Bravely into the unknown - (author: Carpdime)
~ Planet Earth - Late 23rd Century… ~
–
“Mummah! Why babbeh have stupi name? Babbeh wan gud name wike bwudda and sissy!” The lavender foal pouted and crossed her front legs defiantly.
The mother looked lovingly with understanding and motioned her baby daughter over. The foal waddled over and leaned on the leg fluff of her mother.
“Babbeh wan heaw stowy?” The mother asked.
The foal lit up, “Yes mummah! Stowy pwease!”
The mother smiled. She laid down next to her little baby, cuddled her and began the story…
The corridor was long and dark. A woman in a spacesuit walked solemnly down the length of the corridor. In her arms was a young purple fluffy. The fluffy’s stare was steely and emotionless.
Reaching the end of the corridor, the woman stopped at the threshold of the spaceship’s entry hatch.
“Are you ready for this Cassi?” The woman carrying the fluffy looked down and asked.
Cassi looked up at her owner and nodded. It was her “born ready” attitude and stonelike response to the unknown that had made Cassi the top choice for this mission.
Cassi was placed into a basket-like enclosure that held her tight within the tiny space of the command capsule. After she was secured, the ground crew helped the woman through the narrow hatch and into her seat. A minute after adjusting the harnesses and various life support tubes, the launch was ready to proceed.
“God speed Captain Jane Anderson. Bravely into the unknown.” the ground crew said.
“Bravely into the unknown.” the captain repeated back.
With the whirring of gears and a loud thump, the two were sealed within their capsule.
A loud, violent rumbling grew beneath them and very soon they were on their way to a destination unknown.
–
Time and tide waits for no man. Fast or slow, time moves forward unceasingly to draw closer the final day.
–
The captain opened her eyes and could see the dimly lit interior of the command capsule. She turned her head to the side and could see Cassi sleeping soundly within her enclosure. A status check on the spaceship console confirmed that their journey was still on track.
According to the calendar, 30 years had passed since their launch.
Nothing felt real.
The capsule looked exactly the same as it did on launch day. That was before everything went dark as she and Cassi had begun their 30 year period of suspended animation.
There was stirring in Cassi’s pod, the purple fluffy was finally awake.
“Am captain otay?” Cassis asked weakly from inside the enclosure.
The captain unclasped the latch on Cassi’s pod.
“I’m ok Cassi, are you okay?”
Cassi looked around the capsule and did a quick count of the green lights upon the digital consoles.
“Cassi am otay.”
The captain ran her eyes over the flight summary that was now displayed on the auto-pilot screen. The ship’s computer had awakened them 5 years ahead of schedule. It had detected a small, unidentified planet that required human intervention to approach.
“We’ve found a planet Cassi.” The captain moved the screen to show her fluffy.
Cassi squinted her eyes, “Am captain goin inwestigate?”
The captain looked again at the screen. The planet was slightly out of the way but it looked promising as a resource station or even perhaps as a colony.
“I don’t know. I’ll have a think about it. But right now let’s get something to eat.”
Gliding with zero gravity through a hatch on the floor, they entered the living quarters below them.
The captain set about reheating a pack of dehydrated stew. As she waited for this, the captain dispensed a kibble cookie for Cassi. Everything was bland and efficient as per the space agency’s directive, but there was enough food to last the mission which was the most important consideration.
The captain took out a digital tablet and read the planet report from it.
Cassi looked on patiently as she nibbled the kibble cookie that was floating in front of her.
“We’ve got ourselves a ground mission Cassi. The planet looks promising. There might be water and potential exotic minerals that could be valuable.”
She dialled in the coordinates to the new planet and plotted a new course.
“Captain…wha about ouw owiginaw mission?”
The captain didn’t answer straight away.
“We’re alone out here Cassi. We think on our feet and do what we think is best.”, the captain started eating the warm stew, “We will get back to the original mission when we are done with this.”
–
The 3 months journey to Planet X as it was now called began taxing the patience of the spaceship’s inhabitants. Although they were well trained to live and work in the claustrophobic environment of the spaceship, the real prospect of never returning home hung heavy in the mind of fluffy and human alike.
“What are you looking at Cassi?” the captain asked as she found the fluffy staring soullessly out the ship’s porthole.
“Nothing captain…fwuffy am just wooking at the staws…”
The captain handed the fluffy a kibble cookie, “Here, you haven’t eaten anything all day.”
Cassi looked away and stared far into the distance, “Fwuffy nu…fwuffy nu am hungwy.” She didn’t feel like eating because she felt there was no point. She would sooner fall asleep and never wake up.
“Eat this right now. That’s an order.” The captain said sternly.
The fluffy shook her head as if waking from daze, “y…yes captain.” Cassi grabbed the cookie from the captain’s hands.
As the fluffy started eating the cookie, she could feel the energy return to her. Cassi wanted to apologize to the captain but she could see no appropriate time. The captain was already heads down at the computer console, checking and double checking the ship’s approach to Planet X.
–
Secured tightly in her enclosure, Cassi looked at the captain beside her who was preparing the ship for its planetary entrance.
“It’s gonna be a rough ride to the planet’s surface Cassi.” the captain said matter of factly.
The fluffy gritted her teeth and closed her eyes. As her training had taught her, she thought of a calm place where her fears could melt away. She recalled the comforting thoughts of warm summer nights back on Earth, listening to stories about the stars from her mommy and daddy.
The captain placed her gloved hands over Cassi’s enclosure, “Everything’s going to be all right girl. The ship’s in my capable hands.”
The buffeting from the planet’s atmosphere started shaking the entire structure of the spacecraft. The captain kept a close eye on all the ship’s diagnostics. It was mainly for comfort than for practicality. Once the ship had commenced its descent through the hellish atmosphere of the planet, there was no way to back out.
