The stars before us

Starfarer Control

        Jennifer Wells, head of the International Space Program, was very, very screwed. Three Thousand of Earth's best and and brightest had just left the solar system, leaving approximately sixteen billion people on a dying Earth. As one might assume, these people were not very happy about being ditched on this smelly hellhole of a planet. And that was an understatement.
            Washington D.C. had already been overrun by riots, and some very pissed off people were ransacking the White House at that very moment. But that, surprisingly, was the least of her worries. To keep fear at a minimum for the future colonists, they had been told that the ship was "fully autonomous". That no human control was needed.
That was a lie. After all, why would anyone ever control such an important mission on a post apocalyptic Earth? 
             Nearly every vital system on the ship was controlled from the International Space Program headquarters in Houston, Texas.
         Which put Jennifer in a bad situation, considering the fact that the headquarters were surrounded by a mob of about three million angry rioters. The National Guard had set up a perimeter 10 blocks in every direction, but that was 2 days ago. Now in reality, that perimeter was only 4 blocks in every direction, and rapidly getting smaller. If headquarters was overrun, Starfarer would be dead in space with three thousand people aboard. And her calculations said she had only a day and a half to come up with a solution. The program to which the Starfarer was controlled was too large to download onto a laptop or a flash-drive, and too important to email. It could only be contained by a super computer, which they only had one of and it was too large to move anyway.
       Leaving only one solution. She had to message Starfarer and tell them the truth. Now, before it was too late. She had to hope that the three thousand near-genius people on board would somehow find a way to their destination. Without the help of Earth.
          Now she was in the control room.
She turned to an operator next to her "Jerry, pull them out of cryo. We have to let them figure this out for themselves." Jerry said nothing, just shook his head. But he did as she commanded.
And so it begins, she thought.