7
“There is no need to worry about us. We are quite well protected,” Max Jiang said to the camera. He’d become well practiced enough by now to anticipate certain questions and work around the increasing signal delay. He’d also become more camera savvy, always knowing where the live one was and taking care to not look directly at it, giving the illusion of a sit-down interview with the itinerant astronaut.
“Our command and service module is radiation hardened, and we are shutting down all nonessential systems before the coronal mass reaches us,” he explained. Behind him, his wife could be seen moving packages from their inflatable habitat module through the docking tunnel.
“We see Jasmine back there,” the interviewer said, and she waved as if on cue. “What is she doing?”
Jiang looked over his shoulder. “She’s bringing food and water from the hab into the CM. We don’t know for certain how long we’ll have to stay in here, but our control center thought it best to plan for an extended stay,” he said with a hint of amusement at the expense of their overly cautious control team. “As you may know, water is an excellent insulator against particle radiation and we plan to have every square inch of panel space covered with water bladders.”
The interviewer had no such idea but nodded along as if he did. “Yes, of course. But is there enough aboard?”
A self-effacing laugh from Jiang. “It’s complicated. The environmental recycler filters and recirculates nearly all of our air and water, the rest is made up for with onboard supplies. We have enough stored for a sixty-day contingency.” He made a sweeping gesture around the cabin. “Part of which is intended for situations just like this.” He moved briefly off camera and returned with an undulating blue bladder, about a half-meter square. “Five liters of fresh water right here. Notice the Velcro strips and corner grommets?” He fastened one to an empty side panel, then grabbed another to place next to it, then another. “There. Instant rad shielding.”
“It looks as if you still have some work to do,” the interviewer said as the floating camera bot spun about in midair, showing off the cabin’s cramped quarters and mostly bare walls. “You’re only a week away from your first destination, asteroid RQ39.” Which wasn’t the proper name, but the media had been running with it long enough that it had stuck. “Are you concerned about this solar storm interrupting your exploration plans?”
“Not at all,” Jiang said. “It will be over with well before we begin our rendezvous. On the contrary, our confinement will make us all the more eager to get outside for a walk.” He reached out for the camera and placed it in front of a nearby window. “You can see it from here already. It’s just a bright spot in the sky right now, but our destination is literally in sight and we’re quite excited.”
Preparations aboard the Borman were much more hectic, and being a brand-new division officer only made it that much harder. Lieutenant Flynn already had his hands full as their newly appointed engineer, which left Marshall completely reliant on his senior NCO. This was much as it had been in military organizations throughout history.
Chief Riley’s patience with him was admirable, no doubt helped along by the fact that the spacers on their team had apparently drilled for this to the point where they could do it blindfolded. His biggest challenge was staying out of their way, not an easy task in a module already full of equipment.
After fumbling around in a storage compartment that held exactly all of the wrong items, Riley handed him a pair of clear wraparound goggles. “Augmented reality glasses,” he explained. “Tap the right hinge and a menu bar will show up. Navigating it’s pretty self-explanatory.”
Marshall turned them over in his hands. “Can’t help but notice no one else is wearing them.”
“You’re the only one who needs them, sir. Nothing to be ashamed of. It’ll be asses to elbows around here for a while and this’ll help you find your way around. Every piece of gear on this boat has an RFID tag, but not all of it ended up where Fleet Ops thought it should go. What makes sense on the ground ain’t always so up here.”
“So I’m finding out.”
“Just the way things are, sir. Like I said, nothing to be ashamed of.” Riley looked around the compartment, appearing satisfied with their preparations. Of the seven enlisted crew aboard Borman, four worked here. It was a plum job and they knew it—there would be no slackers for him to worry about on this crew.
“Coming through. Make a hole—sir.” Rosie swam past them, trailing a net bag filled with medical packs.
“Anti-radiation prophylactics,” Riley explained. “She’s taking them down to the core module. If anyone starts feeling funny or sees any light flashes, we’ll all be taking them.” He motioned for Marshall to put the AR goggles on and tapped the hinge for him. “You should be seeing an inventory list scrolling down the right side of your field of view.”
