“They took a look at the radiation we were all absorbing from the solar storm and made a better argument about constructing a solar storm shelter instead. To that, the UNSOC said yes, provided that it was made from Lunar materials only. So, through the years, the commanders of the Chaffee and the Collins got together and built the solar shelters.” Franz paused to chuckle. “The best thing was, they built them to be both solar shelter and emergency escape vehicles. Oh, the big stuff they built openly. It's hard to hide large sheets of Lunar aluminum and steel sailing through space.”
“Wait, how did they do that?”
“The MoonCans you've heard about? They're more than just tanks of liquid oxygen. They all have an engine on them for final approach. All they did is weld a couple of MoonCans on the sheets and shoot them off the Lunar Flinger and, voila, custom delivered construction material to your doorstep. How many more boxes have you got?”
“About another case and a half. So, we're going down in an aluminum box? Won't we burn up? I'm sure they have that problem solved.”
“Sure do. That Roque character. Met him? Legs don't work? Big shock of white hair?”
“Yes. Funny kind of guy. Gallant in that Olde Europe fashion, but then stops dead. Wouldn't even dine with me alone, or have a nightcap or anything. Is it true he's been up here for twenty years?”
“At least. Well, he's a whiz with transforming one thing into another. Took some of that Moon sand and turned it into the same kind of tiles the old NASA Space Shuttle used. So put your mind to rest, little lady, we're going down safe and in style, thanks to Roque.”
“If you say so. But what about landing? Even the old Shuttles came in at four hundred kilometers per hour. That's pretty fast to whack into the ocean.”
Franz turned to her, a wicked smile in place. “Oh, we have to keep a few secrets to ourselves. You're gonna love it.”
Alice tried to return the smile, but grimaced, looked surprised, then kicked over to the corner of the room. Franz could see her fumbling for the plastic bag dispenser. She just got a bag over her mouth and nose before the retching began. Fortunately, there was nothing much to bring up. Franz carried over a squeezebulb of water.
“There, there, the landing will be perfectly safe. No need to get all upset. Rinse out your mouth, then spit it into the bag. I can finish packing now that you've pointed out what you want.”
“Thank you, Franz. See you at the sleds.” She made her way out of the module, her flight uncertain.
***
Elsewhere through the station, crew began showing the first signs of radiation sickness. Reports of the spreading illness came to the Bridge. Lisa answered a call from Medical.
“Commander, I recommend we start boarding the sleds now,” he said. “Otherwise, we'll have too few able spacers to move the sick ones inside. Hell, I'm feeling a little green, myself.”
“Understood. We still have two hours to go, but there's no reason to wait.”
Clicking to the all-hands channel, she announced, “Attention, crew. Begin moving to the sleds immediately. Department heads will arrange for personnel to man each sled evenly. Move.”
Turning back to the monitor, Lisa said, “That should keep their minds off the barfs for a while. Doc, make sure you hand out those barf and poop pills to everyone, and make sure they take them. Commander's orders.”
“Will do. Got a case of whoops bags with me, too. See you on the sled.” His image faded from her monitor.
***
Eddie was soon deep in the departure checklist, his thoughts only vaguely on the reason for the sudden departure. He was startled to see unconscious people getting strapped onto the rude benches.
“What's the hap, Head?” he asked one of the spacehands who was strapping in another body, this one dazed and staring.
“Busy. Ask Panjar.” Panjar's head popped up into the flight deck.
“I'm your flight engineer, Pilot Zanger,” he said, as he strapped into the seat in front of a jury-rigged instrument panel.
Eddie asked some questions of Panjar, and was quite stunned at how this little reentry was going to work out.
***
Celine popped up on the Lisa's monitor. The Astrogator was in the cockpit of one of the sleds. “Commander, time to drop the bomb on UNSOC.”
“Yeah, I've been putting it off. Can you get up here for a few minutes? I don't want to have to control the board as well as deal with Subby.”
“No problem, Ma'am. Be there in two minutes.”
