by Mark Kelly
It was the same when the boys checked the late news on TV before bed.
“I don’t get it,” Mark said to Scott as he pulled up the covers. “NASA has to get it in gear soon. How much breathable air does Ilya Ilyushin have left?”
“Eleven days’—if what the Russians said is right,” Scott said.
“Michael’s mom says you can’t trust them,” Mark said. “Would they lie about something like that?”
“How do I know what Russians lie about?” Scott asked.
“You seem to know everything lately,” Mark said.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Scott asked.
“Nothing. Shut up so I can go to sleep, would you?”
Scott’s attempt to tell his brother to shut up right back got interrupted by a yawn, and soon both boys were asleep.
Chapter 12
* * *
The next morning, Sunday, Scott Kelly was awakened by a projectile glancing off his shoulder. “Ouch,” he said.
“It was only a slipper,” Mark said. “And I didn’t even throw it that hard.”
Scott rolled over and looked at his brother. “What time is it?”
“Early. Come on.”
Because of politics in the countries in the Middle East, heating oil had become expensive in New Jersey. The twins didn’t understand the connection exactly, but they did know their parents turned the thermostat way down overnight to save money, and their house was chilly in the morning. Now the boys wrapped their blankets around their shoulders and made their way down the hall to the living room, where Mark turned on the TV and began twisting the dial to find the channel they wanted.
Scott had known right away why Mark was waking him up. They had to check the news. Maybe NASA had announced the rescue plan overnight.
At last the dial landed on CBS, which had the earliest weekend news show. There was an item about the Republican presidential primaries and one about how the leader of Cambodia had just resigned and been arrested. Democratic presidential candidates Jimmy Carter and Mo Udall were campaigning in Wisconsin.
Finally, the anchorman said, “Coming up after the break, NASA responds to international humanitarian calls for rescue of the stranded Soviet cosmonaut.”
The boys waited eagerly through toothpaste, detergent, and deodorant commercials till at last the news came back. On a screen beside the anchorman was a photograph of smiling guy in a space suit—Ilya Ilyushin—and then that changed and the blue NASA emblem came on.
“Today authorities from nations as diverse as Pakistan, Indonesia, and South Africa are calling for the United States to do something to bring stranded cosmonaut Ilya Ilyushin home,” said the anchorman. “In response, the NASA press office has called a briefing. We take you live to Houston, where a spokeswoman is fielding questions at this hour.”
The scene shifted to a woman in a blue blazer behind a podium. A bunch of microphones were in front of her. She looked tired.
“. . . unfortunate and tragic situation. At the present time, NASA engineers are assessing the space agency’s capacity for mounting a viable rescue operation.”
“Is the hang-up engineering or politics?” a voice shouted.
“Can you confirm that the Russian mission has a military component?” another voice shouted.
“Our sources indicate it’s biological in nature,” said someone else.
Scott thought he wouldn’t like it if strangers were yelling at him this early in the morning. Mark just wished she’d hurry and get to the part about Greenwood Lake.
“I have no specifics. For political considerations, you’ll have to talk to the State Department. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. That’s all I have to offer at this time.”
“That’s all?” Mark said to the screen.
“That wasn’t much!” Scott said.
But the woman gathered up some papers and exited the stage so fast she looked like she might trip on her high heels. Meanwhile, the reporters were as disappointed as the twins. “Whatever happened to détente?” one shouted.
Dad, who had worked a swing shift, four p.m. to eleven p.m., was still asleep, so it was Mom who came in a few minutes later. She didn’t even have a chance to say good morning before Mark asked her, “What’s détente?”
“Look it up in the—” Mom started to say.
“We already did,” said Scott. “The dictionary says ‘easing of tensions.’ But what’s that supposed to mean?”
“Can I get a cup of coffee?” Mom asked.
Scott said, “Sure, Mom.”
Mark said, “How long will that take?”
Mom raised her eyebrows.
Mark said, “Sure, Mom.”