After 30 minutes of the most violent and cacophonous experience that the two had seen, the ship landed on the planet’s surface to the sounds of the retrorocket’s thrust bouncing off the solid ground.
“We’ve made it.” the captain said plainly.
–
Donning their external environment spacesuits, the two exited the craft with Cassi in the lead. Cassi was lowered from a winch on the side of the spacecraft which the captain operated from inside the ship.
The planet was mostly rock. The rock itself was a yellowish hue that blended in the far horizon with the blue, nitrogen rich skies. The feeling of solid ground beneath her excited the fluffy greatly. She turned back to the captain who was slowly descending the ladder.
“Captain…” Cassi tried the best she could to contain her excitement, “Gwavity feews weiwd…”
“It’s 1/5 gravity, just take it easy before you adjust to it.”
The captain immediately went to work. She lowered the geo-drill from the ship’s cargo bay and began setting it up to extract a rock core sample.
Meanwhile, Cassi continued to explore the immediate area around the spaceship. She jumped over crevices that would have scared her back on Earth. Frolicking in the patches of rocky dust and kicking up the dust high into the air which scattered all around, glittering like gold in the reflections of the distant sun.
“Cassi.” the captain called over the radio, “Stop fooling around and give me hand over here.”
“Yes captain.” the fluffy restrained herself and went back to work.
Over the course of the next few hours, they had set up the drill which began its task of locating valuable minerals and resources to report back on.
With a free moment to spare, the captain took a step back and looked around her.
Although the planet was featureless save for a few outcrops of yellow rock, the alien sunset that was now beginning its 5 hour phase touched the captain deeply. For all its unforgiving nature, the vastness of space still managed to produce such speechless beauty.
The captain took out a small tennis ball that she had taken with her from Earth and tossed it towards Cassi. The fluffy jumped a good 30ft into the air and effortlessly caught the ball. Cassi could hear the captain laugh through the radio, it was possibly the first time that she has ever heard the captain laugh.
–
Later that day, as Cassi awoke from a short nap in the living quarters, she caught a glimpse of the captain looking worriedly at the computer console. The fluffy knew better than to interrupt the captain’s deep thoughts so she bide her time.
After a few minutes, the captain switched off the screen and walked over to her bed for a rest.
“Wha is the mattew captain?” Cassi asked.
“We took some damage on the landing. We’ve got to make some repairs in the morning.” the captain said without further elaboration. In another minute the captain was fast asleep.
–
Cassi did not sleep well. She played out the various scenarios in her head about what the captain had said.
The scenarios were what could only be described as nightmares. Dark, empty thoughts, abandoned on an alien planet, never seeing her beloved fluffy family again.
Her thoughts then turned to her training, she could see the face of the captain in her dreams. A resolute yet caring aura surrounded the captain and it reminded Cassi of her mission, her commitment to tough it out to the end.
“Hey Cassi. Wake up.” the captain called to her fluffy.
Cassi was visibly sweating, “Captain….” the fluffy stuttered half asleep.
“Get up.” the captain said, “I need you to help me with some tasks.”
The captain turned away and started putting on her space suit.
–
The long alien night had settled in. Only the unwavering stars that lit up the sky could be seen beyond the reach of their torches.
The captain pulled out the rock core from the drill and inspected it closely. Large veins of valuable minerals were found within it. They had hit the jackpot.
From the cargo bay, the captain deployed the emergency mineral sample return craft that was designed to take rock cores back to Earth.
“The radio and the thrusters on our ship took heavy damage on the landing. With the added weight of the rock core samples we would never be able to take off again.” the captain explained.
The captain started packing the rock samples into the return craft’s cargo pods. After she was done with the samples, there was one empty cargo pod remaining. The captain gently lifted up Cassi and placed her snugly into the pod.
The fluffy wriggled restlessly.
“Wha captain doin?” Cassi asked.
“I’m really sorry Cassi. I can’t take you with me. I’m putting you here to travel with the return pod back to Earth. I don’t have a spot for you on my ship for the rest of the mission.”
Cassi almost cried at the rejection. It was her mission to stay with the captain no matter what. Through thick or thin, they were inseparable.
The captain could see the defiance on the fluffy’s face. She looked sternly at Cassi.
“That’s an order.”
The captain closed the hatch on the return pod and activated Cassi’s stasis. The fluffy looked helplessly as her watery eyes became heavy and she drifted off into a long, long slumber.
–
“Is that it?” the lavender foal asked her mother incredulously.
The mother looked tenderly at her daughter, “Did babbeh nu wike stowy?” she asked.
“Babbeh wike stowy. But babbeh wan know wha happen aftew! Did Cassi fwuffy wive happy evew aftew??”
The mother laughed and hugged her little baby, “Probabwy…”
The foal thought for a second. Her eyes suddenly widened at the thought of another question.
“Wha about captain? Did captain wive happiwy evew aftew???”
The mother paused for while in thought.
“Babbeh ask too many questions! Babbeh nee go sweepies nao!”
The foal groaned with disappointment and refused to budge.
“That’s an ordew!” the mother stated authoritatively.
The baby foal groaned one final time before shuffling away to the waiting fluff-pile of her brother and sister.
“Gud night mummah!” the lavender foal said as she nestled herself with her siblings.
“Gud night Jane.” the mother replied gently.
As her babies went quietly to sleep, the mother walked outside to the patio as she did every night. She picked out the same yellow sparkle in the sky that she did every night and thought about the captain.
‘Cassi hope captain am pwoud of Cassi.’ she thought to herself.
A tear rolled down the corner of her eye as she thought about the captain.
“Bwavely into the unknown…” Cassi whispered.