NationStates Jolt Archive

Arrival
A massive silence prevailed across the open void, followed by a cold white blinding flash, as the transporter rendered itself from the jump.
Tau Ceti glowed brightly in the distance, if not a little dimmer than the sun of Earth. Closer a huge gas giant shone brightly off to the left, a faint ring of dust just visible.

The ship shuddered as the drives kicked in to bring it closer into the system, anticipation and some nerves were present, for if no rocky planet existed, they were truly in the shit. Some crew experienced nosebleeds, a strange phenomenon during space-time jumps. Usually effecting about 12% of passengers, something medics and scientists still could not figure out.
At about the same time, the other nation’s craft appeared from their jumps, contact was made between vessels and new calculated vectors were patched from Ceti1 to the others.

*sound edited*

People’s Republic of Mega Tau (http://www.angelfire.com/empire2/megatau)

A massive bang boomed across the open void

Erm... let me be the first to point out the blindingly obvious; there's no air in space, and thus no sound.

A massive bang boomed across the open void

Erm... let me be the first to point out the blindingly obvious; there's no air in space, and thus no sound.
*sigh* well done.

From the bridge of the Telamonian, Admiral Boorda looks out onto the new system.

He sees the Mega Tau and other friendly ships floating nearby…thousands of people sit on these steel shells, awaiting their futures. And we’re responsible for that.

Boorda's comm staff pick up the radio calls from the Mega Tau lead vessel and they work to confirm the Western Asian presence and to coordinate operations.

The Western Asian commander walks over to his station and taps in a few commands on a CommScreen and orders fly out to the Diomedes and off to the fighter bays of the Admiral’s own ship.

Soon, many of the fighters have been launched and zoom off to guard the fleet’s flanks and rear as the larger ships make for the planet’s orbit, the Diomedes positions itself to command the fighter squadrons but continues to move for the planet.

Cherie, the transporter commander, felt her confidence lift as she saw the Telamonian and Diomedes ships, everything was going to plan so far. She was eager to prove herself to the President, her aunt, for she was not one for nepotism and wanted to be in the position on merit.
The chief navigator checked over his on-screen display, the computer gave a best trajectory to approach and orbit of the gas giant, as they could not yet confirm where exactly the target planet was. "This may be the perfect task for Western Asia's scouts," she said to her second in command, "contact them and see if they can assist."

(Captain Freamon of DSC Tremble looks down on the new planet where Derto's first colony will form and thinks "My God, it's so beutiful."
He turns to the second and says "Give orders to prepare code blue, we're setting this baby down."
- "Yes Sir", turns on the intercome and "Code Blue, code Blue.")

EDIT:
Hmm, I might have been jumping on the gun. Taking a step to soon. Hell, I was damn tired when I wrote this. So the text that follows are more correct.

Captain Freamon turns to the second "Send a confirmation to the Mega Tau ship, stating that all is well, allthough some noseblood."
"Yes, Sir."
"And bring the trusters on line, we're have some traveling to do. We gotta find that planet."
"Yes, Sir."

The captain of the Diomedes, Vice-Admiral Kahane, received the message from the Mega Tau commander and a confirmation was quickly returned.

Kahane handed down the orders to the flight crew and they entered the course into their navigational computers. A wing of Hammerheads and Makos loaded with THARPS pods was called together and ordered to scout ahead of the Diomedes in search of the planet.

The task force begins to break away from the main fleet vessels now, the fighters leading the way as the Diomedes follows in their wake. The powerful sensors of the Diomedes are activated and begin to search for the planet--future home of these numerous people. The fightercraft move swiftly ahead, the THARPS pod sensors seeking any IR, Radio, or visual signs of the planet.

The Ceti1 Transporter cruised alongside the Diomedes, Telamonian and DSC Tremble, as the crew watched the Hammerheads and Makos move ahead of the fleet and then out of sight.

The fleet reached a geosynchronous orbit above the gas giant, the MT crew nicknaming the planet “Enigma”. It was hard to tell what was going on down there in its atmosphere, giant swirls would move across its surface from time to time. It appeared nearly as large as Jupiter, and seamed to have a slight bulge at what appeared to be it’s poles, which appeared to be tilted through 90 degrees. The faint dust ring encircled the planet in a way that made it look as it was on its side.
“I hope the target planet isn’t orbiting this thing”, Cherie thought. “What kind of weird environment would that create for our new home?”

If the planet was orbiting ‘Enigma’, would it be rotating around it’s own axis, or stationary like the Earth’s Moon. Would it’s rotational axis be tilted and by how much? These were questions she wished they had answers to.

