Ozzy nodded, "Yeah, fair enough. I was just curious is all, and I know Iris is going to ask. So, what else needs testing? Or should we bring this back to base?"

  Meg considered, then asked "Do you want to take it back to the lab, or land it in my back yard on Earth to test the stealth capabilities?  I DID work on those, because stealth is a good idea sometimes."

"Let's test out the stealth, and head for Earth,"
said Ozzy, wondering how the stealth mode worked.

  "Well at least your own back yard means the least amount of potential complaints if somebody spots it." Though, plenty of people Meg knows could spot it regardless.  But they would also be the ones least likely to complain.

  Matt swings around for a lazy course back to Earth.

  Meg moved to another crystal orb set into the 'wall', and when it morphed a control panel out of the wall, where she tapped a couple more crystalline looking spots, and the ship seemed to alter shape, streamlining itself and removing shapes that would trip radar, as well as the matte black exterior becoming 'camouflaged' to match the EM fields around it, including all the other spectra.

  Matt considers the philosophical matter of a nearly featureless streamlined ship streamlining itself. The design aesthetic equivalent of 'it goes to eleven', perhaps.  "So what would you say are the main limitations of your design that keep you from going off the radar full time?  Though knowing you, maybe the answer is nothing but courtesy to flight control."

  Please direct yourself to runway eleven, watch out for the other three ships also not showing up on radar and pray nobody is already parked there.

  Meg chuckled, and said "Pretty much, yes, it's being polite to flight control and the poor fellows manning the radar installations."  She'd blushed a little at Matt's very accurate assessment of her own innately polite mannerisms, since he'd gotten her exactly correct.

  How many girls did you make blush with compliments before getting pushed into traffic by a little old lady Matt?  Zero that's how  many.

  These insights happen when you make an effort to be less of a cliched jaded jackass in your second strange shot at life.

  "Speaking of precautions as we approach your choice landing spot, while I know the hull could handle the slight drop, are there old fashioned landing gear?  On site repairs at the very least would benefit from such a thing."

  Meg nodded, and said "There are, although you have to manually deploy them, normally it sits on a cushion of antigravity that keeps it a relative ten feet off the ground.  That height can also be adjusted for preference of the pilots."  As she spoke, she highlighted her back yard on the display for Matt to aim them at for their first Terrestrial landing.

  Always good to put the navigational aids through their paces.  The point is to test the ship, not go 'I could park this with my eyes closed, even if I had eyes' after all.

  "Good to know, just having them in the first place reduces the odds of needing them." He comments, as the ship heads for Meg's preferred landing spot.

  Meg chuckled, and said "The fun part will be seeing how many people come to the gates today swearing there's a UFO in my back yard now."  She clearly DID have a bit of wickedness in her sense of humor every so often, but they were testing out the stealth systems.  The ship moved gracefully, and Matt found it responded beautifully to his control, heading precisely where he indicated, even as they hit the upper edges of the atmosphere, the clean lines of the hull slicing through the air without seeming to meet any resistance at all.

  Always a plus not having to enter atmosphere as a fireball.  Matt wishes he had thought of that sooner than the third time he had done it himself.

  Soon enough, Meg's ship is parked without incident.  "Well, I guess it's up to you what they get told should they ask."

  Meg giggled, and said "Well, to ME, it isn't a UFO.  So I could tell them that it's not a UFO.  But I probably really should call Uncle Ethan too."  She grinned at them both, and said "It works pretty nice for hopping around the planet too, if you don't mind people swearing it's a UFO and they think aliens are coming."

  "One would think you have to identify it, to longer have it be considered a UFO.  But that's what technicalities are for.  Either way, having actual seating is much more responsible a mode of transport than theoretical distance ziplines"
This message was last edited by the player at 00:16, Tue 05 Sept 2017.

  Megaira and Bella were at the Lab, with the enormous gantry outside that was the drydock for the Pandora in full swing as she worked on things inside, puttering in the kitchen.  Bella loved the cupcakes and cookies Auntie Megs produced in prodigious quantities for her, and it gave Meg something to do while she constructed the Pandora.  Honestly, the exterior hull was about done, aside from little things like the defensive mounts and such, she still had a considerable amount of work to do on the interior.  She'd put herself through some extremely rigorous education early on in the time between then and now, and she was probably frighteningly far ahead of the terrestrial space programs of any major country on earth now.  She wasn't building interplanetary ships, she was building an interstellar ark.  One for humankind, to keep them alive in case someone, like those aliens who had come knocking, decided to wipe out mankind.  Ozzy, Matt, and Uncle Ethan were pretty much the only ones who knew that so far, but she'd also talked a little to Oswald senior, and she knew she needed to begin the selection process for those who would go on the Pandora.  Like Pandora's box, this ship would hold hope for a future for humanity even if something happened to Earth.

