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"What do you think Bob. Should we take a walk around the park?"

If you build it, I will come.

(Ostensibly, the story related below is supposed to be happening here on the Flying Castle, in one of the large storage areas below the Castle level. The time is approximately twenty years from now.)

Brian and Jade felt very much at home. They pushed through into areas which would ordinarily have been off-limits, wearing the invincible cloak of innocence.

They stared through the observation window at an immense assembly area. In the middle of the field, a miniature version of the saucer like habitat of the castle was either being put together, or taken apart. It rested on custom made cradles, and an air of discovery seemed to encompass it, even though its hull was scattered in total disarray.

They made their way to what appeared to be a control station hovering overhead on a suspended catwalk. Unchallenged, they entered the room and wandered nonchalantly about the information workstations. It was still impossible to determine if the strange craft was being assembled or disassembled. They stepped again to an observation window of the control station, and watched the leisurely activity around the “flying saucer.”

“Like it?” A voice came from behind them. A man with white hair and a gray beard was casually lighting a pipe.

“Sure! I’ll bet you’re really pleased to be working on it, too.” Brian responded. “If you don’t mind my asking, though, just what is it?”

Through a thin haze of pipe-smoke, they could see an obvious twinkle in his eye. “It’s a flying saucer! Can’t you tell?”

Brian said gently, “It doesn’t look as though it ever flew anywhere, or ever will.”

If anything, the man’s smile grew. “Quite perceptive. We’re building an Nth generation starship.”

“Enth generation? What does that mean? What’s Enth?”

“Oh, sorry. Mathematical jargon. We’re building a space-ship designed for an unknown type of drive engine. Something that will be able to move without using reaction mass. Something to the Nth power, and so forth.”

“Oh, I get it.” Brian looked again at the craft. “It looks as though you’re going to be flying through space like a custard pie directed at someone’s head. The main deck seems to be oriented only for standard gravity.”

The man raised an eyebrow. Jade gently nudged Brian. “You have a sharp eye. No, we’re expecting to be oriented with minimal aspect as we move through space, but the main deck will have a form of artificial gravity.”

“Something other than rotation, you mean?”

“Exactly.” He seemed to appraise them for a moment. “I’m Dave. I’m heading up the build team.” He offered his hand to Brian. Brian shook it. Jade reached out and shook hands with him also. He smiled.

“I’m Brian Hawthorne. This is Jade Regalo. We’ve been on EH-1.”

“Ah.” It was explanation enough. “Would you like some lunch? We don’t get too many visitors.”

Dave directed them to a dining area. Using his personal communicator, he ordered meals for himself and his guests.

“How can you build a machine for an unknown engine?”

“We’re operating under the expectation that the technology will come along. We’re using the form factor of a fighter airplane, that is, we’re building something that is essentially all engine, and we only need to design the rest of the crew comforts.”

“So what we saw out there will have more than sixty percent of its space taken up by engines? How can you guess that even that formulation is correct?”

“Simple enough. If the craft required one hundred and fifty percent of its space to be engines, we couldn’t build it at all. We have to assume that it’s possible, and we’re just using optimism as our guide.”