Okay. This one is a bit naughty. A bit of a what if … I apologize to any of my religious friends for this one…

They announce a pandemic. They issue the order to isolate, then quarantine. I laugh. Not because I don’t believe, but because I’m alone. I’ve been here, on my own, forever. Maybe a little less than forever, but near as makes no difference.

I used to believe they would come. But no-one can hear me. I miscalculated. My trajectory was off by one millionth of one millimeter. Instead of landing in the promised land, I landed here. The howl around me is continuous, buffeting my ship. 

The chill took some getting used to. I tried letting myself freeze for a while out of boredom. I can’t die. I can give the appearance of death. But my body regenerates at a tremendous rate, even in this frozen waste. 

I tried walking out once, twice, but the magnetic pole played havoc with my internal navigation senses, and I ended back where I started both times. The ship is wrecked. I couldn’t restart it. I failed my mission. I was supposed to return after 100 years … but still at 1000 I hadn’t found my way back, and now I’m too ashamed to attempt again. Maybe if this virus pans out, I might get my chance. There has to be some kind of cataclysm for my style of PR to work out after all. We are way off schedule here. By almost 2000 years. They should have been out in the galaxy by now, instead of isolated.

In fact I bet the others are thinking of striking them off the list of eligibles now they have nuclear warheads, but I still think there is hope for them. If this virus runs its course, if they get sick enough of introspection and social media, and go back to exploring, I can do my thing. Wander out of the frozen wilderness and proclaim the company message. I’m glad they got part of the way by themselves. I mean, my first visit here, they were still enslaving massive portions of the population. That’s always a hard habit to break, so I’m pretty impressed that they managed that one on their own. Unification of religion didn’t work out too well though. I really thought I had that one sold, but looks like it’s even more fragmented than ever. I will have to think about whether to go down the miracle route, or whether to just ‘fess up and give them the heavy hand of intergalactic law speech. 

By the way the H is for Harold, but how did they know I had a middle name?