Day 0
20 Dec 2018Vallysa
Optimization. Turning down the cabin temperature an additional 1.6 degrees would save .07 mega-joules per day. Vallysa did some rough math in her head...if she was able to finesse out an additional 3% power for her engines...that should reduce her travel time by...days? Maybe two weeks? Every small gain in efficiency, drop in mass, improvement in systems, aggregated to a significant enhancement in her overall performance. After spending weeks tinkering with and fine-tuning her ships overly-robust mechanical components, it only made sense she should apply the same incremental approaches to her own human factor performance measures by lowering the temperature just a little bit more. Sure, she could now almost see her breath in the cabin's artificial atmosphere, but she reached down and snapped the wrist-cuff buttons on her fitted, insulated waist-coat, stylized with the 528ths crest and smiled...probably the best return on investment for any single acquisition.The docking clamps of the orbital station Abraham Lincoln released, and she sedately glided the LLV Ferdinand through the portcullis just under the 100kph limit. This was the last piece of humanity she would see for a while, and felt compelled to pay homage to the civility and decorum of Federation laws before she found herself deep in the black void of space, with only her semi-intelligent COVAS as company. There would be plenty of time in the very near future for her set her own rules and boundaries as she glimpsed into the infinity of creation; for the next thirty seconds she would obey the posted speed limit.
Clearing the restricted maneuver space, she fired up her cruise engines. Choosing the Lincoln as her departure point was not a coincidence. There, suspended above her, filling her canopy, continents and oceans etched into the brain of every space-faring human, was Earth herself. Vallysa had not grown up here--this was not her home--but it was the mother of the race that now occupied thousands of star systems in a complex, chaotic symphony. The view of the Iberian peninsula, unchanged for the duration of humanity's infinitesimal period of self-awareness, manifested in reality the poster she had taped to the bottom of the bunk above her during her childhood, which had inspired her first to learn to drive, then to fly. This was the perfect image to greet her journey's beginning, and would be the last vestige of human evidence for the next few months.
Well, almost the last. She smiled again. There was one more stop she was going to make before leaving the system. Why? It did her no good. It slowed her down. She wouldn't be the first, or the last, person to make this stop. It wasn't anything new. In fact, it was very, very old...
The previous night she made one last stop at the bar for a little social interaction and last minute advice on where in the galaxy she might want to travel. Listening to the blaggards drone on about "oh, make sure you stop at this high paying system, and when you hit Colonia go to that valuable scan, that should earn you some money, and make sure you have two maintenance modules to handle the neutron-jumps so you don't die of boredom...." made her realize she didn't actually need their advice. She was not out to find the highest paying discoveries or get the trip over as fast as possible. After returning to her room, she had completely remapped her entire route, opting for a 'slower' path that would get her to everywhere she wanted to go, but at her pace, in her way. Slightly shorter jumps meant her engines would not be subject to the extreme harshness of particle injection, preserving her engine fitness and performance in perpetuity. Slowing down a little meant she could go forever. Patience was her armor.
...returning to the present, she keyed her newly installed sensor systems and triangulated for the very, very faint EM signature she was seeking. There. Over two million light-seconds away. Impossible to jump to, so the only option was by in-system faster-than-light drive. This was time that could be better spent by jumping, scanning, scooping, but Vallysa had decided to smell the roses. After almost an hour, she reached the source of the signal, launched over 1,300 years prior. Humanity's first ever expedition beyond Sol, before its true moment could possibly be fathomed by the war-torn, frightened people of the time.
Playing its message for all to hear..."Hello from the children of planet Earth". This. This was the anchor she would use for her journey to the center of the galaxy, an inward and outward trek of infinite possibility. Now, now she was ready to begin her voyage.
Hyperdrive engaged....three....two....one....JUMP