Perigee (16 page)

Chen appeared to get his back up over that remark. “It was a four-year program, Walt. We had to take a lot more than just the technician’s classes. Calc, physics, econ…”

It at least took the edge off his temper. “Figures,” he snorted, almost laughing. “Makes you think you’re a rocket scientist
and
you know how to run this place, when all you need to worry about is learning how to keep these birds flying.”

The younger man grinned. “Well, I guess that’s why they stuck you with me, Walt.”

…

Hammond sat with Penny and Charlie Grant in the emergency operations center. Projected on the screen before them were diagrams and timelines for the rescue mission they were still cobbling together. Behind them sat the rest of the tiger team, waiting to be assailed with questions.

He rubbed his eyes as they flipped through briefing slides. Uncharacteristically rumpled, he looked even more drained than the rest of them. Charlie traced a pointer along a chaotic graph of colored arcs, each swirl representing different orbits. “Final approach vector will be from underneath relative to 501, Y-axis minus 500 meters for maximum visibility. They’ll offset Z-plus 50 meters and complete the final approach while on the day side. If they can’t close for any reason, they’ll wave off and hold position until the next sunrise.”

“And the cargo deck?” Hammond challenged. “You’re comfortable with them using it as an airlock?”

“Not much choice,” Charlie said. “There’s no other way to get them off. We think its safe enough for at least one depress cycle, maybe two.” The Clipper’s cargo bay was contained in its own separate pressure hull, with an access hatch at the rear of the passenger cabin. They would keep it closed off, vent its air, and open it to space. “The flight test engineer will run the extra-vehicular activity. He’ll float over to 501 with attachment tethers and the flexible docking tunnel.”

Hammond turned to a tousle-haired young man behind them. “You ready for this, Will?”

Will Gardner had been managing the test flights and crunching data on the Block II spaceplane for weeks, up until being drafted to help devise a rescue. “Not sure if I’ll ever be ‘ready’, Mr. Hammond,” he said. “But it looks like I’m all we’ve got.”

“What kind of experience do you have with EVAs?”

“I interned at a space adventure-tourist company for two summers in college. Suited up a couple of times for their neutral buoyancy trainer,” he said, referring to a deep swimming pool used to simulate spacewalks. “And I’ve participated in a couple of emergency suit drills during flight test.”

“That’s better than nothing,” Hammond said. “And as long as you’re willing to hang your young ass out on the line, you can call me Art.” He turned back to Grant. “When’s your next launch window?”

“We have a ten minute window starting at noon Pacific time tomorrow. Our test site is one piece of luck in this whole mess,” he said. “The inclination at Moses Lake is pretty close to their orbit, so it keeps our windows open longer and frees up reserve propellant.”

“Any chance you can launch earlier?”

“They can’t have the bird ready any sooner,” Penny interjected. “And I’ve got to figure out how to get some sleep between now and then.”

“For Pete’s sake, let Charlie manage things while you get ready to fly,” Hammond said. “That’s what I hired him for. Not like we have anything else going on,” he added dourly. They had cancelled all other flights until the cause of 501’s malfunction could be determined. It was probably the smart thing to do, but he knew they wouldn’t be able to absorb the losses for long. Like other airlines, they were heavily dependent on cash flow. Shares of both the spaceline and his manufacturing company were already tanking on the news.

“We’re not leaving here until morning,” she insisted. “I’m the only one in the company that’s ever flown orbital rendezvous.”
Much less ever practiced a crazy-assed stunt like this,
she thought. “They need me in on the final planning. We can’t just wing it.”

Hammond held up his hands in surrender. “Okay, you win,” he said. “And the company jet’s at your disposal, by the way. I’ll have the Gulfstream crew on standby to take you guys up to Moses Lake as soon as you’re ready. But get some damned sleep. You’re not doing this on caffeine and adrenaline. Got it?”

“Wouldn’t dream of it, Art.”

30

Austral Clipper

Tom fiddled with the adjustable sunshades around the windows, trying in vain to find one angle that worked. They were back in full daylight and blinding sun filled the cockpit. The harsh light at least brought some warmth—it was beginning to get awfully cold. Frost formed around the edges of the windows, the glass sharply cold to the touch after forty minutes in nightside. Reaching into a boxy leather flight case behind his seat, he finally grabbed at some airway charts as they floated out and began clipping them above the big window.

“Don’t like the view?” Ryan asked.

“Lost my sunglasses,” Tom said. “Already got a headache, and this light is killing me.”

Ryan could see he looked tired. “How much sleep did you get?” he asked, stealing a glance at his wristwatch.

“Not enough. I’ve been up since yesterday.” It had been a long time ago, indeed.

“Then you need some rest, skipper. Why don’t you go find a quiet corner back in the cabin? We’re not going to get anything done by killing ourselves.”

“That’s what we’re trying to avoid, remember?”

He couldn’t find much about that to argue with. “Your call, but we should put ourselves on some kind of rotating watch up here.”

“And you should be glad I’m not one of those old-school graybeards who don’t take well to copilot ‘suggestions’.”

“I am eternally grateful,
sir
, for crew resource management techniques,
sir
. It’s kept my butt out of many slings for many years.”

Tom laughed, finally. It had been realized a long time ago that if the other members of a flight crew didn’t feel like they could speak freely, then any problems were much more likely to spin out of control. A couple of notorious accidents had in fact been attributed to authoritarian command pilots. The days of the grizzled old Captain of the Ship were long since gone. Probably for the best, he thought, but it had sure made for a lot of smart-aleck young FO’s. “Well, at least you’re good for something other than raising the gear and working the flap handle.”

