“
I'll be home in no time.” Those were the words Major Hanar McKallister told his wife the last time she saw her, right after she whispered in his ear that she was pregnant. Before Thunderbird made its way out to the stars, before he was put into a hibernetic state to save resources, before Thunderbird and its cargo fell through a wormhole and found itself floating through space, past worlds that none of the starmaps uploaded into the TB’s knowledge database knew.
TeeBee, the primary Artificial Intelligence attempted to wake him up with a gentle sounding jingle and kindly words, but he only stirred even as stimulants like caffeine were being pumped directly into his blood from his Fortified Suit.
“Master McKallister, it's been 5 and a half months! Wakey wakey! It's time for you to get up and seize the day.”
It took the secondary AI, BeeTee, to force him to truly awaken by blasting Swing music at maximum volume through the earpiece of his suit. Hanar jerked forward in his cockpit chair with an irritated groan, smashing his head against some overhead console, breaking some sort of no doubt expensive piece of technology, now crushed and sparking in a dent the shape of his head.
“I'm up. I'm up! Crap.” The pilot inhaled the oxygen rich air, which was being pumped into his cabin. It had hints of mossiness to it, a result the smell of the mutant lichens that produced oxygen from the carbon dioxide and waste his body produced.
“TeeBee.. where the hell are we?”
“... I do not know Master McKallister.”
“Mmm that doesn't sound very good. Seriously? Do you even know where Earth is?”
“I- we lost track of Earth months ago. We are well and truly lost.”
“Affirmative. The void Is cold and will be our grave.”
“Shut up BeeTee. Play some
Sinatra, I'll take over manual operations. You girls rest a spell.”
And so the Major flew through the void for hours before he noticed something. A planet of some type, a big blue dot in the distance. So, the soldier smirks. First contact. It only took five months! And a ship in orbit within reach of his comms range.
“Come in, come in anybody- Major Hanar McKallister with the New Enclave Republic Army here, any friendlies aboard? Requesting permission to land in your dock and resupply. I don’t have any cash but I have a huge container of things we can trade for if that’s more your speed.”
Indeed, he pushed behind him some manner of container filled with survival supplies and tradeable knick knacks from their burnt out Earth such as 3 pallets of Nuka Cola and 5 of Sunset Sarsaparilla, or Vault Boy bobbleheads. Or an entire ton of gold bars, rescued straight from the remains of Fort Knox. Maybe even a complete Giddy Up Buttercup.
“Ultimately its your choice- You guys aren't Zetans right?”