Pilot (4/?)
Dave didn't ask Kara any of these questions as they careened into space. Ships in 2095 had come a long way from space shuttles, with personal crafts coming some time around the forties, and slowly being refined into what could be best described as space cars. Until the eighties, however, interplanetary travel was incredibly slow what with the distance between planets, and it wasn't until just recently that the gates up to Jupiter had been set up.
Actually, the completion of such gates put a dent in the space car industry for a hot minute. Most crafts built prior to 2073 (when construction of the gates was announced) couldn't handle the speeds at which the gates could allow one to travel, which caused a large-scale financial panic - which in turn, arrested construction on any gate past Jupiter, both as a reaction to the panic and to ensure that the space automotive industry could keep up if those gates ever were developed.
Dave's father had worked in the automotive industry. Times being what they were, Dave had moved out with very little to his name, and had taken a job at his nearest grocery store. Awful work for little pay, but the alternative was not paying the bills. It was in leaving the store that afternoon that Dave stumbled into Kara's ship.
They were nearing Earth's northeastern USA gate now. If he hadn't realized the gravity of the situation before, he did now.
