“She actually said that? ‘Captain to captain?’”
Stephanie thought the President had turned a nice shade of angry red.
“Her exact words, Mr. President.”
“Jeez!” the President exclaimed in disbelief. He waved at a phone. “Captain Gilly, please make another call to the captain.”
Captain Gilly shook his head. “I think you should go through channels, sir.”
The President gestured at the other Secret Service agent. “See that General Harrison and the others get in here forthwith.”
The agent walked to the door, said something to someone outside and returned. “Five minutes, sir.”
The President turned to John Gilly and then pointed at the phone on the conference room table. “I asked you to make a phone call, Captain.”
“Aye, aye, sir.” He sounded resigned to Stephanie.
The President turned to her. “You understand, don’t you, Professor, that now and then it’s really cool to be President and be able to do whatever you damn well please?”
“Sir, it’s my working assumption you do that all the time.”
He laughed. “Oh God! Don’t I wish!”
It was a classic case of good timing. The President’s advisors arrived, then a bronzed young man escorted by two Secret Service agents. The young man was wearing a very skimpy Speedo bathing suit.
Stephanie gestured at the splendiferously endowed young man. “Anna thinks he’s really cute, and I’m sure you can see the reason why.”
The only people in the room not blushing were Stephanie and the President.
“Young man,” the President said, “your name, sir. I understand you are also an Air Force officer. If that is the case, your rank and duty assignment.”
“Sir, First Lieutenant Malcolm Woods; I’m the Air Force Project Liaison to the Ad Astra project.”
“Do you have any idea why I asked for you to attend this meeting?”
“No, sir. I was told by Captain Karen Thomas, my superior, to make myself available after 1700 hours today to answer any questions your party might have.”
“And you’re prepared now, no doubt, to answer any questions I might have?”
“Yes, sir!” the man said enthusiastically.
“What is the percentage of the hull that is complete?”
“More than 90%, sir! They expect it will be complete any day.”
“And how long did it take Professor Kinsella’s latest vehicle to reach Saturn?”
“Sir? Another vehicle? I wasn’t aware of another vehicle.”
Captain Gilly held up the phone and the President walked over and spoke into the handset. “Is this Captain Thomas?”
He pushed a button and everyone could hear a feminine voice say, “Yes, it is. May I ask who this is?”
“Did anyone ever teach you how to speak on the phone, Captain, when you don’t know who is on the other end?”
“Yes, of course. I was just talking to Captain Gilly.”
“Captain Thomas, I’ve put this on the speaker. Present is Captain John Gilly, US Navy, Professor Stephanie Kinsella of Caltech, Anna Sanchez, ditto, Air Force Lieutenant Malcolm Woods, Air Force Chief of Staff, General Samuel Harrison, NASA Administrator James Michaels, Steve Shale, the Chief of Staff to the President of the United States, and I’m the President. Please, Captain Thomas, I’m interested in your appreciation of the Ad Astra project and how it has progressed.”
Stephanie had been a little curious at first why no one else had spoken and then kicked herself. Who would want to speak into a firestorm?
“Sir, work on the hull continues. Contracts have been let for most of the hull, tankage, electronics, the turbines, all of that. The project is on time, sir!”
“Captain, the last of those contracts were let more than three months ago, weren’t they?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You make it sound like new news.”
“Well sir, it’s something we ticked off on the progress chart.”
“Three months ago. How much work has been done on the hull?”
“Quite a bit, sir. More than half.”
“Tell me, Captain, did Navy Captain Gilly call you and complain about the performance of Air Force Lieutenant Woods? Did you tell him, captain to captain, that he, Captain Gilly, was overzealous?”
“Well, we did exchange words, sir. I think, sir, the captain is new to his duties and doesn’t fully understand the difference between how we do things in the Air Force and how they do things in the Navy.”
The Air Force Chief of Staff stepped forward. “Captain, this is General Harrison. Why aren’t you here?”
“Colonel Arken, my superior at the Pentagon, asked me to be there no later than 0700 tomorrow morning, sir.”
“Where is Colonel Arken, Captain?”
“It is my understanding it was his intention to arrive around 1700 Hawaii local time this evening, sir. He’s en route.”
The President pushed the Air Force general aside. “This is the President again, Captain. Tell me, are you aware that Naval ranks differ from Air Force ranks?”
“No, sir. Is there a difference?”
“Captain, Captain Gilly suggested I not relieve you personally. I think that was out of some belated desire to save your career. Don’t bother to board the aircraft for your flight, Captain. I’m sure General Harrison will be able to get the word to you long, long before you’d have to be on that red eye... you are relieved of duty, Captain.”
“Sir, it’s a special flight, laid on by Colonel Arken himself!”
“Not any more,” the President said. “You just sit back and relax. Smoke, if you got ‘em. Check your civvies, you’re going to need them. For your information, Captain Thomas, Naval captains are the equivalent rank to Air Force full bird colonels. That, and he’s my personal representative to the Ad Astra Project. Hopefully in your next employment you will pay more attention to the details.”
The President waved to the lieutenant. “Go get dressed. Then await further orders. You also are no longer needed.”
