I sat on top of the apartment building, looking out at the vast expanse of blackness through the holographic screen on the ceiling miles above as our salvation, the ark ship Starlight, raced through the unknown, on route to the planet known by Earth scientists Kepler 452-B. Many other citizens and I on board the Starlight have heard about the recent project the engineers have been researching and building called the RIFT drive. I suppose it will allow us to reach Kepler 452-B within our lifetime! As I stared out at the twinkling cityscape, I started to ponder, once again, how I got here. I recently moved from the cramped alcove that my family still call home to one of two booming urban sprawls on board the Starlight. My family was a bunch of engineers and from the stories they told and the minimal time I got to spend with them, I learned the harsh truth about the bowels of the great ark ship.

The engineering areas were a mess and most times overcrowded, like the ships of old. Cargo containers were sometimes stacked to block the stairwells up and disease spread quickly through the ranks of workmen keeping the Starlight running.