by Jeff Pollard
“I guess so,” K says. “Meanwhile your method is way more manipulative. I mean, if I had said I loved you, would you have then shut this all down?”
“Yep.”
“So then you make him say he loves you, then shoot him down? That's cold. That's like Hoth cold.”
“A girls gotta do what...you know. Gotta find out who's just doing anything to get in my pants and who's sincere.”
“What if the guy really did love you?” Kingsley asks.
“That's not real love, that's just infatuation, and I'm not gonna be with any guy who hasn't figured that out by himself already.”
Chapter 8
“Have you seen ShitKingsleysays.com?” Caroline asks K. They are attending the White House Correspondents' Dinner, a black-tie affair where even the President gets up and tells jokes. The ceremony is about to begin as dinner is finishing up.
“No,” K replies, as he tries to flag down a waiter to get another drink.
“It's a website devoted to ridiculous things you say,” Caroline replies. “I made a low-ball offer to the Russians for an ICBM like I was buying a used car. That was a fun day.”
“That was a fun day,” K replies.
“If you use this as a golf cart, you'll have a good time between the holes,” Caroline continues reading. “The idea of lying on a beach sounds awful. I'd go bonkers. Unless I had some really good drugs.”
“That's true,” K replies. “What's a billionaire gotta do to get a little service around here.”
“Get elected President,” Caroline replies.
“I guarantee I'll tip better than the President. I made more money by the time I was 24 than he'll make in his life,” K says. “Hey, that's a good quote, you should submit that.”
“So how do you feel about having a website of people just stalking after you to get good quotes?” Caroline asks.
“I like it. Sometimes I forget how funny I am,” K says.
“You're not that funny,” Caroline replies.
K grabs her phone away from her and reads a quote, “Theoretically if somebody were to stow away in the cargo Griffin, they'd be totally fine. I mean, hopefully.”
“Not that funny.”
“I mean, hopefully. Come on, that's brilliant comedic timing,” K says while typing on Caroline's phone.
“What are you typing?” Caroline asks.
“Nothing,” K says, handing the phone back. She looks at the blank home screen suspiciously.
“So does this thing ever start?” K asks.
“That's what she said,” a voice says behind Kingsley. K just closes his eyes indignantly.
“Hey Dick,” K says without turning around. Richard Branson takes a seat next to Caroline. “Don't think I've ever seen someone rock a bow-tie and a mullet simultaneously, so good on you.”
“Thanks Mr. P,” Richard Branson replies.
“Don't call me Mr. P,” K replies.
“Boys, please,” Caroline interrupts, “a woman can only handle so much witty banter,” she says sarcastically.
“Ladies and gentlemen, the President of the United States.” The President takes the podium to begin the event amidst applause. As the President gives a little opening speech, Kingsley's phone vibrates. He pulls it out to find Brittany Hammersmith calling. He hits ignore. Then Brittany texts him: “Call me ASAP.”
K starts to text her back. “Put that away,” Caroline whispers insistently. K sighs and puts it away.
Caroline's phone vibrates on the table. She doesn't look away from the President. K sneaks a peek, then surreptitiously reaches for her phone. She smacks his hand away without looking. The President introduces the night's host Jimmy Kimmel and steps away from the mic amidst more applause. Caroline looks to her phone and finds that she has received a tweet.
“Did you just tweet your own quote at shitKingsleysays from my twitter?” Caroline asks.
“Maybe,” K replies.
“Well they rejected it as unsourced,” Caroline replies sardonically, showing K her phone.
“Fine,” K says, whipping his phone out, retweeting Caroline's tweet, adding, “I literally just said that.”
“Kingsley, I didn't realize you were so obsessed with being famous. Rather off-putting if you ask me,” Richard says.
“So, I'm gonna go call Hammersmith, cause this is actually important,” K starts to get up while the crowd is still applauding as Jimmy Kimmel takes the podium.
“Sit down you self-important wanker,” Richard says.
“Mind your own business, balloon boy,” K says as he leaves the table.
“Why don't you go back to Africa!” Richard Branson shouts at Kingsley as he walks away, wanting to make sure K hears him over the applause, but unfortunately for Richard, the applause dies down just before he shouts and so his call for someone to go back to Africa is heard by pretty much everyone, including the non-Kenyan President Obama.
“Hey now, I'll tell the jokes,” Jimmy Kimmel responds. Bransons's face goes red and Caroline types away quickly on her phone.
“What are you typing?” Richard asks.
“I'm starting a twitter account called shitDickBransonsays,” Caroline replies.
In the lobby, K gets Hammersmith on the phone. “What's important?”
“Congress cut the budget for commercial space flight. NASA is being forced to down-select from three to two contractors.”
“For crew or cargo?” K asks.
“Both.”
“God dammit,” K replies. “What the hell good does a competition do if you end up giving someone a monopoly anyway?”
“Well, congress forced their hand,” Hammersmith says.
“Because they're either in the pocket of our competitors and they're trying to rig the competition, or they're trying to eliminate alternatives to their Senate Launch System.”
