The Venturer Program: Tour of the planets

[RogueMason]

Yaaay!

Is this the final episode or is there more?

We still have... THE EPILOGUE.

[PnDB]

Wonderful story! I stayed up until 2 a.m. last night reading it, and I only got through the first 50 chapters or so. Spent another hour or so reading the final bits. Can't wait until the epilogue!

[RogueMason]

EPILOGUE

A few days later…

Bill: “Jeb?â€Â

Jeb: “Hmm?â€Â

Bill: “Our shuttle’s here.â€Â

Jeb: “Oh, right, yeah, umm… I was just taking in the view.â€Â

Bill: “Yeah, of course.

Jeb: “…She’s been a good ship, don’t you think?â€Â

Bill: “Better than good, I’d say. Shrugged most things off without so much as a glance backwards. Sure, Laythe was a bit horrible, but the old girl still bounced back.â€Â

Jeb: “With a little help from Lengas.â€Â

Bill: “Yeah, with a little help from Lengas.â€Â

Jeb: “Hmph… well, I suppose we’d best go. Don’t want to keep the shuttle waiting for too long. Ed, Lengas, you two head over to the shuttle now, we’ll follow you.â€Â

Ed: “Got it.â€Â

Lengas: “Yeah, alright, just don’t hijack the ship, would you?â€Â

Jeb: “Hah, don’t worry about it.â€Â

Jeb: “Stanley?â€Â

ANSI/Stanley: “Yes, Jeb?â€Â

Jeb: “You ready to go?â€Â

ANSI/Stanley: “I suppose so. I’ll finalise some checks and prepare for my removal.â€Â

Jeb: “Alright.â€Â

Shuttle Pilot: “Enterprise, this is shuttle two-zero, we’re in formation off your portside, over.â€Â

Jeb: “Copy that, two-zero, we’re coming over. Stanley?â€Â

ANSI/Stanley: “Let’s go.â€Â

Jeb pulls Stanley’s card out of the socket on the main bridge console before flicking a few switches to dim the lights. A couple of other things power down in the process, making the command centre go rather quiet.

Jeb: “So long, Enterprise.â€Â

Bill: “All good?â€Â

Jeb: “Yeah, you go on ahead. Here’s Stanley. I’m just gonna check the ship one last time.â€Â

Bill: “I’ll meet you over there.â€Â

KIN Reporter: “…It was only earlier this morning that the first shuttle touched down with half the crew from Enterprise on board. They are currently sat outside the spaceplane hangar at KSC awaiting the landing of the second shuttle later on this afternoon, the ship that will be carrying Captain Jebediah Kerman and Commander Bill Kerman in addition to engineer slash geologist Lengas Kerman, and Field Medic slash biologist Ed Kerman…â€Â

“…In fact, it’s understood that they are just now heading over to the shuttlecraft, so they should be here within the hour, if I’m getting this correctly…â€Â

“…And with it having been such an epic mission, I’ve no doubt that they’ll all just want to put their feet up this evening. This is KIN reporter Lenel, signing off.â€Â

-----

Shuttle Pilot: “Control, approach is green, touchdown in twenty seconds.â€Â

KSC: “Copy that. Don’t scratch the paintwork, it’s your shuttle in the photoshoot.â€Â

Shuttle Pilot: “Oh lovely.â€Â

Lengas: “Photoshoot?â€Â

Shuttle Pilot: “Hang on.â€Â

Shuttle Pilot: “Contact with the runway, braking now.â€Â

Jeb: “This seems awfully stringent. I usually just say I’m landing and that’s it.â€Â

Shuttle Pilot: “Normally I’m like that, too, but, you know, public appearances and stuff.â€Â

Jeb: “Fair enough.â€Â

Shuttle Pilot: “Ok, well, here we are folks. Feel free to leave the shuttle when you’re ready.â€Â

Lengas: “So, as I was saying, what photoshoot?â€Â

Shuttle Pilot: “Guys, come on, you’ve just been out in space for over two decades, maybe longer, and you visited every single planet and moon. I’d say that warrants more than a group photo, really.â€Â

Lengas: “I suppose I should have expected it…â€Â

Jeb: “Well, I’m getting out to stretch my legs. See you out there, guys.â€Â

Jeb: “Oh man, there’s been a little bit of work going on here, hasn’t there? Is that a new mission control building I see?â€Â

Bill: “Looks like it.â€Â

Jeb: “Nice.â€Â

Bob: “Jeb, over here!â€Â

Jeb: “Hey, there you are. So, where are these crowds?â€Â

Bob: “Hiding inside the hangar just there. I think they’re opening the doors in a minute.â€Â

Jeb: “Oh, lovely. Guess I’d better remember what a smile is before they take my picture.â€Â

Cal: “I personally think you’re a lost cause in that department.â€Â

Jeb: “Ooh, you cheeky little… that’s it, you’re buying me a drink later, no questions asked.â€Â

Cal: “I can live with that.â€Â

Within a few minutes, the crew are lined up, barely standing in Kerbin’s gravity, and posing for the hordes of cameras being pointed at them. A few brief interviews later, the crowds have cleared off, leaving everyone to their families and friends.

