Message to the Denizens of the Void
14 Dec 2022RGinny
Wednesday, December 14, 3308CMDR RGinny
Scout of the Path Rangers Squadron
Current Location: Eembaisk ZQ-U d3-9011
Hello fellow Commanders. My name is Commander RGinny
First, a little backstory. It’s been 2 years since I left from Shinrata Dezhra. 2 years I’ve spent in the black. I’ve traveled far and wide across this great big beautiful galaxy of ours. And every night, before I shut down the ship, I recite my favorite poem to the cosmos:
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there,
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air…
Up, up the long, delirious burning blue
I've topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or ever eagle flew —
And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
The high un-trespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
— John Gillespie Magee, Jr
To me, there is no greater peace than watching a sunrise over a moon that no man has stepped foot on before me. Millions of years it took to build these amazing vistas. And to think, that I get to be the first man to see them. It’s almost as if, in those moments, that these worlds were made for me to one day see.
But that’s not quite true, is it? These worlds were not made for me, nor you, nor anyone. They exist because they can, just as we exist because we can. We could have ended our journey through the cosmos a thousand years ago, destroyed ourselves before ever leaving Mother Earth, never escaping our species adolescence. But we did. We put aside our petty differences and chose a new path, into the cosmos.
And yet, over a thousand years later here we are again, on the cusp of a monumental shift. To think, the first intelligent life we’ve encountered in this vast galaxy of ours, and we made them our enemy. Although it’s been several years since I left the safety of the bubble, I still get the reports from the GalNet, and things have only gotten worse. The Thargoids were patient as enterprising young pilots cut their teeth by battling them. They only attacked in defense. Yet we persisted in provoking them. Even going so far as to unleash a weapon of mass genocide against them. Have we not learned from our ancestors? Are we that intent on their extermination? Are we even certain we can win an escalation?
And now they come for us. Not to study, or learn. But to destroy us. Our stations, our outposts. I can’t say I agree with the events that have lead us to this point, but the past matters not. The question is, what do we do now? Run? I have scouted hundreds of worlds, perfect for colonization. Should we pack up, and leave the bubble, and write our names among the stars? Or do we fight for our home, and do what we must to survive? You have to wonder, is this the future CMDR Salome feared?
I’m sure I am not alone in pondering these questions. There are many of us, out here in the black, lonely islands of humanity, searching for something in the vast expanse. Do we leave behind what we have come to know, this solitary existence, and run fast for the Bubble, to lend a hand? Do we stand and fight for our brethren, even if it was due to the their actions that we are now in this mess?
As Salome once said: "All must make a choice”
And I have made mine.
Computer, set a course for HIP 22460
We’re going home.