Fiction: “Dreams of Stardust: Part 1”

'So fragile and strange a thing it is, Life, 'said Aster as they gently smiled, teary-eyed.

A moment had just passed in their own that for the longest time they dreaded, then expected, and - just now - felt. The bed they are lying on had turned into their deathbed. For some time now, Death had been teasing them, peeking in through the window, catching in their throat, and visiting in their sleep. Now, it had at last embraced them, gently and softly, like a mother would a child before taking them away to the cradle. There was no need to struggle; Death was not a stranger to them anymore, and its touch was surprisingly warm and kind. Perhaps Aster was just delusional, their chemical brain saying  a final, fond farewell to the mind inside, or, perhaps that was the way Death always was, and they were merely lucky to see it clearly and calmly, unclouded by fear. Comforting and beautiful as it all was, just like Aster, it was bound to end soon.

Lying there, completely alone in a dark, quiet room, with only the dim and obscured stars behind the window silently watching over, Aster fell into deep thought as their last embers of vitality slowly fizzled out. Reflecting on their long, but not too long, and amazing, but not that exceptional life, they remembered all that had come to pass and all that did not, what was and what could have been, all they knew and did, and all they had planned for the years that were yet to come. They recalled all the good and the bad, the important and the obscure - triumphs and failures, friends and enemies, love and loss, tears of happiness and of despair; all that made them who they were now, and all that their existence brought about. Remembering everything they valued, knew or had, including their very self, Aster pondered the inevitable and imminent loss of it all:

'It really was quite a journey, wasn't it? So many smiles and moments of joy, so many great memories... What a true wonder it all was. It's almost a shame it has to end. How I wish now that I could hold on to it all for just a bit longer... If only I could even stay just like this, for just a while more...

That's how it is all meant to be though, isn't it? Everything has to end at some point. Even me. I am just a small part of the great cycle, after all. Born of the stars, a spark, a speck of dust, I must now return to the stars - as all things do.

All I've done, all I've been through, all I've felt and all I've known - everything will turn to nothing before the sun rises - before the universe blinks. Some may remember me for a few days, months, years, decades even, but eventually the last remnants of my being will disappear into the wind. Not even to this world will I matter in the least, spare a few people that are not long for it too — one extinguished life among billions, soon to be replaced, unknown and insignificant. A few stars may save my light, some millions of years into the future, and think fondly of me — as we think of them, who had already disappeared eons ago, and marvel at their long-gone beauty. But even they will forget. Even they are but sparks to the universe, brief and small. And how small I am to the vast universe! To it, I am less than a cell in my body is to me, or even a single molecule in that cell is the smallest particle of matter, for a fraction of a moment popping into existence, before disappearing forever, unnoticed. Even if the universe could hear my cries for mercy, I would be long gone before its timeless mind could understand me. All of us - countless generations of strugglers, with all our grief and joy, loss and triumph, unstoppable determination and boundless passion - we all share that same fate. All those thousands - no, billions of years of constant struggle are in vain, and even if they continue for a billion years more, we will still be just a tiny spark, powerless against the grand scale of it all.

How tragic is that? To be given a life that can never amount to anything. To cry, laugh, create, and work until you break down, only to build nothing that may ever last. To live to know that it's all futile. To be given a mind and a feeling heart by a universe that will never know your existence, and to stare in the face of your own impermanence. To watch the grains in your life's hourglass drop one by one, knowing each one may be the last.

 Now that I know my time has finally come to an end, I should be sad, I know I should, but somehow... I am not. There is some strange beauty in it all, and just thinking about it... It makes you feel things nothing else can make you feel, that cannot be described - only felt. Now I feel them stronger than ever. I'm sure this is the last thing I will feel, very soon; that odd warmth. While I still persist and think, there is another feeling, one that I can describe. In the face of it all, I am glad. I really am. The more I think about it, the happier I feel and I can't stop feeling it. For the longest time, I feared it, all the more when things went wrong. Whenever I lost something, or saw it slip out of my reach, whenever I did wrong or failed, I was always terrified. I thought, "What if this is all I end up achieving in my life? All I end up being - one big failure?" But what is failure, really? What does any of that matter, in the grand scheme of things? We all have failed over and over and will continue to do so as long as we persist, until we no longer have a chance to fail. Who have I failed anyway, but myself? Life already moved on and had forgotten all about it, and I have no reason to regret it all now, or regret anything at all for that matter. Maybe it could have been better; maybe if I made different choices I would have done more, lived longer, been happier. It's not worth pondering all the infinite what ifs of life though. It's all in the past now, where it will never return from, and what did happen, has led me here.