Park ------>

  Matt could probably enter through previous permission or his own means, but honestly it's not just manners that have him decide to come to a stop outside a convenient airlock.

  It's to take a moment and appreciate the absurdity of looking like an Aliens parody.  Don't worry, it's safe to open the airlock, the monster has cotton candy!  Totally legit.
This message was last edited by the player at 02:21, Wed 20 May 2020.

  The most noticeable thing Matt perceived, was that the gantry had been disassembled, and there was an absolutely enormous ship now parked where the gantry had been.  Sleek, clearly capable of speed, but also with so much space it was stunning.  And there were a number of clearly operational hangar bays in action, with at least one of those small ships docking right now.  The Lab's airlocks had 'friendly scanners' and irised the external door open for Matt when he approached, as he was in the friendly database.  The computer greeted him once he had entered with "Greetings Matt.  Megaira and Bella are in the hydropinics section."

  When the concepts of speed vs aerodynamics are often a mere suggestion for intergalactic travel, going for the style points anyways still stands out. "Thanks for the heads up." Defaulting towards polite to onboard computers has also proven to be a good idea.

  Matt zips along just fast enough to let doors perform there intended function, arriving at his intended destination. "Hello, I've come with carnival snacks and to pass along the fact Andy wants to play catch up with Meg.  Though I can see you've been even more busy than expected.  Though if you'd rather stay up here for the moment, I can grab Bella something for herself." I mean sure, Meg COULD share the cotton candy.  But that wouldn't be the same now would it?

  Megs looked the same as ever, and she smiled at Matt as she said "Oh, I imagine Bella would prefer her own.  Have you ever known a toddler to want to share?  And yes, I have been busy.  It's just a little project I've had in the works for about five years, although I began some of the preliminary application work almost a decade ago.  Most of the final details were finalized in the last year, and some only in the last month.  Mostly everyone else has been busy pursuing things, careers and such, so I've been working on this one.  It's a non-profit one."

  Bella said brightly "Pandora!!"

  "Honestly people have seen too many movies to want anything to do with a for profit space ark anyways." Even when megacorp dystopia isn't the problem and healthcare is so great they can grow you spare fingers, they just have the worst luck.

  Matt's head tail or whatever we're calling it today returns from a quick gentleman's agreement with physics with a second batch of cotton candy.

  "Here you go, Bella.  It's nice to see you."

  Meg chuckled, and said "Well, most of those movies involved cryonic stasis, which this does not, nor were they the intended destination. They were all going somewhere. Pandora is meant to BE a home for humanity, with the option if the folks aboard so choose to set colonies out if they want, but colonization isn't the destination, it IS it's own colony.
 We were just picking some plants to put in the one garden aboard the Pandora.  There are large hydroponics sections for atmospherics, but that doesn't always include the 'pretty' that sometimes gets forgotten alongside 'useful and edible'.  But that's beside the point.  A festival would probably be good for Bella."

  Said young lady was hanging upside down in midair, six feet up, gobbling the cotton candy Matt had procured for her.

  "Having both options does tend to work wonders on disaster proofing a concept more than usual. Though it is true that it's easy to take the stuff keeping you alive for granted when it starts to look samey" Probably the real reason for so many seemingly pointless blinking lights in Sci-Fi. Installed so you'd have something more interesting than watching paint dry.

  He turns towards the floating kid, and comments "Of course, the fair has a bouncy castle already.  And so far as I've heard those stay entertaining even if you've already learned to fly like you have, Bella."  He asks Meg, "So how would you prefer the trip down?  Your own ride, Mittens express, or my way?"

  Megs reached up, lifting slightly off the floor, and plucked Bella out of the air with ease, and said "I think we will let you provide transport, might as well enjoy it."

  Bella giggled, and snagged at his head-tail with a sticky-fingered hand.

  Matt has always been thankful for his Super Harmless Powers, but leaving his headtail blunt by default means no 'Hey kids, sharp objects are harmless!' lessons will be his fault down the line. "Well, off we go then."

---> Weston City Park

The shuttles were landing and disembarking their volunteers every hour.  The crew complement were already there, and the hydroponics and greenbelt sections were being filled out, all the plants being lovingly selected, as well as more seed samples collected with every incoming load of crew.  The ship was complete, aside from the crew, and could embark upon it's endless flight whenever the crew was complete.  If anyone on Earth actually looked, they could now see the enormous craft nestled into the asteroid belt between Earth and Mars, nose pointed outward, solar sail rigging and engines still off and folded, but clearly powering up section by section.