For centuries the stars have been used by many cultures across the galaxies to navigate by. Their constant glow in the night skies, and while on occasion some fade and new ones step out from the blackness of space. It takes a while, charts are up dated and changes are made. It takes years for a star to fully disappear, for it's light to slow fade out to those that can only see it as a small dot. They act as road maps in the inky blackness that envelopes the small bubbles of life.
There are many that have entire fields of study on stars and they're life, how they form how they die, where they are. All of it. Such a person is highly valued in a crew, they are the navigators, the ones that lead them into adventure and then bring them home again. Most rely on them for knowledge of where they are if they're safe, or they have lived long enough to know when they aren't safe anymore.
Here in an uncharted part of space an old planet with many cultures all different, but capable of working together. They have all thrived, with some specialising in some fields over others. As a whole, an outsider would consider it one culture. Wouldn't see the slight differences between them since they are all so influenced by each other. What they do see clearly though is that unlike many other cultures throughout the galaxy, they have stayed where they are. They have not ventured far into the vastness of that beyond planets limits. Only into orbit. The technology exists for them to leave but they don't. Large stations sit in orbit. All armed and constantly scanning the skies.
Navigators drew new star charts spent hours of their visit, pouring over the charts that were kept by several cultures. All different. None of the charts matched. charts from the same cultures and those from different ones from the same time period. None of them matched. It was chalked up to inexperience. they hadn't had the proper tools and the environment of the upper atmosphere would have distorted any observations made when on the planet. The study of it was abandoned in favour of other pursuits. Ones that were felt to be of greater benefit.
The trip goes well. Until they wish to leave.
It wasn't until the course was mapped and the planet was behind them, now a near inviable dot in the distance. Courses changed constantly, needing to mapped an remapped throughout a journey. This one was no different, this part of space changed more often then others, with clouds of dust and nebula common place. Each of scientific interest and all a visual spectacle. vivid colour contrasted with the nothingness behind them, stars occasionally peeking through the thinner areas of them. After stopping to once again marvel at their surroundings and taking a moment to take in where they were, they returned to their charts. Double checking headings and the course home. Eyes flicking over their charts and the stars ahead of them.
They didn't match.
Between one nebula and another a constellation had moved.
It was no longer to their left. But their right.
Thinking they had just skipped across the chart a little they checked again.
And again.
And again.
They were moving.
They didn't know how it was possible. The stars they were navigating by where lightyears away. It took centuries for the light they emitted to reach them here. They couldn't have moved.
It's not possible.
Dread overcame them. Made them cold. Their fear of the blackness that surrounded them grew. It wasn't until the ship was moved, like a boat in the ocean being moved by the waves. A gentle rock, before it grew to something moving across the hull. Vibrations moved through the metal of the ship as whatever it was outside moved and a noise something akin to the calls of whales echoed through the ship.
It wasn't long before the ship was silent. The noise gone. The only evidence that they had come into contact with something the slight roll of the ship. All eyes turned to each other before landing on the navigator. Meeting their gazes then moving it to glass that surrounded this part of the ship. The constellations there were navigating by were far closer than before moving slowly across to the front of the ship. It wasn't till the ship was rocked again that the noticed.
The lights from around the room reflected back at them from beyond the glass.
They weren't stars at all.
They were scales.











