by Peter Damon
In the space of just a couple of minutes, Allan had modelled the return of over 20 parts of the container, and linking the programs together, had created a graphic to show the reverse movement of all exploded items.
“Do they return to the exact location of the satellite, or is the point of explosion slightly off?” she asked.
Allan checked the coordinates. “Three meters off the centre of gravity,” he told her.
“Do some more work on it with as many pieces of the explosion as possible, but I’m pretty sure we’re going to confirm that the explosion occurred inside the container, and at one side, either close to the back wall, or close to the doors,” Lisa explained.
Allan nodded, watching the movement repeat itself in reverse with a bleak look on his face. “We have a saboteur on board,” he sighed.
+++++++++++++++
The fragment was a 900cm piece of the far corner of the container, with 100cm of floor and 200cm of the side wall remaining.
Jon took photographs from all sides and angles, and then took swabs of the interior and exterior surfaces.
Kevin took his own photographs, concentrating on the ragged edges where the explosion had torn the metal apart. When done, he cut off a small piece and put it under a microscope for a closer look at the tear. The microscope allowed him to take digital images which he stored directly onto his tablet.
Lisa returned and took her tablet out of her case to begin questioning the other two, coordinating their tests and recording their individual findings onto a single database.
Jon made tut sounds as he ran tests on his collection of swabs using the chemicals from his case, then joined Lisa and Kevin at the main table.
Michael and Oliver came in and introduced themselves. “I’ve been on the internet trolling for any information there might be out there, and it would seem there were a number of keen home astronomers in Australia who were watching our satellite the moment it blew up,” Oliver told them.
“Did they see anything strike it?” Heather asked.
Oliver shook his head. “None of us are sure a missile would have been noticed anyway, but their independent recollections are that the satellite just exploded, with no cause being visible.”
“Well, that ties in with our findings so far,” Lisa agreed. “The fragment of metal tells us that the explosion occurred within the container, blasting outward, while the work Allan has done, and we’ll verify it with our own interpolation later, shows that nothing struck the container to cause the explosion.
“So, sabotage,” Michael confirmed.
“Unless you had a store of BPN inside?” Jon said, coming over to join them.
“BPN? What’s BPN?” Michael asked.
“Boron and Potassium Nitrate,” the twins told him, coming into the room with faces set in a single frown.
“It’s that which caused the explosion,” Jon explained. “It burns very hot, but leaves a very strong residue; very easily identified,” he told the ARC crew.
“An explosive?” Michael gathered.
“Yes. It’s used in a variety of applications, from airbags to rockets,” the twins confirmed.
“And works in a vacuum. I didn’t realise explosives would work in a vacuum,” Michael admitted.
Jon shrugged. “Most explosives do, actually. Even gunpowder,” he chuckled.
August 7th.
Jake waited impatiently for Matt to pull himself into his spacesuit, making appropriate noises in response to Matt’s excited ramblings about sabotage on their precious communication satellite while he waited impatiently for him to leave. He felt no guilt at wanting his partner gone, not now that he had found where the land forces were fighting. He couldn’t wait for him to leave, welcoming the unplanned time on his own so he could once again grab one of the exterior cameras and turn it to his own use.
Matt was ready and Jake leant into his perfunctory kiss, folding his arms to hide his restlessness until Matt was finally out of the door and Jake could continue with his clandestine detective work.
He was at the controls in seconds; calling up a camera close to the hull and bringing up the control menu in order to calculate the coordinates he would need to view the area he was interested in. Only then he did notice the large brown land mass over which they seem to have stopped.
“Oh shit. You bastards!” he cried, only then realising that the ARC had been brought to a halt over Australia.
+++++++++++++++
“You’re not the flavour of the day, are you?” Stan asked, holding up a printed copy of one of the European newspapers to show the headline; ‘ARC Drops Deadly Metal Rain on Australia’.
“Yes, thank you Stan,” Michael answered, his temper frayed by lack of sleep. The UK papers were less hostile, and many had used the copy Oliver and Michael had written for them, but the rest of the world press had been using the US and Russian press releases for too long to stop now. And of course, bad news sold far more papers than good news. That, unfortunately, was an universal truth.
“I understand it was a particular explosive substance; BKNO3,” Stan said.
“I was told BPN,” Michael frowned.
“Same thing,” Stan confirmed with a nod. “We have dogs who can find that, you know,” he explained.
“You do? Can you send one up?” Michael asked.
“Not on my own. Send a taxi,” Stan chuckled. “We’ll have the dog and handler waiting at the airport for you.”
+++++++++++++++
There was a knock on the door and Michael automatically called “Come!” for the room intelligence to release the lock on the door and allow his visitor to enter.
In this case, it was three, all of them looking grim. Professor Don Graves was in the centre and seemed to lead the delegation, Professor Pavel Chaichenko on his left, Professor Charles Brewer on his right.
Michael had heard some of the arguments the three had been having. They had been going hammer and tongs at each other in the restaurant the previous evening, and the twins had admitted that they tended to argue all the time, often heatedly.
