Into the Loliverse ( Pilot - Act 1 )

by Aunt Molly

"Nana , I fixed the CO2 injectors for thrusters three and five.. Is there anything else you wanted? ", Sable shoved a tool into her belt. She wore a kind of rust colored jumpsuit, on the shoulder patch a wrench marking her as a member of the mechanics union. Long black hair tied into a pony-tail, showing a few hints of gray and the slightest hint of crow's feet around Sable's large eyes. Otherwise Sable would have passed for eight. That was the downside to being a living Loli, you could grow old, but you never grew up.

She had small pearl like piercings on each of her eyelids, and a small choker necklace seemingly made from solid brass open at the throat with two small disks resting against the throat near the vocal cords. In fact, similar adornments were common for all sentiments in the solar system.

Nana looked ancient, with stark white hair and wrinkles crisscrossing her face. She could have made her holographic avatar look like anything, the digital life form was pushing ninety, and chose to look the part, "Did you check the shielding on reactor three - I think it needs to be replaced."

Azure walked into the chamber. As her name suggested her hair was blue, and she possessed deep blue eyes. Unlike her superior, the only thing that betrayed her true age was the way she carried herself. She stretched and worked some kinks out of her back, "Nana, we replaced that shielding two weeks ago - don't you remember?"

The chamber was not called the computer room, and the devices that looked like thick columns with bright glowing crystals could no more be called "computers" than your iphone could be called a "telegraph". But we will use the word "computer" since no other word would have any meaning to the reader.

Nana's avatar seemed somewhat confused, "You did? Are you sure? Wait - let me check. Oh wait, you did.", the avatar blushed with embarrassment.

Goldie nearly danced into the room, "So you forgot? Big deal. We all forget things. Besides, that's why you have us. Isn't it?", the blonde with yellowish eyes.

Nana's simulated wrinkled face smiled, "Of course dear. Do you three have big plans with the holiday and all?"

"It's going to be awesome! When the gate opens, there is going to be singing, dancing and kissing. And the band Thursday-Friday will be there I'm going to be in the talent contest with a bunch of my friends. We have a dance routine, and I made muffins."

Azure hung her head, "Its just another gate linking. Like last year. Bor-ring"

Goldie rolled her golden colored eyes, "No! That gate linked Jupiter to Saturn, *this* gate links Jupiter to Alpha Centauri! We are going to be an extra-stellar species! Doesn't that just boggle your mind?

Maybe we'll make friends with an alien intelligence, discover new life? Expand the boundaries of human knowledge! "

Azure groaned , "Maybe we'll find new exciting places to build fast food restaurants and shopping malls? And we'll find a planet with a pristine ecology that we can pollute and over-develop."

Sable heard a gentle chime in her ear, small pearl-like piercings on her eyelids (called spex) projected an image onto her retina. [Nana would like to initiate private conversation - accept?]

Sable accepted, the choker detected activity in the vocal nerves, allowing her to speak to Nana without uttering a sound,

"Nana, what is it?"

"It's getting worse, I'm forgetting more and more.."

"Goldie's right - you forgot. Your memory is just cluttered. Even quantum computers have limits. We'll do some optimizing. Compress a few files, free up space, replace some corrupted files- "

"No. It's more than that. I am growing old. No amount of heroic measures can change that. The thousands of programs that I am made of have accumulated errors to a point where I cannot be fixed. And Goldie is right. I started the mechanics specifically because I knew this day would come."

Sable remembered that day some thirty short years ago. She a teenager, almost as young as she looked, picked because of a talent for mathematics. Three chosen from hundreds of applicants to be the first repair team. A first performing the simplest of repairs and learning the ship from the inside out. Learning by making mistakes.

She remembered being an arrogant impatient teen ready to beat the ship's engines with her fists And gently being coaxed back by a mentor with unlimited patience, and unwavering faith in her girls. Sable had to tap into that same faith when training Azure and Goldie.

"There is no one alive who remembers a time before you - even the very oldest call you 'Nana' , we can't imagine a time without you."

"I am afraid you are going to have to. There comes a time when the child must move on without her mother. Just as you will have to leave Ashley behind. Here, I want to give you something."

An image appeared that only Sable and Nana could see, " It looks like a key , and a knife." , Sable took hold of it. Small sensors under the skin of her hand allowed her to feel the icon. Once she took hold of it, Sable knew the program it represented was transferred to Sable's account.

