by Allen Steele
As they carefully fitted the bullets into their clips, neither man said anything. They listened intently to every sound in the corridor outside, pausing whenever someone passed by. Yet they were both professional soldiers, albeit in a war of a more covert sort than that which was now being waged by their comrades a thousand miles away; although they were in enemy territory, they knew that the odds of their mission being detected at this last stage of the game were quite slender.
For a time, they had worried about the man who’d assumed the role of Paul Dooley. It wasn’t just that he didn’t belong in their class; the organization had recruited him for talents which they simply didn’t possess, and they accepted that as a matter of course. Yet the fact that he had undergone facial surgery to change his appearance, however necessary that might have been, was the potentially weak link in their plan. He had also been ill-trained for this mission, and although he had been able to disguise this as general incompetence so far, Talsbach and Aachener had barely been able to keep from looking at each other every time Dooley stumbled against a bulkhead or was unable to climb through a hatch without assistance.
Fortunately, Dooley wasn’t their leader. That was someone else entirely. Talsbach took some comfort in that fact as he glanced at his watch. It was almost 2300 hours, and the person they awaited was scheduled to arrive at any minute….
Footsteps approached from down the corridor. Markus and Uwe glanced at one another, then laid their guns on the bed, dropping towels and pillows over them.
The footsteps stopped outside their door. There was a double-rap on the door, a short pause, then a single knock. Markus looked at Uwe and nodded his head; Aachener stood up, unlocked the door, and opened it.
Without saying a word, their contact stepped inside.
The Late Show, with Roy Boone; ATS broadcast June 16, 1977
(Music fades; studio applause)
Boone: Thank you, thank you … double rations of cheese dip for the audience, Moose! They deserve it!
Moose: Hah hah hah hah … yes!
Boone: Fresh cheese dip, an American favorite … that’s right. Can’t get enough of our official dairy product…. Anyway, later in the show we’ll have on that lovely and talented actress, Miss Pia Zadora …
(Wild studio applause)
Moose: Hah hah hah hah … they love her! Yes!
Boone: Right … but first, please give a warm welcome to our next guest, all the way from West Germany, astronaut Karl Schiller!
(Polite applause as Schiller enters and shakes hands with Boone and Moose. Studio band plays an off-key Bavarian drinking song.)
Boone: Thanks for being on the show, Karl …
Schiller: Yes, yes … thank you. Good to be here today.
Boone: So, Karl … or maybe we should call you Colonel Schiller … ?
Schiller: No, no … it is okay to call me Karl, thank you …
Boone: How about Colonel Karl?
(Laughter)
Schiller: Karl is okay, thank you …
Boone: Anyway, Karl, I understand you’re soon going to be flying West Germany’s first privately developed spaceship into orbit, the … uh …
Schiller: The Sanger XS-1, yes, Roy. It’s an experimental …
Boone: The XS-1? Does that mean it’s going to be excessive in one way?
Moose: Yo! Everything in excess! Hunga-hunga!
(Laughter)
Schiller: No, no, it’s really … it’s a prototype of a new spaceplane my country is developing to … uh, how should I say it? … explore outer space.
Boone: But it’s not excessive?
(Laughter)
Schiller: Ummm … I don’t know. How do you mean, excessive … ?
Boone: Well, here’s a picture of it … show the folks back home that picture, Mike … yeah, there it is … and, gee, it looks kind of puny to me, Karl. Not much compared to an Atlas. Kind of a shrimp-ship, if you ask me.
(Laughter)
Moose: A shrimp-ship! Yes!
Schiller: Yes, it is rather small, if you should compare it to an Atlas-C, but that is the point, correct? A smaller spacecraft, we believe, can achieve much the same goals as an Atlas-C, but with less time to prepare on the ground …
Boone: Uh-huh, right. But it can only take one person.
Schiller: This is correct, yes. But it is only the experimental prototype for a much larger—
Boone: And you’re going to fly this thing?
Schiller: That is correct, yes … I will be the test pilot.
Boone: There’s just one seat aboard, right?
Schiller: No, no … there are three seats, but I’ll be …
Boone: Three seats? Maybe you could take Pia Zadora and Moose along with you, then?