After completing one full orbit of Enigma, they would set themselves on a course towards the inner part of the system, closer to the star and hopefully the target planet. This was if the scout ships didn’t come across ‘Ceti Prime’ on the other side of Enigma.

The navigational information was sent to the crews of DSC Tremble, Diomedes and Telamonian, with a summery outlining the plan for the next stage of the mission.



"EDIT:
Hmm, I might have been jumping on the gun. Taking a step to soon. Hell, I was damn tired when I wrote this. So the text that follows are more correct."
(OOC: Don't worry Derto, look at the blunder I made writing this while I was half asleep in the early hours one morning. Didn't even notice till awhile later, and then Tsaraine beat me to it, hehe!)

As the fleet orbited Enigma, two probes were deployed from Ceti1, there mission was to travel to the inner system in search of planets. They would transmit images every few minutes, giving the colonisation group a better idea of the inner system, hopefully showing a habitable planet.

They waited for word from the scouts on their progress, now probably on the other side of the huge planet.

As data and imagery started coming back from the probes, it became clear that some planets were possibly in orbit closer to the star.
"Contact the rest of the fleet and tell them we're heading to the inner system for a closer look, while the scouts explore the gas giant for any moons." Ordered Cherie, "They may want to leave one ship here for the scout craft, also we may need to return here later."
A new course was set that would bring them close to a planet the probe data had showed. The course data was sent to the rest of the fleet so that they could follow.

A short radio message is relayed from one of the scout teams to the Diomedes:

"Unknown object contact observed. Moving to investigate signatures."

Captain Freamon says to his second "Wire a message to the rest of the fleet that we're staying for the scout craft."

Message from Captain Freamon confirmed.

The transporter approached the inner planet slowly, they were still some distance off from the planned orbit.
Mission Commander Cherie wiped the sweat from her brow, and breathed a little easier. What she saw in the distance appeared to be a cool blue planet in a lazy orbit around it’s sun. It was still unclear what the surface was like, or what type of atmosphere it had.
Flashes came from the side of Ceti1 as 100’s of probes were spat from their launch bays. “Let’s start the digital image capturing”, she ordered, “launch DEMSAT1 and the Imagesat.” she added as she peered through the window at the planet.
DEMSAT1 would use LIDAR to bombard the planet’s surface with laser pulses that would bounce back and be received by a sensor. Recording the time taken to return, onboard software would calculate the terrain height of the area, thus creating a Digital Elevation Model. Post processing would sort ‘noise’ from real data to form high-resolution 3D terrain models. Merging the digital surface images from Imagesat over the terrain model would create a realist 3D image of the surface. This would be used to assist the First Contact Team (FCT) in choosing a suitable area to land, by being fed into simulator software allowing the team to practice their landing & surface movements before the real thing.
The probes would relay vital stats of surface temperature, atmosphere composition, and climate integrity.

Expeditionary Fighter Sqadron Echo-Delta-Novenine pulls itself to a standstill as the sensors of the THARPS pods scan what the pilot's eyes can already see--a large, solid-bodied planet and an accompanying moon.

The gravitational sensors indicate that the force is very close to that of Earth...and the range from the star is within the parameters indicated by the Mega Tau briefings.

The commander of the squadron, after a few minutes of awe, flips on his long-range radio, "This is Echo-Foxtrot Squadron Echo-Delta-Novenine for the Diomedes. We've confirmed the source of the signatures. It appears to be our planet."

It gave them no warning as it streamed around and over the transporter.
Pete was just about to check on his wife in the room next door when the overhead lights flickered slightly and his muscles stopped responding. The shuddering felt like a high-speed tremor and seemed to carry on for a couple of minutes.
Every person was motionless, but conscious to their breathing and that awful shuddering.

On the bridge the effect was the same.
Cherie realised that her eyes would not move their stare and she couldn’t even lift a finger. She could hear and feel her breathing, but why could she not move a muscle?
“What is that purple haze I’m seeing thru the viewindow?” She thought. She tried to speak but her mouth remained closed.
She could see her engineer out the corner of her left eye, his mouth was still slightly open, she remembered he was in conversation.

The shuddering was causing some rattling of fittings, but the lighting had stopped flickering, and then, after what seamed like a few minutes Cherie felt her muscles come back under her control. “What the hell was that!” She exclaimed trying not to sound in a panic but failing somewhat.

