We called our vessel Icarus.

Not out of misguided cultural reference, I might add, nor any wish for self-immolation. But there is a certain poetry at work.

Our Icarus flees the confinement of Earth, seeking a better future across the ocean of stars. Our Icarus is genius-engineered, craftsman-built, and its construction contains more than a token amount of wax-like hydrocarbons, securing its wing-like solar array to our hull.

Our orbit is a vast ellipse, a needle-nosed coronal apoapsis to slingshot us to escape velocity from Sol’s grasp. All windows point aft, but if you listen closely you can hear the sun beating on our hull, its fires raging as it pulls us close, quickens our hearts and our velocity to unimaginable extremes.

And then Sol rips away our wings.

Falling, tattered in embers, we plummet into the cold, everlasting night of deep space.