The grass swayed loudly in the summer breeze. It hissed and rattled as it danced, forming a shimmering yellow carpet over the empty plain. The Lagos skyline stood at the end of the carpet, a wall of dark blue haze and slim, flowing skyscrapers. A paved highway receded into the grass, a black ribbon against the gold.

James Masozi looked in the exact opposite direction, toward the wall of grey cement. Perfectly uninteresting, but good enough for him. It was interesting, James thought, that this material should still be in use, through the millennia. One would have thought some other, flashier one would have come into popular favor, but it seemed that cheap old concrete would outlive everything.

James finally decided to turn back toward the impressive panorama out the window. The city, one of many very new ones, had been designed to look pleasing from almost any angle. The twists and curves of the buildings, the soft, mountainous slope of the skyline, the green spaces, all that which defined the modern city, with a hint of personality that set it apart from all the others while simultaneously and unintentionally installing it into the grand theme. The grasslands were part of this personality, a legally required donut of bare, natural land to remind visitors and inhabitants alike what the Nigerian wilderness was. The Lagos Spaceport was built on the far edge of the grasslands, to afford a good view of both the savannah and the city.

Standing squarely in the center of the room stood a UDS transport shuttle, plastered all over with corporate logos. It bore the scars of a hundred orbital round flights, its underside charred with re-entry heat and its engine nozzles yellowed with residual fuel. But it meant much more to the people gathered around it now. It meant opportunity, freedom, escape. For James, it was pure confusion. He felt the small body beside him as it stirred in sleep, looked down to stroke its hair, before returning his gaze to the shuttle. As he followed the bullet shape with his eyes, he felt a pang of fear.

How did he end up here? It was a long road, anyone could see that at a glance. There was the burning passion for discovering the unknown, still glowing in his chest even now. His convoluted path to adulthood, leading him to the doorstep of the Exonavis Corporation. What he learned there was too much for any man. The result of his weakness lay beside him now, but he wore it proudly.

They said the Facem mission would be the ultimate opportunity, to leave the whole world behind and start anew on a fresh, untouched planet. And what an opportunity it was. All criminal charges dropped, monetary compensation for all family members on Earth, and the promise of a simple life on the other end. Yes, there was some selectivity in the process; out of the fifteen billion stuck on Earth, only two thousand would have the chance to leave it. Those that did saw only hope in the future.

For James, the situation was much more complicated. Yes, he certainly wanted a better world for his daughter. And yes, he personally yearned to see something no one before him had seen. But there were other reasons, well beyond his control. Better to convince oneself that choice was meaningful and move on.

A feminine voice echoed through the spaceport, calling the waiting masses to their shuttle. Moving as one, the passengers rose and boarded the spacecraft, silenced by excitement, fear, or resignation. As he approached it, James noticed that the shuttle was shaped like a bullet, its nose pointed and its base flat.

There was no countdown. James frowned slightly as he listened to the shuttle creak and shift in preparation to launch. He looked to the drowsy girl sitting beside him, and wondered what he was about to put her through. He leaned into the central corridor, and looked up to the sun shining through the cockpit windows. James squinted at it and sighed.

It began with a shudder as the engines ignited. Then, James felt his ribcage compress, his eyes contort in their sockets, his body push into the foam seat until the sun disappeared from his sight.

The transport shuttle leapt into the air, rising like a child's balloon above the savanna. It thundered with chemical fire, shining blue down on the receding spaceport. The tops of the skyscrapers dropped below the shuttle, and Lagos became a toy city inhabited by ants. The clouds passed by soon later, cotton balls floating miraculously in clear air. The yellow grass extended in a great circle surrounding the city, and was itself surrounded by dense slums and factories, just outside the view of the citizens of Lagos.

The shuttle climbed ever higher. The air outside became thinner and thinner, and the trail of exhaust widened, blossoming with petals of blue fire. The shuttle began to roll onto its side and turn into the flow of orbital traffic, arcing gracefully into its final trajectory.

