November Theme Prompt: Celestial Signals
- Jim Dutton
- 6 days ago
- 4 min read
Write a sci-fi story about a mysterious object in the sky.
Throughout human history, people have looked to the skies for signs, interpreting unusual celestial phenomena as messages from the gods, warnings of disaster, or hints of major change. Ancient civilizations recorded appearances of comets, bright “guest stars,” and eclipses, each seen as a portent. In China, for example, comets were often viewed as harbingers of political upheaval or natural disasters. Roman and Greek writers likewise described comets appearing just before the deaths of emperors or major battles. The bright comet seen after Julius Caesar’s assassination was taken by many as a marker of his deification and the legitimacy of his successor, Augustus.
In the Middle Ages and beyond, anomalous celestial lights, such as moon halos, meteor showers, or aurorae, were likewise treated as divine signals. Medieval European chronicles often record a comet or strange sky-glow as announcing famine or plague. Indigenous cultures around the world developed their own sky-omen traditions, interpreting sudden lights or unusual alignments in terms of cycles of nature, hero myths, or spiritual disruption.
Around this time of year, we're reminded of one of the most famous “sky portent” stories: the Star of Bethlehem (sometimes called the Christmas Star). The Gospel of Matthew recounts a brilliant star guiding Magi to the birthplace of Jesus of Nazareth, heralding the arrival of a new king. Over the centuries, scholars have proposed various astronomical explanations — a bright comet, a nova/supernova, or a rare conjunction of planets such as Jupiter and Saturn in 7–6 BCE — but none is definitively proven. Regardless, the story illustrates how ancient peoples wove celestial anomalies into their worldviews.
In more recent years, astronomical tools have brought clarity to such phenomena, though the wonder remains. A current example, 3I/ATLAS, is only the third confirmed interstellar object ever observed traversing our solar system. Discovered by the ATLAS survey in Chile on July 1, 2025, it follows a hyperbolic trajectory and originates from outside our Solar System. While 3I/ATLAS may not carry mythic portent status, its sheer rarity evokes the same human impulse: when something truly unusual appears in the sky, we take notice.
And we ask what it might mean.
About this prompt
For this theme prompt, we ask you to write an imaginative and evocative flash sci-fi story using any topic and sub-genre you choose. Your story must include a mysterious object visible in the sky, either above Earth or some other planet.
Remember that we expect a science fiction story, not pure fantasy.
Rules
The rules for the theme prompt are as follows:
Entries should be submitted in the usual way using the Write for Us submissions link.
Mention the title of the prompt (Celestial Signals) in the Notes field of the submissions form.
Submissions must be received by December 21, 2025 to qualify.
Entries must comply with all the usual SFS Guidelines.
Your work can be horror, romance, dystopian, alien, or whatever, as long as it’s Sci-Fi and addresses the prompt's theme.
Submit only one story for this prompt.
You may continue to submit stories to SFS that are outside the contest, and we encourage you to do so.
If you have more than one story that fits the theme, please submit your best one for the prompt and send us the others as non-theme entries. Also, if the editors feel your theme entry is good enough to publish but does not satisfy the theme requirements, we reserve the right to accept it as a non-theme submission.
After the prompt has ended and all the entries have been processed, we will list and link to the participating stories in a blog post. The editorial staff will choose one story for special mention as the Editors' Choice.
Exemplars
Here are some vintage stories about strange objects in the sky:
The Star — Arthur C. Clark, Infinity Science Fiction, November 1955. Clark's famous story about an even more famous star came out at just about this time of year. Maybe he was responding to a story prompt? The story won a Hugo award the following year.
Story of Your Life — Ted Chiang, Starlight 2, November 1998. This is the original novella that became the script for the movie Arrival.
Monsters are Due on Maple Street — Rod Serling, The Twilight Zone, March 1960. I'll let Mr Serling explain this one with his own voice (in your head). From the show's epilogue...
The tools of conquest do not necessarily come with bombs and explosions and fallout. There are weapons that are simply thoughts, attitudes, prejudices — to be found only in the minds of men. For the record, prejudices can kill and suspicion can destroy, and a thoughtless, frightened search for a scapegoat has a fallout all of its own for the children... the children yet unborn. And the pity of it is that these things cannot be confined to... The Twilight Zone!
I must also mention that I've recently watched the first couple of episodes of the new Apple TV series, PLUR1BUS. It's not vintage, of course, but so far it looks like an excellent example of a celestial signal that is NOT a physical object.
So this month, find a dark place, far away from this too-bright reality of ours. Stand there in your imagination and look up to the sky, then tell us what you saw there. Whatever it is, I can promise you this...
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