Asteroid

Max’s fingers drummed against the plastic of his laptop’s keyboard, the soft click of each keystroke pressing into the silence like a metronome. The screen flickered, the dark glow shifting into a dense labyrinth of text. Long strings of data clustered into something that, to most, would have seemed like incomprehensible nonsense.

To Max, however, it was a dialect of precision. A language of numbers and symbols that he understood as naturally as breathing, as fluidly as a pianist moving across the keys of a grand piano. Each line of text had its place, each digit slotting into a complex puzzle where the correct pattern could unlock entire galaxies.

He leaned in, eyes reflecting the shifting glow. His voice was steady. Patient. Razor-focused.

This was a puzzle.

And puzzles had solutions.

“Okay,” he murmured, his gaze unwavering. “Read out the name of his asteroid for me.”

The soft creak of Magnus shifting in his chair punctuated the silence. The chair was old, an antique rotary model, and the wheels grumbled against the polished wooden floor as if annoyed at being disturbed. Max had intended to replace it years ago, but something about the familiar sound felt like a companion in the stillness of the library.

The desk they shared was a monster, a vast sprawl of rich mahogany. The deep brown wood was scarred from decades of use, its surface littered with an uneven scatter of drawers and cabinets. A desk meant for a scholar. For a collector of knowledge. For someone who thrived on detail.

It hadn’t been his choice.

It had belonged to the previous owner, just like everything else in this house. The towering shelves. The impossible labyrinth of books. The glass tomb of parchment at the centre of the room. A man obsessed with knowledge. A man who never left this library. A man who died here, alone.

Max had inherited it all, not by blood, but by purchase. And yet, despite its bulk, despite the stain of its history, it fitted.

It belonged.

The library itself was a cathedral of ink and paper, a hexagonal chamber carved from centuries of wisdom and obsession. The shelves stretched high, spiralling toward the domed ceiling like wooden ribs, forming a skeleton of knowledge.

From below, they seemed chaotic, stacked in impossible layers that defied order. But from above, standing on the balcony that wrapped around the upper level, their symmetry was revealed.

A perfect snowflake pattern of bookshelves.

A perfect maze, leading toward the heart of the room.

At its centre, a glass enclosure stood in stark contrast to the library’s dark, aged wood. A sterile, six-sided chamber filled with the most delicate texts. Parchment so brittle that even a breath felt like a risk. Knowledge on the edge of extinction, preserved in carefully regulated air. A tomb for words too old to survive the modern world.

No windows interrupted the walls of the outer library. No sunlight would ever touch paper or parchment. Just the glow of artificial fluorescent tube lights, stretching their pale fingers across the room.

Max’s desk was positioned against the northernmost wall, a silent guardian of the room’s fragile order. Across the chamber, the only entrance loomed. The southern door. A massive slab of dark-stained oak, its frame thick enough to absorb sound. When it closed, the outside world ceased to exist.

A fact Max found increasingly comforting.

Magnus, still turning slowly in his chair, clutched a small book in his hands. One thumb wedged into the pages, marking his place. A flutter of paper. A breath. Then:

“I have serious reason to believe that the planet from which the Little Prince came is the asteroid known as B-612,” he read.

Magnus’s voice was young but steady, carrying through the library with the careful enunciation of someone reciting something important. He repeated the designation, slower this time. “B, six, one, two. Is that it?”

Max nodded, his fingers already moving. The rhythmic tap-tap-tap of his keystrokes echoed through the room as he entered the string.

B-6-1-2.

Pause.

A frown tugged at his features.

Something wasn’t right.

He tried again, his fingers moving slower this time, deliberate.

Nothing.

Magnus leaned in, his brow creasing. “Is it not there, Dad?”

That tone. Max recognised it instantly. The quiet worry creeping in. The childish hope flickering on the edge of disappointment. The way a kid’s face falls when they start to realise Santa isn’t real.

Without looking away from the screen, Max reached out, ruffling Magnus’s hair. “Hang on, Moonbeam. Give me a second.”

I know it exists. His mind was already dissecting the problem, turning it over, stripping it to its core. That doesn’t seem like enough digits.

His fingers found his chin, scratching absently.

Wait.

He repositioned his hands and typed out the asteroid’s designation in full.

