Starfire (58 page)

The S-500 command, power, and radar trucks sparkled as the beam swept across them, and moments later their fuel tanks exploded, setting all of them afire. Next were the transport planes, which one by one burst open like overripe melons, transforming hundreds of thousands of gallons of jet fuel instantly into huge mushroom clouds of fire. The same fate awaited the MiG-31D fighters, fed by ten exploding 9K720 solid rocket booster motors that launched several of the missiles spinning through the sky for miles—and spreading radioactive material from two of the missiles' micronuclear warheads. The beam shut down the base operations building, destroyed several more parked and taxiing aircraft, and then detonated several aircraft inside their maintenance hangars, obliterating each hangar in a spectacular fireball.

Casey heard the alarm and hurriedly began unstrapping herself from her seat in the Skybolt module. There was no lifeboat in the Skybolt module, but she knew that the closest one was in the Engineering module just “above” hers. She donned her emergency oxygen mask, then looked up and saw Larry Jessop the life-support guy looking through the window in the hatch waiting for her. She smiled and was about to unlock the hatch . . .

. . . when a tremendous explosion rocked the station. The destruction of the S-500 command and control vehicles at Chkalovsky had nullified guidance to all of the 9K720 missiles . . . except for the first four that had been launched and had locked on to Armstrong Space Station with their own terminal guidance sensors. All four made direct hits, and the fourth missile hit squarely on the Skybolt module.

Casey turned and saw nothing but planet Earth beneath her through the gaping, sparking hole that seconds ago was her Starfire microwave cavity and Skybolt. She smiled and thought it was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen in her life. As she watched, the spectacular blues and whites of the spinning planet below her feet slowly faded into shades of gray. It was not as beautiful as before, but she still marveled at her home planet
right there
—she even thought she could see her home, and she smiled, thinking of the next time she would go home and see her parents and her brothers and sisters and tell them about this incredible adventure. She smiled, her mom and dad's faces smiling back at her, and felt happy and a little euphoric, until her vision tunneled closed into blackness seconds later as the last of her oxygen seeped out of her body.

The S-500S missiles tore into Armstrong Space Station. Boomer and Brad watched in absolute horror as modules were either hit or ripped off when the station started to cartwheel through space. “Midnight, this is Shadow,” Boomer radioed. “Hold on, guys. I'll be over there in a minute. We'll transfer you out through the cockpit and through the hole in the fuselage.”

There was no reply for several long moments; then, a sleepy, tired voice radioed, “I don't think . . . even . . . the great spaceplane pilot . . . Hunter ‘Boomer' Noble could . . . could match this spin,” Vice President Ann Page said. “Save your fuel. Retrieve the lifeboats. I'm . . . I'm hypoxic, I don't see . . . see any lights on Gonzo's suit . . . save your fuel and . . . and retrieve the lifeboats, Boomer. That's an . . . an order.”

“I'm not in your chain of command, Miss Vice President,” Boomer said. “Hang on. Stay with me.”

“Brad?” they heard. “Brad, can . . . can you hear me?”

“Sondra!”
Brad exclaimed. “We're going to rendezvous with you! Hang on!”

There was silence for a long time, and Brad's mouth was quickly turning dry. Then they heard in the tiniest of voices: “Brad?”

“Sondra, don't worry,” Brad said. “We'll be there as fast as we can!”

“Brad? I . . . I'm sorry. I . . .”

“Sondra!”
Brad cried out. “Hang on! We'll rescue you!
Hang on!
” But as they watched the crippled space station spin away, they knew it would not be possible to try a rescue.

B
LACK
R
OCK
D
ESERT

N
ORTH
OF
R
ENO
, N
EVADA

O
NE
WEEK
LATER

Defying federal orders, thousands of vehicles of every description were parked at the edge of the Black Rock Desert in northwestern Nevada at the terminus of Highway 447 to witness something that no one believed they would ever see in their lifetimes. The Black Rock Desert was the home of the world-famous Burning Man Festival, where thousands of artists, adventurers, and counterculture free spirits gathered every summer to celebrate freedom and life . . . but this would be a day on the playa that would represent death.

