Lost Among The Stars

CHAPTER 2 – SPACE REFIT-4

‘’Well, it couldn’t be worse than arriving late for the address. The rest of the family has been ready for ten minutes now, so let’s go!’’

Leaving the family’s apartment, which was located next to Priya’s own one-bedroom apartment, the mother and daughter joined up with Priya’s father, younger sister and two brothers outside their door, then walked as a group towards the nearest elevator. Taking a quick ride down one level, the Indian family then walked alongside the transparent wall of the giant aquarium which formed a ring around the base of the bow section. That aquarium, with a circumference of 2,036 meters at half of its maximum width of 27 meters and with a maximum depth of thirty meters, actually housed a diverse marine life forming a true ecosystem of its own which did a lot to make life aboard the KOSTROMA even more pleasant. The family then turned into the entrance to the covered observation gallery linking the bow outer ring with the central core at the level of Deck 19. There was already a fairly dense crowd of crewmembers and their families walking towards the core section, all heading to the ship’s auditorium on Deck 10. When the Mistry family arrived at the auditorium, it was to find most of the other occupants of the ship already there and sitting in the concentric rings of folding jump seats of the vast theater-like room. Already on the stage was Tina Forster, standing behind a lectern and with a microphone in front of her. Also on the stage with her was Captain Shanandar. His presence intrigued Priya and her family but they quickly took up seats as near to the stage as possible without asking questions then. At precisely nine o’clock, the scheduled time for her address, Tina powered her microphone and spoke in it, with her voice resonating around the 4,000 seat-capacity auditorium.

‘’Thank you for coming, my friends, and welcome to this address. Now that the refit work on our ship has been completed and tested, you probably expect me to announce our return to business on the trade and passenger routes of the Solar System. Well, we will indeed be traveling far and wide, but not in this solar system.’’

Tina paused for a moment to let pass a wave of surprised exclamations from her audience, then resumed her speech.

‘’What I mean by that is that our beloved KOSTROMA is now much more than just a giant interplanetary cargo ship: it is now a true starship, able to travel quickly between various star systems. We owe this incredible new capability to a Koorivar scientist, Doctor Koomak, who invented the interstellar drive now equipping our ship. During the past three month, me and a very small group of engineers and specialists, both Human ones and Koorivars, worked in secret to design, build and test a small prototype starship equipped with the Koomak Drive. Those tests were fully conclusive, with our modified cutter jumping nearly instantly to the Alpha Centauri system and the Barnard’s Star system before coming back without incidents or damage. We then equipped the KOSTROMA with its own Koomak Drive and further improved it by adding anti-matter engines of Koorivar design to it. Our ship is thus now truly without equal in the Solar System. You may now be asking yourselves why I and my Koorivar friends did all this. The answer to that is simple: to go effect a search and rescue mission in order to find and save the two sister ships of the VEON SHOURIA which left Shouria just before its destruction some 361 years ago. As you all know, the VEON SHOURIA suffered a number of significant systems degradations during its long trip towards the Solar System, with the result that it landed by default on Eris, with its crew still in hibernation and with its food reserves already spoiled and inedible. The two other Koorivar evacuation ships, the SHUNDAR and the SHANIZAR, are unfortunately likely to experience the same kind of systems degradations and may get lost in space if left to their own devices. When we saved the VEON SHOURIA and its occupants from their icy tomb on Eris, I then vowed to Captain Shanandar, who is now standing beside me, to help him find the rest of his people if and when we ever become able to travel among the stars. Well, that time has now come and I fully intend to honor my promise to him. However, I also have a responsibility to all of you, who are all very dear to me. I would never force you and your family members to participate in what will be a risky, even dangerous mission, just to honor a personal promise. I thus called you here this morning to inform you of my intentions and to give you the choice of either staying on board and participate in this search and rescue mission, or to leave the ship and stay safely within the Solar System. For those who will prefer to stay behind, I will arrange alternate places of living and employment while the KOSTROMA travels through the stars. Be assured that no one will blame you for deciding to keep your family safely inside the Solar System. However, I can assure you that all who will accept to come will be useful for our mission. This includes the owners and employees of our commercial concessions on the Main Promenade, who are most welcome to join us in this adventure. For those owners who will come with us, I offer them a suspension of their rent payments during our trip, as I doubt that you will find many paying customers where we are going. I will now let you some time to decide with your family members if you want to stay in this system or go with the KOSTROMA. If you need more time to decide, then I will happily delay our departure for a few days to let you take an informed decision. Don’t feel pressured in coming along and don’t fear any negative repercussions if you decide not to come. The choice is now yours, my friends.’’

There was then a heavy silence around the auditorium, a silence that was however quickly broken when Priya Mistry jumped to her feet and shouted out loud, surprising her own family.

‘’I AM WITH YOU, CAPTAIN!’’

That prompted at once dozens of other crewmembers to also jump on their feet and yell their willingness to come. That caused a snowball effect around the auditorium among the single crewmembers present, who all volunteered for the mission. The married members of the crew took more time to take their decision, as they consulted their spouses and children first, but everybody voiced their decision within minutes. Tina felt tears come out of her eyes when she saw that not one single crewmember, commercial concession owner or employee decided to stay behind. When she spoke, it was with a trembling voice full of emotions.

‘’Thank you my friends, thank you from the bottom of my heart. I couldn’t ask for a more worthy group of people to be with. I will ask you not to inform others outside of this ship about our intentions, as public and political reactions to our planned mission are hard to predict and could be negative. We will now power up our engines and go to the Jupiter System, where I will inform personally Governor Robeson about our mission before we leave for the stars. Bless you all, my friends.’’