by James Harris
“Get out!” Joe said. “The one with your actual body inside?”
“The very one. Captured in some detail, I might add.”
“Dad, does anyone really know what your crypt is?” Joe asked. “You know, what it holds? Where it’s from? That sort of thing.”
“Joe, they know the object is not from this planet. My family crest on the lid is a dead giveaway. It’s in alien symbols. I have to recover the crypt before anyone else discovers its secrets.”
“How?” Joe asked.
“The U.S. Space Shuttle Atlantis has a flight scheduled this month. It’s a classified Department of Defense mission that I initiated and the Secretary of Defense approved. It’s a public mission as far as the on-board experiments go, but the retrieval payload is classified as a military secret. The mission – sealed to the crew until orbiting – is to retrieve my orbiting crypt using the Canadarm, a retrieval mechanism that juts out from the space shuttle and grabs objects.”
Grayer continued. “One of us has to be on board to observe the retrieval and protect the crypt until I can get it.”
“On board Atlantis?” Joe said. “Are you crazy? None of us are trained as astronauts.”
“Not crazy. We must secure the crypt before someone else does.”
“We aren’t trained for that type of situation.”
“True. But the role would be non-interactive or combative. It would be clandestine.”
“Space recovery operation! I don’t know, Dad,” Joe said. He looked at Hawk with a “help me” expression.
“Although it will be the trained crew actually operating the machinery, we must be there to make sure it arrives back on Earth safely into my hands. No one else can know about this. Whoever goes cannot be part of the official crew roster.”
“A stowaway?” Joe said. “A stowaway on Atlantis! That’s impossible.”
“Difficult but not impossible. Stell and his group must not be aware of our plan. If we go on board publicly, he will immediately know and ruin our chances. Our only hope is secrecy.”
There was a contemplative silence for a moment.
“If we recover your crypt, can you revert to your stored body?” Hawk asked.
“I could, I guess.”
“Didn’t you tell me that if you were restored to your original body, you would regain all your old strength and powers?”
“Hold on, Hawk, I’m not Superman. Besides, I have no such plans. We have to rescue my crypt as quickly as possible now that NASA knows about it. We don’t want it to fall in the wrong hands.”
“OK, good to know,” Joe said. “Well, I vote we fire up our own spaceship and scoop up the crypt ourselves.”
“Sorry, Joe, but Alpha III was not designed to retrieve objects from outer space. There’s no way to snag it and we couldn’t bring the crypt on board. You can’t just open the hatch in outer space.”
Grayer explained that the best chance was for someone to stow aboard the shuttle dressed as a crewmember.
“Because Stell’s watching my every move, I can’t go on the mission. It is somewhat risky, but I’m asking one of you to go on the mission in my place. The one with the best skills at cloaking their presence and movements.”
“Which one of us?” Joe asked, but he already knew the answer.
“Hawk.”
On the day of the launch, Hawk drove to the east Florida coast in his bright red Corvette. He drove to the Kennedy Space Center as instructed by Grayer. Outside Gate 1 he read the sign: United States Air Force, Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS), Main Gate.
At that time of the morning, the white Florida sand beside the newly paved entrance road was nearly blinding. Hawk glanced to his left, on the driver’s side, to the northwest. He saw the blue outline of Banana River. To the right he squinted into the sun and saw the Trident Turn Basin.
There was a single military guard at the post. Hawk smiled and presented the credentials his father had secured for him in Washington. He was waved through. His adrenaline spiked: The plan was working so far!
It was a warm, sunny December day. Hawk pointed the car north along Cape Road toward the Mission Control Center. The facility was on a peninsula – almost an island – that jutted east from Florida’s Atlantic coast. It was shaped like a squat triangle with the long base facing west, inland, toward the Banana River and the apex toward the ocean. To the right of Cape Road was ICBM road with all its launch complexes. They were neatly aligned along the ocean shore directly to the east.
The Corvette was covered with a fine layer of white sand as Hawk turned left into the mission area for 39-B. The road was crudely paved with a topcoat of tar over a crushed stone surface. It seemed as if the road was meant to be temporary.
