Rogue Stars

by C Gockel et al.

  Tom pulled up the relevant schematic and flipped the table light on so it was clearly visible.

  “So this is what you’ve been working on?” Mrs. Brown asked, looking over Jack’s shoulder at the diagram.

  Rock’s entire team looked at her with a wide range of emotions etched on their faces. This was the first time the NSA spooks seemed to care what they were doing.

  “Yes,” Lisa said, pointing to the spacecraft drawing on the table. “This was where the rover would have been secured on top of the lander. It actually acted sort of like a cargo bay where the rover and its instruments would ride the lander to the planet’s surface. In the past, we’ve used airbags, parachutes, and rockets to land our equipment there safely. The Adomite-300 was going to use rockets for the Mars landing, so now we simply added a crew bay here”—she glided her fingertip to the command module—“and then used shielding around the base and outer walls to prep it for a human presence.”

  “Sounds simple enough,” Mrs. Brown said.

  “That’s just the beginning,” Jack said. “The rockets were designed for the rover’s payload, not the crew’s command module, so we have to adjust the thrust of the rockets to account for the extra weight.”

  “Not to mention the extra fuel load,” Marge chimed in.

  “Which changes the weight of the lander, that has to factor in the fact that the original rover design was meant for a one-way trip. This lander has to be able to return to lunar orbit as well, so it has to have more than twice the fuel load in order to escape the gravity well of the moon,” Rock added.

  “Also, don’t forget the fact that this is just the lander. You have to have an orbiter to re-dock with,” Tom said. “This means extra weight on the overall payload manifest.”

  “Which has to be calculated in the launch profile,” Jack finished.

  Mrs. Brown almost looked pale. “Well, I’m glad we have your expertise to count on, and I’m sure you’ll find the right solution.” She didn’t wait for an answer and left the room completely, which was rare for her.

  Tom chuckled. “We didn’t even have to use any techno-jargon.”

  “Thank God,” Jack said, and even Lisa smiled.

  “Which brings me to the question,” Rock said, more serious now. “Will this configuration work?”

  “It will,” Lisa said. “There’s only so much our carbon scrubbers can do, but with only two bodies and these extra oxygen tanks, we should be able to match the ten-day mission profile with an extra two days to spare.”

  “That’s cutting it a tad close, isn’t it?” Marge asked, looking at Lisa.

  “We can’t add more oxygen tanks, and the current carbon scrubber would have to be twice as large unless we make one from scratch. That’s the next largest size, and it would impact the dynamic envelope of the lander considerably.” Lisa nodded.

  “Probably take it over the maximum range,” Tom ventured.

  “Well, the mission can always be cut short, if that’s an issue,” Jack said.

  “Or our handlers figure our nauts can stick it out for nine days instead of four,” Marge said.

  “You can’t be serious, can you, Marjorie?” Lisa asked.

  Marge nodded before Tom spoke. “Damn right they can, them bastards.”

  “Hey, aren’t we in charge of the mission? We say lift off and bring Craig and Julie back on time. How could they interfere?” Jack asked.

  “Don’t ask, son. They’ll do it one way or the other if they have to. We’re all expendable when it comes to something like this,” Tom said, giving his stern-father look at Jack.

  Everyone looked at Rock. “I don’t know, folks. Let’s not take any chances, though. Jack, being our signals guy, can you rig the orbiter so that it communicates directly with the lander?”

  “It’s already configured that way,” Jack said. “It’s used as a relay from earth.” He looked confused.

  “No, I get that already. I’m talking about receiving commands from moon-side and not just mission control. I want to ensure that Julie and Craig can send commands to the orbiter and receive trajectory data from its radar so that they can lift off on their own, without data or telemetry feeds from earth.”

  Jack whistled, and Marge responded, “Wow, that’s intense, Rock. You’re willing to do that? Right under their noses?”

  “You’re damn right I’m willing,” Rock said, his face serious.

