“If you are receiving this message, I am already dead.”
How I wish that I could begin this recording with that old cliche! But in all likelihood I am very much alive by the time you hear this. Though it would doubtless be better for all if it weren’t the case.

You remember, don’t you, how this all started? Ah, maybe not. Maybe many years have passed. No matter. I remember it as clearly as if it were painted on the wall before me as I record this message, instead of these obscure and crude images. It began, for me, with the journey to Malocus on the Carter. It was an old ship, full of its own kind of creaks and groans that no other ship had…

Message Intercept: Chapter One