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9




Traci perhaps shouldn’t have been surprised when she and Roy were called into a meeting with the center director the next day. While Ronnie Bledsoe may have recognized that he’d been allowed to remain as the Manned Spaceflight director in order to check off someone’s “diversity box,” he’d first risen to that level through his repeatedly demonstrated competence and no small ability to stay a step ahead of the timeservers in headquarters.

They were led into the director’s office by an administrative assistant who shut the door behind them. Two chairs had been arranged facing his desk, though they each remained standing as their boss studied them.

“Sit.”

They exchanged glances as they took their seats, each having a good idea of what to expect but not knowing the form it would take.

“I hear you’ve been busy.”

Traci shifted in her chair uncomfortably. Before Roy could speak, Bledsoe held up a hand.

“That wasn’t an invitation to talk. My time is short, whereas you two seem to have an abundance of it, judging by your recent activities.”

Roy met his gaze, not easily intimidated. He’d known Bledsoe long enough to also understand where their boundaries were. He unfolded his hands in a “go on” gesture.

“I’ll get right to it. I got a call from the administrator early this morning—allow me to emphasize early—and she had some interesting information to pass on to me. Before I go on, you understand she’s got eyes everywhere?”

Another furtive glance between her and Roy. “That’s why we’ve been working on our own time.”

Bledsoe shook his head sadly. “If I’d been aware, I might have been able to help. You don’t trust me?”

For once, Roy was surprised. “That’s not it at all, Ronnie. You know I believe in finding solutions before going to the boss with a problem.”

“I can appreciate that,” Bledsoe said. “But in some cases, an ounce of prevention is worth a bucketful of cure. So tell me: How long have you known the HOPE team’s been in contact with Magellan?”

“Since last week.”

“I’m actually impressed you could keep it to yourselves that long. Why the secrecy?”

“Again, we wanted to understand the situation and develop options. When word of this gets out, it’ll be a media circus and a political clusterf—”

Bledsoe held up a hand again to stop him. “Please, no polluting my virgin ears with your profanity.” He patted his chest. “Preacher’s kid, remember? I’m the only one allowed to cuss in my office.”

“Sorry,” Roy said, and he meant it. “We know this is going to get out of control rapidly. Everybody who isn’t running away from it is going to want a piece of it. Problems don’t get solved in that environment. They only get worse.”

“And there’s not much time,” Traci interjected.

“How much are we talking about?”

“Two years at most. Jack could stretch it in hibernation, but the sooner we can get to him the better.”

Bledsoe did a double take, then studied the pair silently. “You two are good. That wasn’t on Dr. Cheever’s radar. Did I mention the lady’s got ears everywhere?”

She felt emboldened at that. “May we ask what she said to you?”

“You may ask.” Bledsoe paused as he considered his response. “First off, assume Cheever only told me half of what she actually knows. But she has contacts inside HOPE who’ve said there’s been a huge burst of activity down there, and Hammond himself has been on site since last weekend”

“Not long after Owen contacted us,” Roy noted. “I did mention that, didn’t I?”

“You didn’t. But I knew that, or rather that was the other thing she implied. A little bird told her you two have been burning the midnight oil ever since Jack popped up again and she put the two together. I told her it could be a mistaken assumption but she didn’t believe me. So what’s the plan?”

“We go get him,” Traci said. “Finish outfitting Columbus and burn hard for this Anomaly, or whatever it is, with a gravity assist from one of the outer planets.” She decided to press her luck. “Honestly, sir, I’m appalled there haven’t been formal contingency plans for this. We shouldn’t be kludging something together this late, but here we are. If I hadn’t already been studying mission profiles in Future Apps, we wouldn’t have been able to do as much as we have.”

Bledsoe arched an eyebrow. “Why do you think I put you there?”

Traci was taken aback. Of course. She glanced at Roy, who answered with a telling shrug.

Bledsoe turned away, steepling his hands as he stared out toward the rocket garden in the courtyard below. Still early in the day, a handful of tourists wandered among old Atlas and Titan boosters before the notorious Houston heat chased them all inside to the air-conditioning. How would the average mom-and-pop taxpayer respond, had they known what was being discussed in this room? There was the political point of view and then there was the human point of view, which were too often at odds with each other. He turned back to face his astronauts. “Load up and go. Kick the tires, light the fires. That simple, is it?”