  “Screw them spooks, Marge. You know they’ll do it if they have to. I like Rock’s idea,” Tom said.

  “It’ll be risky . . .” Lisa added.

  “Not at all, unless someone talks,” Rock said. There were looks, but no one spoke. “Can you do it, Jack?”

  “Yes, I’ll have to add some wiring and maybe an extra transceiver on the lander, but it can be done.”

  Marge added, “Just tell them it’s a redundant system. That would be the truth, too.” NASA was known for its triple redundancy, so no one would really question an extra piece of equipment if it was coded in the weight manifest as vital.

  “Good. I’ll talk to both of them this afternoon when they finish in the tanks, and fill them in. Jack, you try to get some downtime with them. Say when they transition to physical training, and get them up to speed on the equipment. Lisa, it’s minor, but you reconfigure the weight profile, and Tom, you make sure the damn thing works. Marge and I will run point on this with the NSA,” Rock said.

  “Spooks,” Tom retorted.

  “NSA,” Rock said, giving Tom a look. “Okay, now let’s get to work.”

  The group broke with each team member heading to a laptop or tablet somewhere in the room, but Rock was sure he heard Tom mutter “spooks” under his breath as the man left. It would be a long day.

  People’s Republic Space Command

  Outside of Beijing, China

  In the near future, Day 20

  * * *

  Hun and his team had walked the debris field of the Long Reach impact site looking for anything salvageable. It had been an exercise in futility. Liquid hydrogen and oxygen didn’t just burn, it burned hot. Hun was no geologist, but he swore some of the rocks at the impact site had turned molten and reformed as a different type of stone.

  His entire team as well as over a dozen military officers were flown from Beijing to Wenchang the day after the catastrophic launch attempt. He knew the exercise wouldn’t result in anything positive, but the military had insisted on it and had given Hun nearly a hundred soldiers to poke and prod through the blackened area. That had been a week ago. Hun’s team had been flown back to Beijing and was hard at work configuring a way to get one of the Long Reach rockets ready to carry a reconnaissance payload to the moon. The problem is they were always overweight for what the military wanted to send.

  “Can’t we strip the horizontal brackets and use just one cross joint?” Chang Fu, his mechanical engineer, asked from the video feed on Hun’s second monitor. Chang was nearly a thousand kilometers from the command center, working on the actual orbiter which was to be called Liquid Eye. Hun thought the name unique but silly, if nothing else. They had to use a Skype-like secure video connection to discuss the details with their chief mechanic.

  “Our calculations show that any lateral stresses above four-point-five G’s will result in structural failure,” Hun said, looking at his data tablet.

  “So we keep lateral forces to a minimum,” Lin said from where she sat next to Hun.

  “That would be a minimum considering the torque and spin once it enters LEO,” Chon said.

  “How would you know, Chon? You’re a signals technician, not a mech engineer,” Lin asked him from across the table.

  “I studied thermal dynamics and geometry before I took up advanced wave theory at Sun Tsu,” Chon said, referring to the new university which included advanced sciences as well as military theory.

  “Chon’s probably correct. I was hoping our trajectory could be flattened a bit to compensate; otherwise, I’m running out of ideas here,” Chang sai
d.

  “The problem is we can’t add fuel to the Long Reach in order to flatten the trajectory,” Hun said, frustrated at the dilemma.

  Everyone sat quietly for nearly a minute. The Chinese were known for their patience, and unlike Americans, silence was something to be welcomed, not avoided.

  Finally Chon tapped on his paper. “Why do we have to send the orbiter on only one rocket?”

  Lin looked at him as if he had lost his mind. “What kind of question is that?”

  “Well, the entire purpose is to put eyes on the Fleeting Locust landing site, right?” Chon asked, referring to the unique name the original robotic mission had for itself. Hun nodded, as did Lin. “Well, we are already saving weight by going the lithium route on the battery instead of nickel-cadmium, but the whole thing is still large and heavy due to the electrical demands of the equipment on the orbiter. So we send up the equipment first, inserting it into lunar orbit minus the battery module, and then we send the battery module along with a docking clamp and mate it to the equipment module. Don’t you see? Equation solved.”

