[ WP ] The cure for death is found . But die to the fear of overpopulation on earth , people are given a choice . Stay on earth and be mortal , or be cured and go on a deep space mission .

People think of the speed of light as really, really fast. Peeking out the window of his ship, Gatsby thought that it did n't feel that way at all. Nothing really looks fast when there's no reference point. 
 
 Sure, in the old movies when the ships reached warp speed all the stars stretched into lines and it looked really fast. But the universe is not just stars. The universe is pretty much 99 % not-stars. Huge chunks of blackness, empty between galaxies. 
 
 Over there in the nothingness, looking out the window at light speed was like being still. Floating still, hanging from nowhere. 
 
 They had figured out, a million million million million years back, on Earth. A long time ago people already figured out that the faster you move, the slower time passes. Of course, you do n't feel it. To you, a hundred thousand years on Earth is going to feel like a second anyway. You don ’ t get the extra years. So, yeah, people on Earth live and die and live and die for thousands of years in the time it takes for you to watch a movie, but to you it's just two hours. You grow old and you die, from your own perspective, in regular time. 
 
 Until they found a way around that. Now you could get the extra years that come from travelling at the speed of light, but the experience of non-motion. And being that at light speed time stands still, you got to go to space and live forever. Literally. 
 
 But few would want that, Gatsby thought, eyes still out into the black. Few would want to spend their lives in a 
 metal box, floating around space until the universe dies. You'd have to have a really good reason. 
 
 Like Daisy. 
 
 She went on the first trip. Cancer. Terminal. His best friend from school. The crush he never admitted to. She 
 climbed onto the first rocket ship, her and other hopeless, and away they flew, to whatever immortality was saving 
 for them. 
 
 Gatsby did n't even get a chance to say goodbye. They had n't spoken in years, anyway. What was the point? 
 
 But after the divorce... After his kids moved away.... Gatsby found more and more there was little to life without hope and the prospect of something. Even if it never comes to pass, you have to have a dream to keep you going. A Daisy. 
 
 When she was on Earth, there was always the'what if'. What if she leaves her husband? What if I tell her how I 
 feel? What if someday? 
 
 With Daisy out in space, looking for forever, there was nothing. 
 
 Gatsby took a deep breath, stepping out from the window and going for the tiny bed by far wall of the ship. 
 
 When he heard about the cancer. When he heard about her decision to fly away. It took two years of the 
 hopelessness of knowing she was gone for him to make the decision. He was n't terminal, he was n't even sick, so he 
 could n't get a place on one of the regular ships. The ones with malls and whole cities inside. 
 
 He had to go underground. The black market. And he did and he found a way. A small metal box, no more than 
 that. A bed and a window. They would send him flying through space at light speed, all the time in the universe in his hands. Room for one. And no control. The ship just went. No direction, no way to turn back. 
 
 Few would want it, the man told him, as he counted the money. Few would want a life like that. All alone in a box, 
 floating forever. You have to have a really good reason. 
 
 You have to have a Daisy. 
 
 But Gatsby went. Jumped into the box and off into space he went, ready to live forever. 
 
 `` No way you're going to find her,'' the man told him, just before launch. `` Do you know how big space is? Her ship could be literally anywhere in the universe.'' 
 
 `` You're going to float around for eternity, and another eternity after that. And you're not going to find her.'' 
 
 It did n't matter. A man's got to have a Daisy. A reason to go on. 
 
 A million million million million years had gone by. Years of darkness. Of nebula crossing and molecular clouds and 
 distant planets. Years of nothing. So much time of nothing, just blackness. No ships. No Daisy. 
 
 But it did n't matter. Gatsby had all the time in the world. And so did Daisy. By the laws of nature, by the very laws 
 of probability, one day their ship would meet. 
 
 He closed his eyes and let the comfort of statistics lullaby him to sleep. One day. 
 
 & nbsp; 
 
 Back on Earth, a million million million million years before, Daisy's ship landed softly on Cape Canaveral. The ship 
 of hopeless. Of cancer patients. 
 
 `` Right this way, Mrs. Buchanan,'' the captain said, as Daisy stepped out of the ship into a long corridor. 
 
 The news had reached them, a couple of years before. The cure had been discovered. If so they wanted, they were 
 welcome to return to Earth. To be cured. To live a happy – if mortal – life on their home planet, disease-free. With their loved ones. 
 
 `` Thank you,'' Daisy replied, with a smile. Outside by the cab, her husband greeted her with tears in his eyes. He 
 was a few years older, but nothing too extreme. 
 
 `` Your surgery is scheduled for tomorrow,'' he said. 
 
 Daisy kissed him on the lips. 
 
 `` It's good to be back,'' she said, with a smile, looking up at the night sky. 
 
 Somewhere between the distant stars, way, way up ahead, a metal box floated silently through its first years of 
 infinite darkness. 

