by Taiyo Fujii
The investigator had commented that desktop computers all over the world seemed to be serving as transmitters. At the cyber center in Langley, it was 6:30 in the morning and the investigator, who felt he’d wasted his time conducting a pointless search at this early hour, had sarcastically concluded, “Could you narrow it down a bit?”
“If one or two of them turns out to be what we’re looking for,” said Bruce, “you think we’ll still get any credit?”
Just downloading the search results would take two hours. They would have to consult with Akari about it.
2020-12-16T12:00 GMT
Project Wyvern
Today is Space Experiment Day.
I had Ronnie lift me up in the center of the room and gently let go, leaving me floating there with nothing to support me. What do you think would happen in a situation like this?
No matter how much you paddle the air, you won’t move forward. You can try kicking and stretching, but all you’ll do is keep spinning round and round in place around the center of gravity in your stomach. If you ever stay at the Wyvern, this is one thing I’d love for you to try!
There’s only one way to move when you’re in this state. Strip off your shirt or pants and hurl it at something. This will send your body moving in the opposite direction. It is a wonderful moment.
This is the principle by which spacecraft propel themselves.
I didn’t think I’d be writing any formulas on this blog, but let me include just one:
This is called the Tsiolkovsky rocket equation. It’s a rule for rockets that was set down in 1903, more than a century ago. It describes a law that all rockets using propellant follow. Want to know how much speed you can get if you shoot out propellant at a particular speed from a spacecraft of a particular weight? Weighing 58 kg, if I were to throw my 500 g pants at 3 m/s, I would reach a velocity of 0.2 m/s. So pathetic I might as well be stationary.
By expelling propellant at a higher velocity than this and accelerating in a horizontal direction, the hotel moves in the high orbit of the ISS (be careful to remember that it doesn’t accelerate upwards!).
The important point here is that in order to move an object with a lot of mass, you need a lot more propellant, or, to put it in simple terms, fuel. Once you use up all your propellant, you will continue orbiting at the same velocity. Just like me when I was left unsupported in space, you’ll become very lonesome.
Several spacecraft that don’t use such fuel have been conceived: a solar cell ship that propels itself by catching light, a magsail that uses the electromagnetic force of the sun, and the tether-propulsion system. All of them generate only a small amount of power, but they’re all indispensable. At Project Wyvern, we’re currently accepting applications from engineers who can make such technologies a reality.
Calling all people with exciting ideas!
To conclude, I have some news. The Wyvern return vehicle that carried up this orbital hotel will be dropped into the atmosphere. I’ll let you know when the schedule for reentry has been decided. I think there’s going to be a big shooting star. Look forward to it!
Little Rocket Smark
12 Seed Pod
Wed, 16 Dec 2020, 09:02 -0700 (2020-12-16T16:02 GMT)
Peterson Air Force Base
“Our weapon for this operation is the ASM-140, a piece of equipment none of you have used before. Colonel Claude Lintz, chief of Orbital Surveillance at NORAD, where the R&D for this weapon was carried out, has agreed to be here today.”
The voice of Operation Seed Pod’s operational commander, Colonel Waabboy, reverberated throughout the briefing room where the team members were assembled, seated neatly in rows. Lintz raised one hand briefly and then turned his eyes to the map of North America that hung from the ceiling. Frowning, he noticed that the words “Rod from God” were written beside the line drawn from west to east that designated their target. He had pushed for the name “SAFIR 3 R/B,” but apparently he had been unsuccessful.
“The air force’s knowledge of space is limited,” Waabboy said. “So please listen closely. Colonel, if you please.” He retreated to the other side of the whiteboard.
Lintz was hoping for a quick escape from this performance. Whether the team understood how the ASM-140 worked or not was irrelevant: it launched automatically, and once it had approached its target, it operated automatically.
“Let me put our objective in simple terms,” Lintz said, tapping the map with his baton. “Our target will follow this route into sector 26 of the North Pacific Air Defense Zone. Its altitude is 390 kilometers, and current observations suggest that its velocity upon entry will be 7.6 kilometers per sec—yes?”
