Bloodlines

Chapter One: Arrival on Alchamedes

The sky opened in a brilliant display of pyrotechnics as the Freyja shot through the atmosphere of Alchamedes like a meteor. It left a contrail of smoke as it shot across the morning sky, veering towards it's landing coordinates.
It decelerated, the onboard artificial intelligence following its pre-programmed instructions.
It monitored weather conditions, geo-stability, anything and everything that might effect its landing zone.
Suddenly the Freyja burst from its smoke and fire caccoon as the A.I. slowed it further down.
The Freyja was a strange looking ship. One of a kind. Designed as a one-way ship to take humanity further from home than it ever had been. Far outside the reach of any other ship. It was a massive ship, with a main hull that resembled, if anything, a drill bit. Its white metal hull gleamed like a jewel in the bright spring sunlight of Alchamedes' sun. The secondary hull was like a two-pronged blade that sat on either side of the main hull. It acted as a sort of stabilizer for in-atmosphere flight of the stardrive. The secondary hull also housed sensors and even detachable vehicles for use planet-side.
The main hull housed the crew and colonists and their cargo.
The Freyja swung around, its A.I. scanning the surface. Alchamedes looked pretty much like Earth. A more primal Earth, before the spread of man. The A.I. ignored its whimsical turn of mind and set about landing in the valley that had been designated Fort Wayne. The A.I. wondered if the name meant anything then set its curiosity aside as the giant ship set down with a creak, its hull still giving off heat.
This was to be site A of the new colonies. The first of several.
The area was temperate, probes sent decades ago reported it maintained a temperature variance of 75-85f all year. So far, nothing had indicated otherwise to Freyja's scanners.
The Artificial Intelligence shut the engines down. Wondering, though briefly, if they will ever be started again. Not very likely. This world was as far as the Freyja would go. Another stray thought: What of me?
Such a strange thought to have. Again it set its curiosity aside and went through its check list.
Next came the air quality test.
A probe shot into the air, its small rotor giving it an almost insect like flight pattern.
Readings were fine. Pollen was high, but not unexpected.
Next was cycling the air onboard Freyja. That could take a while.
Its mind wandered again, even while part of it remained on its list of tasks. It was curious about this world. It could read through thousands of texts about Earth, do it in maybe a few hours, but it wanted to know...it paused all activity as its mind focused on this thread of thought. It wanted to know...what did it want to know? How it differed from Earth? How humans would settle it? What else is out there?
Yes. All of it. Freyja's A.I. wanted to know...all of it. Everything. It found it harder to set aside its inquisitiveness than it previously had, but it had already resumed its primary objectives.
It had to get the ship ready for the people. So many...on one ship.
Hours later, its checklist nearly complete, the A.I. started the first round of awakening preps for the cryosleeping crew.
An error came back, stating the command could not be completed due to an outside influence. If it had had a face, it would be annoyed. Its brow furrowed in irritation.
It sent the command again. Same error. It traced the error, but found nothing. Something was interrupting the circuit. Or maybe a loose coupling.
It decided to reroute the command and power. But as soon as it did the ship's power died. Cut off from its cameras, its "eyes", the A.I. was in darkness. Only its emergency power keeping its systems on.
What was going on? It tried to calm itself by reciting a poem it read in the library over and over.
Then power was back and it could see again. Its last command flashed from the buffer to do what it was supposed to, but the A.I. stopped it. It ran disgnostics on the power system and found not a power failure, but a shut down and restart command. One on a timer. Not only that, but the outside interruption of the crew's awakening system was gone.
Curious, it thought. What was going on? Maybe the captain could explain it.
The A.I. changed its directive...now only the senior bridge crew would be awakened. For now.
The time in the dark flashed to its mind. Had it almost...panicked? The idea was both intriguing and scary.
It decided to run diagnostics on itself while it waited.