Floating tables of alphanumeric characters appeared, rolling over and changing wherever he looked as green outlines appeared over his constantly changing focus points. “So it’s telling me what’s in each compartment I look at?”
“Yessir. We all know what’s stored where because we’re the ones who set up the spaces. You’ll pick it up soon enough. Where you will see these glasses used is when we take inventory for resupply missions. Easier than working off a tablet and it updates in real time.”
Everywhere he looked, new outlines and rosters appeared. He tapped the hinge and they disappeared. This would be useful. He noticed a countdown timer in the opposite corner of his view. “Is that time to ignition?” he asked, realizing it was a stupid question as he said it. What else would it be, a self-destruct timer?
“That it is, sir. All major shipboard events will show up on the left side.” He made a sweeping gesture around the medical cabin. “You can see the module’s prepped for a burn. We only had to make sure any loose items were secured, and I can promise you there were none. Loose gear turns into projectiles as soon as those engines light, so the skipper takes a hard line on it.”
He searched his memory for anything he might have left floating loose in his quarters. He’d find out in a couple of minutes. “Thanks. Good to know.”
“Wouldn’t worry too much, sir,” Riley said, reading his mind. “Unless you left a socket wrench or cutting tool loose somewhere. Which I’m sure you didn’t.”
So they’re checking up on me, he realized, not sure whether he should be reassured or irritated. Maybe they just wanted to make sure the new ensign was settled in, but he now realized he and his personal space were being sized up. He shook it off. They lived in close quarters and there were any number of ways for a stupid mistake to get lots of people killed.
Riley must have known he was processing that very thought. “Come on, sir,” he said, pointing him toward a seat embedded in the aft sidewall. “We need to get secured. That first burn’s going to be a long one.”
Molecular hydrogen flowed through twin solid-core fission reactors to be flashed into plasma and expelled through a pair of rocket nozzles. The reaction was immediate and intense—Marshall could feel the ship move beneath him, and a quick glance through a nearby porthole showed Earth falling away from them.
With less thrust than the chemical rockets which had brought Borman’s various pieces to orbit, nuclear-thermal’s advantage was its efficiency: they could get more impulse from of each gram of propellant than even the best chemical engine, almost twice as much. This meant they could burn for a long time and use a lot less propellant for the same work. It was what enabled the Borman to move freely between Earth orbit and cislunar space with only occasional refueling. Though after this episode, Fleet Ops would already be planning to send a tanker mission up to them.
The scuttlebutt among the crew was to expect a lot of postflare cleanup work. There were certain to be a lot of damaged satellites to clear out of their orbits, not to mention a possible rescue of that civilian Stardust vessel. That had really set the EVA team abuzz. His spacers—and Marshall was still learning to think of them as “his”—were chomping at the bit to get out and apply the skills they endlessly trained for. They wouldn’t admit to it, but everybody wanted that first Space Lifesaving medal.
Nick Lesko kept the radios off and the shades down, keeping the cabin quiet and dark as the Sun emerged from behind Earth. He’d stayed up well beyond the end of his watch, driven by urgency and adrenaline. It was a testament to how hard they’d worked that they’d all managed to sleep through it without stirring, but the time had come to wake them.
He turned the cabin lights up slowly, not wanting to unnecessarily startle them. They had only a few hours until the first waves of the CME would hit, and Nick had scrambled to engineer one last spacewalk while they slept.
“Wakey wakey,” he said as they stirred. “A lot has happened while you guys were sleeping.”
“Like what?” Whitman asked, rubbing his eyes.
“Necromancer was acting squirrely,” Nick said, a tad overconfident. “Some servo calibration errors came up in its daily diagnostic routine.”
Billy looked at his watch. “And you didn’t wake me up?”
Nick looked away sheepishly. “Didn’t want to bug you. It wasn’t control related, so I thought it could wait.”
