by R Davison
“I will take a look at it.” Ivan hit a few buttons on his keyboard, and his display showed the same data that was on Susan’s. He studied the information and then ran some calculations, concentrating on one object in particular.
Susan, expecting a quick confirmation of her analysis and obviously not getting it, floated over to Ivan’s station to see what he was doing. Paul tagged along. “Did I miss something?” Susan asked, while she tried to follow the screens Ivan was switching between.
“No, I think everything is good. I was just concerned about this satellite and wanted to get more information on it, if it were military or not. Some of the military satellites tend to shift around, depending on what they are observing. But at this point and time, I guess that they have no real reason to move. I am sure that the United States and Russia have more important concerns right now. Anyway, it is a civilian satellite, so it is not a concern. That does bring up the point that this orbit is safe as long as all satellites stay in the same orbit. Things may change if any of them were to move, for whatever reason.” Ivan looked from Paul to Susan, and they both nodded in agreement.
Susan bit her lip, thinking about what could be done to make the orbit more secure. “I guess that there is nothing we can really do to improve the situation. Is there?”
Ivan looked at the display and then to Susan, “No, this is as good as it is going to get now, especially with our fuel situation. We will have to remain vigilant.”
“Okay, then we go for it and worry about wandering satellites in the future. It should not be our problem. We should be back on Earth before it becomes an issue.”
Ivan turned back to the console and started to program the engine firing sequence to achieve the desired orbit. Paul contemplated Ivan’s statement about the military. He was not so sure that they would be so introverted. “Don’t you think that this might provide a perfect opportunity for some countries to try to take over other countries that they have designs on?"
“You mean, like, one country wants the water resources another country has, and it is now even more important to have them? So, what do they have to lose?” Ivan volunteered in between keystrokes.
“Yes, something like that,” Paul responded.
“It may provide an incentive for some countries. I don’t know if the major countries would resort to that. I would like to think that they are more civilized and would work together, knowing the consequences if they didn’t,” Susan offered, not really wanting to get into the discussion. She felt that there were just too many unknowns to try to predict human behavior, and it was fruitless to speculate on this topic.
“Susan, I think you’re more optimistic than I,” Paul stated. “What do you think, Ivan?”
Ivan stopped his work at the keyboard to answer Paul’s question. “I think that the way people react is dependant on so many factors, that it is impossible to predict what they will do on the whole. There are some countries that I think might try to seize this time to advance their geopolitical-religious standing. They are small, and their conflicts would not have an impact beyond their local region. But, there are some other countries and factions, which have access to nuclear weapons that can complicate the survival efforts of the rest of the world, should they push their aggressions to the point of using these weapons. Times of desperation often bring desperate measures. I hope that I am wrong and being too pessimistic.” Ivan traced the frame of the keypad with his fingers as he waited for Paul’s response.
Paul thought about Ivan’s comment and felt that he had to agree with him. Paul really wanted to be optimistic about what was to come, but reality and experience forced him to look on the darker side of human nature.
“Yes, I tend to agree with you, Ivan,” said Paul. “Maybe we will all be pleasantly surprised with what the future brings.” After a few moments of silence Paul added, in a darker tone, “I guess we will find out soon enough, one way or another.”
Nicholas returned at this moment and informed Susan that Commander Orlov was awake and ready to go. “Apparently, the evasive maneuver had jostled him enough to wake him up, but he was not really sure what had disturbed his sleep. I told him that it was Ivan’s split second timing that had provided the smooth ride!”
“And what did he say?” Paul asked, while he watched a grin growing on Ivan’s face.
Nicholas gave Ivan a brisk slap on his back. “He commented that he was glad to see that Ivan’s piloting skills had not changed since their early days of training!”
Everyone had a good laugh at Ivan’s expense, including Ivan. For just a few moments they forgot the situation they were in and the challenges ahead.
“We have another burn coming up and after that one we can reconnect the communication systems,” Susan said to Nicholas. “At that time, we will have our altitude set and if our favorite captain at Korolev Control wants to play games, it won’t matter much.”
More than thirteen hours have passed since the impacts. Major seismic activity had died down, but there still were many severe aftershocks that persisted after quakes of this magnitude.
By this time, the greatest damage was done. There were still isolated seismic occurrences when a large chunk of earth fell back to the ground from the initial destruction. These pieces had neither the velocity nor the energy to do much damage outside of the immediate impact area. Nevertheless, the fires and damage they produced contributed to the maelstrom of dust that was already in the air. The density of the debris that rained down over the southern United States had diminished with most of the larger, heavier objects having yielded to the pull of gravity and returned to their home planet. Some larger pieces received enough energy to be launched into shallow orbits that allowed them to be carried hundreds and in many cases, thousands of miles from the epicenter. These pieces rained down on cities, towns, forests and fields, as far west as California and beyond, north to Kansas, east to Virginia, and south into Mexico.
