by Peter Damon
Allan nodded and checked his board. Samuel, he saw, had conducted maintenance on all the major systems. Forty students were due to be returned to the UK and Mickey had arrived back on board during Allan’s ‘night time’ without mishap.
As students and professors returned to earth, the ARC became quieter and quieter, the common rooms looking cavernous now that they were largely empty. Even the travellers were quiet, keeping to themselves now that the recovery of space-garbage had been suspended. There was little point in assisting an earth that didn’t want to reciprocate, and travel down to the planet had become hazardous, now the authorities knew that the ship was not going to allow the United Nations to board it.
Allan, along with the rest of the crew, hoped that whoever drove the students down to earth could take the time to do some shopping, but the reality was that the number-plate recognition system used in the UK was just too good. Their vehicles had scarcely five minutes on British roads before the police moved in.
Michael entered, glancing towards the far wall where one of the monitors showed the four Chinese astronauts in their small and cramped capsule, checking their systems and softly talking to their control as they tried thinking up alternatives to their predicament. The other monitor showed the continued work on the asteroid.
“Any change?” he asked.
Allan shook his head. “We know the radio frequencies they’re using. You can talk to them, or their control, or both, your choice,” he explained.
Michael sat and cleared his throat, his eyes once again drawn to the astronauts who, despite their situation, appeared to be calmly working.
“They appear very calm,” Michael noted.
“Chinese inscrutability, training, or they know something we don’t,” Allan suggested.
“Bets, gentlemen?” Oliver asked.
“Not I,” Michael shook his head. “Patch me into their control,” he decided.
Allan nodded and, with a few finger-strokes, set up and opened the communication’s channel.
“Hello, Chinese space program, ground control,” Michael spoke. “This is Michael Bennett on the ARC.”
There was a silent pause of a few seconds and Allan imagined the men in the control room in China looking towards one another, assessing the protocol of the moment and who should respond.
“Mr Bennett. This is Eric Li, Program Director,” came the response in English.
“Hello Mr Li. We have been monitoring your launch and mission. We are concerned at the apparent failure of the docking mechanism and politely offer you our assistance, should you wish it,” Michael told him.
There was another short silence while on the screen, the four astronauts heard the exchange and waited pensively to hear the answer.
“What do you suggest, Mr Bennett?” Eric Li asked.
“My people suggest we bring both partially locked capsules into the ARC. We can provide an atmosphere before risking a separation of the two,” he explained.
“You can transport the two vehicles without placing any torque on the docking mechanism?” Mr Li asked.
“Yes. It will remain weightless in our docking bay while we provide an atmosphere. We will provide a full video feed to you of everything we do, and involve your engineers at every step,” Michael told him.
“You may proceed,” Li told him after another long silence.
Michael nodded and watched Allan close the radio link.
“Do you still think it intentional?” Allan asked.
“I don’t know,” Michael admitted, shrugging his shoulders and giving him a fleeting smile before he turned to leave the room. Allan frowned as he tried working out how Michael had changed. It was a subtle thing, but Allan was somehow reminded of Samuel when watching Michael access a situation. There was that moment of reflection in him that hadn’t been there before.
+++++++++++++
Viktor lit a cigarette and ignored the withering look he received from the other guard in the small, bare room. There was a single small table and two chairs, all bolted firmly to the bare cement floor, a drain in one corner of the floor for ease of cleaning, but otherwise the room was bare, cement rendered walls stained by the spilling of unknown liquids, but guessed at, and worried at.
The other occupant in the room, Paddy Miller, looked a little anxious, his hands working together incessantly while his nervous eyes glanced from the guard, to him, to the unknown stains on the walls and floor, unsure which to worry about more.
“I told you people all I know,” he told Viktor.
“Not my people,” Viktor told him offhandedly. To his mind, Paddy Miller had been badly handled right from the start. This was recognised, now; and the commander to whom Paddy had gone had lost his position, his property and his pension. He was lucky to still be alive in Viktor’s opinion. Imagine; to have had an SUV right there, right in front of you, and have then allowed it to escape!
“So read the transcript,” Paddy shrugged.
Viktor sucked on his cigarette and remained outwardly calm, even as he began imagining this gypsy properly interrogated, every last little detail of his life and knowledge of the ARC drawn out of him by the careful application of pain.
He stubbed his cigarette out, concentrating on the task to allow his arousal to soften a little, enough to not be noticed by the guard when he stood and stepped back. Only then did he nod. It was time they began.
+++++++++++++
Jerry sat behind the wheel of their SUV as it curved around the earth to come up on the struggling Chinese module, locked against the unmanned Space-lab. The space-lab was showing its age against the brighter, polished metal of the manned capsule. The lab’s unfurled fuel-cells were pitted from the strike of small, dust-like particles travelling at extremely high velocities while the curved outer skin of the lab itself was scoured as if by various grades of sandpaper.
