“Alright, I’ll update the council, and you keep me updated. I’ll be at my desk,” Smith said, referring to his console at the back of the room.
“Fine,” Rock said, taking a deep breath and composing himself.
“Richard, do you want to update the Horizon?” Lisa asked.
Rock wondered what there was to update. If Commander Monroe and her crewmates were still exposed to the Martian atmosphere, then if they couldn’t reach them, they would be dead in about eleven more hours when their air ran out, less time if exposed to the Martian temperatures at night. “Not yet, Lisa. Keep the line open, and let’s see what the probe tells us.”
The probe was mounted on a powerful rocket that burned from the other side of the planet. It was designed to be able to reach any target on Mars with its payload and fuel profile. Now it was going to land near their shuttle on the planet’s surface, and the payload was another rocket-powered drone that had the ability to go sky-borne for ten minutes. It was thought they may have had a need of it in case they wanted to get a visual inside a canyon or other deep chasm, though admittedly it was designed to navigate in the open, not down a shaft with a clearance of only twenty-one feet on each side.
Marge returned and walked to Rock’s desk. Rock looked at her. “Good news or bad?”
“Neither for the moment,” Marge said. “He had a question and a comment and then wanted to check something out. Where are we at?”
“Same as before,” Rock said.
“So Murphy reared his ugly head,” Marge stated.
“It appears so,” Rock said, taking a deep breath. “Let’s do the probe offline. I don’t want the world watching in case it lights up four dead astronauts down there.”
“Right . . .” Marge said.
Chapter 24
Construct
Red Horizon
Mars’ orbit
In the near future, Year 4, Day 175
The probe arrived on time and entered the Martian atmosphere, disposing of its heat shield and then popping its payload around three thousand feet above the planet’s surface. The small rocket motors ignited to allow the probe to fly overhead. It was being monitored by Commander Sullivan. who had remote control in case it was necessary to alter its flight profile. The lag time from Earth would be too long to react.
The design proved sound as the probe encountered the mesh back at the top of the shaft with a solid-black, metallic-looking door underneath of it, but without their crewmembers. It must have opened in order to allow for the dirt, rock, soil, and astronauts to enter into the construct. Not wanting to waste fuel, Neil piloted the craft over to the lander and set it down, shutting off its motors to conserve fuel. It would operate for another six and a half minutes in its current state.
They put the data into the next transmission queue and sent it to Houston, where a reply came back. They would organize a rescue party. Houston had a list of equipment onboard and gave a recommended list along with a plan. They would take the second lander along with cutting torches and a hydraulic lift, and Major Carter would access Harris’s explosives kit to blow the seal off the top where they would rappel down and see if they could locate their crewmembers.
The problem was that it would take time to rig the gear necessary, pulling various items from several different storage pods, as well as rigging the makeshift lift to lower them. The depth of the canyon floor was considerable, and there was a very good chance that they wouldn’t have enough length of their tensile line in order to reach the bottom, if there was a bottom within reach. That was where the airborne probe would prove handy once they arrived.
They started work immediately. Doctor Hill would accompany Major Carter, while Sullivan would pilot. This would leave only two NASA crewmembers onboard, both their mechanical engineer and their electrical, along with four SEALs, all lower ranking. This was not according to mission plan. Neither was the alarm that sounded when there was a proximity alert with the ship. The claxon blared, and warning lights came on, startling several members of the crew despite their training. It wasn’t supposed to activate unless there was a serious issue.
“What the hell is that?” Dakos asked across the intercom system onboard the Red Horizon.
“I don’t know,” Neil Sullivan said. “Let me check.” The man hit a monitor near his work station in the twirling habitation wheel, walking over to the window to look out for a second. Generally they tried not to do that, as the twirling star field and rotating planet could disorient them, but he wanted a visual of their nearby surroundings. Seeing nothing, he watched as the data from the alarm fed into the monitor. He was still on voice activation, so his next comment was broadcast ship-wide. “You gotta be kidding me.”
“What is it, Commander?” Hill asked.
Neil didn’t answer, hitting the main broadcast and sending a live, real-time message to Houston. “Red Horizon to Houston. Be advised, Chinese ship inbound on collision course. Intercept in forty-five minutes.”
Doctor Hill was less formal. “Then move us out of the way.”
Neil nodded absentmindedly. “Good idea, Doctor. I’m heading to the flight deck. You all prepare for maneuvering.”
Neil wasn’t sure who made the next remark, but he had to ready the ship to change its orbit, ignoring the comment in the process. “Fuck me.”
*****
Roaring Tiger
On approach to Mars
In the near future, Year 4, Day 175
Commander Sun had read the orders months earlier when they burned the last of their reserve fuel and were ordered on communications blackout. He knew what General Wang was going to do as if the man had shown him a diagram. One did not “slow” a ship by intercepting another one. In fact, any sort of collision was nothing short of catastrophic in space, and yet that was exactly what his orders indicated.
