A lovely trip
15 Nov 2018Admiralfeb
I decided to open Hermes to passengers. This one lady and her entourage wanted to travel 1400 lightyears. I balked initially at the distance, but there weren't any other passengers worth taking. She was only paying 5.2 million credits, but I figured it would be a nice, relaxing trip with no one chasing after me since all she wanted to do was explore.I accepted the commission and she boarded. She kept to herself, but I caught her looking out the window in awe. She's a seasoned explorer, but yet she looked out at every system with the same look as I did when I first became a pilot and ventured into the unknown. I hope I look at every new system with the same look that she does even when it's my 7000th jump.
The plotter told me that it would take 73 jumps to arrive at her intended destination. Roughly 2 hours distant from my home system of LHS 3167. I turned on some music in the cockpit. Not too many people like 21st Century music, but I like it. The cockpit is sound-shielded so I didn't disturb my guest. I quickly fell into a rhythm. Even though my Dolphin doesn't have the best fuel tank, I was making good time. Make a jump, run a scan, jump again. Whenever I'd drop below half tank, I'd stop at the nearest star to refuel. I ended up starting to scan the star and any nearby stellar phenomena.
We finally arrived in the system that she wanted. After a scan, she came up to the cockpit and looked out. She pointed out the planet she wanted to see and I locked in the destination. As we arrived, I scanned the planet. It was in orbit of a blue gas giant. She directed me to a mountain on the planet and we headed that way. We landed and watched the gas giant come into view. It was like watching a sunrise. After it was in the sky, she turned to me and said that she had wanted to come here because her great grandfather had visited here and watched the blue giant from this mountain. She told me that she was ready to head back to McMonagle Station.
I plotted the course for home. Jumped the 1400 lightyears back, scanning all the way.
I dropped her off at McMonagle and turned in all my exploration data. She had given me 5.2m credits. In turning in the 3 pages of data, I received another 3 or so million.
I look back on the journey with wonder. I'm a Trailblazer. Exploration is what I love.
I set my next course, looking forward to the journey, for what is life, but one journey. When it is done, another one begins.
To the Journey, my fellow Voyagers.