Terra Nova.
The landscape of the planet was bright with the light from the binary suns. In the distance came the sounds of a placid lake fed by a waterfall. Overheard came the sounds and calls of animals. In a valley not far from the lake, the space and the air distorted as several wormholes opened, some of them on the ground and others in the air, discharging several large aeroplanes, drones, and helicopters, while on the ground people stepped through the wormholes followed closely by coaches of people.
When the vehicles stopped or landed, the new colonists looked at their new home. Patrick flinched as little, as his bones and muscles adjusted to the gravity. He turned to his wife and family, and he saw they too were feeling the effects of the gravity as well, but his young children were looking around at the pristine, crystalline surface of the lake and breathing in the fresh, clean air with the scents of vegetation, listening to the sounds of nature around them.
Patrick, Karin, and their children, Anna, Stephanie and Lara had spent their whole lives on Mars. They had lived in one of the underground cities which protected the colonists from the dust, dirt and storms of the planet. They had gone through the wormhole gateways and travelled to the other planets, like Venus, the moon, and Earth. But being here, standing in a valley on an alien world totally unfamiliar to them was making their eyes pop out.
This was one of the reasons they had brought the kids with them. Patrick and Karin had become tired of the solar system, of Mars despite being born and raised there. They wanted more for their family. They wanted to become pioneers, when the opportunity came along they took it.
Patrick was proud they had been accepted as part of the first colonists sent to Terra Nova, a world located some 20 light years away from Earth which possessed the same size, and the same amount of air, vegetation and water. Aside from the survey teams sent to the planet to explore it, Patrick, his family and 50,000 more, who were here and were settling down in other parts of the planet, were the only humans here.
"We're really doing this, huh?" Karin stepped to stand next to him, taking his hand.
Patrick squeezed his wife's hand slowly in reassurance. "Yes, hun. We are."
"Daddy, is this really our new home?" Lara asked.
"Yes, sweetie," Patrick replied.
"It's so pretty, daddy," Lara clasped her hands together.
"Yeah, it is," Anna smiled at her little sister before her eyes wandered, and she went as still as a statue. Frowning curiously, Patrick and Karin followed her gaze. Anna's eyes had locked onto a fairly handsome young man who was helping his own family with unloading the supplies and equipment and the parts for the prefabs sent with them to begin building the colony quickly until they began building their own shelters later.
Patrick felt his fatherly instincts kick in. Anna was 13 years old, and while she had thrown a temper tantrum or two at the thought of being separated from her friends, she had quickly realised defiance was futile and she'd come with them. While he was glad she was now used to the idea and now had reasons to stay, that didn't mean he had to like the thought of her being popular with boys.
"Anna, come and help us," he gently pulled her away.
"Dad," she whined.
"No," Karin said, although she sent a look at Patrick, wishing he'd accept the fact Anna was a pretty girl and she'd logically have admirers. The colonists spent the whole day exploring the valley, and they began unloading the supplies in the coaches, trucks and aircraft. The prefabs needed teams of people working on them. As the prefabs were built, and linked to the fusion generators of the aircraft, and would remain their power source until the colonists made use of other sources of power, the colonists built up a fire and had a feast of their supplies. They would soon send teams of hunters and foragers to find local game and vegetables and fruit while they experimented to see if the planet could support grains and fruits and vegetables and animals imported from Earth without damaging the planet.
For the next six months, which turned into six years, the colony grew. There were many challenges. Hunters and foragers and explorers came across many insects and predators, which proved capable of harming humans. In their first year, Patrick's family almost lost Lara to a nasty insect bite; the venom passed through the bite, as the insect acted like a mosquito, and sucked her blood had left her bedridden for days before the venom was collected and analysed.
A basic cure was made, but it was soon discovered that the venom, when refined was actually capable of helping cancer sufferers.
A year after their arrival on the planet, the first marriage took place and a year later the first child was born. More and more colonists arrived from the SOL system, as they sent back favourable reports about the status of the colony and the discoveries made, and they began building more towns and settlements.
Back on Earth, the parts for a floating city were being constructed before they were shipped to the planet named Terra Nova. Fitting together and possessing the equipment for getting power from differing temperatures, and powering the pods which propelled them through the seas. The inhabitants of the city included oceanographers, marine biologists, chemists, and aquacultural scientists tasked with documenting and recording the marine life of Terra Nova, and to find the ones which could be cultivated and grown for food.
The city also contained a large fleet of specialised submersibles, diving bells, and probes for exploring and mapping the ocean floors, and many marine biologists rapidly catalogued the new life forms.
Within a decade, as the Terra Nova system was explored, there were other solar systems nearby which were colonised by humans, and they were either successes or dismal failures.
