A Message from the Past

Every day has been the same for as long as I can remember. Wake up, go to school, come home and do homework. The same boring schedule day in and day out.

But then everything changed.

My sister and I were walking back to our quarters when the ship gave a sudden shudder. This had never happened in the history of our ship. We have been in space for years, ever since Earth became uninhabitable. We have been orbiting the remains of Earth for seventy five years, but there is no hope of ever returning to it due to the radiation infecting the planet.

“Everyone please return to your quarters.” The voice of my father echoed through the halls.

We looked at each other. Our father never made announcements. He was the director of the science division, and the announcements were usually left for the captain. We rushed the rest of the way to our quarters and met our mother, home usually early from work.

“What’s happening?” I asked, “Dad never does the announcements.”

Looking worried, my mother responded “The wave we felt was a solar flare hitting the ship. From what I’ve heard, it seems like we are going to have to move, or the ship will be torn apart by the storms that are coming.”

“Move?!” my sister cried, ignoring the rest of our mothers explanation. “But where?”

“There has to be some place we can go, right?” I asked my mom. “People have been working on this problem for years; we should have some idea of where we can go by now.” My mom has been on the relocation team since before my sister and I were born, just like her father before her, and the team I have studied my whole life to join. The look in her eyes told me that they have not found a place yet. I began to fiddle with the heart-shaped locket around my neck. My Grandfather gave it to me just before he died. He always believed that there was something more out there for us.

“Let’s wait until your father gets home. He will have more information than I do right now.” Mom said. With nothing else to do, my sister and I sat down to do our homework. An hour and a half after we returned, the door opened to reveal our father. His salt and pepper hair was more ruffled than usual, the first sign that he’d had a rough day. He always ran his hands through his hair when he encountered a difficult problem.

“Dad?” I asked, my voice wavering, “What’s happening?”

He looked at the three of us, the terror in his eyes was visible. “My team has been doing the calculations, and the wave that we felt today means that the sun is rapidly reaching supernova state. If we stay where we are, this ship and everyone on it will be sucked into a black hole. With the power running out on the ship, we need a destination or we will be left stranded.”

“We have no idea where we can go. The relocation team has been working on this problem, but none of the planets we have found so far match what we need. But from now it looks like they are going to be working around the clock.” With that, my mother’s communicator went off.

“That's my cue to leave; our whole team is to report to the office right away.” She looked at me, “They want you to come too. It looks like everyone your age is getting assigned to their jobs effective immediately.”

I looked at her shocked and excited; this was what I’ve been waiting for my whole life. The relocation team is one of the most sought after positions on the ship - the chance to look for our new home is something that every person wants to do. I don’t know a single person who wouldn’t want to get off the ship and back on a planet. Only a couple of the members remember what it was like to live on the ground. The radiation that forced us off the planet also led to the loss of life for so many people.

“Let's go, I’m ready to help.” I grabbed my necklace again, thinking about my grandfather and what he would say if he was still here. His dream was to see all of us safely returned to the ground somewhere.

____________________________________________________

Laying in bed that night, I couldn’t stop thinking about the last words my grandfather said to me; search your heart, you will find the answer there. It did not make sense, it was not possible. But I don’t think that is what he meant. Search your heart. It had to mean something more…something tangible.

My hand went to my necklace, as it so often does. It has to mean something. My grandfather was a brilliant, if eccentric, man; he would not leave something this vague. He was one of the few people that remembered what it was like to live on the ground, but he was only six years old when the ships deployed. I remember sitting with him and listening to the stories that he told. He told me once that his grandfather gave his grandmother a locket with a picture of him inside so that he could be with her wherever she went.

That’s it! My locket! I sat up and fumbled for the light, taking the chain off my neck. I brought the locket to my face to inspect it closer. I never would have guessed that it would open. In all the times I looked at it I had never seen any seams.

Running out of my room, I searched for the tools that my father keeps in his desk. I knew that he had pliers and a magnifying glass in one of the drawers. I keep searching, not minding the noise that I was making. My mother must have heard me, she always was a light sleeper, and came walking out from her and my father’s room.

“Honey, what are you looking for?” she asked.

“Pliers and a magnifying glass.” Not bothering to look at her, too focused on finding what I needed. Finally I found them, “I think grandad left a note for me in my locket. I was thinking about that story he used to tell us about how his grandfather gifted a locket with a picture of himself to his wife. I think he meant that as a message to me, so that I would look in my locket.”

Looking at me like I was crazy, my mother sat me down. “Honey, I think you are just tired. It was a long day of school and your first day on the team, you may just be imagining things.” Not wanting to listen to her coddle me, I got up and went back to the desk, tools in hand. “You should get some sleep sweetheart, it's going to be a long day tomorrow.” Ignoring her, I kept looking at the locket. There seemed to be a minuscule seam running down the middle, I would have missed it if I didn’t have the magnifying glass.

I tried to pry it open, and it worked! A small piece of paper fell out. Picking it up, I saw that it was a note from my grandfather.

My dearest Granddaughter,

I hope that you find this in good time and we are able to save our people. I wish I could have given this message to those in charge, but in my time they would not listen to my ramblings. They thought I was a rambling old fool, but my mind has not left me yet.

With your brilliant mind I’m sure you will be able to finish the work I have started. You see, I found a planet. It is the right size and possibly the right atmosphere, it is close enough to a star that the weather should be similar to that of Earth. To be sure that it is habitable we would need to go to the planet. I have been unable to calculate the time it would take us to get there, I leave this up to you, my dear Granddaughter, to discover.

The coordinates are as follows:

005B:003E-02X9

I believe in you, and I love you more than the stars in the sky.

With love,

Grandfather

Handing the letter to my mother, I rushed to the computer and punched in the coordinates. It was there, just like he said!

“Mom,” I said looking at her “How have they not found this one yet?”

“We have yet to look that far out,” my mother said, coming up to the computer and looking at the monitor. “Your grandfather had a lot of side projects, things he did not always report to the director.”

Typing on the computer, I said to my mother, “This planet looks to be the right size, if we can figure out what the gravity and atmosphere are, this planet could work.” Typing more, I sent all of the information to my datapad, “We need to take this information to the director right away. This could save us!”

____________________________________________________

After changing out of our pajamas, my mother and I rushed to the relocation office. Looking around to find the director, we finally found her sitting in her office with some other officers.

“Mind if we come in?” My mother said, “We have some very important information that we think you should see.” The director waved us in, and I continued for my mother, explaining how I found a letter from my grandfather in the locket with the coordinates for a planet inside it. I showed her the paper and the information that I had transferred to my datapad.

“This…this could work,” said the director, “I need to get this to the captain right away. Follow me.” We ran down the corridor to the director's office. This had to work. it just had to. We had no other options. “Captain, we might have found it, a place we can go.” She looked over to me to explain, so I told him exactly what I had told her.

“That’s it!” he exclaimed, quickly typing the coordinates into the computer, “but it would take us a hundred years to get there.”

“The cryo chambers!” I cried. We’ve had cryo chambers on board all this time, but have never thought to use them. We had no destination before now. The research that my grandfather did - this is the key, this will lead to our salvation.

I could hardly believe it, through my grandfather's message to me, we finally have a destination. For the first time in seventy five years we were moving.