A few days later…

Gene: “Well, I suppose I’d best get to debriefing you all. You’ve been gone for a long time, after all. First thing’s first, you’ve probably noticed that the KSC has changed a little bit. The new mission control is, well, new, so we’ll get someone to show you around it. Second, things around the world have changed, the most significant being some unification of the global currencies. We don’t operate with individual monies, now, we’re all under the Credit, so don’t be alarmed when you look into your accounts. There’s been an awful lot more, too, so I won’t stand here blabbing about it all. That can be saved for some other time, perhaps. Thirdly, well, this is more mission-related stuff we’re getting into now. I suppose I should start with mentioning that the Venturer Program is now officially at an end, with your return, but you all knew that anyway, so let’s talk other stuff.

Lengas: “Excellent.â€Â

Gene: “Jeb, Buzz, seeing as you’re the only two pilots remaining, sadly, you’ll have to collect the posthumously awarded medals for Jim, Franklin and Dean. We’ll award yours to you directly at a ceremony in the next few days.â€Â

Jeb: “I, uh... I wasn't aware of any medals being awarded for a science mission.â€Â

Gene: “Don’t be silly, every single one of you will be getting a medal. You two are getting pilots medals, the scientists getting… science-y ones, and so on.â€Â

Jeb: “Cool.â€Â

Buzz: “I can accept that, I guess.â€Â

Gene: “Bill, your navigation skills and prowess with orbital mechanics has been recognised by people in high places. Bob, your technical expertise has not gone unnoticed. Mac, Ed, your medical work has been noted and held in high regard. There were some tough times out there and you both held up well.â€Â

Bill: “Well, alright then.â€Â

Bob: “Cool.â€Â

Mac: “Thank you, Gene.â€Â

Ed: “Yeah, thanks.â€Â

Gene: “Cal, the data you collected has proven invaluable to a bunch of the astronomers and physicists in R&D, plus the logistics work you did helped keep the mission running as smooth as possible, so well done for both.â€Â

Cal: “Thanks.â€Â

Gene: “Lengas, your work on the ship to keep it from exploding on various occasions has no doubt been important, and you will be recognised for it, but the limelight must be shone on the samples you gathered and the analyses you did; both have been extremely useful to us all down here. We’re sorry you lost so many other geologists on the mission, and their contributions have not gone unnoticed. Nevertheless, we must give you the credit for a great deal of geological data.â€Â

Lengas: “I… well, ok, I guess, just so long as Matton and Matt have indeed received credit where credit’s due. And Sid, for his engineering.â€Â

Matton: “Oh don’t you worry about it, we’ve been given our respective attentions.â€Â

Matton walks in through the door, a crutch under one arm supporting his once-broken leg.

Lengas: “Holy frak, Matton!â€Â

Jeb: “Damn, good to see you, man!â€Â

Matton: “Yeah, likewise, guys. It’s been a while, eh?â€Â

Lengas: “Just a bit, buddy, just a bit.â€Â

Mac: “Say, how’s the leg? I can’t help but notice the crutch seems a little… permanent.â€Â

Matton: “Oh, yeah, the bone never fixed itself properly, so now I have to limp around on this all the time. I don’t mind, and it doesn’t hurt unless I put my leg down hard. No big deal.â€Â

Mac: “Alright then.â€Â

Gene: “Folks, if we may?â€Â

Jeb: “Yes, please continue.â€Â

Gene: “Right, well, there is a reason Matton is here other than to boost morale. Matton?â€Â

Matton: “Thanks Gene. Folks, you obviously remember me going home early, but how many of you remember the samples I took with me?â€Â

Jeb: “The samples…?â€Â

Bill: “No, wait, I remember you pointing them out on Duna…â€Â

Lengas: “Those star-shaped stones?â€Â

Matton: “Yeah, those.â€Â

Jeb: “I knew that. Was about to say it, too.â€Â

Bill: “Sure you were.â€Â

Jeb: “No, really! Ahem, carry on Matton.â€Â

Matton: “Alright, well, I figured these things were rather special from the get-go, but I started looking in the wrong places, trying to figure out what sedimentary, igneous, or metamorphic processes could possibly have created such fine and beautiful things. Here’s a picture of the little things, for those who can’t remember what they looked like or perhaps didn’t see.â€Â