Since he had some modicum in the wording to use in his defense, he planned on doing his best to get close to the ship, if not actually hit it. The military didn’t understand such things. Still, it was quite the feat to close the gap by over thirty hours with the Americans, even if they had landed first.
They would delay their orbital burn to the last second, allowing them to arrive as quickly as possible and launch their lander on approach as soon as they had hit maximum deceleration. The computer navigation models showed a slightly higher than fifty percent chance that Mars would capture their ship into orbit. If not, they would go sailing by the planet, off at an angle that would eventually take them to Jupiter a decade or more from now. Of course, they would all be dead from lack of food, excessive radiation, and perhaps hypothermia if their nuclear reactor wasn’t up to the task.
“We’re ready here,” Colonel Tsu said, and Commander Sun hit his view screen to get a video feed of the two men in the lander’s cockpit.
“Launch at will, Colonel,” Sun said.
“Acknowledged,” Tsu said, watching their own countdown timer, as they would hit closest approach in less than an hour. Two of his men would attempt to commandeer the American ship, or at least disable it should Commander Hun fail to hit it, again assuming they didn’t blast right by it. “I have initiated the jammer, and automatic targeting of our missiles has been activated.”
“Luck,” was all that Sun could say, and he wondered exactly how this would be presented to his countrymen back on Earth.
*****
NASA Space Command
Houston, Texas
In the near future, Year 4, Day 175
“Where did the Roaring Tiger come from?” Rock asked, looking at the updated information from their Martian satellites.
For a rare occasion, Mr. Smith was at a loss for words. Jack came across the intracom and updated Rock. “We’re losing signal now.”
“What?” Rock asked, turning to look across the room at Jack.
“Confirmed,” Lisa said. “We’re trying to get laser coms online via the lunar station.” The backup for all this was an underdeveloped laser system that woul
d bounce light waves off of a receiver based on the moon. There were three receivers on the lunar surface in order to have at least one pointed at Mars at any given time. The moon represented a good location, as any Earth-based location had atmospheric interference with the laser beam.
“You reading this, Mr. Smith?” Rock asked.
Smith pulled out his cell phone and nodded to Rock, holding up a finger at the same time, and turning away, he walked back to his desk.
“Another urgent call from Navari,” Lisa told Marge.
“Not now,” Marge said, working from her desk.
“He says it’s urgent,” Lisa repeated.
“He said that last time,” Marge countered.
“All right,” Lisa said.
“Rock,” Marge started. “We have failures now all over the place, mainly in our satellite coms, but also reports from some basic backup features.”
The lights flickered and then came back on, while the computers continued to hum away as normal. Rock looked up and then back to the main screen where he pointed to an external feed in a very small screen at the far bottom. “Marge, can you pull up that newsfeed?”
“Hang on a sec,” Marge said, punching at her console keyboard.
The main screen changed over to CNN, where some sort of alert was going on regarding the nation’s internet and power grid.”Can you put the audio up on one of the channels?” Rock asked.
“Channel four,” Marge said, switching the frequencies around and then turning control back over to the press liaison officer who sat at a far desk in the upper back.
It took a few moments to sink in, but basically there were sporadic blackouts of not only the country’s internet but of the aging power grid as well. Without warning, the newsfeed went to static, and the hissing noise was annoying to say the least.
Smith bounded down the stairs, standing next to Rock. “I think we have problems.”
“What kind of problems?” Rock asked.
“Power grid and most net-based systems have crashed. They’ve shut down Wall Street and are sending kids home from school,” Smith answered.
“Marge, Doctor Navari is rather insistent that you talk to him. I can’t keep taking his calls if you won’t answer them,” Lisa said.
“All right, I’ll take it in room 103 again,” Marge said, taking her headphones off and leaving the room after a nod of approval from Rock.
“Any idea why or from where?” Rock asked Smith.
“Not yet, though we have the usual suspect,” Smith said.
“You used the singular,” Rock noted.
“Yes, I did,” Smith replied.
*****
Red Horizon
Mars’ orbit
In the near future, Year 4, Day 175
“All communications are jammed,” Neil noted on their ship’s log. He wanted something on the official record of the Red Horizon’s last moments if it went down. The log was being transmitted in real time to a special satellite that was storing the data for later retrieval. At least it was until it was obliterated from its orbit in a ball of plasma.
“Oh shit,” Doctor Hill said. “Did we just lose our satellite?”
“Yes, we did, Doctor,” Neil shot back. “Major Carter, are you reading me?”
“Affirm,” the man said.
“The Chinese ship has changed vector twice to match our own changes. They seem hell bent on intercepting us. I’m going to shut down the wheel and bring all four wings down against the hull. I don’t know what else to do. It’s not like we wrote a procedure to counter intentional ramming by another spacecraft.”
“Understood,” Carter said.
There was a long pause when Hill spoke. “A man of few words.”
“That’s fine by me,” Neil said. “I’m going to try one more thing with Max before I throw in the towel.”
