The President pauses now, and stops reading from his notes as he continues. “I was advised not to present this message, as some people felt that a panic would cause more harm than the asteroids themselves. However, I have faith in my fellow people to act civilly in this time of uncertainty. Go to your homes; be with your families, and may God be with us all.”
The announcement ends, allowing news anchors to take over the airwaves, each one ready with their own slant on the speech.
“Mr. President, we must leave now. Marine One will take you to the airport where you will board Air Force One.” The Secret Service agent is quite formal with a hint of haste to his tone. He, too, wants to get away from here.
“I should have told them the full truth, the whole truth. God help us all.” The President mutters to himself. The President looks at his staff and continues. “Please go home and be with your loved ones; we really don’t think Washington is a target.”
News stations across the world pick up where the speech ends with stories ranging from how to cope without a cell phone, to end of the world scenarios. With impact sites, still mostly unknown, it is impossible to plan evacuations. People are encouraged to stay in their homes, stock up on water, batteries, canned goods, and the like. Most newscasters are sensible and calming as they explain how to cope, in case of power and water disruptions.
Those that fear being trapped in cities without services leave. Some people head to friends and relatives, others, to campgrounds. Roads and highways become congested, and traffic slows, then in some places, stops completely. Police do their best to get people moving, but even without any visible threat, many are starting to panic.
Hospitals feel the burden, as some doctors and nurses do not show up in this time of need. There are numerous fender benders, keeping the remaining ambulance services busy, as they try to negotiate congested streets. Suicides escalate, some take drugs, others shoot themselves, others add to the mayhem by jumping from city skyscrapers, tall bridges, or in front of buses and trains. Most cities find their transport services slowing, and then stopping. People become trapped, unable to move in the gridlock that is created. As people abandon their vehicles and start making their way on foot, fear escalates further. Gunshots fill the air in some cities as fear boils over into anger. Gangs start to walk many city streets as anarchy takes over. Airlines suspend services worldwide as they have been grounded, either from their own fears, or under instructions from various governments. More and more people have to wait this day out where they are stopped. Some fear being trapped in their homes, but with nowhere else to go, find vantage points to watch history unfold in the skies. Many of the media are promising a fantastic light show, as they expect the meteors to burn up in the atmosphere.
The President rubs his forehead as he reads last minute updates on the chaos, not only across his nation, but around the world. So much damage has occurred even before any of these objects strike. He shakes his head as casualty estimates stare at him from possible strike zones. With evacuations in order, or deemed more hazardous than the strike itself, he wonders how history will view his decisions.
Location:
North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD)
Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado Springs, Colorado
Deep inside the Cheyenne Mountain, General Walker once again steps onto the floor of NORAD's Command Center. Gazing around, he can see a lot of nervous people looking to him for answers. “Increase readiness to DEFCON Two.”
Looking across the room the General watches the condition lights switch from yellow to red, and then says. “Prepare to receive the President in three hours. This is real people; make it happen.”
This comment makes many heads turn. The General ignores the looks of surprise as he retires to his office. There, he spends quite some time debating a personal dilemma of his own. Finally, he calls his officers to a meeting where the General raises his concerns. The discussion is short, and, with a sigh, the General rises from his chair, places his cap under his arm and walks back into the control center.
“All personnel listen up and listen well.” General Walker gazes around the room making eye contact with as many people as possible. His expression is unreadable. “What I am about to do violates my standing orders.” Again, he pauses as he looks at everyone around the room. “Contact your families and friends. Get them into this facility; you have ninety minutes people. Security will be doubled and they will have access only to the areas which they are assigned, understood?”
For many with families, the orders are nothing short of a miracle. Standing beside the General is his entire staff, their support obvious. As the General’s staff looks on, those with families close by make hasty calls. Those with family too far away can only fret at the situation.
