The controller pointed, mute, at the two red dots scintillating one above the other on his handler's chest.
The man refused to look down. His face hard. "He wouldn't dare," he growled in English, loud enough for Easy to hear through the mic.
Easy held down the key hard.
In the video feed, the supervisor simply exploded, with a dull thump of steam. The controller threw his hands up in front of himself long after it mattered and looked at the splatter all up the buckled smoking bulkhead. He felt wet and ran his hand down the side of his face and brought it around staring in horror at the gore smeared on it.
He covered his face with his hands and cried with shame, because he saw himself a beaten dog and dead no matter whom he obeyed.
Easy cut all four lasers back in at full power and was near cutting the control room open and obliterating everything in it, but hesitated. It might actually make it harder to get loose, if he destroyed the controls and cables which worked the grapples.
What about simply cutting them off directly with the lasers? He pivoted the camera around with the joy stick and looked. He could see where both grapples came out of the surface. If he cut away the sheet metal he might sever the heavy clamps. Or he might weld them solid.
There was a tap, tap, tap sound, which finally penetrated his concentration on the displays and he looked up horrified to see a suited figure tapping a screwdriver handle on the forward port not a meter away. It was the refueling guy. If he had been another soldier sneaking up on them, they would have all have been dead. He held up three fingers and tapped the side of his helmet.
"April give me feed on local channel three," he said, unwilling to look away.
"- can get it." He heard the tail of something.
"Ok I have your feed now. What are you saying?"
"I can go in and manually release the grapples. I have the key to the maintenance panel. I've been listening to your little love fest with the controllers. There's chatter on the other radio channels, saying the Chinese are barricaded in the control room and station security is breaking in. They are yelling for some other Chinese over in the service yard, to take a yard tractor and ram you. I have to go down to the next dock to go inside. You gotta move off quickly then. I'll bang on your hatch when it's loose. You won't feel it release without power."
"Thanks. Who are you? "Easy asked.
"I don't want to say on a clear channel. I don't know who'll win here. I've got a hidey hole I'm going down as soon as you're clear. Look on your hatch."
He jumped away, swinging back to the boom on the end of his safety line and scrambled up the hand holds to the next dock, where there was a one man lock. Pretty soon they heard a couple solid thumps on their hatch. Easy eased the ship away from the boom on manual and swung the tail away. He was relieved not to feel any dragging, or see any debris trailing them out.
He keyed the laser to stow back in. They still weren't sure how much acceleration the arm could take, with the added mass on the end. When the open cargo port came into view their new friend was still visible, looking out of the opening, but quickly gave a wave and scampered away, toward the main part of the station. On the far side of the boom, clear around the clutter of the scientific areas, there was a big heavy yard tractor making a braking burn to clear the station wide. A kilometer away maybe. They would be figuring to roll over pointing at the boom and come straight in and bump them hard enough to disable them. But they quickly weren't going to be here anymore.
Still, he didn't want to rush to leave, before they could find him and try to bump. Better to disable them before they had any vector towards the Happy. He deployed the laser again to aim at the tractor. He just wanted to disable it, not burn it to junk. He zoomed in until he could see enough detail to aim away from the crew cabin. He swung the cross hairs ahead of the vessel and when the engines came into the center gave a quick jab on the key. There was a splash of light and spray of tiny sparks, but the burn wasn't interrupted.
He led ahead of it again and held the key down solid as the boat slid engine first into the beam. This time one engine quit and a puff of vapor showed a leak of some kind punched in the fuel feed. The other engine still firing tumbled the boat over, before the pilot could kill the unbalanced thrust. He thought they'd have a long hard time easing it back to dock. Certainly they were no danger now to him.
"Easy how about those guys in the control room?' April asked. "They may cause us some trouble calling for help and they sure aren't going to give us a flight clearance anyway. How about shutting them up?"