  “Wait, yes, that would not only work but it would allow us to use a much stronger battery as well as bigger and more capable equipment,” Lin said, excitement in her voice.

  Hun started to see the benefits of the idea, but instantly the complications reared their ugly head. “Can you configure docking clamps to each cargo section, Chang?” Chang nodded from the monitor. “I’ll need to ask General Wang if we even have two Long Reach rockets available. I was under the impression that we had only one.”

  “Well, we would have had two if the colonel—” Chon was cut off by Hun.

  “Shhh, don’t speak of it. What is done is done. Maybe we would have had two Long Reaches, but let’s look at the future, not the past.” Hun remembered all too vividly his boss’s fate, and he was fairly sure they were being monitored. Chon was young and rebellious, a bad sign for anyone living under this regime.

  “How long would it take for you to construct a docking collar?” Lin asked.

  Chang looked down at something and then back into the monitor. “Inventory shows we have two small collars ready. I just need to bring them out and size them. Perhaps make an adjustment after checking their tolerance levels. The main issue will be the actual maneuver. There will be just over a two-point-five-second delay in all command inputs for docking. We’d either have to adjust here or make sure the computer programming is up to the task.”

  “I can take care of the programming,” Chon said. “That shouldn’t be an issue as long as I can get a targeting grid on the docking lens.”

  “Sir?” Lin asked, everyone falling silent and looking at their lead.

  “Go with it, Chang. You, too, Chon. Make the programming fixes, and I’ll present our idea to the general directly.”

  Hun received nods from all his staff, including Chang, who nodded through the monitor before clicking it off. Hun knew the raw parts were available, but he had no idea what the Red Army had done to their engineering capacity once they took over. He moved to his desk where he phoned General Wang’s aide and requested an appointment. He told the aide it was urgent, and the man informed him he’d have an answer within the hour. It took only seven minutes, and Hun was instructed to meet the general in the director’s office in ten minutes. It appeared Hun was going to have one shot at this, and he planned to make it work.

  11 Payback

  White House Situation Room

  Washington D.C.

  In the near future, Day 20

  * * *

  “Those bastards!” the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said more than a little uncharacteristically for his position.

  President Powers looked at him and at the others in the presidential situation room located in the basement under the West Wing of the White House. “We’re sure the Chinese destroyed our satellite?” she asked.

  “No, Madam President, not sure, but our HUMINT indicates that it is probable that an anti-satellite missile took out our bird,” the military attaché said, putting his papers back into his portfolio.

  “It was a military sat, too, Madam President,” the Secretary of Defense said to her, leaning over and then returning to his stoic posture beside her.

  “Well, that explains our chief’s reaction,” she said. “We have protocols in place for this, do we not?”

  “We do, Madam President, you only need to give the word,” her Director of National Security said, a smug tone in his voice.

  “Chief, are you in agreement with the deployment of the X47B Hunter drone?” she asked.

  The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff smiled. “Hell yes, Madam President, and not only in agreement but ready as well.”

  The Secretary of Defense clarified, “We’ve fueled the Atlas V at Vandenburg and stand ready to launch the Hunter within sixty minutes on your orders.”

  Everyone looked anxiously at the president while she took her time with the decision. “Proceed to execute Mission Boomerang, then.”

  People started to move quickly, some picking up secure phone lines, others heading to their duty stations. “You heard the president,” said the chief, “time for some good ole fashioned payback, the hoorah way.”

  No one laughed, but more than a few smiled. Only a handful understood the danger involved. “Shall I give the order?” the Secretary of Defense said, his tone hushed, literally unheard by those in the same room, such was their focus.

  “Yes, Secretary Davis, bring us to DEFCON three.”

