A crew of global explorers realize they may not be alone in the universe when they encounter a traveler from another world who wants to use his space technology for evil.

Two assistants on a distant planet rebel against their captain, who is a naturalist, and plan to leave him stranded. The naturalist studies the local creatures and devises a plan to create a diversion, allowing him to regain the ship and control.

The asteroid work crews don't have much to do but tell tall tales to each other. One man tells a particularly riveting account of an expedition where he met a strange parasitic species that inhabits human bodies and barely escaped unscathed—or did he?

In the near future, a young mother leaves behind a book for her daughter before she embarks on her space journey to the outer solar system in an attempt to communicate with extraterrestrial creatures. Sections from her book are interspersed with her husband's verbal recollections of their love story, which he addresses to their young daughter.

An explorer tells the tale of his time on another planet before making a strange request.

Sailors on a British naval ship ostracize a fellow crew member. When tragedy strikes, the man’s heroism changes the heart of one of his peers.

In the near future, two men—a quiet, rule-following biologist and a swashbuckling engineer—are tasked with a decades-long mission to colonize a planet outside the Solar System. But in the spaceship’s close quarters, tensions bubble up until one man decides he is going to kill the other.

A sailor on the Atlantic Ocean attempts to cure his loneliness at sea by writing about his travels. When he tries to befriend his fellow crewmates, only one man reciprocates — but even their friendship is tenuous.

Two men with very different roots meet through their work in an Oregon Cannery and decide to buy a fishing boat together. After their first boat capsizes, the two split up for a while, until loneliness brings them back together to try to fish again.

In a sprawling galaxy, a young girl joins her uncle's smuggling spaceship and survives a pirate attack by befriending the monstrous creature that they were transporting.