Beyond Ourselves

Posted on Tue Jan 20th, 2015 @ 12:12am by Lieutenant Jidar Tolx

575 words; about a 3 minute read

Mission: Episode 4 - Parallels
Location: Stellar Cartography
Timeline: Day 1 - 1030

Chief Science Officer's Log Supplemental,

On long range sensors we have discovered a large nebula that potentially has a star system contained within it. The computer predicts that this nebula may be comprised of Argon and Hydrogen. Though as I continue to study this distant phenomena I often find myself wondering when or if I will get to see this or any nebula while I am out here. Something seems to be very wrong I just cannot put my finger on it.

"Computer delete log." Jidar aggressively sighed as the log was erased from ship's memory and he looked up at the chart in front of him again. "Computer begin scan of coordinates seven four nine six three."

"Scan initiated."

The Science Chief had been in Stellar Cartography for hours. And, already he had attempted to make multiple logs to report his findings of the nebula that he had spent the past several hours studying alone. But, each attempt had the same result finding itself to be forever destroyed.

There was something in the air on board the ship since they had departed the space station. Certainly as one of the newer officer's he knew little of the others. After all given the past three hundred years of life as shared with him by the creature that occupied a portion of his body a little intuition would have been nice.

Instead the computer spoke to him, "Scan complete."

Tolx nodded and began to review the data that had been provided to him. Some of the pieces of the puzzle had started to fall into place, "Computer calculate the odds of a star system contained within the nebula."

"There is a thirty-nine percent chance of such a system. There is a four percent chance that such a system has a binary star."

The second piece of the answer didn't occur to him. The only real way to determine whether such a system existed would be to visit the nebula. But, since it seemed like something else was going on he would not be given such an opportunity. "Computer calculate the odds that given that there is a system present that such a system has some sort of life."

"Given a thirty-nine percent chance of an existing system there is a fifteen percent chance that some sort of life exists."

Tolx nodded, "Computer begin scanning at coordinates four four nine six." He watched as the computer indicated the scanning process on the console in front of him. On the large screen the indicators zoomed in on the location that he had requested the scan from. "Computer predict the chemical composition of the stellar mass."

"The stellar mass is potentially made up of primarily hydrogen and argon materials. There is a small chance that duetrium exists within the nebula as well. However, there is insufficient data to exert the claim."

"So what you are telling me is that a mining operation would be a bad idea." Tolx said ignoring the chime as the scan completed itself. He sighed heavily and leaned back on the back of his feet before rocking to his toes, "Computer switch to long range sensors and indicate the presence of any unexplored systems present around the nebula."

"Scanning."

Tolx nodded and began typing on the keys in front of him. Wondering if three hundred years of intuition was correct about the crew of this ship. Or, if he was truly going crazy.

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