“Servo problems are enough,” Billy said, annoyed as usual but now with good reason. “If the manipulator arms don’t work, then this whole trip was for nothing.” He snatched a tablet from his personal kit by his sleeping bag, opened up a window, and began scrolling.
Giselle peeked out of her sleeping bag. “You didn’t wake any of us. Your watch ended four hours ago.”
“You guys were all sleeping hard, and I was wide awake,” Nick said, mostly truthfully. “Too amped up, I guess. Figured I could sleep later.”
“You may have figured wrong, then,” she said. “If we have to work in another EVA, we’ll have to get cracking on it right now.”
He was counting on that. “I know, at least I do now.” He yawned. “Don’t worry, I’ll be good.”
Giselle regarded him. If he looked as tired as he truly felt, this might work as the others would have to pick up his slack. “No, you won’t. If it’s a simple matter of recalibrating a drive motor . . .” she said, looking expectantly at Billy.
The hacker swiped through the report. “Wrist roll joint alignment. It’s not off by much, just enough to make it harder to control if you’re not looking right at your target. The latching effectors won’t go precisely where the operator’s aiming.”
She sighed. “Yeah, that’s a problem. We’ll have to get out there.” She looked at Whitman. “When’s our first deorbit burn?”
The pilot checked the master display on his control panel. “Twenty-six hours to leave GEO, then another day before entry interface. We’re already using our consumable reserves.”
“So we have to get on this fast.” She cursed, rubbing her temples. “Here’s what we’ll do. Nick and I will do a hasty suit checkout and start pre-breathing now.”
“Wait a minute,” Whitman protested. “He’s not rested, and you can’t go solo.”
“We don’t have time to keep this by the book,” Giselle said. “I’ll do the outside work. I won’t be solo. All Nick has to do is hang out in the ’lock and send me tools if I need them.” She looked to Nick. “Think you can handle that?”
“Absolutely,” he said, stifling a yawn that wasn’t entirely for show. He stole a glance at the comm access panel and secured an equipment box in front of it as he helped them stow their sleeping bags.
Whitman’s voice sounded surprisingly remote for just being on the other side of the hatch. Static hissed and popped in the background. “I’m having trouble with the ground,” he said. “Looks like telemetry’s being transmitted but voice comms are crap. It’s like I’m talking into thin air.”
“We’ll have to work on that later,” Giselle said, already secured to their pirated satellite. “Radios sound lousy out here too.”
“Do you need to wave off?”
“Negative,” she said tersely. “Negative. So long as Nick can hear me when I need something. You still awake back there?”
“Affirm,” he called back helpfully, though he was starting to feel the fatigue wash over him. “I’m—”
He winced as a flash of light in the corner of his eye snapped him awake, a pinprick from the Sun passing through his skull. “What was that?” Despite knowing what to expect, it was still a shock.
“What was what?” she asked, then, “Oh. Cosmic ray; just zapped me too. It happens occasionally . . . oh shit.”
“What’s happen—?” but Giselle was already barking commands over their frequency before he could finish.
“Whitman, you seeing this too?” she snapped.
“We are,” he said through a crashing wave of static. “Like a damned fireworks show in here. I can’t raise the ground. Stand by . . . no space weather alerts . . . what the hell?”
“Report.”
“It hasn’t just been quiet—we lost data uplink six hours ago. Nothing since.” Staying professional, Whitman flicked off his mic just as he was unleashing a torrent of curses.
Giselle finished his thought. “If we’ve missed a flare warning . . .” He watched her suddenly double over, gloved hands cradling her helmet. “Nick!” she shouted. “Get me—”
Her voice disappeared beneath a crescendo of static, accompanied by another explosion of light like flashbulbs going off in his head. And he was in a shielded compartment—what was it like being exposed?
“I don’t feel very good . . .” Billy said weakly. Nick thought he could hear retching through the rising fuzz before he dropped off the frequency. He reached for the outer door and pulled it shut, sealing himself inside their storm shelter. He turned off his radio so as not to hear them shouting his name.