The jet stream, disturbed by the impact, was gradually reforming and as it did it pulled hundreds of thousands of tons of dust along with it. This caused the usually invisible jet stream to stand out from the rest of the atmosphere, as if a child had colored it with his pencil while doing a map of Earth. The individual impact sights now were indistinguishable from each other. A roiling cloud of dust and small debris, almost a thousand miles wide, stretched from California to the Atlantic, east of Florida and covered the sights and everything in-between. This cloud was augmented by the arteries of dust that flowed through the jet stream carrying the dust toward the northeast and onward toward Europe.
Below the clouds, the fires still burned. Where there was no fire, the heated earth created thermals that continued to pump the particles of smoke into the atmosphere. The natural mixing of the atmosphere would eventually distribute the majority of the dust across the northern hemisphere. Lesser amounts of the particulate would make its way to the southern hemisphere, but enough to contribute to the reduction of the sunlight and a drop in the average temperature of the planet.
The tremendous amounts of carbon dioxide that were released into the atmosphere by the burning would remain long after the dust settled and would trap the radiated heat of the planet that would normally escape into space. The ocean impact and tsunami activity disturbed the vast beds of methane hydrate, which lay below the ocean floor. Eventually the methane would combine with the carbon dioxide to stop the cooling of the planet and would ultimately create a tremendous green house effect. The temperature of the planet would rise, further complicating the survival efforts of those left alive.
The space station continued on its way to its new orbit without further incident. Inside the station two were asleep, Jerry and Alexander, who resumed his nap once he was assured that the station was okay. The rest of those on board worked to make sure everything went as planned. Paul took advantage of the time to set up an observation station to use on their next pass by the United States with the intention to map the progress of the debris cloud. They w
ere now moving across the eastern Atlantic Ocean, soon to cross over Europe. It would be two more orbits before they traversed the mainland of the United States.
Paul had discovered a small telescope that was already tied into the video-communication system and realized that he could use it to visually observe the dust cloud. Nicholas stumbled on an ongoing atmospheric science experiment on the station that used a small radar system to image the cloud layers below the station.
He and Paul managed to redirect the radar beam so it would point toward the west for their next orbit. This would give them another way to track the cloud and would also give them an indication of how dense it might be.
Satisfied with his accomplishments, Paul decided to give in to the fatigue that was pestering him and told Susan that he was going to try to get some sleep. She agreed to wake him in an hour to give him time to doublecheck the equipment he had set up. Paul left the module in search of someplace quiet and dark to make the most of his hour.
Watching Paul leave the command module, Susan turned to Nicholas. “Nicholas, if you’re tired, I will take over the radar display, and you can get some sleep.”
“Thank you, Susan, but at this time sleep would be impossible for me.”
Susan glanced over to Ivan, “Ivan—”
“No!” Ivan said.
Susan shrugged her shoulders, “Okay.” Having nothing pressing to do at the moment, she moved over to Paul’s empty station and started searching through the computer for information on the CRV.
Although she and her crew brought the CRV to the station, they were not trained in its operation or use. Ivan would have had training before he made his trip to the station next year, but he was too busy to work on that while preparing for this shuttle mission.
Susan knew that the system was fully automated and that it could be flown in a manual mode to some extent. She was not sure if the autopilot would be able to cope with the obstacles they might have to negotiate to get back to Earth. Reentry is a very tricky procedure in any craft, but more so in an unfamiliar one. It’s ironic, she thought, to have a “lifeboat” that could kill you if you don’t know how to use it.
The computer brought up several items for her to choose from. She selected the one that said: CRV EMERGENCY OPERATIONS.
Susan read through the file and was impressed by how brief it was, or rather how sophisticated the CRV really was. The basic reentry was fully automated and required only the selection of the desired, preprogrammed landing site. The ability to manually control the vessel was limited. One could change its orientation while in orbit and steer the huge parafoil while landing. There was no information on how to program a landing site that was not preprogrammed into the autopilot. Susan thought this would make life very interesting if all the preplanned sites were inaccessible due to the dust and debris.
She thought about Jerry’s stunt and wondered how he intended to fly the CRV back by himself. If he even thought that far ahead. After all, she knew how much training she and the rest of the crew had with the CRV, and she had no real idea on how to initiate the departure from the station and reentry. Curiosity got the best of her, and she turned to Ivan, “Ivan, did you have any more information on the operation of the CRV than that one briefing we all had?”
Ivan looked over to Susan and thought a moment, trying to recall the briefing she referred to from the hundreds of briefings they had had over the years. “No, nothing formal, that is. Why do you ask?”
“I was just looking over the emergency procedures for it, and it got me wondering how Jerry could plan to jump in and take off with it. I mean, it is pretty well automated. You don’t really need to fly it once you initiate the separation from the station, but still, you have to have some idea on what to do.”