Husbands, wives, children, and friends alike are all in a state of shock as they enter Cheyenne Mountain. Heavily armed soldiers are seemingly everywhere, directing all newcomers deep into the mountain. Many stare in awe at the massive blast doors as they enter this once forbidden realm.
With only minutes to spare, the last civilian is escorted inside just as the President's motorcade comes roaring down the road. Tires screech as the vehicles stop. Secret Service agents scramble to get the President to safety as they frantically look at their watches. They are also looking upward, it seems time has run out.
Watching the President’s progress via monitor, General Walker issues further orders to the staff in the command center. “Seal the mountain, go to DEFCON One, I repeat DEFCON One; this is not a drill.”
The color indicator switches to white for the first time since its inception. As the light engages, General Walker can only hope that all their plans succeed. All around the base, massive doors close and lock. Whether these measures will protect, or entomb, the occupants is not known. The base will stay on external power for as long as is possible, but is now automatically using the internal water reserves. General Walker has no idea if they will be inside for days, months, or even longer. They have food and water to last a couple of years, if needed. Even so, with the additional people inside the mountain, water rationing is immediately implemented. Teams get to work monitoring the air and water quality continuously. Each of the six diesel generators were test-fired as soon as the DEFCON status moved from five to four. They are ready to kick in at a moment's notice, and their enormous reserves of fuel can run the facility for a long time. Even so, General Walker plans to implement power rationing to extend the life of these engines. He is the right man for the job, as he prepares the facility for the worst possible scenario.
Chapter Three - Impact
Location:
International Space Station
Planetary Orbit
Earth
“ISS, please respond.”
“Commander Gustav Fuchs, receiving you loud and clear, Houston.”
Gustav listens to the almost frantic, hurried voice and responds calmly. “Please repeat your last transmission. Did you say, abandon the station? You do realize that we have a crew of twenty-six, and no shuttles docked. How exactly are we to evacuate?” He is quite perturbed.
As Gustav listens again, he turns his head to look out the window into space. The hand piece slips from his fingers to float about in front of him. He slams down on the ‘All Stations’ intercom button and almost screams. “Abandon the station, this is not a drill, prepare to abandon the station!” His voice is not so calm now, as he barks the order into the microphone.
Down below, thousands of missiles can be seen rising up out of the atmosphere from America, Russia, Europe, China, and a dozen other smaller countries. They rise to meet what looks like a cloud in space, a cloud coming straight at them. Amongst all this chaos, can be seen one small speck rising up, getting closer, an aging space shuttle.
Gustav grabs the hand piece again as he says with bewilderment. “Endeavour, uh I thought this was Houston. I was also of the understanding that the Endeavour was decommissioned.”
“Commander Fuchs, this is Commander John Thompson of the Endeavour. We dug this old bird out of mothballs, fitted some seats, strapped the fuel tanks on, and here we are. Hell, we didn’t bother contacting you before, as every simulation we ran had us either exploding on takeoff, or falling apart during assent. I am however, pleased to inform you that the simulation computers can be wrong, sometimes.”
Gustav listens to the list of instructions that follow and loses himself for a moment in his thoughts. That’s one hell of a brave flight crew out there, he thinks. How the hell did they get the shuttle ready and launched so fast? Not possible, but here they are.
Twenty-six people now race for safety as fast as possible, in the near-zero gravity space station. Heading to where the shuttle will dock, no one is sure what will happen. Gustav Fuchs awaits them there. Checking that everyone is present, he speaks up loudly and clearly. “Ladies and gentlemen, as we know, the meteor shower we have been monitoring is a real hazard to this station. A shuttle has been sent up to rescue us. As such, we must abandon the station immediately. We will each take our space suits, as much oxygen as we can carry, and strap ourselves into the seating area in the cargo hold.”
All members understand that this has never been done before, and is quite probably a death sentence for those in the cargo hold. With limited protection and hastily fitted insulation and chairs, they would almost be strapped to the shuttle bay itself. But staying on the station means certain death. With trepidation and a little faith, they suit up and wait at the docking bay.
