Bedtime - A Short Story Anthology

A Comet's Tale

A Comet's Tale

By flavoredcatlollypop

There was once a comet who loved to race through outer space. Her name was Cara Comet. Because Cara was a comet, she did not need a spaceship. Instead, she would fly on her own and let her long tail fly behind her. Most comets have blue tails and purple tails. Some have red tails and orange tails. A few have yellow tails and green tails. Cara's tail was all six. She loved to watch it whip straight out behind her as she flew through space.

Cara had a very pretty tail with six colours, but none of the other comets liked to race with her. They saw Cara's special tail, and they also saw that their tails were just one colour. The other comets grew angry whenever they saw this. They wished that they had six-coloured tails like Cara. They used to ask Cara where she had found her tail, but Cara did not know. She had not found her colours. She had been born with them. When the other comets heard that Cara could not help them get six-coloured tails like hers, they flew away and left Cara to race all by herself.

Cara did not like to race all by herself. When she raced by herself, she always won. There was no fun in always winning. Cara decided that she needed a new friend. A new friend could race her! She flew off into space in search of someone to race.

She came to a Star. "Will you race me?" Cara asked the Star.

"No," said the Star. "Stars do not race. We would blow out our fires if we tried."

Cara kept flying. She flew up to a Moon. "Will you race me, Moon?" Cara asked the Moon.

"No," said the Moon. "Moons are not very fast. We only like to walk around and around our planets."

Cara flew up to a Planet. "Will you race me?" she asked the Planet.

"No," said the Planet. "Planets cannot race. We would throw off our people if we went too fast."

Cara was sad. It seemed like no one wanted to race her. She decided to try one last time. She flew into the Planet's atmosphere. The atmosphere is what we call the sky. "Will anyone please race me?" she asked the things in the atmosphere.

"Yes," said a Cloud. "I will race you."

"Yes," said the Sunshine. "I will race you, too."

Cara was very happy, and the three new friends began racing across the sky. Because comets, clouds, and sunshine live for a very long time, Cara and her friends are still racing today. When the Cloud races, she drops some of her water. That is called rain. When the Sunshine races, he sometimes shines through spaces in the Cloud and makes her rain sparkle. And of course, we can still see Cara. Her six-coloured tail makes up the rainbow!