“Well, he was not very rational at the time. He may not have given that much thought. He was focused on getting off the station, no matter what.” Ivan stared off into space thinking about Jerry and what he knew about him. It did not really fit Jerry’s character to take such a desperate action. Jerry was one who usually calculated his next move carefully before taking it.
“Or, maybe,” he hesitated, “maybe he read up on it the way you are doing now. He was alone and did have the time.”
“Yeah, you’re probably right. He was not one to be that impulsive. Although, it’s hard to tell what was going on in his twisted mind at the time. Like you said, he was not very rational.”
She turned back to the document on the display and just stared at the words. Her mind was fixed on Jerry and what had driven him to do what he did. She toyed with the console keyboard and noticed that she had inadvertently highlighted a command on the header to the file.
Looking closely at it and pushing thoughts of Jerry aside, she realized that it was a link to the files properties. Curious about what it might tell her, possibly about the programmer, or tech writer who wrote the file, she clicked on the link. The display snapped to a list of information that told her when the file was created, and to her amusement, by whom. There was other information listed below that was of lesser interest. Just as she was going to jump back to her original page, her eye caught the last bit of information: LAST TIME ACCESSED.
She noted the time, but didn’t think much about it and switched back to the screen for the emergency procedures. But something nagged at her about that time. She checked her watch and saw that the file had been last accessed about seven hours ago. Susan knew that she had set her watch to the station’s time when they powered up the station earlier, and it appeared to be functioning properly now. Looking back at the screen, she saw that the clock in the lower corner of the display agreed with her watch.
Puzzled, she switched back to the file properties and checked the logged time again. Sure enough, it was previously accessed a little over seven hours earlier than her watch displayed now. Thinking about the time they had been on the station, she realized that seven hours ago they were unloading Endeavour.
“This doesn’t make sense,” she mumbled to herself.
Hearing her mumble, Ivan asked, “What does not make sense?”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say that out loud, I was just talking to myself. It’s this file I was looking at. It was last accessed about seven hours ago. That would place it about the time we started to unload Endeavour. Right?”
Ivan thought about it for a moment and then checked the time on his display. “Right. So?”
“Did you access any information about the CRV then?” Susan asked, knowing the answer.
“No, I was working with Alexander at the time and did nothing with the station computer then. Why is this important?”
“It just doesn’t make sense. Why would the time on this file be off? Oh, damn!” Susan exclaimed having a flashback of entering the Habitation module and unexpectedly running into Jerry.
“Nicholas and I ran into Jerry in the Habitation module when we brought over a load of stuff.” Turning to Nicholas, she said, “Remember that, Nicholas? Do you remember how funny Jerry acted when we entered?”
Nicholas nodded his head. “Yes, I remember that, he looked very guilty. I mean, he would not look at us, as if he did something he was not supposed to do.”
“Yes!” Susan shouted. “Exactly! That’s what I thought when we saw him, but I really didn’t think about it at the time. He must have taken the opportunity to check out the CRV when he and Paul separated. He’s been planning his escape from the moment we got here!”
“You do not know for sure, Susan,” Ivan countered.
“Ivan, it only makes sense. There is no other logical explanation for it.”
“You may be right, but what good does it do you, or us, now? I guess what I am saying is that we know that Jerry was determined to leave the station before we entered a higher orbit. It makes sense that he would check out his only avenue of escape.”
“You’re right, but how can you be so calm about it? Damn it! He was scheming this all along and would have gladly left
us all here if he got the chance!”
“But, he did not do it. We stopped him, right? So it is just another piece of evidence that tells us that Jerry went off the deep end.” Ivan’s voice remained calm in contrast to Susan’s, which she found irritating.
Susan heaved a big sigh and relented. “You’re right. It really doesn’t matter now. It’s a good thing I didn’t find out about this before the incident in the airlock, because if I had, I would have jettisoned him into space!” She turned, went back to her station, cleared the screen and left the module to Ivan and Nicholas.
Nicholas watched Susan float out of the room and turned to Ivan, who was still looking at the empty hatch Susan had passed through. “She seems very upset,” he spoke softly and in Russian.
“She is very hurt,” he replied.
Nicholas moved over to Ivan’s station and asked, “Why should she be hurt? I can understand anger, but not hurt.”
Ivan took his hands off the keyboard and massaged the back of his neck. “We have worked many, many months together, no, years and had many good times together. We, as a group, grew very close together, helping each other out when one was in need. Susan always kept her position as commander in the background. I do not think that there was ever a time that she had to exercise her authority, until today. That was hard enough for her to do to someone she always considered a close friend. Then, to find out that this person was willing to betray her, and her crew, was too much.”
“She should not take it personally,” said Nicholas. “I do not think Jerry is in his right mind. Although I have known only this side of him. I mean…he would never have gotten this far in the space program with an attitude, or behavior like that. No?”
