Space Station Down, page 9
SOUTH CHINA SEA: 745 MILES SSE OF HAINAN, CHINA
The Chinese launch facility for unmanned rockets was located on the southernmost part of the Spratly Islands, one of the most remote spots in the South China Sea. Most of the world was unaware of its existence. And although thousands of miles from any major land area, the bare bones spaceport was located in bitterly disputed territory claimed by both the Philippines and China.
A hundred and fifty-five miles to the northwest a low-pressure system moved across the water, increasing swells. Wind whipped the water into frothy, turbulent waves. The seas were unnavigable and dangerous for all but the largest supertankers and cargo ships.
But twenty-one hundred feet below the surface the water was absolutely still and darker than any place on earth; no light could penetrate through the crushing depth. Although the seabed was relatively shallow compared to the rest of the South China Sea, life took on unworldly, exotic features to survive in an environment where forces were over sixty times greater than atmospheric pressure.
A spot of light pierced the absolute darkness. The intense glare lit up the sandy bottom and swept back and forth in a smooth pattern, as though searching for some elusive feature. Moments passed. The light methodically expanded its search until it illuminated a half-buried length of man-made material.
The beam stopped. It grew brighter as it focused on an underwater cable, completely out of place in the otherwise homogeneous sand.
Minutes passed and the 453-foot hull of the USS Jimmy Carter slowly approached the high-speed transmission line. Specially equipped thrusters positioned the massive submarine next to the cable until it hovered near-motionless over the seabed. An opening dilated in the hull; operations initiated for remotely tapping the polyethylene-clad, fiber-optic line that ran from Mainland China to the Spratly Island spaceport.
Three hours later the submarine released a buoy, trailing its own, thin fiber-optic cable as it shot to the surface, twenty-one hundred feet above. The line wavered as it reeled out, moving with the shifting currents.
Popping up from the water, the buoy splashed down; an antenna unfolded and despite the squall, solid-state gyroscopes kept it pointed to a pre-positioned point in the sky.
Within seconds, the USS Jimmy Carter transmitted purloined, encrypted data to the buoy, which relayed it to an overhead constellation of satellites. The data bounced from satellite to satellite until it was downlinked to Fort Meade, Maryland.
DAY TWO
JAPANESE MODULE (JPM)
Kimberly woke with a start. She was trapped, caught, confined, bound. In a flash, though, she realized that she was wrapped in the bungee-cord restraints that she had wound around herself so she wouldn’t go floating across the module while she slept.
She glanced at the vestibule. The hatch was still tightly sealed. Farid and Bakhet had not broken through. Grimly, she realized that if they had found a way into the module she would never have awakened from her troubled sleep.
The only way she’d been able to get to sleep at all—despite her bone-deep weariness—was that she knew it was impossible for them to get in without making a racket, either by depressurizing the vestibule, breaking that hatch window, or even somehow cutting through the JPM module’s aluminum side. But the memory of the way they had slaughtered her crewmates haunted her as she dozed fitfully in the normally comfortable zero-gee environment.
She untied the cloth straps and floated free, stretching as she forced herself fully awake. Her hip ached from where she’d been hit by the prybar that they’d thrown at her, and she swam over to the first aid supply to replace the bandage. Preparing the gauze, she reached down and gingerly pulled the wrapping off her hip; a small corner stuck to her skin, but as she exposed the wound she saw that at least it had stopped bleeding. She methodically coated the area with more antibiotic and covered it again, taping the sides.
She’d been lucky to find an extra med kit in the JPM, and would have to somehow raid the U.S. lab if she needed another. But she knew that this would be the last time she’d attend to the wound. If she couldn’t stop the terrorists soon it wouldn’t matter if the injury got better or worse.
She floated over to the ham radio and started to key the mike, once again trying to establish contact with the ground. Looking at the world map on her laptop monitor, her heart sank: She saw that the ISS was now in the ascending mode, just south of the Middle East. She’d have to wait until she was over Australia or back above the northern hemisphere before she could speak to anyone using line-of-sight. She grumbled to herself in frustration and clicked off the low-power radio.
