Starstruck

The ship creaked and moaned as it pushed through the artificial atmosphere of Mars. The deafening noise of the engines rang in my ears as I lazily sat in my tall chair. I was the only man on this mission. The rest of my team had been transferred to a different station, leaving just me, the stupid droid in the back, and my wit to keep me company. This was my seventy-second mission to fix some dysfunctional equipment on some remote space station or some moon satellite's solar panels. This time, it was to fix the computer on an evacuated station orbiting Tau Ceti E, a planet in one of the nearby systems. Apparently, a small meteor had ripped a hole through the west wing, and I had to go patch it up.

    It was a relatively new station that only went up about forty-five years ago. I know, it’s only twenty-three years older than me, but still. It’s crazy that humans landed on the Moon just a hundred and twelve years ago. Now we have a ship on its way to the Andromeda galaxy, and it’ll be there in just twenty years.

    I read that kids who lived between 1970 and 2020 all had aspirations to be astronauts, but now that it’s just a simple way to travel to your job and back, it really kinda sucks. I hate space. I’ll be the first to tell you. I’ve always hated it. It is literally the worst way to die for me. Now that I run these missions alone, I’m afraid of being left alone. Just imagine, being stranded in space, choking on your own CO2. Slowly feeling sleepy, knowing that you will never get home to be buried in native soil. That’s a luxury that most space travelers don’t have.

    The only reason I have this job is because my father forced me into it, then he left with everyone else in my family to move onto some deep-space “Cruise Ship” that’s making its way to Andromeda. I’m alone now in every shape and form. I don’t have time to make friends because I’m constantly on the move. Something is always there for me to repair. My ultimate dream though is to live on the Earth. They say it should be safe to live on in the next five years, and the plants will grow back in about ten. I’ve never had a chance to walk on Earth, but it’s been my dream to go there since I was small.

At least I have my very own Cruiser, right? I named her The Escape from Mars. Fitting, since I absolutely hated Mars. Sure, if I went outside, sometimes I would see a red rock or two or three. There was never anything to do except attend illegal fighting rings. It was fun I guess. I got pretty good at fighting, until I almost got arrested. I knocked out a cop, and luckily they never figured out who I was. I read books about how life was on Earth before the accidents. You could have a job, own land, have a family and anything you could dream of. The different continents seemed divided, but each was as welcoming as the other with their different cultures and whatnot. Except for Antarctica. That place is a literal frozen wasteland most of the time, but anyways, I would have loved to lived there on Earth. A place where I could actually feel like I was home.

    But now, seventy-six percent of the Earth’s surface is either polluted with dangerous radiation released after all the major nuclear plants in Europe had meltdowns twenty-seven years ago, and on top of that, major climate change killed off fishes and melted a lot of the polar ice caps. Many cities on the shores around the world were destroyed. Everyone was either forced to live in space or die. Sounds almost like a movie.

    Humans love to cheat death, so we left. A billion people were still able to inhabit the earth in massive shelters, but the rest were shipped off in “ARKs,” massive ships that could hold hundreds of millions of people each. Now, I had the opportunity to see the place where humans had lived for so long. It was my chance to finally take control of my own ship and be who I was born to be… But that was all for when it was habitable again.

    The annoying droid pulled up the comms system and spoke to me. I didn’t hear him the first time over the engines, so I pressed the button on the side of my helmet and asked, “Can you repeat that, Tin Can? Over.”

    “Captain Weaver, we will be entering orbit in thirty seconds. Over.”

    “Tin Can, what did I tell you about calling me that? Over.”

    “Soren, you're the only guy ever who doesn't like being called captain. Wierdo. We will enter orbit in seven seconds. Over.”

    “I know you do it just to make me angry. Over.” I counted the remaining seconds in my head before I heard the boosters shut off.

    “We are now in orbit. Over.”

    “Hah! We didn’t die!” I joked. I let a big smile take over my face. This was the only part of space that I enjoyed: the beautiful silence and the view. I can never get tired of seeing what’s out there.

    “Smiling at the stars again?” asked Tin Can.

