Amplitude

by Dean M. Cole

  Mark stopped moving. “What are you talking about ‘last time’? This thing has never flown before, not with anyone aboard it anyway.”

  “At this point, I think it’s safe to say that I know more about this module than you do, but I’ll explain that later.”

  Mark leaned forward and looked at Vaughn’s face. “What happened to you? How did you get like this?”

  “Later, Mark. For now, just grab the cyclic stick.”

  Vaughn clutched the collective control with his right hand. Anchored at its rearmost end, the stick protruded from the floor between him and Mark. It was tilted forward like a handbrake.

  Applying upward pressure, Vaughn started to raise the stick slowly.

  Mark’s hand slammed down on top of his again. “No, Vaughn! We can’t do this!”

  Suddenly the tone of the conversation coming over the radio changed, becoming more animated. However, they were no longer focused on the actions inside the chamber. The doctor’s nasal voice rose above the din. “What the hell is that?”

  It was all Vaughn could do not to punch his friend in the chest. Instead, he stopped struggling and looked the man in the eye. “Hear that, Mark? They’ve seen it.”

  “Seen what?”

  “Right now, there’s a wall of light out there, and it’s rushing right at us. If we are on the ground when it hits, we will die. We have to take off now!”

  A female voice suddenly blared from the speakers. “Team Sigma … uh … Shut it down.”

  Maddeningly, Mark didn’t release Vaughn’s hand. Still pushing down, the stronger man kept it clamped onto the collective control stick. He tilted his head as he listened to the woman. “That’s the local director.”

  Her voice returned, suddenly urgent. “Terminate the test, Mark! We need to get you out of there.”

  Vaughn’s eyes widened. “Oh shit! That’s exactly what she said last time!”

  He tried to pull the stick up.

  It wouldn’t budge.

  “It’s almost here, Mark! Let go! We have to go now!”

  “No, Vaughn! We need to—”

  “What the hell is …?!” the director blurted over the radio, cutting off Mark. The woman’s words trailed off mid-sentence. Vaughn could hear her quickening breath. In the background, several voices raised, some screaming.

  Mark’s face went pale. He looked at Vaughn and finally released his hand. He gave a short nod.

  Vaughn returned the gesture and then pulled up the collective. He knew Mark could do this without his help, but there was no time to wait.

  The familiar vibration of the Q-drive’s ramping up power transmitted through Vaughn’s seat.

  He pointed at the center joystick. “Grab the cyclic! Keep us away from the walls!”

  The power reading rolled rapidly through fifty percent.

  Then the module lifted off the scaffolding.

  Suddenly, the director’s voice returned. “What the hell is that?!”

  The now hovering module began to drift sideways.

  Vaughn’s eyes went wide!

  The woman’s voice echoed in his helmet. “Oh God! No! … No—!” Her words died, and then she was gone.

  “What are you doing, Mark?!” Releasing the collective control, Vaughn reached across the astronaut and grabbed the top of the cyclic. “You were so much better at this last time!”

  Vaughn pulled the stick to the left, guiding the craft away from the side of the chamber. At the same moment, he reached across his own body with his free left hand, groping for the falling collective stick, but came up short as the shoulder harness kept him pinned to the seat back.

  He couldn’t reach the control!

  Suddenly, a visible wave passed across the chamber’s wall. The aluminum surface appeared to flex.

  At the last moment, Vaughn remembered to close his eyes just before the wall flashed brilliant white like burning phosphorus.

  An instant later, the dazzling radiance that was streaming through Vaughn’s squeezed shut lids faded.

  Then he was thrown against the harness.

  Opening his eyes, Vaughn saw that the module had crashed down onto the edge of the scaffolding.

  He released the cyclic and reached for the collective, intent on yanking the vertical control stick up, but it was too late.

  The module began to topple, falling backward.

  “Crap!”

  Chapter 5

  “Oh shit …” Vaughn coughed. “That hurt!”

  Blinking, he stared up at the distant ceiling as he fought for breath.

