ATHLETE – Journey to the Edge of the Universe
I. The Origin of the Dream
In the year 3092, humanity has gone far beyond the days of fighting for small pieces of land under the Sun. The cities on Earth are only heritage gardens, where people come to reminisce. The majority of humanity lives in orbital cities, or artificial superclusters of planets.
From a research institute on the South Pole of Mars, a top-secret project was born – Athlete, an interplanetary spacecraft not to search for new planets… but to find the edge of the universe.
Athlete is not made of ordinary alloy, but of Matter Zero – a form of matter that can exist in multiple layers of reality at the same time. Its shell reflects not only light, but also memories, dreams, and possibilities that have never happened.
II. The Immortal Crew
Athlete has no permanent captain. It is run by the Council of Thirteen Shadows – half-human, half-data entities, each holding a piece of the Edge Map. They do not age, for each heartbeat is stretched into centuries in quantum space.
There is Elyra, who hears the heartbeat of the stars;
Dravon, who lives on cold nuclear energy;
Orpheon, the blind poet who sees the universe only through the song of a black hole.
And the rest, those whose names cannot be spoken – for to speak them would cause their memories to drift into another reality.
III. Stepping Out of the Dark
On the day of departure, Athlete left the Oort Belt like a silver arrow, piercing the dark sea. The space before the ship trembled like water, then shattered into millions of crystalline fragments of light.
They passed through the Metaphysical Mist – where light lost its direction, time became nonlinear. There, a strange star burned in a deep purple, casting ancient letters on the hull of the ship that did not belong to any civilization known to man.
IV. The Cities of the Void
In the 102nd year of the journey (in ship time), Athlete encountered the Cities Suspended on Gravitational Waves. They were not on any planet, but floating in the gravitational field of a double black hole.
The people there had no fixed form – each time you saw them, you saw a different version: a child, an old man, a bird, or a lone point of light.
Elyra asked the inhabitants about the edge of the universe. They just smiled:
“The edge? It is not the end… it is where all your questions become answers.”
V. The Final Storm
With only one step left before reaching the edge of space-time, Athlete faced the Nameless Storm – a gigantic vortex where past, present, and future overlapped like a million broken mirrors.
Orpheon stood at the prow, singing a song that made Athlete’s entire quantum structure resonate with the storm. Each note was a path, each vibration a door.
Athlete did not pass through… but became part of the storm.
VI. The Edge of the Universe
When the storm cleared, they saw before them the Plane of Infinite Light – the edge of everything. There were no stars, no darkness, only white light like paper waiting to be written on.
A voice rang out from all around:
“You have come to my end. But every end is a beginning. To move forward, leave behind all that you were.”
The Council of Thirteen was silent. Then one by one, the figures stepped out, fading into the light. Finally, only Athlete remained—no crew, no memories, drifting into a new universe, one no one had ever named.
