“Bob, I need some rockets I can hook onto my Wayward Son. I just signed a charter with Astrocor and I mean to run my own freighting outfit. With the right ship and a good crew, I figure I can pay back Sterric well before my five years are up. No problem.”
         Bob smiled. “I might have something.” he said, “What is it you’re flyin’ exactly?”
         “GPOS Peregrine, Model 2.” said Jack. “A detachable shuttle-craft. She’s good for flying around the planet and its moons on her own, but I’ll need some rockets to attach to ‘er if I’m gonna go interplanetary.”
         Bob rubbed his chin and took a sip from his margarita.
         “An old Peregrine, eh? Hmm, this might be tough. They stopped making Model 2’s in the sixties.” He turned his head and thought for a second, “It can be hard to find rockets for those, but if I remember correctly, we just purchased a pair of GPOS Griffin Mark 1’s. They’ll hitch on to an old Peregrine. Almost thirty goddamn years old, but they’ll do the job for you, I think. And they got enough cargo space in ‘em for whatever you’ll need, I’m sure.”
         “Good,” said Jack, “That sounds like exactly what I need.”
         “You’ll just have to give me a day or two to get back to you, so I can find out for sure.” said Bob.
         “Of course,” said Jack. He pulled out a pen from his denim vest and tore off a piece from his cigar pack and wrote a phone number on it. “This is the number of my hotel room. I’ll being staying on the station for the next little while, so you’ll have plenty of time to get back to me.”
         Bob took the number and put it in his pocket.
         “Alright,” he said, “A handshake and a toast, shall we?”
         Jack shook his outstretched hand and then Bob slapped his hand on the table.
         “Ha ha! Now, enough with the business.” he said, “Let’s celebrate like it’s the old times!”
         He raised his glass and clinked it against Jack’s and they finished what was left of their drinks in one gulp.

~
         The next week at school, Jim was nursing a mild hangover while his history teacher, Mr. Hemstock, a bespectacled, overweight man with a long bushy beard, was droning on at the peripheral of his attention.
         “...and as we come to the close of your twelfth semester, most of you will be preparing to graduate. But before you can do that, my students, you will first need to pass your final exams. This year we covered the entirety of Phaethian history and today we will recap.
         “We learned about Frank Hurley and his crew of a hundred and forty four, who came to Phaethon from Earth aboard Mankind’s first interstellar vessel, The Helios. And how, nearly two thousand years ago, he became the first man to set foot on our planet. We learned about how the Apocalypse destroyed the Old Civilisation on Earth and how our ancestors descended into barbarism without contact with their homeworld. We learned about how a New Civilisation was built on Earth and how the starship Cygnus brought the first Earth men to our planet in over five Phaethian centuries. And how, on the plains of Togarmi, they were greeted by nomads on horseback. We learned about the rise and fall of the Toliman Empire and how...”
         Thunk! Whatever attention Jim was paying was broken by an eraser thrown at the back of his head.
         “Psst! Jim,” whispered Tyler Keefer from behind him. Jim turned around, rubbing his head.
         “Shit, Ty, what the hell do you want?” he said.
         “Yo, Jim, I have an idea for you to pay back Ted.” said Ty.
         “It better be good, that actually fuckin’ hurt. What is it?”
         Ty leaned in closer.
         “I can get us jobs in space.” he said.
         “Ah, hell no.” said Jim, “I don’t wanna leave home for years and years and come back when everybody’s old and shit. And besides,” he added, “my uncle said he can get me a job working in the coal mines up in Rusty Hills.”
         “What?” said Ty incredulously, “You don’t wanna work in those muddy shit holes. Look! We can get jobs in space, man! We can be goddamn astronauts! And besides,” he added, “you’re only gone for ‘years and years’ if you go to another solar system - you know, interstellar travel. I’m talkin’ about jobs right here, in this system. You won’t be gone for more than a few months at a time - at most.”