His real name is TIMM, but I call him Tin Can sometimes. He spoke, but not over the intercom. He had entered the cockpit without my noticing. TIMM was a robot that looked almost like a four-legged spider. He had a top half, with extremely well-calibrated retractable arms and other fancy science stuff, and his four powerful legs. They could jump six feet high in places with twice Earth’s gravity. He’d been my only friend since I joined this crew at nineteen. No matter how much I insult him, or call him annoying, he’ll always be my partner.

    “Yeah. I have that feeling on the back of my neck again, TIMM,” I said, pushing my face against the window.

    “It’s time to sleep, Soren,” he said calmly. I sighed and pressed my gloved hand on the window.

    “I know, TIMM, it’s just that… This will be the longest time that I’ve ever slept in cryosleep. It’ll take me twelve years to get there.”

    “Yes, I know, but on the bright side, Earth should be repopulating by the time you get back home.”

    “I know.”

    “Just remember, I’ll always be here for you.”

    “Ah shut up, Tin Can. Alright, go turn on artificial gravity while I get something to eat,” I said. I opened my heavy-duty belt and floated past the cockpit and into the portside wing of my ship. I wore the standard engineer space suit, but when I was off ship, I usually wore the same thing every day. Black skinny jeans, a solid blue T-shirt, a blue trenchcoat thing I had got from the company, and some nice black boots that cut off below my knee. The intercom blared.

    “Artificial gravity activated in five seconds. Five, four, three, two--” I braced myself with a pole as TIMM completed the countdown. I felt the gradual pull back to the floor as the ship began its spin. “Gravity at 9.807 meters squared. Earth’s gravity achieved.”

    “Good. Nice work, TIMM,” I said.

    “Thank you.”

    “If you’d be so kind, would you set the timer for my cryosleep? I want to have something in my system before I go.”

    “Sure.”

    “Timer set for twelve years and twenty-six days, four hours and fifty-two minutes,” TIMM said as the cryochamber emerged from the wall of the ship. The steam hissed out of pressure release mechanisms as the front of the chamber opened. TIMM then pulled it out flat like a bed and told me to lie down. I quickly put on my water suit which was made specifically for cryosleep and lay on the thin squishy mattress. For a few minutes, we checked my blood pressure, stuck some needles into my skin and then finally got me ready to sleep.

    “See ya in twelve years, ya Tin Can.”

    “See you later, Soren. Don’t worry, I’ll take care of the ship for you.”

    “If you hit it against an asteroid or something, I’ll crawl out of here and kick your big metal ass,” I joked.

    “Yes, yes, of course.”

    The procedure continued until he finally put me to sleep. The chamber then recognized that I was unconscious and pulled up its walls. Warm saline water poured into the chamber, and after it had filled, the top shut and clamped down. TIMM pressed a button on the wall, and the chamber slowly lifted itself back into the wall.

    “Good night, Soren.”

    I took my first breath in twelve years. The light pierced my eyelids as the chamber opened and began to drain the water. My muscles felt extremely weak, so I couldn’t move. I just gasped for air, coughed and gasped again. My hair had grown, but not as much as I thought it would’ve. It was maybe a little lower than shoulder length, but I expected much longer.

    “Good morning, Soren. Or afternoon. Or night. Whichever you prefer.”

    “TIMM? TIMM! It’s been twelve years!” I yelled. My throat ached with pain after not using it for years. Every breath I took hurt, but it was a good pain.

    “I missed you, Soren. I counted every second that you were gone.”

    “TIMM. Ugh, I- I’ve been asleep for twelve years?”

    “Yes.” After hearing him say that, my eyes watered and I choked back a sob. I had spent twelve years sleeping.

    “I’m thirty-four, but I’m still twenty-two!” I cried, shaking my arms helplessly at my side.

    “Calm down, Soren. It’s just a side effect. You have a job to do, remember? Don’t worry. I’ll go get the mechanical walkers.” TIMM left me on the wet bed as I had a mini mid-life crisis. Technically, I was still twenty-two, but I wasn’t at the same time. It took me a bit to calm down, but I was still a little uncomfortable. It was always the same after a long sleep. TIMM reappeared with a metal exoskeleton designed for people to use after cryosleep while they go through physical therapy. After the wearer regained some muscle, it was removed and put back into storage.

