Station Breaker

by Andrew Mayne

  "Watch out for that one," Peterson whispers to me, singling out a girl in crutches wearing a glitter-speckled t-shirt and purple streaks in her hair. She looks to be between nineteen and twenty-five.

  I pretend everything is totally cool and my hero didn't just emasculate me moments before the most important day of my life. "I'll be careful."

  "No, seriously. She once asked the NASA director a question about a contractor funding overrun that he didn't have the answer for. It nearly cost him his job and killed the program."

  "Seriously?"

  I give the girl a hesitant glance. Leaning on metal arm crutches, from some kind of condition, she doesn't look threatening...

  I keep a wary eye on her anyway as Renata starts our briefing. There's also a mischievous curl to her lips, like she's holding back something clever, that I find alluring.

  Bennet explains how excited he is to be part of this program. Peterson talks about how thrilled she is to be going to the Station and what kind of research she's going to do.

  I make an inane comment about being eager to ride shotgun – actually saying the word "shotgun," and catching myself too late. Thankfully, the joke passes by and I feel pretty sure Bennet isn't looking at me with daggers.

  Renata opens it to questions. The menace in the glitter shirt shoots an arm into the air and almost drops a crutch.

  Renata manages to avoid her as long as others have their hands up.

  There are the predictable questions about what it's like to be an astronaut from a group of people who look like the most adventurous thing they'll ever do is move out of their parent's basements.

  I get a couple technical ones about the new version of our space capsule.

  Finally, the only raised hand is glitter girl.

  I can see Renata's hesitation. "Okay, Laney Washburn, you're our last question."

  "My question is for David Dixon. As one of the first astronauts to not have prior NASA or military training, what's it like to be the odd man out in a capsule full of veterans?"

  Did she just call Yoga Boy out for being a poseur?

  I probably stutter and take longer than I should. "Well Laney, the mission of iCosmos is to open space up for everyone. That starts when a regular guy like me gets a chance to fly next to a couple of real heroes like Captain Bennet and Dr. Peterson."

  She smiles at my answer. I mentally clap myself on the back.

  Before Renata can end the briefing Laney blurts out another question. Teetering on her crutches she asks,"When will people like me be able to fly for iCosmos?"

  By "me," I think she means handicapped.

  Gut punch.

  I flinch.

  I hope Bennet's gun is loaded and I get the first bullet.

  Thankfully, Peterson jumps in and saves the day telling Laney that both NASA and iCosmos have a program for making space accessible to all Americans.

  Laney smiles at her answer, but keeps her eyes on me. I get the feeling she asked the question just to make me squirm.

  3

  MOVING TARGET

  IT WAS A TEXTBOOK LAUNCH, just like the simulator – except for the part where I'm worried my commanding officer is going to whip a gun out at any moment and shoot my brains out.

  The Gs were more than I've experienced for a sustained period, but I've done enough gut-churning flight maneuvers to not be bothered. The real stomach twister happens a few minutes after we reach orbit.

  Launching to a space station is like trying to throw a baseball through a specific window of a bullet train as it flies past – if the train was going 17,000 miles an hour.

  You don't aim for the target. Instead, you calculate where it will be at a specific time, then try to intercept it. Launch windows are measured in half seconds for this kind of thing. You don't use a map, so much as a spreadsheet.

  While we were sitting on the launchpad for three hours, the US/iCosmos flew overhead twice.

  If you've ever been out in the middle of the desert on a moonless night and seen the tiny speck of a low earth orbit satellite or space station whiz across the sky, that's what we're trying to intercept. It's not even over the horizon when the launch computer fires the rocket.

  The launch computer controls everything.

  Joining up with a space station involves two other computers besides our own: There's the one at mission control in Nashville, watching everything and making sure tracking and telemetry jibe. Then there's the one controlling our destination, the US/iCosmos station, doing things like adjusting the pitch of the solar panels every few minutes so the station will encounter less drag as it reaches the closest point to the atmosphere in its orbit and controlling the tiny little thrusters that move the station out of the path of space debris.

