Cold Sky

Shelia shivered, staring at the message flashing on her console. The dim sun barely penetrated through the observatory’s glass windows, with the eternally orbiting energy harvesters all but blocking the sun’s warmth from reaching the slowly freezing Earth. The reactors defiantly gasping heat into the atmosphere could not keep up with the thirsty Sphere, as it fueled humankind’s expedition through the cosmos. Humanities’ legacy, an inhospitable planet home to the remaining fraction of civilization, had received its first message from the distant voyagers in over a century. Shelia closed her eyes, the single syllable message floating in her vision.

“Hide”.