“How we doing this?” Ted asked from beside him, fingers sliding across his monitors as he continued to look for an even better image of what they had come to recover.
“Not much different to what we’ve been collecting,” Jerry considered. “We’ll straddle the two with our skids and strap both units down, then head for home,” he suggested, reaching for his faceplate.
“Ok,” the ever imperturbable Ted answered, doing likewise as their vehicle stopped, 30 metres from the Chinese.
Ready, the two one-time gypsies voided the air in their cab and presented the SUV’s skids to the Chinese vehicles to begin the move slowly forward, cameras on the base and sides of the SUV allowing the occupants to judge position and distance, adjusting their angle of approach when necessary.
The two vehicles touched, and for a moment everyone held their breath should the impact cause anything to break. Ted watched the Chinese through his monitor and nodded to himself as he saw them continue as they had before, un-alarmed by their contact on their hull.
The SUV continued to move slowly forward, until it pressed against the Chinese vehicles. Ted then opened his door to draw himself out, and headed to the flat back of their vehicle to unroll the first of the four waiting straps.
With the grace of someone who’d been doing it two, three times a day for the last two months, Ted flung himself from the SUV, and allowed the limits of the strap he held onto to stop him. Then a shot of compressed nitrogen off to one side propelled him around the curve of the Chinese space-lab and back to the other side of the SUV.
He fastened the strap and did the same with the others, checking them before he propelled himself back into his seat and closed the door.
“Gently. They may feel inertia from our movement,” Ted reminded his working partner.
Jerry nodded as he prepared the parameters for their return to the ARC. The limitations of the capsules they were carrying would require delicate changes in velocity. All-in-all, while it had taken them just minutes to get to the Chinese, it would take them close to three hours to return.
“Here we go,” he told his partner, and pressed the app.
+++++++++++++
Joanna waited for her evening meeting with the president before she brought up the subject of Professor Don Graves. “I had to threaten them with going round there myself, and taking along a few choice representatives from the various funding groups, before they admitted that he’s been sequestered onto some special project that they know nothing of,” she explained to the president. “They do have a formal request for leave though, signed from this office,” she added.
“By this office? Whom in this office?” the president asked.
“You, Ma’am,” Joanne pointed out, the president’s reaction only serving to confuse her still further. Surely the president had more control of her facial expression?
“No,” the president told her, once more in control of herself. “I did not authorise his leave of absence, and nor do I know of any special project. The university is quite capable of debriefing him from his time on the ARC.
“I would, however, like to know who dares to counterfeit my seal and signature,” she asked.
The president looked at her over the rim of her glasses, a long stare that would have disturbed many by its intensity and length. “So, do we know who has him?” she asked
“No Madam President, we don’t,” Joanna confessed.
+++++++++++++
Pierre Moulier stared out of the window, wishing the building that faced his was not so tall as to block the view of the lake. He had always wanted an office with a view of the lake. But now he was coming to terms with the truth about the United Nations Space Authority.
He had just spent the greater part of the day talking to the committee, obtaining guidance from each of them on how best to proceed, and it was clear from all of them that their own obligations to the treaty as space-going members was somewhat low on their agendas, while seeking to board the ARC and integrate its facilities into their own space programs was at the top.
The USA had told him not to worry; their report would be in the post at some stage. The important thing at the moment was to rein in the ARC and ensure that they complied with the treaty.
The Russian delegate had laughed and shaken his head. Pierre shouldn’t waste his time asking Russia to comply, not while the ARC was so publicly breaching the treaty by going out and retrieving an asteroid.
The EU had suggested he might not be the right man for the job if he was wasting his time asking delegates for their plans, when the plan that was really needed was already mining asteroids.
Had he been so naive as to take the treaty at face value, to honestly have believed all nations would finally work together in achieving true space development?
He shook his head and turned back to his desk. His secretary had placed a copy of their research on top of his other papers, and although it had been a good two minutes since placing it there, she remained in front of his desk, silently waiting for his instructions.
“That’s fine, thank you,” he told her, allowing her to step back and out of the office.
He opened the green folder and began reading the details. The ARC was not British at all but a private enterprise that leased the facility to the British.
Pierre should inform someone, he knew. How would they react, he wondered, when they discovered that the ARC was under no obligations to the United Nations, whereas, each of them was.
He started to laugh, uncontrollably so, tears rolling down his cheeks while his secretary peered in on him nervously.
+++++++++++++
Doctor Gail Barber checked her watch while, beside the large door leading into the loading-bay, a monitor showed one of the ARC’s SUV’s lining up before negotiating the entrance with its Chinese load anchored by ties to the vehicle’s skids.
She once again reviewed what she might find, ticking off the medicines she had brought with her, six medical students standing behind her with four gurneys, in the event they’d be needed.
Samuel appeared, nodding toward many of those waiting for the door to open, speaking calmly to a few, his presence alone calming some of the more jittery individuals.
“Ok, Gail?” he asked, coming abreast of the doctor.
