Yes. It’s still worth it. I don’t know what these aliens are like, what they want, or what they’re planning to say. But they will have information. Any information, even stuff I’d rather not know, is better than none.

I spin the handle and open the door. The empty blackness of space lies beyond. The light of Tau Ceti glistens off the door. I peek my head out and see Tau Ceti with my own eyes. At this distance, it’s a little less bright than the sun as seen from Earth.

I double-check my tether to make darn sure I’m attached, then I step out into space.

I’m good at this.

I must have practiced a lot. Maybe in a neutral-buoyancy tank or something. But it comes as second nature to me.

I exit the airlock and clamp one of my tethers to a rail on the outside hull. Always have two tethers. And always have at least one attached. That way you’re never at risk of floating away from the ship. The Orlan-MKS2 is possibly the best EVA suit ever made, but it doesn’t have a SAFER unit like NASA’s EMU suit. At least with a SAFER unit you have minimal thrust capability to return to the ship if you fall adrift.

All that information floods into my mind at once. I guess I’ve put a lot of time and thought into spacesuits. Maybe I’m our crew’s EVA specialist? I don’t know.

I flip up the sun visor and peer toward the Blip-A. I wish I could glean some special insight by seeing it in person, but it’s pretty far away. The Hail Mary’s telescope gave me a much better view. Still, there’s something… unique about staring directly at an alien spacecraft.

I catch a glint of the cylinder. Every now and then the flat ends of the gently tumbling cylinder reflect Taulight.

I’ve decided “Taulight” is a word, by the way. Light from Tau Ceti. It’s not “sunlight.” Tau Ceti isn’t the sun. So… Taulight.

I still have a good twenty minutes before the cylinder reaches the ship. I watch it for a while to guess where it’ll hit. It’d be nice to have a crewmate inside at the radar station.

It’d be nice to have a crewmate at all.

After five minutes, I have a good bead on the cylinder. It’s headed for roughly the center of the ship. It’s as good a place as any for aliens to aim for.

I make my way across the hull. The Hail Mary is pretty big. My little pressurized area is only half its length and the back half flares out to be three times as wide. Most of that will be empty now, I guess. It used to be full of Astrophage for my one-way trip here.