“Take your pick, either way, we've got work to do for this down-select,” Hammersmith replies.
“I love being a political football,” K says sarcastically.
“The conference is in five days, we need to set our strategy ASAP.”
“Call everyone, I'll get on Skype in fifteen minutes,” K says. “But,” K says, looking back into the ballroom.
“But what?”
“That means leaving Caroline alone with Dickie B.”
“Is that a euphemism?”
“More of an anthropomorphic mullet,” K replies.
“All we can really do is lower the price,” Brittany says. Kingsley is back at the hotel, Skyping with his team back in Hawthorne on a laptop while he drinks from a series of mini plastic bottles.
“So how low can we go, that's the real question,” Travis adds.
“If we bid too low and have cost overruns, that'll hurt us big time in the future,” Brittany adds.
“Okay, let's look at it from the NASA perspective,” K says, “assuming the people making the decision aren't compromised, that this down-select came from above. So if you're the NASA person, you see Orbital Sciences with the refurbished rocket Antares and the designed for cargo transport Cygnus as an ideal cargo platform. Cheap, non-man-rated, not overloaded with life support and a heat shield. When you let it burn up rather than trying to design it for re-entry it leaves you with a lot of internal volume for about the same mass. So they make a lot of sense as a cargo vehicle. So if you have to pick two cargo systems, you go with Antares/Cygnus for dedicated cheap cargo, and then you go with ULA or us for the second one. The Griffin/Eagle 9 is going to be way cheaper than the Atlas V/CST-100, so why would they pick them over us?”
“They can't, not if our price is way lower than theirs,” Travis says. “At least not for a legitimate reason.”
“And then for crew, the Dream Chaser seems a favorite,” K says, “it offers something that the CST and the Griffin don't, low-g re-entry and runway landing. I think NASA will want a variety of choices, so a space plane and a capsule as opposed to just having two capsules with basically the same capabilities.”
“And again, we're looking at ours being significantly cheaper,” Travis adds.
“Maybe they'll pick the CST for the crew missions and pick us for the cargo missions, that way this down-select doesn't stop any program,” Brittany says. “I mean, isn't that the ideal way of down-selecting without undermining the very concept of competition to provide a private alternative?”
“That's assuming that the down-select isn't an intentional ruse to eliminate some of the competition,” K adds. “If it were a fair decision, they'd pick us over the CST on both of them and eliminate it as too expensive. But something tells me that the real motives here aren't so pure. We have to remember how much influence ULA has. Hell, Orbital Sciences has ties to the military, they build missiles and drones.”
“So what are you saying, that we need to buy some influence?” Brittany asks.
“We need to figure out how low we can go responsibly with our bid,” K says.
“Aren't the contracts cost-plus though?” Dexter asks.
“Yeah, but if we go over budget, that'll really hurt us in future bids and competitions,” K adds. “So we need to figure out what price levels for both crew and cargo make the most sense. Low enough to win, but not so low that we don't actually profit from them. And high enough that we don't go over-budget.”
“I wish we knew what their bids were going to be,” Travis adds.
“Okay, well everyone look over the numbers, think this through, I'll be back in the morning. Now I'm gonna go back and make sure Richard Branson isn't stealing my girl.”
Kingsley flies the T-38 back to California first thing in the morning, leaving Caroline behind in Washington. He arrives at the SpacEx Headquarters just after six in the morning local time. He finds the building empty and quiet save for a single lit office. K follows the light and enters the office, finding Brittany Hammersmith giving a presentation to no one in front of a projector screen. It's her presentation she's set to give at the conference at the end of the week in Houston, laying out all of the features of the Eagle 9/Griffin system both for crew and cargo delivery services.
“Don't stop,” K says. Brittany finishes up her presentation, blushing. “How's that?”
“Good until you get to the blank dollar number at the end,” K says.
“I didn't want to practice with a real number in there so I don't get mixed up when I give the real presentation. So I'm leaving it blank until we know,” Brittany says, sitting down at her desk and making changes to her presentation slides.
“I think we have to face the possibility that we lose both bids,” K says. Brittany stops typing mid sentence and she looks up at him.
“I can't even think about that right now,” Brittany says. She takes a hefty drink of coffee and focuses back in on her presentation.
“It's all I can think about,” K says. “We've been the outsiders since day one. If there were real competitions, ULA wouldn't even be in business. They exist because they've monopolized US government launches. If it weren't for that, they wouldn't be competitive. And yet, they not only exist, they're the front-runners. Obviously it doesn't just come down to the dollar figures, they have influence, however you want to describe it, it's the only way you can justify their continued dominance of the market.”
“But this program, this move toward private enterprise, competition, maybe this really is a game-changing evolution. Maybe this won't just be more of the same. Maybe this is just the first step toward true competition.”
“I'd like to think so, but even if you try to think that, even if you think it's just a meddling congress that's doing this, then how do you explain that NASA tried to force us to wait until Griffin 3 to even attempt to dock with the ISS, yet the Cygnus and the CST-100 both were allowed to dock with the ISS on their first missions. Why the double standard there unless it's an attempt to bankrupt us?”
