Stars

The hemispherical console wrapped darkly around my seat under the dark glass of the windshield. The few stars that could be seen through the port lights were faintly visible from inside. I sat down in the padded chair. I've never liked five-point harnesses, something about the idea of the impact that that fifth point would have if I were to rapidly decelerate. The safety advantages outweighed the discomfort, however, and I buckled myself into the harness before pressing my thumb against the small, cold, glass of the print-reader to bring up the auxiliary power to the instruments around me. Picture the scenes from those ancient movies that were supposed to be what the technology of the "future" (now, of course, the past) was going to look like: hundreds of small L.E.D.s flashing here, blinking there, holding steady in other places, all greens and oranges and blues (no reds this time, thank God). I guess they got the aesthetic effect right after all, even if they were off on their dates.
Once all the lights were solid, I flipped the small red toggle on the right, next to the engine feedback screen, to start up the engines and get independent power to the systems.
The screen in the center of the console began to scroll the self-diagnostic log up and up. Systems software – online, batteries – ok, fuel – 100%, life support – ok....ok....ok....ok, control surfaces – ok....ok....ok, control hydraulics – ok....ok....ok, engine temp – 3000, engine cooling – ok, and so on.
I could feel the beast beneath and behind me coming to life. From behind I could hear the dull rumbling of the engines; from around me the vents started breathing, the faint smell and taste of ionization in the air. I radioed the traffic control center to inform them that I was ready for departure, and a few moments later the reply came in my ear, acknowledging and telling me to wait for clearance.
I sunk back into the seat's cushioning and tried to relax all my muscles as much as I possibly could. My left hand went out almost unconsciously to the small touch screen in the upper left of the console, touching it where i knew the triangle-shaped button would be, filling my surroundings with soft music from another era.
Just when I had all but lost myself in the slightly overdriven guitar, the crying harmonica, and the smoothly chaotic drums, I was jolted by the voice in my ear telling me I was cleared for departure.
Shaking myself from my reverie, I radioed back to inform them I was departing, and smoothly slid the throttle lever forward until it stopped. The dull roar behind me grew quickly to a cacophony that engulfed me in its all-enveloping roar. A second later, an enormous, invisible hand was shoving me with all its might back into the padding of my seat, and I felt as though I would suffocate under the pressure. All at once, the lights of the port dropped away around me and I was completely surrounded by black except for the tiny little points of light that were beginning to come out in greater and greater numbers up above, growing brighter with every mile the beast around me pushed around and through itself.
Soon I could see the silvery-blue sliver that I knew was the horizon and the sun behind it. It sagged at its ends, and I began to be able to see the spherical shape of the rock that I was leaving behind me. Finally, with a gasp and a sigh, the hand that had been holding me released its grip, and I knew I had burst free of the planet's atmosphere.
I keyed in the coordinates of my destination – the small point of light ten degrees to galactic west and 5 degrees universal-up from my current heading – and sat back to lose myself once again in the sounds of a poor mississippi man who had played his guitar some hundred or so years before I would take to the stars.