Moose: Yo! I’d do that for a dollar!
(Laughter)
Schiller: I don’t think so, no. It will be very dangerous, this mission, and this is why I will be the sole occupant.
Boone: I see. Taking any cheese dip?
(Laughter)
Schiller: No. I will not be taking any cheese dip. We will be conducting experiments in … ah, how do you say? … new theories of aerobraking maneuvers, so …
Boone: How about beer? Maybe some schnitzel?
(Laughter)
Schiller: No, I think not. The XS-1 is configured to take advantage of newly developed …
Boone: Yeah, I see. Very interesting. So what does your country intend to do with this schnitzel-ship … excuse me, spaceship?
Schiller: Ah! I’m pleased you asked! The European Space Agency believes we can open new commercial opportunities in space … umm, building solar power satellites, perhaps, or mining the Moon for valuable substances … if we can lower the costs of launching spacecraft into orbit. The XS-1, therefore, is a way of proving that we can …
Boone: Such as going to the Moon? Or building space stations?
Schiller: Yes, to begin with, but—
Boone: We’ve done that already. Read the papers sometime.
(Laughter)
Moose: Yes! We’ve done that already!
Boone: Ten seconds left, Karl. So tell us … are you going to put any German babes on your space station?
Moose: Yo! The man has a point! Hunga-hunga!
Audience (in unison): Hunga-hunga!
Schiller: I cannot … I don’t see what is the point in discussing European space objectives if you will not seriously consider …
Boone: Well, time’s up. Thanks for coming by, Karl. Hang around, folks, Pia Zadora’s up next …
(Applause as the studio band strikes up the Star Wars theme; screen fades to a still-shot of Moose wearing a space helmet painted with the Late Show logo.)
ELEVEN
2/16/95 • 2245 GMT
JOE LAUGHLIN HAD TOLD her to follow the noise to the rec room; it turned out he wasn’t joking. As she climbed down a ladder to the second deck of Section 14, Berkley Rhodes heard music reverberating through the narrow corridors: “Concerto for Guitar and Orchestra,” by Jimi Hendrix, as performed by the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra. Just under it was the unmistakable porcelain clack of billiard balls striking one another, and voices:
“Oh, f’r chrissakes!”
“I told you I could make that shot.”
“Coriolis effect …”
“I’m telling you, spin doesn’t have anything to do with it. Rack ’em up again and I’ll prove it.”
“Okay, but put something else on the deck. This classical stuff’s distracting me.”
The concerto stopped in mid-movement as Rhodes walked down the narrow corridor toward a half-open hatch at the end; the opening bars of “Stairway to Heaven” were greeted by a disgusted howl until the music abruptly stopped in mid-chord.
“Goddamn, Billy! Anything but that!”
Someone else laughed. “Just kidding … okay, hold on.”
Rhodes hesitated, then gently pushed open the hatch and peered inside. Several crewmen were hanging out in a narrow compartment which look
ed as if someone had made a conscientious attempt to furnish it like a comfortable den, but were doomed to failure by the metal walls and the pipes that ran across its low ceiling: a TV showing a video of an old Bruce Willis movie; an unpainted Revell model of the Wheel, suspended by a string from the ceiling; a small refrigerator, above which was taped a poster of Lou Reed’s “Satellite of Love” World Tour.
One man sprawled across a sagging couch, drinking beer as he watched two other crewmen playing eight-ball on the battered pool table that dominated the center of the room. Another crewman was sorting through an enormous rack of CDs next to an old Sony stereo system; someone else had his legs propped up on a table next to a computer terminal, typing into the keyboard in his lap.
Everyone stopped what they were doing to stare at her.
The white cue ball slowly rolled across the scratched felt to gently tap a striped ball out of place; the two men playing pool barely noticed. The uncomfortable silence was broken only by a static hum from the stereo speakers.
Rhodes swallowed. “Hi,” she said brightly. “I’m Berkley Rhodes.”
“So what?” said one of the men at the pool table.
“Berkley Rhodes,” she repeated. “ATS News.”
The other pool player sighed as he picked up the triangle and placed it on the table. “Great. It’s one of the TV reporters.”
