When Burt Rutan's SpaceShipOne won the Ansari X-Prize in 2004, becoming the first private manned spacecraft to exceed an altitude of 100km twice in two weeks, it was supposed to usher in an era of unbridled commercial spaceflight. Indeed, when Richard Branson came into the picture, grabbing SpaceShipOne - and Rutan - as the foundation for Virgin Galactic, the future of space travel suddenly surged into view, hovering just over the metaphorical horizon like that big prawn ship from District 9.
But I fear Branson's once noble plans to capitalise the final frontier have been subverted. I have put two and two together.
The clues are all there, if you know where to look: the delay in unveiling SpaceShipTwo (or the VSS Enterprise, as Branson's dubbed it, ho ho ho). And the wild rumours about Scaled Composites - Burt Rutan's firm, which made SpaceShipOne - working with Darpa, the US military's mad scientist division. And, of course, the fact that Richard Branson has a private island.
Now, before we join those dots, before we draw the only logical conclusion possible, I must point out that by hook or by crook I am going to be going into space.
Not now, obviously. While having several million dollars to spend on frivolous flights of orbital fancy is something to which I hope to one day become accustomed, right now the furthest my sightseeing budget can stretch is to my third-storey window, which has an admittedly unrivalled view of the top of a palm tree and the tattered remains of a weaver's nest.
But I'm going anyway, come hell or high water. (And judging by the way the glaciers are melting, high water seems a foregone eventuality - remember, climate change sceptics aren't denying global warming is taking place, just that mankind is responsible for it - either way, it's sink or swim. Marco!)
Polo. The Virgin Galactic subversion aside, it's likely that I've still got a good 20 years to wait until any private space enterprise can accommodate my budget. That's okay. I can wait. All good things, and so on. Patience is one thing, but turning a blind eye to nefarious wheelings and dealings is another.
Now, I have no actual proof that Richard Branson is building a private fleet of spaceships on his private island in the Virgins.
Let me just say that when all his cards are finally on the table, it won't come as any surprise to find that these spaceships are in fact heavily armed fighters, nor that once aloft they can sort of hook into one another to form a gargantuan space robot with a giant laser sword.
Of course, this is just plain silly. The Voltron approach to space combat has already proven entirely ineffectual in the event of an invasion by space zombies.
It makes much more sense to wait until we have the technology to make individual fighters convert into giant robots. The joining together thing is a waste of resources that could be better spent in making it cheap enough for me to afford a trip into orbit. And that's all I have to say on this subject.
tater1337