You're frank with the crew. This might be their final journey. You tell the colonists who aren't on the bridge to prepare themselves for the end. The crew up in the command center knows the situation and you're trusting in them to hold it together.

Virginia Rein, an American astronaut and veteran of four dozen Earth re-entries is strapped in to your right. The g-force presses her cheeks back, robbing her of her usual warmth. "We've got about a thousand kilometers of wiggle room," she says. "Where we landing, captain?"

Overlaid on the screen projection of Europa are several likely landing spots. There's a smooth plain in the Annwn Regio, flat and easiest to land on.

To your left, Kosmo the philanthropist swivels his one metal eye towards you, and his vocoder voice echoes in your earpiece. "Let us be bold! We're here to find life, and life is in the cracks!"

Using the neuro-interface in his helmet, Kosmo highlights on the screen a potential landing spot on the top of one side of the Hyperenor Linea. The linea is formed of two parallel ridges of pushed-up ice that run for thousands of miles, with a permanent crack between them leading straight to the inner ocean.

You hear another voice in your ear. It's the melodic voice of Sungura Kikwete, the representative for the Habitus corporation. "Here's a big idea!" they say. "We should head straight to Callanish Crater. It will make dome building much easier."

An image of Callanish balloons up on the screen: vast concentric rings of ice spikes caused by an ancient asteroid impact. This could eventually be covered in a dome.

"Darlings, I hate to fault your judgment, but our number-one priority here is not dying right now," Rein argues. "My vote is Annwn." The way she pronounces it, Annwn sounds like "A Noon." You know she's memorized the names of all the features.

Kosmo exhales a digitized huff. "We only have one shot at the interesting life! If Hyperenor is too dangerous for you, I'd settle for Callanish."

It's a life-or-death situation, so it's your call.

I'm with Virginia Rein on this one: Annwn Regio is our best chance for survival.

Kosmo is right: we're here to find life and landing on Hyperenor Linea is going to be best for the scientists in their search.

I stand with Sungura Kikwete: we don't want to be under ice our whole lives and Callanish would be an excellent place for a dome.

Next

"Brace yourselves for Callanish," you cry. "We're heading for the center of the crater!"

"Thank you, Captain," Sungura whispers on a private channel.

"You can thank me if you survive." The screen shifts to the final destination and the landing A.I. works its adjustments on the thrusters. You can feel it in your seat as the ship shudders in an altered direction.

Europa has the thinnest of atmospheres so the landing parachutes barely do anything with such low air resistance. But still, they're deployed. The forward rockets burn out the last of the fuel, slowing the ship as it comes in towards the moon, the intense blue flames melting the ancient ice below.

Tidal shifts keep the surface fresh, so there are relatively few craters on Europa. Callanish is one of the most impressive. There is no real bowl to the canyon, just rings upon rings of spikes like so many standing stones. The ship's software directs you all towards the center surrounded by the towers of ice.

The crew takes a final look out across Europa through the Asterion's external cameras. Before the ship lowers between the spikes of ice, you see a jagged horizon ringed by Callanish's spikes. You briefly see the blue ice walls envelop you. Finally, the steam from the boiling water below occludes everything as the ship sinks into the frozen surface of the ocean moon.

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You have made it to Europa. Everyone is alive, to your knowledge. The ship shudders and shifts as the meltwater slushes down on top of it and the whole ship buries itself into the ice, safe from the deadly radiation bombardment. Your mind races with what your first priority will be.

This is supposed to be a scientific base. We need to start up the readings immediately.

Earth needs to know what just happened!

I need to check on everyone, make sure there were no injuries.

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You pull up the recorder and begin to compose a message to Earth. It takes two hours for any file to get there, and it's reliant on a trailing wire and antenna all working as planned.

Virginia Rein is the first out of her seat. She unlatches your buckles and pulls you to your feet. You feel light in the low gravity, even lighter than on Luna.

"Time enough for all that in a moment," she says. "We did the impossible. We're here."

