Launch (26 page)

The spacesuit was designed to resist
micrometeorites traveling at 30,000 miles per hour. It was too tough for the
squid, but the animal was holding David under water, and his helmet continued
to flash a low oxygen warning. He could not move his legs and drew back his
right arm to punch the squid. But before he could deliver the punch, it released
him and disappeared.

A robot diver appeared from behind David where
it had electroshocked the squid. It held up the life vest and pointed to
David’s left arm. He nodded, and the robot put the neck of the life vest under
David’s left armpit and pulled the two lanyards to inflate the vest.

David was glad when he felt himself being
pulled up, but the squid had not left. It hovered about 20 feet away, watching
and changing colors between red and white. Shortly after David began rising,
the squid began another attack. The robot gave its bang stick to David and swam
toward the squid. Instead of ripping it apart, the robot stopped moving. The
squid wrapped its tentacles around the robot and began trying to bite it.

David realized the robot was giving him time to
get away, and he did not waste the opportunity. He put the electroshock/bang
stick in his left hand and held his left arm tight against his body, so the
life vest would not float away. Then he stroked with his right arm to swim
toward the taxi.

The second rescue taxi landed and another robot
jumped out just as David began to see red and white flashing all around him.
The vague colors became dozens of Humboldt squid attacking from all directions.
Each squid held its tentacles together in streamlined point aimed directly at
David and used its fins and siphons to propel itself through the water.

David quit swimming, took the electroshock bang
stick in his right hand, and waited. The flashing light in his helmet blinked
faster and turned to orange. In all directions surrounding him, tentacles lined
with rasping suckers opened and revealed sharp orange beaks.

As he was preparing to defend himself, David
heard a rising crescendo of clicking. It was the rescue taxis broadcasting the sonar
sound of attacking sperm whales, a voracious squid predator.

Instead of being overwhelmed by a mass of
tentacles and beaks, the squid jetted away and David was left in a cloud of ink.

The Humboldt squid holding the robot also vanished
in a cloud of ink.

The robot swam to David and held out a hand for
its bang stick. He was glad to see the robot and more than happy to give it the
weapon. A red oxygen warning light was flashing rapidly in his helmet, and he was
feeling short of breath. He looked at the robot, pointed to his helmet, and
mouthed the word “Oxygen.”

The robot grabbed David’s right arm and began
swimming with powerful kicks toward the nearest taxi. He began to feel like he
could not breathe and barely noticed the second robot grab his other arm. Then
he did not feel anything.

David regained consciousness lying on the floor
of the taxi. His helmet was off, and a robot was holding an oxygen mask on his
face. An instrument plugged into his suit monitored his blood pressure. His
gloves were off, and a pulse oxygen monitor was clipped to a finger. His boots
were off, and another robot was monitoring the strength of his pulse in his
ankles.

The robot holding the mask checked David’s eyes
with a light and asked him if he was okay.

He nodded.

“Do you feel like sitting up sir?”

Again David nodded. Keeping the oxygen mask in
place, the robots lifted him to the middle seat in the back and buckled his
seat belt. The doors closed, and the taxi took off.

The robot checked his eyes with the penlight
again. Then it asked, “Do you think you can breathe without the oxygen mask, sir?”

David nodded, and the robot took the mask away.
After a minute, it checked his eyes.

“How do you feel, sir?”

“I think I’m okay. How long was I out?”

“Less than two minutes, sir. But after all that
you have been through, you should probably have a complete physical examination,
soon.”

▼

When they met on the launch pad at Vandenberg,
Amira gave Claire a firm hug and asked about the baby.

“She’s fine,” Claire said. “Thank you for what
you said about David.”

“It was understated truth,” Amira said. . . . “Did
I hear you call him Buni?”

“Yes. That’s his Air Force call sign.”

“Where did it come from?”

“It started as a joke after David saved the
life of the President, and it stuck.”