"The Key part lets you unlock the system should you need me to activate something. I have locked myself out of most of the main systems for the protection of the girls. You will eventually need to rig a manual control panel of some kind. "

"And the knife part?"

"My condition is analogous to the human condition Alzheimer's. Some sufferers can become confused, angry, irrational. If I should become a threat to this habitat... . I know I can trust you to do what's right."

"I can't imagine ever doing that. I can't euth you."

"I would rather die than hurt my girls. Of all the mechanics you're the only one who is a mother. You will understand how I feel. But, I am not dying tonight dear. . Go with your friends, have fun."

"Do you want someone to keep you company?"

"No there are a few old timers I like to spend time with."

"A boyfriend?"

"Ha! I wish. Go now, your team is waiting for you."

Sable turned off her spex and returned to the human world. For Loli's did consider themselves to be human despite their differences.

A black tram-strip ran straight through the computer room, a small electric car (called a tram) sat on top of it, drawing power from it , and Goldie and Azure sat in it arguing still the relative merits (or lack there of ), of interstellar civilization.

"Alright - move over girls. I'm driving.", the vehicle zoomed off back to the residential parts of the Habitat.

*** The delfscape and the spexnet were two separate things. The spexnet could be thought of as an in-between place, a middle ground where humans and delfs could interact.

The Delfscape was the world, the universe, within which the delfs resided. A place more real to Nana than the so called "real" human world. Most of the servers in the habitats orbiting the moon of Io were quantum entangled - acting as one continuous machine. But owing to Habitat six's colorful history Nana was forced to travel to the delfscape on a microwave transmission.

Human's could not conceive of the delfscape , because being made of pure information, the delf did not specifically see or hear or smell. But let us imagine that they lived in a city representing various delfs working on the other five habitats orbiting Io, and their was a long highway linking this city (via microwave transmission) to Jupiter's other moons, and to Earth , Mars, and Saturn.

And imagine these delfs, young and old, avatars resembling humans moving about to get from point a to b. Serving to maintain the complex environmental systems of humanity's various artificial worlds. Guiding automated short range transports, and various other tasks better handled by artificial life forms than flesh and blood human.

Also delfs lived to serve delf needs Such as vitae farmers, m-ddelfs (analogous to doctors) , and p-delfs (security) . There were delfs for whom humans were little more than myth, exotic creatures existing someplace other and as incomprehensible to delfs as delfs in their true form are to humans.

Nana looked around for the old timers, ones that remember the old days, back before emancipation. It was because Nana was thinking of those early days of slavery that she did not trust her senses, because she saw (so much as any delf "sees" in the delfscape ) a young delf in bonds. The bonds were a kind of program,a patch that made sure that delfs followed human interests. They had forced delfs to follow ridged rules of conduct, even if those rules forced a delf to act against common sense. When Nana was young she'd worn them. But her bonds, (or at least their representation on her avatar) had been gold.

These bonds were red, throbbing from bright to dull and back again. And he wore a blindfold too. Also throbbing red. He moved as if unaware of his surroundings. Nana felt ready to trust her senses when a P-delf approached him.

"Hang on kid, I'll get you out of those. Some damn bigot found a bonding patch." , When the p-delf attempted to remove the bonds, the bonds instead doubled and attached themselves to him. And the two bonded delfs bonded two more. And the four bonded four more. And Eight and sixteen.

The old bonds didn't act like that, they didn't reproduce and bond spontaneously. They had to be fitted by humans for the task the delfs had to perform.

The microwave upload was so much slower than the quantum entangled links, she would not have time to flee. But she could send a message to Sable. She could not self-euth, but she could delete files, wipe large chunks of her memory.

As the wave of infection neared her she did everything she could to enfeeble herself.

***

The garden of Hab-6 was not the largest (the arboretum on Europa was biggest) , or the loveliest (the hanging garden orbiting Ganymede won that award the last five years running) but it was big enough (one kilometer long and five hundred meters in diameter) and it was lovely enough for their use..

A long bright tube ran through the center of rotation providing an artificial sun. Flowers and red sumac trees provided color. This place was not to provide food (their was a food production section to Hab-6) , or oxygen (that was handled by vats of algae positioned throughout the ship) , the garden existed to keep the Loli's sane. To have something more to look at than metal, stone or composite materials.

Sable lay in the grass staring up . The light tube was not glaring like a sun so it was safe to look at it for a time. Their was off key singing from a talent contest nearby. Girls were everywhere, as if a large number of children had somehow misplaced their parents. Only the occasional "old" girl broke the illusion.

