Zack woke up to the sound of the fat Gulgarren Korg dragging in an unknown spacecraft. “Zack, my people found this ancient hunk of junk floating near the outer colonies. After our scientists spot some human symbols I thought I could bring it to you to identify it.” The dish was smashed by space debris and the body eroded by solar winds. Zack place a hand on the only thing relatively intact; a golden record. “Man, this thing was supposed to find you first. Welcome back voyager one.” -- Anon Guest
Technically, it was the rad-alarm that woke Zack from his sleep niche. Which was why he rolled out of bed and stumbled into his livesuit before Korg could knock on his door.
Korg was also in her livesuit, almost blocking the doorway, but also trailing rads all over the hallway.
"Did you even glance at the decon booth on the way here? We have to neutralise a whole slew of radioactive pollution now."
"It's an anomaly in the debris field. Tech... with Human symbols."
Ah. That explained her panic. Zack was still half-asleep and managed, "This far out from Terran Space?"
That was when Korg uttered the classic line, "You have to see this."
It was not a vessel, though parts of it were larger than an average 1-SG[1] Humanoid. It was almost barely recognisable as technology, as it had taken a lot of hits from micrometeors since it had been set loose between the stars. If there had been paint, it had faded. The plutonium container for its power had ruptured, explaining the rads spilling out everywhere, and Korg had got a panel off, revealing a gold disk.
It was the star pattern that made Zack have goosebumps. It wasn't exactly an ancestral memory, it was witnessing a legend come to life.
"So that's where you've gone," Zack whispered. "Hello again."
"You know this device?"
"Yeah. You're witnessing the remains of some pre-shattering space tech from Terra. In the late Twentieth Century, one of the military polities sent out four probes to investigate the solar system and maybe find life outside that. So we put messages on them. Pioneer one and two, and then Voyager one and two. This... is one of the Voyagers. We might be able to narrow that down. After we contain that plutonium and clean up the radiation you tracked everywhere."
"Should we notify the Archivaas?"
"They'll want the rads purged, too, buddy."
[1] One Standard Gravity being ten meters per second per second fall acceleration.
[Photo by Sai Kiran Belana on Unsplash]
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