  The station's biggest concern is fast-moving objects hurtling towards it – which is exactly what our space capsule is doing.

  At 17,000 miles an hour, a 1% margin of error in velocity means slamming into the station at the same speed as a race car at full throttle – enough force to destroy the structure.

  Before we even get close, we have to reach a parallel orbit matching its velocity.

  This is made all the more tricky because spacecraft, even the fancy iCosmos Unicorn capsules, don't have a lot of fuel to burn.

  It's not like the Millennium Falcon where you can just have Chewbacca take you to orbit on a whim and dodge incoming TIE-Fighters without worrying about fuel consumption.

  A little spreadsheet is keeping track of fuel, velocity, distance to target and has lots of little triggers to tell us when we need to take a different course of action.

  All of this is automatic for the most part. Commander Bennet's job and mine is to watch our big flatscreen displays and keep an eye out for any flashing warnings.

  At some point in a normal launch ground control will let him use the joystick to bring us closer to the station before the automatic docking computer takes over. This is really just giving a monkey something to press so he feels he achieved something.

  The iCosmos ships have done this kind of thing hundreds of times without anyone at the controls. But when there's human cargo, in this case Dr. Peterson, you want pilots onboard for when all the computers don't agree and letting the ship burn up over the Pacific Ocean isn't an option.

  Fifteen minutes after launch I get a flashing box on my console saying there's a problem with our trajectory.

  "Commander, I'm getting a warning about our projected path."

  "I'm on it. Nashville, this is Unicorn 22, I'm getting a warning that our intended destination is unavailable. Over."

  "Unicorn 22, hold steady while we check on this. Over."

  I flip through a few screens and realize the US/iC station is sending us a "do not proceed any closer" signal. This would be from the computer system that watches out for any fast moving threats.

  "Unicorn 22, we just heard from the US/iC that they experienced a solar flare that knocked out their inbound telemetry sensor. They're going to try a reboot. Continue your orbit until otherwise noted. Over."

  "A solar flare?" I check through all my readouts and can't find anything from the Helios satellite. "There's nothing about it."

  "Dixon, are you planning on arguing with their computer?" says Bennet. "Which is preferable? They're right or that their computer made a mistake?"

  "Good point." I shut up.

  I pull up the reentry profiles. If we can't dock with the US/iC then we'll have to return to Earth. Like trying to catch the station, reentry is equally complicated.

  If we miss the window, we could find ourselves in the Pacific thousands of miles away from the nearest rescue, or worse, in hostile territory.

  Ideally, we hit the window at the right time and come back down over Canaveral where we use the landing rockets to bring us down to the pad – which could mean I'm home in time to grab dinner at Outback Steakhouse and get to sleep in my own bed.

  The alternative is a prison cell in North Korea or burning to death in the upper atm
osphere.

  "Reentry profiles loaded, Commander."

  "Hold your horses, Dixon. Let's see what the folks at Nashville have to say."

  "Are you that bored of space already?" asks Peterson from the seat behind me.

  She's joking, but there's something cold in her voice, like it was forced. She can't be scared, can she?

  "Unicorn 22, this is Nashville. We just spoke to the US/iC commander and she says they think there may be a sensor alignment issue and they won't know until they do a space walk. And even then it could be days. Please load up the reentry profiles and we'll tell you when to proceed. Over."

  "Affirmative, Nashville. Doing a systems check now. Over," says Bennet. "Dixon, what's our ETA to a Canaveral window?"

  I'd already done the math. "In 34 minutes we'll need to start our reentry burn."

  He nods then starts going through screens on his console. Out of the corner of my eye I see him digging through directories of all the onboard sensors. I'd never seen him do that in the simulator – but we've never been in this kind of situation before.

  "Nashville, this is Unicorn 22. It looks like we've got our own sensor issue on our heat shield. Over."

