The Lodestar Contest

A man lives in a sealed habitat on a desolate planet, leaving it only for short walks in his spacesuit. He’s been there a long time, clinging to formal routine and scraps of his sanity. He starts seeing things: old colleagues come to visit him, people he buried years ago. Then unsuited strangers start coming to his base. Tired and desperate, he succumbs to his madness: he opens his airlock door, depressurizing it, and steps outside. He can breathe. Strangers are real.

A possible reveal ▼