April 4, 2035
Earth Departure Minus One Day
11:45 Universal Time
Kennedy Space Flight Center
Promptly at a quarter to seven a.m. the eight men and women of the Mars-bound Arrow spacecraft left the astronaut center and walked, single file, through a crowd of onlookers toward the van that would take them to the waiting rocket booster.
They were wearing sky-blue coveralls and baseball caps. Prokhorov wore his cap slightly askew, as if it was alien to him. Catherine Clermont had hers perched delicately atop her chestnut-brown hair.
As they strode toward the waiting van, the crowd of NASA workers, government bigwigs and news media reporters broke into spontaneous applause and calls of “Good luck!”
Bee Benson led the little parade, looking slightly self-conscious. Behind him, Ted Connover grinned and waved at his wife and teenaged son, standing in the front row of the cheering crowd. The six scientists also waved, almost shyly.
Steven Treadway brought up the rear of the mini-procession, talking nonstop with the miniaturized microphone pinned above the pocket of his usual long-sleeved white shirt.
“The team isn’t wearing spacesuits,” he was saying, almost in a confidential undertone, “because they won’t need them. The vehicle that will carry them into their orbital rendezvous is exactly the same type that has ferried all the equipment and supplies to the Arrow, plus the human technicians who put the various modules of the Arrow together in orbit.”
He drew a breath, then continued, “Their ferry vehicle will mate with the Arrow’s main hatch, and the crew will step into their Mars-bound vessel just as safely and confidently as if they were stepping into their own homes.
“And it will be their home, for the one hundred and seventy-eight days it takes them to reach Mars.”
In the VIP stands flanking the control center, Bart Saxby watched the van drive off to the waiting rocket booster, silhouetted against the gray morning sky. The meteorologists had predicted cloudy skies, but enough visibility to go ahead with the launch.
Saxby felt a mixture of pride and resentment as the van approached the launch stand. He had had to fight hard to get this final Mars launch done at NASA’s facility at Cape Canaveral, instead of the commercial operation in New Mexico, where all the other launches had taken place.
“Dammitall,” he had exploded more than once, “this is a NASA operation, not some tourist excursion. We’re going to launch the crew from the Kennedy Complex.”
The objections were many and intense, including those of the governor of New Mexico and both that state’s senators. The commercial interests that were building their business on space industry and space tourism were apoplectic at the decision.
But Saxby fought all the way to the White House, and after some hard bargaining, President Harper had finally agreed with his NASA chief. The final launch—the big one—would be from the Cape.
Saxby should have felt triumphant, but as he watched the elevator carry the eight crew members to the top of the booster, he found himself worrying.
Every ground launch has been fine—so far, he thought. What if this one goes sour? We’re using exactly the same booster as all the other launches, but what if this one fails? What if we kill those eight people?
He felt a burning pain in his chest. Ignore it, he told himself. You can’t have a heart attack; not here, not now. Tomorrow you can drop dead if you have to. But today you’ve got to see those eight kids safely into their vessel.
Treadway felt a pang in his chest, too, as he stood on the launch platform, forlornly watching the elevator cab take the crew up to their module atop the booster.
He took a deep breath, then turned to face the camera standing a few feet away. “This is as far as I go, physically. But I’ll be with the Mars crew every inch of the way, in three-dimensional virtual reality.”
Craning his neck at the booster’s upper stage, he continued, “For now, though, all I can do is the same as what you millions of viewers are doing: wish those eight brave men and women good luck and godspeed on humankind’s first mission to Mars.”
For the first time since he’d been a child, Treadway felt tears trickling down his cheeks.