    “Be careful, TIMM. I don’t want you to break my back,” I said as he slowly lifted me off the bed and dried me carefully with a towel. He removed my wet suit and dried the rest of my body. When I was finally dry, he helped me put on my clothing and then my suit over it. Then he lowered me into the metal exo-suit and strapped me in. He calibrated the back panel and then told me to try to lift an arm.

    I tried to move my forearms, but all I heard was a whirring and clicking sound coming from the arm. TIMM then recalibrated and told me to try again. This time, along with the whirring, my arm slowly lifted off the ground.

    “Try to get up.” I moved and flipped onto my stomach slowly. Then, with all my might, I mushed against the floor to push my body up. It took a few minutes, but I managed to get on all fours. A few tries later, I was on my feet again for the first time in years. My face had filled with blood and my veins had popped, but I had done it.

    “I did it!” I exclaimed.

    “Yes, you’re doing just fine. Try taking some steps.” I focused with all my might and moved a single foot forward. I had to regain my breath before trying again. After the second step, I couldn’t take anymore.

    “It’s- It’s t-too hard,” I gasped.

    “Hmm, let me see,” TIMM said as looked over the configuration once again. “Ahh, there’s the problem.”

    “W-what?”

    “I didn’t set it to the ‘wuss’ setting.” He pressed another button, and then suddenly I felt lighter. I took another step with ease. I could move my arms and legs like before, with no difficulty whatsoever.

    “Ah, that’s much better,” I sighed.

    “Well, I guess you’re the wuss on this ship,” TIMM said to me as he sucked up the spilled water on the floor. “Go get something to eat. You look like crap.”

    “Wow. thanks, ya jerk,” I said as I turned and slowly walked into the food storage area.

    I worked hard through physical therapy like normal. It took a little longer than usual, though. I suppose it was just because the amount of time that I had spent asleep. It had been nearly four months since I woke up, and now we were nearing Tau Ceti E. TIMM’s estimated time of arrival was something close to two weeks and two days. Just enough time to get some work done.

    TIMM helped me remove my exo-suit while I punched some numbers and studied the job file. You wouldn’t believe how good it felt when you finally got to take it off. Once you were healthy enough to move on your own, the exosuit just restricted your movement. It couldn’t do EVERYTHING that a human can.

    “The station’s northwest corner was hit by a small asteroid about the size of a fist. Surprising that it actually made it through the hull. It must’ve been going extremely fast. It ripped through some electrical stuff and tore through the other side.” I paused and looked at TIMM, who just stared blankly back at me. “Huh, not too bad. Just two small hull repairs and some wiring. I slept twelve years for this? Well, I suppose I’m just a step closer to living our dream, eh, TIMM?” He didn’t say anything, so I called him a stupid robot, earning me a hard slap on the back of my head.

    “Looks like this job can be completed in less than one hundred twenty hours,” he said to me as he pulled the last piece of the suit off of my back. I rubbed the back of my head where he had hit me when my arm was finally free.

    “Yeah, looks that way. Any sign of missing parts, jagged stuff? Hazards? Pretty girl robots?” I teased.

    “You know that robots cannot fornicate. Why do you hurt my feelings like this, Soren?”

    “Shut up and go get me something to eat.”

    “Get it yourself. I have pretty girl robots to dream about.”

    “Ah, finally done with repairs,” I said as I pulled my EVA suit off bit by bit. “I’m hungry. get me something to eat, TIMM. I’d like a good meal before I go to bed for another two years.”

    “It seems a bit redundant to sleep for years and take months to get back in shape just for a few days. I don’t get to experience sleep, so I play chess on my lonesome for hours.”

    “You played chess for twelve years straight?”

    “... I played checkers occasionally. Sometimes solitaire.”

    “You lonely bastard...”

    “... Shut up.”

    “Don’t worry though, TIMM. This is the last time I’ll be asleep for a while. Just think. The both of us owning a little home next to a nice big forest! Maybe even a lake or a river! I have enough to buy a pretty good plot of land. We can even build our own house! Most people don’t want to go back, so that just means cheaper land! How much do I have currently saved?”

