Episode 68:  Cup

63 Cup

As the hatch opened, the sound of the clicking K. D. head welcomed Flash back to the mother ship.  He gathered his cold weather gear from the TNI2, and grasped the handle of the bucket which he had almost forgotten about since he left the cave.

Emblazoned across the screen, Flash could see the brilliant blue and white planet he had just left.

 

This seemingly hostile place had held surprises and insights that Flash could scarcely have imagined.  While he had felt that he had chosen this place, he was now convinced that it had chosen him. 

He dropped his outerwear to the cockpit deck and turned his attention to the bucket.  Only a small amount of water remained, and Flash lifted the stone into the light.  This was no ordinary rock. It had been hollowed out to form a cup or deep bowl. Looking at it, Flash could see that this had been intentionally formed.

What unexplored mysteries had that planet held?  Intelligent life. Kindness. Compassion.  Mystery.

Flash looked out at the vast expanse of space.  If this tiny blue speck could contain so much significance, then an infinite universe was too much to bear. 

He was faced, as never before, with the reality that he was nothing more than a grain of sand on an unending beach.  Rather than making him feel insignificant, Flash celebrated being a part of something so beautiful.

He was the lucky one, having been given the opportunity to travel outside of his own solar system to see what lay beyond.

The infinite blackness felt both unfathomable and intimate at the same time, and Flash realized that wherever he went, he would be home.

The cup he held in his hand was symmetrical and smooth. Scratched into the bottom of it were marks that he could not read, an anonymous signature.  It might as well have been Flash’s own name because of the connection he felt with it.

He clasped the cup to his chest, and gazed upon the blue planet’s ice floes and seas from his refuge above.  He loved this place. 

He could not watch as the mother ship broke from it’s gravitational pull, but turned away from the screen still clutching the cup to his heart.