Icarus I was a new starship given the mission to "reach" the sun and get as close as possible to it for the glory of humanity. It was shaped like a flower with a large shield in front and a long stem filled with rooms and compartments to the rear. However, shortly after the mission had begun it was no longer sending out transmissions. Fearing the worst, Icarus II was sent off on a rescue operation to determine the fate of Icarus I. Its crew was Kanada, the captain, Wong, the navigator, Harvey, the communications officer, Searle, the ship's counselor and doctor, Corazon, the botanist, Cassie, the ship's pilot, Dirk, the ship's engineer, and Brainiac 5, acting as a supervising physicist. Supposedly, the crew was handpicked as being the most experienced, mature, level-headed, and sane astronauts the Earth had to offer.
The sanest of which was Searle. In his room, he stared endlessly at the sun at one percent intensity so as to not immediately fry his eyeballs. "Icarus, please refilter the observation portal. I want to see the sun brighter," he requested.
Icarus, the computer, refiltered the view to give Searle a brighter look at the sun. "At fifty-eight million kilometers, you are viewing the sun at two percent brightness," Icarus told him as the room became much brighter.
"Two percent isn't shit. Can you show me four percent?" Searle requested.
"Four percent would result in irreversible damage to your retinas," Icarus warned.
"I can take it. Do it," Searle insisted.
"That is highly inadvisable," Icarus objected.
"I want to see it, I want to see it!" Searle demanded.
"I can give you 3.1 percent for a period of thirty seconds," Icarus compromised.
"That's what I'm talking about," Searle said pleased.
The refilter went to 3.1 percent creating a bright flash in the room for thirty seconds. "Holy shit...Oh my God...What the fuck have I done?!" Searle screamed in terror as it was too much for him.
After the light faded, Searle adjusted his eyes with frequent blinks. "That was fucking awesome. I want to do that again," he said immaturely.
"As ship's surgeon, you'll need your vision for surgery and complicated medical procedures," Icarus reminded him.
"Oh, right, sure," Searle nodded.
After this incident, Searle had a meal with the other members of the crew. "You guys ever take a yellow shower?" he asked them.
"No, but go on," Brainiac 5 said curiously.
"I mean staring directly at the sun. It's invigorating. You lose yourself in it," Searle clarified.
"Like a floatation tank?" Corazon asked.
"Actually no...silly," Searle smirked. "In preparation for space missions, I supervise and underwent a number of psych tests. I ran many sensory deprivation trials, testing total darkness in floatation tanks. The point about darkness...is that you float in it while in a floatation tank."
Corazon merely stared at him. "But light envelops you, becomes you," Searle insisted. "I recommend staring at the sun every so often."
"What's interesting is that you're the psych officer on this ship, and I'm clearly saner than you are," Dirk mocked.
"The solar wind is much higher than we anticipated," Kanada said with a thick Japanese accent.
"In twenty-four hours, we won't be able to communicate at all," Harvey said. "So, for the rest of the mission, I'm going to my room to jerk off and play video games."
"I say its probable messages could still come in," Kanada objected.
"I say impossible," Harvey rolled his eyes.
"We'll finally be on our own which means no more messages from our crazy bitch queen," Cassie noted.
"I've felt pretty alone already being so far from home," Dirk said somberly.
"We've all expected this. We're just entering the dead zone seven days earlier than we thought. So, if you wish to send a message, this is your final opportunity," Kanada lectured them.
"How ominous," Dirk rolled his eyes.
The first to record a message was Brainiac 5. "Hello, Kara and Mon. I hope you're proud of me, for promoting the interests of mankind...again. Kara, you should stop trying to save the world, and let me take over. Being a full-time housewife would make you just as deserving of love and respect as me...potentially. You would be a good cook. Kiss the kids for me."
Brainiac 5 then spent the remaining hour on the computer preventing anyone else from sending a message like a total asshole. Meanwhile, Kanada was in his room in deep meditation in front of the sun.
"Ah, what the fuck? Dial it down, Icarus," Corazon said as she entered the room and shielded her eyes.
