by Peter Ward
The pilot closed the hatch and climbed into her seat at the front of the ship.
“Everyone OK?” she said, pressing a couple of buttons to her side and looking back at the group.
Tim, Ruth, Mr. Knight, and the Defence Minister all nodded.
Geoff raised his hand.
“What is it?” she said.
“Are we really going into space?” he asked.
“Ignore him,” Tim said, pulling Geoff’s arm down again. “He’s new to all this.”
Ruth sat down alongside Geoff and looked at him.
“You worried?” she whispered.
“I don’t know,” Geoff replied. “It’s just—I’ve never been into space before, you know? I’m kind of a little nervous.”
“Well don’t be,” she said, fastening her seatbelt. “Everything will be fine. Going into space is as easy as catching a bus these days.”
That was all very well, unless Ruth was talking about catching a bus that someone had actually thrown at him. He lay back in his seat, took a deep breath, and tried to relax. Unfortunately, his current position gave him a direct view through the cockpit window and up the length of the launch chamber, which wasn’t exactly helping him take his mind off things. And whilst it looked as though the belfry had thankfully been removed to make way for the shuttle’s launch path, the roof of the spire still appeared to be blocking the top of the chamber, which was slightly disconcerting to say the least. He didn’t like this at all—in fact, the only way this situation could possibly get any worse would be if he were to discover zucchini were on the in-flight menu.
Geoff dug his fingernails into the armrests.
“Erm … what’s the deal with that roof?” he said.
“Oh, don’t worry about that,” the Defence Minister said.
“Don’t worry about it?” Geoff said. “What, is it made of tissue paper?”
“No, no,” the Defence Minister replied. “Just relax. Everything’s under control.”
“I need everyone to take a few moments to watch this safety video,” the pilot said, pressing a small button in front of her.
Geoff looked up as a wafer-thin television screen folded down from the ceiling and flickered to life. A well-dressed gentleman appeared on the screen and stood next to a computer-generated image of the shuttle. In the background, some soft, cheesy lounge music began to play.
“Hello, and welcome aboard this Boeing 74447 light transport shuttle,” the man said, gesturing towards the image next to him as if the viewer was somehow too stupid to understand which shuttle he was talking about. “Please pay attention to the following procedures, which are designed with your safety and comfort in mind.”
Geoff normally ignored these sorts of videos when he was on a plane, but right now, it had his complete attention.
“As we are about to take off,” the man continued, “please ensure that your seatbelt is securely fastened. To fasten your seatbelt, push the two metal ends together until they click, and tighten the belt around your hips. To unfasten the seatbelt, simply lift the buckle and pull the ends apart.”
“I don’t think they’re going into enough detail about the seatbelts,” Geoff said, adopting a sarcastic tone to try and disguise his nervousness. “Can we rewind it just to make sure I understand?”
Everyone ignored him.
“Should additional oxygen be required, a mask will drop down in front of you. Pull the mask towards your face—this activates the oxygen supply.”
On the screen, a woman demonstrated how to wear the mask, looking remarkably calm for someone who was supposed to be suffocating in a depressurised cabin.
“In the event of an emergency landing, you must use the ‘brace’ position to help prevent injury. Place both feet on the floor, with one hand over the other on the back of your head. Lean forward, tucking your elbows outside your knees. If possible, rest your head on the seat in front of you.”
The woman demonstrated the “brace” position on the screen. Once again, her face was as calm and unemotional. It was as if she was just practicing some yoga rather than crashing to her death. Presumably all the good actors in the world weren’t really interested in starring in a low-budget flight safety video.
“Should the shuttle suffer a power failure in outer space, spacesuits are located under your seat. To put the spacesuit on quickly, step into the legs first, then pull the suit up to your waist. Next, place your arms in both sleeves and fasten the airtight zip. Your captain will pass round helmets and oxygen tanks when all passengers are ready to disembark the craft.”
Geoff felt under his seat. There was indeed a spacesuit packed away underneath it, although he wasn’t sure if this made him feel better or worse.
“Finally, please remember that your safety is our number one priority, and your pilot is there if you do not understand any of these procedures. Thank you for listening.”
The screen went blank and folded back into the ceiling.
“Well, that certainly made me feel better,” Geoff said. “I had no idea there were so many things that could go wrong, but now I know about power failures, emergency landings, oxygen shortages—thanks a lot.”
“I think we’re just about ready,” the pilot said, pulling a small portable radio out from the dashboard. “I just need clearance from Space Traffic Control, and we can be on our way.”
