New Eden

Premise In this sci-fi Western, a third-generation Executive Office on mankind’s last hope, a colony ship nearing the end of its journey to a habitable planet, has to stop an escaped murderer before they destroy the ship. With the fate of everyone on board - including the would-be colonists in stasis and his own wife and unborn child - in the balance, and a crew degenerating into anarchy, our hero must uncover the saboteur in their midst before it’s too late. Synopsis Mankind has been forced to leave Earth and search for a new home after a cosmic fluke makes it inhospitable to life. The Copernicus is our species’ last hope, taking 10,000 colonists in cryogenic storage, on the centuries-long journey to a planet which could support humans. On board is a crew of 100 people, third generations of crew bred to live and die on the ship. Their sole purpose is to keep the decrepit ship running to ensure that cargo of genetically-modified colonists sleeping in cyrosleep, reaches their destination safely. The crew know that they cannot leave the ship with the colonists once it reaches its destination, because their physiology is unsuitable for surviving planetside, having been born and living only on the ship. JOHN GOODE is the Executive Officer of The Copernicus, expected to maintain law and order among the crew, and help the senior crew members to maintain their crew’s focus. His partner, ships’s physician DR YINGA ZHI, has just found out she’s pregnant - a death sentence in a ship bombarded by cosmic radiation As the crew shows signs of a breakdown in discipline, stoked by a rebellious crew member STEFAN DIBRITSKI driven by an apocalyptic religious fervour, one of the colonists, ABRAHAM, wakes early from cryo-stasis. This could cause a breakdown in morale and discipline as it should mean the ship should have reached its destination (which it hasn't), but the decision by CAPTAIN FERNANDEZ to keep Abraham's existence a secret leads to fatal consequences when the crew learn the truth. After the mutineers kidnap Abraham, a violent mutiny breaks out pitting crew members against each other, while John tries to rescue Abraham, kill Stefan and save the ship before it's too late. John’s investigation leads him to discover that Abraham was woken early deliberately by the Captain, but not why. All he knows is that time is running out. However, he is too late to save Abraham, who is sacrificed by the crew, now led by Stefan. John can only watch helplessly as Abraham is killed and the crew disperse to take over the ship so they can destroy it, and to stop anyone else from using the escape pods. John confronts The Captain about the situation. She reveals she is in fact a construct of the ship and it was she who woke Abraham so she could use it as a catalyst for killing the crew. John manages to kill her and assume command of the ship, but Yinga is badly wounded in the fight and a plan is formed to get her to safety using Abraham's empty cry-tube. As the mob storms the bridge, John is trapped and with nowhere left to go, he delivers the cargo of colonists to the planet and then starts the ship’s auto destruct sequence to stop the mutineers taking control. Having landed safely and with her wounds healed, Yinga exits her cry-chamber and sees for the first time New Eden in all its glory, along with the thousands of colonists who have been safely delivered to the planet. She looks up at the sky and sees the after affects of the destroyed Copernicus, debris raining down as a celestial firework display.