The President turned to the others in the room. “With exception of General Harrison, I want the rest of you out.”
Anna sidled up to Stephanie out in the main office. “Remind me never to get on your bad side, boss!”
Stephanie laughed. “Oh, neither of those two were ever on my bad side. They did nothing to hinder the project. In fact, they were a positive factor, not interfering at all. Expect to start having someone every bit as active as Captain Gilly looking over your shoulder, and he’s probably going to put in his two cents worth. That’s when we start having to go to the mat more often and sooner.”
“I was going to say you think of everything, boss. But that’s not news.”
Stephanie smiled at her, and then smiled at John Gilly. “The really nice thing about all of this? It’s distracted the President about the main issue. Which means when he remembers it, he’s going to realize that I did a snow job on him, which means he’ll be suspicious of the new ideas... and give them more thought than he would have if we just bomb-shelled him.”
“Sometimes, Stephanie, it’s not nice to move people around like chess pieces,” Captain Gilly said quietly. “They start thinking you’re playing them.”
“Captain Gilly, I tell people what I think. I explain the arguments for and against and give my best judgment. I make it clear what I believe the best choice to be; I make it equally clear what I think the worst choice is. I do not wheedle, whinge, whine, wallow or carry on to get what I want. I do not opportune, beg... I could go on, but I think you get my drift.
“I learned when my age was still in single digits that I could present people with what I thought was a limited set of options... and they would pick something I’d not imagined. I worked on trying to take what I thought were wild cards into account. I eventually realized that ‘free will’ is just that, and what I thought was wild chance was actually something deeper. Even at this late date we have no idea wha
t role quantum phenomena play in consciousness or thought. A lot of theorists have tried to rule them in or out, but without success. I get all tingly just thinking about it.”
She smiled at him sweetly. “Not that kind of tingly, though.”
Everyone laughed, even the two Secret Service agents present.
Air Force General Harrison stuck his head into the room, a look of distaste on his face. “You’re laughing with Professor Kinsella when she just sent two Air Force officers to early retirements?”
The President’s Chief of Staff laughed again. “General Harrison, we were laughing at a comment on quantum theory. As for your two officers, I know of complaints from Captain Gilly about them, I know of none from Professor Kinsella or Miss Sanchez about them. In fact, a minute ago, Professor Kinsella was expressing regret at their departure.”
“The President wants everyone to return,” the general said, remembering his actual duty assignment at the moment.
They reentered the conference room. The President was blunt. “Professor Kinsella has been a busy little lady. Professor Kinsella, please show these gentlemen ‘Top Secret Kinsella.’”
She redid the briefing, virtually word for word the same until the end, when she simply, straightforwardly said, “The Citroen arrived in the vicinity of Saturn in fifteen-plus seconds. That is about 320 times the speed of light, for those who are interested.”
The NASA Administrator glanced at the President, who airily waved. “If you have a question, go ahead and ask.”
“Faster than light? You’re saying that you sent a vehicle to the vicinity of Saturn, then on to Vega? And you expect us to believe that?”
Stephanie shrugged. “It was my hope that we would be in a position to get close enough to photograph the Cassini probe, except we weren’t close enough to achieve that with the available fuel. So no, aside from my word, there is no proof.”
“And in less than a month, that, that vehicle will be at Vega?” The sneer in his voice was insulting.
“No, of course not. As I said, there wasn’t much fuel left. About an hour’s worth, was all. Right now it’s almost a light month away from Earth, out in the Oort Cloud, going considerably faster than the local speed limit, and something like three quarters of a million years from reaching where Vega was when we launched, and nowhere close to where Vega will be when it gets there. We do not, in fact, have any idea where Vega will be by then.”
“And we are to just take you at your word?”
“I’m looking forward to dinner in another month or so,” Stephanie said with a grin. “I’ve picked Rio de Janeiro, atop the mountain there.”
“Your ‘fleet’,” the NASA Administrator crowed, “has already had one accident, not to mention an unauthorized flight to Mars.”
“As I told the President a short while ago, the pilots who went to Mars were discharged. As for the malf on the supply vehicle, that was a fan failing shortly after takeoff. The pilot circled the field and landed safely. Too bad Challenger couldn’t do that, when a solid-fuel rocket booster malfunctioned during liftoff.”
“Don’t you dare bring those brave people into this, Professor!” the NASA Administrator said with so much vitriol, he was spitting.
“I have the utmost regard and respect for that crew, sir,” Stephanie said with aplomb. “Someday I’ll lose someone I’m responsible for, and I’ll cry myself to sleep for weeks. In the meantime I spend every waking minute making the risks to my crews as small as possible and do everything I can to insure that I share those risks.”
“Mr. Administrator,” the President interjected, “I think you’re finished here. I put up with NASA’s tomfoolery for long enough. You have done nothing at all to adjust and adapt to the new order. It’s time to put a stop to this. Please go to where our aides are waiting. Ask Miss Celia Bonaventure to step in. She’ll be taking over for you. Have your resignation in my hand by the close of business today.”
You could see in the Administrator’s eyes, the wheels going around. Finally he had to ask, “Who is she?”