She sailed into the Main Deck and belted into her perch. “Panjar's checklisting my sled, Zanger's doing his. We're going to be fine there.”
“Good,” said Lisa. “Let's go face the lion. Make sure you have the recorder running, Celine. By the way, what's the crew pool on the situation?” A window showed on her screen.
Agrees
10
Orders to stay put
90
“That's pretty pessimistic. And if we go ahead with reentry?” Another window showed beside it.
Changes mind, helps
05
Rants, helps anyway
10
Does nothing either way
40
Cuts off help, telemetry
40
Shoots down
05
“There are crew who really believe Subby would shoot us down?”
Celine chuckled. “Yes, but I don't see how they would collect if we're all dead.”
“People will bet on anything, it seems. okay, enough fooling around. Time to talk with the Esteemed Panjandrum himself, Director-General Herr Doctor Subramanyan Venderchanergee.”
Decision Point
UNSOC Control Room, New York City, June 17 2082, 1245 hrs
The last of the children was shooed out of the double doors from the UNSOC Control Room when Subramanyan Venderchanergee concluded his last deal. He checked his tie, flicked a bit of lint from his lapel, and ran a comb through his dark, oiled hair. It simply would not do to seem flustered, no matter what the crisis. He had watched events unfolding on the repeater screen in his office, but with the sound turned off, he was not truly aware of the extent of the disaster. Time to talk to the underlings, who would sort it all out for him.
Stepping briskly out of the door to his office, he made his way down his staircase and over to the raised platform in the back of the Control Room. To his surprise, all three head controllers were at their desks. He certainly hadn't ordered this. Glancing around, he noticed that the room seemed unusually crowded. Looking at his watch, he saw that the “B” shift was on. Rather than talk to Ms. Vedya, though, he turned to Fred Palowitz, who was senior to her.
“What's going on? Why are all the shifts here? I certainly didn't approve any overtime for this.”
Fred goggled briefly at him, then, hooking his thumb over to Gayatri, said, “Ask Gayatri, busy on a problem.”
Forestalling a certain explosion, Gayatri moved in smoothly. “There was a huge explosion on the Moon at fourteen hundred UTC, almost three hours ago. A huge shockwave, visible on the Chaffee, rolled over the position of Moonbase Collins. All communications have been lost with the colony.”
“Well, get them back!” Subramanyan ordered.
“We are trying, but they are not answering.”
“I bet their mast just got knocked over. Lazy, sheer inefficiency.” He shook his head. “The press will think they're dead, and that will make us look bad. It will make me look bad, understood?”
Now it was Gayatri's turn to look incredulous. Gus stepped into the breech.
“There's more, sir. At the time of the explosion, Chaffee's monitors recorded a large burst of radiation. We believe that the crew of the Chaffee has sustained major radiation exposure from the Lunar explosion, and we've been batting around the idea of sending them an emergency launch of anti-radiation medication.”
“At millions of credits per launch? Never. Let them ask for it first. If there was radiation, why weren't they i
n those solar shelters they demanded we build? All that time and money wasted for shelters that didn't work, obviously. Another black mark against me!”
Gus was shocked but tired, having been on the job for over fifteen hours. He could be excused for losing his temper.
“Now you listen to me, Subby, it ain't all about you for once.”
Subramanyan turned a dark hue under his usual light brown complexion. He opened his mouth to speak, but Gus rode him down.
“You've just had about three hundred people probably killed on the Moon, and a decent chance of losing a lot of folks on the Chaffee as well, you've been holed up in your office for three hours, and all you can think about are your press clippings?
“You ask about why there are so many shifts in here, and I'd love to tell you, but I can see from the little message light blinking that the good Commander Daniels from the Chaffee is on the line. I think she'd like to tell you herself.” He gestured to Fred who, with a flourish, spun the dial up on the audio speakers.
“Chaffee, this is CAPCOM B. We have the Director-General Subramanyan Venderchanergee with us. Please repeat your request.”