Just because it could have been better doesn't mean it was all bad. It could have been worse. It could not have been at all. I could not have been there to see it, experience and know it, for example. I thought about this often, but it really strikes you different at a moment like this. How amazing is it that I even got to be alive at all? Or any of us, for that matter. Just the idea that there could be no other life in this universe besides us, or even in any other universe, feels so incredible to me now. And that we carried on that spark for so long, that we evolved to feel and think and shape the world we live in... that we humans, we sweaty, violent apes, managed to learn it all, see the universe for what it is and do what even we thought was impossible - touch the very night sky above us - that is the greatest wonder of all!

Maybe that was the meaning of it all, the goal of all our struggles; the one great achievement of humanity, however briefly we may be able to relish in it. We made even the tiniest things in the world finally have some value. We saw them, we named them, we learned about them, we cherished them and we made art with them. We broke the rules and made our own, stood up against the chaos, brought order to it, and swore to win against it one day or die trying. We defiant, little clumps of matter turned into the universe's most incredible creation, whether it liked it or not. We carry the universe within our tiny, errant minds; all of it, from the dead, distant stars and most massive black holes and galaxies, to the tiniest, unseen quarks and our own, strange creations. We made so much out of nothing, so much that would have never existed and will never exist again, and even what never had a chance to exist otherwise. How incredible is that? One must imagine even the very universe, finally aware of itself through us, amazed and in awe. And how truly lucky am I, to have been born at a time where I can know and experience all this? I could have been born and died just before we learned it all, or before we even knew how to speak, I could have been born elsewhere, doomed to die fast, in pain, oblivious to all this wonder and only knowing suffering. And yet here I am, aware of things even mere decades ago nobody could have dreamed of. Here, with all my precious memories, with a life full of joy and wonder behind me, difficult as it was, knowing a story nobody else will ever know in all its incredible beauty - a story that will never happen again, anywhere, ever. Here I am, about to rejoin the dead universe that made me, carrying a universe within myself.

I can feel the small parts of me dying away, cell by cell, molecule by molecule returning to chaos; my time is near. It's time to venture into the last unknown, and learn that which cannot be learned. I wonder what death is really like. Will some part of me continue to exist? Will I know if it does? What really am I, anyway? Am I my brain, my body, my mind? And what is my mind? Is there even such a thing, or was it all just an illusion? And what about the soul?

Come to think of it, it's been a while since I gave any thought to religion, but what if one of them was somehow true? And if so, which one? What if the scientific view was wrong, and all that beauty I felt was the actual illusion? I hope not. I don't want to give this all up for anything else. And I hope none of the religions we knew were true. I don't think I could bear facing anything they claim; not their vicious, nonsensical gods, nor their terrible visions of "paradise." But maybe there is a God out there, some kind of creator, some kind of afterlife? Ah, I don't suppose it's worth thinking about that now; I spent enough time on it in my life already, and I will find out soon enough. I have to say though, I do wish there was something after this. I don't want eternity, not in the slightest, but I do wish I could just... see it all. Learn all there is, and witness the universe in all its glory.

Know all that was, all that could be... all that will be. If there is an afterlife, I hope that's what it is.

I can't help but wonder, how will it all go after I'm gone? How far will we get and how long will we be around? What paths will we take and what will we learn? I do feel somewhat lucky, that I leave this world while all those big problems are still just looming on the horizon... If this really is the end times, I have truly lived the best life I could possibly have wished for. But if we somehow get through it all, if we make it as far as we began to dream of or maybe even further than we can imagine now... I wish I could see it. I wish I could glimpse it, even for just a second before I disappear forever, know that we made it. Know that, however small my part was in it all, I helped somehow. That I helped bring life to the endless, dead void and give it its own voice. I wish I could see into the future and know we took good care of the incredible gift we were given.

And I wish I could see the stars in all their glory, one last time...'

And so, in the quiet dark, Aster closed their eyes, gave up thought and slowly drifted into peaceful, eternal sleep.