“Our sensors are detecting large amounts of activity around the hull and some minor surface damage as if we’ve been hit by debris.” Replied the engineer.
The chief navigator added, “We’ve also been nudged a bit off course by whatever that was.”
“Well we are now picking up small objects in our near vicinity, about 50cm in diameter, just a few kilometres off our port-side.” The engineer said, swinging his chair around so that he could face commander Cherie.
“Transmit a message to Dertonian & Western Asian Fleets to be watchful of this phenomena. Also confirm with WA that we've received their promising news.” She ordered, while noticing that about 30 minutes of time had gone unaccounted for…

The Ceti1 crew's spirits lifted on hearing the message from WA. A message was later transmitted to them requesting their present location in the system.

To the Mega Tau fleet;
"Roger that, we will put all our scanners on the highest resulotion and be extra careful. And now when tha planet has been found, we will travel towards the planet."

"Roger that Derto Fleet, we expect to receive sensor data and imagery of the planet soon", replied Cherie.
The transporter was brought into a geo orbit around the new planet, in preparation for a possible landing...

http://www.angelfire.com/empire2/megatau/new_mtplanet.jpg

A few weeks of orbiting had seen a vast amount of data received from the probes and 2 satellites.
Atmosphere and climate was suitable for humans, large oceans surrounded many small continents that were very young in geological terms.
One rotation taking 20.5 hours. Gravity was a little stronger than earth's, which required the citizens and crew to undergo continuous weight training to build muscle mass after the first readings came in. The weather fluctuated often and strong tides were controled by a nearby moon.

"Prepare the first contact team," ordered Cherie, "and contact the Dertonian fleet and inform them of our location so that they may join us." Crew went about their duties excited about what lay ahead. Some Celeborne medical engineers would attend the away team.
"FCT are ready and await your orders commander." the engineer said as he watched his display.

"Deploy the Drop-pod." she ordered, and with that they were jettisoned out the bottom of the ship with a burst of ionised particles. They plummeted towards the planet, the pod's surface heating up as they tore through the atmosphere. "All systems are looking good!" relayed the crew's leader, as the pod entered the atmosphere, making a streak across the alien-like sky.
The small gravitic drive automatically activated to reduce airpeed, the wave-guide projecting an intense field behind them, counteracting that of the planet's. After a few minutes, three huge white parachutes whipped open, allowing them a comfortable and slightly awkward landing. Touchdown!

On Ceti1, the crew waited for word from Western Asia about it's findings on the other planet...

The team of pilots had been searching the entirety planet closely for days now. The Diomedes had found a landing zone and had set down.

A few EVAs in protective suits and numerous atmospheric gas and microbe samplings had left the explorers with one determination: this might be the future.

The Hammerhead and Mako runs, having been carried out almost constantly from the Telamonian far above, provided high-resolution scans...but the lands were still very much unknown.

While higher-order life-forms had yet to be spotted, several small lifeforms...shrew-like...had been identified via the cameras of the ground scouts. This planet was not only able to support life--it had been able to make it as well.

Having completed the main tests, the Diomedes activated its antigravity system and as electricity began to run across the outer rim of the large ship it slowly rose into the air. Soon, the main engines were ignited and the ship rose into space.

The commander sent out his report: "Unknown planet Alpha is suitable. Congratulations to Mega Tau--we've found ourselves at least one new home."

Loud cheers went up in the bridge as the word came in from Western Asia.
The message was transmitted to the Diomedes and Telemonian, "Congratulations to all on your discovery. Good luck should you start colonisation. We will begun construction on a small town on the other planet in the coming weeks. We have transmitted the co-ords of the planet to you."

http://www.angelfire.com/empire2/megatau/mtcolony.jpg

Research continued into the phenomena they encountered after arrival, could it have been a side-effect of their journey? They doubted they would ever find out.
The transporter Ceti1 was set down on the planet, and the offloading and building began. Eventually the transporter would return to Earth, leaving behind a small space fleet and airforce.
Over the next month, an airfield and buildings were established by the construction and engineering crews, some crude infrastructure was put in place and then the research crew was deployed to explore the surrounding areas. MT biologists and researchers explored the region, cataloguing lifeforms.

A new life had begun for everyone, Mega Tau's first colony was born.

More citizens, supplies and equipment would be transported from Earth over the months, until they were self-sufficient.

"Well wouldn't you look at all the plantlife! Is it wonderful?"
"Yes, captain Freamon, it is"
"Tell me how is it going with our plans?"
"Well they are on scheudel(sp?) and every thing is proceeding without a glitch."
"Excellent"
"Any news from homeland, regarding Arani?"
"No sir, but the latest told that it wasn't going so well."
"Well if homeland fail, we will be there to carry on."
Captain Freamon started to take a evening stroll.