Jack stood on the bridge of the first S-Drive ship ever built. It was really an experimental ship, driven by an untested technology. If it worked though... He and his crew would be the first humans to break the light barrier, to travel beyond Mars, and to the stars themselves.
They had always wanted to be stars, but never in a billion years did they think it would be like this.
The S-Drive. The creation of a mad man. A genius who died to make it a reality, even if no one would ever know his name, everyone on the planet would know theirs. If it worked....
Everything was green. They had clearance, navigation was ready, and the world watched with baited breath, but this was a very different kind of count down. Jack and his crew, his band, shared a grin as they readied themselves. They had studied physics, biology, astronomy, and every other discipline they might need out there. Yet, it was the skills they had all been told since they were kids to give up, that they were not worth anything in today's world, that put them where they stood now.
The S-Drive also known as the Sound Drive.
It didn't work with recorded sounds. Only live instruments played by people, and only specific kinds of music. Some said it was the creator that built it that way, but Jack knew the creator, he knew why it worked.
Clorvis Erronson-Falcion had been Jack's friend since they were kids, dreaming of becoming astronauts on late summer nights, laying in the field behind their houses and watching the stars. That was before Clorvis descended into super-nerddom and Jack found Heavy Metal.
Jack's father had told him endlessly. "You'll never be a rock star. Get a job." Jack eventually did get that job, if only to shut up his father, but they never broke up the band. Even played a few gigs. Now they were about to play the biggest gig of all.
The bridge set up more like a stage, and the ship was named for their band. Jack looked at his bridge crew, his friends, his brothers, his band, and getting their nods of readiness, he stepped up to the microphone. He keyed the mic and smiled for the camera watched by everyone on the planet. "This is The Darkness Rage, ready for launch." Nodding to the camera and his friends. "This is for Clorvis! A one, two. A one, two, three, four....!"
They began playing, the S-Drive roaring to life with the first notes. The universe took careful note as Jack and his friends played themselves into the history books of the universe.