illphated

Lone Star Ascension”
By illphated

In a not-so-distant future where megacities gleamed like microchips and neon signs outshined the stars, there was one place that never forgot where it came from—Texas.

After the Second Digital Frontier War, nations collapsed into technocracies, and corporations stitched the sky with data cables. But Texas? Texas went vertical. Real vertical. The Lone Star Ascension project launched a new kind of spacecraft—not for war, not for profit, but for pride.

Carved from the bones of old shuttles and lit with more neon than a midnight rodeo, the TEXAS orbiter soared over a rebuilt Houston, now dubbed “Neo-Houston Prime.” The city pulsed with cyberlife, its skyline an homage to resilience and rebellion, where honky-tonk AI bartenders served data martinis to cowboys with chrome spines.

The ship bore glowing glyphs: a jackrabbit, a roadrunner, a lone star. Emblems not of corporations or countries, but of culture. Of home. Painted on its side in pink neon, bold as a boot in a saloon fight, was one word: TEXAS.

As it lifted off on a hydraulic tether flanked by plumes of gold plasma, the crowd below didn’t cheer—they hollered. Families on overpasses. Bikers with bio-augmented arms. Children with glowing cowboy hats and hacking tools in their pockets. And as the great shuttle vanished beyond the clouds, the sky itself shimmered in a soft blue and red wash—like God had hung the flag up there himself.

They weren’t launching to escape Earth. No. Texans were expanding the frontier.

And somewhere deep in the Texas Spaceport Control Tower, a cigar-smoking grandma named Miss Lulabelle whispered into her comms:
“Y’all don’t forget your manners up there. Make Earth proud. And bring me back a Martian armadillo.”

🚀 The stars at night are big and bright… even brighter from orbit.
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