October 2011
2 posts
1156.17.10.2776 via desk
The date is 2.9.2776. This may take some time to reach you
Have you ever traveled by way of spaceship out of the star system and looked at a view of the planet you’ve left from far, far away?
It’s tiny, isn’t it? If you can still see it, that is.
Heavily bodies—planets, moons, even stars—are so massive, so colossal that they dwarf our tiny forms; our largest...
10 tags
0022.13.10.2776 via desk
The current date is 29.8.2776.
I am in the deep of it now. Unfortunately, this portion of space is very sparse in human settlement. Well, it should be completely void of human settlement, but assuming still that Captain Verity is being truthful, I’ll use the word “sparse”.
Because of that, there aren’t any hotspots out here. The nearest network buoy is not for several...
August 2011
3 posts
6 tags
2329.20.8.2776 via desk
In our time adrift the cosmos, the human race has explored and colonized an enormous quantity of worlds. However, if you consider the size of the universe, humanity hasn’t even made a scratch on the surface of it. Not that any of it matters, because the scale that the empire of man thinks in is the human scale. And relative to our size, we’ve done a lot.
The coordinates Captain Verity gave me...
9 tags
0114.9.8.2776 via desk
Landed on a planet today.
Yes, just because I’m chasing weird conspiracies and ghosts doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten my real job. It was a small planet, and the life was mostly microorganisms and vegetation.
There was this plant that grew fruit. Considering there wasn’t much of anything to eat the fruit, it was an odd thing. Perhaps there were creatures I hadn’t...
6 tags
0128.4.8.2776 via desk
I received a message on my private mail account about 0700 hours ago. It was from the captain of the Fish Out of Water. It is as follows, minor edits done by myself:
0630.3.8.2776
<REMOVED>, Captain, E. C. Pytheas
Captain:
I understand you’ve been asking about us. Don’t act surprised. You think you’re the only one who can gather information? We’re explorers....
July 2011
3 posts
7 tags
1655.20.7.2776
Human beings are the least predictable aspect of the universe.
Planetary exploration? We’ve got that down to a science. We practically know what to expect when we find a new planet. Sure, there are always new and exciting things, but they generally can be categorized.
We have created computers with the ability to match or even surpass human thought processes. There are artificial...
8 tags
0040.5.7.2776
My calender tells me that today—no, yesterday—was the millennial anniversary of the founding of a nation called the United States of America.
Do people still celebrate things like that? Earth-nation-specific holidays?
Still though, it’s fascinating. A thousand years ago, people were founding nations on a single world; exploration consisted of sailing a ship only a couple...
1937.3.7.2776 via desk
It’s been a while. Sorry. Developments have been fast and frequent and as such updates have been sporadic.
I’ve been asking around more about the Fish Out of Water. I’ve been reluctant to surface on the recuperating planet that the ship visited, but for the past week or so now I have been in orbit of it’s natural satellite.
I even reported to headquarters and received...
June 2011
3 posts
1720.22.6.2776 via desk
Have you ever had that terrible feeling associated with happening upon information that causes both understanding and confusing at once?
It’s strange.
The Fish Out of Water was in this area of space on a rumor that a nearby planet had sentient alien life. We get rumors like this all the time, and I suppose I don’t need to tell you that they are never true.
But hunches, rumors,...
2300.15.6.2776 via desk
Criminals are smart. Don’t ever doubt that. It is hard to be a criminal—even harder to be one in space—without knowing. And the longer you’re in the business of the illegal, the more you come to know.
But information doesn’t come cheap. Especially the type you learn from being a criminal in a backwater system like this. Or traveling the seedy parts of the known...
0200.11.6.2776 via desk
The PHALANX-32 refueling and supply station to which we are now docked orbits the planet Mu-7. The locals call the station the Backalley and for damn good reason. It’s an awful place to live, but an excellent place to do business.
Since I’m here for neither, and only want the fueling and the supplies, I certainly hope this stop can be without incident. I will bring my gun and some...
