by JournalStone
Floating back to the chair bolted in front of the lab’s central command console, he donned a seat restraint to hold him in front of the camera. He idly held the box a quarter meter above the table and watched as the microscopic tidal gravity gently dropped the box to the surface. He lifted the top off the box, withdrew a clear plastic bag with a lock of auburn hair tied in a ribbon. Kissing it gently, he replaced it in the box.
"Soon, Lynn. I will be there all too soon," he whispered to the memento as he wiped a tear from his left eye. The voice of Lisa Daniels brought him back to the present.
"I will be brief, we haven’t much time. I've been avoiding UNSOC for the past ten minutes or so, since I believe we have to reach a decision here. We’re in deep trouble. When—whatever it was—happened on the moon, all of our radiation alarms went off. Medical. Any idea on our radiation dose?"
The young man on the monitor seemed overwhelmed at all the attention. He was a physician’s assistant, since the population of the station did not rate a full-time doctor.
"It’s a little out of my league, Commander, but here’s what I’ve got. The situation is serious but not immediately fatal. Everyone on board has received between one and two Grays of radiation. Say, ten to twenty thousand chest x-rays. Untreated, there’s a good chance about five percent of the folks will die. It’s guaranteed about half will be down with nausea and diarrhea in four to six hours. We have to get everyone into a groundside hospital for treatment."
"Four to six hours?"
"Yes Ma’am".
"Astrogation. What’s the word on the debris cloud?"
"As things stand now, Commander, we can see the first debris hits as soon as we round the Earth, ten minutes from now." A gasp greeted her words. "But it should be the smallest stuff, dust only. The acceleration needed to move something from the lunar surface to Earth orbit in thirty minutes is certainly enough to powder it. And we’re only in real danger when we cross the plane of the moon’s rotation, at least in the short term. I think we’ll get four to five orbits, say six to nine hours, before our position becomes actively dangerous."
"Thank you, Astrogation. Engineering. Can anything be done to lengthen our time up here?"
John looked mightily unhappy. "No Ma’am. Radar shows objects twenty meters long moving fast enough to escape lunar gravity. Big mountains like that would crush us like a bug fairly soon. Worse, the smaller stuff will be flying along three or four kilometers per second, relative to us. Doesn’t take too many golf-ball sized hits to kill everyone on board. We’re going to have to evacuate."
"Anyone else? I want everyone to have their say. Roque?"
"I vote to evacuate. We are sitting ducks up here. The laser I have been working on will do nothing against this volume of space debris."
"This is preposterous!" broke in George Cranston, the representative of ZGCFabricam. "I have a major silicon melt going. We’ve got a large order for the high-Q silicon crystals for the Valley. We can’t evacuate now!"
"How much longer do you need?" asked John, leaning forward.
"Thirty-six hours at the earliest." The thumbnail image of Celine was shaking her head mournfully.
"In thirty-six hours, the chances of one or more collision with a ten centimeter object, rises to eighty-seven percent."
"Overruled George. I’d rather be alive and in court on Earth than free but dead up here."
"I’ve got another two hours until our final production run is up," said Alice Webber of ElectroPore. "We’re running an anti-diabetes drug now. Any chance we can wait until then?"
Celine frowned and said, "We’ll be taking hits but it will be from sub-millimeter-sized impactors. Risky but doable."
"Celine, to clear the air, at what time does the impact threat for a centimeter-sized object rise to one in a thousand?"
"Six hours."
"Interesting coincidence. Right about that time we’ll be woofing up our cookies."
Lisa scanned the images of all the conferees. "Anyone else? OK, here’s what I've decided. We evacuate in four hours. We eat now. I want the mess hall closed as soon as everyone is through, or in one hour, whichever comes first. No exceptions. And no hoarding. No apple in the pocket. We’re going to chuck but I want that to be as content free as possible,” she looked around the edges of her conference screen, collecting nods.
"ElectroPore gets their run but all manufacturers will be limited in the product they can ship down."
