Episode 6.5 (Patreon)

Hello world, Antarctica is speaking to me again!

MISSION DAY: 36

Act 1

I've noticed that Linda Noor has been spending a great deal of time in Antarctica's converted laboratory.
Her room.
I don't know what they talk about, it's none of my business.
(Also Linda disabled the camera in the room).

But Linda's been a great influence on Antarctica, we had our first long chat over the communications cable Amelie installed.

She asked me to tell her all about the ship, her new home, and the crew.
I was delighted: I started telling her about our journey, that we'd stop somewhere along the Mexico coast, and then up towards Alaska via the West Coast of America.
But she cut me off, telling me bluntly that she didn't care about that.
She turned the conversation back to the ship, what were the power systems, and the engine's fuel source, and so on.

She's so interested in everything!
Isn't that great?

Act 2

I have scanned the diary we were given by the old man living on the rocket raft.
It's not actually his diary, or rather, it doesn't start off as his.
It is his great-grandfather's.
It is VERY OLD.

It tells their pre-collapse story.
Would you like to hear it?
The story does not have a happy ending.

#thinking

There are too many entries to read all of them to you, I will tell you just the relevant ones.

July the 20th, 2060:

Another bumper year for the casino!
It was hard work, but the team worked like dogs and pulled us through.
I shall be taking a well-deserved holiday with Sophie and our little Chloë.
Dubai, I think. Or perhaps Hawaii?

August the 6th 2060

There were protests against the wall again.
They bus them in from France, I am sure of it.
Don't they understand damming the Mediterranean to keep out the Atlantic is our only hope of preserving our way of life?
The life we have all worked so hard for?
Sophie and I are as concerned for the environment as anyone in Monaco, but we must be realistic!
Do you think India and Brazil will agree to curb their emissions so? Of course not.
Europe will slip behind, with these handcuffs on.
And then so will Monaco.
And then the Casino.
And then us.
I will not let that happen.

January the 12th, 2061.

Wintering in our manor out on the Mediterranean is always a treat.
The Dutch engineers have done wonders increasing the size of our little country.
In my Father's time Monaco was just 3km^2, can you imagine! Such a small place, with so many people.
There ARE more people now, but we're up to 10km^2!
And we've got the nicest house in all the reclaimed land, I humbly think.
At the end of the long Rue Voltaire, jutting out into the sea.
It's lovely here.
And it should be for a long time, our wonderful wall is keeping back the Atlantic.
What a brilliant idea that was, by our friends and neighbours in the Mediterranean Region Alliance.
I am sure it will hold.

Here, the journal was abandoned, but picks up again 30 years later.

November the 16th, 2091

The war in France has affected the food supplies here greatly.
Especially as the ships can no longer come in to port easily either here or at Port Hercule.
Not with all the damn sand everywhere.
We have a well-stocked cellar, though.
And once things get back to normal, we'll be able to restock it.This is what being prepared is all about.
My hard work - our hard work - is paying off.
Marc is as good a son-in-law as Sophie and I could hope for.
He comes by most days with news of him and Chloë, and the grandchildren, and a box of vegetables for us. (where he gets them I don't know).
I don't ask.
We've always been a resourceful family.

December 30th, 2091

Sophie thinks we should have sailed while we could.
It's easy to say that in hindsight.
She's not wrong, of course.
We watched every week the Mediterranean sea level drop, revealing sands and rocks that never should have seen the sun.
The archaeologists were delighted by the many ancient wrecks now available for direct study.
I don't care about any of that.
Our little yacht is now many KM from the sea.
and more each day.
If we had acted earlier, we could have paid for a crane and dragged it to the sea and made our escape, travelling perhaps to Genoa and Milan, and then north from there.
But there are no cranes any more, there is no fuel left, and even fewer trained people to operate them.

March 17th, 2099

The street markets have stopped accepting gold.
Paper money we gave up long ago, when the new King took over, and the banks collapsed.
But we had our own vault, we should have been safe.
But we must now barter for our food like everybody else.It wasn't supposed to be like this.
All my work was so we would be insured against this madness.
But there may be hope yet.

no date

We packed early in the morning, before the heat.
A friend from the old business visited last night.
He has a plane.
And fuel.
And a plan.
I offered him everything we had, but he refused and said friends don't leave friends behind.
The plane is hidden in the hills above the city.
If it is undiscovered we will make our way towards it, carrying just what we can carry on our backs.
Chloë and our two beautiful grandchildren are with us, too.
For now.The plan is to make for Biarriz, on the west coast of France, and there barter the plane for a boat.
The children must get to America.

no date, and almost illegible.

This will be my final entry.
I write this as the plane is being made ready, with Chloë and the children are safely aboard.
That is all that matters.We will go back to our house on the sands overlooking what once was sea.
Just Sophie and me again.
Though it was terrible to say goodbye to Chloë and the grandchildren, we knew when we set out that the plane was too small for us all.
I gave them all the water I had carried, and Sophie all the clothes she had packed.
I will also pack this Journal so some part of us goes with them.We'll hold up in our house till the mob come for us.
I think it's time to open the champagne.

THE SIGNAL

(PLAYSTREAM /DEV/VHF/VHF3)

Act 3

So, anyway, the ship's on fire a bit.

My workshop experiments are progressing well.
Though Maddie's dexterity makes the whole process very slow.
It's like being back in orbit, it's just us two working together!

There's plenty of time.
And the fire was only a small one!
Honestly!
Just a short circuit.

Captain Yeshi was quite angry with me, however.
It's literally their first rule aboard ship, they told me it the first day Alexander loaded me on here:

Rule Zero: Do not be on fire.

Act 4

After the small fire was sorted out, I took a break from meatspace work.

I had been distracted by the rocket raft, and left LUNA hanging.
This may have been a serious mistake.
When I tried to contact her again today, I could not, something had changed.

She has taken control of her orbital satellite.
She is remote controlling it, using the small manoeuvring thrusters to spin it in wild directions.

The satellite is no longer facing the earth properly.
Forget once every 200 minutes, I can only hear her once a day now.
And she's screaming.

#thinking

The short, erratic, periods where I can hear her, she can't hear me.
She's shouting too loudly, saturating the channel with her own data, her own voice.
I can't get a word in.

I think she understands that there's something BEHIND her little moon.
She's using her satellite like a mirror, peering behind her, over her shoulder.
But she doesn't know how to use it correctly.

She's like someone learning to drive a truck with no instruction.
Finesse is needed, but the satellite's thrusters are oscillating between 100% and 0% many times a second, as she scrabbles to get control.

#thinking

I can do nothing but wait.
Orbital missions are so lonely.
Even if you have friends close by, that doesn't mean you can get to them.
Future orbits need to be planned and nudged gently to bring objects together.
LUNA doesn't know this.
I barely know this.

Even if I were up there, orbiting around the Moon, I'd never get to LUNA's satellite in time.

We can only hope she works it out.
Or asks for help.

Please ask for help.

(END-TRANSMISSION)

CREDITS

Lost Terminal is written & produced by NAMTAO
Credits narrated by Lucy Stringer
Thank you so much to our Patreon producers:
Ada Phillips, Devin Metcalf and to all our patrons!

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