Blood and Stardust
Ellen Weaver, Captain of the Icarus 15, felt small. She had for a long time. She’d seen the universe up close, peered into its countless abyss. And though she’d grown hard and numb to their horrors, she always felt tiny in their presence.
Even while resting on Earth, surrounded by people that admired and respected her, children who idolized her, and adults who begged to join her crew, all she had to do was look up at the sky on a clear night, gaze into the infinite blackness of space, and she’d feel like an ant crawling on the back of an elephant. The people around her could never understand just how insignificant they were in the face of eternity.
Where once stood a young, eager astronaut, now sat a tired old woman.
And she continued her missions, to explore the furthest, darkest reaches of space, and further mankind’s knowledge of the stars. She’d seen a lot.
Seen the fall of countless civilizations,
Come face to face,
With the fragile nature of enlightenment,
For progress is not a straight line,
It is a marble statue,
That will crumble if not cared for.
Seen the monstrous beasts of the galaxies,
Beyond good and evil,
Consuming entire planets,
For only a meal of that scale,
Can stop their hunger pains.
Seen the bizarre forms of life,
That lurk in the caves of the desert moons,
The tentacles that vomit up their offspring,
That crawl onto her ship,
And eviscerate her crewmates,
Right in front of her.
Seen the black holes,
That suck you inside,
Twisting your body and mind,
Eliciting emotions more powerful,
And paralyzing,
Than Love or Fear,
Joy or Sorrow,
And when they release you from their grip,
You stand by idly,
Wondering if you’ll ever feel anything that strong,
Ever again,
Wondering if you’d ever want to.
And at the end of every mission,
After enduring the horrors,
The pains,
The agonies,
The traumas,
Captain Ellen Weaver,
Covered in blood and stardust,
Sits at her desk,
And writes a report,
To send back to Earth.
She’ll also try to include some photos,
And physical samples,
If she can.
After the report is sent, Ellen travels back to Earth, to recuperate in a small hospital run by the government. She stays there for four weeks. She spends the first two weeks trying to rest, tossing and turning in bed, waking up screaming from nightmares, and not being able to eat for long periods of time. Sometimes she aches and groans, as an alien parasite squirms through her body. Often she weeps for the crewmates who will never come home again. Other times she stares up at the ceiling, reeling from the blank infinite of the cosmos, wondering if her existence has any meaning.
The last two weeks are spent planning the next mission; reading reports from probes, inquiring about the status of her ship and crew, and requesting the necessary equipment. She never likes to be out-of-commission for too long.
One evening, a few days before she was scheduled to check-out of the hospital, one of the nurses sat down with her, and asked why she still did it.
“After all you’ve been through, all you’ve seen, why keep going?” The nurse asked. “Why don’t you retire? You’ve been doing this for so long, it’s destroying you.”
“That doesn’t matter.” Ellen said. Her voice was low, tired, yet still strong and committed. “Mankind lives in a placid island of ignorance, and that cannot be allowed to go on. The universe is vast and complex, and Earth is floating adrift in its cosmic waves. If we are to survive in this place, to deal with the horrors that may lurk at our doorstep, or the terrors that await future travelers, we need to know what’s out there. And I’m the only one who wants to do the job. If the future of mankind depends on me losing my body and my mind, then so be it.”
“It’s not right.”
Ellen shrugged. “Worst that can happen is that I’ll die.”
“Do you want to die?”
Ellen paused. “I don’t know. Either way, no big loss. But I’m just some little old lady.”
“You’re much more than that.”
A small smile touched Ellen’s lips. Then she got a call from her first mate. He wanted to talk about rations for the next mission.