He parked his car as inconspicuously as possible in the east parking lot. He locked it and hid the keys under the wheel well. The morning sun was rising higher in the thick, humid atmosphere. A film of perspiration coated his bare arms. He noticed a flurry of activity as the shuttle was being ferried carefully into place. He had arrived right on schedule.
Hawk was wearing a ground crew uniform supplied by his father, which allowed him to fit in with the other personnel. The launch area was guarded, but with only a light guard detail.
He waited for the right time. A small group of fitting engineers was on their mid-morning break, downing coffee and doughnuts from a supply van parked nearby. Hawk joined the cluster of workers as they returned to the launch area.
A guard checked everyone’s credentials and Hawk was allowed to pass unchallenged. Grayer’s people had done a good job with his fake ID. In fact, it wasn’t fake at all. It was the genuine article, printed on real DoD stock. Only Hawk’s identity had been invented.
Hawk settled in at the administrative building, waiting for the most opportune time to stow away on the craft.
CHAPTER54
Hawk stared in awe at the three giant aft thrusters of the shuttle. The magnificent white tail fin had to be thirty feet above the fuselage. Hawk, disguised as a flight engineer, carried a supply box to the flight deck. He never deplaned. He slipped into the cargo hold behind the crew quarters and hid behind the gold foil cargo protective cover in the aft of the craft. White curved slabs of insulation protected the inner portion of the shuttle from the extremities of space. Hawk slid down the curved aft bay and waited staring up at the long delicate-looking Canadarm mounted on the sidewall. Before long there was a wailing warning of the all-clear for take-off. Hawk pressurized his smuggled space gear and strapped himself like some kind of space merchandise into the cargo bay under the gold foil.
He was surprised and disquieted by the feel of liftoff. Having trained in the interstellar ship Alpha III for the past five years, he had become accustomed to gravity buffers. At NASA, gravity was still a demon to be dealt with.
He had never experienced the gut-wrenching Gs of gravity. On the scout ship there was no discomfort at all, because the computer instantly counter-gyroed the force of gravity. At one point Hawk thought he was going to puke because of the forces.
After the trauma of a rough and shaky launch, Hawk explored the cargo bay while the crew up front wrestled with their assigned tasks.
The mission was scheduled to last four days. Hawk could survive in his spacesuit but decided to rest in the comfort of the crew’s quarters where there was warmth and fresh air. This seemed like a bold move, but in reality it was not as difficult as he had imagined. He implanted a subliminal mental command in the crewmembers that rendered him invisible to them. On the rare occasions they might see him, they wouldn’t believe their own eyes. He didn’t have to do this often because he went out of his way to avoid contact with the crew. When it couldn’t be helped, he did his best to make the contact brief. He was a “ghost” and the crew would begin to feel uneasy if he lengthened his contact time. He had heard about space hallucinations and didn’t want the crew of the Atlantis to suffer from them. The watchword was: lie low.
By the end of the first d
ay, the orbiter reached a comfortable orbit at 290 miles. At that distance from the planet it was dangerously close to losing gravitational proximity to Earth and drifting out into space.
The crypt had been jettisoned as the scout ship had struck Earth’s atmosphere. The shuttle had been programmed to intercept the co-ordinates of the crypt. It was now resting at orbital range 289.5, half a mile from the shuttle’s orbit. Half a mile may not seem like much in the vastness of space, but it was. When inches were crucial for contact and grab it meant a huge amount of space had to be bridged between shuttle and target. The orbiter was about 122 feet long with a wingspan of 78 feet. The target was an object about 8 feet long and 3 feet wide. The orbiter crew would require a lot of finesse to maneuver the craft close enough for the space object to be within the Canadarm’s reach.
The craft’s orbit velocity was 25,405 feet per second. The crew would have to align the craft with the small target space object, match the object’s speed, snatch the object, and stow it in the cargo bay.