Captain Ricky McGillis had his hand raised. McGillis, Lintz knew, was the F-15 pilot who’d actually have the ASM-140 on board.
“Pardon me, sir,” McGillis said, “but could we have those figures in feet? Mach numbers for velocities would also be helpful, sir.”
The woman sitting beside McGillis—Second Lieutenant Madu Abbot, who was to pilot the accompanying F-22 Raptor carrying the observational equipment—looked at him sideways. “You haven’t read the briefing material yet?” she hissed.
“Sure, I read it,” McGillis said, then turned back to Lintz. “I just want to make sure we all share the same mental image, sir.”
A few members of the maintenance team were nodding as well. Lintz smiled thinly. They’d asked for it.
“It seems we have some attendees who don’t know the speed of sound,” he said. “Fine. I’ll start again from the beginning.”
Sighs filled the briefing room. “Take it back, Ricky,” someone muttered. Lintz ignored them and held the tip of the baton in his other hand like a teacher.
“Is everyone here at least aware that the speed of sound varies depending on air pressure and humidity? In fact, what we call the speed of sound is a figure defined by the physical properties of the medium we call the atmosphere—yes, Captain McGillis?”
“I apologize, sir. Metric units are fine.”
“Oh, it’s no trouble for me. There appear to be quite a few team members who find them hard to visualize. It can’t hurt to do the conversion.” Lintz wrote two figures on the whiteboard beside the map. “The altitude is 1,280,000 feet, entry velocity is Mach 23.”
The room erupted with chatter. “Did he say million?” “Mach 23? Really?”
“Colonel, if I may?” Waabboy said, taking up a position before the whiteboard. “Surprised?” he barked at the assembled members. “The figures are correct. This mission involves shooting down the fastest target, at the highest altitude, the US Air Force has ever engaged. It contravenes COPUOS guidelines and as such is being conducted in secret. But eventually—maybe ten years from now, maybe thirty—the details will be made public. And by that time, we will most likely have entered an age of competition for hegemony over space.”
Waabboy fell silent and raised his clenched fist to his breast.
“When that day comes, your successful interception and neutralization of the Rod from God during Operation Seed Pod will be revealed as the shining milestone it was. Wherever, whenever, whatever the objective, the US Air Force defeats its enemies. I am certain you will have no trouble demonstrating this. Understood?”
“Yes, sir!” said the team in unison, sitting up straight. Ricky McGillis’s face had lost its smirk and was sober and tense.
“Please continue, Colonel,” Waabboy said, returning the reins to Lintz.
Referring to the orders posted on one side of the whiteboard as he went, Lintz explained the dimensions and other physical characteristics of the ASM-140. The team members flipped hurriedly through their copies of the orders, nodding and taking notes.
“The ASM-140 has two armaments designed to minimize the chances of creating debris,” Lintz said, pointing at the diagram of the ASM-140 with his baton. “The first is known as ‘Blackout.’ The second is
extremely small-caliber ammunition.”
“Sir,” said one of the attendees. “Captain Gehner, serving as chief of maintenance. I have a question. Blackout is said to be effective only against civilian electrical equipment. Will it work on the Rod from God?”
“Good question. Satellites are usually built to be as light as possible, so most are not adequately hardened against attacks of this sort. The CPU might be safely behind a shield, but if the exposed sensors can be killed, that will do the trick. Clear enough?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Blackout’s range is five kilometers. Sixteen thousand feet.” Lintz drew a point on the whiteboard, then, careful not to let his bitterness show, wrote “Rod from God” beside it. As he drew a circle indicating Blackout’s range, he was struck by a sense of déjà vu. Hadn’t he recently seen this same diagram before? That attachment from Freeman?
“Colonel Lintz?” Waabboy called to Lintz, who had paused to rack his brains.