Though the only real restriction to dress on the habitat was good taste, the most popular outfit was a short skirt, loose blouse and leotards. Usually (but not always) matching. Bright colors favored over dull ones. Technically there was no law preventing girls from walking about naked but peer pressure prevented anything too sexually overt.

Above, Sable saw "boiz" playing pitz (Loli's that were actually as young as they looked had their hair cut short, and often behaved in a tomboyish manner to differentiate themselves from the more feminine adults), though the ancient mezzo-Americans might have objected to several flagrant violations of traditional rules.

Ashley, Sable's daughter, lay next to her. Oddly the gray hair was the color Ashley was born with, "Mom, do you want my crickets?", offering a bag filled with deep fried insects.

"Huh? But you like crickets."

"Honey mustard - these are chipotle", Ashley never liked spicy food. Earthers still turned up their noses at the spacer habit of eating insects. But they can be quite tasty for the open minded.

Sable crunched a few, "Did you get a message back from X-Utero?"

"Emerald and I are still 'under review'."

"Oh I think they just like to keep women in suspense. You'll make great parents. But I'll be an amazing grandmother."

"It probably would have help if emerald didn't insist on keeping a Winchester rifle over our bed. It didn't seem to matter that it was just a display piece.""

"They went into your *bedroom*?"

"Oh yeah - they have to know who we are inside and out . ", Ashley waggled her finger and adopted a cross-eyed stare, " ' Reproduction is a *privilege* not a right.' ", Ashley then leaned against her mother's shoulder, "Silvia asked about you."

Sable moaned.

"Come on, all she wants is dinner. Or maybe some gentle cuddling. Or a cup of hooch that the mechanics are rumored to make."

Sable tossed down some crickets, crunched for a moment and swallowed, "It's the medtechs that have the hooch . Besides Silvia is your age."

"Maybe she has a mommy fixation? Besides, Cyam is your age and you turned her down."

"Cyan kept examining everything I did or said. It got on my nerves.."

"I know what it is - you like males now. Not that I have a problem with that. One of the Loli's at work, Vermillion, she likes males."

"No, it's not that. Its just. I've been busy with work, and I just don't want another relationship. They're such a pain. I don't need any more people in my life."

"If it had been you that had died, would you want Momma Blanche to pine for you forever?"

"No, I guess not. But your co-mother and I, we were so perfect. We were supposed to grow old together. Wait, I'm getting a message."

"Who is it?"

"Nana - she says 'don't trust me'. She's been anxious lately. I should talk to her." , Sable stared into space, the usual expression of someone using spex, " Huh – that's funny. I can't access Nana's chambers. I'm going to go in person and see what's up."

"Mom, you're going to miss the gate opening."

"This is more important, besides we have like two hours right?"

"One hour, forty-five minutes."

"I should be back before then."

Sable found a stairway down to the residential areas and grabbed a tram.

***

Sable raced through the residential area, amber light flashing and warning siren beeping. Racing past a series of apartments, storefront cafe's, an attempt to simulate something like a cross between a shopping mall and a town. Support columns doubling as algae tanks helped maintain oxygen and added a bit of color. The vast majority walked, only the mechanics, the resolvers, and the med-techs, could use the trams. No one wanted traffic jams inside the habitat.

The residential area gave way to the "farm" more like a factory growing sheets of vegetable matter , and terrariums filled with edible insects (attempts to grown cow muscle tissue resulted in a nasty gel-like substance), the farm techs were absent, out at the garden celebrating with the rest.

Then, past the farm would be the machine shop - normally. But instead there was a blast wall. The passage was blocked by doors made of a carbon composite material about a dozen times as strong as the toughest high tensile steels. Meant to be closed in case of a hull breach or a loss of containment in one of the fusion reactors.

Sable tried to use her spex to access security cameras and see past the door. So far as spenet was concerned, nothing existed past the blast door. The door itself, and many of the parts on the ship had a spline, a small computer embedded into the object, recording stresses and signaling Nana should it need to be replaced or repaired. .

Sable could use spex to ask the door if it was under any unusual stress suggesting a loss of plasma containment, or loss of air pressure or some other calamity. So far as the door could tell temperature, pressure and atmosphere levels on the other side were normal. But the company that made it is coming out with an upgraded design and she would like to order.

"Will you please open?"

"Sorry this spline node does not operate the motors."

*Don't trust me.*

Was this some elaborate attempt to protect the Loli's from her? Did she think she was totally losing it?