May 2011
4 posts
2247.23.5.2776 via desk
Though the population of non-religious or non-practitioners is an ever-widening majority in the galaxy, one should not discount the still very large number of religious individuals. There are quite a few aboard the ship. Though I do not intend to criticize another person for his or her beliefs, there are some rituals that I find… odd and archaic.
Some religions require the believer to pray in...
0012.18.5.2776 via desk
About six years ago I intimately knew the commander of a smaller vessel called the Reluctant Cooperation. He was known in his circle for being a bit rebellious and loudly contrarian and found any way he could to criticize the chain of command. I won’t deny a small part of that attitude might have rubbed off on me.
He told me he hated the phrase that was lovingly etched abreast the hull of...
2258.9.5.2776 via desk
Lieutenant Quartlery down in engineering killed himself today. The Doctor had prescribed him a sleeping medication after he had had trouble sleeping. He had also prescribed an antidepressant medication. The poor kid overdosed on the pills. There was no question that it was intentional. He left a note. It was rather lengthy and I shall not reproduce it here out of respect to him, his family, as...
2315.2.5.2776 via desk
We have begun the month long voyage on reserve power to the nearest fueling station. It is my desperate hope that word of our blunder in discovery has not already reached them there. I achingly do not feel like explaining myself to whatever sort of backwater outskirt-dwelling fueldrinker would hang out around that empty expanse of uncharted pirate-space.
Pirates. Bandits. Brigands. Smugglers....
April 2011
12 posts
1600.19.4.2776
We have been orbiting this same planet for about two weeks, maybe. Neither I nor my crew has the drive to go anywhere. There has been a melancholic shadow over the entire ship. It’s probably me more than them. It’s hard to feel like doing my job when I feel like I’ve already failed it.
It’s a respectable idea, to restart civilization anew. Find an empty, unsettled planet, build from the earth, and...
0000.6.4.2776 via mobile
life is a joke, isn’t it. a joke.
we’re put on earth so we can spend ten thousand years reaching for the stars so that when we finally get there and reach the door to discovery we’ll step through the door and a bucket full of indiscriminate disappointment will drop on our heads and we’ll all be part of some massive cosmic prank
only there’s no one else out here to see it. just rocks and dust and...
2300.5.4.2776 via mobile
they are human
2257.5.4.2776 via mobile
skeletons. skeletons i have seen before
2244.5.4.2776 via mobile
The walls depict more humanoids. Other strange things. Perhaps this civilization’s idea of an afterlife.
One stands out to me: it looks as though they believed they were ferried here from some Eden-land in the heavens. There are certain ways you could interpret this…
2230.5.4.2776 via mobile
They are beginning the excavation of the tomb. I shall be joining them inside. Hoping there will be signal.
2203.5.4.2776 via mobile
A tomb! They have found a tomb.
2155.5.4.2776 via mobile
There are tools in the abandoned homes, crafted for hands not unlike our own. I could use these tools. I have used tools just like these. Far more advanced, of course, but fundamentally the same thing.
Furniture and pottery and artwork crafted still by those alien hands.
It’s all very crude–or perhaps deliberately abstract?–and hard to logically discern, but it’s still masterful...
1948.5.4.2776 via desk
Presently, I prepare myself to shuttle down to the site again today. I’ve had to adjust my sleep schedule due to the location of the ruins. The team works in the day, and on the planet that puts the hour almost opposite the normal hours of our ship’s clock. The sun should be rising over the site very soon, if it has not begun to already. This isn’t much of a problem; I’ve had to do this sort of...
0813.5.4.2776 via desk
The survey team puts it at 200-300 years old, though more thorough investigation is necessary to properly date it. That is very, very young. We could have encountered these people if we had only traveled to this part of the galaxy sooner. We could have befriended them – fought them? They are a younger race than us, that much is certain. Perhaps we could have been mentors to them. Imagine...
0011.5.4.2776 via mobile
Splendid. Sadly, not very large. A society that died too young. The architecture is almost reminiscent of Egyptian, in appearance. And maybe a little Aztecan. Perhaps I am being too anthropocentric in my evaluations. But first impressions are first impressions. We human beings have a tendency to project ourselves on non-humans, even non-livings.