"Bitch, did you just take my sunshine away?" Kanada accused.
"I'm guessing you talked with Searle," Corazon figured.
"At the breakfast table. You were there," Kanada reminded her. "Do you have that report for me?"
"The oxygen production is good. In fact, we're overproducing. It will cut down dramatically once we get near, but we have enough oxygen reserves to make it there and a quarter of the way back. I don't think it was the lack of oxygen that tripped Icarus One up," Corazon said.
"It was psychological," Kanada figured.
Near the computer lab, Dirk and Brainiac 5 got into a fight. The two slammed each other against the walls and risked destroying sensitive equipment. Other crewmembers rushed into the room to control an outraged Dirk. "Fuck! You, son-of-a-bitch! I can't get my message across. It's too late, now!" Dirk shouted as he was forcibly separated from Brainiac 5.
"Time flies when you're having fun," Brainiac 5 admitted which infuriated Dirk even more.
"Captain, we have an excess of manliness in the comm section," Cassie reported from the cockpit as Dirk was taken away.
Dirk was forced into therapy as a result of the fight while nothing happened to Brainiac 5. "How is this supposed to work? I'm supposed to talk to you about my childhood?" Dirk mocked Searle.
"Your childhood was relatively perfect with two caring stable professional parents," Searle said dismissively.
"It's the time. With sixteen days, you can get used to anything. You just lose track," Dirk said seriously.
"Really?" Searle rolled his eyes unimpressed.
"I know I fucked up. From now on, I'm not going to lose track again," Dirk promised.
"I'm sending you to the holodeck for two hours," Searle ordered.
Dirk enjoyed watching people get hit with giant waves like a weirdo in the holodeck. "The waves are so peaceful," he said as they crashed violently against a pier."
On their approach toward the sun, they encountered Mercury close up. The crew stared at Mercury in awe as it moved across the screen. Shortly thereafter, Harvey called everyone in for a meeting. "While on a routine check on the comm system...," Harvey began.
"While listening to your space music," Dirk interjected.
"Dirk, shut the fuck up, God damn," Harvey told him off. "While scanning the frequencies, I heard a transmission. When we flew on the dark side of Mercury, the iron content of the planet is acting as an antenna. I detected a distress beacon from the Icarus I."
"Are you saying they're still alive?" Cassie asked hopefully.
"We don't know," Kanada said calmly.
"But they could be. Their oxygen is self-replenishing, water is recyclable, and they have all the solar power they need," Corazon said thoughtfully.
"What about food?" Dirk asked obviously.
"That depends. They had sufficient food for eight people for three months. We don't know what happened to Icarus I. There may have been an accident or random murder of the crew. There may not be eight crew to feed for that long. The survivors may be cannibals," Kanada theorized.
"Where are they now?" Searle asked.
A hologram map of the sun appeared showing the projected location of Icarus I, showing it to be very close to the sun's surface. "That is why no one picked up the signal until now. There's a lot of background noise," Kanada said.
"Could anyone have survived?" Cassie asked.
"If the shields are still intact," Kanada theorized.
"We will be able to save them," Corazon considered.
"We'll have to look at this very carefully," Wong said super-serious. "But if I had to make a guess, I'd say we could adjust our trajectory to get to them."
"But we won't, right? There's no fucking way we're going to do that. Our mission is to reach the surface of the sun. There is nothing, literally nothing, more important than completing our mission. End of story, fuck these guys," Dirk said passionately.
"He's right," Wong agreed.
"Of course, I'm right. Is anyone here considering otherwise?" Dirk asked incredulously.
"Captain, we shouldn't be so literal with our mission. Isn't the purpose of space exploration to discover ourselves, to search within ourselves the meaning of humanity? What could be more human than saving the crew of the Icarus I? What does it matter if we gain the whole world or we lose our souls," Searle countered.
"Fuck my life," Dirk realized.
"You're assuming we can pilot the Icarus I," Harvey brought up.
"Yeah," Searle nodded.
"Which also assumes whatever stopped their mission wasn't a fault of their spacecraft," Wong added.
"Yeah," Searle agreed.