“I hate to ask,” Hill said.
“You don’t want to know,” Neil said, looking at his radar screen and noting a smaller blip heading planet-side. “Ah, Major Carter, one more thing . . . The Chinese have launched their lander, and by its trajectory, it looks to be headed straight for our lander.”
The next pause was real, and then Carter spoke. “Roger, we may need to follow them down.”
“Copy that, Major,” Neil said. “First, though, I want to try one last thing.”
Another pause. “I won’t ask,” Carter said.
Wise man, Neil thought to himself, and he prepared the ship. “Everyone stand by for intensive maneuvering and brace for impact.”
Carter wasn’t finished, however, and his next transmission may have not been meant to be ship-wide, nor recorded for future’s sake. “God, I hate being right.”
*****
Alien Construct
93° West, 4° South
Near Tithonium Chasma, Mars
In the near future, Year 4, Day 175
Jules came to and found herself in an odd room that was the opposite of the transmitter chamber that she had been in earlier that day. Instead of a dark black console with black floors and walls, she was in a white room with similar consoles and hieroglyphs. Maria was lying on the floor next to her, and there was no sign of the SEALs who were with them.
She found that she was already sitting on the floor, leaning against a wall. She got up, checking her footing to ensure she wasn’t injured, and then walked over to where Maria was lying prone on the floor. She checked her vital signs and found them within norms. She decided to leave her at rest till she could orient herself to her new location.
The first thing she noticed after trying her radio communications, which did not receive a response, was that the secondary light on her outer wrist was showing double green. She normally only saw this indication when she was in an airlock or inside a ship or rover. The first light bar on the button was an indicator of the suit’s status. It had only two parameters to stay within, internal pressure and carbon dioxide levels.
This bar was always green, as it indicated the status inside the suit. The top bar was the status outside. It was always red when on the surface of Mars or in the vacuum of space. Here, it gave Julie a chill up her spine to see it green. That indicated that the room she was in had an atmosphere primarily made up of nitrogen, with oxygen supplementing it, and not the ninety-five-percent carbon dioxide that she would expect on the planet.
She didn’t dare take her helmet off, however. No telling if a sealed door could open and change the composition rapidly. A quick look at her oxygen supply showed her that they had been using nearly all of their four hours of available breathable air. It would be only a few minutes more before she was warned by her suit to change out her oxygen canister. She felt at both her sides and was comforted to feel them attached still to her utility belt. They were difficult to dislodge for a reason and took considerable effort to detach and secure.
She sprung the latch on one and removed her main canister on her chest mount, replacing it with a fresh one. Looking around the room, she noticed the lone console in the center and walked over to it, looking for a chip or something familiar. She found nothing of the sort. Instead, she saw a similar symbol that was green, and hesitantly she moved her hand toward it. Before she could touch it, the entire room dimmed and a huge hologram filled the space around her.
She backed herself toward the wall where Maria lay and watched as the display showed several areas around her. It took a minute to fix the positions, but the Chinese lander was unmistakable, as were the two astronauts who approached the alien door at the chasm’s bottom where the infrared heat signature had spilled out on their maps. They were in intense shadow, the rays of the sun no longer shining into the steep canyon walls, and for a minute, she thought they were going to use a device to blow the door open, when it did so on its own.
The crew never hesitated and moved into the construct. Lights guided them toward the center where she spotted her crewmembers in another room, feeling around the outer edges, looking for an egress. It didn’t take lo
ng for the two groups of men to meet. When they did, what happened next took the air from Jules’s lungs.
All four men seemed to pull their small, ceramic-made weapons to no effect, and there was much gesturing between them before they were either holstered or discarded, and then they moved around each other and engaged in hand-to-hand combat. “No,” Jules screamed, but no one heard her.
Chapter 25
War
Red Horizon
Mars’ orbit
In the near future, Year 4, Day 175
“Hold on,” Neil shouted over the intercom, a completely useless gesture, as the speakers would regulate to an appropriate decibel level.
The rockets on the Red Horizon fired, and the ship started to shoot forward, out and away from the path of the Roaring Tiger. The result was that as the Chinese ship came, the American ship went into a slightly higher orbit. Neil was burning their reserve fuel, but he didn’t care. There’d be no need for any fuel if there was no ship to return to Earth.
After several more minutes of firing and a massive lateral burn, the ships both stopped their momentum and ended up in orbital tandem. The last burn was done on purpose by Neil, guided by Max to ensure this. Otherwise the Chinese ship would have shot further in front in a lower and faster orbit.
“It looks like it worked,” Hill said, looking out the window at the smaller Chinese ship that was moving sideways slightly toward them. “Ah, is that you or them closing the gap?”
“That would be them,” Neil said. “I only matched the x-axis on our orbit. They are closing the y-axis. I’ll do another burn if they get much closer.”
Red Horizon: The Truth of Discovery (Discovery Series Book 2) Page 23