His eyes gazed upwards as they always did on nights as clear as this. It looked like any other star on the canvas of night sky, but he knew it was Earth. He'd always loved that comparison. The night sky was a large blue-black blanket that tucked the planets into sleep and the stars were like tiny picks and pinholes in the fabric that let the night light shine through and keep away the monsters. As he looked up at it, he tried to feel the distance. it was impossible. It was beyond his reach, beyond the distance his feet could cover or would ever in his lifetime. Even the shuttle that brought him here from there could not give the span any definition. From the transparent aluminum windows for hours and hours, the only indication of movement was the growing and shrinking of worlds. It just didn't feel real. The iridescent blue speck was, for all intents and purposes, accessible but not in the least attainable.
There was just something about light travel that was still too unfathomable for Henry to entirely believe. It was all just some clever trick of the government. Smoke and mirrors. Even if it were true (and he had all of the evidence to prove it was) it would never be enough. There was always something beyond and beyond and beyond. He wanted to see it all. He wanted to go and do and touch and taste. It would never be enough.
From the imagination of Ray Bradbury and into his textbooks, space travel had become real and was steadily becoming more real every year. Some day, he smiled wistfully to himself, I will dip m feet in the warm waters of Venus. I will scream into the yawning eye of the great raging storm on Jupiter and i will conquer all fears. I will dance on Pluto while it waltzes on the brink with its moon. I will seduce Andromida and make her my wife. It is only a matter of time.
He stubbed out his cigarette and flipped the still-smouldering butt into the gutter. The only way to make any of these things a reality would be to ace his final exams and it was already crunch time. He clicked the lock behind him as he returned inside to his dorm. At his desk he shuffled through mountains of loose pages with no discernible organization. Peeking out near the bottom of the stack was the colourful corner of a children's book Henry had received as a gift from his family's nanny the day he left for Mars. He chuckled to himself when the bright colours caught his attention and wiggled the thin hardcover out from the mess.
It had seemed like such a cliche at the time. it was an ancient story written long ago, and would have likely gone out of print centuries ago if it weren't for nannies and grannies and distant relatives shucking the nonsense onto graduates.
"Oh the places I'll go" He said aloud, if only to himself. maybe that old cow wasn't so bad after all.
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