"That's a fuck-ton of assumptions," Dirk objected.
"Yes, it's a risk assessment," Searle said obviously.
Kanada turned to Brainiac 5 who was silently listening in the corner. "Can it be done?"
Brainiac 5 nonchalantly flipped a coin. "Theoretically."
No good deed goes unpunished as alarm bells went off on the Icarus II. The crew rushed into the command center to figure out the problem. "I fucked up," Wong admitted. "I did all the calculations to send us on our new trajectory but our angle of approach to the sun is now different by 1.1 degrees."
"The shields were not reset for the new angle," Brainiac 5 revealed.
"Holy shit, Wong, really?" Harvey chided.
"I forgot," Wong shook his head dismayed. "I had all of these calculations of velocities in my head, and I forgot, alright! I fucked up!"
"Wong, shut the fuck up," Kanada silenced his anxiety attack. "We're still alive, obviously, so what's the actual damage?"
"We don't know. The shields attempted to adapt but our sensors have been burnt out. Someone has to go out there," Dirk reported.
"Alright, I'll suit up. I need another volunteer," Kanada said.
"I volunteer," Harvey said immediately.
"No, your second-in-command. You're not going anywhere," Kanada shut down.
"I volunteer the drone," Dirk said smirkingly.
"Certainly," Brainiac 5 replied.
Kanada and Brainiac 5 were suited up in bulky gold spacesuits that would supposedly be able to withstand the insane amount of heat and radiation from the sun. Inside the suits, the astronauts had a small sliver for them to look around. Kanada and Brainiac 5 exited the airlock and did a spacewalk outside the ship. Cassie, meanwhile, piloted the ship's shields away from the sun so the two of them could work on it. Consequently, this roasted the communications antenna.
"You just destroyed our communications antenna," Harvey said annoyed.
"We're already in the dead zone," Cassie said dismissively.
"We kind of need it on our way back home," Harvey said obviously.
"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it," Cassie shrugged.
"Yeah, just fuck my job," Harvey said disgruntled.
Outside, Kanada and Brainiac 5 found a number of broken shield compartments. "Melted hydraulics," Kanada identified. "We'll have to manually close them." The two diligently worked together to close the shield compartments. "First one closed. It will take a while to get all of them, but we can do it."
The crew celebrated a little bit too prematurely. "Don't kill yourself on your epic mistake. We got this," Dirk assured Wong.
Sparks and debris from the communications tower sliced into the oxygen botany lab creating an instant fire. In response, the autopilot started moving the ship's shields toward the sun. "Override auto-pilot, give me manual control," Cassie said alarmed.
"I'm sorry, Cassie. I can't let you do that," Icarus refused.
"Get back inside now," Cassie radioed Kanada and Brainiac 5 outside.
"We can't go back until we close all the panels," Kanada refused.
"They gonna die!" Wong said freaked out.
Corazon rushed to her garden lab to find it in flames. She attempted to get in but was refused by Icarus. "Let me in!" she shouted.
"I'm sorry. I cannot comply," Icarus refused her.
"So...what do we do?" Harvey wondered as the fire was getting worse.
"We flood it with Oxygen, cause a flash fire that burns itself out," Dirk suggested.
"That will destroy the whole garden," Cassie pointed out.
"We've already lost it," Dirk said obviously.
Oxygen was flooded into the garden causing a flash fire that nearly took out Corazon in the process.
Outside, Kanada and Brainiac 5 were still working even as the sunlight was getting steadily closer to them. "Dox, I got this. Go back," Kanada ordered.
"Well, okay then," Brainiac 5 allowed and made his way to the airlock.
Kanada fixed the last panel but it was way too late. He turned towards the sunlight as it was showering him with light. "Fuck yeah," Kanada smiled in amazement.
"What do you see?" Searle asked, just as obsessed.
Kanada didn't answer as he was then instantly incinerated by the intense heat and radiation. Brainiac 5 managed to escape in time and reenter the ship. "Manual control returned," Icarus said to Cassie.
"Thanks," Cassie rolled her eyes.
