticking out, as if to block it out.

"Marie? Are you okay?" I asked.

"It's real," she whispered in a voice just loud enough to be picked up by her microphone. "The doors. The triangle. Three out of five monoliths are filled. Just like you said."

"Yes, and -"

"It's real."

"That was weird, though! You were teleported and not pushed away! And you're not screaming like a - "

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-" She then began screaming like I had. This continued for the better part of a minute before we were able to get her talking about what else she had seen. We reached the general conclusion that, like Cheng, she couldn't tell us much. The monoliths had apparently placed vows of secrecy on both Cheng and Marie.

But she could tell us one thing, a very strange thing though. She suddenly took a deep breath and announced "We need to have a party!" in an oddly happy voice. We were all silent for a few seconds after that. "What, you heard me!" she said.

"A... party?" asked Alonya.

"Yeah, what's wrong with a party? Alonya, you can bring your fireworks, Ethan can be the music, Jack can sing, and Cheng can bring the -"

"How did you know I brought fireworks?" asked Alonya.

"Hush now. As I was saying, Cheng can - "

"And how did you know I can sing?" asked Jack.

"Just get down here, y'all! Not just the humans, all Kerbals are welcome as well!" The beings on the ship looked at each other for a few seconds.

 

So then they all headed for the airlock after making sure that Jack could actually fly. They hoped his suit will absorb whatever impact he manages to create...

 

 

================================================================================

"Oh man, I so need this! I'm so going!" said Bob.

"Careful, Bob. Remember that EVA landing on Minmus?" cautioned Bill.

"That was one time! Twenty years ago!"

"I'll go as well... Bill, grab the smaller Whack-A-Kerbal spheres," requested Valentina. Jeb, are you coming?" Jebediah stared at his monitor, a stressed look on his face. "Jeb?"

"Oh. Sorry, there's a bit of a situation with the council - I'd better stay up here."

"Are you sure?" asked Valentina.

"Yes. Go enjoy yourselves... I really need to stay here. There was another fraction of a second blip from the communicator, an unintelligible scream.

==================================================================================

The party was actually very awesome. I mean, I've never really been to many parties, so I don't have much to go by, but how much better can you get than a low gravity party on an alien moon with actual aliens?

The Kerbals (Jeb didn't come for some reason) showed us an interesting Whack-A-Kerbal variant called Kappa Mode. In it the goal is to work co-operatively to evacuate everyone in the system into deep space (represented by a tray so the planets don't go flying off). The twist is that before each game, we all grab the gameboard and jetpack upwards.

Yep, that's right, Kappa Mode is played on a suborbital trajectory above a low gravity body. Really adds to the "Impending Doom" aspect of the evacuation! I hear it was invented by this guy named Parka Kerman, from what I know he sounds like a pretty cool guy...

We also set off Alonya's fireworks. I have no idea how none of us knew about those, and why she wanted them as her personal cargo... They were spectacular, if terrifying. With no atmosphere to guide them, they spun out of control fairly quickly.

As far as the music department goes, sound doesn't travel in a vacuum (duh), but Bob told me how to hook my keyboard into the communication system. As it turns out, Jack can actually sing very well, although the songs he knows and the songs I know don't overlap much.

And after a really good round of one-upping each other with jetpack acrobatics (Valentina won, but out of the humans it was Jack probably because of his recklessness), we saw the Voyager fly over. It appeared pretty much the same that the ISS does, but a tad slower. At that point, Marie dared me to go to Voyager and back as fast as I could, and I agreed for some reason, probably the party mood.

I noticed she said it an a pretty weird voice, though. Like it wasn't actually her doing the talking... Probably just me being paranoid for some reason.

As I ascended into the sky I burned about half of my EVA fuel (I had refueled at the lander earlier) so I would have some left to break once I reached the Voyager. I then let go of my controls and spun around slowly, watching the stars go by, the moon recede, and Jool linger in the cosmic canvas.

"Woah," I said to nobody but myself. I had turned off my microphone. Looking at those stars I was suddenly overcome with the incredibly emotional realization that every single one of those stars had a story. Most of them probably have planets. And some of them - Just a few - maybe they have life of their own. So much to explore. So many stars... And we can't even see many of the stars at all...