"I could bust it open to vacuum easily and burn a crater on the station where it used to be, but they probably have suits on by now and if station security has busted in I'd hate to be shooting some of our friends."
"No. I don't mean the control room. Look there" - she pointed at the antenna farm on the side of the station. " That's all their long distance radio and data links and radar. How about burning all of it off the station? It'll probably take days to replace, even what they have spares."
"Excellent idea," he agreed. The invisible beams reached out and cut through the metal rods and shapes, sliced cables and dug furrows across the skin of the station underneath as it went from one to the next. He rolled the ship over a bit, so they could observe straight out the forward ports.
April saw the white circle of a radar dish tumbling away into the void with a bite cut out of its rim. Pretty soon there was so much vaporized junk and dust hanging over the site, they started to see their laser beams back scattering off the debris. The four beams together had an eerie quality. They looked like one square shaped green beam, instead of four round ones. It played a trick on the eyes.
He looked over at April. "Sorry to be ignoring you. I'm supposed to explain what I'm doing so you learn and I'm just zooming along madly without a word. I really haven't forgotten you're there."
"Oh, I've been paying attention. We've covered use of the laser weapons system pretty well today, " she said, tongue in cheek. "You didn't have to say much. It was all pretty self explanatory. I liked how you just disabled the tractor instead if vaporizing it. You were looking at the grapple points with the laser. Were you really going to cut us away from the station there, before the fuel tech got us loose?"
"I was giving it some serious consideration. Next time this goes in the shop we install grapple posts with explosive bolts. Then if they won't let loose of them we just pop them off. How about setting up alternative profiles back to M3 and I'll call and tell them we're coming? We want to get back fairly quickly, before someone can respond and send a space plane out here. They don't keep them sitting on alert. It'll take some time to launch one, if they don't have one near ready to go anyway. What you want to do? Go high orbit and let M3 catch up with us, or low and fast and chase them around to get home?"
"If we go low there are anti-sat systems which could give us trouble when we go over North America and China, right?"
"Almost anywhere now. USNA has anti-sat/antiballistic missile systems on all their aircraft carriers, even the compact submersibles and all the Aegis ships and attack submarines. I'd be surprised if the Chinese don't have a similar capability."
"And the higher we are, the harder it is for the space planes to come up to us and the less delta v they have left to engage us right?"
"Absolutely. With the plasma drives we have more legs than any of them."
"Let's go up then." April turned to working alternative solutions.
Easy changed frequency on the radio, selected a directional antennae and told the computer to point it at M3.
He remembered something. "You folks doing OK back there?" He unclipped from his seat, turned around to look and saw three faces peering at him in silent horror.
"Uh, sorry about the fuss," he indicated over his shoulder with his thumb. "They wouldn't allow us to undock and we had to get a bit assertive. I forget you can't see very well from back there. We really need to rig you a video feed too so you can tell what
's going on."
"At the last we could see just fine over your shoulder, when you appeared to be firing on the station to burn off all their communications." Eddie said. "We've been listening to all of it of course. I really didn't know anyone had these kind of laser systems. Four times now you've fired. The last time sustained for quite a long time. My understanding was the lasers military space planes can fire a single pulse and then need time to charge up for another. How do you do it?"
"Oh they've had the big lasers for years. The trouble was powering them. But we have four big fusion generators back there, behind the bulkhead you're laying on, courtesy of Dr. Ajay's boy. They'll power them their full duty cycle. We could have cut the station up like an onion for soup if we'd wanted. My problem was trying to be moderate actually. I shot a yard tug which was going to ram us and it was tricky to just nip it and damage it, instead of just blowing it to junk."
"A lucky shot, Sir." Eddie laughed.
"What?" Easy frowned at him.
"I watch classic movies. In one of the Star Trek movies, the Klingon Captain tells his gunner to shoot the Federation ship's engines and disable it and he lets loose with one small shot and the whole ship disintegrates in a zillion glowing fragments. Reality has caught up with fiction. Again," he added in a serious tone.