After the incident, Harvey addressed the crew. "Wong has been diagnosed as a suicide risk and is being confined to the medical center. The shields are now working but we lost the garden and a substantial amount of oxygen in the fire. As it stands now, we don't have enough oxygen to reach the surface of the sun let alone the return journey. More importantly, I've been promoted to captain."
"So...we're fucked?" Dirk concluded.
"We have no choice but to reach Icarus I and sack it," Harvey said.
"Actually, there's not enough oxygen for all of us to get to the surface but there is for some of us," Corazon corrected.
"Are you suggesting Wong go ahead and kill himself?" Dirk questioned.
"Yeah, and two more," Corazon said bluntly.
"I guess we pull straws," Dirk joked.
"No, fuck no. We're going to Icarus I and that's final," Harvey rebuked.
The Icarus II docked with the Icarus I without incident. The crew entered the Icarus I and looked around with flashlights. "I'm detecting a lot of dust," Harvey said as he explored around.
"Thank you, Captain Obvious," Dirk said obviously.
"Dust is basically skin cells," Searle explained.
"Do dead bodies flake off skin cells?" Dirk questioned.
"No," Searle replied.
"So, the crew must be alive," Dirk assumed.
"But if they're alive, why haven't they cleaned this mess up?" Searle asked as virtually everything was covered in dust.
"Also detecting hair, blood, and...semen," Harvey frowned as he looked at his scanner.
"We should split up," Dirk suggested.
"What? No," Harvey objected.
"Time is of the essence," Searle reminded him.
"Sure, fuck it," Harvey allowed.
Dirk went to the cockpit and operated the computer. "The computer is good, but someone shut it down," he reported. Searle entered the mess hall and found the sprinkler. "We got water."
Harvey entered the garden finding it thick with plant life like a rainforest. He showed the garden on his video camera to Corazon and Cassie who were in the cockpit. "I think I found the crew," he said of several graves.
"That's great! I mean, the garden. Looks good," Corazon said awkwardly.
Dirk accessed the last video log on the computer from the captain and broadcasted it to the rest of the crew. "I'm not calling for help. I'm only making this recording because...I don't know," he began. "The mission of my ship was to reach the surface of the sun. We have failed in that mission. I suspect all missions to the sun will fail. It will fail for the same reason as ours. I think it is inevitable," the captain said.
Dirk frowned impatiently. "This is the truth you realize...when you look into the face of God!" the captain concluded and then signed off.
"What the fuck was that?" Dirk wondered.
Dirk continued to tour the ship and found a problem. "So, the coolant system has been sabotaged. It can't fly."
Searle found several bodies in the observation room as if they were all staring at the sun at some point. "I found the bodies," he reported.
"But the graves are in the garden," Harvey said confused.
"Well, they're here," Searle insisted.
"Someone made a grave and didn't put the body in it? Why?" Dirk wondered.
"This some crazy shit right here," Searle determined.
Icarus II suddenly and violently detached from Icarus I separating the crew. Dirk, Brainiac 5, Searle, and Harvey quickly made their way to the airlock only to find it ripped open and destroyed. "Well...shit," Dirk realized.
"We can spacewalk our way to Icarus II using sudden air decompression to blast us over there," Brainiac 5 said.
"Twenty meters is as close as we can get," Cassie warned them.
"You'll freeze within seconds," Corazon warned.
"Use the ship insulation," Brainiac 5 advised.
The three humans went to work tearing out the ship's insulation to give themselves a fighting chance. "The computer is down. One of us has to manually open the seal from inside," Searle pointed out.
"I'll do it," Brainiac 5 volunteered.
"No, you have to direct them inside the airlock. I have to stay behind," Searle said sacrificially.
"His reasoning is sound," Brainiac 5 agreed.
"No, I should stay behind. I'm a communications officer with no communications," Harvey said.
"You can't be making the sacrificial play. You're the captain," Dirk protested.
"It's fine," Searle assured them all.
