by Dale Brown
He turned his attention back to the open bay and glided inside. The airlock was a no-go, much too small for his COMS to fit. So I’ll make my own hole, he decided. With his thrusters set to stabilize him, he powered up his saw and started cutting into the inner hull.
Mars One shuddered sharply.
“I have breached the aft module’s outer hull,” Nadia reported. “Moving on to the inner sections now.”
Brad finished slicing an opening large enough to fit the powerful fingerlike appendages of two more of his robot’s mechanical limbs. Bright white light, oddly flat in a vacuum, was visible through the gap. He gripped the edges of the slit he’d cut and then fired several of his COMS’ thrusters at full power, pulling back and to one side.
For a moment, the section of hull plating held . . . and then it gave way—peeling back like tinfoil. Given the payload constraints involved in any rocket launch, no one built spacecraft like an armored battleship. Conduits and cabling running through that area of the inner hull ripped loose in a cascade of sparks. The bright white light he’d seen winked out, replaced instantly by dim red emergency lighting.
Instantly, Brad let go and maneuvered over to the breach he’d opened. He looked into a compartment full of electronic consoles and displays. A single cosmonaut in a white space suit was tethered by an umbilical to one of the consoles. Through the visor of his helmet, the Russian’s eyes were wide with fear. The cloth name tag on his suit identified him as Lieutenant Colonel Pavel Anikeyev. A sign on one of the compartment’s intact walls read: oкружающая среда и техника.
“Environment and Engineering,” his computer translated helpfully.
Brad swung the limb holding his powered saw toward Anikeyev and activated his short-range radio. “Sdavaysya! Surrender!”
Immediately the other man raised both hands.
The station rocked again.
“I’m inside the forward module,” Vasey said carefully. “No hostile contact yet.”
“Copy that,” Brad said. He turned his attention back to Anikeyev. “Do you speak English?”
“Yes, a little,” the other man said shakily.
“Good. Then stay here and don’t move,” Brad ordered. “Do you understand?”
“Da,” the cosmonaut agreed.
Frowning, Brad used a short burst from his thrusters to enter the compartment. Hatches on either side opened up into narrow corridors. “No way is this thing going to fit through those,” he muttered to himself. His robot’s thermal sensors were picking up the heat signatures of at least two more Russian crewmen down the corridor to his right—the one that led off toward where the Federation orbiter and one of the Progress cargo ships were docked. Another sign over the hatch indicated this was the way to the station’s command compartment. He spun the COMS in that direction, trying to decide what he should do next.
And through his rear-facing sensors, he saw the Russian cosmonaut suddenly lower his hands and grab a pistol that had been Velcro’d to the side of the closest console. It came up, aimed straight at his robot.
“Not cool,” Brad growled. He lashed backward with the powered saw. Blood sprayed lazily across the compartment, already boiling away in the vacuum of space. Another of his flexible limbs grabbed the pistol as it drifted out of the dead Russian’s gloved hand.
His COMS computer identified it for him. “The weapon is a Vektor SR-1M 9mm pistol loaded with armor-piercing ammunition able to penetrate 2.8mm of titanium plate at one hundred yards.”
Or this robot I’m riding, Brad realized. His jaw tightened. These guys weren’t going down easily. “Wolf One to all Wolves,” he said tightly. “Stay sharp. This crew is armed.” His computer transmitted pictures of the pistol to the other COMS.
“Roger that, Wolf One,” Nadia replied. “The Russian I just encountered was similarly equipped.”
“And?”
“He resisted,” she said simply. “It was futile. I threw him out of the station. Major Filatyev should reenter the earth’s atmosphere in approximately twenty minutes. He will have ample time to regret his error.”
Harsh, but eminently fair, Brad decided. “How about you, Constable?” he asked.
“Captain Revin has opted for the better part of valor,” Vasey answered. “I have his pistol.”
Which left the two cosmonauts whose heat signatures he’d detected, Brad thought. It was time to put an end to this. He toggled his radio again. “Attention, surviving Mars One crew, this is McLanahan. It’s over. Surrender and we’ll spare your lives.”