(http://woostergeologists.scotblogs.wooster.edu/files/2014/02/Isocrinus_nicoleti_Encrinite_Mt_Carmel_585.jpg)

Matton: “Quite pretty, right?â€Â

Cal: “Hmm.â€Â

Buzz: “Very pretty.â€Â

Lengas: “Wait, Matton, those are crinoids you’re showing us…â€Â

Matton: “Yes, let me finish.â€Â

Jeb: “Crinoids?â€Â

Bill: “Whatever they are, they’ve got Lengas baffled. Look at him.â€Â

Jeb: “Oh whoa… Lengas? Oi, snap out of it.â€Â

Lengas: “Mother of Kerbin… Matton, are you saying…â€Â

Matton: “Alright, I suppose I’d better, lest you die of anticipation. I couldn’t find anything to do with rocks, so I looked at fossils instead. Now, palaeontology isn’t my thing, so I had no idea these little buggers existed. Nevertheless, the moment I turned a page on the crinoids section, I was greeted with a picture and some descriptions almost exactly matching the samples I found on Duna, except those from the textbook were from the Southern Ocean here on Kerbin. I had to be sure this wasn’t some trick or error, so I looked. I even dipped into some unexplored Ancient Kerbal data troves to try and check it out. Guess what? Duna was once a wet planet with a breathable atmosphere long before the Ancients even took to exploring the planets. The Ancients didn’t have anything to do with this. There was only one explanation, and it was confirmed in this old, barely readable file I’d found. Folks, there was once life on Duna.â€Â

Stunned silence, with a few people looking around at each other.

Jeb: “Holy frakking Mother of Kod.â€Â

Lengas: “Matton, you’re saying…â€Â

Matton: “There is another implication arising from this; at least two planets in just one star system supporting life? What’s to say that there aren’t a whole host of other worlds out there amongst the stars that are teeming with life?â€Â

Ed: “My Kod.â€Â

Bill: “This is… whoa. This is some big stuff.â€Â

Jeb: “Wait, what about the Kraken, we already knew of their existence?â€Â

Cal: “A malevolent universal force given form. I wouldn’t exactly say the Kraken was ever alive in the sense that we can understand.â€Â

Jeb: “Right.â€Â

Lengas: “So wait, we happened to find crinoids on Duna that look almost exactly like those we found in the Southern Ocean? What gives?â€Â

Matton: “Beats me. This particular life or its origin got carried from one planet to the other? Efficient organism design? Hell, maybe the Ancients even decided to bring a couple over from Duna to see how they’d fare in Kerbin’s waters. Like I said, I’m no palaeontologist.â€Â

Jeb: “And to think I never found anything of the sort on Laythe. Laythe! I mean, that’s just bizarre!â€Â

Matton: “We haven’t explored beneath the oceans of Laythe. Who knows?â€Â

Jeb: “Well, I want to go find life of my own! Gene, get me on the next ship to Laythe!â€Â

Gene: “Shut up, you big buffoon, you had your chance.â€Â

Jeb: “Aww.â€Â

Lengas: “Kod almighty… and no-one’s called you crazy or foolish, yet, Matton?â€Â

Matton: “They couldn’t when I showed them every scrap of evidence I had. Believe me, they wanted to call me some harsh names, I could see it all over their faces, but they simply couldn’t.â€Â

Lengas: “…Damn...â€Â

Jeb: “I think someone needs some fresh air. Come on, we can continue this talk outside.â€Â

Everyone heads out of the mission control building.

Bill: “This is just… damn.â€Â

Lengas: “Matton, this may just dwarf every single other discovery in history, you know that, right?â€Â

Matton: “Well, I wouldn’t say that just yet. The paper is still under review, got about a month or two until I get the verdict on it.â€Â

Lengas: “Trust me, that work’s going to change everything.â€Â

Matton: “Well, I heard you got some pretty interesting work done on gravitational theory while you were out there.â€Â

Lengas: “Oh, that? Just a bunch of dead ends, it turns out.â€Â

Matton: “Hmm, I don’t know, a couple of the astrophysicists seemed pretty enthralled by your work.â€Â

Lengas: “What? Really?â€Â

Matton: “Yeah, go ask ‘em yourself if you don’t believe me.â€Â

Lengas: “If that’s so, I may just have to, just so long as I don’t convince anyone to actually jump into the nearest black hole to find out what we need.