BE-SIX-ONE-TWO.

Enter.

Another pause.

Another frown.

Magnus leaned forward, eyes wide with anticipation. “Still nothing?”

Max exhaled through his nose. “It would appear that it’s not that either.”

Magnus hesitated, then flipped back a few pages in the book, scanning the lines with renewed determination. His small fingers traced the words.

“Dad, the book says it was discovered by a Turkish astronomer in 1909.”

Max stilled.

Then, slowly, a grin crept onto his face. The kind that signalled a breakthrough. He turned to Magnus, the usual measured calm replaced by something sharper.

A flicker of genuine excitement.

“It sure does, Moonbeam.” He clapped Magnus lightly on the back, already shifting toward the keyboard. “And that, my boy, might just be the key.”

Max poised his fingers above the keys. Then hesitated. The glow of the screen reflected in his eyes as his hands hovered over the letters, his mind running through the next step.

“I was going to try this again,” he admitted, voice even. “…in Turkish.”

Magnus looked up from his book, curiosity mixing with something else. A rare sight. His dad uncertain.

Max, the man who could navigate equations like constellations, who could pull answers from the void like they were waiting for him to find them, was stuck.

Magnus blinked. “What’s stopping you?”

Max turned, grinning. “I can’t speak a word of Turkish.”

Silence.

Then Magnus let out the most exhausted sigh a ten-year-old could possibly manage.

This man built the world’s first artificial intelligence, but he trips over translating numbers into another language? he thought.

Things like this were becoming quite frequent. Only now was Magnus beginning to suspect an anterior motive. A game. Little hurdles and hoops assigned by his dad to see if he could traverse them.

Dad was testing him.

“Dad—”

Max barely held back a chuckle as Magnus rolled his eyes, shaking his head in exasperation.

“You’re on a laptop.” He gestured at the screen like he was explaining fire to a caveman. “Just use a translation app.”

Max snorted.

Magnus muttered something under his breath. Probably something insulting.

Max was too amused to care. He winked. “Absolutely great idea, Moonbeam. And you came up with a resolution so fast. Genius!”

His fingers danced over the keyboard, a rapid-fire staccato of clicks and taps, as if his hands had become extensions of the machine itself. The monitor’s glow cast sharp angles across his face, painting him in cold blue light. Magnus leaned forward, his own reflection ghosting across the screen’s surface.

“The Turkish translation didn’t work, did it, Dad?”

Max sighed, rubbing his chin. “How did you know that?”

Magnus grinned, eyes glinting with something sharp and knowing. “Because I figured out the name of the asteroid. You were close, so don’t feel bad.”

He reached across the desk and pulled the laptop toward him. Max allowed it, intrigued. Then Magnus dropped his book onto the desk, a soft thump against the polished wood. He patted the front cover, excitement barely contained.

“Look. The answer was on the cover the whole time.”

Max blinked. The first moment of genuine surprise he’d had in a long time. He stared at the book.

The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.

Nothing else. No hidden codes. No anagrams. Just the title and the author’s name.

But Magnus was looking at him expectantly, vibrating with certainty.

“Can you not see it, Dad? It’s right there!” Magnus tapped the cover again. Then, without waiting for a response, he turned to the laptop. “Look, I’ll show you.”

Max leaned back, watching. His son’s small fingers moved clumsily over the keys, typing with deliberate intent.

The first attempt yielded nothing. Magnus frowned. Not frustration. Not disappointment. Just recalibration. He was working through variations, adjusting course like a scientist in a lab, methodical and unshaken.

Max studied him, his initial excitement flickering.

Maybe the kid had jumped too soon. Maybe he hadn’t really found anything at all.

What a shame.

For a fleeting moment, Max had felt something close to wonder. The thought that his son was solving riddles he himself hadn’t unravelled had been thrilling. But maybe not today.

“Don’t stress too much about it—”

“Done it!”

Magnus’s voice cut through Max’s doubt like a knife through fog. He spun the laptop toward his father, eyes alight.

Max looked.

And his jaw slackened.

The laptop’s cool glow bathed his face, reflecting in his widened eyes. He flicked his gaze between the book’s cover and the screen.

So simple.

So glaringly obvious in hindsight.

But it required a kind of perspective, an angle of thinking, that only an eight-year-old might possess.

