Lost Colonies

The joint Japanese-Australian colonisation effort that was launched in 2037 towards Sigma Draconis never got there. In 2348 an Arcadian survey ship reached the system but found no trace of the two colony ships, despite the inviting Sigma Draconis I. It may be that the ships had some fatal flaw, that there is an unknown hinder between Sol and Sigma Draconis or even that they were sabotaged. The planet appears to be quite habitable, a small temperate world covered with cloudy mountain ranges.

Zeta 2 Reticuli III is marginally habitable, a glacial world with a thin open equatorial sea that likely could be seeded with terrestrial life. Among Atlanteans it has been suggested again and again that a colony operation ought to be initiated, but there have never been any strong force for it. In 2301 a small expedition was launched by the Kraskat Association, using a modified sublight transport ship. The ship apparently reached Zeta 2 Reticuli III, naming it Tjetvir and setting up a small base on an equatorial island. Over the next months they reported regularly, but then their radio transmissions ended. When a TRI experimental ship in 2340 visited the system they found no survivors. Apparently the expedition broke down into anarchy, and the people killed each other or sabotaged essential systems; the last ones froze to death when the base power supply broke down. This explanation is somewhat controversial on Atlantis, where some claim that the expedition was deliberately sabotaged or attacked by something unknown.

There may be unknown colonies, launched during the late 2040’s or afterwards. While the most obvious locations have been found to be empty, it is not unreasonable that other colonies could exist. One possibility is O’Neill habitats; they could be located just about anywhere. Science fiction stories about unknown technologically advanced colonies (or even solarians secretly moving among the population) are popular on several planets.