  Suddenly a bright red box starts flashing on my console telling me there's a heat shield malfunction.

  I start to flip through sensor readouts and scan for anything that looks out of line and then my screen goes blank.

  Confused, I turn to Bennet. "I've lost my display."

  He relays this back to Earth. "Nashville, this is Unicorn 22. My co-pilot appears to have lost his display. I'm giving Dr. Peterson redundant controls. Over."

  "Roger that, Unicorn 22. We'd suggest a reset, but if you're experiencing a shield sensor issue, we advise against that. Over."

  "Affirmative, Nashville."

  I reach out to touch my display, to see if it was just a video issue. Bennet stops me with a sharp look. "Dixon, keep your hands off it. Peterson and I have this."

  "I have control," says Peterson. "Checking heat shield sensors. Nashville, I can confirm we have a sensor problem of our own. We'd need to make visual confirmation to verify. Over."

  "Unicorn 22, please stand by. Over."

  It's amazing how calm everyone can be when you just realize you've been fucked by the universe.

  The US/iC can't let us dock and we just found out we might burn to death on reentry.

  Making things worse is the fact that I think Bennet intentionally shut me out of my screen so Peterson could have access.

  First the gun. Now this.

  Something is not right, but I keep my mouth shut.

  4

  HOT MESS

  "WELL KIDS, any suggestions?" asks Bennet, while we wait to hear our fate from Nashville.

  Peterson types away on the console behind me, while I stare at my own matte finish reflection in my screen. Bennet's question was rhetorical, at least in respect to me.

  "ISS doesn't have a spare docking collar," says Peterson. "Checking on OPSEK. No, she's only got the Soyuz-type free. What about New Star?"

  "The Chinese station?" says Bennet. "Didn't they have a rapid depressurization problem with their airlocks? I think I'll risk burning up."

  She left out one option. "There's the Korolev," I point out.

  "The K1?" replies Bennet. "There's a thought. Peterson, what do you see?"

  "Pulling it up now. They've got a universal dock that looks free. Although they're pretty cagey about non-Russians on there. They say the K1 is for industrial research."

  "I think this is an extenuating circumstance. Nashville, did you get all that?"

  Even though we use a lot of "overs" and "affirmatives," our comm is always open. That's why the sting of Bennet telling me to keep my hands to myself hurts so much. It wasn't just Peterson who overheard it. Everyone I work with did.

  "Affirmative, Unicorn 22. We're checking on that now and putting in a call to Roscosmos. Over."

  "I'm going to put a pin on our reentry at this point until we've heard back. Over."

  "Roger that, Unicorn 22."

  We spend the next half hour waiting for a response from the Russian space agency. While Peterson and Bennet run through their control panels, I stare out the window for the first time since we reached orbit.

  Our craft has a small spin so it doesn't get too hot as we go through the sun side over Earth.

  While the stars are too hard to see through the internal glare of our displays, Earth is a bright blue and white disc that takes up the entire window when we rotate towards it.

  The hard thing to understand, even if you experienced it virtually, is how big the earth is from low orbit. While we're in space, we're still only about 400 times the height of the tallest building in the world.

  The distance from the ground to my window is less than the trip from Cape Canaveral to Miami – a three-hour drive for most people – half that for me.

  Space, technically speaking, is the place where you can orbit the earth without running into too much atmosphere. If the earth had no atmosphere and was perfectly round, you could orbit an inch off the ground if you were going fast enough.

  At our altitude of 200 miles, we're roughly just over 2% of the earth's diameter away from the surface. Which means the earth looks really fucking huge even from here.

  But it's still far away.

  There is 200 miles of progressively thicker atmosphere below us. If we were just dropping straight down, that would be no big deal. We wouldn't need a heat shield.

  But we're traveling 17,000 miles per hour. People often get confused as to what it means to burn up in our atmosphere.

  It's not that the air is a giant oven up here. Quite the opposite.