Kalau Matumbe, head of ExoMat, interrupted. "Excuse me Commander. Ship down in what? There’s no shuttle in dock at this time." A chuckle ran around the conference. "What am I missing? George? Alice? You guys know anything?"
Lisa took pity on him. "Ah, sorry, Kalau. Remember those ‘solar shelters’ we drilled on a few months ago? They are really emergency reentry vehicles. We call them ‘sleds.’ We’re going home in them."
"I never saw anything about such a thing in the UNSOC literature." Kalau looked a little indignant.
"That’s because UNSOC doesn’t know about them." The rest of the department heads muttered and stirred. "It’s time to let the secret out everyone."
Lisa addressed herself to Kalau. "We’ve been petitioning UNSOC for the sleds for the past twenty-five years. We’ve always been told no. Once the Collins colony…" Her voice caught and she had to clear her throat to continue, "The colony was able to ship us materials, we decided to build our own reentry craft. They never knew about it."
Kalau looked around his screen. "Are you guys buying this? Risk our life to some hand-built, untested rattletrap?" George and Alice nodded.
"Kalau, I know you haven’t been up here long, but there’s one thing you have to realize," said Alice earnestly. "UNSOC might be a bunch of corrupt clowns but the astronaut corps is some of the most professional, careful and dedicated people I know. I would absolutely trust my life to them. In fact, we’re doing so every day we’re in orbit." Kalau subsided, troubled.
"Anything else? Celine and I will set the undock time. Everyone will be in the sleds, strapped down, no less than ten minutes before undock time. Nobody gets left behind. Medical, be prepared. We might have to sedate a couple to get them on board.
"Let’s move."
Roque toggled away from channel seven. The off-white box with the lock of Lynn’s hair in it caught his eye. He sighed and grasped the box carefully.
"Sorry to disappoint you Commander Daniels," he murmured to himself. "But I won’t be aboard."
* * *
UNSOC Space Station Roger Chaffee, June 17 2082, 1100 EDT
Throughout the Chaffee people were zipping about, shutting down systems, powering off experiments, gathering records. Anti-static bags of electronic parts and memory chips floated in the air. Engineering was working overtime emptying the sleds of Collins supplies to free up room for items that must get to Earth. Medical sent over all of the anti-nausea drugs they had.
And Lisa Daniels found herself with a problem.
"But Roque, you must leave!"
"Ah, my dear Commander, you know that I cannot.” his wan smile flashed briefly. "I would be completely helpless on Earth."
"You know you will be killed if you stay," Lisa said.
"My dear," Roque said, "That should have happened eighteen years ago. I figure I just had a little reprieve from the Grim Reaper all these years."
"I could order you sedated and carried aboard you know," she said. "Don’t think I won't."
"Ah, Lisa, Lisa. I remember you as a young lieutenant fresh out of UNSOC Ground School. Struggling along here, learning how to swim in the air. But I knew then, as I know now, you were destined to lead people. You do care. That is why I'm not strapped into a sled right now, snoring away. You are allowing me my dignity."
"And I will continue to allow it until it endangers the mission," said Lisa roughly.
"Let me tell you a very brief story. One time, long ago, I was an exchange student to the United States. It was so different from my beloved España. So busy, so alive! My
foster family took me to the Outer Banks of North Carolina on their annual vacation. Two weeks of the beach, girls and, even sometimes drinking. I was seventeen and not sure what I wanted to do in life. Then I met Lynn.
"She was eighteen and beautiful, full of life. The second night I was there I went for a walk on the beach near sunset. It was strange. In España, the beaches face west into the setting sun. On the Outer Banks, they face east. The land is so flat you can sometimes see the setting sun through the maze of vacation homes.
"I was walking on the beach towards one of the shafts of sunlight when I saw her. Her hair was a rich auburn, shining like a halo in the reddening light. She had put on a light shirt against the cooling temperatures but she was lithe and slender and to a young boy who was almost a man, irresistibly attractive.