Still muttering unhappily, Kimberly pushed over to the experiment bench. Trying to cool down, she studied the data links that were still transmitting down to Earth. She hoped she would discover that one of the researchers on the ground had noticed the enormous flow of data that she was sending over the links—or even more obvious—the messages on the digitized pictures she’d been sending.
All they have to do is take a little time and look at their damned incoming data, Kimberly groused to herself. There was no way that any halfway awake person could miss her efforts to insert information over the links. But yet, nothing. No response to her messages, nor any indication that any living human being had even looked at the experimental data she had doctored.
Kimberly figured that since Vasilev’s murder had been broadcast over NASA TV, that all ISS activity on the ground had probably ground to a halt. As a scientist herself she understood that such catastrophes took precedence over scientific curiosity.
But yet there were some people out there who were more concerned about science than anything else in the world, oblivious to everything around them except for getting the results from their experiments. She remembered one of her fellow scientists when she had briefly worked as a postdoc for the Space Telescope Science Institute, at Johns Hopkins. Her colleague cared about nothing except her science: despite local or national disasters, she never missed a day at the lab, through hurricanes, floods, and even a massive protest demonstration.
Where was she now? Kimberly wondered. Surely there must be one researcher who would at least visit her equipment and discover the anomalous data.
She decided to give the data links one last try. Then she had to move on. After all, what could NASA do for her on the ground now that they couldn’t have done immediately after seeing the murders? Knowing that she was still alive might give them hope that not everyone aboard the ISS had been killed.
But even with all NASA’s collective creativity, could they really whip up some miracle solution to keep the ISS from deorbiting and for her to survive? Nothing short of launching a rescue mission would do the trick, but the next Soyuz resupply capsule wasn’t due for another month, and that was the only vehicle that might be swapped out to carry humans to the ISS. And even then, with the terrorists waiting for them, there was no way the Soyuz crew could gain access to the ISS’s interior, no way they could live to help her.
Kimberly knew that an unmanned U.S. SpaceX Dragon capsule was scheduled to launch in a few weeks, but that commercial resupply ship was not a human-rated vehicle that could carry astronauts into orbit. And even if it could, it wasn’t like the old Apollo capsule where the astronauts wore spacesuits and could go EVA to enter the station. The unmanned Dragon had been designed to dock with a berthing port, not open up to the cold vacuum of space.
So what did that leave her?
The reality was that NASA might possibly pull a rabbit out of a hat if they knew that she was still alive, and were thus motivated to come up with some creative solution to thwart the terrorists. She couldn’t imagine what they would whip up, but they had hundreds, thousands, of people on the ground they’d be able to utilize. So Kimberly decided to give the data links one more try.
But as she pushed back toward the experiments, she knew that she couldn’t wait around for someone else to solve her problems. She kept remembering that she had been trained to anticipate and direct the solution, not to react.
That meant that she had to figure out how she could possibly stop Farid and Bakhet by herself.
She floated over to the laptop and started modulating the data links with everything from Morse code to prime numbers to Fibonacci sequences, anything to make someone on the ground do a double take and revisit the information she was sending. Surely no one would think that these modulated data streams are natural. Somebody must be inquisitive enough to look at them!
After setting up the links to jump from one modulated stream to another, Kimberly turned back to the Portable Computer System’s graphical interface, called up the administrative controls, and once again started trying to take back command of the station.
NASA HEADQUARTERS, WASHINGTON, D.C.
Restlessly, Scott Robinson paced back and forth across the office of NASA’s Chief of Staff, still dressed in his astronaut’s blue bunny uniform. He’d brought only the one blue flight suit with him, and since the uniform instantly identified him as an astronaut he now wished he’d packed every one he had—it opened doors and allowed him access not only to the higher-ups in NASA but throughout the entire government.
