Race to the stars
Written and Illustrated by: Elliott Harding, Zoe Callan,, and Sarah Weiss
I knew my Sci-Fi novel had come to life when I woke up in the cockpit of a spaceship. I
was wearing a purple outfit that felt like some sort of silicone, with an oxygen mask strapped to
my face. I looked around the ship, seeing futuristic controls similar to those of an airplane. I
caught a glimpse of a window and I began to panic, realizing that I was floating above a
racetrack in the middle of space. One wrong move and that was the end of me. I continued to
look around the spaceship, and saw a toolbox hanging just to the left of my head. I was going to
inspect it when the spaceship suddenly made a groaning sound and lurched forward.
My eyes widened as I heard an electronic voice say, “Autopilot disabled, please take
control of the ship.” I hurried over to the controls as spaceships zoomed past the ship and got
there just in time to turn the wheel enough so that I could stay on the track.
In front of me a green spaceship collided with a gold spaceship, resulting in the gold one
being flung into a spiral off the track. An announcer’s voice boomed, “And there goes Lota X!!
This race sure will be a wild ride!,” The announcer didn’t seem to have a concern in the world to
whoever was in the spaceship that got flung off the track.
I didn’t want to meet the same fate as the gold spaceship, so I swerved around other
racers, trying hard not to hit them, although they did not return the favor and I was almost
thrown off the track several times.
A green spaceship zoomed along ahead of me. It was the spaceship who had flung the
gold one to its probable death. I tried to drift behind it, just trying to survive. The spaceship
seemed to think I was trying to pass it, and tried to throw me off the track as well. The spaceship
rammed against me. Metal against metal screeched in my ears, sparks flying everywhere. I
looked around my spaceship desperately. At this rate, I’d never win the race. Then I laid eyes on
the toolbox. A violent push from the green spaceship had knocked it over, and a screwdriver
had fallen out, rolling onto the floor. I looked at the window. Then I pushed the wheel as far
towards the green spaceship as it would go, and let go of the wheel. I picked up the screwdriver,
and then raced to the window, which I smashed open with the screwdriver and stuck my head
out of.
The spaceship was flying next to me, trying to ram into me again. I pushed the
screwdriver into the engine on its wing, and then ran to the wheel and pushed back. The green
spaceship sputtered and was thrown off the track and into space.
The announcer’s voice boomed across the track again. “Racer Ted has thrown Green off
the track! Racer Ted advances on the finish line and…”
I maneuvered across the finish line and slowed down, relieved to have survived.
“Ted wins the race, breaking Green’s streak!” yelled the announcer into his microphone.
Crowds of alien snakes and humans alike congratulated me as I climbed out of the
spaceship.
Their cheers surrounded me as they chanted my name. “Ted! Ted! Ted!” The cheers
were accompanied by a beeping sound, which sounded a bit too much like my school alarm…
I woke from my dream with a start, quickly turning off my alarm. Man, I thought, That was
some dream.
Suddenly I noticed a strange trophy next to my alarm clock. Was it really a dream?