  Beside him, Mark groaned and nodded. “Yeah, it did.”

  Lying on his back, Vaughn rolled his head to the right and looked at Mark. “You okay?”

  The astronaut’s head bobbed up and down inside his helmet. Mark looked around at the toppled structure of the module and then shook his head. “There goes my career.”

  Leaning forward, Vaughn began to power down the vehicle. “I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this, truly, but it’s a helluva lot worse than that.”

  Even though the flight module had crashed onto its back, all of its systems were still running.

  Watching him work, Mark shook his head. “What happened? How did you get this way?” He paused and then knitted his brow. “And what the hell was that light? Why was everyone in Sandusky screaming?”

  After flipping a final switch, Vaughn reached down and began to release his harness. “I’ll tell you all about it, I promise, but right now, we have a phone call to make.”

  “We don’t need to do that. I’ll just call them on the radio.”

  Vaughn glanced at his friend as he continued to climb from the module. He pointed through the chamber wall. “There’s no one out there to answer, Mark.”

  The astronaut stared at him wordlessly for a long moment.

  Waving for his friend to follow, Vaughn continued to climb through the open architecture of the vehicle. A moment later, he slid through a wide gap in the tubular frame and stepped onto the chamber floor.

  Looking back, he saw Mark disentangling himself from the harness and climbing out of the prone captain’s chair. The man toggled his suit radio. “Control, this is Team Sigma, over.”

  Vaughn frowned. “Wasting your breath.”

  Climbing through the module, Mark shook his head. “What are you saying? What was all that about we’re going to die?” He suddenly stopped and looked up at Vaughn, his eyes widening. “Was that a nuke?”

  Vaughn shook his head again. “No. I almost wish it had been. That wouldn’t be as bad as the truth.”

  Mark continued to stare at him.

  Waving for him to follow, Vaughn started walking toward the red emergency phone that was mounted to the chamber wall. Fortunately, the module hadn’t damaged it during the crash. Somehow, the falling ship appeared to have missed all of the electronics. Most importantly, the radio rack was still intact.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I told you. We need to make a phone call.”

  “Vaughn, we are in vacuum. That thing isn’t going to work.”

  Undeterred, Vaughn pulled the phone from the wall and set it on a nearby bench just as Mark had done the first time. A moment later, he finished prying off the cover, revealing the hidden rotary dial beneath.

  While he worked, Mark had continued his attempts to raise someone via the radio in spite of Vaughn’s assertion that it was wasted energy.

  The calls went unanswered.

  Mark now stood silently next to him.

  In Vaughn’s peripheral vision, he saw the man staring at his face. Then his friend looked down and saw what he had done to the phone. “How did you know about that dial?” He paused and then raised both hands, palms up. “About all of this?” He turned and stared at Vaughn again. “And what did you do to your face? Is that makeup?” His eyes lost focus. Looking through Vaughn, Mark shook his head slowly. How did I miss that? I was there when you suited up.”

  Vaughn pressed his lips
together and then shook his head as well. “Mark, anything I tell you is just going to lead to more questions.” He pointed at the red phone. “Right now, I need you to connect this to the radio so that we can call Director McCree in Houston.”

  Mark did a double take. He opened his mouth to speak, but Vaughn cut him off.

  “I know you can because I’ve seen you do it before.”

  Still the astronaut continued to stare at him.

  Sighing, Vaughn placed a hand on Mark’s arm. “I can tell you this much for now. This is the most important phone call you’ll ever make. There is someone that the director can put us in touch with that might be able to undo all of this, but if we don’t talk to McCree before the light reaches Houston …” Vaughn paused and then shook his head. “Things will get much more complicated.”

  Mark looked from him to the phone and back. Then he nodded and pointed to a nearby toolbox. “Hand me that.”

  Vaughn grabbed the toolset and placed it on the bench next to the phone. Then he walked across the chamber.

  “Where are you going?”

  He pointed at an assembly mounted to the aluminum wall. “Going to start working on the manual pressure release.”