Matton: “Yeah, that would probably be a good idea.â€Â

Lengas: “Damn… nothing’s gonna be the same, now. We’re gonna be looking for life signs on every world we visit in the future.â€Â

Matton: “Is that such a bad thing?â€Â

Lengas: “…Not in the slightest. Unless we do actually send Jeb back to Laythe…â€Â

Jeb: “Hey, you two alright over here?â€Â

Lengas: “Yeah, we were just talking.â€Â

Jeb: “Well, let’s talk at a pub or something. First round’s on me, so come on.â€Â

Matton: “If you insist.â€Â

Lengas: “Don’t ever say that to him, just go with it without question.â€Â

Matton: “Hah, yeah, I forgot what he’s like.â€Â

Jeb: “Right, everyone! We’re going! Gene, we can finish this debriefing over drinks!â€Â

Gene: “I… oh, alright.â€Â

-----

Captain’s log, entry 90: Well, this is my final log as Captain of the Enterprise. Technically, this isn’t a log as I’m not on board the ship right now, but I’ve got to summarise stuff. Paperwork bullsh*t. Ugh. Well, I suppose I could try and make this more interesting. Let’s see…

It was as much an exercise in seeing if we could actually pull such a stunt off as it was a mission of great scientific value and prowess. The IEV Enterprise was the largest ship ever built, home for decades to the largest crew of any interplanetary cruiser ever to take flight amongst our lonely little system in the midst of this vast and wild galaxy. To explore but one planet at the start of our space program was viewed as the ultimate in spaceflight, and now we have visited them all, but we must not forget our humble beginnings. While the Venturer Program may not have been the first time we went into that good night, it was certainly a more interesting approach to our exploration of the system we call home.

We can’t forget the roots of the mission. Enterprise was spawned from the success of the IEV Venturer; a smaller ship, and yet it proved itself to be tough, reliable, and easy to love. The folks who flew it had never said a bad thing about the venerable ship, and even is it went on to more standard missions before finally being decommissioned, it never stopped giving its all.

Of course, more glamorous missions were always going to come along at some point, and when one finally did, it shook the world in so profound a manner that it left most people in complete awe.

The final mission of the Venturer Program was the be-all and end-all of the missions we’d done up to that point. Pushing the limits of technology and Kerbal-kind itself, the mission could have failed at any point. It nearly did so on multiple occasions, but the crew kept going, as did the Enterprise, both utterly unyielding even in the face of extreme odds. Together, they saw the mission through, and together, they returned triumphant. Were it not for them, we probably wouldn’t be sure of our place in the stars, and we’d still be uncertain as to our loneliness amongst them, but now we know we can’t possibly be alone. Until the day comes, however, that we are able to go forth and seek out these new life forms and new civilisations, we shall continue to work, continue to strive, and then maybe, just maybe, we’ll be ready.

-----

Well, that's it for Tour of the Planets. 70 chapters including the prologue and epilogue. That's a lot.

I spent months prior to starting the mission just planning everything out; what would the ship look like? Planet order? Crew? Will I ever get that pizza delivery service on Eve sorted out? I'll be damned if it wasn't tedious, but at the same time, it was fun. At least now, I can say I've done a grand tour mission and the evidence is here in its entirety; from Moho to Eeloo we rode, bumpy at times, beautiful at others, and incredible at yet other moments. Getting off Eve and landing on Tylo were the two biggest challenges, as you're all no doubt aware. I must have exhausted around five Eve designs before finally settling on that monstrosity. Tylo wasn't much better. Still, conquered them I have. Bring on more planets, Squad!

And to those of you who stuck it out until the end, well... how?! Even I realised about halfway through that things were getting a little dull, that's why I made exploring Jool such a catastrophe! Well, some of the Jool stuff actually happened; nearly crashing into Laythe on an aerobrake approach, winding up around Tylo first, and nearly ploughing into Bop, plus the tedium with the transfers to the two little moonlets that orbit that green ball of gas. That all happened. It wasn't especially nice. Nevertheless, like a true KSP player, I forged on with what I'd been dealt... stupid Tylo.

Anyway, after many months, I can now rest easy...

...wait...

...oh, that. Riiiiight...

Soon... ish... ish...

Consider it a teaser for something that I'll hopefully have ready to get into in a few months. I want to get this one as good as possible, plus I actually need to do stuff in-game before I can go any further with what I've already done.

Alright folks, that'll be all. Thanks for reading!

[RocketPilot573]

Great story, Mason!

[The Error]

And now we just need to wait until the Kerbals figure out FTL drives.

Excellent story, all round. 10/10 would read again.

[VelocityPolaris]

Amazing story. Just... epic. So much Jeb... I think my head is exploding with the sheer awesomeness.

[Angelo Kerman]

This was a really great read. Loved the storyline and the character developments. The ship was awesome too!

[Needles_10]

Beautiful.