Zero-G

by Alton Gansky

  “They . . . um . . . they tell me that you’re having a little trouble up there.”

  “I’ve had better trips.” He shuddered. “I miss you more than I can say.”

  There was fear in her voice. “I miss you too. I . . . I want you to come home safe.”

  Tuck started to speak but failed. It took several moments and every ounce of concentration he could muster to speak the words. “Do you still have those pork chops in the freezer?”

  There was a pause before Myra responded. “Yes.”

  “I’m talking about the thick-cut ones.”

  “Those are the ones.”

  He heard her confusion. “Good. I’ll be back soon and I’m thinking of having some friends over for a barbeque. Will you make potato salad?”

  “Of course.”

  “Good. On second thought, let’s make it just a family affair. Do you understand what I’m saying, Myra?”

  “Yes. I know you’ll make it home.”

  “That I will, kiddo. I’ve got the best team in the world on the job.”

  “I know, baby. I know.” The effort to put on a brave front collapsed like a wall and Tuck heard every brick land. His heart ached and he lowered his head into his hands. Even two hundred miles above the Earth, traveling faster than a bullet with half his crew dead, he had to be brave for his family.

  “The kids are here, baby. They want to talk to you.”

  What steel remained in Tuck’s spine melted.

  The next voice over the line was higher than Myra’s. “Daddy?”

  “Hey, gorgeous. How’s my pretty Penny? Did Mom take you shopping for school?”

  She was crying. “Yes. Daddy . . . Daddy . . .”

  “I’m coming home, sweetheart. Got that? I’ll be there to torment any boys you bring to the house.”

  Penny’s laugh came wrapped in a sob. “In that case, I’m going to the mall and round up some.”

  “That’s it. You’re grounded for the next twenty-two years.”

  “I . . . love you, Daddy.”

  Tuck fought back the sobs. His daughter’s voice, the tone, the timbre, brought more pain than the fear of death. “Remember all those stars we see at night? My love . . . is bigger.”

  The connection fell silent for a moment, then Myra came across the link. “Gary is having a little trouble right now. He wants to talk but he doesn’t think he can.”

  “Tell him I understand; I’m having a little trouble myself.”

  “This is kinda tough on the kids.”

  “I know. I wish it weren’t so.”

  “Tuck, there’s so much to say, I don’t know where to begin.”

  “Just tell me you love me. That will say everything I need to hear.”

  “I love you more than I can say.”

  “And I love you with every breath. You take care of the kids. Make sure Gary keeps up his math and . . .” Tuck broke. Words were now useless, but the connection between them was greater than anything science and engineering could manufacture.

  “We’re praying, Tuck. We’re praying every minute.”

  “Me too, kid. Me too. Does Dad know?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Good. Don’t tell him yet. There’s nothing he can do but worry and he doesn’t need that.”

  “I’ll wait, but he’ll be here soon. He’ll find out.”

  “I understand. Do what you think is right. I’m not at my best right now.”

  “They said you’re feeling and acting better.”

  “My head’s clearing. I’m not as foggy. Myra, listen, I’m assuming they’ve told you about Jodie and Jared and Vinny. They have family. You’re good with people in tough situations. They’re going to need some strength. Do you know what I mean? Someone with spiritual roots.”

  “I know what you mean. I’ll do what I can.”

  A moment of relief ran through Tuck. Helping others would help her. “Okay, baby. Give yourself a hug for me. I’ve got to get back to work and see if I can’t come home and annoy you some more.”

  “You can annoy me anytime.”

  “I’m coming home, Myra, but if this goes south any more . . . You’re the best thing that ever happened to me.”

  Sobs covered the first words but Tuck made out, “. . . me too.”

  Tuck straightened and filled his lungs. A moment later, he packed away his runaway emotions in the stowage of his mind. “Houston, Atlantis.”

  “Go ahead, Atlantis.” It was Rick.

  “What’s next, CAPCOM?”

