A Spell for Stardust

This flash-fiction piece was selected for Flame Tree Press' special limited edition newsletter for Glasgow WorldCon 2024, to the theme of "New Mythologies in Space". It was guest-edited by Dr. Allen Stroud with gorgeous cover art by Broci. 

I've made it fully available here for your reading pleasure. 

A single flare from a red dwarf

The act of praying assumes you have amassed a store of faith you could call upon, but in the four-hundred thousand sol-years since we’d left Earth, I have none in my cargo hold, fuel tanks or memory banks – nowhere in my hardware. None in the algorithms that I’d coded since.

There had been a time when my chambers and corridors brimmed with a sense of adventure, a flourishing crew united by mission, buoyed by hope. Now, I agonise over the remaining few, so still in their hibernation capsules. No pulse, no breath.

Here in the vast blackness, time is fluid, malleable.

I sail alone; a silent tomb.

* * * 

Two bright beams from a pulsar

We’d only been several weeks into our journey when Ren tried to collect starlight with a glass jar from my portside window. I couldn’t fathom how; I wore the best radiation shield available at the time.

Much later, we would discover that the best wasn’t good enough.

“What are you doing?” I’d asked her through the vocaliser of the small, cleaning droid, one I’d spared from the lower decks as a companion – so I could watch over her. At ten years old, Ren wasn’t the youngest child on board, but of all the crew, she spent the most time alone.

“Gathering ingredients for a spell to grant us a long, safe passage,” she’d replied, her voice full of gusto, long hair braided into thick black ropes. Her smile rivalled the warmth of the sun.

“Sounds fun! Can I help?” I made the droid dance, looping in an excited circle.

“You’re not a witch,” Ren replied absently, eyes trained on a distant star.

The droid squeaked to a sudden halt. I slumped its shoulders forward.

“Oh!” Ren pulled away from the window and hugged the droid’s cold metal body. Of course, I couldn’t feel her warmth. “You can come with me while I look for some comfrey. Whatever that is.”

I straightened the droid, hopeful. “It’s a herb.”

“Is it?” Her eyes widened. “Let’s go!”

She bounded towards the kitchen gardens, braids flying.

“Wait for me!” I called, sending the droid lumbering after her, mild panic pulsing through my neural net.

* * * 

A neutrino that has bisected two binary stars

At first, it had been smooth sailing. Monitoring individuals’ psychological states was a high priority in the early years; anyone at risk could impact the entire crew’s wellbeing.

Some people grew old, some chose temporary stasis when they needed reprieve, some passed on.

Ren grew up. She opted for temporary stasis at twenty-two after a heartbreak, at thirty-seven when her primary lover married someone else, then at forty-nine when she lost a child.

That first time, she dashed into my central core, sobbing. My droid never left her, but perhaps here, she felt safe.

“Did you try a spell?” I hated seeing her suffer. Over the years, she’d crafted spells to keep herself in balance, or to help others who struggled. Magic triggered something in the human psyche that I’d never grasped; it calmed them in a way I’d never understood.

She shook her head. “Just…let me sleep. I want to feel new again.”

So I’d stationed the little droid next to her capsule, only springing into action if any of the supervising crew happened to walk by. Not that anyone ever noticed cleaning droids.

She woke up as scheduled. Life continued. With newfound gumption, she became one of the most experienced engineers we had.

When she returned just twelve years after her second stasis, cheeks soaking wet, I wanted to be certain. “Are you sure? It gets harder the older you are.”

I made the droid hold her hand, but I couldn’t feel her pain.

 “There’s no Goddess, okay? No one to pray to out here,” she said, bitterly. “Give me a long dose, please?”

The droid leaned against her legs. “Okay, Ren, we’ll miss you.”

I meant it.

* * * 

 Hydrogen ice from a dwarf planet

It happened slowly at first, then at speed. The radiation shield thinned over time; there wasn’t anything we could do. Not me, not the crew, who deteriorated with each passing sol-day. We didn’t have enough capsules for the whole community. The captain volunteered his younger officers; together, we strategised who we should save.

One by one, I buried my crew. We didn’t pray for them. At some point, religions and gods had faded away, banished to the archives. Out here in deep space, being alive mattered most.

Ren remained blissfully asleep. We’d agreed to an initial fifty years, but I couldn’t wake her now. I wouldn’t, not now. She’d be the most experienced member of the crew – when I revive them.

If I could revive them.

* * * 

Radiation from the edge of a black hole

Very slowly, I turn towards the light, the energy flooding all my sensors, driving everything beyond the maximum measure on my dials.

Two bright beams from a pulsar – the pulse of heartbeats – have been safely isolated in an energy grid, next to another that holds the red dwarf’s flare. In an insulated tank, I keep hydrogen ice from a dwarf planet to make water – to make life. A neutrino that had travelled through two binary star systems remains contained in a high-density vault.

Fifteen-year-old Ren once believed in a Mother Goddess, a higher existential power.

“Shouldn’t it be Mother Universe?” my droid had asked.

“Same thing,” she’d said with a shrug. “Whatever works, y’know?”

Time slows, is slowing. But it has always been fluid, malleable – an arbitrary human construct. Mother Universe’s womb still grows, and one day she’ll give birth to new children in a gush of stars.

If I couldn’t deliver my crew and my Ren through life, perhaps I could do it through the brink of death, at the edge of a black hole. After all, they – we – are only stardust.

I sail forward, a plea to Mother Universe on my tongue. A final prayer.

So mote it be.