Sunshine Page #2

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lt was...

... beautiful.

- Mace?

- Yeah.

Your maintenance program

allows a further 14 minutes...

... for the mainframe panel

to remain out of coolant tank.

Sh*t.

Guys...

...you wanna see something?

Well, I should have

a few words to say...

...but on reflection...

...what can one say?

Ladies and gentlemen.

Mercury.

Twenty-three hours ago,

on the comms systems...

While listening to your space music?

- While scanning the frequencies,

l heard a transmission.

It appeared as we flew

into the dark side of Mercury.

The iron content of the planet...

...is acting as an antenna.

There's high background interference,

but the signal is clear enough.

lcarus, please play audio file 7-5/B.

Yes, Harvey.

End file.

What is it?

It's the lcarus I.

That signal is their distress beacon.

Jesus.

That's impossible.

It's been seven years.

Clearly it's not impossible

because you can hear it.

- They're still alive?

- We don't know.

But they could be.

Oxygen is self-replenishing.

Water is recycled.

They have the solar power

they need.

What about food?

Their supplies couldn't last.

That depends.

They had stock to cover eight people

for three years.

That's a four-year shortfall.

Hell of a diet.

We don't know what happened

to lcarus I.

There might have been an accident.

There might not have been

eight people to feed.

- Captain, do we know where they are?

- Well done, Capa. That is the question.

lcarus.

Please plot our trajectory following

the slingshot around Mercury.

Yes, captain.

Now plot the source

of the lcarus I beacon.

Jesus. They almost made it.

That's why no one picked up

the signal until now.

It was lost in the background light

and noise.

We're gonna pass right by them.

Within 1 o or 15 thousand miles.

Can anyone survive?

If the shield is intact.

We'll be able to see them?

Yes.

I'd need to look at all of this

pretty carefully. Very carefully.

But if I had to make a guess right now,

I'd say we could adjust our trajectory.

We could fly straight to them.

But we're not gonna do that.

Just to make it absolutely clear,

there's no way we're gonna do that.

Do I have to spell it out for you?

We have a payload to deliver

to the heart of our nearest star.

We're doing it

because that star is dying.

And if it dies, we die.

Everything dies.

So that is our mission.

There is nothing...

...literally nothing, more important than

completing our mission. End of story.

- He's right.

- He's right. Of course I'm right.

Is anyone here seriously

considering otherwise?

- May I put a counter argument?

- No.

Captain?

Go ahead.

It would, of course...

...be absurd to alter our trajectory

to assist the crew of the lcarus I.

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