Ryan was searching for just the right retort when they were both distracted by the view through the big forward windscreen. The moon drifted above Earth’s rim, rising through the thin haze of the atmosphere and into the blackness. Ryan stared at it in fascination.

“You’ve never seen that before?” Tom asked.

“Only once. You know how fast these hops usually go. We’re so heads-down, there’s no time to take in the scenery.”

Within minutes the moon was in full view and directly ahead. “Never thought I’d make it up here like this,” Tom observed. “How about you?”

Ryan thought back on his final year of active duty at the Naval Flight Test Center in Maryland, when the Marines had seriously considered purchasing a squadron’s worth of Clippers to support a global rapid-strike force. The ability to drop a platoon of Marines and equipment anywhere in the world within hours had been compelling, but not enough for the Corps to carve a few billion out of its budget once the Air Force had stepped in with a blank check.

“I thought there’d be a good chance for a while,” he said. “They got my hopes up when they sent us to play with the old shuttle simulators. Then I figured out how low the probability was of it actually happening.”

“I thought you guys were all math geniuses. You didn’t see the odds of that one coming?”

Ryan shook his head. He’d held on to bitterness over it for a long time. “That’s how it goes…hope gets in the way of reality. We were drinking the Kool-Aid long before they sent us down to Houston.”

Tom thought about that, having toyed with the idea of becoming an astronaut long ago. “Don’t beat yourself up. I saw how you could get sucked in by the idea, especially when they were making all that noise about going back to the Moon.”

“Oh yeah,” Ryan grumbled. “I had grand plans to space-drop Marines over a combat zone, maybe command the first mission to an asteroid.
That
would’ve been even cooler than the Moon.”

“I always saw you as a Captain Kirk type.”

“Is that a compliment or an insult?”

“Not sure. Depends on which episode we’re talking about. Does it matter?”

“Guess not. But I always liked the leather jacket and silk scarf image better.”

Tom laughed at that. “I knew some old hands at Edwards and you’d better believe they had a few stories. Some of the legends weren’t all they were made out to be.”

“Almost forgot you did research flying there. SR-71’s, right?”

“Yep, flew the Blackbird until they finally pulled the plug…I hated to see that one go away.”

“No deep-black stuff?” Ryan teased. “No double-secret Aurora project? The word at Pax River was that you guys always got the good toys.”

Tom smiled at the irony. Aurora—the storied top-secret replacement for the vaunted SR-71—had been a persistent subject of wild rumors for decades. Now, here they were, stranded in the only ship that had ever come close to doing what that phantom spaceplane was fabled for. “No secret-squirrel programs,” he replied. “Are you kidding? They don’t let real people fly any of the hot stuff anymore. Everything’s scaled down and automated…if you’re lucky you get to fly it from a console in a control van.”

“And if you’re
not
lucky, it’s a pre-fab autonomous robot,” Ryan snorted.

“Easier to let the computers fly it,” Tom agreed. They sat in silence and watched the moon climb past as they drifted towards central Asia.

“You’ve still managed to plant your butt in some nice equipment,” Ryan finally said. “Those Reno racers are nothing to sneeze at.”

Years ago, Tom had found his way into racing hotrod WWII fighters at the National Air Races in Reno, Nevada. Already fast airplanes, famous rides like the Mustang and Corsair had been turned into stupendous racers. Speeds topping five hundred miles per hour, flown within a hundred feet of the desert floor, were typical.

“Funny you should mention that, too—this was the first year we missed it.”

“That explains a lot,” Ryan said. “When you were off the schedule last month I just assumed you were at the races.” It wasn’t mentioned in the company newsletters either, he realized. He watched as Tom stared into the void, his thoughts again elsewhere. Something tugged at his mind, but maybe it was best not to pry. Whatever had happened, it was clearly an unpleasant subject.

“Couldn’t make it this year…personal issue,” he answered hesitantly. “Arthur won’t trust anybody else with his baby, so we sat this one out.”

That was surprising. “Hammond would rather forfeit? He must trust you even more than I thought.” Their racer, a restored Grumman Bearcat named
‘Fraidy Cat
, was Hammond’s pride and joy. It was also the catalyst that had brought the two men together, back in the early days when the Clippers were still just an idea tucked away in his office.

Tom smiled at the irony. “Think Art will still trust me after this mess?”

“You get us down, skipper, and I guarantee it,” Ryan said. “And let me know if he ever decides that beast needs a backup pilot.”

Before Tom could answer, a yellow flash on the radio panel caught their attention. “Company’s calling. Hope they have some good news,” he said, picking up the microphone switch. “Denver ops, this is 501, answering your SELCAL ping.”

“We have some good news for you, 501.”

Both were surprised at the coincidence, and at hearing Penny through the static.

“Is that Stratton I hear down there? You guys must have given up all hope,” said Tom, some wit finally back in his tired voice.

“You take the prize, old fart. Think of me as your guardian angel until this is all over.”

“And how long will that be? I’m not sure we can put up with your nagging.”

“Not as long as you think,” she replied, and explained their plan.

Both pilots exchanged dubious looks before Ryan revealed his skepticism with a low whistle. “Sporty,” he said. “But what other choice do we have?”

…

Castle Rock, Colorado

Elise Gentry had given up on sleeping and was staring forlornly at the night sky beyond their bedroom window. Already fitful enough, rest had become impossible with her husband unimaginably stranded up there. The news coverage brought back bad memories of his Air Force service: too many times he’d flown away on combat deployments, leaving her with tantalizing glimpses of similar airplanes on the news. Once in a great while she’d recognize his squadron’s markings and run to the TV, hoping to catch a peek. Round-the-clock news coverage had made it nearly impossible to pull away and get on with her life. After a time, she’d learned the best way to get through those times was to keep it turned off.