Flip Danielson and his partner-in-crime Potsy are facing a minimum of four years hard time for their deeds, so they hijack a spaceship to Alpha Centauri, thinking (as the rest of humanity) that the ship is faster-than-light, but as the buglike Quang Dal keeps telling them, it is a sub-light ship that’s has only a few time conveniences that won’t help the humans shorten the journey at all.
“Are explaining many times before,” said Quang Dal patiently. “Is no such thing as faster-than-light drive. As your good man Einstein show you long time ago, is theoretical impossibility.”

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  1. “Minimum Sentence” by Theodore R. Cogswell, in Galaxy, August 1953.
    2. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . written by Theodore R. Cogswell