His old friend Chief of Staff “Mini” Mott was hunched over his phone, elbows on his desk, his left hand massaging his forehead. The stubby ex-Marine nodded vigorously and attempted to break into the monologue pouring through his earpiece, but only managed to blurt out quick objections to whatever excuses were being thrown at him.
Whomever Mini was talking to reminded Scott of lots of general officers in the military. Take-charge, Type-A individuals. When you tried to speak with them they told you what they were thinking and you couldn’t get a word in edgewise. And when they thought the conversation was finished, they told you that as well.
“Yes, sir … yes, sir,” Mini was saying.
Three bags full, Scott finished sourly. From Mini’s tone and the expression on his perspiring face, it didn’t look good. But he had to keep trying. Just because some bureaucrat was trying to save money, or thought the risks were too high, Mini would still keep going.
It was one thing for the President to order that the ISS be shot down with the antisatellite weapons if the station posed a real threat. But as yet they’d seen no indication that the station was descending in altitude. And if it wasn’t getting closer to the ground, then it wasn’t deorbiting; and if it was staying in orbit then it certainly wasn’t a threat and it shouldn’t be blown out of the sky.
Scott’s idea of attempting a rescue mission had been summarily dismissed at the National Security Council meeting. So the government was lumbering ahead, preparing to blow up a million-pound, $150 billion target flying 250 miles above the Earth at 17,500 miles an hour.
And they weren’t even going to do it alone.
He’d sat in the conference room when the Secretary of State confirmed that both China and Russia had secretly agreed to use their own ASAT weapons to join in the effort to destroy the ISS. Scott fumed inwardly. They weren’t really concerned that the ISS might come down on their soil and kill some of their citizens. Rather, they saw this as a way to show off their own military capability against a mostly American target, and demonstrate to the world that although the Americans couldn’t stop the threat, they certainly could.
The Chinese briefed the National Security Council that they would use their direct-ascent SC-19, a variation of their Dong-Feng 21 ballistic missile, carrying a Dong Neng-3 non-explosive, kinetic-kill warhead, launched out of their site in the Spratly Islands. The kill would be achieved by intercepting the ISS at 17,500 miles per hour in an orbit head-on to the station, resulting in a direct hit at 35,000 miles per hour, more than enough kinetic energy to pulverize the station. That is, if it hit one of the station’s modules and not one of the solar panels. If it hit a solar panel the warhead would fly through the flimsy solar cells, ripping through the station’s power source like a hypersonic bullet whizzing through Kleenex.
The Russian ASAT capability was less certain: their kinetic-kill vehicle had yet to be publicly demonstrated. American intelligence sources indicated that they might try to use an old high-power laser system they had developed five decades ago as a counter to the U.S. Strategic Defense Initiative. The CIA reported that the Russians might even use one of their mothballed, explosively powered iodine lasers that they had originally developed to power a laser-driven nuclear fusion system. The massive iodine laser was a relic compared to today’s more efficient solid-state devices, but it still might be powerful enough to rip the ISS to shreds.
In any case, Scott thought, the National Security Council considered the Russian and Chinese options as fail-safe backups, which motivated Scott even further to push his proposed rescue mission.
Scott flinched as Mini slammed down his phone. It looked as though the conversation hadn’t ended well.
“So Congress won’t step in to help?” Scott asked.
Mini’s expression could have boiled water. “Not only will they not come up with funding for a rescue mission, but they won’t even guarantee emergency funding to purchase a replacement launcher to resupply the ISS, if the mission fails. Which throws the decision back in NASA’s court.”
“But they didn’t say they wouldn’t support it, right?”
Mini snorted. “Two negatives don’t prove acceptance, Basher. They just hinted that they wouldn’t try to stop us if we moved ahead and mounted a rescue mission. So it’s in our hands; it’s NASA’s decision.”