"Who the hell are the Klingons?"
Eddie sighed, "It would take a long time to explain."
"Easy," April called with some alarm. "Three soldiers just came out of the lock there, near the control center. They must have just blown the whole air load and not pumped down, because there was a big puff of ice fog formed when it opened."
"Are they a danger to us?" Easy asked her as he scrambled to get back strapped in his seat, pointed forward.
"No - they're only wearing brown uniforms, not p-suits." She explained, horrified.
Easy looked where April pointed and fumbled with the camera. He zoomed in and tracked but the image was hard to hold and he gave up after they saw enough to be sure. He didn't really want to see too clearly. It was three men in ordinary brown uniforms, with no helmets visible, tumbling slowly apart and dead of course. He had heard jokes for years about sending people out the lock, spacing them, but never knew of it really happening. He'd never be able to joke about it again.
"I think your friend Jan has gotten into the control center," Eddie explained. "The Chinese who tried to stop us at the elevator were in brown uniforms and I doubt he would have any patience left for them, after he let them live the first time."
"I think it's time to get out of Dodge boys and girls." Easy switched the screen to radar and took a quick look around and shut it off. He told April - "Give me the flight profile and I'll tell M3 we're coming home." She put it on his screen and he raised his eyebrows.
"It's more efficient at the higher thrust." She explained. "I'd use higher, but I'm scared to, not knowing everybody's medical status back there." Easy nodded agreement. "Also, I wouldn't send control a flight profile. It would just make us easier to intercept. I'll make sure our transponder is off too. Since we're outlaws, what difference does it make?"
He checked the antennae was tracking M3 and keyed his mic.
"M3 local this is Happy Lewis at ISSII. Be advised we are departing for M3 as soon as we can burn, without local clearance. Do you copy?"
" Happy Lewis this is local traffic control, M3. This channel is for local traffic at M3 and you should file your flight profile with ISSII local and let them negotiate with Earthside for your departure. Do you understand?"
"Local 3 - listen up guys. It isn't that I don't know how to do it. We have experienced armed attack at ISSII. Last we heard, the Chinese had seized portions of the station and were fighting station security. There is damage to the station and local traffic. There is no pressure on the boom. Local control. ISSII is off the air. There are casualties and a continuing hazard to remain here. I am declaring an emergency and burning out of here right now and I'm offering no flight profile, because we fear interception and attack. We'll contact local traffic again when we're close and we suggest you view any combat capable space craft with caution and skepticism. It's a whole new ball game boys. We saw soldiers spaced out the lock here with no suits. Get it now?"
April was instructing the ship to orient for her burn slowly. She didn't want to make the antennae lose its track on M3. Easy watched what she was doing as he talked and silently signaled his approval.
" Happy Lewis this is M3 local again. Earthside Control is monitoring our conversation and demands you consider yourselves under arrest and redock.The Chinese protest your slander of their mission on ISSII. They and the USNA both protest that without a profile we must warn you - you will be fired upon if you approach any sensitive sats, or your path conflicts with a military mission. You will have no further warning. Do you understand? You do not have clearance. I have no authority to grant it over Earthside veto. We have protests from China and the USNA both. China is demanding arrest for two of your passengers."
"Well isn't that special, since only one of our passengers is Chinese," Easy told him. "I suppose they want to arrest the other one for marrying her without government approval," he speculated. "I can't imagine what other trumped up crap you must have, to tell the rest of us we are under arrest. Is the USNA saying we are under arrest too?
"Earthside refuses to talk to you," M3 local control informed them. "Actually they said they refuse to negotiate," he corrected.
"Is Earthside control still listening?" he inquired in a growl.
"Yes they are."
