Project: Legacy

When we leave this world, we like to believe that we made an impression. That someone will remember us for our actions and remember our story.  Every human being wants to have a legacy. Its natural that we want someone to look back and say we did something important, we changed someone's life. Even now as this ship hovers motionless amongst the debris of this shattered world. As I stand here looking down into black hole that has consumed a planet, and will destroy the rest of the system, I know I have a legacy. I only hope I can change it.

When humanity was young, we dreamed of the stars. To walk amongst these points of light millions of miles away. But like many dreams, they fade against the realities of the world. We lived our lives but still acted like we were dreaming. We consumed this planet's resources, until the situation changed. The desperate realities of the world soon faced us and left with no other option, we once again turned to the stars.  Leaving the solar system and our broken world, humanity casts its hand for a lifeline and was rewarded. We found rich worlds, terraforming them for our needs and made ourselves at home in the galaxy. But perhaps we should have knocked first.

It is remarkable the amount of surprise that occurred when humanity first discovered that we were not alone. When first contact was made, we prepared for the worst. The fleets were mobilized. Ships that had once lain dormant since humanity first left Earth were reawakened from their slumber. For a time it seemed that peace might prevail. But then there were border clashes, ships were destroyed and finally there were all out attacks. Every world mobilized troops and for the first time in history humanity was united against a common enemy. It was not blood lust or hatred that started this war. It was more a distrust of the unknown. Of course that is not to say that we played no part in it. It was not our willingness to start war, but to accept it. It is one of our most primal instincts. Had we not left earth before the situation became desperate, I am sure that we would have turned on each other with great ease.

As the losses began to mount, humanity started to grow desperate. We began creating new and more disturbing ways of killing our foes. Thermo-nuclear missiles, de-atomizer weapons and biological warfare all became apart of the arsenal being employed as we scrabbled for victory. Desperate diseases must have desperate remedies and war is a terrible disease.

There were still those who developed new ways of ensuring safety. The Voyager Project was one such development.
Before Voyager, Faster than Light had been the fastest and most direct form of space travel. But as the war progressed, the Troxi developed faster and more efficient forms of FTL drives. We needed something that would put us back in the lead of this twisted space race. Voyager itself was not fast, but it was its means of travel. Voyager launched dark matter pods at faster than light speed. These pods then detonated, literally tearing a hole in the fabric of reality. These dark-matter gates would be held in place via an electromagnetic ring that was formed around the hole. Voyager would then launch a second pod to complete the gate. This slip-space hole was the continuous link of getting to and from a place instantaneously.  Voyager could be deployed on worlds that were being evacuated and once its mission was complete, it would seal the portal behind itself. Voyager required a huge power source. The vehicle would constantly be moving and most of the systems were run by automated control. Even the most practical of human solutions failed to pass testing and for a time it seemed that hope was lost. But it appeared that in front of us lay our solution- the stars. We made a star. We built the ship around the star and finally Voyager was complete. But how easily is science tainted by our drive for war?

They saw Voyager as a weapon. Referring to it as the Reality Cannon, they saw that it could be used to destroy fleets, cities, planets. There had been several issues with the slip-space portals, should they be closed while there was a ship passing through, it would be destroyed in a most violent manner. If the drive core leaked, the entire ship would be flooded with radiation within seconds, faster than any computer could ever respond. But the greatest issue was what would happen if a slip-space portal were left to grow unchecked. The portal was a hole in the very fabric of reality, an unraveled thread in the patchwork of the universe. With strain, the hole would grow ever larger, consuming moons, planets, suns, entire solar systems until it grew to large and collapsed under its own weight and formed a black hole. This is what happened on the planet Luminof- a Troxi stronghold. The Voyager's slip space cannon had been crafted onto the helm of a destroyer class cruiser. It was fired and struck. The hole then consumed the entire planet. The fleet then tried to detonate a hyper gate, but by this point, the hole was too big. There were no survivors as ship after ship tried to slip away only to be sucked back under the incredible pull of the black hole.

This is where I come in. Following the fleet's destruction I proceeded to destroy all plans of the Voyager, the cannon and the hyper gate. I stole what little reserves of dark matter remained and hijacked Voyager, who had been long forgotten in the chaos of the destruction.

They never asked how the hyper gates destroyed the slip space portals. They detonated with the same force as the portals were created with, thus cancelling it out. But there is only one force strong enough to close the portal now. A supernova. It seems ironic that the death of a star is the salvation of life. By injecting the dark matter into the core of the star, I will be able to replicate the supernova.  
I pilot the ship as close as I can, before the gravity gets too strong. The computer informs me that now is the time. I move the canisters with deliberate care into the injectors. All that now needs to be done is activate the injection process. I head down to the drive core, listening to straining sounds echoing throughout her frame. The sounds of a being too old for its age. But soon it will be time for rest, for both of us. I arrive at the console and find my hand lingering over the button, and closing my eyes push down with both hands.
It's done, and with that I find myself lower the blast shields of the drive core, allowing me one last glimpse at the heart of this gentle leviathan.

I look into the fires of the dying star and I know that even as the atoms that make up this ship, the star and me are exploding with the force of a thousand suns, just what my legacy is- not death, Voyager, or even a sacrifice, but hope. With so much lost perhaps humanity and Troxi may look at each other eye to eye.

A child looks up into the sky, distracted from his game, he notices a small twinkling amongst that glow of the starry sky. The star flickers, then wavers and finally blinks out of existence. The child continues to stare at the sky for a moment before loosing interest, returning to his game, moving his troops closer to an invisible enemy.