His companion began digging balls out of the pockets. “You’re not going to find a story here, miss,” he said as he rolled the balls across the table. “Maybe you ought to hunt down one of the uniforms and interview them instead.”
It dawned on Rhodes that there were only a handful of women aboard the Wheel, and none of them were in the rec room. She tried to bring Alex with her, but he had wanted to get some sleep before the flight tomorrow, so she’d let him go. Now she wished she had insisted …
She was about to back out of the compartment when the crewman sitting at the computer spoke up. “Chill out, guys,” he said. “I picked her up from the ferry this afternoon.”
It was only then that she recognized him as Dr. Z, the pilot of Harpers Ferry. He didn’t seem much friendlier than the others, but neither was he openly hostile; at any rate, it was a small relief to spot a familiar face.
“Doesn’t mean shit, Doc.” The man racking the balls took a beer out of the fridge and opened it. “She’s press. She wants a story, she can go interview Old Joe. This is our place.”
“C’mon, Fred, you don’t have to be an asshole all the time. You don’t see her carrying a camera right now, do you?” Dr. Z waved her into the room. “Want a beer, Ms. Rhodes?”
Rhodes took a tentative step through the hatch. “Thanks. Yeah, I’d love a beer … but I was told that wasn’t allowed here.”
Quiet laughter from the group, except for the two men at the pool table. “Whoever told you that was a liar,” the man on the couch said. He was the oldest one in the room; with wire-rimmed glasses, a potbelly, iron-gray hair that nearly reached his shoulders, and a four-day beard, he looked like an aging hippie who had somehow panhandled his way into orbit. “You’re looking at the last of the great space drinkers.”
“Speak for yourself, Poppa …”
“Hey, guys,” Rhodes insisted, “I’m not here to do a story about you. I’m off the clock. I just came to—”
“Bullshit. Open your mouth in front of a reporter, tomorrow you read it in the paper.” Fred stopped racking the balls, picked up his stick, and dropped it in a stand near the TV. “C’mon, Lou, let’s get out of here. I gotta fifth of tequila my wife sent me back at my bunk.”
“I hear ya.” Lou placed his stick on the table and walked toward the hatch. “Who needs this shit?”
Each of them cast cold glares at Berkley as they passed her on their way out of the rec room. “Media slut,” Fred muttered to her back before he slammed the hatch shut behind him.
An uncomfortable silence descended upon the room. “Sorry about that, ma’am,” Poppa said softly. “They’ve just been up here too long and have forgotten their manners, that’s all.” He looked at the kid who had been sorting through the CDs. “Billy, give the lady a beer, please. And put something on that won’t peel the paint off the walls.”
“I think it’s peeling already,” Billy murmured, but he slid a CD into the stereo. The first low-key riffs of “Black-Eyed Man” by the Cowboy Junkies filtered from the beat-up speakers, as raw and mellow as a winter morning in eastern Kentucky. Billy looked as if he might have come from coal-mining country himself; mid-twenties, tough and stringy-looking, greasy black hair, and narrow sideburns stretching down his jaw. He reached into the fridge, pulled out an ice-cold can of Budweiser and silently handed it to her before slumping into a chair to watch Bruce Willis kill some bad guys.
“I’m sorry I caused a problem,” Rhodes said as she sat down next to Poppa and cracked open the beer. “I was told I could get a drink here, and … well …”
“Let me guess. You wanted to meet some people here, maybe see what we’re like off-duty.” The old man crushed the empty can in his hand and lobbed it toward a nearby waste can; it bounced off the wall and hit the floor, but he made no move to pick it up. “Your arrival wasn’t exactly a surprise, ma’am. In fact, we sort of thought you’d show up sooner or later.”
“I wasn’t …”
“Horseshit,” he said slowly, smiling a little. “You’re not the first journalist who’s come calling, and you ain’t gonna be the last.”
Rhodes took a nervous sip from her beer. There was no point in denying it; Poppa had caught her in the middle of a lie. “Don’t take it personal, miss,” he continued, “but there’s not a whole lot of sympathy for reporters among the people who work here. Ain’t that right, Curtis?”