Gail nodded and checked her watch yet again.
“There but for the grace of God?” Samuel asked of her.
“Do we all feel the same affinity?” she asked.
Samuel shrugged. “Do you have family down on earth?” he asked, continuing as she nodded. “It must be much harder for them, waiting for you back on earth,” he said in reflection.
“Yes,” Gail admitted, trying to recall when last she’d spoken to them. “I think I might just call them, after this little episode,” she smiled thinly.
Samuel nodded, his eyes on the monitor as the large outer doors began to close. He had often marvelled at how quickly they swung open or closed, and yet on this occasion, felt the frustration of having to wait for them.
They felt them close through their feet, and then heard the rush of air as it filled the large space.
“Ready everyone?” Samuel called.
There was a mass cheer, and the door opened and they rushed into the cold room, ice crystals suspended in the air as they bent their knees to jump from the threshold into the weightlessness of the loading bay, the precision of their jump taking them to various points around the joined vehicles.
Jerry and Ted had already climbed from their SUV and were tapping on the Chinese module, waving through the small windows and giving the thumbs up until the hatch at the side broke its seal, and then swung open.
A helmeted astronaut drew his head out to look about him, then swung his body out to allow the next figure to join him. Shortly, all four were out of their capsule and were following hand gestures to launch themselves towards the open doorway where most of the ARC team waited.
They made their way forward to the surgery where Gail ignored their claims that they were all fit, to have them lie on the cots and monitor their vital signs while she ran tests on their blood and urine.
Michael entered, his appearance drawing their attention. “Must we continue with this?” the commander asked, lifting his arm to show the leads trailing from his chest.
“The doctor is in command of all new entrants to the ARC,” Michael nodded. “If any of you fall ill while here, we have some chance of knowing if it originated on the ARC, or was brought with you,” he explained.
They nodded, the glances they cast each other indefinable.
Michael pulled up a chair and sat down and Gail told them all to drink the water beside their beds, and left to oversee the results of her tests.
“Our crew have bets on whether the fault was for this purpose, or indeed an unplanned fault,” Michael began.
October 26th.
The ARC’s auditorium was near empty, a large proportion of the students having returned to earth. Nonetheless, practically all the remaining crew and students were there to watch the fifty minute program, narrating the short life of the Rolle College and the ARC.
It was concise, and had to be; too much had been achieved in the short five months that the ARC had operated for all of it to be properly portrayed in just fifty minutes. However, the earth’s population probably knew some of it, such as the changes to mobile telephony afforded by the ARC’s network of satellites, the improvements made to watches and tablets, the sudden spur in electric-car technology. Most notably perhaps, they were all aware that the ARC had made it possible for a man to set foot on Mars. But they probably weren’t aware of the three new plastics, one new rubber compound and the more rapid water purification processes the ARC had pioneered. Some may have been aware of the help afforded many of the African nations by the ARC, but probably unaware of the large and regular donations that the ARC made to the charities working in those regions. Nor were they necessarily aware of the additional assistance the ARC provided to meteorological, volcanology and seismology groups around the world. The list of research it had assisted in was huge, from groups wanting to monitor the diminishing
population of Indian tigers, to those who wanted their experiments ‘pushed’ towards distant planets. Similarly, the volume of research papers published was astonishingly long, and in so many diverse fields.
Robert had finished the short film with a silent tribute to all those who had died as a result of the ARC’s development, beginning with Claire and Herbert Rolle, a moment that had Michael’s heart racing.
Heather gripped his arm until the moment passed. He then rose to his feet to applaud the maker of the film, smiling as the others joined him.
Robert stood to nod towards him, and smiling, began to applaud too. He, like the others who were clapping, turned to face him. A hand reached out to shake his, and then another and another, faces smiling and congratulating him, and Michael wondered why.
Michael realised it was he that they were applauding, shaking one hand after another until he must have shaken everyone’s hand. Controlling his breathing just didn’t seem to control the feelings welling up in him. He was glad Heather was there, and wasn’t all that sure who was supporting who as they made their way out of the room, the applause loud enough to follow him down the corridor.
+++++++++++++
Viktor walked into his offices and nodded towards his secretary as the man stood up, his expression worried.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, taking off his overcoat to place it, carefully, on the coat rack beside the door.
“Sir, the Budker Institute of Nuclear Physics has responded to your enquiry and advises that Professor Pavel Chaichenko is not at the institute.”
“Really, then where is he?” Viktor asked.
“They do not know. He did not report back for duty after returning from the ARC, sir.”
“Does he live alone?” Viktor asked.
“There is a housekeeper, provided by the institute.”
“Have her picked up and interrogated. What of family?”
“None,” Demyan told him, already reaching for the phone.
Viktor paused to consider. “Have the professor’s picture distributed to the police. No, on second thoughts, have our own people check transport links, see if he has travelled anywhere. Give me an update at the end of the day,” Viktor decided, his eyes focused beyond the facing wall.