‘I have no doubt at all, dear. And what’s next?’ The three of them walked up to the elevator in the spacious hotel lobby.

‘Next, I am ready to give you a personal drone tour of the spaceport complex. After that, we will offer you a short briefing and an interview with a doctor. And the time to be ready for the start will come. At 17:30, all passengers should be already in their seats in the spaceship.’

‘Lunch, excursion, doctor, briefing, start—is that right, Bo?’ said Lewis.

‘That’s right, sir!’

‘Great. I suggest we do it this way. Right after lunch, Bo, please come over. We’ll be waiting for you,’ Lewis and Meryl stopped in front of the door to the room.

‘All right, Mr Podger. The restaurant is on the 17th floor. Two floors below.’

‘We’ll order a room service. Thank you, Bo,’ Meryl answered, opening the door.

‘I’ll send a waiter right away for you, Mrs Stern.’

A little more than an hour later, a four-seat drone, buzzing heavily, lifted the three passengers into the sky. It was quiet in the cabin—nothing distracted from conversations and exploration of the sights of the America spaceport. The drone took a position at the altitude of 500–600 meters, the most convenient observation level to watch what was happening below, on the grounds of the complex.

The security in the airspace of the spaceport was the function of a dispatcher control system. The movement of flying objects in the perimeter of the complex or approaching it was monitored online. Nothing should be missed, and all actions should be coordinated. Spaceships starting from the site and coming back, transport and passenger planes, sightseeing drones and security drones, even birds—the system was recording and tracking the movement of all the objects in the sky. If necessary, amendments were made to flight plans or to the sequence of take-offs and landings. Security drones interacted with biological objects, as birds were listed in the system, driving away flocks and single individuals. Accidents were unacceptable. The price of a mistake meant, at best, multimillion dollar losses. No one even thought about negative scenarios, preventing such extreme situations.

‘The Equilibrium spaceship will take off now from runway No. 1—please look to the right,’ Bo pointed with his hand.

Meryl and Lewis turned curiously in the direction indicated by the steward. At the beginning of the runaway strip, the spaceship was waiting for the command to take off. The disproportionately large diameter of the ship’s hull in comparison with the relatively short wings raised doubts about the possibility of fulfilling the first stage of the flight plan—to take off.

The drone with passengers was hovering at a safe distance from the runway. Lewis noticed a dozen more flying vehicles hovering in the air and eagerly awaiting the performance to start. They were watching the event from a perfect angle, as if they were sitting at home in the living room.

The propulsion system of a spacecraft consisted of two main parts. To accelerate and get off the runway, accelerators built into the wings were primarily used. Their position, the inclination relative to the wing, was adjusted depending on the take-off stage. At the beginning, the position of the engines was fixed in parallel to the ground. As the speed increased, the angle changed so as to more quickly provide the required lift to get off the ground, compensating for the short wing geometry and the heavy weight of the spacecraft. The tail engines at this stage performed only an auxiliary role. When reaching the stratosphere, at the level of 15,000 meters, the main accelerating engines were started to enable exit to outer space. The creation of such a shuttle spacecraft capable of taking off independently, going into outer space and smoothly descending into the atmosphere of the planet, landing on the runway, would be impossible without the involvement of the power of the PAX quantum computer. Artificial intelligence helped to perfect the early development of space shuttles, increasing their operational characteristics, reliability and safety. A solution was also found to one of the key tasks hindering the development of space travel—an efficient fuel and propulsion systems were developed. Previously, placing a payload into the Earth orbit was expensive, entailed significant time for preparation, and in addition caused damage to the environment. Fuel liquefaction to high degree and a hybrid accelerator system combining the potential of nuclear and classic jet engines—the solution suggested by PAX, allowed humanity to take the next step in space exploration. Theoretically, a fully fueled spaceship could take off and land twice without refueling and additional maintenance. A technological breakthrough determined the possibility of incredibly rapid development of space tourism as well, which gave impetus to the entire industry. The economy, as had been always before, served as the main sponsor and motivator of progress.

The booster engines of the spaceship, which Meryl and Lewis were watching, started working at full power. Clouds of dust rose. The spaceship began accelerating rapidly and after 10-15 seconds it took off into the air, starting the flight. After a couple of minutes, the Equilibrium had already turned into a dot that could only be tracked by the thin white trail left by the engines.

‘It looks a little casual somehow,’ Lewis looked at Meryl. ‘Don’t you think so, Meryl?’

‘I’m really glad about that, Lewis. Imagine the roar of engines, clouds of exhaust gases, crowds of cheering people greeting the start… To be honest, I would not be ready to go to such a feat—to be on board a rocket, the successful launch of which causes such a storm of emotions and delight. So it’s wonderful that it’s an everyday routine.’

Bo smiled. The tour continued further on.

‘There are four operating runways in the spaceport: two for airplanes and two for spaceships. At the moment, two more are under construction—one for each of the assignments. Every year the number of launches