Ah, knights of ICKEE—I have a challenge for you. There is an infidel in these lands, one who threatens to take you by storm. Its name is Proxima. Whether you know it or not, this literary magazine threatens your very existence. I challenge you, then, to purge the ... school ... of this lunacy. Take back the ... night? ... yea, but also fight for the place you once held in this land, for your honor as the high school's ONLY literary magazine... Help us, Ickee-Wan Kenobi! Give us a humble, anonymous venue for our art! Tyler, deliver me from clever art...wait, wrong movie. But you must fight to stay alive in this formerly one-horse, one-magazine school: as Sheriff Woody would say, Reach for the sky! Isn't that what Ad Astra, Per Aspera is truly about, reaching for the stars? All these crazy stream-of-consciousness references...all to convince you that you must change your ways before it's too late! Halt this slide into decadence that has befallen your crumbling kingdom! I wouldn't have taken the time to warn you of the fate which awaits you if I didn't have a special spot in my heart for Ad Astra. I've just noticed that the former glory of this 'zine has given way to vain stabs at—what?—I can't tell, with the contributions mainly attributable to the few who actually know this still exists—there's nothing wrong with a magazine for the sake of the editors, but what about the needs of the people? If you don't serve the people, they go elsewhere—to the infidel Proxima staff! I'm not out to destroy Proxima; in fact, I plan to submit some things to it. But I've enjoyed the last few years of Ad Astra, and I hate to see some newcomers lay waste to your golden-lime-green-magenta-blue-whatever-color-the-next-Ad-Astra-will-be empire. If nothing else, take some time to think what you'd like this magazine to be like. Or is the company more important than the magazine itself? If you have all become too busy or disillusioned, fine, Proxima will be the literary magazine for the coming century. But I personally still hold the good name of Ad Astra, Per Aspera in high regard, if only because it's in Latin. I do like a good Latin phrase. So, knights that say Nnnnee!...I mean, ICKEE, please save us from clever art and all else that ails us! Thank you for all the years of relative anonymity, even if Pfingsten does know who everyone is...