A surge of enthusiasm racing through him, Scott burst out, “That’s great news! There’s a Falcon 9 with a Dragon capsule sitting on Pad 39A at the Cape, due to resupply the ISS next month. You can use that for the rescue flight and move the resupply mission to Boeing’s Starliner. Patricia has the authority to accelerate the Falcon schedule to launch in three days, and since the Dragon capsule can carry at least four astronauts—”
“It’s an unmanned SpaceX capsule on that Falcon 9, Basher,” Mini interrupted coldly. “Not rated for humans.”
“Then send the Boeing Starliner instead. It’s on the adjacent pad!”
“Forget it. It’s only carrying supplies. Hasn’t been certified for humans yet.”
“But the Dragon has. I rode it my last trip to the station—”
“Not this one. The one on the pad would have to be reconfigured, and even if it could, in addition to launching in three days it would still take another few additional days to reach the ISS. We don’t have the time!”
His voice ratcheting a notch higher, Scott countered, “It takes a few days to reach the ISS because of our mother-loving, risk-averse, two-hour launch window.” He glared at his friend as Mini pulled himself up to his full five-foot, five-inch height, but continued, “You know as well as I do that the Russians routinely pull off ten-second launch windows all the time with their Soyuz, and go direct to rendezvous with the station, without changing orbits. Their ships take only a few hours to reach the ISS, not a few friggin’ days, like ours!”
“And how many Vostok and Soyuz rockets didn’t make it off the launch pad, or blew up after they did? We’ve already lost crew on the ISS because of those terrorists. If we lose that Falcon 9 trying to hit a ten-second launch window it’s another four astronauts killed—not to mention the fifty-million-dollar launcher. How do we explain that to the dead astronauts’ families, let alone the American public? And if they fail, forget about that Starliner ever launching; the space program will be over.”
Pounding on the desktop, Scott insisted, “Dammit, Mini, we only saw Vasilev being murdered. Robert, Al, and Kimberly may well still be alive, trying to survive but unable to communicate. The terrorists may be dead themselves. Besides, the surviving crew may need medical attention. We just don’t know, and that’s the whole point! How do we explain it to their families if the ISS is shot down without us attempting a rescue?”
Scott realized he was panting as if he’d run a hundred-yard dash. His hands were balled into fists. Mini was glaring at him, his thin face drawn and pale.
“Mini, we’ve got to try. Or you might as well tell the astronaut corps that their lives don’t matter, and the President isn’t even thinking about us.”
In a low voice Mini replied, “The President is thinking about three hundred and fifty million Americans by bringing down the ISS. That will prevent the panicking, the rioting, and who knows how many deaths.”
“But what if Robert, Al, and Kim are still alive?”
Mini closed his eyes briefly. Then, “Okay, what if Robbie, Rat, and Kimberly are still alive, and the ISS isn’t shot down. How are you going to rescue them if your Falcon 9 blows up on the pad trying to make your ten-second window?”
“Then you simultaneously launch Boeing’s Starliner. It’s scheduled to the ISS in two months, anyway. It’s on another pad, so there’s no reason why you can’t launch them at the same time. The point is, you never give up, you never give in!”
Before Mini could respond, Scott pressed on, “You never gave up as a Marine, so don’t start doing it now. The Associate Administrator for Exploration and Ops will back you, but he has to know it’s NASA’s top priority. I damned well know that Patricia Simone will think it’s a priority: this could have been her up there a few years ago, and not Kimberly. But Patricia’s not here and NASA needs a kick in the butt to get the ball rolling and start reconfiguring that Dragon to carry humans. And you’re the one to do it, Mini! So start doing your job, Marine!”
The two of them stared at each other from opposite sides of the desk. At last Mini’s hard glare relaxed and he muttered, “Semper Fi, Basher.”
As he reached for the phone he grinned. “You’re right. The AA for Explo and Ops is going to have a cow.”
“He’ll know it’s the right thing to do,” Scott insisted. “And if you don’t lead the way it’ll set the whole astronaut corps against Headquarters. Might cause a rift that’ll last forever.”
