“Go ahead and hail them,” you say. “It's a risk but this may be our ticket home.”
“Sure. I've never done this before, hold on,” your sister says as she types away. A couple minutes later she informs you she's ready.
“Just press that button and talk,” she tells you.
“Wait, we don't have a name for our ship!”
“Well, I call it 'Home.'”
“That's a stupid name for a space ship!”
glares at you and purposefully presses the call button.
“This is from colony ship 'Home.' We saw you in the area and, uhh...”
“Please state your business here,” you say, cutting across .
For a minute nothing happens.
“Are you sure this is on?”
“YES. I think YOU were just RUDE,” says.
A moment later an authoritative female voice booms through the PA system throughout the ship.
“This is Commander Knightly. We are on a reconnaissance mission in this quadrant. It is a pleasant surprise to find a settlement here. We would like to talk. Do we have permission to approach?”
“Do you think it's safe?” says uncertainly.
“Well, too late now. They know we're here and there is not much we can do.”
You jam your finger on the call button and say, “Permission granted.”
In a half hour you can see the vessel closing on your ship.
“Permission to board?” booms the voice once again through the ship.
“Granted,” you say before turning to . “Is there anywhere they can board?”
“Sure, their ship will fit into the shuttle hanger. It will be a tight fit with the shuttle in there but I think it will be OK.”
“We have space at the stern of the ship,” you say as you hold the call button, “I'm turning on the landing lights.”
In another few minutes you and are in the hangar greeting a tall, older, fit red head. Her uniform identifies her as the commander of her vessel. She has a petite latina by her side.
“Hello commander. I'm and this,” you gesture to your sister, “is .”
“You can call me Clarissa. This is my associate Rita.”
“Hello,” you and your sister say together.
“To be honest, we don't typically respond to hails. But given the, uh, unusual name of your ship, among other things, we thought we should investigate.”
At this your sister bumps you with her hips and sticks out her tongue at you.
“What other things?” you say warily.
“Well, for one this colony has a disabled homing beacon. That's what lets colony ships know there is a viable planet present. It was apparently disabled deliberately. Second, there was a colony here a long time ago but there has been no communication from the colony for decades.”
“We've never communicated! We tried, but this ship doesn't have anything that wouldn't attenuate past a few light years!” your sister exclaims. “And we haven't been here decades.”
You go on to explain how you found yourself in the colony ship with only you and your sister present. You glaze over the incestuous details as you tell the story up to the present.
“That is puzzling and disturbing,” Clarissa says as you finish your story. “We came here to see if we could steal your homing beacon. We didn't expect to find anyone here.”
“You see,” Rita speaks up for the first time, “we are a US flagged vessel but we operate independently. We are paid to find viable planets and set up homing beacons.”
“Close tabs are kept on beacons,” Clarissa contines, “but if we can make it look like we used one here we will have an extra to dump in a rival's territory. By putting it on a bad planet, we can ruin their reputation and secure more territory as the border systems expand.”
“When you hailed us, we were hoping to find an unknown colony here,” says Rita. “We are, of course disappointed by what we have found. But if you do manage to successfully settle the planet this information would be invaluable to certain people and would fetch us enough money for us to retire. Additionally, an active beacon would reflect poorly on us if another colony ship arrived to find the system already setteled.
“We can turn on the beacon which would result in another colony ship arriving in the next couple decades. Once they arrive, you can assimilate. Or, we can leave it off in the hopes that you succeed. If you choose to leave it off we'll come by to check up on you and drop off supplies. However, we can't afford to drop by if there is no benefit to us so if we turn on the beacon you will not see us again.” |