Centered on the screen, in bold, unmistakable text, was the asteroid’s data sheet.

Asteroid Ref: 46610 – BE-SIX-DOUZE

Max exhaled, barely a whisper. “It’s French.”

Magnus nodded. “The author was French, so I figured the asteroid would be named in the book’s original language.”

Smart. Not just a lucky guess. A line of logic followed through with precision.

“I tried BE-SIX-UN-DEUX first, but that didn’t work.” Magnus shrugged. “So I worked through a few different combinations before I got it right.”

Max felt something close to pride.

Real pride.

Magnus hadn’t given up. He’d processed the problem. Broken it apart. Stitched it back together until the answer emerged.

Max tapped a few keys. The laptop’s display transformed, filling with the vast, inky stretch of space. Stars blinked into view like distant memories, connected by thin white lines, forming a web of constellations.

Magnus gasped.

The screen zoomed in and stopped.

Then it zoomed in again.

And again.

Each layer peeled back a deeper section of the sky, refining the search. The universe shrank, compressing, bending inward toward a single destination.

“Dad, is it trying to find the asteroid?” Magnus breathed, eyes wide. “Will we see the Little Prince? His sheep?”

Max glanced at him. Eight years old, and still full of wonder. Still willing to believe.

He swallowed the ache in his throat. “Yeah, Moonbeam,” he said softly. “We’re going to see the asteroid, real soon.”

The scanner continued, the technology reaching farther, hunting for the right satellite. If the office knew what Max was using their resources for, they’d have a stroke.

He almost laughed at the thought.

Then Magnus spoke again, quieter now. “…And the prince?”

Hopeful.

Max exhaled slowly. He reached out, ruffling his son’s hair, as he always did.

“No, Moonbeam,” he said gently. “I doubt we’ll be seeing any little princes.”

A pause.
A shift in the air.
Something closing in.

“Actually, I wanted to talk to you about that.” Max hesitated, then added, “You still interested in hearing my theory about the book?”

Magnus turned away from the laptop. The realisation that he wouldn’t see a tiny space sheep stung him somewhere deep inside, but he didn’t let it show. He wouldn’t let his dad see. Instead, he latched onto the promise of a secret about to be unveiled.

Magnus turned to his father.

And nodded.

Max reached over and grabbed the book, staring at the cover in deep contemplation. The weight of it was familiar, the leather binding worn down just enough to make it fit perfectly into his hand. Holding the foot of the book, he gently patted it against the desk a few times, the dull thump-thump breaking the stillness of the library.

“You know, Moonbeam, sometimes people don’t always see the wood through the trees. If you swallow information the wrong way, you can mistake theories for facts. They ain’t the same thing.”

Magnus sat quietly, his fingers worrying a loose thread on the edge of his sleeve. He was waiting. Waiting for that moment when his dad would unveil some grand revelation, the kind that made everything click into place.

And more importantly, when was he going to tell him where the sheep was?

“Magnus, we’ve read a lot of this book already, right? Can you remember why exactly it’s assumed that the Little Prince lives on asteroid B-6-1-2?”

Magnus chewed the question over like it was a stubborn caramel stuck to the roof of his mouth. “Because the Turkish astronomer saw it through his telescope!” he declared proudly, confident in his answer.

Max made a sound like a quiz show buzzer. “Nope. The narrator only suggests that he has serious reason to believe the Little Prince comes from B-6-1-2. You read it yourself when you were looking for the name of the asteroid. If you pay close attention, the Little Prince never actually says he’s from a planet or an asteroid. He simply mentions that everything is quite small where he lives, and straight ahead, you can’t go very far.”

Magnus frowned, considering this, his lower lip jutting out slightly. “Then why are we looking for asteroids?” His voice took on a sulky edge as his dreams unravelled thread by thread.

No space sheep in sight.

Max gave him a wink. “Because asteroids are cool.”

Magnus was unimpressed. “They’re just stupid space rocks, and they don’t have sheep.” He crossed his arms and began to swivel in his chair, slow, petulant rotations as if winding himself into a better sulk.

“No, no sheep. You got me there, Moonbeam.” Max sighed, watching Magnus sulk. “But I thought it might be pretty cool to track this one. Maybe even use it for one of Daddy’s work projects. It looks like it’s in an ideal orbit for intersection.”