Once everyone is assembled, Gustav continues his speech. “We have little time. Crew, assist with the docking procedure, and then prepare for immediate departure. I don't know where we will be landing, but we must make haste to get off this station.”
He continues, adding in what he hopes is a positive tone. “Hey, we can count ourselves lucky to have that old bird out there. It is being piloted by a very brave flight crew.” He feigns a smile. We are merely trading one form of death for another. At least our chances of survival on the shuttle are better than zero, if only slightly better.
Off in the distance an explosion can be seen through the windows of the space station. It is followed by another, then another. Small satellites are either exploding, or just disintegrating under the barrage of these small meteoroids. Modern civilization disappearing, one satellite at a time, thinks John sadly, as he gazes outside.
John is sitting in his pilot seat, as he and his two crew mates, finish the quickest manual docking and departure checklist he has ever done in his life. The minutes stretch on as every step seems to take a lot longer than normal. Sweat rolls down his face, he can make no mistakes. The crew members aboard the International Space Station each seem to take forever to get into the shuttle's cargo area. All the while, meteor after meteor streaks toward Earth, striking satellite after satellite.
John confirms the final items on his list, “Check. Okay. That’s the final one. Good. Gustav, are you reading me? We have room up front for you.”
“Gustav here; I will stay with the team. We are strapped in as securely as is possible, and ready to go.”
“Understood.” John replies, and immediately gets to work.
As the space shuttle Endeavour undocks, a small meteoroid strikes the International Space Station, its velocity enough to carry it completely through the station. It passes dangerously close to the departing shuttle. Seeing this, John hits the primary boosters in an effort to put as much distance as possible between themselves and the station. Though the boost firmly pushes the pilots into their seats, the Endeavour pulls away, painfully slow at first, as it takes time to build up speed. The cockpit crew can only watch helplessly as more objects strike humanity's greatest space achievement. The station breaks apart spectacularly in a huge explosion, its fuel tanks suddenly detonate. The shock wave travels out in all directions sending massive amounts of debris with it. In the shuttle, various small impacts can be heard from behind. Suddenly, the primary engines cut out. The usual silence of space is dominated by numerous small metallic pinging sounds coming through the Endeavour's hull, sending shivers down the spine of even the bravest soul aboard.
“Gustav, you still with me back there?” asks John nervously. With the cargo bay doors sealing shut long after they undocked, he can only imagine what could have happened to the people strapped in back there.
Gustav shines his flashlight down the rows of people and smiles as each gives a thumbs-up signal. He pans his light around the shuttle bay itself, before responding. “Commander, your skills at piloting are proven yet again, and everyone is good back here. I can see no obvious hull fractures, though we heard a lot of noise from the engine area a moment ago.”
John switches to all channels. “Okay people. Commander Thompson here. We have cut fuel to the main boosters and are on vector for a good approach. We will be going in hot initially, but we managed to take some fuel off the station to help us with maneuvers.”
As he switches the microphone off, he looks at his crew and says. “God help them back there.” John tries not to think about what may have cut out the main boosters, as he shuts off a multitude of alarms. They will be going in very fast. Without knowing the condition of the rear engines, a deorbit burn could be very dangerous, but it has to be done.
With pieces of the International Space Station forming the backdrop behind a now-escaping space shuttle, the crew gets to see what must have been the first missile to strike one of the larger asteroids. The explosion is far away, almost over the horizon, but is clearly a nuclear blast.
“Oh, my,” says John, his blue eyes darting back and forth from his instruments to the view outside. “What are they doing? You guys don't think ALL these missiles are nuclear? Do you?” He looks out at the hundreds upon hundreds of missiles in view from the cockpit, knowing there are probably many more that he can't see.
He is answered by silence. Neither of his two crewmen can answer as they, too, stare blankly out into space.
More explosions can be seen far in the distance now, many more, all nuclear, and all extremely bright, like miniature suns spilling light in every direction.
