It is late in the 21st Century; later than people realize. The population of Earth has surged to over 10 Billion people when climate disruption wreaks havoc on humanity's agricultural breadbaskets. Most continue believing the hopeful platitudes of the mass media, but one saw Collapse coming and has declined his invitation to the Apocalypse. He has quietly liquidated his fortune, made preparations, and is leaving... For the Stars. Time is running out, money is tight, and Hollywood fantasy is a non-starter. Building a Starship on the cheap requires insane boldness and operating outside the law. Needed components are scattered globally among military junkyards, industrial equipment auctions, and wartime black markets. The huge gamble is that a new math theorem, gaming supercomputers and radical software will unleash the vacuum energy of quantum space on giant super-magnets stolen from the Large Hadron Collider in the European Caliphate war zone. Survival is a great motivator, and approaching doom helps you think outside the box. Also, it helps to luck into an few insanely brilliant engineers, a junkyard genius with a global reach, and a Mars colony willing to deal rather than return to Earth. Earth's first Starship is a Black Swan, flying into a blue sky. As Earth tries to shoot it down.