Magnus wasn’t biting. The excitement drained out of him like air from a balloon, leaving behind only crumpled disappointment. Max could see it. The weight of expectation settling into his son’s tiny shoulders.

“Look, I’m sorry there isn’t a space sheep,” he said, softening his tone. “I thought your excitement came from uncovering the secrets in the book, not from what everyone else assumes. Now you have a real mystery. Where does the Little Prince actually come from? Isn’t that even more exciting?”

Magnus slowed his swivelling, then stopped. His curiosity flickered back to life, dim but persistent, like embers beneath ash. “Where does he come from?”

“Ah, well, for that, we’ll need to finish the book.” Max grinned. “No shortcuts, I’m afraid.”

The laptop erupted into a sudden symphony of dings and chimes, an explosion of sound that yanked both of their gazes to the screen. The central display pulsed with life, revealing a slowly rotating rock, its surface jagged and scarred from millennia drifting through space. A landscape of craters and deep fissures marred its body, ancient wounds left by the violence of the universe. Occasionally, white and red lines flickered over the image as the satellite took measurements, layering geometric shapes across its surface like battle maps.

It was breathtaking. A trail of cosmic dust swam behind it, a cape of fractured stardust following in its silent wake.

Magnus stared at the display, his sulkiness melting away like frost beneath a rising sun. “Maybe asteroids are a little bit cool,” he admitted. Then, after a pause, he added, “Be better with sheep, though.”

Max laughed, warmth filling his voice as it echoed through the cavernous library. The sound bounced between towering shelves, weaving itself into the scent of aged paper and polished oak.

Just as he did, the heavy double doors at the far end of the room creaked open.

A slow, deliberate groan.

Both Max and Magnus turned toward the sound.

A pause followed.

Then came a faint shuffle of footsteps, accompanied by the low rustle of fabric. Whoever had entered remained out of sight, hidden by the glass dome at the library’s centre.

Max glanced down at Magnus, who was already staring wide-eyed toward the source of the noise. The boy’s small hands curled around the edge of the desk, his breath held as if waiting for some grand reveal.

And then, finally, she appeared.

Beatrice.

She stepped from behind the glass dome, her usual crisp uniform pressed and pristine, a dusting cloth folded neatly in her hands.

Magnus gasped, a delighted sound as his tension vanished. He sprinted forward, arms stretched wide. Beatrice barely had time to kneel before he collided with her, throwing his arms around her neck.

“Hello, Moonbeam. What a lovely hug,” she murmured, squeezing him tight. “You must have been practising since the last one, as I’m sure it’s at least a hundred times more huggy.”

She looked up at Max, offering a polite nod. “Afternoon, Sir.”

“Max,” he corrected, his tone weary but amused.

“Of course, Sir… whatever you say,” she replied, her voice laced with light sarcasm and mischief.

Magnus beamed. “I have been practising on my foxy. That’s why I’m so good. You can borrow him if you want to practise too.”

Beatrice chuckled. “Thank you, Moonbeam. I might just do that when you’re at school tomorrow and I’m making your bed.”

She turned to Max, releasing Magnus to stand. “Lunch is ready, Sir—”

“…Max,” Max interjected, shooting her a pointed look.

“…If you have finished with Magnus, I will be taking him to the dining room.”

“Thank you, Beatrice. I’ll be along in a minute. I just need to make a quick call to the office.”

Beatrice nodded, reaching for Magnus’s hand. Together, they made their way down the aisle of towering bookshelves, heading for the double doors at the far end.

“Me and Dad were looking at asteroids, and they have no sheep on them, but they still look kinda cool,” Magnus could be heard telling Beatrice just before the doors closed behind them.

Max smiled to himself before slipping his phone from his pocket. He pressed a speed-dial number and waited.

“Hi, Thomas. I’ll cut to the point. I have a candidate for you, as per the Argos project.”

He spun the laptop around to face him, fingers tapping rapidly over the keys. The display shifted, the asteroid data expanding to fill the entire screen. A graph appeared in the corner, charting the percentages of various metals and minerals.

“Well, what’s the point in being the boss if I can’t choose my own toys?” Max smirked. “I’m looking at it now. It’s perfect. Check your inbox. I’ve sent you the extracted data packet. I think you’ll find its composition, location, and trajectory all fall within the parameters.”