The boys were way too old for Captain Kangaroo, but even so they watched Mr. Greenjeans and Bunny Rabbit dispute the price of carrots for a few minutes while they waited for Mom to return from the kitchen. By this time, Major Nelson had trotted in and made himself comfortable on the rug between them.
“Want to practice some lifesaving?” Scott asked his brother. “Our patient is available.”
“No,” said Mark.
“What is with you, anyway?” Scott asked.
“I just don’t, that’s all.”
“You’re worried you won’t get to go up in space and rescue Ilya Ilyushin and come back down and be a hero, aren’t you?” Scott said.
“No,” said Mark.
“Yeah, you are. Because I am too. Also, I’m worried about what if we do have to rescue him. Mom and Dad will make me get a haircut for the parade.”
Mark smiled in spite of himself. “A haircut will be the least of your problems. That Titan rocket might not be as big as a Saturn, but it’s plenty big enough to blow up—kapow!” He threw his arms in the air and dropped them to illustrate.
“What is it you’re blowing up now?” Coffee mug in hand, Mom came in and took her usual seat on the sofa.
“Nothing, Mom. You know how careful we are,” Scott said.
“And let’s keep it that way,” said Mom. “All right, détente. You know about the Cold War, right?”
Mark was glad to have a question he could answer. “That’s how forever the United States and Russia have been enemies without actually shooting at each other.”
“Not forever,” Mom corrected him. “Since after World War II, the late 1940s. The Soviet economic system, communism, is basically different from ours, capitalism. And their political system doesn’t give the citizens the same kind of freedoms ours does. They don’t have our kind of real elections, for example. People aren’t allowed to write or say critical things about their leaders.”
“Our way is better,” Scott said.
“I agree,” Mom said. “But if our way is going to work the way it’s supposed to, it requires everybody to think and vote and help make good decisions. That’s what ‘government by the people’ means. Maybe in other countries people prefer having leaders who make all the decisions, then tell them what to do—no need to think, no arguing allowed.”
“Hey,” Mark said, “in that case, life for Scott and me in our house is a lot like living in the Soviet Union.”
“Very funny,” Mom said.
If it was funny, Scott hadn’t noticed. “I remember the protests about the Vietnam War,” he said. “They were on TV. Protests are bad, aren’t they? And they don’t happen in Russia.”
“People here are allowed to protest peacefully,” Mom said. “The right to assemble is guaranteed in the First Amendment because it’s one way for us to tell our leaders what we think. The trouble is when the protests aren’t peaceful, when property is destroyed or someone gets hurt.”
“So people in the Soviet Union can’t protest?” Scott asked.
“Not the same way we can,” said Mom.
“Okay, you have totally convinced me,” said Scott. “I am never moving to the Soviet Union.”
“But what’s this got to do with détente?” Mark wanted to know.
Mom sipped her coffee, then frowned, which
meant her coffee was cold. She set the mug down on the arm of the sofa. “I’m getting to that,” she said. “So the leaders in the U.S. and the Soviet Union disagree about how to run a country, and we don’t always trust each other either. At the same time, we are the two most powerful countries in the world, and we both have nuclear bombs. So about six years ago, our two governments decided that we had better find a way to get along or else—”
“Kapow!” said Mark, which made Scott laugh and Mom cringe.
Mark said, “Sorry.”
Mom continued. “Not blowing each other up was something they could agree on, and another thing was not spending all the money they had on building bigger bombs. So since 1969, both countries have been having meetings and writing treaties with the idea that talking is better, and cheaper, than fighting. That deal is called ‘détente.’ ”
“And the Soyuz-Apollo space mission last summer was part of it?” Mark said.
“Yes,” said Mom.
“Now the word makes sense,” said Scott. “ ‘Lessening of tension’ like the dictionary said, making things more peaceful.”
“And on TV when that reporter asked the NASA lady about it, he meant it would make things more peaceful if we rescued the stranded cosmonaut,” Mark said.