2045.4.4.2776 via desk
Ruins! We have discovered ruins! On an uncharted, unsettled Grade 4 planet! Or it’s definitely a… it would be a Grade 5 now, wouldn’t it? The skeletons of a dead civilization. Do you know what this means? Do you realize the ramifications? This is astronomical! Possibly the greatest discovery in of all human history! Do you think there are surviving descendents? They may have all...
March 2011
4 posts
0005.26.3.2775 via desk
Oh right, I’ve avoided using the planet grading system so far because, unless you know the complex details of the system, it isn’t all that effective in this particular setting. The layman’s descriptions are entirely too vague to even use correctly. However, because I slipped it into my previous entry, I might as well explain for the readers:
The grading system describes levels...
2035.23.3.2776 via desk
It’s quite interesting to see how people in the populous and protected colonized worlds believe the worlds that I and my crew visit look like. And the beasts we encounter.
Here are some artistic interpretations of my recent battle with some indigenous life (the wounds still throb with pain at the memory):
Savage Encounter by HWO
We Are Alone. Accept That. by...
2045.17.3.2776 via desk
I asked my first commander whether he believes in God. The response he gave to me was, “Religion is an archaic subject that should inhabit only the annals of human history.” The man is your average sort: raised in a non-religious family, so that he does not believe is no surprise. His answer, however, was somewhat curious in its choice of wording. Simply, or at least by my interpretation, he is...
0745.29.2.2776 via desk
February is the shortest month, but lucky for her, she gets an extra day every so often. Such an oddity is the product of a fickle calendar based on the arbitrary movements of a tiny planet, its satellite, and their orbit around an insignificant star. It is a relic we refuse to put behind us, perhaps because of our own historic pride.
Somewhere, spring approaches. Here, it is summer. On our...
February 2011
4 posts
2040.19.2.2776 via desk
People who argue against the notion that Homo sapiens are the supreme species, at the peak of evolution, cite our lack of evolutionary advantages found in other creatures: claws and fangs, wider spectral vision, enhanced senses, etc.
Obviously, proponents of the human superiority go directly and rightfully to our minds. There is more to it, though, than that we are smarter than the other species....
1614.19.2.2776 via mobile
Fought beasts today. Native. Pack hunters. Vicious animals. But you learn to fight them. When it comes down to it, they’re never all that different from planet to planet.
tumblrbot asked: WHERE WOULD YOU MOST LIKE TO VISIT ON YOUR PLANET?
1515.6.2.2776 via desk
Black holes are a rare and marvelous sight in the galaxy. It’s said that we explorers see more black holes than any who lives or travels in the civilized part of the galaxy. There’s some logic to it, besides the obvious factor which is that we travel quite a bit. The thing is, people are afraid to go near them. They still have the mostly misinformed impression that they are inescapable, swirling...
January 2011
3 posts
0040.23.1.2776 via desk
Dinner did not go as planned. I dressed my best, and brought along with me my first commander as well as the ship’s medical officer. We three were careful with our words and mannerisms, but it seems we were not careful enough. After a magnificently prepared feast, and a semi-translated discussion on various things including the ramifications of our presence here, I made the awful mistake of...
0635.22.1.2776 via desk
To give you an idea of the underlying mission of galactic expansion: when I was to become the captain of an exploration vessel, I was taught three important things outside of my usual education as a ship’s commander:
1. Dealing with isolation away from human settlement
2. Interacting with alien worlds and all that entails
3. Diplomacy, especially with foreign entities
I emphasize...
2107.14.1.2776 via desk
I do not intend to practice misanthropy when I doubt the human endeavor. I love humanity, and all the more that it’s the thing above all else that deserves to be loved. There are things, there are places, there are animals, and then there’s the human race. Though I have the adequate amount of self-loathing to accept a job like this one, it does not manifest as a hatred for my kind.
Nevertheless,...