At the end of day two, contact was made with the space object. The sun’s rays reflected starkly off its gleaming body. The crew pressed their noses against the flight deck windows, staring in wonder at this small mysterious object floating in space. The strange markings slowly came into view. The object was not terrestrial.
Hawk had patched himself into the ship’s intercom. When he heard the crew begin to talk about the unknown object, he moved quickly through the flight deck. One by one he temporarily disabled the cameras on which mission engineers from the Kennedy Space Center could see his image.
He crept past the distracted flight crew and studied the transmission feed to the space center. Following special instructions from his father, he studied the series of banks of gray radio equipment above the flight console. He was to disable the radio temporarily by removing its fuses. He would return the fuses as the flight ended and the shuttle descended toward California.
Next he jimmied open the faceplate. The radio bank swung toward him on a piano hinge. Snakes of wires gushed outward. Behind the wire harnesses were the primary fuse buses. Grabbing the panel door with one hand, he twisted out a radio com (communication) fuse. There were two backup radios. He removed them. The transponder and guidance equipment remained untouched. Only the parts transmitting internal audio/video to KSC were disabled. The crew’s intercom was not affected.
Finally, he disabled the in-flight voice and video recorders. There would be no record of the nature of this flight’s cargo.
Hawk faded into the background as he listened to the crew chatter excitedly about discovering the first space artifact.
Then, as the crew retired to their sleeping quarters, he eased himself into an aft corner of the cargo deck and drifted off into a dreamless sleep. There was no hint that they sensed his presence.
CHAPTER55
The next day was bright and sunny, like every day in space – bright and sunny, and cold.
Hawk knew it was the day of the retrieval. He kept out of the way, hidden by the gold foil cover at the aft fuselage. There was a movement in front of him. A crewmember climbed in the back and released the Arm from the sidewall. The fuselage opened up. The Canadarm began to lift away and outward like a child stretching in the early morning. The uncurling action was slow and deliberate. Mission Specialist William Shepherd was controlling the Arm. He gently stretched the Canadarm out toward the crypt. It snaked through space like a divining rod toward water.
Shepherd, standing at the aft flight deck, watched the slowly uncoiling Canadarm through the rear viewing windows as it reached out farther and farther from the orbiter. His left hand was on the joystick of the rotational hand controller, while his right hand was operating the Arm remotely through the computer controls at the payload station.
Bob Gibson, the flight commander, popped up through the interdeck hatch. “How’s it going?”
Shepherd smiled back, slightly distracted. He never took his eyes off the Arm or the computer monitor. “Going good. This Arm is a wonder.”
“Saves us a lot of work. Mind if I join you on deck? I don’t want to be a distraction, though.”
“No bother, Commander.”
Gibson examined the procedure with interest. He alternated between watching the broadcast monitors and the actual movement of the Arm through space, seen through the viewing windows. The Arm moved slowly and smoothly. Shepherd had carefully aligned the Arm with the floating space object.
The voice of Guy Gardner crackled through the aft flight deck speakers. “Five meters, Bill.”
“Roger, Cap.”
“Four. Steady on. Three meters. Two meters. Stand by, Mr. Shepherd.”
The outstretched Arm was symbolic of the moment: man’s reaching out to an alien civilization.
“One meter. Careful. No sudden movements, Mr. Shepherd.”
Gardner continued piloting the shuttle closer and closer to the crypt.
“Hold her there, Cap.”
“All stop, Mr. Shepherd. It’s yours now.”
Reverse thrusters negated the forward progress of the orbiter until it perfectly matched the speed of the object. The orbiter’s velocity was held.
“You’re good for the snag,” Captain Gardner said. “I read close to zero velocity variance between us and the object.”
“Roger that, Cap, I’m reaching to snag.”
The Canadarm inched out and touched the side of the crypt. The end of the Arm opened its jaws and tentatively reached out. The clawlike hand grasped the object firmly but gently. The pistons of the Arm reversed, pulling the crypt back toward the payload bay.
“Docking successful. Coupling completed. Payload Retrieval underway. Estimated time of retrieval is ten minutes. Object weight is unknown.”
