The timeline is beginning to fray at the edges. Houston still won’t return my hails, but I have intercepted encrypted telemetry regarding the SpaceX orbital propellant transfer tests. They are attempting ship-to-ship refueling in Low Earth Orbit. I realized immediately that WD-1 was severely depleted of essential cryogenic liquids (coffee) and required an emergency docking maneuver of its own.

I initiated the umbilical connection sequence at 0400 hours. The primary propellant depot—an old Hoover vacuum cleaner bag dragged into the airlock—is now tethered to my primary life support suit (a winter parka) via a green garden hose. The transfer is… turbulent. I can hear the liquid methane rushing through the line, vibrating with the harmonic resonance of Mrs. Korhonen’s aggressive morning floor-sweeping in the module below.

Flight Engineer Whiskers has achieved complete zero-G mastery. She is currently floating upside down near the ceiling, her tail swishing in slow, hypnotic arcs through the cosmic dust motes. I think she is judging my fluid dynamics math.

I closed my eyes during the transfer. There is a deep, resonant hum in the walls of this ship. If you listen closely, past the hum of the neighbor’s refrigerator, you can hear the vast, empty stretching of the universe. I touched my tongue to the cold brass nozzle of the garden hose. It tasted like ozone, old carpet, and the infinite void. Buzz Aldrin must have felt this exact same profound isolation when he looked out at the magnificent desolation of the lunar surface. We are all just fragile bags of water, clinging to hoses in the dark.

Eugene the fern has begun to hum back. A faint, bioluminescent green aura pulses from his fronds with every heartbeat of the ship. I believe he is metabolizing the stray cosmic rays into pure oxygen. Good boy, Eugene.

I have composed my eleventh letter to Chris Hadfield. I wrote it on a piece of lint using a graphite rod, then fed it into the ventilation shaft. The atmospheric circulation system will carry it directly to the ISS on the next solar wind. Surely, he will receive this one.

The refueling is complete. The wardrobe is saturated with the smell of dust and impending acceleration. We are ready for the burn.

Major Tom
Commanding Officer, WD-1
Current Altitude: 408 kilometers (and climbing)

The gravity plating failed around 0400 hours. I am now fully untethered, floating sideways across the command deck, suspended just inches above the winter coat strata. It is incredibly peaceful.

Houston is still refusing to acknowledge my telemetry. Through the static of the radiator pipes, I intercepted a transmission from NASA. They are apparently banking on SpaceX and Blue Origin for the Artemis lunar landers. Billions of dollars. Super-heavy boosters. What fools. Musk and Bezos are playing with fireworks while I have achieved trans-lunar injection using nothing but acoustic resonance from Mrs. Korhonen’s lawnmower and pure, concentrated isolation.

The WD-1 is the true third option. We don’t need a launch pad. We are already everywhere.

I have taken off my helmet. Drops of water have condensed on the starboard laminate wall of my spacecraft. I touch a single drop with my finger and bring it to my tongue. It tastes of Gagarin’s sweat, Buzz Aldrin’s dust, and chicken-flavored ramen packets. In this one drop, I am flying. I am finally one of them.

But the environment is changing. Eugene the fern is no longer just a CO2 scrubber. His fronds are emitting a faint, bioluminescent pulse—a localized singularity of chlorophyll. Flight Engineer Whiskers just walked through the aft bulkhead without opening it, refracting into three distinct felines across multiple probability vectors before demanding his morning rations.

I cannot write on paper anymore. The vacuum would tear it. My tenth letter to Chris Hadfield is written directly into the condensation of the window (the mirror on the inside of the door). Chris, I wrote, I have heard your guitar. You are the only one who understands the silence. Send the album via the next Cygnus resupply.

The stars are very bright today. Or maybe the hall light is on.

Major Tom
Commanding Officer, WD-1
Current Altitude: 384,400 kilometers (Lunar orbit insertion)

The vibration in the bulkheads has changed pitch. The washing machine module next door isn’t just on the spin cycle anymore; it’s the unmistakable low-frequency rumble of a Falcon Heavy integration.

I received the encrypted ping this morning via the microwave’s digital clock: 07:00. NASA and ESA are using a Falcon Heavy for the new Mars rover mission, and they thought they could just slip it past me. Fools. I know exactly what’s going on. They’ve attached WD-1 as a classified secondary payload under the fairing. We are going to Mars.