So many stars... So many planets... So much life...

But would such life be kind?

======================================================================================================

The lights turned on again in the Council Chamber. A strange being had appeared in the room on the stage.

"We've lost orbital altitude!" shouted one Representive. "We are seven meters from the black hole!"

"That," said the strange being on the stage, "is because we shut off your power. Because you should technically be travelling faster than light, orbiting so close to a black hole, the universe couldn't decide whether to send you a week into the future or reduce your velocity. It did both."

"Who are you, with those weird tentacles?" said a Representative.

"Tentacles? I see a twenty eyed two armed three legged man!"

"Nonsense, he is obviously a cyclops, can't you see?"

"We," said the being, "have chosen the most intimidating form for each of you. None of what you see is what we really look like."

"But how is that -"

"SILENCE!" said the being. There was not silence, there was panic. A few seconds later the lights dropped out again for a fraction of a second.

"We are now orbiting five meters from the black hole!"

"Now that I have your attention," said the being, "I would like to accept your surrender."

"Who are you, exactly?" scoffed one of the indifferent representatives. The lights dropped again.

"Four meters!"

"My name is not important. I think who I represent is obvious. As a member of The Species, I again ask for your surrender." There was a collective gasp.

"No," said Representative Galactus. His skin immediately turned purple and he cried out in agony.

"None of you wish to surrender?" Nobody spoke. "Well, then. Surrender will be accepted at any time and your planetary resources will go to the benefit of our cause." Nobody dared speak for a few seconds.

"So why don't you then?" bluffed Representative Xanth carefully. "You said it would be no trouble removing our galaxy. We got your message. If you are using your time talking to us, you must need us for something, so why don't you just take us?"

"You seem to think you are valuable to us. You are in fact the opposite." The lights flickered again and the station lurched.

"Lowest point is now three meters above Sagittarius!" reported one panicked representative.

"Seeing as you choose not to surrender, we will do this the hard way. Yes, we could remove your galaxy in a single instant... But what would be the point of that? Our invasion has now begun." Just as suddenly as he appeared, the strange being disappeared in another flicker of the power systems. Everyone began fearfully talking to each other in a loud clamoring mess of conversation.

"Orbit has stabilized at two meters. This is bad, this is very bad!"

"People!" boomed Representative Hess. "Do not panic - "

"AAAAAAAAA!!!!!! WHAT HAPPENED TO LYSON!" screamed the Ziquunod Representative. Lyson, representative of planet Kawpo, was dead upon closer inspection. It was determined that during the power outages, his atmospheric conditioning system had failed to provide him with the delicate sulfur-ammonia mixture his species breathed.

"The death of Representative Lyson is a tragedy. However, we need to not panic," said Representative Hess. "The attacks have not started yet. We have three possible courses of action - we fight, we run, or we surrender. Surrender is a pretty bad option... We could run... Or..."

"We cannot fight!" shouted Representative Galactus. "We are a peaceful union of races, this is why we came together! To keep the peace!"

"I'm afraid that, unless they are lying about controlling an area larger than the observable universe," replied Representaive Hess, "We cannot run. What I am about to suggest is treason of the highest order - but we can at least attempt to hold our ground. I'm ordering my home planet to restart production of quantum tunneling weapons." This sentence caused an uproar among the crowd.

"You haven't even told your planet yet!" shouted Galactus. "Was I not the last of my kind, I would have already!"

"I shall put as many of my kind as I can on high speed warp ships," said another representative. "We shall run!"

"No! You can't do that! Peace is still possible!"

"The peace is dead!" shouted Hess. After that the entire room descended into chaos once more.

"Guys?" said one pale faced representative, one of the representatives from the Small Magellanic Cloud. Everyone felt the weight of his voice and stopped bickering to listen.

 

"The galactic observatory is under attack."

 

======================================================================================================================

Representative Jebediah Kerman went pale at that last sentence. He had been listening in. There was little doubt now. The Species was real, and they were coming fast. He quickly opened a communication link with one of the many Pol Stations and asked them to send for the ship. He had hoped it would never get this far... But if the Galactic Observatory was truly under attack... If the Council was this divided... He needed to enact his plan, no matter how futile it was.