“What NASA lady?” Mom asked.
The boys explained what they’d seen on TV. “And NASA still hasn’t promised to rescue the stranded cosmonaut,” Mark concluded. “And the whole world wants them to. So they’re going to, right? That’s what Mrs. O’Malley told Egg yesterday. Isn’t it?”
That question was never answered, because the phone rang. Major Nelson, even though he was accustomed to the sound, startled awake and barked.
“It’s Egg.” Mark looked at his brother. “I’ll get it.”
“Not if I beat you to the kitchen,” said Scott, and the two boys scrambled to their feet.
* * *
The boys were right. It was Egg. And by the time Dad came into the kitchen a few minutes later, the phone call was over.
“I don’t know why, but I’m in the mood for a cheese Danish!” Dad said heartily, and then he saw glum faces all around. “Uh-oh—what’s the matter?”
“NASA isn’t going to rescue the cosmonaut at all,” Mark said.
“And it doesn’t look like the Soviet space program has what they need to rescue him either,” said Mom.
“He’s got ten days of air left,” said Scott. “And after that he’ll . . . die.”
Chapter 13
* * *
News outlets all over the world covered the story of the stranded cosmonaut. Every day there were more details about Ilya Ilyushin. He had a wife and a baby. He had two dogs and loved animals. He had been a cosmonaut for ten years.
The twins had never met Ilya Ilyushin, or any cosmonaut, or any Russian person at all—and yet they felt like a friend of theirs had been condemned to a terrible fate.
In West Orange, there was one more week of school before Easter break. Every day that week, they ate lunch with Barry and hatched plans for a cosmonaut rescue. Since the existence of the Greenwood Lake launch complex was a huge secret, they couldn’t exactly let other people overhear. So they always sat by themselves at the table known as the “desperation table”—so called because if you were one of the older kids, you had to be desperate to sit there.
The table got its reputation because it was located next to the first graders, and first-grade moms came in to help supervise. These moms were tough. At the desperation table, a single well-aimed spitwad, fake belch, or uproarious joke about sloppy joes would get you sent to the principal’s office fast.
The boys were sitting at the desperation table on Tuesday when Scott asked Barry a question about navigation. How did you do it in space anyway? It’s not like there were street signs, or even landmarks, like mountains and rivers.
As so often happened, Barry the Brainiac gave Scott a look that implied anyone who didn’t already understand something so basic probably also had a hard time tying a shoe, brushing his teeth, or walking.
Barry was eating a tuna sandwich on wheat bread with pickles. Between bites, he turned to Mark. “You understand it, right?” he said.
Mark, mouth sticky with peanut butter, nodded eagerly. “Oh, sure,” he said. “Any time I have to perform celestial navigation, I just get out my trusty slide rule and—bam!—I’m halfway there.”
Barry sighed and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “So I guess we start at the beginning. You’ve heard of triangles?”
“Come on, Barry, we’re not that dumb,” Scott said.
“Good,” said Barry, “so how about trigonometry?”
Mark looked at his brother. “Maybe we are that dumb,” he said.
Barry checked the clock on the wall. “Okay, I’ll try to make this fast. Basically, trigonometry means measuring triangles. But more generally it’s using the special properties of triangles to do other things, cool things like mapping the land or the stars or the ocean, or navigating from place to place, or designing roads and buildings.”
“Mr. Hackess covered triangles earlier this year,” Mark recalled. “There’s more than one kind, but the only one I remember is equilateral, where all the sides are the same length.”
“The angles are the same too,” said Scott, “sixty degrees because the total of all the angles in a triangle has to add up to a hundred and eighty.”
Barry nodded. “That’s right. And the other triangle types are isosceles, scalene, and right. The last one, the right triangle, is especially useful.”
“It’s the kind where one of the angles is a right angle, ninety degrees,” Mark said.
“A square corner,” Scott put in, “like what you want if you’re putting up shelves, so nothing rolls off.”