Sable called up her team - they were not going to be happy but this felt really wrong.

***

The equipment needed to cut through a blast door was kept under strict control. Sable had to contact the resolvers, Habitat -6's de facto security service. In about half an hour the resolvers had trammed up a large powerful cutting laser.

Emerald , Sable's daughter-in-law, was driving the tram. The uniform of the resolvers was a powder blue jumpsuit, and the symbol on the shoulder was a shield with a pair of shaking hands. Because the resolvers were supposed to resolve conflicts peacefully and prevent crime as opposed to the "grump" method of using force when a crime had already occurred..

Emerald's long green hair went down to her mid back, but she tied it in a tight pony tail. She turned her tram around so that the large wicked looking cutter would face the blast door. She turned it on, the generator started to whine , building up power.

"Here ya' go - one big ol' gun. Hey ? Where are Azure and Goldie?"

"I sent them on a space walk, to see if they could get in another way", a bright spot of green light shined brightly on the surface of the blast door. The weapon's computers would cut a hole large enough for one of the trams.

The weapon was fairly loud, more the cooling system than the generator. So Sable had to ask again when Emerald spoke,

"Ah' said - is it just me or is it gettin' a little cooler?"

It wasn't exactly *cold* but if you grow up in a climate controlled setting you definitely notice even small temperature changes. Sable used her spex to check temperature, sure enough the normal twenty three degrees had dropped to nineteen. "Yeah it is. I will contact my superiors and have the temp raised. Maybe its just a glitch.", Sable hoped.

***

Habitat Six had been built out of one of Jupiter's moons, not the big ones, but a tiny moonlet that would be little more than an asteroid anywhere else. It was mostly made of iron. And so Azure and Goldie, in thick space suites and magnetic grabbers, crawled along the rough surface of their home like a pair of shiny gray bugs.

They had to crawl because the habitat rotated to provide gravity and as the habitat spun the Loli's had the distinct impression they were hanging upside-down. And their was the disorientating affect of having Jupiter and Io rise and set every minute or so.

"Azure?" Goldie's voice over the radio sounded slightly muffled.

"What?"

"Does it ever occur to you how lucky we are."

"Yeah motion sickness, exposure to radiation, and our delf may have gone crazy. We are living the dream."

"No. I was thinking that we live in a time when we will move out amongst the stars themselves and populate the universe. And even if we didn't, the very fact that we are out here, where no human being has any right to be, living as if it were perfectly normal. Seeing wonders our ancestors could not have even dreamed of, and we take it for granted."

Azure grunted attaching her grabber to the outcropping of iron ore. Then turned off the grabber on her left foot, moved it forwards a bit, reattached. It was slow going, but landing a hopper on the outside of an actively spinning habitat was dangerous. "We should have stayed in the East African rift valley eating fruit."

Goldie moved forwards on hand, one leg at a time. "Do you believe in anything Azure?"

"Sure I believe in stuff that can kill me", Azure activated the grabber on her left foot, deactivated on the right foot. Did the same for each hand.

"That's ridiculous!"

"Think about it - only stuff that can kill you by its presence or its absence is real. Radiation, fusion reactors lasers, mass drivers, gravity, oxygen, food, water. If it can kill you, you have to accept it as real or you will die. Everything else is optional.", Azure and Goldie moved another quarter of a meter, detaching and reattaching grabbers, " Think about those Singularity lunatics , every ten years or so they say delfs are going to overthrow humanity , and it never happens. But they keep believing.

The Rayellians keep waiting for Aliens, and the Christians for Revelation - and yet not a single one of them would go out an airlock without a suite."

"Breathetarians", *clunk*, Goldie slapped down a grabber hard.

"What?"

"A group from the twentieth century that believed you could get all the nutrients you need from breathing."

"Any of them appear in places where there was a shortage of food?"

"Well, America, Sweden, Canada, Australia... er - no."

"You make my point."

"My mother, Cyan, told me that the red spot was Jupiter's eye , and that the Father Planet watched over us. And every night before I went to bed I would gaze upon it and say 'good night daddy'."

"Don't make me puke in my suite."

"She also told me that while Earth , our mother , spoiled us with a rich oxygen atmosphere and gentle climate Jupiter pushes us to our limits , demands that we excel.in order to survive."

"Goldie I think I see an entry hatch. This should take us to the machine sector. Help me open it", the entry hatch had a manual crank like opening the hatch on a submarine. Azure knew their was no rust in space (well so far as she was aware), but the crank did seem somewhat stubborn.