    “Hmm… you have one-point-two million dollars saved from the last thirty-two missions. Without interest. With interest, you have roughly one-point-five million dollars.”

    “That’s not enough. I guess my big mission this time should cover it, right? When we get home, I’m bound to get a shit-ton of money.”

    “Yes, exactly two point two million dollars. Let’s get you suited up for sleep now,” TIMM said, pushing me into the cryochamber room. I dressed out like normal and set the coordinates for Earth.

    “Aight, we’re set!”

    “Hey Soren, do you think we can circle around Tau Ceti once before we head back? I want to take a few pictures.”

    “Sure, bud. You can do it when I’m asleep. I’m already dressed for bed.”

    “Thanks, Soren.”

    “Yeah, no problem. Just come over here and tuck me in, won’t you?”

    The next hour was spent preparing to put me to bed again. As the lid was shutting, I told TIMM something.

    “TIMM, guys like us, guys like you and me, we’re the loneliest in the universe. You and me, we’re a crew. We have a plan unlike the others. We’re gonna make something of ourselves.”

    “Tsk Tsk, Soren. Quoting Of Mice and Men shamelessly? You’re not gonna shoot me, are you?”

    “If you keep that attitude, maybe.”

    “Good night, Soren.”

    “Night, TIMM.”

Soren had been asleep for about six years now. TIMM had made sure to keep his sleep chamber as spic and span as possible. He was his best friend, so he didn’t want anything to happen to him. It gets really quiet when he’s not around. Nothing left except the beeping of the controls, the nav system and whenever TImm decide to listen to Soren’s ridiculous collection of music. He had almost a thousand exabytes of classical music from the 1900’s and up to the mid 2100’s. After that, he complained about how people stopped appreciating music as an art. He particularly like the “rock” genre. He was never sure why they called it that. It has no affiliation with geology.

TIMM blasted some band called Radiohead while he made sure the sleep chamber was getting a steady stream of oxygen. There’s only one organism on board who needs it, so there’s enough to last many many years. To make sure he isn’t malnourished, he is fed through a special tube that allows his skin to absorb whatever nutrients he needs. It’s old technology, but it’s what we could afford at the time. Honestly, many think it’s even more reliable than the new stuff.

As soon as he finished maintenance on Soren’s cell, the lights went dim. Strange. TIMM had fixed those a year ago. They shouldn’t be doing that. At the same time, the emergency lights cut on and a sickly sound of shredded metal resonated throughout the ship. This couldn’t be good.

He moved as fast as his legs could move. The doors had to be manually pried open to the cockpit because the power had been redirected to make sure life support still worked. He could hear the warning sirens now. A star had gone supernova about twenty-six light years away.

“How could I have been so dumb? Why didn’t I check this first? I could have redirected our path to make sure we missed the whole star explosion thing.” TIMM said out loud to himself Anything within eighty light years of a star going supernova is basically guaranteed to be exposed to Gamma Ray bursts.

For a living organism like Soren, that’s not a good thing. Seems like the hull of the ship managed to take the first wave of burst, but the ship was in shambles. That sound of metal shredding and tearing was apparently the tail of of the ship. The weaker part simply melted off and was then tossed into the deep vacuum of space.

Panic mode wasn’t activated yet, but it was getting there. TIMM had to figure out how to save Soren and the ship. The ship’s hyperdrive was still functioning, but he wasn’t sure how well he could steer it without the tail. Wait a second… This was space. He didn’t need the tail to steer. In that case, he needed to check the ship’s monopropellant supply.

The ship only had two still functional computers. The others had been fried in the first Gamma Ray burst. It took two tries to force-reboot the computer, but it seemed to have minimal sustained damage. Good. According to the computer, the monopropellant reserves are at around eighty-two percent. Enough to get away from here.

At that very moment, another wave hit, frying the computer in front of TIMM. The final computer was a goddamn stallion. To keep it a bit hands free, he turned on the voice command.

“Voice activated. Ready for command,” the computer’s female voice droned.

“Acting Captain TIMM, reporting,” TIMM said, moving over to the monitor.

“Yes, Captain, what can I do for you?”

