The End is in Sight

I docked last night at Polo Harbour and started preparing for the final leg of my journey to Colonia. I can get there in about 100 jumps. I lay back in the observation room and looked up at the night sky. Here in the midst of the Venetian Nebula the stars are packed in so densely they're everywhere. The bright glow from the galactic core serves as a backdrip to a million beacons of light against the dark. As I taak it all in, I considered the journey from Gagarin Gate.

I'm starting to get the hang of this Selfie lark

I'd taken a little detour at the start of my foray from Gagarin Gate, in order to visit the system GRU HYPUE AA-A G4, known to some travellers as Jo Ella's Flares. It's a dead system. Literally. No planets, and all four stars in the system have collapsed. At the centre a black hole and and angry pulsar orbit each other, with two more neutron stars slightly further out. Black holes have interested me ever since my trip to Maia and I find myself drawn to them like a moth to flame.

It's difficult to get a photo of a black hole, for obvious reasons...

I headed closer. And closer, and closer - mere kilometres away from the singularity as the light began to warp around me. As before with Maia I became suddenly terrified. The fear as you approach a black hole is like nothing I can describe. It's an existential fear of a scale of magnitude rarely experienced. You feel concern for the essence of your very soal as you approach. I don't think I'd call it a pleasant experience in and of itself, but as you boost away from the tiny yet all encompassing monstrous lurking horror you feel more alive than ever. Will I feel the same when I see Sagitarius A*?

I will never tire of neutron stars

I used the jetstreams of the netron stars to supercharge my engines and left Jo Ella's flares behind.

In astronomical terms, they're practically touching

When I arrived in the Nuekuae LW-M D7-20 system I was greeted with a full system unexplored by anyone. Ever eager to carve out my name across the galaxy, I started tagging and bagging. Eventually I came across an extraordinary sight: two ice planets who were orbiting each other so closely I initially thought that they were touching! I grabbed some photos and landed on the surface of the larger of the two (I say larger - its diameter was only some twenty kilometres more than its partner) in oder to do some exploration and just take in the wonder of it all. Here I was, the first person ever to see this beautiful sight. It's moments like these which define why I am addicted to exploration.

The rest of the trip was fairly standard - I found some familiar but beautiful sights like a binary star system and multi-ringed metal planets, and just smiled at the feeling inside. When I fianlly touched down at Polo Harbour, I received a promotion to Ranger. I plotted the course to Jacques Station before I went to bed. My journey was almost over.

Or was it about to truly begin?