Michael sensed that they all struggled to work with people as brilliant as themselves and prepared himself for the three to demand the others leave, or they would leave.
“Can I do something for you gentlemen?” he asked politely, hoping to dilute their mood while also wondering how the twins would take the news that their Brain Team had been broken up and returned to their respective universities.
“This cannot continue!” Don Graves told him seriously.
“I don’t see what I can do,” Michael began.
“You can provide us with a little more peace and quiet!” Don cried sharply, and the two accompanying professors nodded their agreement.
“We cannot work with alarm bells sounding, with additional people coming and going, the students working with us distracted by things that should be of no concern to them.”
“There are too many distractions. We need to concentrate!” Professor Pavel Chaichenko agreed.
“I don’t think you appreciate just how close we are to understanding gravity and mass,” Professor Graves pointed out.
“I see,” Michael murmured.
“You will see to it that we’re not bothered by interruptions again?”
“Er, yes, of course,” Michael agreed.
“Good! Very good,” the professor nodded and turned to the other two to usher them from the room.
Michael shook his head.
August 8th.
The full management team were at the meeting, including the three professors from Cranfield and the new entrants; Oliver Cole and Gail Barber. Michael had chosen not to invite Pavel Chaichenko, Don Graves or Charles Brewer, pretty certain the three professors would not thank him for the invitation.
Michael leant against the refreshment counter rather than standing at the head of the table, and cleared his throat. “As you know, our first commercial satellite blew up over Australia. The press claim that falling parts may hav
e caused damage, even hurt, which is very far from ever having been possible, but that’s another matter.
“We had a spare and we commissioned it straight away, so from a contractual point of view we’re good. However, our clients are worried, and so am I.
“Truth is, the explosion was not a fault on the container, but an act of sabotage by someone on this ship,” he told them.
There were gasps and shocked expressions. People looked at one another and shook their heads in disbelief.
“You can’t be serious,” Professor Juliet Rogers spoke from beside Frank Hill.
“I’m afraid I am,” Michael told her. “Someone on board has been building up to this. They started by fouling our water and giving ten of us a bout of Viral Gastroenteritis. Since then, we’ve had lights come on at odd hours, microwaves fail on us, revolting smells permeate our quarters and foods spoilt. None of those were faults in our systems. All were caused by one or more people trying to make it difficult to do our jobs,” Michael explained.
Again, people looked at one another, too shocked to do more than swallow and shrug towards one another.
“I hope you don’t think it is one of the Koreans,” the Reverend said.
“I don’t know who it is,” Michael stressed. “I wish I did.”
“What are we to do?” Cheryl asked.
“Well, I’ll tell you what we’re not going to do, and that’s stop,” he told them. “We give up on this, and HYPORT ends up in the hands of the military before anyone else. What will happen then is anyone’s guess.
“We do not stop; we proceed with all our projects, we persevere, because sooner or later, we will find this person.”
“They’re getting more and more dangerous though, aren’t they?” Professor Rogers asked.
Michael nodded. “We brought a specially trained dog onto the ship to see if it could find where the explosive material had been kept, and it confirmed that it had been on the docking bay. And we know there’s no more on board, which is a relief.
“So keep your eyes and ears open. Do not let others piggy-back through the door you’ve just opened, ask them to let their own RFID unlock the door. We need to see this person’s movements, we need to make it as hard for them to attain their objective as they are trying to make it for us to attain ours,” he stressed. “Other than that, it’s business as usual.
“So, how is your extended farm?” he asked of Professor Rogers on a lighter note.
Juliet smiled and nodded. “Very well, thank you. All the new tables have been commissioned and planted, and we’re monitoring them as the plants grow. They should be giving us vegetables within three months,” she explained.
“Very good. Check your security with Heather and Allan and make sure only trusted personnel go into your farm.
“Leanne, how are the other satellites coming along?” he asked.
“Getting there,” she answered. “Some of the Cranfield students are helping me, so we have a production line of five stages, with one satellite being finished every two days,” she explained. “We’re going to run out of parts in about 10 days though,” she warned.
“I know; I’m on it,” Michael agreed. “Make sure you personally check each satellite before the doors are sealed,” he stressed.
“How difficult would it be to create a few ‘Spy’ satellites for us?” he asked. “In particular, I want to monitor the International Space Station and earth-based launch locations,” he explained.
“No problem. We can use the half-length containers and use an extremely low LEO to avoid collisions,” Leanne agreed, making notes. “Give me a fortnight,” she begged.
“I’ve got some free time, if you need a hand with any of that,” Jake offered.
“How are the strange and wonderful experiments then, Jake?” Michael asked.
“We’re receiving about seven requests a week from the Friends of Rolle College group. Of those, we’re averaging three to four in the first week, and the balance within two weeks. The Friends have begun coordinating their activities across universities, so we’re seeing fewer duplications and greater cooperation within each experiment. It’s going very well,” he summarised with a nod.