A wise human once said, "A house divided against itself cannot stand." The Council was the house and it was falling. It may be every man for himself now.

But should he tell his people? Should they know about their impending doom?

Should he tell the humans?

=========================================================================================================================

Ten minutes later...

==========================================================================================================

I was finally at the Voyager.

It had been about half an hour since I left the surface. I could have made better time, but really, the break from the party was nice. It helped to return to the peaceful void of space for a while. I quickly entered the Voyager and refueled my jetpack before heading for one of the airlocks. "Hey, Jeb!" I shouted. "Are you sure you don't want to come down, we're having an awfully good time!" There was no response. Odd, I thought. Maybe he was asleep. I checked the halls of the ship. He was not there. I checked again. No Jeb.

I shrugged it off and left the ship. He might have been EVA or maybe he was taking care of business elsewhere. Maybe I was just going crazy or something. I then exited the ship and proceeded to de-orbit back onto Pol. Anyway, that's all for this time, I'll update you all with the rest of the Pol segment of the mission in a bit! Ethan out! Enjoy life!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

=======================================================================

Ethan's impromptu emergency private journal, entry #1.

 

Heck no, that's not what happened. I can't tell anyone about this part. How could I just shrug off a missing Jeb? It sent shivers down my spine. Something felt... wrong.

 

What really happened was I had exited the ship and almost began the de-orbit burn when I realized something. The Voyager was very slowly spinning. Spinning weirdly. Just to make sure I wasn't seeing things, I switched my velocity indicator to target mode and zeroed it out. Sure enough, the Voyager was spinning very slowly around a point.

Objects, when they obey the known laws of physics, spin around their center of mass... But Voyager's center of mass was not where the command pod was, it should have been much further back. The spin would only make sense if Voyager had been docked to something. So... I felt my way along the command pod. I reached the scanning section and continued on. My hand brushed the docking port... And what should have been the empty space beyond the docking port felt strangely like another docking port.

Which meant there was an invisible ship docked to the Voyager. My eyes widened. But this meant... I felt further along the port and my gloved hand reached a smooth curving surface. I felt further and faster. Suddenly my hand hit a ladder.

"Ow!" I exclaimed, more out of surprise than actual pain. I grabbed on and felt around some more. It was a hatch.

So, naturally, I entered. The airlock sequence was over in a few seconds and I found myself in a strange cockpit.

And out the front window was Voyager.

I gasped a little and immediately tried to find out more about this strange ship. The computer interface was similar to the one on Voyager, but it looked ancient - a hundred years old, easily! Still modern, by... Human standards, at least. The parts that made up Voyager couldn't be the most advanced thing Kerbals had built... They did teleport 7.5 billion people from planet to planet...

I was about to open a schematic diagram of the ship when all of a sudden I heard two people sneeze at the exact same time. I turned to face the sound - and, well...

"Jeb?" JEB?!?!?!?" I screamed.

"I can explain!" said both of the Jebediah Kermans, raising their hands defensively.

 

My extraordinarily abnormal life had just gotten even more confusing. One wonders - is there a limit to how far it can go?

 

Judging on the past... Probably not.

 

 

[obney kerman]

2 Jebs? We're all doomed!

 

In the first game of "Kappa mode" only 50 Kerbals escaped.

 

I suppose seeing the future can make you scream a little, and decide to throw a party.

[53miner53]

[KAL 9000]

See, this is why you don't build your space station next to a black hole! 

I say we fight! If we die, at least we die with honor! 

(Also, maybe get the humans to teach you about war) 

And build this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Nicoll#Nicoll-Dyson_Laser

"Nicoll proposed the Nicoll-Dyson Laser concept where the satellites of a Dyson swarm act as a phased array laser emitter capable of delivering their energy to a planet-sized target at a range of millions of light years."

[53miner53]

*bumps to front page*

[Ultimate Steve]

2 hours ago, 53miner53 said:

*bumps to front page*

All my stories are currently on hold as in two days TTI will legally own them, holding my breath here. If it will help with legal stuff I might consider moving everything to a different platform.