A pause. Max leaned back slightly, listening.

“Excellent. Create me a portfolio, and I’ll pitch this to the committee during the next board meeting.”

He nodded, satisfied. “Thanks. Bye.”

Max hung up and closed his laptop.

As he did, he heard footsteps.

Echoing in the library. Coming from the other side of the glass dome.

The problem with the dome was its position. Dead centre of the library’s snowflake design. From Max’s desk, he couldn’t see the main entrance.

The footsteps continued.

Too many steps for someone who should have rounded the dome by now.

“Hello? Beatrice?” Max called.

No reply.

He began walking toward the glass dome.

The footsteps trailed him, their rhythm precise and deliberate. There was something wrong with the sound. Too steady. Too purposeful.

Max tried to peer through the glass, but the dome’s curved surface warped the view. The towering shelves inside only added to the distortion. Ancient scrolls and fragile parchment crowded the space within, their brittle edges catching the dim overhead glow.

He moved, circling the dome, breath shallow, ears tuned to the unrelenting cadence of those footsteps.

He half-orbited the dome, and finally the double doors came into view.

Nobody was there.

Yet the footsteps continued.

The lights flickered once, then twice, before settling into a dull yellow hue.

A chill crawled along Max’s skin as a new realisation settled over him.

There were no windows in the library. No natural light. Just clinical, artificial fluorescence overhead, weak and struggling, as if it too knew something didn’t belong here.

The sound of footsteps shifted.

No longer in the library.

They were coming from behind the double doors.

“Hello?” Max called, his voice thin in the still air.

Silence.

He moved between the shelves with measured steps, weaving through them like a thread through fabric. Books loomed on either side, their worn spines watching him pass with the patience of a forest observing the seasons.

The lights flickered again. A rapid series of erratic pulses, then the room plunged into murky twilight.

A soft green glow lingered from the LED indicators inside the dome.

Keypad controls.
Air sterilisation and temperature regulation.

The only sources of light.

Beyond those faint glows, the darkness felt hollow. As if something had taken a deep breath and was waiting for him to exhale first.

Max turned back toward the double doors. His eyes adjusted to the dimness, details sharpening into shadows and faint glimmers of reflected light. His pulse quickened.

He reached out.

The footsteps stopped.

Right outside the doors.

His hand hovered inches from the handle, then froze.

The metal twitched.

Just barely.

A small, almost imperceptible shift.

Then it twitched again.

A rattle followed. Soft at first. Then frantic. The handles jiggled violently, shaking as if something unseen was desperate to get in.

Max’s mind yanked him backward, into memory.

Magnus, bundled beneath a duvet.
Small hands clutching the edges like a lifeline.
Wide eyes catching the glow of a nightlight.

“Dad, what if they’re always there, but you can only see them when you’re scared?”

Max blinked.

The memory fractured. Shattered.

The present rushed back in like cold water.

He inhaled sharply, grabbed both handles, and yanked the doors open with force.

Nothing.

The library lights flickered back on, washing the room in pale, sterile illumination. Everything sat exactly as it had before. Bookshelves undisturbed. Shadows normal. The dome silent at the centre of the space.

Max let out a long, controlled breath.

Idiot.

He stepped forward into the hallway beyond. Glanced left.

Then right.

The corridor stretched on, empty.

He exhaled again, stepped back inside, and gently shut the doors behind him.

A second later, the footsteps returned.

Fast this time. No nonsense. Purposeful.

Max spun just as one of the doors started to open.

His heart slammed into his ribs.

Then he saw her.

Daphne.

She shouldered the heavy door fully open and stepped inside, balancing a tray of sandwiches and two cans of soda, her expression utterly unbothered.

Max let out a shaky laugh, rubbing the back of his neck. “You scared the hell out of me.”

She smirked, the kind of smile that softened the air around her, turning something mundane into something almost magical. She lifted the tray slightly, a gentle reminder. “Lunch? Let’s have it in the garden.”

“Yes, that’s a great idea. I need to get out of this damn house. It’s beginning to drive me crazy. Mice in the walls, lights flickering like we’re in a horror movie, a glass library that nobody can get into.” He gestured toward the dome at the centre of the room.