“Good afternoon, Director Venderchanergee. The crew of the Chaffee has sustained serious radiation poisoning from the event on the Moon. Without treatment, up to five percent of our crew will die within the next two weeks. In addition, we have been monitoring the debris from the event, and believe that it will intersect our orbit within the next two to four hours. Over the last thirty years, as you know, we have been constructing solar shelters from Lunar materials. What you don't know is that they have been designed to function as emergency escape and reentry vehicles. We believe they represent our only salvation. The Chaffee must be abandoned, and all crew must return to Earth. To stay aboard will be to risk certain death from the impact of space debris, the effects of radiation sickness, or both. I request the assistance of UNSOC for this reentry.” On screen, her face was composed and determined.
Subramanyan's thoughts raced. His first thought was that Commander Daniel was a rank coward. The Moon was hundreds of thousands of kilometers away. How could any explosion be a threat to his space station? Daniels was cutting and running from an imagined danger. Worse, evacuating all the crew, whether the ramshackle 'reentry vehicles' made it or not, meant that the Chaffee would be out of action for months as flight after flight would be needed to ferry a new crew back up to man the station and get operations—and, more importantly, money—flowing again.
“Request denied. Frankly, I am surprised at you, Commander Daniels, running away like this. Commander Holt would never do anything this drastic. In fact, I remember three years ago, wasn't everyone predicting some kind of meteor storm? Calls were out for evacuation of the Chaffee. Commander Holt appeared on the infonets, urging calm and stating his determination to stay. He lived. So will you. I order you to remain on board, and cancel this 'evacuation' of yours.”
“Sir, with all due respect, the matters are completely different. Meteor storms are one thing. This is a dense cloud of rock and soil blasted off the Moon. It will sweep throughout cis-lunar space, punching holes in everything in orbit. If we don't leave in the next four hours, our chances of getting hit rise to one in a thousand. The next orbit, ninety minutes later, we will face one in five hundred chances. It gets far worse after that; seven in eight in thirty-six hours.”
Subramanyan looked around at his controllers. “Do we confirm those numbers?” Fred, Gus, and Gayatri nodded yes. “From our own data or did it come from the Chaffee?”
Fred dropped his eyes and answered. “The Chaffee, sir.”
“Well, there you are. First, the Collins radar doesn't see the meteors that killed Angus Turley, and now you're telling me that yours sees dense clouds of them. Perhaps your radar is set so sensitively that it sees meteors that don't exist.
“Commander Daniels, until we can confirm your radar data and construct our own probability charts, you are ordered not to leave. That is how science works. Independent verification. I am not saying that you fudged the numbers, but we cannot have you abandoning your post from what could well be some error from your Astrogation section.”
Lisa put out her hand, forestalling a scathing retort from Celine.
“But our casualties from radiation sickness, sir. They need medical attention.”
“Why do you think I sent up a trained medic? Is this beyond him? Does he need to be replaced? If so, it will come out of your morale budget.”
Lisa controlled her anger with obvious difficulty. “Director, we've all been fried with about two Grays worth of radiation. We don't know what kind, though. But every counter went offscale. The medic tells me that about one person in twenty will die without prompt treatment. You've lost the Collins, sir, are you determined to lose the Chaffee, too?”
“Assuming your radiation sensors aren't also set to be too sensitive, when these alleged victims of radiation sickness become known, we'll send a rescue craft. In the meantime, Commander Daniels, and for the last time, I order you to stay put. Otherwise, the next shuttle will be bringing your replacement.” With that, he stalked off the CAPCOM platform, regally mounted his staircase to his office, and carefully closed the door.
Lisa remained on screen. She knew from her long-ago assignments in the Control Room that Subby was probably watching a relay of everything she sent. She also knew just how incompetent he was at the computer.
“CAPCOM, please advise us as to when you have acquired independent data on our incoming debris.”
“Will do, Chaffee.”
“There will also be some sideband data for you. Route it to, what was his name? Tom?”