“My apologies. Armament number two: slugs, just three millimeters in diameter. The basic principle is similar to that of a shotgun …”
Lintz continued his explanation, but all he could think about was that email from Freeman. What had it said—a large number of space tethers floating around SAFIR 3? The ASM-140 warhead would have to pass through that dense crowd of space tethers. But what would happen if it hit one?
“The ammunition seems too small to do much damage,” said Gehner. “Will it really get through the Rod from God’s shielding?”
“Nothing to be concerned about. The ammunition has a two-layer structure. When the outer layer strikes the shielding, both are vaporized together, and the core flies in. Same principle as an antitank missile.”
“Is the core tungsten or DU?”
“DU.”
Lintz sensed the tension rise slightly among the team members. The armed forces denied that the radiation from depleted uranium could have health effects. Even if such effects did exist, they were negligible. This common sense had penetrated the surface-bound members of the army and navy but not yet the air force.
“There’s no need to worry about special handling precautions,” Lintz said. “The rounds are completely shielded. If the shotgun mechanism functions normally, they’ll sink into the atmosphere and burn up a few weeks later.”
“Thank you, sir. That is very reassuring.”
As the team members visibly relaxed, Lintz’s sense of foreboding continued to swell within him. It was that email. He had to read the report from Freeman as soon as he could.
Noticing Lintz glance at the clock on the wall, Waabboy rose to his feet. “Any further questions?” he asked.
Only the sound of paper being folded came from the audience.
“I’ll take that as a no. This concludes the briefing. Thank you, Colonel Lintz. Attention!”
The attendees rose to their feet and prepared to salute.
Lintz sat in the passenger seat of Fernandez’s Ford, open laptop wedged in the narrow space between his belly and the dashboard. Fernandez glanced at the screen from the driver’s seat.
“Daryl’s report?” he asked.
Lintz grunted in the affirmative. “You read it?”
“Sorry. It was way over my head. Space tethers, right? Crazy stuff. Hard for me to follow.”
“I see …”
The email from Daryl, sent from his new base of operations provided by the CIA, was full of surprises. An engineer from Japan named Kazumi Kimura had used a radar system borrowed from a Seychelles billionaire to observe the space tethers. Now Daryl was requesting that NORAD replicate the observations.
Opening the attached diagram again, Lintz saw that his sense of déjà vu before had been warranted. SAFIR 3 was densely surrounded by the mass of space tethers known as the Cloud. Apparently there were twenty thousand pairs—far more than he had imagined.
These space tethers were already past the hypothesis stage. They were a real and pressing threat.
“I should have read this before the briefing,” he muttered. “Operation Seed Pod is pointless.”
At best, Lintz thought, but kept it to himself. He thought of the two civilians who would be in the area when Operation Seed Pod went into action.
Fernandez shrugged. “No stopping it now,” he said.
Lintz groaned and closed his laptop, stowing it in the map pocket on the passenger’s side. “How many staff do we have not involved with Seed Pod who we can use to make orbital observations?” he asked.
“Twelve,” Fernandez said. “They’re scheduled for video-call training for NORAD Tracks Santa. Which is next week, by the way.”
“Cancel the training,” Lintz said. “I’m redirecting all resources to support Daryl—the Seattle team. Gather everyone in my office. We need to be prepared for a video call from Seattle at any time.”
“An emergency, then. Understood, sir.”
Fernandez stepped on the gas. The Ford accelerated quickly to forty miles per hour, the on-base speed limit.
Wed, 16 Dec 2020, 09:14 -0800 (2020-12-16T17:14 GMT)
Western Days Hotel
Bruce watched Akari’s shoulders sink as she stood miserably in front of him.
“All right,” she said at last. “But I’d like to see it for myself. Can I have the data?”