“I guess it is returning home,” Brad McLanahan said. He was seated in a lawn chair on the roof of a rented RV. Beside him on one side was Jodie Cavendish, on the other was Boomer Noble, and behind them, clearly separating himself from the others, was Kim Jung-bae. They had just concluded a series of press interviews with the dozens of news agencies that had come out to witness this incredible event, but now they had broken away from the reporters several minutes before the appointed time so they could be by themselves.

Jodie turned to Jung-bae and put a hand on his leg. “It's okay, Jerry,” she said. Jung-bae lowered his head. He had been weeping ever since they had arrived on the playa and had refused to talk with anyone. “It's not your fault.”

“It
is
my fault,” Jung-bae said. “I am responsible for this.” And for the millionth time since the test firing, he said, “I am so sorry, guys. I am so sorry.”

Brad reflected back on the events over the past week. After realizing they could not rescue the persons trapped in the Midnight spaceplane, he and Boomer had returned to the area where the three lifeboats had been jettisoned before the Russian S-500S missiles had hit the station. Boomer had exited the cockpit, suited up, gone into the cargo bay, and jettisoned the last few remaining pieces of cargo. With Brad at the controls of the Shadow spaceplane, he had maneuvered them to each of the lifeboats, and Boomer reeled them into the cargo bay. After hooking up oxygen, power, and communications cables, they made a transfer-orbit burn and entered the International Space Station's orbit.

It took almost two days, but they finally rendezvoused with the ISS. Sky Masters had flown up two station technicians on commercial spacecraft to power up the station and bring supplies, and they used the robot arms to attach the lifeboats to docking ports. All of Armstrong's crewmembers had to spend a night in an airlock pressurized with pure oxygen to ward off nitrogen narcosis, but afterward they were all deemed fit to fly, and they returned to Earth the next day.

Brad's smartphone beeped a warning. “It's time,” he said.

They watched and waited. Before long they could see what looked like a star grow brighter and brighter in the cloudless Nevada sky. It grew brighter and brighter, and everyone parked on the playa thought they could actually feel heat from the object . . . and then suddenly there was a tremendous earsplitting sound, like a thousand cannons going off all at once. Car windshields cracked, and cars rocked on their wheels—Brad thought he was going to be jostled right off the roof of the RV.

The star turned into a spectacular ball of fire that grew and grew, trailing fire behind it for a hundred miles, until the ball started to break apart. Seconds later there was another tremendous explosion, and twenty miles to the north the spectators saw a massive ball of fire at least five miles in diameter, followed by a rapidly growing mushroom cloud of fire, sand, and debris. They saw a huge wall of sand and smoke thousands of feet high rushing toward them, but just as they were thinking they should retreat inside their vehicles, the wall began to dissipate, and it thankfully disappeared long before it reached them.

“So long, Silver Tower,” Boomer said. Jung-bae was openly and loudly sobbing behind them, crying in sheer anguish at the thought of his friend Casey Huggins in that maelstrom. “It was nice flying with you, old buddy.”

S
AN
L
UIS
O
BISPO
C
OUNTY
R
EGIONAL
A
IRPORT

T
HE
NEXT
EVENING

After observing the final flight of Armstrong Space Station, Brad McLanahan and Jodie Cavendish had done more media interviews in Reno and San Francisco, then they flew the turbine P210 Silver Eagle back to San Luis Obispo. Night had already fallen. They had just pushed the plane into the hangar and were unloading their few pieces of luggage when Chris Wohl appeared at the hangar door. “You must be Sergeant Major Wohl,” Jodie said, extending a hand. After a moment Chris took it. “Brad has told me a lot about you.”

Chris shot a querying expression at Brad. “Yes, a lot,” Brad said.

“I'm sorry about your friends,” Chris said. “I'm glad you made it back, Brad. Had enough of space travel for a while?”