“…Because the previous owner was the only one with the key code. And that owner… he was found dead in this house. The staff joke about ghosts, but at this point, I’m not ruling it out. Maybe it’s him.”

Daphne smiled again, an impossible balance of innocence and quiet understanding. She had that rare, untouchable quality, like she had stepped out of a world softer than this one. Standing near her felt like standing in sunlight after years in the dark, and he had the strangest feeling that if he reached for her, she might dissolve into light.

“Because you’re insistent on living next to your lab,” she said, her voice light, teasing. “And the only way to legally store fifteen thousand litres of liquid hydrogen and oxygen outside of a government facility was to find an obscure zoning loophole.” She tilted her head slightly, a knowing gleam in her eye. “God knows what else you have over there.”

Max chuckled, unsteady, like even laughter might fracture the moment. “Oh yeah. That sounds like me.” He glanced around, shaking his head. “How do you ever put up with me?”

She looked at him then, and something inside him twisted. She was the kind of beautiful that shouldn’t exist in a world like his, a world where everything cracked and broke.

“Because you built me a massive pool house and spa, honey, remember?” Her voice was soft, carrying that same weightless warmth she always had, the kind that settled into his ribs like something permanent.

She turned, balancing the tray against her chest to free one hand. The simple act of opening the door looked effortless, as if the world bent for her rather than the other way around.

Max followed, watching the way she moved.

Like sunlight skimming the surface of a still lake.

Something too perfect to belong to this world.

And for a fleeting moment, he thought maybe, just maybe, he hadn’t been completely damned after all.

They sat on the grass overlooking their estate.

The gardener worked in the distance, trimming the hedges with slow, meticulous strokes. The old two-seater swing beneath them rocked gently, floral cushions thick with padding. The scent of fresh-cut grass mingled with the faint metallic tang of rust from the swing’s iron frame.

Daphne passed him a can, cracking her own open with a soft hiss.

Max took a slow sip, letting the cold fizz linger on his tongue.

She watched the gardener, her expression unreadable. Then, quietly, she wrinkled her nose.

“I don’t like him.”

Max glanced at her. “Why?”

She hesitated. “I can’t explain it. I just don’t.”

Max sighed, shaking his head. “He’s harmless. He’s been here for years. Him, the maid, and the chef all came with the house. I kept them on.”

She pursed her lips. “Don’t get me started on the chef.”

Silence settled between them. Birds chirped in the distance. The wind stirred the hedges, making them whisper.

Max looked at her then. Really looked at her. “I love you, Flower.”

Daphne frowned, turning to face him. “Why do you always call me Flower?”

Max smiled, gaze steady. “Because, Daphne, you are my daffodil. My springtime flower.”

For a moment, she smiled. Eyes soft. Full of something close to warmth.

Then she looked away.

Her face fell.

The atmosphere shifted.

She set her drink down, fingers curling into the fabric of her dress.

“You don’t love me.”

A rhythmic beeping cut through the quiet.

Max frowned and pulled his phone from his pocket.

The screen flickered.

A heart monitor reading.

He stared at it. Jagged peaks and dips. The same rhythm pulsing beside him in another world.

Daphne watched him, her eyes dark and knowing.

Max didn’t react. Didn’t tense. He took another sip of his drink.

His wife turned toward him. “Do you realise this is just a dream? An old memory?”

Max hesitated, fingers tightening around the can. He stared out at the view, listening to short bursts of birdsong drifting from the hedgerow.

Then he replied calmly, “…Yes.”

She took his hand, resting her head on his shoulder. “You don’t miss me.”

Max swallowed. “I do.”

She squeezed his fingers. “No, you don’t.” Her voice was soft, almost affectionate. “If you really missed me, you would have died.”

Max lifted his drink to his lips.

Something blocked it.

A breathing tube.

His chest seized. Panic surged. He gasped—

Her grip tightened.

“Don’t be scared,” she whispered. “Especially when you see them. They’ll leave you alone… if they don’t know.”

Max’s eyes opened.

The hospital ceiling loomed above him, sterile white and unforgivingly real. The rhythmic suck and hiss of the ventilator filled the room.

But despite the noise, despite the pain, one thought burned through everything else.

If they don’t know…

Know what?