“No problem, Lisa, we have all shifts here. Tom will handle the data. I'm guessing radar?”
“That and measurements on the radiation plume from the event site.”
“Roger, Chaffee. Anything else for us?”
“Negative, CAPCOM. This channel will remain open, but will be cutting outgoing audio and video for the time being. You need us, just holler and we will hear. Chaffee listening out.”
Fred wrote hurriedly on a scrap of paper and palmed it over to Gus. “Gayatri, it's getting near your normal lunch hour. Better go get your crew fed and drained. It might be a little dicey soon.”
The note said “Ready room, hook Tom into Chaffee's int. net. Msg inbound on it.”
As CAPCOM on shift, Gayatri stood and addressed all the shifts, “You heard Subramanyan. There will be no evacuation. C Shift, you are welcome to crash in the spare dorm if you want, or go home. Me, I would go for the dorm.” Fred brushed the side of his nose with his middle finger, falsifying her words. She saw the gesture and nodded to the entire staff. “Since we've got everyone here, we're going to do the normal lunch operations for the B shift early. Let's hit the cafeteria and the lavatory now, while A and C cover for us.” She bundled her shift out into the hallway and led them to the elevators. She instructed each car to head for the floor above the cafeteria, which held auditoriums for various events. She led her group inside and shut the doors. Waving them close to her, she spoke quietly.
“Look, we all know they have to evacuate the station. We all know Commander Daniels. She will disobey Subramanyan rather than place her people in danger. So, when we go back up there, we will assist Lisa in any way we can. We'll probably get fired. Well, tough. As I see it, if Commander Daniels is right, it's the end of space anyway. There is no way that anything can fly once the debris spreads itself out across orbital space. So I, for one, will happily disobey our Dear Leader rather than let our friends and colleagues get killed.
“But I can't make that decision for everyone. If you cannot, in good conscience, disobey Subramanyan, let me know and go home. We'll mark you as sick for the rest of the day and you will not get fired. Decide by the time we get back in the Control Room. I don't want any problems when things get sticky.” A rumble of assent followed her as she exited the auditorium and made her way to the cafeteria.
Aft
er B shift came back, the A and C crews had much the same talking to. Oddly enough, only five members total decided to stick with Subramanyan.
“What did Tom say, Gus?” Fred asked as he forked mashed potatoes into his mouth.
“Lisa sent some encrypted files that basically said, Screw Subby, we're going for it, and provided some detailed data about the sleds, expected aerodynamic forces, and anticipated landing zones. She's done her homework, Fred.”
“So, where do you think she's going to land?”
Gus took a sip of coffee from his well-stained mug. “Well, Fred, that's a toughie. Fortunately, her orbital path will carry her over the East Coast when she has to retrofire. She could land at any major airport up or down the East. If I had to guess, though, I would go for the old Shuttle strip down at the Cape, JFK in New York City, or even Stewart up in Orange County, New York. They're all over ten thousand feet long.”
“How well do you know these sleds, Gus?” Fred sawed through the overcooked slice of roast beef.
“I did some work on them when I was up there about three years ago. Heat shield is good, we won't have to worry about that. Avionics are kinda crude, servo-assisted cable, no fly-by-light. No hydraulics, of course.” Gus frowned suddenly as he put his mug down on the table with an audible clunk...
“What?” asked Fred.
Gus's face was immobile. “No landing gear. No provision for any. I remember, since one of the things I worked on was the design for the tiling of the sleds' belly. There were no doors for landing gear.”
“Then they're going to ditch in the ocean.”
“That's what everyone else was guessing. Wow, that really changes things. Forget about the airports, we're going to have to call in the Coast Guard.” Gus stared around him in wonder. “And every tugboat captain up and down the East Coast.”
Fred pushed his plate away from him and got to his feet. “We've got work to do.”
“We need one coordinator. Subby's useless. You want it, Fred? You outrank my by three months.”
Riddled Space Page 18