“Yebat’ tebya! Go fuck yourself,” an older man’s voice replied.
“But, Colonel, maybe we should . . .” a younger voice said hesitantly.
“Shut up, Konnikov!”
Based on its triangulation of the radio signals it had just received, the COMS computer tentatively assigned identification tags to the two thermal signatures. Brad studied their indicated positions and improvised a quick plan. It was probably insanely risky . . . so he decided not to waste any more time thinking it through. Pushing these Russians fast and hard was the surest way to beat them.
He released the robot arm holding his explosive breaching charge and swung it into position in front of the opening to the station’s command compartment. “Set the charge timer for thirty seconds,” he instructed his computer. “But deactivate the detonator.”
“The timer is set and running,” the computer replied. “The detonator is inactive.”
Without waiting any longer, Brad disconnected his neural link and life-support umbilical. His awareness of the COMS dropped away, leaving him feeling fully human for the first time since they’d loaded aboard the S-29 Shadow several hours before. He squirmed around and punched the hatch release mechanism. It cycled open and he floated out into the environment and engineering compartment. The electronically compressed carbon fibers of his advanced Electronic Elastomeric Activity Suit protected him against vacuum and he had enough air to last at least thirty minutes.
He took the Vektor pistol out of one of the robot’s hands. Its safety was off. He scooped up the rectangular breaching charge. A red light on its top winked on and off, counting down seconds.
With a crooked smile, Brad braced himself against the COMS. Then he tossed the breaching charge down the corridor toward Mars One’s command compartment. It sailed away, flying straight and true.
One. Two. Three, he counted mentally. Now!
Brad pushed off hard with his boots. Holding the 9mm pistol out in front of him, he shot through the open hatch and along the narrow corridor.
The explosive charge flew out into the next compartment. Its red light blinked rhythmically, apparently signaling imminent oblivion.
“Bombit’!” the younger man screamed over the radio. “Bomb!”
And then Brad soared into the compartment right behind the dud charge. Out the corner of his right eye, he saw a cosmonaut desperately trying to pull himself down behind a bulky console. No threat there, he decided. At least not immediately.
But straight ahead, he saw another space-suited figure rising from cover. Time seemed to slow down, with single seconds seeming to stretch out into whole minutes. That other Russian’s weapon was already swinging toward him, coming on target with frightening control.
Brad squeezed the trigger.
There was no sound. Only the sensation of a slight deceleration when his pistol fired, bucking back against his hand.
The other cosmonaut’s helmet exploded.
Killed instantly by the bullet that drilled through his forehead and out the back of his skull, Colonel Vadim Strelkov drifted backward and then stopped, snugged up tight against the umbilical still connecting him to his console.
Screaming shrilly inside his helmet, Georgy Konnikov let go of his own pistol and frantically raised his hands.
Mars One had fallen.
Forty-Eight
Shadow Two-Nine Bravo
That Same Time
Hunter Noble felt the
sensation of acceleration compressing his body vanish. Rapidly, he scanned the readouts flowing across his cockpit displays and HUD. “I show a good burn,” he confirmed. “We’re in the groove and closing on the predicted orbits of the second Elektron and the reactor module.”
“I confirm that,” Liz Gallagher said from her copilot’s seat beside him. One of her displays pinged at her. She leaned forward, with her mane of red hair making a halo around her head in zero-G. “We have a radar lock on the Elektron. The range is one hundred thirty-five miles and closing fast.” Her fingers tapped the display. “Passing the data to the OWO.”
“I have it,” Jill Anderson, their offensive weapons officer, said over the intercom from the Shadow’s aft cabin. “Pinging the target with the laser radar now.” There was a short pause while her small targeting laser hit the Russian spaceplane with pulses of coherent light. A sophisticated sensor picked up the reflected pulses—using them both to paint a 3-D image of the enemy spacecraft and to refine the range and closure rate established by the S-29’s radar. “I have a good range. Now down to one hundred twelve miles. That guy has his nose pointed right at us, Boomer. Depending on how long it takes us to get burn-through, we may get a little cooked.”