“Pull up Captain Weaver’s Life Support systems on screen one and pull up system functions on screen two.”

“Yes, Captain.” The computer complied and pulled up Soren’s life support system. He was stable, but a few more Gamma Ray bursts like that could be devastating to him.

“Computer, note the time until the next Gamma burst.” Since it was an older computer, it took about five minutes for it to calculate.

“Around twenty minutes. Your chance of escaping the burst in time is around seven percent.”

“Okay, better than I originally thought it’d be. Charge up the Hyperdrive and head towards Earth with emergency warp.”

“Warning. This spacecraft will not be able to handle warp in this state. The maximum it can achieve is around sixty-four percent of full Hyperdrive.”

“Can it do seventy?”

“With a small chance of failure, yes.”

“Good, Hyperdrive at 70 percent towards Earth.”

“Yes Captain. Charging Hyperdrive. Eighteen minutes and twelve second to fully charge Hyperdrive.”

“Eighteen minutes? Can you expedite that?”

“Unfortunately, no, Captain. We will have roughly seventeen seconds to launch the hyperdrive before the next Gamma burst. Chances of escape have fallen to three percent.”

“We have to try. We are not going to be sitting ducks here.”

“Yes Captain.” With that, I headed back into the room where Soren was asleep. His vitals were normal and he was healthy. To his delight, even though he spent years in there, he only lost about a month of his actual life span. So, technically he was still twenty-two in body and mind. He was afraid that if he kept sleeping like this, he was going to miss everything, but TIMM had told him differently.

“Six minutes to Hyperdrive!”

“I’ll get us out of here, Soren. Don’t you worry. We are going to get ourselves a little spot of land, you hear? You and I are gonna build a little house with a nice fireplace, but you gotta stick with me through this, okay?” I sat in silence, looking out at the stars, just like Soren liked to do. Huh. It was pretty breathtaking, if I could breathe, that is.

“Two minutes to Hyperdrive!”

TIMM looked back at Soren’s sleep chamber.

“I gotta go, okay; stay with me, alright? Stay with me!” he headed back into the cockpit and took manual control of the ship.

“40 seconds until Hyperdrive is fully charged, Captain.”

“How long until the Gamma burst?”

“90 seconds.”

“Okay, Turning forty degrees starboard towards Earth.” TIMM moved the control stick as accurately as possible and could see the burst of monopropellant out of the front windshield slowly turn the ship in Earth’s direction.

“Hyperdrive fully charged! Forty-two seconds until Gamma burst.”

TIMM basically slammed the button down. The ship lurched forward. If he was a human, he would have surely passed out from the G-force. The inside of the ship moaned louder than ever as it was pushed to the absolute limit.

“GAMMA RAY WILL HIT IN 5”

“4”

“3”

“2”

For a good five minutes, TIMM was not sure what happened. The computer malfunctioned, and I was flying totally blind. The burst hit us in mid-Hyperdrive flight. Seconds felt like years. He looked out the window, and something wasn’t right. It almost seemed as space itself was warping around us. Wait… He could see the space station orbiting the Earth! Wait… No.

It wasn’t orbiting. It was falling. He watched it fall into the atmosphere and burn to a crisp. Wait, he could see more than that, too. He could literally see the continents of Earth move around. It was spinning at a ridiculous speed, but then it suddenly stopped.

The ship still had monopropellant and some actual rocket fuel they stored before the mission for emergencies like this. Modern ships used ion cores to power the ship, but Soren’s was a bit old-fashioned. Lucky too.

TIMM had to force the ship into orbit around the Earth. It took a little bit to calculate, but he managed to find it. For the first time ever, the escape from Mars was in Earth’s orbit. It was a very far orbit, so Earth was only barely visible from the window. TIMM was efficient enough to have just enough to escape orbit.

TIMM looked back and wondered if Soren was okay...

    “Soren, wake up. Wake up.”

    Strange. I guess sleeping had really taken its toll on me. I didn’t feel right. I opened my eyes and let them adjust to the light. The emergency light of my sleep chamber was lit and blinking. What? They didn’t do that unless they’d worn down or something. Took years and years. I guess TIMM just forgot to reset them last time and it thought it’d been in use ever since we installed it. My body felt weaker than normal. Damn. I’d need to wear that stupid exosuit again.