John looks around at his crew again and says with some concern in his voice, “Ah, if those explosions get any closer, we are going to have a lot of problems. Normally, I would not worry about EMP, but with so many explosions, we will have to consider the blasts effecting our systems.”
The space shuttle Endeavour, its tricky deorbit burn a success, continues its descent into the upper atmosphere. The tiles on the heat shield hold, at least for now. John’s piloting skills are put to the test yet again, as the Endeavour responds sluggishly. Damage to the rear engines is just the start of their problems. Smaller pieces of one of the engine’s nozzles begin to fall away. With the shuttle’s descent, air friction increases, causing more bits of the engine’s innards to break away. One significant chunk breaks off and clips the tail of the Endeavour, causing the entire craft to shimmy as John struggles with the increasingly less responsive controls. Entering the lower atmosphere, the Endeavour resembles a meteor itself, with temperatures exceeding tolerance levels over most of the ship.
Sweat pours down into the suits of all aboard while they descend; the very suits saving them, are almost cooking them alive. The ambient temperature inside the cargo hold is so great that many of the passengers pass out. In the cockpit, John fights both the shuttle, as it shakes and shimmies, and his own body’s desire to shut down from the oppressive heat.
Looking at the equally taxed co-pilots he says loudly into their intercom. “She is either going to burn up, or break up! We have to risk slowing her down. Plotting a course to Northrop Strip, White Sands Space Harbor.”
At a distance of fifteen miles, the Endeavour is far closer than any standard landing would permit. At ten miles out, John’s ability to control the landing is taxed even further, as portions of overstressed heat shield tiles start breaking away. A few pieces tear away at first, then mor
e and more fall like confetti, trailing behind the struggling shuttle like a tail. The vibrations aboard are shaking controls panels and passengers alike. Alarm after alarm is silenced by the flight crew, as the shuttle literally starts to shake itself to bits.
With concern is his voice, John says to his crew. “Well, we can't ask anymore of this bird.” Flicking a switch on the console, he hesitates to speak. “Gustav, you still with me back there?”
“Yes, many have lost consciousness, and I am unsure of their condition. The hull still seems intact, but some small cracks are forming towards the rear of the cargo bay.”
“Understood. John out.” He switches channels. “Whites Sands, this is Commander Thompson of the Endeavour, on approach, do you read?”
The tower crew can only stare in surprise at the speaker. That radar blur they see is not a meteor after all, but a space shuttle.
“I repeat, this is Commander John Thompson of the space shuttle Endeavour. We have the crew from the International Space Station on board. We are severely damaged and coming in fast. Chute deployment is problematic at best. We will require fire crews, medical assistance, and an immediate evacuation of all aboard.”
The tower crews respond immediately, galvanized into action by the distressed shuttle. Some grab binoculars to look for the Endeavour visually. Dark scorch marks score her white nose and flanks, and with massive areas of heat shield tiles missing, the craft hardly looks like a space shuttle anymore. The tail has an obvious bite out of it, and the engines themselves look peculiar at this angle. The shuttle leaves behind a trail of smoke and debris in her wake as she approaches, awfully fast.
John gets the Endeavour lined up for the final approach; it is tough as the failing ship wants to drift left, then right. It vibrates so much that his teeth rattle. He lowers the landing gear, and is pleasantly surprised to see green lights. The runway approaches much faster than desired however, which adds to his anxiety. The rear tires touch down hard, causing parts of the main engine assembly to break off, littering the landing field. The front wheels make contact with the runway, sending additional vibrations through the overtaxed shuttle. John hits the parachute deploy controls. They too, report green. The onlookers from the tower can only watch in horror as the entire parachute assembly simply falls off the Shuttle. It smashes into the ground, then, with more than a touch of irony, the parachutes open, to billow uselessly, mocking the fast-retreating shuttle.
Initiation Series: Series One Compilation (Terran Chronicles) Page 5