Nestled in his acceleration chair, James heard the engine recede to a low rumble as the air outside grew too thin to carry the earth-shattering roar. The push of acceleration began to fall off, and he was soon able to move again. Looking out the porthole, he saw the curve of the planet grow more and more pronounced as the shuttle flew bravely into the dark. The African plain was flat brown, interrupted by glaringly white clouds and the occasional blotch of grey city. The sky above was black, with no hint of a star marring the celestial dome. The feminine voice spoke again, informing the shaken passengers that the shuttle had passed the Karman line. They were in space.

James turned to the body beside him, and noticed with surprise that it was asleep. Somehow, little Costanza had managed to fall asleep as she was whisked violently away from the world of her birth. What a child.

The shuttle continued on its orbital circle around the globe, flying over all the beauty that the planet Earth had to offer. James found himself gawking at the miniature world below, the clouds scudding over a thin film of air and water, the sun reflecting yellow and white off ribbon-like streams and vast oceans. Sometimes, a farming station passed close by, a hulking mass of gleaming metal, a flash of greenery, then empty space.

It was several hours before the shuttle could rendezvous with the Facem. It took three course corrections and a huge jump in altitude, taking it to the very edge of Earth's orbital space, and relegating the planet to a small blue golf ball floating in the ether. From his place in the shuttle, James was unable to see the Facem.

The jarring halt came unexpectedly. The other passengers hurried to leave the shuttle, but James didn't even unbuckle himself, choosing instead to take Costanza out of her chair, and hold her for a moment before leaving his own. She was awake now, but calm and quiet as usual. James was the last to exit the shuttle. He passed the pilotless cockpit as he went, and said a silent goodbye to his last liaison with home.

The Facem was enormous. One could tell without ever having seen it from the outside. Surrounded by the empty vacuum, the ship echoed and reverberated like some great cavern, every sound muted but audible as it clanked and rattled within the isolated bubble of air. Costanza's eyes widened as she realized the sheer size of the vessel.

James followed the signage to one of the passenger quarters, a honeycombed structure full of tiny one or two-man rooms. His own was built with a near telepathic consideration for his preferences. It had a window, almost certainly just a screen, which exquisitely framed the hanging Earth. There were two separate bedrooms, one clearly made for a small child. The paintings hanging on the walls were minimalist twenty-first century pieces, purged of all deeper meaning, simplicity in its most raw form. A set of speakers sat in the corner, playing soft orchestral music even before he opened the door. The furniture was simple, Spartan, white plastic desk and chair and nothing else. The walls too, were white.

James led Costanza to her room, made sure she was settled, and returned to his own. He sat in the chair and looked out the fake window at the silently spinning image of Earth, framed perfectly in the square of dark. He felt a pang of homesickness, something he hadn't expected. But of course, he took the planet for granted, as anyone would. Everything he had ever done or experienced had happened on that beautiful sphere. Every memory, good or bad, every relationship was contained by it. Losing it would be difficult.

The room was helpful. It would ease the pain, most certainly. He knew, of course, that it had been built based on his personal data file. Shopping preferences, network searches, all of it emphasized in the precise engineering of this room. It was about as close to perfect as anyone would ever be able to manage. But that was fine.

The voice came yet again, instructing all passengers to please strap into their beds, as engine ignition would begin in less than five minutes. James sat there for a moment, staring at the globe, before checking on Costanza, finding her quite ready to face anything the starship could throw, and in need of no help. James settled into his bed, felt the foam give and mold to accept his body, and waited for the great torch to begin burning.

As he lay there, he heard Costanza humming along with the music. It was Brahms's Hungarian Dances, light and bouncy, very unfitting. But she hummed anyway.

The Facem roared with unfathomable power, shaking James to his very core. The engines moaned, as if they were leviathans chained deep below him, wailing into the night. The sound continued growing louder and louder, crowding out the humming and the music and his own thoughts. James felt the might of the engines in every fiber of his being and gave himself to it falling into a near stupor.

The sensation of constant gravity took hold as the engines began burning in earnest, and eventually the shaking began to die down. The ignition sequence lasted for perhaps thirty seconds.

James shook, and stood on two disembodied legs. The senses began returning one after the other. First the white of the walls, then the feeling of a dull ache at the back of his eye sockets, then Brahms.

And Costanza's humming.