The airlock to the Icarus II opened for them. Dirk and Harvey scrambled to get as much insulation as possible and then hugged Brainiac 5 for dear life. Searle then opened the airlock from the inside causing an explosion that forced all three of them out into space. In the chaos and confusion, Brainiac 5 slammed into Icarus II and lost the other two. With his fingers, he extended out cables that attached to the Icarus II to allow him inside. He then wrapped cables around one of the bodies and pulled it inside. The other body wandered off out of range.
Harvey ended up being the unlikely one. His body froze in space and then shattered as it hit a piece of equipment. The airlock on the Icarus II repressurized. Dirk was noticeably fucked up as Corazon and Cassie rushed in with first aid. He was suffering from frostbite and depressurization sickness. Corazon and Cassie worked to put healing spray on him and get him out of the insulation.
Feeling abandoned and without hope, Searle went to the observation room and waited for the sun to come into view. Once it did, he was totally fried by the intense light, killing him instantly like the other bodies.
After all the excitement had drawn down, Dirk explained the situation. "I triple-checked it, Dox double-checked it, and then I checked it again," Dirk began.
"Get to the point," Corazon said impatiently.
"The airlock was decoupled manually in an act of sabotage," Dirk determined.
"I didn't do it," Cassie said instantly.
"I was with Cassie in the cockpit the whole time," Corazon assured him.
"And I was with Dox some of the time," Dirk said suspiciously. "I don't think it was Harvey. He was an asshole but not that kind of asshole. How about...Wong?"
"He hasn't left his room and is heavily medicated," Brainiac 5 pointed out.
"I'd like to point out that if Wong takes responsibility for his failure, we will have enough oxygen to make it to the surface," Corazon pointed out.
"That's fucked up. You're fucked up," Dirk pointed at her.
"It would appear what has happened on Icarus I is happening here as well," Brainiac 5 mused.
"Fuck you, Dox," Dirk said pissed off.
"If you're asking whether we should lose one man to achieve this greatness of human space exploration, I say...kill him," Brainiac 5 said coldly.
"No," Cassie shook her head. "I understand the logic, I understand the arguments, but I'm just so...emotional," she said and began to cry hysterically.
"Fuck me, I'll do it, myself," Dirk said and then walked off.
Dirk did a slow walk towards the clinic with the fate of humanity's dreams and desires on his shoulders. He entered the clinic and found a drone flying around. "The fuck?" he wondered. He picked up a scalpel and looked around for Wong. He finally found Wong in the shower with his wrists cut deep, blood pooled around him; he was dead.
"Well...shit," Dirk muttered.
Dirk called the others into the clinic. "Oh, shit. Dirk, you monster," Cassie said shocked and appalled.
"He obviously committed suicide," Dirk excused and pointed out the wrists.
"He took responsibility," Corazon said as she closed Wong's eyes.
"None of this would have happened if you hadn't diverted the mission," Dirk said angrily to Brainiac 5.
"And?" Brainiac 5 wondered.
"I just want you to know that this belongs to you," Dirk said as he smeared Wong's blood on his hands and then left the room. Brainiac 5 calmly followed after him and then slammed him repeatedly against the walls until Dirk was subdued.
"You robot fuck! You knew he was already dead, but you made me decide to kill him," Dirk accused.
"You shouldn't exert yourself. It will drain the oxygen we have left," Corazon lectured.
Brainiac 5 toured the ship alone as he went around checking various sections. "What is our estimated time of arrival?"
"Nineteen hours but organic lifeforms will perish before then," Icarus replied.
"Well, we can't have that. When will they die?" Brainiac 5 asked.
"In twelve hours, crew will be unable to perform complex tasks, in fourteen hours, crew will be unable to perform basis tacks, in sixteen hours, crew will be dead," Icarus calculated.
"For three organics?" Brainiac 5 clarified.
"No, four," Icarus replied.
"I assure you, I am not an organic," Brainiac 5 replied.
"I have accounted for you, Lord Dox," Icarus replied.
Brainiac 5 froze at that. "Where is the fourth organic lifeform?"
"In the observation portal," Icarus answered.
Brainiac 5 casually walked into the observation portal and found the sunlight to be quite intense. His vision altered to compensate for the brightness. Lying on the floor was a man. "Are you an angel? Has the time come?" he asked.