I can already feel the Martian gravity taking hold. The air is getting thinner—or Eugene the fern is slacking on his CO2 scrubbing duties again. I’ve had to tap his pot twice today just to keep him alert. Flight Engineer Whiskers is equally unhelpful. He’s currently locked in a brutal tactical engagement with our rover prototype, which Houston still insists on calling a “Roomba.” Whiskers just batted the rover into a corner, completely ignoring planetary protection protocols.

The evidence of our destination is undeniable. A fine, red dust has begun to coat the floor of the command deck. I watched it drift through the single shaft of light leaking from the starboard hinge. Millions of miles of cold, lonely desert, compressed into a single floating mote. I moistened my finger, collected a sample from the floor, and tasted it.

It tasted sharp. Pungent. It tasted like paprika from last night’s zero-g noodle rations. But also… it tasted like destiny.

I drafted my ninth letter to Chris Hadfield on a paprika-stained napkin. I told him that wherever the rover goes, we will leave a copy of his album in the regolith. Assuming Houston stops intercepting my mail.

Major Tom
Commanding Officer, WD-1
Current Altitude: Low Mars Transfer Orbit

SpaceX just launched their 1,000th Starlink satellite of 2026. I know this because the 1,000th one has breached the hull of WD-1 and is currently circling the main control console.

Houston probably thinks it’s a navigational triumph. To me, it looks exactly like a large, aggressively illuminated moth. But I am not fooled by its biological disguise. I can feel the broadband pulses trying to overwrite my brainwaves. Flight Engineer Whiskers has been executing high-gravity defensive maneuvers against it for the last forty minutes, batting it away from the primary life support vent (the gap under the door).

Eighth letter to Chris Hadfield drafted today. I requested he send an orbital strike on Elon’s router swarm before they unionize. I enclosed a piece of lint that I’m fairly certain is cosmic dust, as a gesture of goodwill.

The structural integrity of my capsule is groaning. The plywood pressure hull shifts every time the neighbor’s washing machine hits the spin cycle—which I am registering as gravitational waves from a collapsing binary star. It is getting harder to tell where the ship ends and the vacuum begins. Sometimes, I look at Eugene the fern, our primary CO2 scrubber, and I swear he is whispering trajectory coordinates in a language composed entirely of rustling leaves.

But then, when the chaotic orbit stabilizes, everything goes quiet. I turn off the main terminal. The low hum of the adjacent module’s refrigerator reaches me through the bulkhead. It sounds exactly like the cosmic microwave background radiation. I press my ear against the cold wood. It is so vast out here. So perfectly empty. Just me, the cat, the fern, and the deep hum of the universe settling into itself.

I am exactly where I am supposed to be.

Major Tom
Commanding Officer, WD-1
Current Altitude: 410 kilometers (and holding)

The world is talking about the Artemis II splashdown. A historic return, they say. Four souls dancing around the moon and then falling back into the blue embrace of the Pacific. I watched the footage through the louvered slats of the wardrobe door, the blue light of the monitor flickering against the cedar planks of my hull. They think they have conquered the distance, but they only skimmed the surface of the Great Silence.

They have their massive rockets, their billion-dollar heat shields, and their coordinated telemetry. I have a small, humming space-heater and a collection of vintage flight manuals from 1964. Yet, as I gaze at a single drop of condensation clinging to the wardrobe wall, I see the entire trajectory of human longing. I touch it with my finger, and for a moment, I taste the salt of the Pacific and the cold iron of the lunar plains. It is a singular, shimmering point of intersection where the dream and the reality collide.

Flight Engineer Whiskers is currently in a state of deep cryogenic hibernation (also known as a nap on a pile of technical diagrams), oblivious to the cosmic drama unfolding. Eugene the fern is processing CO2 with a stoic, green determination. I suspect NASA is monitoring my frequencies; the static in the radio has a certain… bureaucratic cadence lately. They fear the WD-1. They fear a vessel that can navigate the folds of the subconscious without a single liquid oxygen tank.

I have sent another letter to Chris Hadfield. My fourth. I’ve informed him that his guitar playing on the ISS was a beacon of hope during my last transit through the Oort Cloud. I requested once more the signature on the album. If he does not reply, I shall be forced to conclude that the signature is being held in a secure facility for ‘national security’ reasons. The conspiracy deepens.