Amira shook her head. “It should be Tiger. He
is the bravest man I have ever met.”

▼

When he stepped out of the rescue taxi, David
felt and looked frazzled. Claire flew into his arms. They held each other, and he
knew his ordeal was over.

With a hug that surprised him, Amira welcomed
David. Then she said, “Claire, take your husband to Broadview. Because of him,
we have a future, and we can wait until he is rested before we try to say thank
you.”

▼

The first thing David did was take a shower.
When he came out of the bathroom, he was wearing his navy blue robe.

Claire put their baby in his arms. “This is
your daughter, Kathryn Joanne Archer.”

David carefully held his baby daughter as he looked
at her tiny fingers and toes and blue eyes and wisps of blond hair. With a note
of awe in his voice, he asked, “How did you make her so perfect?”

She smiled. “I had a little help, you know.”

“A very tiny bit,” he said.

“It was enough. She’s half you and half me.”

▼

While David ate a brunch of steak and eggs, Claire
told him about the court decision and the grandfather law.

He looked at her and said, “That means we’re
staying, right?”

She saw tears in his eyes and went around the
table. Claire kissed away his tears and gently kissed him on the lips. “Welcome
home.”

▼

David went to bed at two in the afternoon. When
he woke up, twelve hours later, his wife was kissing him, and his daughter was
crying in the nursery.

“Wake up Buni,” Claire said gently. “It’s time
for a parenting lesson.”

Following her into the nursery, he noticed she
was wearing a new black negligee. It emphasized more than it concealed, and Claire
was extremely sexy.

She supervised as he changed a diaper for the
first time. Afterward, she breast-fed her daughter. Then she put a cloth on
David’s shoulder, and showed him how to burp Kathryn.

After she burped softly, he carried her back to
her crib. Very carefully, as if she was a fragile work of irreplaceable art, he
put her down and kissed her. Claire lightly cleaned Kathryn’s face, kissed her,
and adjusted her blanket.

David put his arms around Claire from behind as
they watched their daughter go back to sleep.

He spoke softly. “Shall we start another one?”

“It’s too soon,” she said, “but we can
practice.”

“I
love
practice.”

Kathryn quickly went back to sleep, and Claire turned in David’s arms.
Her kiss triggered blazing passion for the woman he loved more than his own
life.

He picked her up and carried her in his arms to their bed.

THE END

The image of Earth on the cover is from

“The Blue Marble”

a NASA image. It can be seen at

http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/view.php?id=57723

The background behind
Origin
in Chapter 12 is a

modified copy of a NASA photograph of Omega Centauri

taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. It can be seen at

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_1465.html

The tetrahedron shaped starship images on the

cover and in Chapter 12 are copyrighted and are used

herein with the permission of the copyright holder.

As Amira says at the housewarming,
“The point
is that we human beings are interdependent. We learn from each other and depend
on each other to meet our needs.
We are much
richer for it, because we directly and indirectly benefit from all human
experience.”

Me too. I was intimidated by the thought of writing this book, and I have
relied heavily on the generosity and compassion of very special people to get
the job done.

My wife, Diana, has tolerated much and helped me in innumerable ways. I
have relied and continue to rely on her suggestions, more than she knows.

Rebecca Ingram was my muse and my first editor, and she designed the
cover. She is indeed a very kind soul who took time out from working on her
doctorate to help me. Her intelligence, encouragement, and help made this novel
possible.

I would also like to thank Betsy Winslow, Carol Boote, Erin Wolf Reyburn,
Faith Hickman Bryne, Kelly Eskridge, Layla Benitez-James, Briana Olson,
Elizabeth G. Messler, Marlo and Matthew Taylor, Lori Culwell, Janna Balthaser, Christina
Ingram, and Hortencia Fabiola Guadalupe Figueroa Becerra Fuentes for their help
and suggestions. Their contributions to this book are beyond measure.

This is a work of fiction, and any errors or failures are entirely those
of the author.