  What matters is our velocity. At this speed, the friction from hitting those air molecules so fast it's hotter than an industrial furnace.

  The skin on the bottom of our ship, Pica-Z, is designed to handle atmospheric reentry from even higher velocities. The problem is if one part of it gets a little too hot or there's an uneven spot.

  The Unicorn has reentry thrusters and is designed to land via rocket propulsion, but if we have to use them in the upper atmosphere to slow us down, then that means we'll end up burning all our fuel and need a parachute to land nowhere near our intended zone.

  The ideal situation is we get to dock with a station and check the sensors before attempting reentry.

  If nobody has any room, then we're kind of screwed in the short term.

  Worst case scenario; iCosmos sends up another craft on autopilot in a few days to come get us and lets the Unicorn 22 attempt an unmanned reentry.

  Theoretically, it's a choice between trying to reenter with a faulty sensor and hoping iCosmos can send up an unmanned craft for us to dock and transfer to – which is a lot easier said than done. Possible, but extremely time consuming.

  "Hey, guys, this is Vin here." The face of Vin Amin – the CEO whiz who started iCosmos – appears on Bennet's display. It looks like he's Skyping from his home office. "I just want you to know we're doing everything we can to figure out a solution. We're having trouble figuring out what readouts you're getting, Halsy. But Dr. Peterson says she's getting the same thing?"

  "Affirmative," she replies.

  "David, right? Any luck with your control panel?"

  I'm not sure if telling him Bennet won't let me touch it will go over very well right now. I just say, "No, sir."

  He smiles. "Vin. Save 'sir' for Commander Bennet."

  "Any luck with Roscosmos?" asks Bennet.

  Vin loses his smile. "Well, we're working on it. Zhirov, the head of their space agency, just gave us a flat out no."

  "Sounds like that's our answer," says Bennet.

  "I don't know about that. I've got a call into his boss, Radin, the head of the Russian Federation. The two have been known to disagree. Plus, there's one more thing..." Vin holds up his phone. "I just tweeted that we're asking the Russians to let us dock at the K1 because of the solar flare."

>   Bennet shakes his head. "You're hoping a bunch of people on Twitter will make Zhirov change his mind?"

  "No. I'm counting on them to persuade Radin. He's a bit more media aware." He looks at something on his computer. "Oh good, our hashtag, 'LetThemDock' is trending!"

  Jesus. Christ.

  My life depends on a bunch of hipsters retweeting a plea from a man probably sitting on a Yoga ball right now.

  5

  PARTY CRASHERS

  I IMAGINE some kind of high-level negotiation somewhere in a huge, dark tapestry-lined Kremlin office where tsars had been poisoned, disloyal party members had their death warrants signed and pogroms were planned – all based on how high #LetThemDock is trending on Twitter right now.

  "You have the post-docking reentry profiles?" Bennet asks Peterson.

  It sounds a little presumptuous to me to start loading reentry profiles for departing the station when we haven't even docked yet. We could be there eight hours or a week, all depending on what our sensor inspection shows us. You don't plan a reentry profile for a departure when you don't know when that's going to be. There are thousands of variations.

  Maybe Bennet is just running drills so he knows Peterson is ready to take the pilot seat?

  If that's the case, then that means he has no plans for letting me sit at a working display.

  Relax, David.

  Peterson has been into space multiple times. She's NASA. Bennet is former NASA. She's the one he wants working with him in a crisis.

  Yeah...but, she hasn't been trained in all the iCosmos procedures. Putting her in my seat is one thing when my panel goes out mid-crisis, but leaving her there after we have a chance to switch seats or fix the problem – totally not cool.

  If Bennet is acting out of line, they'll say something downstairs. If I make a fuss, it'll only justify him taking me out of my role.

  "Commander, let me know if there's anything I can do."

  "Will do, Dixon," he replies without even looking at me.

  I feel like a toddler sitting at one of those fake steering wheel consoles they put on the back of car seats. Hell, at least those did something...