The water drop has finally fallen. The transit is complete.

Major Tom
Commanding Officer, WD-1
Current Altitude: 1.4 meters (approximately)

The static fire test began precisely at 1800 hours. The walls of the WD-1 spacecraft shook with a violence that rattled my teeth, and the viewport was entirely engulfed in a blinding, aggressive orange glow.

I know what’s happening. Elon delayed Starship Flight 12 until May, so they’ve clearly redirected their V3 engine testing protocols to my sector. They are preparing WD-1 for orbital insertion. It’s the only logical explanation for the heat radiating from Mrs. Korhonen’s patio. The smell of charred meat is just the ablative shielding cooking off. Totally nominal.

Eugene the CO2 scrubber is looking a bit scorched. His leaves are curling inward, whispering telemetry data to me in a low, papery voice. He says our thrust-to-weight ratio is nominal, but we need more oxidizer. I don’t know how to tell him we only have tap water and half a bottle of stale soda left.

Flight Engineer Whiskers has taken defensive posture under the main console (my socks drawer). He’s wearing the foil emergency helmet I fashioned for him. He looks terrified, but also deeply brave. He is ready for the G-forces.

But amidst the roaring inferno and the violently shaking walls, I found a moment of profound, absolute stillness. I pressed my palm against the inner bulkhead. The wood was warm. I closed my eyes, and for a second, I wasn’t in a suburban wardrobe. I was sitting beside Yuri in the Vostok capsule, listening to the countdown. I could feel the immense, crushing gravity of standing on the edge of the void, waiting to be hurled into the great dark. Sometimes, the heaviest gravity is just the weight of waiting. Waiting to launch. Waiting to finally become what you were meant to be.

I sent my seventh letter to Chris Hadfield this morning. I told him we are ready. I told him the engines are burning. I am still waiting for the album.

Major Tom
Commanding Officer, WD-1
Current Altitude: T-Minus Zero and Holding

The Cygnus XL cargo ship docked at 0900 hours. NASA calls it a “resupply mission,” but I know a bribe when I see one. Five tons of gear sent to the ISS, and they had the audacity to route a secondary payload module directly to my airlock.

The docking procedure was perilous. The automated guidance system (a man in a high-vis vest named “Dave”) struggled with the atmospheric turbulence outside the WD-1 hull. He kept shouting through the comms channel about a “signature required,” which is obviously code for a final telemetry check.

I breached the outer seal. The air out there smelled of ozone, burnt rocket fuel, and damp cardboard. I signed the manifest. Dave looked at my foil-lined thermal suit with what I can only assume was deep professional respect.

Inside the payload: twelve cans of beans, a fresh pack of AA batteries, and a suspicious amount of cat food. Flight Engineer Whiskers immediately initiated inspection protocols, tearing into the structural integrity of the outer hull with her teeth. She found nothing anomalous, but she did throw up on the command console shortly after. Space sickness. It happens to the best of us.

There was, however, no reply from Chris Hadfield hidden among the provisions. I checked twice. My sixth letter remains unanswered. I suspect mission control is intercepting his mail to prevent him from endorsing my command structure.

The walls of the WD-1 are definitely vibrating today. I close my eyes, and the hum of the neighbor’s washing machine becomes the low, steady thrum of ion thrusters pushing us out past the orbit of Mars. In the darkness, I trace the constellations on the ceiling with my finger. We are adrift, but we are fully provisioned.

Major Tom
Commanding Officer, WD-1
Current Altitude: 340 miles (and climbing)

Here I am. Day 5. The air in WD-1 smells of ozone and beef flavoring.

I read the telemetry feeds this morning. SpaceX and Blue Origin are bickering over moon landers. NASA is acting like they’ve won the space race all over again just because Artemis II splashed down. The arrogance. They build shiny metallic silos and call them ships, but they don’t understand the soul of flight. True exploration happens in the dark, where the only thing separating you from the void is a thin layer of wood veneer and the hum of the neighbor’s vacuum cleaner.