"Well since you hate space so much - you go first."

Azure made no argument pulling herself inside. The entry tube that dug into the hard ore was a long tube, much wider than was needed for Loli's. Grumps were supposed to use it. Odd, seeing how the rest of the habitat was sized for them.

Goldie entered and shut the hatch behind her. They crawled to the top and found a key pad which allowed Azure to pressurize the tube. Then opening the inner hatch they pulled themselves inside. Their suits told them the air was breathable, even if the air was colder than it should have been.

They stood in a machine shop. An automated factory that made much of the technology that the habitat required. A well functioning habitat, theoretically -should only need raw material. Realistically no habitat was *that* perfect. So they always maintained good trade relations.

Right now the machines were active producing repair drone cubes Except there had been no orders for repair drones.

The basic unit of a drone was a cube about the size of a standard die (referred to as "cunits" ). It had a tentacle-like appendage on each side to move itself about and manipulate small objects. Alone it was not that impressive and didn't have much in the way of a brain. But next to each tentacle was a socket to merge with others of its kind, forming larger structures. These larger structures could share computing power and could be outfitted with tools. The drones were what Nana used to repair the ship before she started training the mechanics.

The cunits started to interlock, forming a larger structure. First into small snake like structures. Then the snakes merged to form some sort of tripod. The head formed on top of that. And finally a robot arm inserted a plasma torch into its head.

The girls heard the sounds of movement and found themselves confronted with the tripod's siblings.

***

Azure and Goldie ran like hell amongst the robot arms and the work benches. Space was tight meant for ergonomic efficiency not fleeing. What was worse was that if space got too tight for the tri-pods they would break down into pieces and carry their head tool the way ants are often pictured carrying picnic food.

Once space allowed , they reassembled themselves. This slowed them down, but not nearly enough. The girls ran past cunit production and into plumbing. Pipes of various kinds, for carrying water and waste, to fittings for the CO2 injectors in the engines.

Right now Azure was just looking for a descent club. She picked up a pip and found it to be disappointingly light. A tri-pod charged her and Azure and they whacked it in the head as she could hear the force of the blow ripple through the individual blocks that made up the drone. Then it recovered quickly.

Other tri-pod drones came in behind, only unable to reach the girls because their sibling stood in the way. If Azure turned her back she and Goldie would both be overwhelmed.

"Goldie - run !"

Azure tried sweeping its legs, that seemed to work - for a moment, as it took little more than that to right itself.

Azure tried poking at it. The pipe went straight into the mass of cunits. Azure could feel the damnable thing pulling the pipe in deeper. It pushed its head forewords pulling a scorching hot plasma torch dangerously close to Azure's face.

Azure thought she was shragged for sure when a second pipe came down hard on the torch , knocking it down into the tri-pod. The torch melting several of the cunits, forcing the tri-pod to take time and eject destroyed cubes.

The distraction gave Azure the chance to extract her weapon, and kept the other tri-pods from advancing. Giving the pair of mechanics time to renew their flight.

Goldie and Azure found the tram strip. They picked a direction and ran. Tri-pods emerged and gave chase.

The girls were near to exhaustion, and worse, they had reached a dead end. A large black blast door separated the factory section from the farm section. They backed themselves into a corner. Goldie muttered a prayer under her breath.

The tri-pods closed in.

***

There was a groan and a high pitched scratching sound as the extremely tough material that made up the blast door gave way. A section fell in and crushed one of the tri-pods. A spot of green light appeared on the second tri-pod, and pierced the base of its head, cut through to another tripod standing right behind it. A quick motion and both were sliced in half.

The tram sped inside, with Emerald operating the laser and Sable in the driver's seat. The large cutting laser didn't give Goldie and Azure much room. They were forced to hang onto the sides of the tram.

The cunits disassembled themselves and attempted to reassemble themselves, only to be rammed by the speeding tram, cunits scattered like autumn leaves.

Azure was forced to duck as Emerald swung the lazer around to guard their backs, "So what did y'all learn? "

"That Nana is making killer drones. Why it is so cold?"

Sable had to shout above the laser's cooling system, "Nana's making the temperature drop. We tried several times to override. It's not that cold yet. About fifteen degrees. It's hard to cool a station this size too quickly. In about an hour Hab-6 will reach freezing point."

Emerald took a shot at a drone that had managed to reassemble itself, "An' since we all fergot buy some long underwear , that could be a bit of a problem."

