"There was no 'before' the beginning of our universe, because once upon a time there was no time."
John D, Barrow
Artificial Gravity always managed to feel just that. Artificial.
It never quite captured the feeling of accelerating towards a large mass with 100% accuracy. There was always something that gave it away, exposing it for the near assumption that it was.
In this case, on this ship, it was the Coriolis Effect.
It was a subtle feeling, like being on a commercial plane that's started its descent; it could go by unnoticed if someone was sufficiently distracted, but definitely there. For this instance, the giveaway was a feeling of being slightly unbalanced despite standing still and upright.
On another ship it might be the fact that everything just isn't quite as heavy as it should be, or that the intensity of gravity seemed to change as you moved from one point on the ship to another. Either way, Ian could always pick out the faults and realise that he didn't have a planet beneath him.
Feeling his balance shift ever so slightly as he made his way around the edge of the spinning disk that made up the living quarters, he came to stop at one of the many portholes situated in the thick aluminium alloy hull. The porthole itself wasn't very impressive, being made out of the same stark material that everything else onboard seemed to be. With the exception of the crews bedsheets and a small collection of consumables, the entire interior was made from the same white composite alloy. This easily made it the least luxurious ship Ian had ever been on, but then again, it hadn't been designed with comfort in mind. This ship, and its crew, had far more important things to be getting on with rather than to worry about how aesthetically pleasing a certain porthole was.
This particular one, being no larger than a medium sized pizza, was designed mainly for service checks of the ships exterior.
It wasn't much to look at, but to look through however, was priceless.
The void, that endless abyss, a sea of lights; those majestic and ancient stars that brought warmth, energy and life to an otherwise cold, dead universe. Those element factories of the cosmos, who without, Ian and indeed everyone and everything he had ever known, wouldn't be able to exist.
Despite having spent his whole life studying those marvellous specks of light, he still found them just as awe-inspiring, mysterious and beautiful as ever.
Their mysterious nature however was about to be overshadowed, for in a few short days, Ian Ludlow and his team would come into contact with the most unprecedented event in human history.