“The reader is damaged, sir,” whined the copilot to his copilot. “We have no vector.”

“What’s that mean?” the other copilot asked, a trace of fear slithering its way into the scene. “Does that mean something?”

“It means we have no reading.”

The transport vessel R-Radion had been in lightspace for a week. It was a new record. Normal travel times from Scintilant to Remedia amounted to several months. The debut of the R-Radion meant a new paradigm for interstellar travel. Tourists could flood Remedia in greater numbers, and cash would flow. The cash would flow. Flow. It would flow. FLOW.

The scientists behind the exciting new Lightspace Blender were only dimly aware of the corporate interests behind the funding of the research, but mostly they were just excited to have work. So they poured themselves into the project. Success meant success. They didn’t think about how their discoveries would be co-opted. That was for the politicians to figure out.

The copilots tapped various panels. That would do the trick. The first copilot, Nummel, sighed. “It’s been the most intense month ever.”

“The second copilot is me,” replied the second copilot, whose name was Rum. “And I agree. It’s been a rough one.”

“Honestly can’t take it anymore,” continued Nummel as he smashed some control panels in an effort to get the R-Radion operational again. The tourists in the back of the ship should still be in their stasis chambers so they would not be aware of any catastrophic failures until it was too late, and even then they would not be aware of it. Nummel continued his mutters by saying things like this: “It’s just day after day of emotional engagement. Sometimes you need a break, you know? Sometimes I just want to shoot the shizirit with my buddies without it turning into a 3-hour psychotherapy session.”

Rum nodded in understanding. He did not understand but wanted to, so he paid close attention. He took a hammer and destroyed one of the viewscreens off to his right.

“I need a vacation,” mumbled Nummel.

“That would be nice,” answered Rum. He was busy stepping into his vacuum suit. Soon the cockpit would depressurize. “Might want to end this horrendous scene, my friend. It’s not looking good.”

Nummel agreed. He donned his own vacuum suit and activated its pressure sensors. A click and a whir and a beep and blap and bleeper beep beep threeeeepy beepy boomy boomer blam wham whim wham ratter ratter ka-junnnnggga rarararar sounded in his headset which signified all systems were go.

“Time for a vacation,” Nummel and Rum said together. Pistons fired and they shot up into space. The R-Radion was left to drift aimlessly through the lightspace void. Nobody knew what had become of it and it caused an interstellar political incident. Chief President Pxxoixixxxix was forced to resign amidst allegations of corruption and treason which were in fact true anyway and this formality only secured more power to the shadow government that was secretly ruling the League of Planetary Systems. TO BE CONTINUED.