Star Fields

Chapter No.61 Launch

Chapter No.61 Launch

Nothing's better than a new bed.

Alexa, Margaret, Marie, Molly and I stepped into our new, fully completed vessel.

"Wow!" Molly exclaimed. "This ship feels much more spacious!"

"It should be. It technically has room for a hundred of us," I said.

"Why do we need a hundred cabins?" Alexa asked. "There are only five of us."

"There are only twenty cabins at present. The extra space gives us the option of expansion," I replied. "All of the cabins are larger, but we might want to make them even larger."

We checked out my quarters, which is the same size as Molly's, Marie's, Margaret's and Alexa's. The others are slightly smaller, but even they were much larger than the ones on Explorer-1.

"Wow!" Marie exclaimed. "You have a much larger kitchen and dinning area."

"The living area doesn't suck either. It has room for two performing stages."

"Who's going to perform?" Alexa asked.

"The androids. They're programmed to entertain."

"I'm glad we aren't," she said.

"Actually, you are," I said.

Her eyes grew larger before she squinted. "You're kidding me, right?"

"No, I'm serious. The android programming for performing music and dance are in your cybernetic brain."

"That's crazy!"

"Not really. Molly and I might have you perform for us."

"Does that include Margaret and me?" Marie asked.

"Yes. You are under our control." I turned to Molly. "Isn't that right?"

"Yes it is," she said, grinning. "I think that Jason and I would love to see you three dance."

"Of for heaven's sake!" Margaret blurted. "I would be a real klutz!"

"Actually, you wouldn't," I said. "Performing is built into your brain."

"We would be boring," Marie said. "I would think that our assistants would be more prolific at entertaining you."

Molly and I chuckled.

"You're right," I said. "We won't make you do anything embarrassing."

Marie looked around the large living area. "All of this room for each of us and a couple of assistants."

"Actually, you may have four assistants," I told her.

"Assistants are like slaves," Alexa said. "Why do we need that many?"

"You don't, but it gives them something to do. We need to activate more of them so that they are ready at a moments notice in case of an attack."

"It creeps me out to have them watching me while a bathe, dress and exercise."

"It's only an illusion. We are continually observed, listened to and recorded. There is no privacy."

"I suppose it's the price we pay for being androids," Molly said. "We are no longer human, but we still feel like a human. It's the dichotomy of being dead but still cognizant."

"I think it's healthier not to dwell on that," Marie said.

We all agreed, and everyone went to their respective quarters.

After they left, my four android assistants appeared. I still had Alice and Ellen, but I decided to add a redheaded female android by the name of Betsy and a male android by the name of Ben just for some variety. Surprisingly, Molly, Marie, Margaret and Alexa didn't elect to add males to their assistant crews.

I did something human when I shook their hands and personally welcomed them to their new assignments.

When I shook Ben's hand, I gave him a wink. He reacted by smiling.

I went to my bedroom and settled into my new larger and more luxurious bed. Even though I didn't really need to sleep, I still enjoyed relaxing in my bed while watching old TV shows and movies. It kept me in touch with my human origins.

Once everyone had spent the night in their new quarters, we all gathered the next morning to take Explorer-2 out for a maiden cruise. Molly had found a possible habitable system only 156 light years away.

"Take us out, Judy."

Judy activated the controls and we were soon out of orbit and accelerating away at 0.5 of light.

"Okay, Judy, let's see if this big slug can do the warp."

We immediately went into warp, causing a momentary disorientation. I checked the engineering status and found that we were at over warp 18 with no obvious problems.

I turned to the others. "Well, It looks like everything is functioning as planned."

They didn't reply. There is always a certain feeling of trepidation about going to warp.

After a ten-minute ride, we came out of warp in a G4 class dwarf star with six planets, one of which was in the habitable zone.

"The planet is slightly smaller than Earth," Molly said. "It has a breathable atmosphere and liquid water on its surface."

"That sounds encouraging," I said.

"I'm not picking up any transmissions or collimated beams of light," Margaret reported.

"The planet is over eighty-five percent water," Molly said. "There are only a few island chains nearer to the equator. The poles have large amounts of ice."

"We are in orbit, Jason."

"Thank you, Judy. Keep us in stealth mode."

After several minutes of careful observations, Molly had a report. "There are structures on the largest island of the longest chain. They don't appear to be natural."

"Put us in geosynchronous orbit over that island, Judy."

After several more minutes, Molly gave us the news. "There is evidence of intelligent life down there. I see movement, but we're too high to make out what's moving."

"Launch an insect probe, Judy."

It required fifteen minutes for the probe to penetrate the planet's atmosphere and then to launch the insect probes. We soon received video feed from them.

"They look very human," Molly said. "I'll run a thermo profile on them."

After several minutes, she had a result. "Their profiles are a perfect match for human."

"Hopefully, the Scath haven't found a new way to fool us," I said. "Let's stay in orbit for a day or two and observe them more closely. I don't want to get fooled like the last time we thought we had found humans."

Everyone was in agreement with that.