JOURNEY OF A COMMANDER PART 17
21 Aug 2022Ni6h70wl
10.10.3307 - Novara Expedition Day 17"Wow, the contents are worth a fortune!" my first officer's eyes gleamed with excitement. "Yes, if we had a ship and the storage capacity of a fleet carrier, then yes," I replied.
"What good is a gas giant with ice rings full of low-temperature diamonds, void opals and tritium if I can't mine or store the stuff?"
"But you can save the location and come back and mine the stuff sometime."
"You forget that carriers need a certain quota for long-haul travel? There's not that much free cargo space left, plus we don't have the money or time for a fleet carrier."
"Not yet, wait and see."
What was there to wait for, the thing is expensive and has little incentive at the moment, but then the lady of the "ship" doesn't understand that.
The Novara is currently in the Hypao Aoscs SG-Y b8 system near the first planet, a Class I gas giant.
These have mainly hydrogen and helium atmospheres. The colouration is caused by clouds in the upper atmosphere of ammonia, water vapour, hydrogen sulphide, phosphine and sulphur. The temperature at the top of the upper cloud layers is usually less than 150K. And this one has just 78K, the only thing special about this one is the ring that surrounds this planet. The outer radius is over two hundred thousand kilometres and has a mass of 882.71 billion megatons. At some point in the 1.7 billion years, an ice moon with 8 times the mass of Saturn's moon Enceladus was torn apart by gravitational forces and spread around the planet as a ring of ice. Apparently, this moon may have crossed the Roche boundary. 7 other icy moons orbit the gas giant, at sufficient distance, which did not end up like their predecessor.
--- Biological signal detected---
The detailed surface scanner has registered biological signals on the surface of Moon 1 f.
The moon has a wafer-thin argon atmosphere, I wonder if life has actually evolved there?
"COVAS, initiate landing sequence."
---Confirm, orbitalflight engage---
I selected a suitable landing site based on the "heat map," hoping to find it there.
---Landing sequence initiated, all passengers keep seated---
---Reverse thrusters activated---
---Landing gear deployed---
---Reverse thrusters activated---
---Landing gear deployed---
Landed. "Alright, this time you guys stay here, I'll take the SRV out on my own and scout the area."
"NI6H70WL, be careful, the average temperature is 51K, if your suit gets damaged, that's it, if only because of the pressure loss."
"The flightsuit seals damage immediately, I'll be fine" and made my way from the cockpit, crossed the workshop area and entered the lift.
Deck 3 - Cargo, Fuel, SRV & Fighterbay, it said on the display panel just inside the lift, my destination.
A few seconds later I was already there and entered the planetary vehicle hangar through an airlock where the two SRVs were stored.
I climbed into the Scarab and activated the exit sequence - which lowers the SRV with a hydraulic arm onto the planet's surface.
---Low gravity warning---
I almost thought so, at 0.05 G it's no wonder, you quickly fly a few dozen metres with the SRV if you're not careful.
Already in the close range of the ship I could see strange mushroom-like structures, I drove towards it and only noticed shortly before how huge this life form was.
The investigations revealed the following, it was the species Fonticulua, subtype Campestris. These are photosynthetic colony organisms that seem to occur exclusively on ice worlds, where they take the surrounding frozen material as a form of protection.
As the Fonticulus develop, they melt the ice around them, absorb the liquid through tiny cell pores and pass it on to the reproductive edge of the colony. Here the liquid is excreted and immediately refreezes, creating hard, translucent exoskeletons that provide protection for the organisms. The leaf structures form a wide, flat space that exposes the photosynthetic cells inside to as much light as possible. Reproduction appears to occur by division of the colony, most likely when a fragment of the structure collapses under its own weight and the smaller fragment forms a new colony. A distance of at least 500m was required for the necessary genetic diversity.
After taking three different samples with the genetic sampler, I went back to the ship and started the boarding and decontamination sequence.
"And, nothing happened to me. You worry too much about me. I'm getting pretty good out there."
Other than a snort, my first officer had nothing to reply, nor did she need to say anything.
"COVAS, get us out of here. Initiate launch sequence."....
15.10.3308 - Novara Expedition Day 22
The Novara reached the system Hypao Aoscs TR-W b1-0, a red dwarf star of spectral class M5 awaited us, orbited by 6 icy planets. After completing the FSS scan, the data revealed that Planet 3 had a thin neon atmosphere and biological signals. Normally I don't do a detailed surface scan of icy planets, but in this case the explorer's heart makes an exception. The planet has to be scanned and the exobiological data has to be collected.
The landing took place in a crater, according to the records the biological signals were bacterial cultures. Special caution is needed with this type of life form as it is not known if there is pathogenicity. These questions will be answered later in the ship's laboratory on decks 11 and 12.
On-site investigations revealed that this species of bacteria is Bacterium Aries. A species of bacteria that converts energy from neon atmospheres, creating loops with bright colours.
In general, bacteria on other planets are true single-celled extremophiles. In fact, they are able to live in the entire spectrum of temperatures, chemical compositions and atmospheres. They form a kaleidoscopic palette of patterns and colours, depending on which metabolic method they use. They gain their energy from photosynthetic, chemosynthetic or thermosynthetic processes. They are thought to be the precursors of many forms of life and are often found in association with other species. Connections between the biochemistry of bacterial colonies and neighbouring organisms are likely, but not yet proven.
Also, to this day, the hypothesis of panspermia persists, which states that simple life forms move across the universe over great distances and thus brought the beginnings of life to Earth and other planets. Its proponents thus attempt to address what they see as the contradiction between the high complexity of life on the one hand and the comparatively short time for its emergence on the other. However, most scientists have so far regarded panspermia as pure speculation, initially because life was only known to exist on Earth and later because certain species seem to occur only in certain areas of the Milky Ways.
Rather, it is assumed that life generally develops where certain parameters are fulfilled. This would also explain the striking similarity of the plant life on the many Earth-like planets. This approach is currently the subject of research into the origin of life and is being tried to be reproduced experimentally on planets by adjusting the local parameters.
There are countless different types of organisms in the Milky Way, both organic and artificial. However, while life in general is abundant, intelligent life is rare. Only four intelligent species have been identified so far: Humans, Guardians, Constructs and Thargoids.
The existence of two other intelligent species is suspected through the Martian relic and the Soontill relics.
The latter is a slab of unidentified material covered with pictograms of unknown origin. This relic is part of a hoard of similar artefacts discovered by researchers investigating a lost alien civilisation in the Soontil system.
Soontill relics are alien artefacts that supposedly came from a planet in the Soontill system that was discovered after the Thargoids mentioned the location around 3250. Analysis of the Soontill relics has shown that they could not have been made with any known human technology, but they also do not completely match any known Thargoid materials. Isotopic dating indicates that they are tens of thousands of years old.
Some historians have suggested that the relics may have come from an ancient Thargoid subculture. The Dark Wheel is reportedly responsible for both the discovery of Soontill and the sale of the relics in the Cheranovsky City market in the Ngurii system.
"COVAS, initiate launch sequence." There is nothing more to discover in this system.
A few minutes later, the Novara was back in supercruise and preparing for the next jump.