"Then I'd like to report a possible hazard," he snarled, sarcastically. "We're burning out of here and instead of them telling us where we can go and when we have to hold, waiting for their secret flights and black satellites to get through using all of space, they can damn well watch out for me today. I'll burn their silly ass out of the sky if they get in my way. I'm not docking back to this madhouse, so the USNA can make a present of us to the Chinese. I'm not accepting arrest from some coward, who won't even come on com and say plainly by what authority they are arresting us. I'm going home and nobody better get in my way. The damn Earthies talk tough. Let's see what they're made of, with somebody that isn't scared of them. Copy that clear, Earthside?" he raged.
There was no reply, so he slapped the radio off.
"Number two," he said, voice still angry, "execute your burn at will. Hang on back there. We're going to have a fair long push for a few minutes. Antennae and laser secured for high G," he told April. "You have the conn."
"I've been updating it two minutes ahead at a time while you talked. Next automated tick in about 20 seconds." April said, slapping the yellow square and starting the count on the screen to use the window. "It will ramp up to a six G burn and hold it for seven minutes. Make sure you are laying comfortable and flat as it builds up back there.
"You know they are going to intercept us after you ripping on them like that, if they have anything at all that can match with us?" she asked Easy.
"Yeah well, they were going to do that even if I was polite," he insisted. "We gotta get some music in this boat," Easy complained. "It's hard laying in silence, waiting for the tick." Then the drive came on and it was different than they were used to. Chemical rockets all ease on to a certain degree as the turbo pumps spin up, chamber pressure builds up and the combustion stabilizes. The electric drive is just ON. So starting at a half G sounds gentle, but it isn't. It's jarring. Nobody said anymore, but you could hear the labored breathing as the acceleration peaked. If anyone saw their departure, it was an eyeful. Two pencil thin lines of white hot plasma merged into a plume which reached out a half kilometer behind them before it started to cool. There was no way to sneak around, like you could with an older grid anode ion drive. Even a chemical rocket was not as bright to the eye, although it was obvious in the infrared.
Chapter 23
Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado, USNA Space Command got a feed off a high orbit missile watcher and a stealth
LEO sat at the same time. "It's the same as Kwajalein showed us awhile back," the specialist told his section commander. They watched as the acceleration numbers climbed and climbed and stayed there. "How's he going to get home? He must have run his tanks dry," the younger man said.
"Don't count on it," his unhappy superior told him.
* * *
"OK let's talk now," April requested, as the Happy assumed a temporary orbit between LEO and the Clarke level. "Will you take the conn Easy? I don't feel experienced enough to talk and keep an eye on things."
"I have the conn number two."
"Thanks. Now that I have us taking a higher orbit, we have some time and we can discuss options. We can burn out and circularize a little bit higher, among the Geostationary satellites. Tell you why in a bit. Or we could even make a burn to Lunar orbit. I'm concerned they must know our flight path pretty well from our exhaust plume, even if we are hard to paint on radar with the hull covering Dave made us."
"But I insisted in our supplies we have a compressed bale of steel wool and a can of vacuum cement. I wanted copper wool, but it's hard to find in bulk. In one of my classes they mentioned steel wool is terrific at absorbing microwaves. If one of us goes outside and glues it on all over our skin we should be almost invisible to radar and it's very hard to see optically also. Then I propose we burn the conventional rockets just a burp, so we aren't exactly where they'll be looking for us."
"What is the possibility of making an actual Lunar landing?" asked Eddie.
April put it in the computer and ran the numbers. She obviously didn't like what it told her and ran it again a few times, with different parameters.
"In theory we could. But if we'd go direct from geostationary orbit, to retain enough fuel for landing, it would be a long trip cramped up here with not enough cabin supplies and if we do a burn in toward earth to use a slingshot exit which is much more efficient, especially for our conventional drive, we expose ourselves to danger from being too close to anti-sat systems which can reach low earth orbit. Our terminal landing burn would be high G also. And we don't know that anyone on the Moon is going to exactly embrace us. I sure wouldn't want to go to Armstrong. Maybe the Russian base. But why should they help us?"
April Page 35