The results of the search he had asked the CIA to perform last night had been nothing like what Akari had expected. Scanning all communications for messages containing three numbers indicating ID, time, and two three-dimensional decimal vectors indicating coordinates and heading had smoked out a vast number of computers. Between two and six hundred thousand devices had been sending data in that format—four orders of magnitude more than the few dozen space tether base stations they had expected. What was more, the data was extremely unwieldy. Most of the search results also included an enormous binary attachment. “These are not the sort of messages that one expects to be transmitted from orbit,” the CIA search team had observed drily in an attachment of their own.
“It’s nothing to worry about, Akari,” Bruce said. “As long as you can find the needle you’re looking for somewhere in that haystack.”
Akari silently opened the data and expanded the window, filling three whole monitors with rows of figures.
Jamshed’s voice came somewhat hesitantly from the display that had been set aside for video calls.
“What has happened?” he asked. “Is that the communications with the base stations? May I read it too?”
Still silent, Akari projected the figures on the whiteboard so that Jamshed could see them. On-screen, he stroked his chin and pulled one of the pieces of paper that dangled behind him closer.
“Doctor Jahanshah,” Bruce said. “You can wait until we’ve narrowed it down to the likely candidates before you begin your analysis, if you like. Let’s leave this part to Akari. Right, Kazumi … Kazumi?”
Kazumi was standing before the figure-filled whiteboard. He had his index finger up and his eyes half-closed as his lips moved silently, trying to use that mysterious power of his to perceive objects in orbit. Daryl, too, was sitting before a computer, waiting for Kazumi to open his mouth.
So that’s how it is, thought Bruce. The whole team’s bonkers except for me. Whatever Kazumi’s forecasting methods were, they were completely impenetrable to Bruce. The CIA agent watched as Kazumi slowly lowered his index finger to one side, his entire body leaning as he did so. “Look out!” he said.
Kazumi took a half-step forward, regaining his balance. Daryl turned around to see what was happening.
“Overlay it on a globe,” Kazumi said. “This data is longitude, latitude, altitude, in that order. Latitude is reversed north-south. Altitude is a floating-point number with the Earth’s surface at 1.0.”
Jamshed held up a yellow piece of paper. “Kazumi is right,” he said. “This is the order I used o
n my paper too. Location indicated by first line of data is—”
“First line of data is—” Kazumi said, speaking at the same time.
“Edge of Washington state, directly overhead,” Jamshed continued.
“Seattle airspace,” Kazumi finished.
“Roger,” said Daryl. “Putting it on-screen now.” He tapped at his keyboard, and a single dot appeared on the globe projected on the whiteboard. The dot was at the western edge of North America, right near the border with Canada. Seattle. The city they were in right now.
“Adding the data,” Daryl continued, and clattered at his keyboard again. One dot after another appeared on the whiteboard. Their locations matched the predictions Kazumi had made based on the Cloud observed by Ozzy.
“Wait a minute,” Bruce said, waving his hand and stepping in front of the whiteboard. “You’re joking, right? There are two to six hundred thousand PCs worldwide acting as base stations? That’s imposs—”
“I’ve figured out what the attachments are,” Akari interrupted. “JPEGs.” She placed a new portable projector on her table. A blue and white gradient appeared overlaid on the globe.
“Photos?”
“Yes,” Akari said curtly, and began to open more of the images, all of the same sort, one after another. Blue and white stripes. Sometimes a fade from blue to black, or a stripy pattern of green and blue. Daryl and Kazumi cocked their heads in confusion. Bruce, of course, had no idea what he was seeing. Only Akari seemed on top of the situation as she opened image after image.
“These photos don’t mean anything on their own,” she said. “I’ll write a program to stitch them together. Just let me check to see if anyone’s already coded some bits and pieces I could use in it.”
The crowdsourcing site MegaHands appeared. Akari entered a few search keywords and brought up a list of parts and libraries for image-processing programs. Bruce looked closely at the “Ordered by” field. The same name appeared in every line: Kirilo Panchenko. The pseudonym Shiraishi had used. Bruce wasn’t sure what Shiraishi had been up to, but once again Akari had managed to follow her uncle’s thinking perfectly. He glanced at Chris, who nodded with apparent satisfaction.