Slow Burn

A crew aboard an orbital station readies a small rocket assembled in space for a solo lunar-circuit mission while political scrutiny threatens their work. A visiting senator intent on exposing alleged waste tours the facility, unsettling the team; he becomes elated by weightlessness and suffers a head injury, adding public-relations peril. The pilot prepares nervously as technicians fuel the ship and tensions rise between scientific risk, political pressure, and personal nerves, highlighting the fragility of early space operations and the clash of ambition with oversight.