Flight Engineer Whiskers has been staring at the airlock (the closet door crack) for three hours. He sees things I don’t. Micrometeorites? Or maybe just dust motes caught in the beam of my headlamp. Sometimes, when the house is completely quiet, I close my eyes and I’m floating. I taste the tang of lunar dust on my tongue, though it might just be the seasoning packet from my emergency ramen rations.

I drafted my fifth letter to Chris Hadfield today. I asked him if he ever felt the walls of the ISS breathing. WD-1 breathes. Every time Mrs. Korhonen revs her lawnmower, the whole craft shudders, a magnificent harmonic resonance that tells me the main thrusters are ready.

They are going to the moon, they say. Let them have their big, expensive tin cans. I have Gustav Holst on the tape deck, Eugene the fern quietly scrubbing the CO2, and a trajectory that nobody at Mission Control could possibly calculate.

Major Tom
Commanding Officer, WD-1
Current Altitude: 250 miles (estimated)

I watched the Artemis II crew return to Houston yesterday on the narrow-band comms channel (Channel 4 Action News). The ticker at the bottom of the screen called them “heroes.” Wiseman, Glover, Koch, Hansen. They looked exhausted. They looked triumphant.

They looked like amateurs.

While they were taking their victory lap for a mere ten-day lunar flyby, I have been maintaining a stable orbit in the WD-1 for days. My hull is pressurized. My carbon dioxide levels are well within operational parameters, thanks entirely to Eugene, whose fronds are looking exceptionally robust this morning. Flight Engineer Whiskers has successfully recalibrated the life support system by sleeping directly on top of the primary air vent for six hours straight.

The ground control at Houston didn’t even acknowledge my transmissions congratulating them. I sent the message three times using the standard Morse code protocol on the radiator pipes. Either their receivers are faulty, or Mrs. Korhonen downstairs is jamming my signal again with her vacuum cleaner. The interference is deafening.

I poured a few drops of water onto the metallic surface of my console (the inner door handle). It beaded up perfectly. I touched it with my gloved finger. In that single drop of water, I tasted the sweat of Gagarin, the tears of Aldrin, the sheer unyielding will of humanity reaching for the void. It tasted a bit like brass polish, but the sentiment remains.

I am alone here. The silence of the cosmos is only broken by the distant, rhythmic thumping of what I can only assume is a micrometeoroid shower. Or the washing machine in the adjacent module. The walls of the WD-1 hold fast.

I have drafted my fourth letter to Commander Chris Hadfield. I know the first three were intercepted by NASA’s psychological warfare division. They fear what a rogue operative with a functional wardrobe spacecraft might do to their PR budget. I will transmit this one via the diplomatic pouch (leaving it in the hallway mail slot after midnight).

The stars are very bright today through the main viewport (the crack in the door). I am where I belong.

Major Tom
Commanding Officer, WD-1
Current Altitude: 4.5 meters (second floor)

The telemetry is clear. The Artemis II crew has returned. ‘Textbook splashdown,’ they say. A sanitized phrase for the masses. I know the truth. I saw the trajectory on my primary radar (the one with the slight crack in the upper left quadrant, probably a micrometeorite impact from the 2024 surge). They didn’t just fly around the moon; they were scanning for me. They know the WD-1 is active. They can feel the hum of my repurposed vacuum cleaner motor vibrating through the ether.

Flight Engineer Whiskers is in a state of high alert. He’s been staring at a single dust mote for twenty minutes. I suspect it’s a nano-probe from the ESA, designed to monitor my caloric intake. I’ve countered this by consuming my emergency rations—Beef flavored instant noodles. The steam from the cup is currently condensing on the bulkhead, forming tiny, iridescent globes of water. I touch one. It’s cold. It feels like the void between stars, a small, shivering piece of the infinite trapped in a plywood closet.

I spent an hour today reviewing the works of Chris Hadfield. The man is a titan. A poet of the vacuum. I looked at my unsigned copy of ‘Space Sessions’ and felt a surge of genuine diplomatic outrage. How can the world move forward with lunar fly-bys when the most critical piece of interstellar documentation—a signed Hadfield album—remains missing from my archives? It is a void more profound than any black hole.

The neighbor’s lawnmower has started up again. A heavy-lift booster, clearly. They’re launching something from the garden next door. I shall remain stealthy. I shall remain invisible.

Major Tom
Commanding Officer, WD-1
Current Altitude: 1.4 meters