“Hey Ma, between anti-grav acrobatics and dashing through starport, your grandpup sure lifts spirits here in the boring cosmos. You’d think the spaceship was a Broadway stage! Boundless energy all day ‘cept bath time – magically transforms into a greyhound then! Food: 1-star. Only the beef. Veggies still a no-go. You know Caffrey? We’re tighter than Earth-jeans on Venusians. Out here, feeling less like lost strays and more like explorers. The void ain’t so bad with a friend like me, huh? Love, Ace.”

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You’d swear to Neptune’s moons, the spectacle Ace brought to our spaceship was as something near to a Broadway show, if one were to exist in the vacuum of space which, as we know, it don’t. Ace, our trusty and spirited Labrador, had a way of wrangling up our drab ship corridors into a parade of games. With a single toss of her squeaky toy, she’d twirl into a boundin’ wildly frenzy, sliding across the anti-grav floor with all the charm and grace of a yellow comet.

The ol’ ship’s mess hall, or Paws On The Grill as Ace and us crew members fondly dubbed it, was her haunt. A fine establishment serving the spaciest of delicacies – freeze-dried beef and rehydrated veggies, not that the latter appealed to our Ace. Offer her a serving of those dismal greens? She’d give those dainty paw-pads a lick and turn up her square nose with an elegance that’d make the prissiest of human society weak at the knees.

Going starport side at Lower Dalmatian Desert and the other picturesque places littered across Spencerville was to Ace like going back in time to when she was a sprightly pup with boundless energy, charging through the tall grass in our old neighborhood back on Earth. But, no more of that now. Just the endless void cradled with distant stars and asteroid belts interrupted by the odd raiding party or a hostile alien civilization.

Now, if you even attempted to reach for the alien-ear cleaner at the end of the day, you best prepare for a dog on the run. Navigating the ship wasn’t always easy, what with it being the size of Rhode Island, but when Ace got a sniff of bath-time in the offing, you could swear she was part greyhound, the pace she’d muster.

Her kinship with shipmate Caffrey, was as solid as a rock – Venusian in texture – and as ever changing as the cosmic winds, taut one moment then loose the next, like a plasma ribbon snaking its way around a pulsar.

In this vast cosmic ocean, bringing together worlds and civilizations, Ace enlightened us to the fact that we too were all just visitors, strays in a curious galaxy, each finding our way back to our cherished places and people. We marveled at her, our resident Labrador galactic explorer, unfettered by gravities and galaxies; and till we draw stardust, she will remain a legend in the boundless constellation of our hearts.

The End.