“Good,” Michael nodded. “Cheryl, Gary; how’s Sales and Marketing?” he asked.
“Answering concerns at the moment, but that should fade once Australia start crowing about the services they’re getting, and the price,” she nodded.
“The Russians were very pleased with our clandestine removal of their orbiting nuclear reactors, and we’re 80 million US Dollars better off for having done them,” she told them.
“We have had a number of tentative requests from corporations asking if we’ll endorse their equipment,” Gary pointed out.
“Such as?” Michael asked, grinning and coughing at the same time.
“Ford USA would be the largest. They’ve worked out that it’s their SUVs that we’ve converted for space,” Gary answered.
“Tell Ford to make 30 such vehicles available to the Save the Children charity working in East Africa, and give us authority over any copy, and we’ll allow it,” he answered.
Gary grinned and took notes while several others nodded their agreement.
“Have we all given Professor Lovell our specification for the types of devices we want to see and use?” he asked. “Those are important. There’s a lot of kudos for the Cambridge University if this scheme of theirs takes off, so please; be supportive,” he stressed.
“Gail, are we doing what we should?” he asked of her.
“In the main,” she agreed. “Some of you need to work a little harder though, or your names are going to go into the Sin Bin, and you don’t want that,” she warned with a grin.
Michael made a note to get into the gym more often, knowing he was one of the offenders.
“Frank, when are you going to start collecting garbage?” Michael asked.
“Couple of days time, I believe,” he agreed. “Just waiting on confirmation from its owner, then we go to collect us a piece of history.”
“Good. And we’re going to get water from the moon?” he asked.
The twins nodded. “Our tests, and those of two independent labs on earth, confirm that the water is good. We’ve agreed a process of preparation to ensure it is fit for use, and Frankie’s team is looking for a suitable container to transport it from the Moon,” they explained.
“And what of your ferry?” he asked.
“Would you like to see pictures?” they asked with an excited grin.
August 9th.
The twins had used an agent to buy the ferry. He was an ex-captain with a love of ships, and it showed in the video he had taken of the ship for the benefit of the absent and anonymous buyers. Beginning from the dockside so the viewer could appreciate the full size of it, he moved onto the car deck, into the engine room, the staff quarters, the saloons, the cabins, finally finishing on the bridge where he displayed all the controls and instruments, unaware that it was the ARC who wished to buy it and that all the equipment was destined to be removed.
Michael watched with the twins, each of them pausing the video at various points to discuss what they were seeing and the implications for the refit.
“Where is it, by the way?” he asked.
“Alexandria, Egypt,” the twins told him.
“Where are you going to do the refit?” he asked.
“England, somewhere,” the twins shrugged. “Unless you think Malta would be safe enough,” they offered.
Michael called Stanley and winced as he woke the man from sleep. “Sorry, I didn’t check on the time,” he apologised.
“Fine. Is something the matter?” Stan asked.
“We have a second ship to refit. Do you have any preferences for where we do it?” Michael asked.
“Yes, I do, but I won’t know the answer until tomorrow. Is that alright for you?” he asked before hanging up.
“We also want to buy some more equipment for the laboratory,” t
he twins told Michael.
“Lasers, and a Diamond Anvil Pressure Cell,” they explained. “The Professors want to put HYPORT under extremes of pressure and temperature.”
“Do you think they’re on the right track?” he asked.
The boys shrugged with uncanny similarity. “No test is wrong if it uncovers something you didn’t know before,” they explained. “We’ve never subjected HYPORT to any extremes beyond that of space, so it should be interesting to see what happens,” they agreed.
“OK,” Michael agreed. “Just keep it under 10 million Euros please,” he begged. The twins were not the only department wanting cash.
Actually, all departments wanted cash and the list of departments was increasing every week. Cambridge University might be good at fending off large corporations, but seemed unable to stop research groups from joining the ARC or wanting to use its resources. The latest request was for the growing fleet of SUVs to travel within the Mesosphere, an area of the atmosphere between 50 and 90 kilometres high where there had been little or no experimentation done, in order to take measurements of the gasses at various altitudes. Additionally, Don Graves, the Harvard University professor on loan to them to help with HYPORT testing, had also requisitioned a SUV and spent all of his spare time travelling up and down from and to earth, the flat rear of the vehicle packed with testing and monitoring equipment.
The problem was; Michael could empathise with all of them and, like those in command of the overall university, could not find a way to say no.
Michael shook his head and returned his attention to the finances. They weren’t exactly destitute, or anywhere near it. Nonetheless, he would never have believed what it cost to keep a spaceship going had someone given him the figure just a year ago.
August 10th.
True to his word, Stan returned Michael’s call the following morning. “Glasgow,” he told Michael.
“Glasgow?” Michael asked in surprise, barely awake after only four hours sleep.
“Sure. There’s still a large naval presence on the Clyde, and we can use the dry dock and other facilities, while maintaining high security. Where is the ship currently?”