“Exactly,” Barry said. “Anyway, people have known about the special mathematical properties of triangles at least since the ancient Greeks were alive—more than two thousand years. Astronomers trying to map the sky were the ones who noticed that there’s a fixed relationship between the angles of a right triangle and the length of its sides.”
Mark and Scott thought that over while Barry ate the last bite of his sandwich, crumpled the wax paper wrapping, and stuffed it in his Star Trek lunch box.
Finally Mark said, “Uh, Barry, could you say that again, maybe using totally different words this time?”
Barry took a deep breath. Apparently, he was trying hard to be patient. “Sure, okay. Uh . . . because of the special properties of right triangles, if you know the length of one side and the size of one angle, then you can calculate the other sides and angles. Those calculations are called trigonometric functions. The functions you hear about most are sine, cosine, and tangent.”
“Oh yeah. I hear about them all the time,” Mark agreed.
“Breakfast, lunch, and dinner,” said Scott.
“Lunch at least.” Mark held up his sandwich.
Barry sighed. “I’m starting to understand how Mr. Hackess feels trying to teach the two of you. Do you want to understand this or not?”
Mark and Scott said “Sorry” at the same time, then Scott thought of something. “I think I remember something else about right triangles,” he said. “It reminded me when you said ‘Greek.’ Wasn’t there some theory some guy with a snake name had . . . a theory that helps you figure out how long the sides are?”
Barry nodded. “You mean a theorem,” he said, emphasizing the m sound. “And I guess the name Pythagoras—Pi-THAG-or-us—does look a little like python, the snake, when it’s written. Anyway, the Pythagorean Theorem says that the square of the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of the sides.”
This time Barry didn’t pause to see whether Mark and Scott had understood him. He just went ahead and explained. “So the hypotenuse is the longest side of the triangle, the one that’s opposite the right angle. The other two sides are called the legs.”
“I really really hate to ask this,” Scott said. “B
ut could you maybe use some real numbers as an example? I think it would help me understand.”
Barry was always up for numbers, and in a flash he had pulled a pencil from his pocket and was drawing a triangle on a napkin. “I don’t have a ruler, so I’ll measure with my knuckles, okay? Let’s make this leg three knuckles long, and this leg four knuckles.” Barry labeled the sides. “So the square of a number is just that number multiplied times itself. You know that, right? So the square of three is nine, and the square of four is—”
“Sixteen knuckles,” Mark at least understood this much.
“Right,” Barry said. “So what’s the sum of nine and sixteen?”
“Twenty-five!” Mark was triumphant. “So according to Pythagoras, this side is twenty-five knuckles long.”
Scott looked at the triangle again and made a face. “That can’t be right. Just eyeballing it, I can tell it’s not nearly that long at all.”
“Whoa—cool!” Mark said. “So we’re the first ones to figure out Pythagoras was wrong! Maybe kids from now on will study the Kelly Theorem.”
Barry’s squinched his eyes shut and sighed. “You guys?”
“Oh, shoot—sorry, Barry. You’re right,” Scott said. “Without you, we never would have recognized our true mathematical genius. The Kelly-Leibovitz Theorem is okay by me. Is it okay by you, Mark?”
Mark nodded. “It’s a lot of syllables, but I think we can afford to be generous here.”
“You guys!” Barry repeated—loudly enough that one of the first-grade moms looked over and shook her head.
Barry mouthed “Sorry” to the mom while Mark and Scott tried hard not to laugh.
“The problem,” Barry said quietly, “is you forgot a step. The length isn’t twenty-five; the length is the square root of twenty-five. According to Pythagoras, the square is equal to the sum of the squares, so the length itself is going to be the square root. Get it?”
“And a square root is . . . uh, what, exactly?” Mark asked.
“The number you multiply by itself to get the square,” Barry said. “So the square root of nine is three, because three times three is nine. Okay: math problem. What is the square root of twenty-five?”