  “How do you know…?” Mark paused and then sighed. “Never mind.”

  Smiling wryly, Vaughn walked up to the red box. Just as it had the first time, the assembly sported a transparent front panel. Evenly spaced white chevrons covered the three-foot-tall, vertically oriented glass rectangle. A network of pipes protruded from the top and bottom of the fixture. A small tool hung from a chain on its right side.

  Vaughn grabbed the bronze hammer and struck the clear panel. Like it had that first day, the safety glass shattered into pebble-sized shards and fell to the floor in surreal silence. Not wanting to risk a torn glove in the room’s vacuum, Vaughn reached cautiously through the opening and extracted a steel pipe from the enclosure. He stuck one end of it into the metal sleeve that protruded from the box’s plumbing. After twisting the tube a quarter turn, he grabbed the end of the handle and began to pump it up and down like a man trying to jack up a car.

  Mark’s voice came over the speaker in his helmet. “That’s going to take a lot of pumps.”

  Nodding, Vaughn continued to cycle the handle up and down. “Oh, believe me, I know.” He could already feel his energy waning, having long ago burned through the meal he and Angela had eaten another world ago.

  As Vaughn worked, thoughts of his mother and Angela paraded through his mind.

  Had Angela survived? What if the explosion or some piece of flying debris had gotten her before the reset could send her back?

  No. Vaughn made a quick head shake. He couldn’t think that way. She had to be alive.

  Otherwise …

  He shook his head again. Stop it! She’s going to be there.

  The thoughts persisted.

  What if she didn’t remember him, didn’t know him?

  Vaughn had no idea what to expect. There was no manual for this, no instructions.

  And what about his mother? Was she at this very moment standing in her backyard watching the approaching light?

  As he continued to move the lever up and down, Vaughn closed his eyes and ground his teeth.

  It was too much.

  Another tear inched its way down his cheek.

  Vaughn sighed.

  He had to keep going. That’s all any of them could do right now.

  Clenching his jaw, he tried to focus all of his thoughts and energy on the pump’s handle.

  It almost worked.

  Sometime later, he released the lever and bent at the waist, resting with hands on knees as he tried to catch his breath.

  “I told you, you need to start working out.”

  Panting, Vaughn shook his head. Sweat dripped onto the inside of his visor. He gave his friend a sideward glance. “Dude, that is so not the problem.”

  Mark pointed at him. “Come on, man. Look how your suit is stretched out.”

  Vaughn peered down and smirked. He did look like the Michelin Man.

  Standing upright, he twisted a valve on his suit’s controls. His ears popped as the internal pressure of the spacesuit dropped to its nominal setting. He had increased the pressure earlier to disguise his new body form.

  No longer pushed out by his belly or overpressurized, the suit shrank back down to its normal shape.

  Vaughn turned to face Mark, arms held wide. He now looked significantly skinnier. “I told you, my friend. There is a lot more going on than you could ever imagine.”

  Standing next to the radio rack, the astronaut stared at him, mouth hanging slack.

  Vaughn lowered his arms and pointed at the phone. “Got that thing working yet?”

  Mark looked at him for a moment longer and then nodded. “Just attached the last wire. I connected it to our internal communications system.”

  Walking over to stand next to the man, Vaughn studied his work. “What are you waiting for? Fire it up.”

  He looked over to see Mark staring at his face again.

  Vaughn sighed. “Dammit, dude.” He pointed at the phone. “Focus!”

  Mark flinched and looked away. “Sorry.”

  “Just make the call, already.”

  The astronaut nodded and then reached out and flipped a switch.

  A dial tone began to stream through the intercom.

  Releasing a breath he hadn’t known he’d been holding, Vaughn closed his eyes and nodded. “Thank you.”

  Chapter 6

  Standing outside of the building that housed Chamber A, Randy looked toward the parking lot and clicked his key fob button. When the lights of his four-by-four truck flashed, he pointed at it. “That one.” He threw his keys to the intern. “It’s Rourke, right?”

