Borg Space : Ocampa or Bust

Dommarraa · Apr 28, 2015

Rumaging around in a junk shop, I found some reference to one of the ancient explorers called Captain Jane Away. A bit of poking around and I found an interesting story. It seems that way way back, she was out on the Far Rim around a planet called Ocampa, when her Jump Drive failed, and failed BIG time. 60ish Kylie from home and nothing but SC, how many people would just self destruct ? I think I would, but she didnt, and whats more, she made it back !
Why she isnt a giant of exploration history, I dont know, so I have decided to follow the few straps of data and bits of image of her route, and see just what she went through.

All I have is a 2d map (no Z coords!), some vague information on Ocampa (G Type Star, 5th planet), and some warnings to avoid the Borg who apparently had an empire way out there, their homeworld called Unicomplex in a red Nebula.

The Asp Class Explorer "I'm Not Here, I'm Over There" tooled up and eager to go.

Day 1 : Good day, over 8kl. Made it to NGC 6357 for the night

Day 2 : Another very good day. Could smelll the NSF, so stopped before the greed kicked in

Day 3 : Slogging through the NSF, always forward, greed will kill. 1st Bump a whole 2%, see what greed will do. Through a thick patch, foot down time, hope I dont regret it. 21kly from home.

Day 4 : Ignoring the cash, just pressing on. Improved my Jump Procedure to check next star as the NS just never end. Plenty of ELW, my first Wolf and a couple of BHs (Polo!). Got past Sag A* ! 26kly

Day 5 : Had a rest. 1 ELW. Borg Space in the next arm, about 3kly away . 30kly

Day 6/7 : Borg Space : Lots of M Class, so little of worth to scan. Only 1 ELW, no signs of Borg, unless they are snowmen. Their homeworld of Unicomplex is supposed to be in a ref nebula. There are no nebulae at all. 40kly, 1400 Systems so far

Day 8 : Press on though the Mmmmm region. 1 ELW, 47kly, 1600 systems

Day 9 : At least Mmmmm space seems to be fading. 50kly 1750 systems

Day 10 : Crossed the gap to the outer arm, home of the Ocampa...somewhere, get my first "Route Unavailable". Stopped travelling and set Scanners to Type G. Lets find that ELW. 57kly, 2000 Systems

Day 11 : Hunting Class Gs, looking at the "5th planet" which could mean many things. Is it a ELW, or an ex-ELW, or something else ? Does she count Asteroids, binaries ? Given the accuracy of previous clues, my search criteria is pretty wide.

Day 12 : Found an ELW in the 5th slot at last (done 250 Class G). "QAUTHAI HV-G C10-3"" No sign of intelligent life, although I am not surprised. Time to head back, mission accomplished as well as can be expected. Ocampa found ? Maybe

Conclusions
Jane Away had quickly fallen pray to Cabin Fever. Not too surprising. Imaging finding yourself 57 Kylie from home and only having SC working.
Borg almost certainly dont exist at all, and if they did, their empire would comprise of a lot of snow.
Ocampa might be out there, but with this level of information, it will be an accidental discovery
Do your prep. I could have looked for the Unicomplex Nebula before leaving. Sloppy. At least it didnt take me very much out of my way

On the way back, I have a Pulsar I am desperate to visit, and I might try out a few Nebula to see if I can find Unicomplex. Its a long shot as they are way out of target area, but might as well.

Home is a long way off

Kuroshio · Apr 28, 2015

Jane Away, I knew I heard that name before, and I went into the small dead tree library I took with me. And I actually found a 'star chart' book (not much use - 2D, no sector names, no usable coordinates) detailing her journey over 7 years. They provide a little more info than the chart you have (it's part of the collection, actually), so if you want to take a look, let me know, I'll sent them over. (Beware, though, it's in Old Earth German, and there are multiple references to humanoid alien races. I believe you're right about the cabin fever.)

