Commander's Log: 29 July 3302
18 Aug 2016T J Stable
****** There appears to be a glitch in the Log entry journal ******[sys]: Your data has been recovered but errors may still exist.
[sys]: Some entries may be lost.
[sys]: Retry manual log upload.
********************************************************************
29 July 3302.
Is this working now? Good.
Disaster struck yesterday when I flew too close to a star! I have no idea what happened, one minute I was entering hyperpsace as routinely as any other, then next moment I was hurtling head first towards a star. I don't even know which one it was!
I lost most systems, and the Frame Shift Drive was venting something into the blackness of space. I managed to limp Grissom over to the nearest planet and make planet fall.
I spent the past few weeks patching her up as much as I can. Most of the major systems are now back up and reporting they are active, although many are badly damaged. I'm sure she can hold together. I'm still amazed the old girl held together, a knock that should have been it for her.
As I rebooted the systems, the subspace communication array burst into life. There was a wide band message being sent out from the bubble! It was coded, pretty well really. I studied the encryption code and recognised part of it. It was Alfredo's coding.
I punched in the release code he had given me many years ago, wondering if it would still work. It did! Alfredo's voice came through the speaker system as loud and clear as if he were in the room with me.
"T" he said, that being his nickname for me. "I know you no wanna be hearing this, but the Empire just put out a huge call for exploration data. They looking for something and they willing to pay people who may know where it is. You been out there for a while now, I figure you get yourself a good pay packet for what
you got. But you best hurry back. I think once they got what they looking for, they be back to paying normal rates."
The message terminated and I leaned back in the chair.
Empire 'good pay packets' were something to make you think. I glanced at the star charts. I could be back within a day with what I had so far. Or i could push on for the rift. I sighed. The ship is pretty beat up. I knew deep down I can reach the rift, but the way she's handling I know I'll never be able to cross.
Alfredo is right. I set the co-ordinates in, strapped in and took off. Home, here I come.