Tight Squeeze

At the sun‑bleached launch pads of White Sands, Major Edward MacNamara walks the ramp with a mixture of pride and dread. Once a top‑flight pilot, he now serves as the flight engineer for the ambitious Operation Doughnut, overseeing the massive Valier rocket that looms like a steel mountain. The air is thick with the smell of fuel, exhaust, and fresh‑molded plastics, while crews hustle to secure the final girders. For MacNamara, every bolt feels like a test of his new, uneasy role.

His old comrade, co‑pilot Johnny Ruiz, joins the preflight checks with a grin, trading jokes about “filthy, germ‑filled air” as they walk the catwalks. Beneath the banter lies a serious concern: a tiny, inaccessible hole that must be wired in zero‑gravity, a repair that could make or break the mission. The memory of the Wyld disaster—an earlier ship that blew apart after a hatch malfunction—still haunts the crew, reminding them how a single oversight can turn triumph into tragedy. As the countdown ticks down, MacNamara must decide whether to trust his instincts or the procedure.