The Greatest Commodity (First Draft)

The Aquila

Xf39b searched the ship and finally managed to locate the crystalline black-box, it was completely intact. Then he zoomed his vision inward and read the laser-engraved binary data, with knowledge of the encoding methods used at the time, he decoded the binary and compiled it into a data pack, he then applied it to his consciousness.

Information flowed into his memory. 

A Billion Years (Old Measurement) Before:

"Hand me the chip will you, Jean?" Asked Dr. Micheal Halsey. His close friend, Jean Alvis, nodded and grabbed the computer chip that Halsey had been pointing to. Halsey soldered the chip onto the main motherboard of the gravitic prototype.

"I think that's enough work for today," Halsey remarked, his hands black with the lubricant oil of the machine. Jean agreed, and they went off to the mess hall for a meal.

Halsey quickly washed his hands at the communal sink. Then they each took sandwiches and sat down at the corner table that they frequently sat at.

Between bites, they busily discussed the political situation back on Earth as well as the process of terraforming on the other planets. Despite having had the technology for interstellar travel for eight-hundred years, early explorers found it not to be worth the effort. 

A tall, thin, authoritative figure walked into the room, he scanned it momentarily before spotting the pair, he quickly strode towards them.

"May I join you?" Asked Captain James Nevil. Halsey and Alvis nodded assent, and the Captain took a seat next to Alvis.

Twirling a plastic spoon in his fingers, the Captain smiled nervously, "All this 'Gravitics' stuff is making me uneasy. Movement without acceleration doesn't sound very good to me."

Alvis cleared the peanut butter from his throat. "Why doesn't it? No g-forces! We can go as fast as we want without becoming splatters on a wall!"

"Just think about it Cap," said Halsey, putting down his sandwich. "We can go at any velocity! We can jump from orbital velocity to ninety-nine percent C! We could rule the universe."

Alvis attempted to pile on further when the ship was rocked by a sudden shaking. "Wha-" he tried to say before the entire ship erupted in alarm klaxons.

Captain Nevil's face showed both shock and vindication before standing up and darting to the bridge. "What the hell's going on?" he screamed at the top of his lungs, "Are we under atta-" he cut himself off noticing the view out of the forward window, the stars moved, And the distant clouds of nebula gas were twisting and turning.

Halsey and Alvis quickly came up to the bridge. "Sir..." said Halsey, a deep feeling of dread coming over him. "It's the gravitic generator, something's wrong."

Alvis, still in shock, confessed. "Mike, I think I gave you the wrong chip."

Nevil's hands were trembling, he pulled a picture of his family out of a concealed pocket of his uniform. His legs buckled, and his face turned pale.

The trio stood in horror on the bridge, looking out at the stars. The navigation system showed they were traveling at near-C, thousands of light years from home, and thousands of years into the future.

Captain Nevil fell to his knees and threw the picture to a corner of the bridge. It was useless now, everyone he'd ever known had turned to dust, and blown away in the wind.

Nevil couldn't help but grieve. Everyone he'd ever known was long dead, his friends, his family; everyone he'd ever loved, everyone he'd hated, long gone; his Earth, his humanity, his civilization, likely turned to dust.