The Long Voyage

This science fiction story explores the space opera. He had closed and sealed all observation ports, so that only in the bridge cuddy could one see into space. So we had left Earth, at night from a field out in Essex. Without orders, without clearance papers, without an automatic pilot check. Eighteen couples and one navigator--destination unknown. If the Interstellar Council had known what Norris was up to, it would have been a case for the Space-Time Commission.