Taban (checking his wrist console): Okay, I think it’s time to head back.

Daley: What? Why? It’s only been twenty minutes.

Taban: Yeah, but I need to look at that engine if I want to make the most of the daylight and this oxygen tank. And you’re fat. So you need to go back and rest.

Daley: I’m fine.

Taban: No doubt. But we really need to get back. This has been fun and all, but it’s not what we’re here for.

Daley: It could be.

Taban: Let’s go back.

VIDEO LOG #10—Ship Designation CS Wyvern 7079

Day 2: 19:02 UTO

[Back inside the ship. The HARE sits in the corner of the cockpit while Taban lies on his back, tinkering with something under the dashboard. Daley enters the room, sweating.]

Taban (speaking from under the dashboard): Where have you been?

Daley (taking off gloves): Out.

Taban (rolling out from under the dashboard): Out? You were out there again?

Daley: Yeah. Just going for a walk.

Taban: You really shouldn’t go out there alone, Daley. What if you slipped and fell on the ice? Or your oxygen tank sprung a leak? Or you got lost? We wouldn’t know.

Daley: Who’s ‘we’?

Taban: Me and the HARE.

Daley: Oh. Well, come out with me next time.

Taban: I’ve been fixing this damn engine.

Daley: How’s it looking?

Taban: I’ll need at least another half-day or so to get it running. It’s a two-person job. The HARE helps, but—

Daley: Uh-huh. So, listen—

Taban: —unfortunately neither of you have any engineering experience. What?

Daley: Let’s claim this place.

Taban: I thought we already did. What’d you call it? Hapfin?

Daley: It’s better than Harpa, or whatever you said for its designation. But I mean officially claim it.

Taban: And how do we do that? You wanna leave a flag with our names here after we leave?

Daley: No. I say we go to ISF and tell them we found it.

Taban: Oh. So . . . No.

Daley: Hear me out.

Taban: Huh.

Daley: We go to ISF, right? We tell them that we found this amazing, virgin planet. But we don’t give them the coordinates to it unless we get credit for finding it. And a cut of the profits.

Taban: Profits? Have you seen this place? It’s a frozen ball of ice in space. What kind of profits do you think we’re going to get?

Daley: It’s a brand spanking new planet, Fin! There’s gotta be something here. Some resource, some chemical element we don’t have back on Earth! Something! They’re at least going to pay to have researchers come out here. We don’t have the resources to mine anything other than ice, but if something’s here, and the ISF can get at it—