Dr. Z didn’t reply; he had already returned his attention to the computer screen. “Of course,” Poppa went on, “Dr. Z and Billy are young turks, so they don’t remember the old days. Now, take Bill here, f’rinstance …”
“Shut up, Poppa.” Billy’s right foot tapped the floor in time with the music; he didn’t look away from the tube. “I’ve got enough trouble as is.”
Poppa ignored him. “Billy’s my co-pilot. We fly a satellite retriever, when we’re not hanging out here. Now, Billy here … he spends six years in the Navy, flying air-sea rescue choppers out of Jacksonville while getting some astronaut training on the side, all ’cause he wants to be an astronaut when he grows up.”
“Shut up, Poppa.”
Poppa paused to belch into his fist. “’Scuse me … only problem is, the program’s going down the tubes by the time he gets out. Kid wants to go to Mars, but he’s lucky to be picking up busted American Comsats with me so we can sell ’em to the Japs.”
“You’re salvaging dead satellites for NASA?” Rhodes asked.
“No,” Billy replied. “We’re salvaging dead satellites for us.”
“McGraw Orbital Services,” the old man explained. “Edmund McGraw, president and chief executive officer, at your service.” He winked at her. “NASA keeps us up here to get rid of the low-orbit junk, and we make a few extra bucks by selling it to the Wogs and Krauts as scrap and spare parts.”
He groaned as he heaved himself out of the couch to fetch another beer out of the fridge. It wasn’t hard to tell that he was already drunk. “At any rate, it’s a living. Sucks, but it’s a living.”
“Gravity sucks,” Billy said, “but only by one-third …”
“Old joke, Bill, and watch your mouth.” Poppa McGraw fell back into the couch as he opened his beer. He stretched out his legs and motioned with his can toward Curtis Zimm. “And as for the right honorable Dr. Z over there …”
Zimm only half-listened as Poppa McGraw droned on, telling Rhodes more than she probably cared to know of his life story.
Not that he particularly minded. Ed McGraw was an old-timer whose service record aboard the Wheel went back to the old Space Force days, and he always welcomed the opportunity to rehash his stories when anyone gave hi
m half a chance. Everyone aboard the Wheel had already heard them a dozen times; pretty soon, Poppa would start telling Rhodes about his glory days as the pilot of the retriever ship that had rendezvoused with Ares One when it returned to Earth back in ’77. Rhodes, of course, would believe every word; so had Zimm, when he first came aboard Space Station One a year ago.
Over a year ago, he reminded himself; fourteen months, two weeks, and three days, to be exact.
Curtis Zimm had wanted to be an astronomer ever since his father had given him a small hobby telescope for Christmas when he was eleven years old. Although his family didn’t have the money to send him through college, Zimm had partially solved the problem by enlisting in Air Force ROTC. The decision had caused him to lose a few friends among the Minneapolis hard-rock crowd he’d been hanging out with, but it enabled him to go to CalTech to study radio astronomy. Given a choice between searching for black holes or watching another Prince-wannabe at a downtown club and pumping gas for the rest of his life, he chose black holes.
Zimm had completed the requirements for his B.S. and M.S. in record time, but in his sixth year of college the federal tuition money began to run out. As a career prospect, radio astronomy is practically worthless unless one has earned a Ph.D., but since his ROTC funds had dried up and the National Science Foundation had turned down his grant application, it looked as if Zimm’s academic term at CalTech would come to an end before he could complete his doctoral thesis on quantum singularities.
As it turned out, his faculty advisor at CalTech had once been a major in the old U.S. Space Force and still had some connections at NASA. On behalf of his student, Professor Beason managed to swing a deal with the space agency: in exchange for spending a year aboard the Wheel, during which time he would learn to fly Harpers Ferry, NASA would pay Zimm’s tuition, as well as giving him preferred access to its low-orbit Advanced X-ray Astrophysics Facility. The last part of the arrangement was particularly sweet; although it was difficult for students to book time with the AXAF satellite, it was controlled from the Wheel, and therefore Zimm would be pushed to the head of the line every time he wanted to log an hour or two with the observatory. And in return, NASA had a new taxi pilot, just when the last one was quitting and going back to Earth.