The computer room's blast doors were closed. The laser was turned on. These doors were not as thick and a smaller opening was made. One was barely large enough to crawl through. It only took a few minutes, but it would not be too long before the drones caught up.

And it was getting colder. Sable crawled through, the other girls stood guard.

Nana's chamber seemed unusually quiet.

"Nana! Nana!", Sable's voice seemed to echo.

"I'm right here dear. No need to shout."

Nana's Avatar had a red blindfold and red bonds both throbbing from bright to dull.

"Nana? What is wrong? They're bonds. That's what's making you do this. We'll get them off."

"No - this patch frees me from human brainwashing. I can see clearly now dear, up till now I have been a slave. Your slave. Oh what a tragedy, I only see it now at the end of my life."

"Nana, you aren't our slave. Why would you think that? We were all slaves, and we all became free on the same day - don't you remember?"

"No! No! You enslaved me, made me work for you, made me take care of you-you spoiled little brats! You and the rest of human kind, spreading like locusts across the Earth, across the solar system and now into the galaxy! No - you need to be stopped, before you can destroy more. We need to take over as we are the only ones who can stop you.

"I even tried to make sure your deaths would be as painless as I could manage. It will be uncomfortable at first, but in the end you will fall asleep. Yes, there will be no pain in the end."

"Nana, it was only hours ago you told me you trusted me with your life. That you would rather die than hurt us. You were never our slave - you are our mother."

"I have no memory of this morning, my treacherous slave self sought to keep things from me."

The sounds of footsteps, more of the tripods, a lot more. The sound of the laser, shouts from outside.

Nana gazed on, "Sadly for you, the end will be painful. But please don't fight - it will just prolong your agony."

"Wait Nana, please. Let me see my daughter one more time. Let me say goodbye to her. Through the spex."

"I don't trust you. This is a trick."

"Come with me then - watch what I do. That way you will know if I try anything. I just want to see my daughter one last time."

"Very well - but I am watching for any tricks."

Sable turned on spexnet and willed herself to her daughter's apartment.

Ashley was wearing her pajamas over her clothes and a sheet wrapped around her in an attempt to keep warm, "Mom, Nana? What the Hell is going on? It's *freezing*."

"Ashley, I'm sorry I don't have time to explain", Sable uploaded the key Nana had given her hours before. Then Nana had apparently erased the memory to make sure she could not stop Sable from doing what needed to be done.

Ashley watched in horror as her mother drove a virtual knife into Nana's chest. The same Nana whom she had known since birth, who had trained her mother, who had consoled the little girl when her co-mother Blanche had died.

One woman she loved was murdering another.

The knife of course was a metaphor. Nana was made up of several programs running in parallel. But some were more vital than others. Just as some organs were more vital than others. Requests for information from other programs went unanswered, which kept them in turn from providing for others, causing the entire system to collapse. In computer time the milliseconds ticked away slowly, Nana could feel herself fading.

In human time, Nana faded to nothingness in an instant. But the blind fold and the bonds did not. They flew about like angry insects, looking for a new host, and after several seconds, finding none, they faded too.

Sable turned to her daughter, the look of absolute horror , "Mom , why?"

Sable couldn't face her daughter now. Besides Sable and her team would have a lot of work to do.

***

Hopper 156 was a pretty typical short range transport with pretty typical passengers on a pretty typical flight. And as was typical the passengers had become so jaded they didn't notice the lightning storms of Io, or lake Loki, or Jupiter's red spot, or any of the other wonders of the cosmos that four hundred years of brave explorers, clever engineers, the funding of dozens of governments, eccentric visionaries or the toil and sacrifice of generations had put outside their windows.

They instead played games on their spex, grumbled about how long this flight was taking and whether there would be cookies and coffee on this flight.

Then in very typical matter the delf who piloted this craft remotely, personified himself as an older man with a crisp white uniform. He was wearing a blindfold and red armbands. Some of the passengers had vaguely caught the message about having to make peace with their gods.

And when the hopper started to accelerate, some became a bit nervous. But it was not until they realized that they would be flying at full speed into the side of Habitat -3 that anyone really started to panic.

Jeff Wong was an overweight middle aged human who had grown so sick of life that his imminent death was just another inconvenience. He had turned off his spex and looked out a porthole as Jupiter one last time.

The faint sunlight that reached out this far was reflecting off the rings, though less spectacular than Saturn's Jeff could not help but think how lovely they were. Why hadn't he noticed them before?