“Deputy Assistant for Space Affairs to the President’s Science Advisor. A particularly fortunate choice of name, too. She will be the caretaker NASA Administrator. Monday I plan on asking Congress for authority to create a US Space Service, to deal with space exploration. NASA has shown itself singularly ill-suited to have any role to play in the future. NASA will be broken up, various research groups assigned to other agencies, the Space Centers evaluated, and some of them probably closed down as well.”
The man turned ashen. “You’re going to let this woman destroy nearly fifty years of NASA achievements?”
The President was gentle. “If you want NASA to go out on a high note, shut your mouth and go fetch your replacement. If you want to make a public fuss about this, you’ll be sitting next to Stan Benko from here on out, talking about space flight on Letterman and Leno, with guest appearances on Saturday Night Live. Give my regards to Jon Stewart.”
Everyone in the room winced, even the now ex-NASA Administrator.
A few minutes later a woman in her mid-fifties appeared. She looked the President in the eye. “I’m at your service, sir.”
“Good. After we finish here, Professor Kinsella will brief you in on some new developments.”
He turned to Stephanie. “Professor, how expensive are the modifications to Benko-Chang turbines to allow them to travel faster than light?”
“Nil, sir. Slightly higher power consumption, slightly different numbers on magnetic field strengths and vortice spins.”
The new woman sighed. Stephanie thought there were tears in her eyes. “I take no pride, no pleasure, in what you’ve asked me to do in the event I was called, Mr. President. But I will do it.”
“That, Celia, is all I ask of anyone.”
The woman turned to Stephanie Kinsella. “I don’t suppose you’d like to engage in a small wager? You guess how much money I have in my wallet and I will kiss some serious bootie in your name until the end of time. If you miss, I get your slot on Ad Astra.”
“Folding bills or change too?” Stephanie asked.
The woman blinked, started to say something, and then swallowed. “Bills.”
“You are middle-aged woman without a wedding ring. You are careful, cautious and self-assured. That means either a fifty or a hundred dollar bill. Odds are you live in one of the tonier suburbs of DC. So, there’s a folded hundred dollar bill that you never use, except in emergencies, tucked in between some pictures. Other than that, you don’t have any cash.”
“Kiss, kiss,” the woman said, laughing.
“Every time you see the President, Miss Bonaventure, I’d like you to remind him what a sterling person I am, not to exceed once a week.” Stephanie reached for her purse, pulled out her wallet, and extracted a folded hundred dollar bill from between pictures of her mother and father and waved it for all to see.
Everyone laughed.
The President waved at Stephanie. “I assume that this means you want to change the first mission itinerary.”
“Yes, sir. Obviously, first we will do a considerable amount of due diligence and research before we put a full crew aboard and head out. But I’d like to propose Tau Ceti as a destination, after Mars. It will significantly extend the mission time, from a week to a month, but Ad Astra will be provisioned for a year.”
“You understand that my purpose in coming here this weekend was to congratulate you on your progress, and then name the Air Force general who will command the mission, and the Air Force colonel who will command Ad Astra?”
“And I told you that I’m a big girl, that you are the man who makes the decisions. I am not pleased with this one. So, sir, I have this.”
She delved into her purse and pulled out a thick wad of paper. She put it face down on the table and slid it towards the President. He caught it, and only belatedly did his Secret Service agents react. The President growled at them, and they went back to their places, all of their eyes now on Steph
anie.
He read the cover page and lifted an eyebrow. Then he flipped the first pages over and started in on the executive summary.
The Chief of Staff spoke after five minutes. “Sir? We have a schedule and we’re already well behind.”
The President looked up at him without speaking, then turned to Stephanie. “Well, at least there is one project I’m tolerably sure you don’t want to be co-opted in the tiniest bit for.”
“Roger that,” Stephanie told him. “Just food for thought. I want nothing to do with it. Ever.”
Much later the President turned to John Gilly at the luau in the President’s honor that evening. “I was surprised not to have roast suckling pig. Not that Beijing Duck isn’t welcome.”
John Gilly laughed. “Sir, Professor Kinsella dictated the menu.”
The President looked at him, frowning.
John Gilly kissed his Naval career goodbye. “Sir, she’s serving you dead duck.”
“Ah! I don’t suppose one of the legs was broken?”
“A lame dead duck? I think she takes that as a given.”
“Well, in eight months or so, the new presidential campaign starts in earnest. The only way that I’m a dead duck now derails Ad Astra. The only way I get to be a lame duck is if I decide not to run, which isn’t going to happen, or a couple of years from now if I win the election.”
“What was the new proposal she gave you, sir?” John asked.
The President smiled thinly. “It’s well above your pay-grade, John. Way beyond. A few minutes ago I was thinking that if I didn’t run, I could leave this to my successor. Except you don’t get where I am unless you have an ego a mile wide and a mile deep. I’ll find a way to deal with it.”
“Deal with what, sir?” John asked.
The President smiled and shook his head.
Chapter 7 — Help Is On the Way
Stephanie Kinsella was standing at her white board contemplating a series of equations when Captain John Gilly knocked on her door. “Professor?”
Kinsella (Kinsella Universe Book 1) Page 12