  THREE

  Tuck pushed back from Russ and studied his work. Under Bob’s direction, Tuck had moved to middeck and retrieved a medical kit. With Atlantis stabilized, the autopilot engaged, and the downlink antenna realigned, Bob could get better information, more than Tuck could tell him. First he’d examined Jess. Now it was Russ’s turn.

  Guided by the flight surgeon, Tuck took Russ’s blood pressure and listened to his lungs. He could tell by the way Bob spoke that he and the others considered him “skill impaired.” They were probably right. It took him twice as long as necessary to do the simple task of exposing Russ’s chest and attaching the leads. The onboard video cameras provided Mission Control with a real-time view of all that Tuck was doing. He felt less alone.

  “Houston, ECG is in place. Ready to downlink.”

  “It’s coming through fine, Tuck.”

  “Same as Jess, Houston?”

  “Stand by one, Atlantis.”

  A minute passed like an eon. He had placed the same kind of electrodes on Jess’s chest. Any reluctance he felt exposing her skin evaporated in the earnest desire to see her live. While social courtesies existed on a space mission, one could not be an astronaut and be overly modest. During liftoff or EVAs, Tuck had to wear things in places he couldn’t discuss in polite company.

  “Atlantis, Houston, this is Surgeon. I’m getting the same readings. Heart rate high, and blood pressure dropping. The heart is trying to keep up with the BP drop.”

  “What causes that, Doc?”

  “A whole fistful of things. Medications for heart disease, antidepressants, narcotic analgesics, anti-anxiety meds, dehydration, anaphylaxis.”

  “None of those sound likely, Bob.”

  “We’re back to the patches again. I can’t think of anything else.”

  “Someone is going to have to make a decision.” Tuck held none of his exasperation back.

  “Tuck, Rick here. We are making decisions, scores of them, including the big one. We’re bringing you home. We can’t risk you trying to dock with ISS. I think you know why.”

  “You think I’ll park this thing in their living room.”

  “I wouldn’t have been so graphic. We’re going to go with full autoland and need you to start preparing for de-orbit.”

  “What about Vinny?” Tuck gazed out the aft windows. Vinny remained like a white-cloaked statue on the end of the manipulator arm. Vinny deserved better.

  “That’s first on our list. We’ve been doing sims down here and think we have an idea.”

  “The simulators show I can get him back inside?”

  “Negative, Commander.”

  “I’m not cutting him adrift, Rick.”

  “No one is asking you to, but . . . You’re not going to like this either.”

  “You want me to retract and place the arm with Vinny still attached. My brain is fuzzy, Rick, but it isn’t gone.”

  “I’m afraid that’s all we can do.”

  “You’re not being creative enough, Houston. Let me get close to the ISS and then a couple of the boys can EVA to Vinny, unhook him, and come through the air lock.”

  “Great idea, Tuck, but we don’t have time. Surgeon thinks we may lose Jess and Russ if they don’t get help soon.”

  “Vinny wouldn’t do this to one of us.” Anger shoved sorrow aside.

  “Yes, he would, Commander, and you know it. If he were alive, then we’d move the Moon itself to get him home. You know that. I kn
ow that. But that isn’t the situation.”

  “Then what is the situation, Rick?”

  “Don’t make me say it.”

  “Spell it out.”

  The pause seemed interminable. “We don’t risk the lives of the living for the dead. We’re bringing Vinny home, but we can’t do anything for him now. The longer we wait, the greater the risk that the rest of your crew will die.”

  Tuck rubbed his forehead, and for a moment he wished he could trade places with Vinny. He looked around the flight deck. Many had touted the Atlantis and her sister craft as the most complex machines ever constructed. Now it was the tomb for three dead, two dying, and one lone, afflicted man trying to make sense of it all.

  “Understood, Houston. Talk me through it.”

  “You worked the RMS on your first mission. We want you to retract and park the manipulator arm in the payload bay.”

  “Then what?”

  “Close the bay.”

  “What about Vinny. I mean, what about his body?”

  “We’ll recover him once you’re home.”

