Jones woke up sweating. Not because of any nightmare, or sickness, simply because the sea-pod he was sleeping in got really hot at night. He sighed. He was told that the pods would have water cooling, but apparently that was a lie. Deciding to not spend all day wallowing in the growing pool of sweat on his bed, he got up, got dressed and climbed out the top hatch of the pod. The sea pods were strange looking. About 60 of them floated in the reservoir including Jones's. They looked like giant capsule pills with floaters clustered around the bottom. From the distance, they might look like a swarm of multicolored ants. None the less, Jones reeled his pod toward the shore, and hopped onto dry land.

Jones worked at the construction site building the interplanetary cruiser Orion. The Orion Was powered by a fusion reactor, uncommon due to its expense. But the scientists said that in this case, a fusion reactor worked better to supply heat and energy to the hover-discs positioned on the bottom of the ship. As Jones arrived he was greeted by a nervous intern. “Mr Jones sir?” said the intern “We’ve got a problem.” “I don’t like problems,” said Jones “especially when we’re this close to completion.” “Unfortunately it’s unavoidable,” said the intern, “we’re getting engine overloads all over the place. We’ve tried rebooting the computers, cleaning the fuel lines, and even cranking them all the way down to minimum power, but nothing’s working. We think if they were activated at full power, it could damage the reactor.” Jones sighed. This always happened just when the project got close to completion. Something always went wrong.

Thirty minutes later, Jones was just as perplexed as everyone else. The engines should be working, and they looked like they were working, but when they fired them up, they just as quickly overloaded. While he was checking the heating coils, a construction worker came over and said “Sir? The inspection crew is here.” What? thought Jones. The inspection crew wasn't due till next tuesday. And now was not a good time to have an inspection, with the engines and all. But an inspection was an inspection. Maybe it was a surprise one, he thought. As he walked towards the site office, he could see the men in suits through the window. Typical bosses. No respect for construction safety. As he opened the door there was an argument going on between the site supervisor and one of the suited men. “You weren’t supposed to come today!” yelled Jerry, his supervisor “Nothing’s ready yet!” “You should always be ready,” said the suited man “that’s the point of a surprise inspection.” Jerry furiously tried to come up with a response to this, but drew a blank. Instead he opted for a fierce stare in the suited mens direction.

“Now, hold on a minute,” said Jones “We were told no surprise inspections at all.” “Well you were told wrong,” said the suited man “ now give me the grand tour. I want to see what you guys get done over here.” A chorus of sighs rang out through the site office. “Fine,” said Jones, “Let’s go”. The tour went fairly well. Jones led the suited man through the ship showing him all the important systems, and avoiding the topic of engines as best he could. Soon they arrived at the c***pit of the cruiser. “So this is it?” asked the man “The control room?” “Yep” said Jones “This is it. All aspects of the ship can be controlled from here” “Good” said the suited man, and he lunged forward and threw the hover-disc lever into full. The ship groaned to life, as the hover-discs fired up and the ship lifted off its supports. The sound of  ground tethers snapping could be heard throughout the ship.

As the ship lifted off the ground, Jones could see the startled and scared faces of those on the ground from the control room. He turned back to the suited man. “Why?” he said “I don’t understand!” “It’s simple,” said the man, “This planet is dying. Years of overconsumption by the population. I don’t want to be here when everything goes south, so I’m taking this ship.” Jones was stunned. He never thought anyone would do something like this for their own personal gain. Besides, this man must have known the ship wasn't ready yet. They’d be lucky if it held up once it got out of the atmosphere. Then he had an idea. It was risky, but if he could stall the suited man long enough, it could work. Putting on his best fake smile, he said “You know, maybe you’re right.” “I know I’m right,” said the man, “and I also knew you’d agree. We can roam the stars together. And with this reactor, we can go as long as we like.” The man paused, and smiled a sick smile. “We’re high enough to activate the engines now.” Jones said, desperately hoping that his plan would work. “Oh! Thank you for reminding me.” the man said, and pushed the engine lever forward. As the engine lever reached it’s peak, an explosion rocked the ship, and the Orion began to fall.

“What the-” The man began, but was cut off by a flurry of sparks from a nearby computer terminal. Jones smiled. His plan had worked. Flames began to spread across the windscreen as the ship reentered the atmosphere. “What did you do?!” screamed the man, pointing at Jones. Jones looked at him, and smiled. “This ship wasn't ready,” said Jones “and you tried to steal it. You’re getting what you deserve.” Another explosion, closer this time, shook them off their feet. Then the windscreen shattered from the forces of reentry, and the ship was torn apart.

The workers on the ground stared up in awe of the ensuing meteor shower of ship parts raining down. They didn't know what happened up there, but they knew they would have to rebuild.