The Black
01 Jul 2020BooleanBrisket
Power up. Jump.A new system. Scoop fuel. Run the scans. Repeat.
I didn't even mean to hit deep space. I plotted the course and got interdicted by the Dreaded. We managed to fight our way out and lost a fighter in the process. Alyson was shaken, still twitching in the harness when we hit the jump drive.
The bastard followed us to the next system. And the next system, and before I knew it, we'd left inhabited space. I'd wanted to stop at a station before we left the bubble to tune the ship up. Ditch some components we wouldn't need and, most importantly, fit the field repair units.
That didn't happen.
Fortunately, we're making progress, averaging about 30LY per jump with plenty of fuel in reserve. Seems every system has a fuel star in it, but I don't want to jinx it. Every jump is a white knuckle exit, wondering if we're going to jump into a pulsar's jet stream or a black hole. We can't afford to take any heat damage or worse because we've got nothing to repair with.
53 jumps. We're 10% of the way there.
Ivy's been helping with the scans at least. Alyson, not so much. She's been in her quarters since we left the bubble. I think she's still freaked out.
In my off hours I've started working on my telepresence kit. I think I have an upgrade with some of the leftover decrypted firmware upgrades in the system. Requires a bit of internal work, unfortunately, but so far, my changes seem to be holding. Hoping Alyson likes the upgrade.