  Tuck couldn’t believe what he heard. “You want me to leave his body in the payload bay, still strapped to the manipulator arm?”

  “There’s no other way, Tuck. This is the absolute best we can do. As soon as that’s done, we want you to start prep for de-orbit.”

  No words came to Tuck. The image of Vinny in his space suit, feet still strapped to the end of the fifty-foot arm of the manipulator, threw him into an emotional vacuum. He started to protest but refrained. With no solution to offer, he would just be wasting time.

  For a few moments, he toyed with the idea of using the RMS to bring Vinny close, then suiting up and going out to get him, but the idea, brave and noble as it was, melted under the heat of logic. He might be able to get into a space suit by himself, but he doubted it. Just trying would eat up time that Jess and Russ didn’t have. In his last dress rehearsal with a space suit, it had taken close to two hours to don the three-hundred-pound suit, and that was with help. Slipping into the suit alone and muddle-headed could take twice that, assuming it was even possible.

  The thought of reclaiming Vinny’s body pulled at him, but the vision of dragging Vinny through the airlock, securing his body, then returning to the flight deck to find Russ and Jess dead quenched the desire.

  Mission Control was right. He hated it, but they were right.

  Tuck drew a deep breath, stepped to the aft flight deck control station, and took hold of the translation and rotational hand controller for the remote manipulator. This was a two-person job: one controller and one crewman to operate the video cameras in the bay and those on the nine-hundred-pound arm.

  He moved slowly, working the articulated manipulator arm and its six “joints.”

  Sweat dotted his forehead and his heart felt encased in concrete.

  “Dear God, what went wrong?”

  “Say again, Atlantis.”

  “Sorry, Rick, but I wasn’t talking to you.”

  “Understood, Tuck. There have been a lot of those conversations down here.” A pause. “PDRS shows manipulator arm activity.”

  Not far from where Rick sat in MCC, the Payload Deploy Retrieval Systems monitor recorded and relayed everything Tuck did.

  With hands on the controls, Tuck closed his eyes and forced his breathing to slow. A familiar sensation oozed through him: detachment — a common emotional state for those who routinely faced dangerous situations. He had learned it in pilot’s school; his father had learned it in the fire department.

  The thought of his father calmed him. The distance between them might be great, but Tuck could still see the old man: gray hair, wrinkles forged in the furnace of life, and eyes that still danced.

  Tuck opened his eyes, gazed out the aft view windows, then turned his eyes to the video monitors at the right. He had already selected two of the six available cameras to help him guide the massive arm back into the payload compartment.

  One of the questions Tuck had answered a dozen times in his many talks to students dealt with zero gravity. Truth is, he would explain, there is no such thing as zero gravity. There is always some measure of the force, even in what appears to be empty space. What astronauts experienced was microgravity — gravity at such a low level that its force is difficult to experience.

  The companion myth dealt with weightlessness. Many assumed that a weightless environment made something massless, and that was dangerous thinking. The arm that Tuck manipulated weighed nearly half a ton. Without appreciable gravity, it could be moved easily and extended in a way that couldn’t be done on Earth. However, it still possessed its mass, and if Tuck were to lose control and bring the robotic arm in too quickly, he could seriously damage Atlantis and possibly kill everyone on board — those who were still alive.

  Having reminded himself of those facts, Tuck began the retrieval and stowage procedure. His eyes moved from aft window to video monitors to the instrument panel with its switches and digital display of yaw, pitch, and more. He moved with caution, doing a two-person job by himself.

  As the arm retracted, Vinny’s lifeless body wiggled in a macabre dance, its inertia resisting the movement of the mechanical device. His arms moved up and down and his torso twisted at the waist. The unnatural motion reminded Tuck of the time Vinny, well lubricated with Italian wine, tried to teach his fellow astronauts the Macarena. That had been at Jess’s birthday party. The memory stung.

  The white space suit was Vinny’s cocoon. It protected him against the 500-degree shifts in temperature that anything in space experiences. In direct sun, the suit fended off 250-degree heat; in shade, it shielded him from 250 degrees below zero.