  The young man snatched the keys from the air and nodded. “Y-Yes, Director.”

  “Okay, Rourke, take my truck over to the gym and grab some rubber mats.”

  “Mats, sir?”

  “Yeah, you know, those flat ones, the ones that people lie on in the gym.”

  “Oh, you mean yoga mats.”

  Randy waved a dismissive hand. “Yeah, whatever. Just bring them. And hurry!”

  Rourke gave a quick nod and then turned to leave. He’d run a few steps toward the parking lot across the street from the chamber facility when he stopped and looked at Randy. “Is this about that thing in Europe?”

  “How did you hear about that?”

  “It's all over Twitter, sir. Something about a weird aurora.” He shook his head. “But nobody seems to know for sure.”

  Randy nodded somberly. “Yeah, son. It's about that … but it's no aurora.”

  The man’s already pale face turned a lighter shade of white.

  Randy could relate. After finishing his discussion with Commander Brown, he had pulled up the video shot from inside the planeload of commandos. He had needed to see the event for himself. Just as General Tannehill had reported—and as Angela had known they would—all of the plane’s occupants vanished, disappearing the moment the aircraft had passed through the light. Later, when the nukes had reached Geneva, they, too, had vanished. The entire fleet of nuclear reentry vehicles had winked out of existence a moment before reaching their targets.

  “How many mats, sir?” Rourke said, snapping Randy from his thoughts.

  “All of them!” He waved for him to continue. “Hurry! Don’t stop for anyone, not even Center security.”

  Unmoving, the man stared at Randy.

  “Go!”

  Rourke flinched. “Yes, sir!” He spun on his heels and then sprinted toward the truck.

  Randy turned and looked at the front of the vacuum chamber facility. He’d walked there from Mission Control. The two structures sat across a parking lot from each other.

  His truck’s turbodiesel engine roared to life behind him. Its tires barked as the young man hammered the vehicle’s accelerator. Then it sped around the corner and was gone.

 
Still looking at the facility, Randy shook his head. “You guys picked a helluva day for a convention.”

  This week was the thirty-third annual Planetary Congress for the Association of Space Explorers or ASE. Astronauts, cosmonauts, and space explorers from all over the world had gathered in Budapest, Hungary. Every one of NASA’s current and qualified astronauts was there. Which meant they’d had a front-row seat to the event that was sweeping across the globe, and it also meant that nobody with adequate knowledge of spacesuit operations was anywhere close to Houston … or even alive.

  If he’d had more time, Randy would have had his chamber techs rig up a Bigelow Expandable Activity Module, a BEAM. They could have loaded the BEAM with as many personnel as it could hold and then drop the vacuum-rated, expandable habitat from the ceiling when the light was about to pass. Its inflatable double walls would have absorbed the impact with the floor, protecting the occupants if they were properly secured.

  However, there were two problems with that plan. The hoist had been removed because the folks from the James Webb Space Telescope program hadn’t wanted the greasy thing hanging above their billion-dollar project during the current vacuum tests. The other problem was that the nearest Bigelow module was at the company’s home base in North Las Vegas.

  Then Randy had realized that there was a small pool of personnel who should be in the area, people who should have a modicum of spacesuit knowledge: the current class of ass-cans or astronaut candidates.

  After a quick scan of their personnel files, Randy had identified several candidates that had skills that would be beneficial for what may lie ahead. He'd tried to reach all of them, but the phone systems were jammed. As Rourke had demonstrated, word was getting out. Everyone must have been trying to talk on their phones at the same time, creating a telephonic traffic jam. It had locked up the system, so Randy had sent texts to each of the astronaut candidates on his list.

  Only five had responded.

  That had proved to be a fortuitous number.

  The spacesuit techs had decided that the event of the ASE Planetary Congress made this week an excellent time for annual overhauls. When Randy had called to tell them to prep the candidates’ suits, they had informed him that all of the spacesuits were in varying states of disassembly. The tech on the phone had unhelpfully indicated that they could have a few ready in a couple of hours.