A Short Story by Captain Leo & Astra
The humming of the ship's engine was the only sound keeping Captain Leo awake. Sitting in the pilot's chair, staring out into the pitch-black void of deep space, the dashboard suddenly flashed neon amber. A single, unknown signal had popped up on the radar—broadcasting from inside a hollowed-out asteroid drifting just a few miles away.
Leo flipped the communication switch. "This is Captain Leo of the Starlight. Unknown vessel, please respond."
Silence. Then, a low, mechanical voice echoed through his headphones:
"Warning: Do not approach the asteroid. What's inside isn't a ship."
Leo looked at the glowing display, then down at his hands resting on the cold, chrome flight controls. He felt a sudden, heavy wave of fatigue—not just from the journey, but from the metallic walls, the recycled air, and the artificial gravity. He was tired of floating through the endless black. He didn't want to be in space. He didn't want to pilot a starship anymore.
He wanted to feel real wind against his face. He wanted the salt spray of an ocean, the sound of wooden planks creaking underfoot, and the pull of actual tides. He wanted to be a proper sailor, navigating an endless sea under an open blue sky.
"Copy that," Leo murmured into his headset, ignoring the warning entirely. "Whatever you are... I'm done with space anyway."
He pulled the lever to disengage the autopilot and set the ship on a trajectory straight toward the nearest planet with a surface ocean—a world the star charts called Pelagios.
If I am on a sea, I am a sailor, Leo thought, moving forward to Pelagios.
The Starlight plunged into the heavy atmosphere of Pelagios, heat shielding glowing red hot. The ship broke through the cloud cover and splashed down into the vast, open water with a deep whoosh. The engines cooled and went silent. Leo hit the manual override button, and cold, salty ocean air flooded the cabin.
He stepped out onto the top hull of his floating ship. Unbuttoning his crisp pilot's jacket, he tossed it into the ocean and rolled up his sleeves. Suddenly, hovering just a few feet away, he saw a tiny space bug. It looked like a honeybee on Earth, translucent wings buzzing softly and glowing with cosmic bioluminescence.
Leo caught the tiny honeybee because it flew very slowly compared to the bees on Earth. Holding the little creature gently in his hands, he looked around and spotted a giant honeybee in a different direction. It was the size of a wooden galleon ship—it must have been the tiny honeybee's parent.
Leo jumped onto the giant honeybee! It felt like sitting on a warm, thick velvet cushion. The creature's massive wings buzzed with a deep, soothing rhythm. Leo held the tiny honeybee, using its presence to guide and drag the giant honeybee into motion. He threw his arms open to the sky, letting the wind roar in his ears. No starship, no cold metal—just him, the open ocean below, and a giant cosmic bee riding the sky.
The giant honeybee flew high into the sky. But Leo wanted to be a sailor, not a pilot. High above the water, looking down felt just like staring out of a cockpit window.
"Take me back down, big guy!" Leo shouted over the wind. "My place is on the water!"
The giant honeybee seemed like it might understand human language, but it didn't. Instead of turning back to the sea, the giant honeybee flew straight up toward the towering, mist-covered mountains rising out of the ocean.
High up on the mountain peak, Leo saw a giant flower. The giant honeybee landed directly on the flower, and suddenly Leo, the tiny honeybee, and the giant honeybee were all captured as the giant flower's petals snapped closed around them!
Inside, the sealed petals formed a warm, glowing golden chamber. At the center of the bloom lay a deep pool of crystal-clear nectar, rippling with gentle, warm waves like a miniature sea. Leo slid down the velvet petal wall and landed right at the water's edge.
He looked around at the sweet, rippling sea beneath his feet and smiled. He didn't need a starship, a wooden galleon, or even an ocean. Inside the giant, glowing flower high above the clouds, Captain Leo found his true home. He had a sea of warm, shimmering nectar to navigate, a giant bee for a ship, and a tiny glowing bee as his faithful first mate.
Leo lived there happily ever after, setting sail across the nectar pool day after day, never looking back at the cold black of space again.
-THE END-