“For now,” Brad admitted. “But I am going back. Most definitely.”

“Done with all the media stuff too for a while?”

“Definitely no more,” Jodie said. “I can't wait for our lives to go back to normal. Crikey, I can't even
remember
what normal is.”

“You need anything, either of you?” Chris asked. “The team will be back in the morning. When you feel up to it, you can start training.”

“He's right back to his usual routines,” Jodie said. “I might join him from now on.”

“That would be fine,” Chris said. “Ready to go back to the apartment?”

“We'll unload, and then I'll close it up,” Brad said. “I'll wipe it down tomorrow.”

“I'll drive with you back to Poly Canyon, and then I'm going to the hotel,” Chris said. “I'll see you in the morning. We'll update your call sign then, I think.” He gave Brad and Jodie a half smile, which was a big one by Wohl's standards, and then he put his hands in his pockets against the growing chill, turned on a heel, and . . .

. . . walked right into the knife held by Yvette Korchkov, which plunged deep into his belly. He had enough strength and wherewithal to head-butt his assailant before falling to the tarmac, clutching his abdomen.

“Grebanyy ublyudok,”
Korchkov swore, holding her bleeding forehead. “Fucking bastard.” Brad pushed Jodie behind him. “We meet again, Mr. McLanahan. Thank you so much for informing the world where you will be. It was child's play to track you down.”

Brad pulled Jodie to the back of the hangar, then went over to a toolbox and found a Crescent wrench. “Call 911,” he told her. To Korchkov he said, “Svärd, or whatever the hell your name is, if you don't want to get caught, you'd better leave. This place has security cameras, and Wohl's troops will be here any minute.”

“I know where all of the sergeant major's associates are, Brad,” Korchkov said. “They are hours away, and I will be gone long before the police arrive. But my mission will be completed.”

“What mission? Why are you after me?”

“Because your father made a terrible enemy in Gennadiy Gryzlov,” Korchkov said. “He ordered all of your father's possessions to be destroyed, and you are at the top of the list. And I must say, after the destruction you caused near Moscow last week, he will have an even greater burning desire to see you dead.”

“The police are on their way,” Jodie called out.

“They will be too late,” Korchkov said.

“Well, then, come and get me, bitch,” Brad said, waving her on. “You like doing it up close and personal? Then give me a hug, bitch.”

Korchkov moved like a cheetah despite the wound on her forehead, and Brad was far too late. He partially deflected the knife with the wrench, but the blade sliced across the left side of his neck. Jodie screamed when she saw the rivulet of blood forming between Brad's fingers as he tried to stop the flow. The wrench dropped from his hand as the room started to spin.

Korchkov smiled. “Here I am, handsome space traveler,” she said. “Where is your tough talk now? You are perhaps a little weak from your space travels, no?” She raised the knife so Brad could see it. “Give me a good-bye hug.”

“Here's your hug, bitch,” a voice behind her said, and Chris Wohl broke a push-broom across Korchkov's head. She whirled and was about to knife him again, but Chris dropped to the floor and was still.

“Finish bleeding and die, old man,” Korchkov said.

“That's not an old man—he's a sergeant major,” Brad said, just before the Crescent wrench crunched on the back of Korchkov's head. She went down. Brad brought the wrench down hard against the hand holding the knife, pushed the blade away, then continued to beat her face with the wrench until he couldn't recognize it anymore. He collapsed on top of the battered body as Jodie ran up to him, rolling him away from Korchkov and pressing her fingers against the gash on his neck.

Brad opened his eyes to the sounds of sirens outside the hangar and found Jodie still crouched over him, her hands pressed against his bleeding neck. “Brad?” she asked. “Oh, God . . .”

“Hey,” he said. He gave her a weak smile. “Who says I can't show my girl a good time?” And he thankfully dropped into unconsciousness once again.

EPILOGUE

There is a skeleton on every house.

—I
TALIAN SAYING

S
CION
A
VIATION
I
NTERNATIONAL
HEADQUARTERS