Beyond the Glass

I stand there, looking out of the observatory windows on the top deck of the civilians’ quarters. Designed almost like the bulb of a snow globe, it consists of triangular glass panels held together at the edges by gray metal rods. Through the several feet of glass, I can see the stars, beautiful and un-warped despite the thickness of the panes. There is an elegance to them that is enhanced by the swirls of reds, blues, and purples that envelop them against the pitch-black sky. So big and so expansive, it is hard to believe that we have traversed so far from home

As a child, I would beg my parents to take me to the observatory and let me look through the lens of the giant telescope. I see myself dreaming about them. The idea of being among them, flying among them, was so strong. It was the overwhelming desire to become an astronaut and pilot myself to the moon or maybe even Mars if we make it that far. We certainly made it that far, and then some. I have gotten everything I could have ever wanted. Everything I could have ever dreamed of.

At what cost though? As I look on through the glass, I tell myself that I can see it. A glowing orb in the far-off distance of the galaxy. Cassiopeia gleams in the darkness. Her signature shape in the form of a ‘W’ that leads me to believe that we won, that we escaped. Not only the plague that raged across the globe, but also the raiders that invaded our skies in order to infect us with it. That burning ball of fire, I want so very much to believe that it is our star that burns in the crook of that ‘W.’ Not only for myself, but for the people resting in the cabins below, wondering if they will ever get the chance to go home, or if they will continue to float in beautiful expanse of space as refugees.

My dreams are made a reality while I look out among a sky that is not my own to claim. The Project Apex titanium armor sits heavy against my body with my helmet tucked snuggly underneath my arm. I haul it up and slip it over my head, waiting patiently for the seal to form with the skin suit. It does with a hiss telling me the air circulation system is active again. The HUD in my visor comes to life and briefly bathes the space around me in green, including the stars beyond the glass. They disappear, but only for a moment as the startup feature finishes and returns everything to its proper coloring. I take a deep breath of filtered air. It is always so nauseating at first while the air filtration system begins to work. Those first few breaths mostly consisting of the exhaled carbon dioxide that begins to collect inside.

As much as I don’t want to, I will the suit’s systems to magnify the image before me, looking millions of miles beyond the glass at the place we all once called home. The glowing star in the center of the ‘W’ becomes two. One is Sol, the star that warmed our planet enough to allow us to survive. The other is none other than the planet we fled; Earth. Her bright blue oceans almost completely dried up. Everything green has been burned to ash, and is still alight with a blazing fury. Her surface glows radiantly with the thousands of bombs that have ravaged and destroyed her, turning everything to glass.

I pull back the image to where the Earth and our sun become one again in their constellation, now unrecognizable to me. There is so much beauty in Cassiopia, but I can no longer see it. She is shrouded in the deaths that now float within her image. Deaths of the people we let perish in order for us to escape her grasp and survive. How arrogant we were to do so.