Boomer felt his stomach tighten. He’d known they weren’t going to be able to surprise that second Russian pilot. “Copy that, Anderson. Zap the bastard and cross your fingers.”
“Firing now,” she replied.
He found the silence unnerving. His brain knew they really were using a two-megawatt gas dynamic laser to attack an enemy spaceplane so far away that it was still invisible to the naked eye. But his animal instincts kept shrieking that nothing was happening . . . since there was no sound, no vibration, no physical clue of any kind.
“We’re hitting the Elektron,” Anderson reported.
“Warning, warning, target-tracking radar lock,” the S-29’s computer said. And then, “Warning, hull temperature rising.”
Boomer grimaced. “And he’s hitting us.” He felt hotter suddenly, though he knew that was an illusion. Before they truly felt the heat of that Russian Hobnail laser penetrating the Shadow’s cockpit, they’d already be dead.
“Lock broken. Hull temperature within norms,” the computer said suddenly.
“Nailed him!” Jill Anderson crowed over the intercom. “Scratch one Elektron!”
Boomer allowed himself to relax a little, but not much. They still had one more task on this mission. He glanced at Liz Gallagher. “That was a little closer than I would have liked.”
She nodded. “Yep.” Then a quick, impish smile crossed her face. “But at least I won my bet.”
Boomer raised an eyebrow. “What bet?”
“That we’d come through this in one piece,” Gallagher said simply. “So you owe me dinner when we get back to the world. A really expensive dinner.”
Boomer grinned back at her. “You’re on.” He spoke over the intercom to Anderson. “What’s the score on that Russian reactor module?”
“I have good images and a solid lock,” the OWO said confidently. “The reactor is in a stable orbit.”
“Can you hit its communication antennas without damaging anything else?” Boomer asked.
“No problem.”
He nodded. “Then do it. Let’s make sure the Russians can’t send any new orders to the module’s guidance systems. We don’t want them deorbiting that reactor before our guys get the chance to find out what makes it tick.”
“Shooting now,” Anderson assured him.
Several seconds later, their laser stopped firing—leaving the fusion reactor coasting silently in orbit, safe from any further interference by the enemy.
Moscow
That Same Time
For a long moment, Colonel General Leonov sat frozen at his desk, scarcely able to comprehend the speed with which all his years-long work and planning had collapsed. The Americans had captured Mars One . . . and it was only a matter of time before they took possession of the orbiting fusion reactor. By destroying the antennas aboard both the space station and the reactor module, the enemy had robbed him of any ability to activate the remaining fail-safe programs secretly installed in their software.
Not that many were left, he thought bitterly. Strelkov’s attempt to evade the American attack by climbing to a higher orbit had completely drained Mars One’s fuel supply—making it impossible for him to order a rocket burn that would have sent the station plummeting back into the earth’s atmosphere. The destruction of the Scimitar missile launcher had been another blow, since he could no longer override its safety lockouts and fire directly into Mars One itself.
In a small inset screen on his display, Leonov could see Gennadiy Gryzlov’s furious face screaming soundlessly at him. To avoid being distracted by the other man’s increasingly unhinged ranting, he’d muted the president as soon as the disaster in orbit became clear.
At an adjacent workstation, he could hear his deputy trying unsuccessfully to soothe Gryzlov. Tikhomirov might as well try to put out a forest fire with a spoonful of water, he thought dispassionately. Russia’s leader had gone far beyond the reach of reason . . . and he would never acknowledge that his own impatience and overaggressiveness were at least partly responsible for this defeat.
Leonov’s gaze moved to another small inset screen on his computer display. RAPIRA SEVEN IN ORBIT. AWAITING ATTACK CONFIRMATION. He entered a quick series of commands into his system, pulling up the hypersonic warhead’s projected track. His eyes narrowed. Yes, there was still time. If nothing else, he could salvage something from this catastrophe by striking at Russia’s most dangerous foe.