“Of course not,” Roy said. “That’s what we’ve been staying up late trying to figure out.”

“The operational concept works under certain specific conditions,” she added, hoping their options would not be cut off. “Number one being we leave the spacecraft under private control.”

Bledsoe gave them a perturbed look. “We’ll get to that later. Tell me about the others.”

“Minimal payload and crew. Two pilots,” Roy said, “with heavy reliance on AI.” He locked eyes with Bledsoe in a signal that he was deadly serious.

“If that’s coming from you, then I know you’ve thought it through. What else?”

“I mentioned gravity assists at the outer planets,” she said. “Either Jupiter and Saturn, or Neptune.”

Bledsoe pulled up a plot of the solar system on his desktop and whistled. Two of the planets were in completely opposite positions relative to Earth and would remain so for some time. That presented drastically different trajectories. “Jupiter and Saturn will be out of position for the next couple of years,” he finally said. “You’re thinking about an Oberth burn?”

“It’s an option,” she said cautiously, “but the advantage would be minimal.”

“You’d spend the first couple of months going in the wrong direction,” he agreed. “And it introduces a lot of risk. You’d have to fly under the rings to get close enough to Saturn for the tradeoff to be worth it.” He tapped his fingers on his desk. “I don’t like it. Too risky. Tell me about Neptune.”

“It’ll be close enough to the midway point to use for deceleration. Columbus can get there for a flyby burning at one-tenth g for three months, then coast. Pass behind the planet to start shedding velocity, then flip for the deceleration burn. Total transit time is eighteen months.”

“A year and a half just to get there,” Bledsoe said. “What’s your departure window?” He could make a good guess based on the relative positions of the planets.

She shared a look with Roy. “Six months from now.”

“Which is why you want to keep the HOPE contractors on the job,” Bledsoe said flatly. He expected their political leadership would be clamoring to take over the mission and turn it into a big international effort, in which case they’d still be arguing over how to divvy up responsibility—and credit—a year from now. At that point they’d be recovering a dead body instead of a live astronaut. “You’ve got a good argument to keep it under private control,” he admitted. “Most of the technical expertise has been transferred to them and we can’t assume everyone would come back. We’d still be reconfiguring consoles and training controllers when we need to be outfitting a spacecraft and running sims.”

“Exactly,” Roy said. “I know it’s a long shot, Ronnie. But we have to try.”

“You two aren’t exactly disinterested parties. That’s going to make for a tougher sell.”

Traci leaned back into her chair. “You’re right, we’re not.”

A crooked smile crossed Bledsoe’s face. “Well, you’re going to have learn how to act like it right quick because Cheever isn’t wasting time getting ahead of this. She’s requested an emergency meeting with the Senate Subcommittee on Space and Science to discuss funding and status of the HOPE contract. All the big players will be there, and she wants to add your names to the roster of witnesses.” He consulted a well-worn calendar on the corner of his desk. “And she wants both of you to meet with her at HQ tomorrow, ahead of the hearing.”

Traci beamed, while Roy appeared less optimistic.

“Don’t get too excited, Keene. It’s in her interest to keep you close. My guess is she wants you two there as an accessory to impress the senators. Never forget that Dr. Cheever is dead set against humans contaminating deep space and it doesn’t matter how reasoned our arguments are. If she wants to take back control of the program, in the end I promise you she’s found a way to scuttle it.”

Her eyes darted back and forth between Bledsoe and Roy. “I don’t understand. Then what’s the point?”

Bledsoe leaned back in his chair and stared at the ceiling as he considered his words. “Rumor control has it she’s got people studying an uncrewed mission, entirely controlled by AI. I presume it would go out to find Jack and bring him home under hibernation.”

“But that’s . . . I don’t see how that works,” Traci said. “He can’t be under that long without active care.”

“Daisy’s managed well enough,” their boss said with a sigh. “The price of success.” He eyed them both with a warning. “Listen to me closely. Washington doesn’t work like the real world, and Cheever didn’t land the administrator’s job without having some heavy hitters in her corner. She is a master of three-dimensional chess. Just when you think you’re a step ahead, she’s already in the next time zone.”

Traci shared a glance with Roy as she considered Bledsoe’s words. “I’m a pretty good chess player myself, sir.”


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