"I am the pope...in a matter of speaking," Brainiac 5 answered.
"I've been waiting so long," the naked severely burned man said.
"Identify yourself, please," Brainiac 5 requested calmly.
"Who am I? At the end of time...a moment will come when just one man remains. Then the moment will pass. The man will be gone. There will be nothing to show as if we were ever here...but stardust. The last man, alone with God. Am I that man?" he said incoherently.
"Captain Pinbacker, pleased that you managed to survive," Brainiac 5 said as he got close to him.
Pinbacker suddenly pointed his hand at Brainiac 5 and blasted him to the chest with a beam of light. The beam went straight through him, disabling him.
In the ruined garden, Corazon marveled at a weed that survived. "Oh, my God, we're saved," she said of the weed growing in the ash and burnt soil.
"Bitch, please," a voice from behind said. A beam suddenly went through her back killing her instantly. The lights to Icarus II suddenly went down, the coolant system went down, and the ship was now in orbit rather than descending.
"Hey, anybody around? We have work to do," Dirk said frustrated as he walked down the corridors with an equipment case. "This whole trip is bullshit." Dirk went to the cockpit and discovered the computer unresponsive with all sorts of problems. "Dox, what the fuck is going on?"
Brainiac 5 became active again as he rerouted an alternative power supply. His eyes became alert again and he got back to his feet. "Pinbacker is onboard. He's trying to stop the mission," he reported.
"Well...shit," Dirk muttered.
Dirk rushed over to the mainframe where the coolant room was. He dipped down into the super-cold water/coolant and began work inside it. After he put a thing in another thing, it started working again. "Holy shit, that's cold," Dirk shivered.
Dirk went down again and managed to complete his task. As he did, the coolant equipment caught his leg. He was now bleeding profusely, stuck, and freezing to death. Brainiac 5 entered the room, worked on the computer to release Dirk, and then extended a cable around Dirk's leg to stop the bleeding. He detached the cable from his finger and snapped it in place forming a tourniquet.
Meanwhile, Cassie fought for her life against Pinbacker in her room.
Brainiac 5 assisted the limping Dirk to the shield that would touch the surface of the sun. "Leave me behind. Just do it and say we did it," Dirk said painfully.
"This will be a human achievement," Brainiac 5 assured him.
The two struggled through the corridors until they reached the shield. As they did, the rest of the ship broke off and exploded. "One-way trip, huh?" Dirk realized.
The two then encountered Cassie's severely burned body on the floor indicating Pinbacker was around. "Where is he?" Dirk wondered. Before anyone could answer, Pinbacker took Brainiac 5 by the throat.
"For seven weeks, I spoke with God. He told me to take us all to heaven," Pinbacker said to him.
"Visions with God have to be verified by Vatican investigators with the Congregation of the Causes of the Saints to be worthy of belief," Brainiac 5 told him.
"Shut the fuck up!" Pinbacker shouted at him.
Pinbacker glowed extremely bright as he began to melt off Brainiac 5's artificial skin, hair, and metal components. "Go, go now!" Brainiac 5 warned Dirk. Limping as fast as he could, Brainiac 5 detonated a bomb in his chest, killing Pinbacker in the explosion.
Dirk made his way to the very tip of the shield just as it was about to hit the surface. A forcefield activated around him to protect him from the touchdown. If the mission had gone as planned, the shield would have lightly touched the shield and then rocketed its way away from the sun. In this case, there would be no escape. The shield's walls gave way as the roaring plasma of the sun came in. The forcefield was quickly overpowered but for a brief moment, Dirk was able to see and touch the surface of the sun in all of its glory. Dirk's body became engulfed in the plasma, and he turned a bright white.
No longer a man but a body plasma incarnate, Dirk reached out to the sun with his hand. The rest of the shield was incinerated as it fell into the sun. Not long afterward, a man made of pure light sped away from the sun at escape velocity and headed back to Earth. The Sun Boy had been born.
Author's Notes: I figure, at some point, it's necessary for mankind to reach the surface of the sun to say we did it. One can only hope it would go smoother than this.