Ad Astra- Ian Morse (January Contest Winner!)

A vast, metallic wheel hung in space, turning slowly around and around, cycling each side through short periods of night and day. Tiny metal boxes drifted in and out, small thrusters firing madly to match the rotation of the wheel. A few leaving slowly fell back into the atmosphere, their undersides glowing bright orange as the ablator burned away under the immense heat. One larger one appeared from the distance, moving at a brisk pace towards the center of commotion. It carried a group of pitch-black rods, each nearly half the radius of the great wheel itself. As the craft approached, long blue streams shot out from each forward engine, decelerating it slowly, clearly weighed down by the heavy load. The rods separated one by one, and, using what minimal reaction control they seemed to have, navigated into specialized docking hangars at the center of the wheel.  

Throughout the various inset rings, people crowded the windows, mesmerized by the graceful movement of each ship as they came into the station. With each docking, the rotational artificial gravity momentarily lurched, and rebalanced only after a second rod could take its place on the opposite side. A few tourist ships scheduled to have left twenty minutes before drifted around the station, ignoring the incessant demands of traffic control to clear the area. One came in directly behind the carrier, and was immediately greeted with a volley of dumbfire missiles streaking only meters away from each side. It frantically backed out. 

In the innermost deck of the wheel, a few dozen people, indulging themselves for one of their last times in a bar, sat stoic, immersed in their own thoughts and memories of life back on the planet that sprawled out below. A few tried to start small talk, but were quickly silenced by the weight of their oncoming leaving. Most didn’t have families back home to give a farewell to. Those who did mostly had some quarrel with them, and had no reason to say goodbye.  

Three years ago, the government had released an appeal for volunteers to board the first interstellar trip. Though marketed as a call to exploration, a chance to become the next great name in history, it was really a death plea. As the climate warmed, most of the world’s sea ports had sunk, or fallen into disrepair. As if to compound on the economic collapse this brought about, natural disasters rose exponentially, bringing nearly every third-world country to infrastructural collapse, and diverting nearly the entire budget of upper-class nations to disaster relief. Disease ran rampant, and more and more of the global population fell away every day. Despite the urgent need for cooperation, war only became more common. No one could agree on how international rights should play out on other planets, so, despite various colonies scattered across Mars, Europa, Venus, and the Asteroid belt, any attempt to set up new ones was greeted with political conflict and a constant threat of bombing. Mercury had been bombed so much that the irradiated environment left it uninhabitable. Most agreed there was little hope left for humanity. 

And so, the government, desperate to preserve its political ideologies and culture through the devastation, decided to send colonists to another system. Such a massive project was impossible to keep secret forever, so they didn’t try; the appeal was completely public, and was immediately hammered by other governments. They did, however, publicly give a launch date two years further in the future. With the light-speed lag, it would be a hundred years before anyone knew otherwise. 

Thousands applied, though many did so only in the need to find a job. They were sifted through, one by one, to find only those with the will to go through with it. Around three hundred were chosen, who then entered a rigorous training program to make them space-worthy. One hundred dropped out in the first month. By now, only forty remained. Of course, more missions would be sent; forty wasn’t nearly enough for a full colony. But it was a start, and more could be found later. 

Each ship was four hundred meters long, very little of which was crew cabins. There were four ships for this first flight, each with a capacity for twelve people cryogenically frozen for the eighty-year trip to Trappist-1 and as minimal survival gear for them as possible. The rest of the length was mostly devoted to a ramjet intake, which would slow them down before reaching the system. Power came from the rather primitive method of Stirling engines mounted between an internal vacuum space and the heat-absorbent outer shell of the craft. It was slow, but over eighty years enough could be pumped into the supercapacitors to power a vacuum ramjet just fine. To reduce their heat signature and avoid detection, their initial velocity would be gained through a railgun launch. 

After a brief comms message broadcasted to each of the passengers, they slowly left their seats and began walking towards the access shaft. A few stayed behind for a moment, reveling in those last moments of normal life. Slowly, they all got up and walked towards the shaft, save one, who continued sitting in the bar, having decided he was content staying. He soon left for the dormitories to pack for the trip home. 

The thirty-nine remaining were carried up an elevator towards the center of the wheel. There, in near weightlessness, an elaborate disinfectant system thoroughly rinsed them of all external microbial life. Each donned a personally tailored flight suit, though they were designed more for body preservation than vacuum survival. The elaborate flight approval system then ensued, consisting mostly of them waiting in a room for an hour. 

Finally, the time came to board the ships that would take them to Humanity’s new home. Each recorded a final message, scheduled to be released in eighty years. They climbed on board the long rod-like ships and entered their cryogenic chambers. As the preserving fluid was forced into their bloodstream and the lid sealed above, each thought of their time on Earth, the memories that they would need to put behind them for the journey ahead. The one who left chose to keep his memories, to preserve all the effort put into his life before that point. He had decided his life on Earth mattered. The ones who now laid in their icy beds had not. 

Each of the ships departed in much the way they entered, though with the carrier no longer present to receive them. Single-file, one by one, they drifted off into the dark. The vacuum closed in around, making them part of the very void itself.  

Their last words to the world were written down the side of each ship in dark grey lettering. 

Per Ardua Ad Astra.

Ian Morse