CMDR Kuroshio, "Me, I'm Counting", 30 LY off Sagittarius A*

Dommarraa · Apr 29, 2015

Gif of the journey. Each frame is about 800-1000ly

xeeleeqax · Apr 29, 2015

I seem to remember another ancient legend of a alien who could fly and shoot lasers from his eyes, but it was proven that this was just a urban myth from Earth from the 19/20th century. Maybe this Jane Away story is also a Urban myth too? The German text also says that she found a realm of space that was "fluid" and had no stars and planets. I wonder if she did succumb to cabin fever as well and her story has been retold through the ages till its as crazy as the "soup-man" legends.

Dommarraa · May 12, 2015

Day 13 : Decided to go spinward along the arm, but quickly ran into a horrid patch of Badlands, so going to divert across to the next arm instead, back the way I came into Borg space. Nav computer is on the fritz, doing it all by hand.

Day 17 : Found a Nebulae that given the previous flakeyness, is the only possible location of the Unicomplex. Flyai Flyuae aq-x b1-0

Day 18 : There is a good selection of WS and NS down here at -1000z. Will see how far it goes.

Day 22 : Have followed along the arm at -1000z jumping between NS. Profitable without slowing things down, its a good route.

Day 23 : Made it to the Circinus Pulsar. Not the first there as expected. Nothing of interest, just looks like a normal NS, although it is huge.

Day 24 : Thats enough, push for home

Day 27 : Back in the Bubble that I suppose I should call Home

Day 28 : Selling the data for 4700 systems takes a LONG time, I got 73mil total. Sold 5-10m each in 5 different systems for Independant Permits. Got Jotun, Peregrina, Hodak, Luyen 347-14 and Pi Mensae. I have all the others that own their own station. The remaining data was sold to Van Maanen's, cos I love them and think they should take over the Galaxy.

(Gif of return journey to follow)

xeeleeqax · May 12, 2015

did you see any borg?

Dommarraa · May 12, 2015

xeeleeqax said:
did you see any borg?

No, I think she was quite mad. Due to all the low temp M Class stars, I think they must be something to do with Ice. Maybe crystals on her canopy, or she possibly stopped off and made Snow Men to keep her company.
Their supposed home system somewhere near Flyai Flyuae aq-x is devoid of any usable systems. So unless there were a space based life form, its all loonatic rantings

AltNite · May 12, 2015

I like your line of thinking. I'd love to do a hollywood star-esk trip -- go to all the major Star Trek locations (i.e. farpoint; DS9; etc.) Unfortunetly my google-fu fails me at finding actual spacial coordinates (or even approximations) for many of the lesser (and even many of the major) locals I'd like to hit. :/

xeeleeqax · May 12, 2015

you reminded me of another ancient Legend - The SnowMen

The Snowmen are believed to be among the oldest species of the Milky Way Galaxy. They developed at a time when the Galaxy itself was no more than a disc of smoke, illuminated here and there by hot-spot protostars, when there were scarcely any heavy elements to form planets.
At some point of their evolution, they turned temselves completely toward the philosophy that to record events - and only to record - was the highest calling of life. They took apart their world and rebuilt it as a monstrous storage system. They used all the material at their disposal to freeze as much data as they could in an atificial structure called the Snowflake, making near-optimal use of matter, by recording information right down to the thermodynamic limit set by the background temperature of the Universe. As the universe cools down they can store more data.
The SnowFlake is a regular tetrahedron built around the remains of a black dwarf. It measures over ten million miles along its edges. How it maintains its structure in the gravity well of the star remains unknown. While possessing about the same mass as the Earth, it has been puffed out like candy-floss; filled with struts, threads and whiskers of iron, like delicate scaffolding. It has a fractal architecture with the tetrahedron motif, repeated again and again, on all scales.
How the structure, nearly 10 billion years old endured, as it was built when the star it orbits, while todya three degrees above absolute zero, still shone at about eighteen K is another mystery.
It remains unclear if the Snowmen still exist and what their oriignal form was like. A Dully-glowing globe of purple, miles wide, embedded beneath the planar skin of the SnowFlake is believed ot be what remains of them. As no complete exploration of the Snowflake has ever been done, other such spheres may exist in its structure.

Source a Ancient English Text called: "The Godel Sunflower"