"I somehow got up the nerve to talk to her. Her family had just arrived for their two weeks at the beach and she had also wanted to see the sunset. It was beautiful. I daresay, more beautiful than any I have seen since, yes, even up here."
Roque removed the lid on his smudged white box and retrieved a sealed tube of what looked like green water and sand. Lisa tried not to show her impatience but something must have leaked through her control, and Roque chuckled.
"There is not much left to tell. She was my first love. The two weeks passed both excruciatingly slow and far too fast. She was fascinated by the stars and she spoke often of joining the Astronaut Corps and going to space. I had never considered that and promised I would join too.
"We were each other’s first lovers and it was evermore sweet for that. We kept in touch of course. We were trying to figure out how she could visit me in España. Then, for some reason, about eight months later, she stopped writing. My friends all tried to console me, saying I should find another girl, for she must have found another man.
"It was a month later when I received a letter in the mail. Her parents had written to me, enclosing an article from the newspaper. She had been driving home from her job when a drunk driver twice her age plowed into her car, killing her instantly.
"Losing Lynn was the defining moment of my life. I have never had another lover and frankly, never really wanted one. I know others would laugh at me for this, tell me I am wasting my life. But she and I were joined in a way I cannot describe to you, even if I wanted to. I joined UNSOC because of her. I have never regretted it, not even when I lost the use of my legs.
"All I have left of her is this little bottle of seawater from that long ago summer and a lock of her hair." Roque removed the plastic bag with the lock and set it on the table. He straightened up and gripped the worktable firmly.
"I would be totally useless on Earth, Commander Daniels. I have not exercised very much over the years. Even if I survived the journey down, my heart would give out shortly thereafter. Even if I didn’t have a heart attack, I would be confined to a flotation bed for weeks as I recovered strength. The work I have done and would have continued to do is all up here. Down there, I would be just another cripple—old, unemployable and half-dead. No, the price of survival is too high. This way it’s a fitting end for me. I know Lynn would approve."
Lisa frowned, started to retort, but he overrode her objections.
"You can sedate me if you want but I will curse you forever. But if you let me stay, I will tell those fat-bottoms in UNSOC that I refused your orders. I will protect you Lisa, for I still have friends there. But I will ask a favor of you, in return,” he returned the tube of water to its foam recess in the white box.
"What is this favor, Roque?"
"Take this," he said, passing her the white box. "Go to the Dare County Cemetery in North Carolina. The directions are in the box. Tuck that tube in her grave and tell her I never forgot her. Would you do that for me?" Roque gripped her hand hard. "What little I have of Lynn," he patted the lock of hair, "and I, will die together in space."
This time Lisa let her eyes fill with tears, forming floating drops as she shook her head free of them. "Of course, Roque. For you, I will do that."
They held each other for a moment but Lisa’s sense of duty rose insistently. "I must go."
Roque released her and formally saluted her. "And I must stay. Tell me how I can be of service as I wait for the end."
"I will. And...thank you Roque,” she returned the salute, wiped her eyes and kicked out of his office for the last time, the small box of Roque’s memories gripped in her left hand.
* * *
UNSOC Space Station Roger Chaffee, June 17 2082, 1230 EDT
Lisa went from compartment to compartment, chivvying crewmen, solving problems and encouraging the civilians to move faster. Throughout the station, crew and civilians began showing the first signs of radiation sickness. Reports of the spreading illness greeted Lisa upon her return to the Bridge.
"Commander, I recommend we start boarding the shuttles now. Otherwise we’ll have too few able spacers to move the sick ones into the sleds," the chief medic said, looking a little green himself.
"Understood. Board the sickest first with enough able-bodied to assist them in the sled."
Clicking to the all-hands channel she announced, "Attention, crew. Begin moving to the sleds. Department heads will direct you to your sled. Man each sled evenly. Move."
"That should keep their minds off the barfs for a while. Doc, make sure you hand out those barf pills to everyone and make sure they take them. Commander’s orders."
"Will do. Got a case of whoops bags with me too. See you on the sled.” his image faded from her monitor.