“Well,” Brittany says with a sigh, taking her glasses off and leaning back in her chair, “maybe that's because we were the first company to try and once we did it they were less nervous about letting another private company do it.”
“Yeah or maybe they're trying to rig the game in favor of the companies that are connected to the military-industrial-congressional-pork-chili-cook-off.”
“Ok, so say you're right, what do we do? Just assume that our lower price won't matter, we get down-selected, then what? We go bankrupt and that's it? What's the point of even entertaining that hypothetical?”
“I don't think it's that simple,” K replies. “Even if we're down-selected for funding, we can still collect 220 million for proving our crew transport capability. Right?”
“Yeah,” Brittany says.
“So then, if we're down-selected, we can man Griffin 4, take up me and Dexter and Travis, then for Griffin 5-”
“Wait, manning Griffin 4? Griffin 4 isn't being made in the crewed configuration.”
“We'd be using the fifth spacecraft, we'd skip Griffin 4.”
“So you want to put people in the fourth Griffin and the first one laid out for carrying people?” Brittany asks.
“It's totally doable. And if we do that, then for Griffin 5, we could go to the ISS and collect 220 million. So even if we're down-selected if we accelerated the schedule, how much would that 220 million sustain us? I mean, once we show we can send people to the ISS, we could then start flying passengers for twenty million a seat, right? So if we did that, would that sustain us? Can we make the numbers work if we get that 220 million two missions from now?”
“Maybe. It'd be risky.”
“I know about risky, I wanna know if it's possible.”
“I'll run the numbers,” Brittany says reluctantly.
“Don't tell anyone about this. I don't want doom and gloom around here unless we actually get down-selected. Nor do I want anyone to know we're considering a risky mission. That could hurt us.”
“I got it,” Brittany replies.
“I'm resigning,” Dexter says. K and Dexter had just left the meeting where they had finally made a decision on the price point for their upcoming bids. Dexter followed K back to his office before dropping this bombshell safely inside K's office.
“What? Why?”
“I got a job offer I couldn't refuse,” Dexter says.
“What the...You're the chief test-pilot for the world's best private space company. We're going to space together in like eight months. What the hell kind of job offer is better than that? If it's about money, I can pay you more money.”
“It's not the money, and it is definitely more. It's just a more secure employment,” Dexter says.
“Secure? You afraid we're gonna go under? We're doing great.”
“We're not doing great now,” Dexter says. “I've been here five years and we've been an inch away from not being able to make payroll four times.”
“It's the cost of being revolutionary,” K says.
“I know, and that's you, you love that stuff, but I want to have a job at a company I know will exist in thirty years.”
“In thirty years I'll be mid-retirement, living on Mars,” K says.
“And that's great for you, but you know, I'll be fifty before I know it. I want to have kids and go to a company where I know I can move up the ladder and retire comfortably.”
“Are you sure this isn't about you being afraid to go up on the first manned Griffin?” K asks.
“You know me better than that,” Dexter replies.
“I'm just saying, if you don't want to, it'd be easier to resign now than to wait and then chicken out.”
“And I'm just saying, shut your filthy whore mouth, I'm afraid? Come on asshole, you know me better than that,” Dexter says in the way that only friends can call each other names.
“Just checking. I don't want to find out later that people were afraid to speak up, go-fever and all,” K says.
“And I'm just saying, the G
riffin is already safer than the shuttle,” Dexter replies.
“Fair enough. Well, good luck. I wish you the best,” K shakes his hand. Dex keeps his head down.
“There's more,” Dexter adds.
“What?”
“I'm taking Hannah with me,” Dexter says.
“My assistant?” K asks.
“She hasn't been your assistant for a while,” Dexter replies.
“True enough,” K says.
“I just mention it because you two had kind of a thing,” Dexter says.
“It's fine. Wait, when you say you're taking her...do you mean as your assistant or is there something more personal to it?”
“Both,” Dexter says. “It's cool?”
“It's really fine,” K replies. “But I am gonna need your replacement in place before you go.”
“Why do you think I hired Tim?” Dexter asks.
Houston, Texas
The SpacEx A-team of Kingsley, Brittany, and Travis sit patiently as the presentations begin in a small conference room. There are more than a dozen NASA personnel watching the presentations with little interest. There would be no new information, but for some reason, each company had an hour to make a presentation before NASA would make their final decisions later in the day. Kingsley suspected that the NASA decisions were already made.
“Is this what normal corporations are like?” K whispers to Brittany as a NASA official drones on and everyone pays attention without actually listening.
“In what way?” Brittany asks.
“Nothing happens, nobody learns anything, no decisions are made, it's pointless, but everybody pretends that it matters.”
“Then yes, lots of meetings are like this.”
Orbital Sciences is first to present. Their team of nervous project managers, terrified that they will screw up and lose their jobs, stumble their way through a forty-five minute PowerPoint that could have been done in about ten minutes.
“No but really, this is like speech class in college,” K whispers to Brittany. “The speaker is way more nervous than he should be, and the entire audience doesn't give a shit and is just waiting their turn.”