“Initiating jump point calculations, Captain,” Aquila announced.

“Thank you, Aquila,” Captain Moore replied. “Any anomalies in the system, Tremblay?”

“Negative, sir,” I replied from my station. “All scans have come back clear.”

“Not even something worth a detour?” the captain asked hopefully.

“Unless you’d like the science department to take notes on a dwarf planet that appears to be on a three hundred year elliptical orbit of the primary, then no, sir.”

“I like dwarf planets,” the captain said. “People underestimate them.”

Robert Moore was not a tall man. I thought perhaps the sentiment was more appropriate for humans than planets coming from him.

“I’ve tagged the relevant data in the scans, Captain,” I offered. “And will send copies to the science labs.”

“Lucky them,” he said leaning back in his seat. “Johnson,” he called, “how about you take us as close to that gas giant as you can manage and we’ll give the fleet at least one spectacular glimpse of a system they’ll never see again.”

“Aye-aye, sir. Changing course now.”

“Captain,” Aquila said from the gel ceiling a few moments later, “the mayor is asking why we are changing course.”

“Tell him we’re sightseeing,” Moore replied equably.

We waited for the returning salvo, expecting it to be colourful. Mayor Logan was quite a guttermouth.

“The mayor has advised that the leaseholder will not be…happy.”

Aquila, on the other hand, did not have quite the same vocabulary.

“The leaseholder is not the captain of this ship,” Moore growled. “I am.”

“I have relayed your message to him,” Aquila diplomatically replied.

“Fleet-wide hail, López,” the captain said dismissing the mayor as irrelevant.

“Fleet-wide channel open, Captain,” the communications officer replied.

“This is Captain Robert Moore of the AUS Aquila. Off our starboard bow, you’ll note the impressive form of a gas giant that puts our own Jupiter to shame. We don’t know if we are the first beings to view this system, but we can assume from evidence so far gathered that is the case. So, I believe, a little contest is in order to mark the occasion. The passenger who takes the best photograph of this impressive celestial body as we fly past shall be given the honour of naming it. Snap away and send your files to Aquila. We’ll let our very competent AI select the winner. You can be assured that he won’t be biased.” He paused briefly. Then nodded. “That is all.”

The comm channel closed.

“Do you really think Aquila has the skills to judge photography, Captain?” Commander Lawrence asked from her first officer’s station.

Moore laughed. “I have no idea, Catherine. But it’ll be fun to find out.”

“Yes, sir,” she offered with a small smile of her own.

“Jump point calculations have been made, Captain,” Aquila advised some time later. “And I have chosen a photograph.”

The AI put the picture up on the main viewscreen. It was stunning. I had no idea if better ones had been taken, but this one showed Aquila silhouetted against the backdrop of the gas giant. An almost too small speck, taken by someone on one of the other fleet vessels, that showed exactly how insignificant we all were in the vastness of space.

“Wow,” Lieutenant López murmured.

“Wow, indeed,” the captain replied softly. “And the name, Aquila?” he asked in a more normal volume.

“Hope, Captain. The photographer has called the gas giant Hope.”

We stared at the image; at the reds and greens and greys that indicated the different layers of gasses. And at the little spaceship that was dwarfed by its magnificent magnitude.

“Congratulate them for us, Aquila,” the captain finally said.

“Acknowledged, Captain.”

“And lay the jump point,” Captain Moore added. “It’s time to see what hope has brought us.”

“Yes, Captain. Jump point beacon released.”

We watched as the Anderson Universal designed jump point beacon shot out of our port side and executed a retro burn to bring it to a stop some distance from the fleet.

“Fleet-wide hail, Lieutenant López.”

“Aye, sir. Fleet-wide channel is open.”

“This is Captain Moore. Prepare for jump transition. We go with hope and hearts full of wonder. May our journey be successful. That is all.”

“Chanel is closed, sir,” López offered, her rounded eyes staring at the captain with no small measure of her own wonder right then.

“Yellow alert,” the captain said, then glanced around the bridge at each of us. “We have successfully carried out one jump already. But that in no way means every jump thereafter will work. As I have said before and will no doubt say again; it’s been an honour, crewmen.”

“Aye-aye, sir!” we all shouted.

“Confirm we are go for jump, Aquila.”

“I can confirm we are go for jump, Captain.”

“So be it. Jump on my mark.”

“On your mark.”

We looked out into the deep black of space before us. Somewhere out there was New Earth. The hope of humanity. Of what was left of it in any case. We might be the ones to reach it first, but New Earth belonged to all of us.

Four fleets.

Thirty-two vessels.

Just over forty thousand survivors of a dying solar system.

“Mark,” the captain said.

We held our breaths.

And then nothing happened.

“Status!” Captain Moore barked a suspended moment later.

“Jump drive is active, sir,” Chief Deschene said from engineering. “It’s not us.”

“Has the fleet jumped without us?”

“No, sir,” I advised. “The fleet is linked with our calculations and therefore has been unable to execute the jump.”

“Aquila! What’s going on?” Moore demanded.

“I am unsure, Captain. The anomaly appeared unexpectedly.”

“I’ll say,” Johnson muttered. “If an AI says unexpectedly, you can be damn sure it happened without any warning whatsoever.”

“Yes, thank you for that excellent explanation, Lieutenant,” the captain said. “But do we know why there’s an anomaly at all?”

“Negative, Captain,” I offered. “All other systems are operating within acceptable parameters.”

“Stand down from yellow alert,” Captain Moore instructed. “Advise the fleet we’ll be delayed while we run systems checks.”

“Aye-aye, sir,” López offered.

The bridge was tense. We hadn’t done enough jumps yet to feel completely at ease with them. In the back of my mind was the thought that this technology had been barely tested. A few short jumps within our solar system, while dodging solar flares was it. And the one intersystem jump we had under our belts so far.

It was enough to make anyone nervous.

“I want answers, people,” Captain Moore said. “Call in second shift to help. No one on this bridge stands down from their station until we know why this jump failed.”

“Yes, Captain,” we all said with various amounts of enthusiasm. None of us would dare shirk our responsibilities. That’s not who we were. But none of us knew what this anomaly would mean for the rest of our journey to New Earth.

Hope was a fickle thing. Throw a curveball at it, and it soon becomes riddled with doubt.

The captain stood in the centre of the bridge and stared at the jump point beacon.

The only thing I did not doubt was him. If anyone could get us through this, it was Captain Robert Carmichael Moore of the AUS Aquila.