Landfall at Hearth

Record

Landfall at Hearth designates the arrival, on May 4, 3031, of the generation ship GS Marek at the world its own crew renamed Hearth at departure. The ship left Ceres ring on September 19, 2288; landfall comes 743 years later, carried across the crossing by descendants of the 3,411 souls who originally shipped out. Boats come down over some six hours; Master Yara Marek, ninth of her line since the ship's founding captain, brings the line's long service to its stated destination.

Andre's Presence

Andre is present at the landfall, recorded greeting descendants of the original crew and passengers by name and reading, in full, the ship's roll of the dead from its own record book — a document maintained continuously since the vessel's departure nearly seven and a half centuries earlier. His connection to the ship predates its launch: Ilsa Marek, the founding master, is on record commissioning him, before departure, to outlive the crossing, remember it, and meet the children it produced. Landfall is the fulfillment of that commission.

The Bell

A bell hung at Hearth in 3032 is cast in part from plate salvaged from the Marek's own hull, joining the ongoing lineage of bells cast, in part, from the tug Dorothy Ann's steel and rung annually in memory of the Gray Hour. The Hearth bell completes Andre's count of nine worlds on which he has personally stood the full forty minutes of the Gray Hour memorial — the final entry in a tally that began, a thousand years earlier, on a single burning pier outside Baltimore.