“Make it quick,” the Defence Minister said. “We’ve got no time to lose.”
The captain nodded.
“Space Traffic Control, Space Traffic Control, this is Black Rod 1,” she said, holding the radio to her mouth. “We are prepped and ready for launch, requesting clearance for departure. Do you read?”
Geoff never understood the point of asking someone if they read in these radio communications. What was “Space Traffic Control” going to say back? “Thanks for asking Black Rod 1. We’re quite partial to a bit of T S Elliot, as it happens”?
“Black Rod 1, this is Space Traffic Control,” came a voice over the loudspeaker. “We read you. You are clear for launch. Repeat—you are clear for launch.”
“Roger Space Traffic Control,” the pilot said. “Please open the launch bay doors. I repeat—please open the launch bay doors.”
This was another quirk of radio communication that really annoyed Geoff—why did everyone always insist on repeating everything? You didn’t walk into a shop and say, “Can I have a packet of salt and vinegar chips? I repeat—can I have a packet of salt and vinegar chips?” Why did you have to ask for everything twice over a radio?
His annoyance was soon replaced by a feeling of relief as he noticed the roof splitting open down the middle and opening up like a huge mechanical crocodile’s mouth, revealing a clear starry night above. Unfortunately, this was soon replaced again by a feeling of panic when he realized this probably meant they were going to take off soon.
“Everything checks out OK,” the pilot said, replacing the radio back in its holder on the dashboard and gripping the flight stick with both hands. “Ready when you are.”
“Excellent,” the Defence Minister said, placing a hand on the pilot’s shoulder. “Shall we have a countdown?”
“Good idea,” Geoff said, digging his fingernails deeper into the arm rests. “How about we start from a million?”
“Five,” the pilot said, checking an instrument on the dashboard.
“Five?” Geoff said. “Five’s far too small! Can’t we start higher?”
“Four.”
“Four? Where did four come from? You said ‘five’ a second ago! Can’t we stick with five?”
“Three.”
“Wait a minute—are we counting down already?”
“Ignition.”
“Ignition!?” Geoff yelled over the sudden roar of the engines as the ship began to vibrate violently around him. “That’s cheating! You missed out ‘two!’”
“One!”
“Hang on a second!” Geoff cried, des
perately trying to think of a final reason for delaying the launch, “I think I might have left my wallet downstairs!”
“Lift off!” the pilot shouted. “We have lift off!”
And with that, the shuttle began to shudder more violently, the engines roaring so loud it was like listening to a rock concert through a stethoscope. Geoff really wanted to close his eyes as the shuttle accelerated out of the launch chamber and into the night sky, but the force of the takeoff was so powerful that the g-force was pulling his eyelids back as far as they could go. Resigned to the fact that he had no choice but to keep his eyes open, Geoff strained his head to the left to avoid looking at the intimidating expanse of space ahead. Unfortunately, this new position was even worse, giving him a dizzying perspective through the side window of the city below, the streets of London spiraling farther and farther away from him.
Fortunately, he felt much better as the shuttle continued to climb; the street lights and buildings of the city below blurred into less recognizable splashes of yellow and orange. Indeed, the more Geoff watched, the more the view became pretty awe-inspiring—at this altitude, he could already see across the whole of the British Isles, and in the black of the night the country actually looked quite beautiful, as if the land was coated in a glittering spider’s web of electric light. The shuttle continued to climb higher and higher into the sky, and soon enough, he was able to see the whole of Europe, the sun just peeking over the curvature of the Earth on the horizon.
“I don’t suppose anyone has any sweets?” Geoff said as the shuttle broke free from the Earth’s atmosphere and began to level off. “My ears are popping.”
Twenty
The sight of the Earth from outer space was unlike anything Geoff had ever seen before, unless of course you counted all the photos he’d seen of the planet, all the television programs he’d watched, and all the computer games he had played where he’d commanded fleets of spaceships in various space battles around Earth’s orbit. In fact, if you wanted to be pedantic, you could argue that seeing the Earth from outer space should not have been something wholly unfamiliar to him.
Nevertheless, seeing it for real was quite different. By now, the shuttle’s engines had died down to a quiet hum, and from space everything looked remarkably peaceful. Entire continents looked as though they were made of a soft brown fabric, with mountain ranges giving off a rough texture on the surface of the Earth. Huge swirls of cloud circled over the land as if someone had taken a spoon and stirred them around like the cream in a cup of coffee. Oceans looked like syrup, wrapping round the planet like a thick blue blanket. It was the sort of view that would normally be described as “taking someone’s breath away,” but since in Geoff’s case this would have meant the cabin had depressurized, it was more reassuring to say that it didn’t.
