After my last entry and considering my proximity to civilization I decided to check the galactic map for potential high tech stations nearby. I am now the proud own of a cheap class 1 Artemis. I also lucked out to find an affordable class 3 weapon to make stepping out my SRV all that much more safe.

I wasted no time exercising the new equipment. Finding a few biologicals signals a couple systems out in Wredguia QF-A.

b55-4 4 a is home to some bacterium vesicula, creating rash-like patches of blue-green sparsely on the planet's surface. I would have missed them had I not consulted various references on biological signs despite the deep surface scans. Easier finds of fonticulua campestris red grew copiously on this rock. Entire fields of the small mushroom like growths.

The references say that these bushy structures are actually a photosynthetic slime mold, and the bacterium seems to take its name from similarities to a toxic earth pathogen. I am no true botanist, but I curious what relationships of symbiosis or parasitism caused these two to develop as the primary life-forms on b55-4 4 a. I will hope that whatever lab buys up these samples will publish, and have already programmed my GNN browser to bring any such paper referencing these samples to my attention. A pre-emptive practice to remind me of the value of the pauses scrape these planets of such tiny samples.

The artemis suit is appreciated. The planets I have stepped upon have all been dangerously cold, but more so the automation of biological sampling cannot be understated in value. My training and care for standards of practice for quality, uncontaminated samples is only enough to ensure that I have the right equipment, and I expect that the growth of exbiology would be stymied if only qualified researchers could collect these samples.

After days of flying and not even being halfway to such a closely placed point of interest. Taking on a personal mission to collect these samples and succeeding in only one day was gratifying. I step back among the stars, a couple of single celled passengers heavier.

Cmdr Wyrm Shine

Addendum - I put the SRV through its paces today and my have scratched her a bit while using thrusters in low gravity to get a birds eye view. While she is plenty of functional at more than 95% integrity, I should break that habit while so far from repairs.

Another day of travel. Another... 40-ish lightyears. I jumped through 12 systems. I know I am still so close to civilization but I feel like I can finally stretch my legs.

I landed on two planets in Col 359 Sector XV. Two separate worlds in different systems light years apart. Nothing so quite notable as the vista's of the Behemoth in the Pink or Crucible's Harvest. Just a couple of rocks, smattered with bacteria. Stepping onto the soil I startled by the sudden fanfare of the navigation system verifying first footfall of an alien world.

A note on preparedness. I would like to purchase an artemis to create more thorough records of my encounters and exploration. The universe teams with life uncatalogued.

My last stop today, Col 359 Sector DA-Z d59, had a navigation beacon. I know the bubble of civilization is still so close, but this did surprise me. I had expected to at least have escape the regularly traversed routes of cruise ships. All the more surprising then, as I reviewed my logs in preparation for this entry I discovered that navigation had credited two small systems as first discovered by me. Two world-less stars I barely noted in making my way to the next that history says no human has laid eyes on before now bare my name.

I am so close to civilization that someone may easily come across those stars... well on their way back home as I just begin my journey. Universal Cartographic will credit them with the discovery as the first to bring their data home to civilization, perhaps to be a regular and short stop in other pilot's journey to the same vista I fly towards myself.

Or.

Maybe, in this galaxy of countless stars, no human will ever fly into these systems again. A forgotten corner of mankind's back yard. Quietly logged empty systems categorized and filed away in our databases.

In this fleeting pointless moment of history, a lonesome pilot signs off.

Cmdr Wyrm Shine

I have a primary interest in exploring. I would like to see my name written on many worlds and stars for first exploration. Unfortunately going deep in a direction and just jumping around can be exhausting to my interests. I have decided to start a deep space tour of points of interest as making my way to the bubble is unfeasible, and yet when I return to the bubble, despite the glut of possible and profitable activities, I find it far less interesting than the isolation of space.

First POI shall be Sadr Logistics Depot. It has an interesting view and I may be able to land for a while to remind myself why I dislike to be among civilization. I have not confirmed, but an eyeball of the galactic map puts it about as far from the bubble as I have ever been. Though I have been en route for a day now-steadily moving towards Sadr Region- I expect that I will have plenty of opportunity to jump into systems not yet logged, moving off-route to make bubbles of exploration as the mood moves me.

I suspect and hope that one day I will die out here, alone and in the deep. If I am lucky I will have the time to indelibly salt my name among the records of Universal Cartographic. To ensure my name is as unavoidable in the history of galactic exploration as Kit Ausland and Straha Yeager, before my corpse is lost among this beautiful sea of fiery gems.