Finding he could access a ground-basedvideo feed of their launch through his contacts, he was shocked to see how far the Saturn had already climbed. A pillar of flame billowed out from its engines, nearly overloading the filters of the cameras as they angled upwards to follow their progress.

The whole craft meanwhile shook with an insane violence. All Saul could do was stare fixedly at the back of Amy’s and Lester’s heads, visible through the clear polycarbonate shells of their helmets, while they continued to throw technicalities at each other with enthusiastic abandon.

After another minute, a loud metallic boom jerked him hard against his restraints. His heart nearly stopped from sheer fright.

‘That’s first-stage separation,’ explained Lester. ‘Second stage kicking in now. And a nice even burn, if I may say so,’ he added with clear approval. ‘We’re doing good, folks. On any other day, I’d be popping champagne corks for a flight this smooth. So just hang in there.’

The shuddering began to diminish, and the intense pressure slowly began to abate. Lester had the grace to at least warn him of what was coming next, when the module shook with even more furious force.

‘What the hell is going on?’ Saul yelled.

‘We’re dumping our second stage now,’ Lester explained. ‘They’re so much dead weight once you’ve used the fuel they contain, so down they go. Check your how-to and you’ll see a live feed of it falling behind us. Only the best for our customers, right, sweetheart?’

‘Except he ain’t payin’,’ said Amy. ‘Nothing less than the end of the world’s going to get you a free ride in this firework.’

Saul distracted himself once more with the how-to, which showed him a cylindrical section of the craft falling behind them, spinning away as it receded. The Earth was falling behind as well, a storm front fast spreading along the North-west Seaboard.

The roar had now faded, but the air was filled instead with the sound of pinging metal and creaking bulkheads. Saul felt his weight slipping away. His stomach lurched as he remembered his long drop to the ground, years before, and he fought a surge of panic, clenching and unclenching his fists until it passed.

‘Not much of a head for heights, has he?’ he heard Amy remark.

‘Yeah, well,’ said Mitchell, ‘that’s probably my fault.’

Before long they were unstrapping themselves and changing out of their spacesuits into loose-fitting overalls handed out by Amy. Lester and his wife kept them both busy after that, occupying their minds with small, routine maintenance tasks; but only those, Saul suspected, unlikely to result in any life-threatening failures.