governments of the world were standing as far back as possible, refusing to offer any of their cash. Everything went completely private, and the private companies found that they didn’t have a clue how to raise the funds they actually needed to make it a fully crewed mission. So, they adapted. They hired other companies who knew how to put prices on things, and they branded. Nothing crass, was the rule: only the tasteful and practical. The food on the ship was all going to be branded; the tech we used would all be stamped with the names of the companies, and everybody would know the companies that were providing the jets, the fuel. And, more than that, the private companies funding the mission – under the umbrella of DARPA, now an independent part of the US government – only had the cash for one trip. It was the be-all and end-all. They knew that, if we weren’t going to land somewhere, we had to do something extraordinary, something that inspired. We had to do a feat that nobody had ever done before. Probes had gone millions of miles away from the Earth before, but never a person, and that was where our flight came in. They built our ship to deal with extreme temperatures, made the fuel as compressed as possible, in as great quantities as possible, and they decked us out with recording facilities, cameras, a crew that translated well to screen; likeable, attractive, for the most part. The extraordinary feat would be to hit the realms of classic science fiction films, of pulp novels and comic books, and to stretch ourselves, to travel further than anybody had ever done before. That was how it was sold: a voyage to rival Columbus, to rival the stories of Jules Verne. It would be, DARPA (in association with McDonald’s, Coca-Cola, BP, British Airways and News Corporation) announced, epic.
It was all done cloak and dagger, more so than most things to do with space, where they were subtly announced years in advance to little fanfare. This was planned and organized and then announced on TV, and everybody watched. Smaller companies from forty-eight different countries were utilized by DARPA, which meant that the whole thing was totally international, no boundaries. It was a big deal. We would run science tests as well: to explore anomalies that we were picking up with the telescopes, stuff that we couldn’t pin down from the ground. I remember that being announced. We were only going to take readings, send reports of stuff, nothing that really required work, but stuff that we could do, as we were out there. The work couldn’t be done with probes: the things that needed to be done had to be done manually, which is where Guy came in. The research was his life and work. The DARPA people told us that they had one shot, because if they could prove that space flight was important – to humanity, to the people of the world as a race, that it inspired, brought people together, united them – the governments might be inclined to reinject funding. That’s what they wanted: a proper space programme again. They wanted the glory days back. The flight was sold and commissioned and divided between corporate partners, and every part of it was to be broadcast and tracked. They ran trailers for the announcement of the first part, where they told the world that they were building a ship, technology, a crew.
When news went out to the various agencies that they wanted a journalist on the flight, everybody leapt at the chance. We had to audition, first – print and video media were both up for it, so they had to make sure we were all on an even footing – and then they whittled us down. When I told everybody that I was shortlisted – totally breaking the NDA, but it was my closest friends, my family – they threw a party for me, and all night people kept telling me how proud they were of me, that I was going to do something so incredible. I kept saying to Elena that it was amazing, that I was so happy.
‘I’m glad for you,’ was
It was all done cloak and dagger, more so than most things to do with space, where they were subtly announced years in advance to little fanfare. This was planned and organized and then announced on TV, and everybody watched. Smaller companies from forty-eight different countries were utilized by DARPA, which meant that the whole thing was totally international, no boundaries. It was a big deal. We would run science tests as well: to explore anomalies that we were picking up with the telescopes, stuff that we couldn’t pin down from the ground. I remember that being announced. We were only going to take readings, send reports of stuff, nothing that really required work, but stuff that we could do, as we were out there. The work couldn’t be done with probes: the things that needed to be done had to be done manually, which is where Guy came in. The research was his life and work. The DARPA people told us that they had one shot, because if they could prove that space flight was important – to humanity, to the people of the world as a race, that it inspired, brought people together, united them – the governments might be inclined to reinject funding. That’s what they wanted: a proper space programme again. They wanted the glory days back. The flight was sold and commissioned and divided between corporate partners, and every part of it was to be broadcast and tracked. They ran trailers for the announcement of the first part, where they told the world that they were building a ship, technology, a crew.
When news went out to the various agencies that they wanted a journalist on the flight, everybody leapt at the chance. We had to audition, first – print and video media were both up for it, so they had to make sure we were all on an even footing – and then they whittled us down. When I told everybody that I was shortlisted – totally breaking the NDA, but it was my closest friends, my family – they threw a party for me, and all night people kept telling me how proud they were of me, that I was going to do something so incredible. I kept saying to Elena that it was amazing, that I was so happy.
‘I’m glad for you,’ was
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