Decisively, he tapped more keys, sending a single encrypted order up into space. The message on his display changed: ATTACK CONFIRMED. DEORBITING IN 10, 9, 8 . . .
Calmly, Leonov took Gryzlov off mute. “Yes, Mr. President?”
In Orbit
That Same Time
High over Western Europe, the Rapira’s retrorockets fired. Decelerated just enough to drop out of orbit, the hypersonic warhead separated from its motor and fell toward the earth at more than sixteen thousand miles per hour. Seconds later, it entered the atmosphere and streaked eastward, trailing a plume of superheated plasma.
The Kremlin
That Same Time
Maddened almost beyond coherent thought, Gennadiy Gryzlov stalked around his office in a killing rage. Screens fixed around the walls showed Leonov seated placidly at his desk in his command post below the National Defense Control Center.
“You blundering fool!” he snarled. “Your unbelievable incompetence has snatched defeat from the jaws of victory!” For a moment, he stood breathing hard and fought for control over a rising tide of all-consuming fury. But then he gave in, yielding himself entirely to its red-hot embrace. “You’ll pay for this, Leonov!” he snapped, delighting in the brutal orders he was about to give. “From this moment forward, you’re nothing but a dead man walking!”
To Gryzlov’s intense surprise, Leonov interrupted him. “As so often, you’ve got it exactly backward, Gennadiy,” the other man said icily. “I’m not the dead man here. You are. Look outside your window, you asshole—”
Stunned, and suddenly terrified, Gryzlov whirled around . . . just in time to see a blinding flash as the Rapira screamed down out of the sky and slammed home only a hundred meters away. The enormous shock wave crushed him to death milliseconds before the following wall of fire and shattered concrete and steel ripped his corpse to pieces.
Epilogue
Aboard Eagle Station (Formerly Mars One), in Orbit
Several Weeks Later
Silently, Brad McLanahan drifted down a narrow darkened corridor toward the space station’s command compartment. Behind him, farther back in the module, he could hear the whine of power tools and murmured conversations. Several Sky Masters technicians brought up in the surviving S-19 Midnight spaceplane were aboard—fixing broken equipment and translating Russian-language controls into English
where possible . . . or replacing whole systems if necessary. Computer specialists on the ground had already identified and removed a number of destructive fail-safe programs hidden in the station’s operating software.
He felt bone-weary. The first days after they’d captured Mars One had passed in a blur of emergency work to seal hull breaches and repair some of the other damage caused by their boarding action. It would have been impossible without their COMS robots. As it was, they’d been forced to use the cramped Russian Federation orbiter as temporary living quarters until it was safe to bring the bigger modules back to life.
Electricity was still in relatively short supply, but that should pass soon. The captured fusion reactor module was in a parking orbit nearby, ready to dock and come online as soon as Jason Richter and a team of engineers were satisfied they knew all its secrets. In the meantime, to protect the newly renamed Eagle Station against a possible Russian counterattack, Hunter Noble’s laser-armed S-29B spaceplane was docked and ready to launch against any threat they detected.
He floated through a hatch and out into the console-crowded compartment. Ahead of him, Nadia Rozek, anchored by footholds in an upright position, was intently focused on one of their computer displays. Images, bright in the half-light, flickered across the screen.
Suddenly Brad heard her swear viciously under her breath. Oops, he thought nervously. Someone was in big trouble. He hoped it wasn’t him. Especially not right now, when he’d finally nerved himself up to take a step he’d been putting off for far too long.
“What’s wrong?” he asked quietly.
Nadia turned her head and gestured at the screen. “This,” she said tightly.
Brad reached out for a handhold and pulled himself closer.
She was watching a newscast from Russia. It showed a group of somber-faced government officials and military officers gathered outside the enormous triumphal arch of St. Petersburg’s Palace Square. With the Kremlin Senate Building and others around it reduced to tumbled heaps of blackened rubble by the surprise Rapira strike, the Russians had temporarily moved their seat of government to Peter the Great’s old imperial city.