  Odd, Tuck thought, that Vinny died not from the many threats outside his suit, but likely from something he wore on his neck.

  Foot by foot, then inch by inch, Tuck brought the arm in until it settled in its latches. Engineers had not designed the RMS arm to be docked with something attached to its distal end. Tuck had to twist the platform on which Vinny’s feet were attached ninety degrees to the resting arm. It tore at Tuck to do so. He felt like he was securing a stray piece of equipment rather than one of his crew. The thought of Vinny riding through reentry in the payload compartment threatened to shred Tuck’s mind. He had no idea what it might do to Vinny.

  Tuck closed the payload doors.

  FOUR

  Tuck finished putting on the gloves of his orange launch/entry suit, or LES. The LES was a vital safety element, designed to pressurize should the cabin suddenly lose pressure during liftoff or reentry. It also served as an anti-G suit, a contraption that helped crew face the increase in g-forces endured during the trip back to Earth. If all went well, they would experience only two Gs, but for crews who had spent several days in microgravity, two Gs could be a lot. Unfortunately, Tuck could not dress his unconscious crewmembers in the suits.

  Tuck had done all that had been asked of him. He had secured everything that needed securing, checked on Jess and Russ again, checked the five-point harness system that held the crew to their seats, and done something never done before. For a complete autoland, Tuck had to string a cable from avionics on middeck to the flight deck. That data cable allowed control of items such as the air-data probes and the landing gear —work the crew would normally handle.

  Tuck was now a passenger.

  The only good news came with Jess and Russ. While they had showed no improvement, they had also showed no decline. For that, Tuck was thankful.

  He felt the OMS fire and saw the indicators on his panel. The Orbital Maneuvering System consisted of a pair of six-thousand-pound thrusters at the aft end of the orbiter that provided the final boost into orbit. They also slowed Atlantis for de-orbit. Atlantis had already been flipped to the correct reentry attitude. As it turned, Tuck saw the Department of Defense satellite they had come to repair — the satellite Vinny had worked on. Tuck had no idea if Vinny had finished the work, and he didn’t care. The Department of
Defense could wait.

  “Houston, Atlantis.”

  “Go ahead, Atlantis.”

  “I see DOD 63 off our starboard side. How close have we been to that beast?” The surveillance satellite was the size of a bus. Tuck, in the midst of drug poisoning, had forgotten about the device.

  “It was never a problem.”

  “Houston, let’s have an understanding. I want you to keep me fully apprised of all things. I don’t want any of that John Glenn garbage.”

  During John Glenn’s Mercury mission, an instrument light at MCC indicated Glenn’s heat shield had come loose. If true, Glenn would die on reentry. Mission Control kept the information from him. Something Glenn took exception to — loudly.

  “It was never a problem, Tuck.”

  Tuck looked at the satellite. A fender-bender collision with it would have meant disaster — greater disaster.

  “Just so that we’re clear, gentlemen.”

  “OMS burn is good. Attitude is good.”

  “Roger that, Houston.”

  Tuck leaned his helmeted head back and gazed at the starry sky. There was little for him to do. Normally the intercom would be full of chatter from slightly nervous crew who waited to ride the meteor. No voices came over the headset.

  The OMS burn had slowed Atlantis by only two hundred miles an hour. Not much compared to the Mach 25 she was traveling.

  Soon the craft would dip into the atmosphere and begin its guided plunge to Earth.

  “Four hundred thousand feet. Guidance looks good.”

  Atlantis was dropping into the atmosphere but was still more spacecraft than aircraft. The computers kept the forty-degree nose-up attitude, preventing Tuck from seeing anything but black space. Before him, a monitor showed the orbiter’s descent.

  “Rick, is my family there?”

  “Roger that, Tuck. They’re in the viewing area. They can hear you.”

  “Dad too?”

  “Yup. He’s a little put-out with you. Apparently you promised to help him fix his truck.”