Celine popped up on the screen. "Commander, time to drop the bomb on UNSOC."
"Thanks. Time to stop fooling around. Time to talk with the Esteemed Panjandrum himself, Director-General Herr Doctor Subraman Venderchanergee."
Celine initiated the call and was soon speaking to Fred Palowicz, Head Controller of the A, or daytime, shift. He got a quick status report from her.
"Gus is blasting Subby right now, Lisa," Fred said. Gus Blukofski was the head of the C shift. The UNSOC control room had all three shifts in to deal with the emergency, much to Subraman’s displeasure.
"You ask about why we have so many shifts in here and I’d love to tell you but I can see Commander Daniels is on the line right now. I think she’d like to tell you herself,” he gestured to Fred, who, with a flourish, spun the volume up on the speakers.
"Chaffee, this is CAPCOM A. We have the Director-General Subraman Venderchanergee with us. Please repeat your request."
"Director. The Chaffee crew has sustained serious radiation poisoning from the explosion on the moon. Without treatment, up to five percent of our crew will die within the next two weeks. In addition, we have been monitoring the debris from the event and believe it will intersect our orbit within the next two to four hours. Over the last twenty years, as you know, we have constructed solar shelters from lunar materials. What you don’t know is they have been designed to function as emergency reentry vehicles. Lifeboats, if needed.
"In my professional opinion the Chaffee must be abandoned and all crew must return to Earth. To stay aboard will be to risk death from the impact of space debris, the effects of radiation sickness, or both. I request UNSOC assistance for this reentry." On-screen her face was composed and determined.
Subraman's thoughts raced. Abandon the Chaffee? What about his deals, his special service fees? Look at the radar; it’s clear as a bell! Cowardice! Evacuating all the crew, whether the makeshift ’reentry vehicles’ made it or not, meant the Chaffee would be out of action for months, as dozens of launches would be needed to ferry a new crew back up to man the station and get operations restarted. The budget would never stand for it.
"Request denied. Frankly, I am surprised at you Commander Daniels, trying to run away like this. Commander Holt would never do anything this drastic. In fact, wasn’t there some kind of meteor storm on his watch? Everyone wanted to evacuate the Chaffee then, too. Commander Holt went public, urging calm and declaring he was staying. H
e lived. So will you. I order you to remain on board and cancel this evacuation of yours."
"Sir, with all due respect, the matters are completely different. Meteor storms are one thing; this is a far denser debris cloud. It will spread to all orbits from beyond the moon right down to Low Earth Orbit. If we don't leave in the next four hours our chances of getting hit rise to one in a thousand. The next orbit, ninety minutes later, we will face one in five hundred chances. It gets far worse after that; seven in eight in thirty-six hours."
Subraman looked around at his three chief controllers. "Do we confirm those numbers?" Fred, Gus and Gayatri nodded yes. "From our own data or did it come from the Chaffee?"
All three stared at Subraman. Finally, Fred dropped his eyes and answered. "The Chaffee, sir."
"Well, there you are. Commander Daniels, until we can confirm your radar data and construct our own probability charts, you are ordered not to leave. That is how science works. Independent verification. I am not saying you fudged the numbers but we cannot have you abandoning your post from what could well be some error from your Astrogation section."
Lisa put out her hand to forestall a scathing retort from Celine.
"But our casualties from radiation sickness, sir. They need medical attention."
"Don’t you have trained medics? Is this beyond them? Do they need replacement?
Lisa controlled her anger with difficulty. "Two hundred people have been exposed to two Grays of radiation. Half will become incapacitated in another three hours. We have, total, two medics. For one hundred casualties. One person in twenty will die without prompt treatment. You’ve lost the Collins sir, are you determined to lose the Chaffee too?"
"When the sickest ones become known, we’ll send a rescue craft. For the last time Commander Daniels, you are ordered to stay put. Otherwise, the next shuttle will be bringing your replacement." With that, he stalked off to his office and closed the door carefully.