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When they want to get away, some people take a vacation. I use an escape pod. Highly recommended.
You don’t have one? I’m not surprised. It’s my newest invention and it’s not widely distributed yet. Admittedly, the escape pod isn’t for everyone, but when you’re say, cornered by an insurance salesman or on a bad date, nothing beats it.
You pull the silver ring attached to the braided orange silk rope and voila! It inflates! Hop inside, close the hatch and push the “start” button. Safe inside the padded ball, you start rolling, gain speed and then the Nerva Engine kicks in. Whatta ride!
But for me the best part is when you rise, slow down and then come to a halt, rocking gently in place in the ether. You are nowhere and everywhere. The world is below you, close enough to see if you like, but too distant to matter. That’s when I usually push the “haze” button and some soothing steam enters the cabin. Bliss.
I was born in the big city and my parents declared me a city boy. I didn’t buy it. The first time I went to summer camp in the mountains, I never wanted to go home. In fact, I didn’t go home. I escaped, built a cabin in the wilderness and fished, trapped food and picked berries. Not bad for a fourteen year old ex-city boy.
I loved the quiet and passed the time tinkering. I got supplies from the General Store a couple of miles down the road. Sometimes I’d pay for the stuff using money I made from my intermittent day jobs. Other times I just took the stuff.
Most of my early stuff were tools to automate capturing, growing and preparing food. That cleared up more time to work on the big one: the escape pod.
Over the years, my wilderness became less wild. Civilization encroached steadily and my nerves frayed. I considered moving further away, but that would only delay the inevitable. Now, with my escape pod, I can get away easily and it’s like I’m in another dimension. The next model will be even better.
The whole planet is getting crowded, noisy and polluted. But that won’t be a problem when the escape pod goes interstellar.