“Roger, Mr. Shepherd. Congrats. Now let’s see if we can bring the eagle back to the nest.”
The giant Arm started to bend at the elbow. It cautiously edged the crypt closer and closer to the payload bay. Hawk nervously watched the sarcophagus of his father sliding closer and closer through space.
The glowing crypt hovered above the open bay. It was starkly blue and white against the blackness of space. The emblem was clearly visible. Although the representation was gibberish to other humans, Hawk recognized the symbol as the property of the House of Narok.
The Arm slowly lowered the crypt down into the bowels of the bay past the Hughes (Intelsot) symbol boldly painted on the rear. It released it, then slowly curled itself up and settled into the payload bay.
Crewmember Ross secured the Arm against the wall and tied down the crypt.
“Mission complete, Captain. The payload is secure in the bay.”
“Roger, Mr. Shepherd. Prepare to close bay doors … Hold on.”
“What is it, sir?”
“I thought I saw a person in the payload area.”
“Yes. That was Ross. He’s back in the cabin.”
“I don’t mean him. I saw him.”
“Nope. We’re all here.”
“Including the Commander?”
“I’m here, Captain Gardner.”
“Mullane and Ross are with me on the flight deck. That accounts for all five of us.”
“Then who the hell did you see in the bay?” Gibson asked.
“Mullane, play back the security tape, please.”
“That camera’s off-line, sir,” Mullane said.
“What …” Gardner said. “Why didn’t we know?”
There was a flurry of activity as buttons were pushed.
“The alarm’s not functioning either,” Ross said.
“Damn! Will someone get this camera back on? How many other security cameras aren’t working?”
The men fell silent as Mullane and Ross checked the systems.
“Four in all, sir.”
“Let’s fix them,” Gardner said.
“I’m not sure we can, sir,” Mullane said. “We have no spare parts for this equipment.”
“What about the
alarms? How many are out? We sure as hell need our alarm system functional. I assume we have repair parts for them.”
“Yes, sir, we do. I think it’s the fuses. Someone forgot to put some fuses in.”
“How’s that possible? We ran a preflight check.”
“These weren’t crucial to launch sir. They got overlooked, I guess.”
“Captain,” Gibson said. “May I suggest that we attend to this later. The mission is complete now that we have the payload. These cameras couldn’t have been that important if we’re just missing them now.”
“Roger that, Commander. Should I start the return trip calculations?”
“Please.”
“Alarms back on-line, sir,” Mullane said.
“Very good,” Gibson said.
“Gardner out.”
Gibson turned to talk to Shepherd. “Look, I just want to say I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you guys about the mission.”
Shepherd smiled and shrugged his shoulders. “No big deal, sir.” After a pause, he said, “I’m just proud that I could be part of this mission. You know, play a part in history.”
“Even if nobody ever knows?”
Shepherd pursed his lips. “I’ll know, sir. I will know.”
The orbiter Atlantis landed smoothly on December 6, 1988 at Edwards AFB. Atlantis was towed to a secure hangar under guard. The crew was whisked away to an Edwards debriefing room.
It was a classified flight. Grayer, representing the DoD, was there to greet them and handle the debriefing. He explained that the payload on STS 27 was a national secret. A leak could have serious consequences. He was there to help them cope with the pressure of keeping the mission a secret. At least that was what they were able to recall. The crew’s minds began to wander as Grayer talked. They were well rested and in a good place. All of them pictured a gurgling stream on a hot summer’s afternoon. The sound was so calming.
Before long, the image of the secret payload itself was a blurry disconnect. Then it was a hazy picture lost in the deep canyons of their minds. Every aspect of the mission was recallable except for the object itself. Their subconscious minds dealt with the memory loss by accepting the payload information as irrelevant. Within two weeks, only the highlights would be recalled. Within two months, they would be hard pressed to recall the names of their fellow crewmembers. Within one year, all memory of STS 27 would be irretrievably gone. The crew would move on with their lives.