It truly is remarkable. Along with private donors and two large corporations, three major geopolitical factions joined together for the first time in a mission of unity. The old guard United Earth formed of the northern nations out of the wreckage of the UN, still dominated by the United States of America. The Group of 81, a loose alliance of disparate nations, mostly in the south, with wildly varying governments, united only in their opposition to the U.E. And then the upstart Libertalia, a grouping of independent city-states floating on Earth's oceans, a handful of renegade regions in Africa, South America and the Middle East, as well as their tiny outposts in the asteroid belt.

Of course, they all want something different from the colony. The liberal democracies and kingdoms of United Earth want the resources of a new frontier to revitalize their market economies. The republics and juntas of the G81 are more interested in securing new habitats for their burgeoning populations. And the Libertalian communes and city-states see in Europa a bold opportunity for new forms of human society.

You're still the leader of the expedition but your captaincy has ended with the ship's arrival. In four years' time there will be an election, but how are you now referred to?

As a leader from United Earth, I'm the President, naturally.

It's a United Earth-led colony, and I'm the Governor.

Where I'm from in the G81, they won't bat an eyelid if I call myself Commander.

I come from an old G81 republic, so I'll be a President.

I'm a Libertalian among equals here, acting as the people's Commissar for now.

In my part of Libertalia, a leader is always called a Captain.

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You look forward to being the President. In another four years, there might be call for an election, but for now you're the boss. The G81 would only offer their extensive rocketry experience on the condition of having one of their own lead the expedition.

The highest offices are not restricted by gender outside of the few theocracies left in the world and a handful of isolated floating cities. The leadership over the Europan colony is no different.

I'm a woman.

I'm a man.

I'm neither.

Next

You are President Voshinu ., the leader of the Europa expedition. You stretch out from your chair, enjoying the freedom of movement. All these people have trusted you with their livelihood. Your mind reels as you consider how you got to this point….

Next Chapter

Chapter One: The Launch

Six months before launch day, you can see the Asterion in orbit through the clear dome over Moltke City on Luna. Construction gantries spill out from a docking satellite along with three supply rockets that are set to be sent in advance of your arrival. The main ship and all the unmanned supply rockets are being built in space to save on fuel. Luna is the staging ground for the Europa colony: from one moon to another.

Like all great plans, it started as an implausible dream. And then, through countless meetings, emails, flights, discussions and projections, the possibility of a permanent base on Europa was wrought into something solid. It had all started when NASA's Europa Clipper, an orbital probe that reached the moon in 2030, discovered the remains of microbial life in a water plume spraying out from one of the many cracks in the ice. The discovery that we weren't alone in the solar system was too enticing not to follow up. But further probes failed to catch plumes, the microbes from the Clipper trip were too degraded to make any final conclusions from, and the intense hostility and distance of the moon made robotic investigation an expensive non-starter. Having a science base under the ice itself became increasingly enticing. But the political appetite for space colonies was set back by the debacle of the Martian catastrophe and the collapse of the U.N. in the 2060s.

But now, on the cusp of 2080, sights are set on Europa. The idea of one country or international grouping or corporation owning the moon was intolerable to most, especially after what happened to Luna. So it had to be an international effort. And they needed a figurehead, someone with the right kind of experience. Someone that each group thought (rightly or not) could be trusted to expand their interests. Someone like you.

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.There were many good candidates for leadership. Asteroid miners in their prime with real experience working in low-gravity and artificial habitat systems. Sharp-eyed pilots with experience in controlling the space, ice, and underwater vessels that would be used in the colony. Marine biologists, experts in the kinds of ecosystems everyone hoped to find in Europa's moon-wide icebound ocean.

There were arcologists, designers and administrators of self-enclosed habitats who would know the signs of system failure. Many favored having an aerospace engineer take the lead, like with most prior space missions. Someone who could think on their feet and keep the colony ship running during the eighteen-month journey. Others pushed for a diplomat in charge, someone who could hold together the many factions vying for control of the project.

I was hollowing out the asteroid Ceres when my country joined the Group of 81.

I was a fighter pilot on the G81 side of the Bering War.

I led the team that saved the dugong from extinction.

I was responsible for putting a dome over central Beijing.

I was deeply involved in the G81 seed-ship project for speculatively exploring the stars.

My diplomacy saved millions of lives among the hot zone diaspora.

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