    “Soren, are you alive?”

    What? Had TIMM gone insane from loneliness? Of course I was alive, stupid robot.

    “Injecting emergency adrenaline now.”

    I felt a jarring pain in my chest, and my eyes opened all the way.

    “... WWWhwhwa!”

    Huh? It felt like I hadn’t used my voice in forever. All I could do was yell, or “croak”.

    “Don’t worry, Soren, I’ll get you fixed up in no time.”

    Fixed up? What was going on?

    “I’ll have to slap the exosuit on you. Sorry, Soren.”

    Damn it.

TIMM told me about the Gamma Ray bursts, and I congratulated him for saving me and the ship... for the most part. I spent the next three months using the exo-suit on its weakest setting. Even so, I could barely move around, but I pushed through with the help of TIMM. I worked my way to being able to walk normally with the exo-suit again. I had to get a rigorous shower with TIMM’s help. It was like my top layer of skin was just dead. My hair had been emergency trimmed at some point in sleep, so it only came down to my hips now. TIMM told me there was an issue with the chamber I was in. It seemed like a reasonable answer, so I bought it. It took a while for my voice to come back, though. I ended up having to communicate with pen and paper for a while.

    The day before my official “awake” twenty-third birthday, we finally got to take my suit off, and I was able to walk with some difficulty again. The one working computer read that we were approaching Earth after... No, there was no way that was correct. I’d have to get TIMM to fix it up.

    Even the Tin Can had been acting uncomfortable around me. He tried to talk to me without saying much, so I knew he was hiding something. I couldn’t find any issues, though, so I assumed he was nervous cause he messed the computer up or something. Oh well, we land our ship on the Company base to pick up our paycheck and then go off to buy ourselves some good ol’ land on Earth. Actually, screw that plan.

    “TIMM, set a direct course for Earth. Find any spot of land that you can. I’ve waited way too long for this. We can pick up our pay later.”

    “Are you sure?”

    “Don’t question me, TIMM.” He sighed and and set a course for Earth. “That’s a good robot.”

    “Estimated time of arrival, six days and fourteen hours.”

    “I can wait a week, not that big of a deal, but it’d be good if we saw this baby hit her max one last time before we put her down.”

    “What do you mean, Soren?”

    “Punch it. Hit the throttle.”

    “Alright, one last time?”

    “One last time.”

    “With Hyperdrive, our ETA is about twelve hours.”

    “Go for it!”

    “Hitting Hyperdrive in… Three… Two… One.

    Twilight Sparkle stepped onto her balcony of the Golden Oak Library. A cup of tea sat on top of an intricate saucer levitating in her magical grip. The sun sat low in the sky as it fell for the night. She sipped slowly at her tea while peacefully reading a book. This was the ideal way to spend her time on a warm summer evening. Some good tea, an even better book, and a comfy chair to sit in. Twilight often fell asleep on her balcony on days like this. Her young dragon assistant, Spike, usually brought her a thin blanket and a pillow and covered her up.

    This time, Twilight wouldn’t be able to sleep. There was a strange sound today. It’s been bothering her for the past few minutes. She put it off until her curiosity got the better of her.

    “Spike!” she called. “Is that you?” Spike entered the balcony seconds later.

    “Is what me, Twilight?” he asked innocently

    “That sound. Do you hear that? What is it? It’s driving me crazy!” she asked while looking around the balcony for the unwelcome noise.

    “Woah, Twilight! Look! Shooting stars! Er- Shooting star!” Spike pointed at a fast object in the sky that was falling closer and closer as every second passed.

    “That’s strange,” Twilight said as she inspected it through her telescope. “A meteor shouldn’t be able to move like that,” she observed. “It might just be Rainbow Dash trying some crazy new trick. You know how she is.”

    “Twilight, that’s not Rainbow Dash. Rainbow Dash is inside reading Daring Do. She can’t be in two places at once.”

    “Then… what is that!?”

    Suddenly the mysterious object turned mid-air and aimed directly for the small, peaceful town of Ponyville.