Core: 3/9. Slightly Bad.
Science: 3/9. Space Travel and nuclear reactor are banal. The main catastrophe is caused by the infinitesimal impurities which adds up the fuel consumption in advance. The solution is to lose unnecessary weight and leave a person on planet to instruct the rocket. I would give higher score if the author could render more elaborations on how the captain on planet could provide his energy for the rocket in the universe miles away.
Fiction: 3/9. The logic of plot is fragile since it at least depicts a rash and irresponsible captain who sacrificed himself for his mistake. So the shared spirits of astronauts here is unable to touch me:
Onward through the impossible.
Character: 5/9
- I: a doctor who narrates the story
- chief archivist: he preserved the information as one of the remaining cabins from that accidents and provided it for me
- Aleksey Zarubin: As the commander of the Pole, he possessed the calm wisdom of a researcher and the wild temperament of a warrior. He likes making, blending and preparing oil paints.
- navigator: a musician and a composer
- doctor: microbiology
- astrophysicist: fluent in five languages
- husband-and-wife engineers: chess
- people in the archive: For a short story, the author should not depict so many unnecessary characters without scruple.
Plot: 3/9. I thought it would be better if the author could depict plots from perspectives of cabin members instead of one curious investigator decades later. Otherwise it’s hard to resonate with characters. Also, the narrator’s opening at the beginning is somewhat tedious especially talking about other scholars who have nothing to do with main plots. Finally, The sacrifice of the captain was actually caused by his incautious and illogical decision rather than unredeemable fate, which makes the theme of story laughable.
The narrator was a space doctor who went to the Central Archive of Space Travel for the history of the twelfth point.
The chief archivist here therefore provided the narrator with the information on the first expedition to Barnard’s Star.
Zarubin was appointed to the commander of the risky task unanimously and his crew trusted him so much that they all agreed with his management unanimously.
On a day of the eighth month of the journey, they found nuclear fuel were consumed sharply higher than expected.
The crew had a meeting. The fuel is enough to reach Barnard’s Star but not enough to come back once they reach it.
The astrophysicist thought people after them may find and rescue them.
The navigator shouted recklessly that they should never return and fly onward.
The engineers thought their sacrifice would be meaningless for mankind if they cannot go back with research and people after them can also make discoveries one day without their sacrifice. People on earth would wait in vain if they didn’t know the experience on the failure of the first expedition. Returning back to Earth just loses a few years.
The captain appreciated the engineers’ logic. But he continued to fly to destination instead of returning immediately because he wanted a miracle to be invented within the next 11 months. “Onward, through the impossible!” (But I thought he made an unrealistic and stupid decision because he risked his crew’s life for his so-called faith. He was an irresponsible captain and his sacrifice hereafter could not make up for it. It would be better if the plot was set like this: There are low chances for them to return successfully and so the captain decided to bet on the possible fuel on the destination.)
The narrator saw captain’s paintings from the chief archivist.
They landed on the planet and did various researches.
In order to get home, the captain commanded to make the rocket lighter by abandoning heavy electronic equipment. The low acceleration caused by the lack of fuel would require a person to navigate the rocket from the planet over the first few months and he offered himself. He therefore had to wait for 14 years alone on an alien frozen world.
The captain gave the remaining crew all the energy he had from his mini-reactors for the crew to come back successfully.
The archivist showed me captain’s other paintings in his remaining days which the archivist later found on that planet. They are all about Earth and hometown. And he also found a note from the captain:
Onward through the impossible.
It was said the twelfth point was written by the captain.
World and Others: 3/9. The destination is tedious and there’s nothing worth to record during the voyage that even the pilots are required to use hobbies for their psychological health.
- Astropsychiatry: Pilots must have outside interests to help them go through the long journey.
- Twelfth point in the flight manual: What are the candidate’s hobbies? What is the candidate interests in? It’s crucial for the long-distance flights.
- Atomic-ion drives: Ships travels at near-light speeds with it but it still takes years to fly to the nearest stars.
- Central Archive of Space Travel: It looks like a white sail hanging over the water.
- Bernard’s star: Their destination. It takes 14 years or 40 months to flight there and back.
Overall: 4/9.
I like space adventure because it’s not dull as this article! If the plot is intriguing enough, I would not mind other kinds of fallacies. Otherwise if the author wants to highlight the astronauts’ spirits, it would be more agreeable to ensure their intelligence.