  “Jesus, Gloria,” the vice president said to the president, whispering as he leaned over so he wouldn’t be overheard. “We’re halfway there.”

  “I know, John. That’s why we’re taking precautions.”

  “Removing the U.S. emblem from the drone isn’t exactly reassuring,” the vice president said. “If they have optical surveillance on their own satellites, they can easily see where the attack originated from. They’re in geo orbit, Gloria, and that makes us exposed,” Vice President John Lee said, his entire brow furrowed in anxiety.

  The president looked him in the eye, assessing her point man’s resolve. “Peace through strength, John. We’re weaker if we do nothing.”

  “We’re talking about launching our drone near geosynchronous orbit. That’s like over twenty-five thousand miles away. I’m no scientist, but the Hunter will be observable that high up, to more than just one device.”

  “I know, I read the report, and you’ll remember the response time? That’s why it’s rigged with a self-destruct device. Hopefully, by the time they register the strike, there will be no drone to observe,” she said.

  “Hopefully?” He arched his brows, bringing a hand to his forehead.

  “Take some aspirin and trust me on this.”

  “We’ve been through a lot, Gloria, but if you’re wrong on this, we’ll be at DEFCON one by tomorrow morning.”

  President Powers sighed. “I’m afraid you’re correct, so let’s hope I’m right.”

  “Lord have mercy,” he said.

  Vandenburg Air Force Base

  Southern California

  In the near future, Day 20

  * * *

  The Atlas Vb had a maximum fuel load and an extra pair of side-mounted fuel tanks as it was carrying the X47B Hunter drone into space and not the usual suborbital launch it was accustomed to performing. The drone itself was specially modified with an extra fuel pack as well as an explosives detail that would trigger automatically once the missile was launched. The missile was specially built to burn in a vacuum with a solid propellant that left little to no visual light once ignited. The fuel burned a dull red and, while highly noticeable in the infrared, it had a very low detection threshold in the visual spectrum.

  Once the sun was about to set, obscuring the casual spectator, the Atlas Vb leaped into the sky from its California Vandenburg Air Force base on a very unusual trajectory over the continental United States instead of over the Pacific Ocean as was usual for saf
ety reasons. After seven minutes, the rocket depleted its fuel load over the Caribbean Ocean and started its long decent for its return, eventually landing in the South Atlantic near the equator. The X47B’s motors took over upon separation, propelling the drone to nearly twenty-five thousand miles per hour, while its trajectory flattened to bring it looping around the African Continent.

  The drone had small lateral thrusters that fired in order to swing the drone on a highly inclined vector. This new heading resulted in the craft passing over the Indian Ocean, moving up and out, away from the earth, in a very unusual launch profile. The radar on the drone’s head lit up, searching the sky, immediately identifying three large satellites orbiting the earth in geosynchronous orbit within its targeting arc. Two satellites were immediately identified as friendly and discarded, but the third met the profile for the target programmed into its computer sensor. A Chinese multimodal satellite array.

  The drone never stopped, making minute changes to its flight path as it burned the last of its fuel. Its speed started to slow immediately as the pull of the earth’s gravity well beckoned the drone to return. The drone launched its only missile, which was three times the size of a normal air-to-air missile. Once the drone’s radar indicated the weapon was over one hundred miles away, the explosive charges were set off and the X47B Hunter ceased to exist.

  The missile, already carrying substantial delta-v, continued to accelerate, making the slightest of course corrections, much as its mother drone had done. It reached a top speed of nearly fifty thousand miles per hour and in less than twenty minutes had reached its target. The one hundred pounds of high explosive Semtex-D did not require oxygen as part of its chemical composition change.

  The explosion was, contrary to its engine exhaust, highly visible as the explosives, missile, and satellite were transformed into microscopic space debris. Seventy percent of transcontinental communications in and through China were instantly interrupted. The second act of aggression in space had just been recorded in modern human history.