“You can take your seatbelt off now if you want, Geoff,” Tim said. “The shuttle has levelled off.”
“Are you sure?” Geoff said, still gripping the armrests of his chair. “I’m not going to float around, am I?”
“You’re not going to float around.”
“I don’t need magnetic boots.”
“There’s no such thing as magnetic boots.”
“There isn’t?”
“No. That’s just something you made up. The shuttle generates its own gravitational field. It’s perfectly safe.”
Geoff hesitantly unfastened his seatbelt but remained seated. He was only too wary of standing up before he was ready—particularly after a bad night’s sleep, which usually ended in disaster.
The Defence Minister walked over to the cockpit and sat next to the pilot.
“How long before we rendezvous with the fleet?” he said.
“Not long,” the pilot said, looking down at some of the instruments in front of her. “The fleet is currently in geosynchronous orbit on the other side of the Earth. Shouldn’t take more than half an hour to reach them.”
Geoff stood up. His knees felt a little weak, his hands were shaking, and his ears were still recovering from the sound of the engines during takeoff, but otherwise he felt OK. He made his way over to the other side of the shuttle, peered out of one of the windows facing away from the Earth, and gasped. His gaze was filled with a dazzling array of stars sprawled across the inky blackness of space in a brilliant patchwork of light. Sure, he’d looked up at the night sky before, but through London’s light pollution he could only ever make out a handful of stars, as if God was having trouble paying his electricity bill and kept switching stars off to save money. From here, however, outer space was really quite beautiful.
Geoff moved over to another window. Just as he had suspected—more stars. Millions of them, in fact. Then suddenly, in the corner of his eye, he could make out a few flashes of light. He looked closer. In the distance, a few spaceships were darting around, firing quick bursts of laser beams at each other.
“Look at this!” Geoff said, watching as one of the ships exploded. “There’s some kind of battle going on over there!”
“That’s not a real battle,” Ruth said, joining Geoff at the window. “That’s just a film set.”
“A film set?”
“You can see the camera ships if you look carefully,” she said, pointing out one of the stationary craft. “It’s nothing to get excited about.”
“So they film in space for real these days?” Geoff said. “It’s not computer generated or anything?”
“Of course it isn’t,” Ruth replied, losing interest in the view and returning to her seat. “What’s the point of doing it on a computer if you can do it for real?”
“I don’t know. It just seems like a lot of effort.”
“Not these days. Filming in space is just as easy as filming a car chase. And besides, audiences can easily tell the difference. Try watching Star Trek 2 alongside Star Trek 200 and you’ll see what I mean.”
Although the journey was supposed to last half an hour, it wasn’t long before they could see the battle fleet in the distance, just on the other side of the moon. Normally at this point in a flight, Geoff would be rummaging around in his pocket to see if he had enough loose change to play a rudimentary game of Connect 4, but in this case the view was so spectacular, his nerves from earlier had completely vanished, and he found himself completely mesmerized by what he saw. There must have been hundreds, if not thousands, of ships up ahead, in all different shapes and sizes, orbiting the Earth in a precise formation. The larger ships were incomprehensibly enormous, perhaps bigger than some of the world’s major cities, and even the smaller ones had an intimidating presence about them, looking at least as big as the world’s tallest skyscrapers laid on their sides. Each ship was beautifully ergonomic in design, with a sleek metallic shell wrapped over a curved black underbelly, and if this was the fleet that the Defence Minister was going to send back in time to defend the Earth, Geoff couldn’t help feeling that the Varsarians were in serious trouble.
“Welcome to the fleet,” the Defence Minister said, watching closely as the pilot maneuvered the shuttle past a medium-sized cruiser. “What do you think, Geoff?”
“I don’t know what to say,” Geoff said, looking through the cockpit window as a wave of fighter craft formed an escort around the shuttle. “I wasn’t expecting anything like this!”
The pilot steered the shuttle to face a large ship at the front of the fleet and pulled the radio out from the dashboard.
“Concordia, this is Black Rod 1,” she said, weaving the shuttle between two neighboring capital ships. “We are on approach and request clearance to dock. Do you read?”
“Concordia?” Geoff said, raising an eyebrow.
“It means ‘with heart,’” Tim replied, peering through the cockpit window as they passed by a convoy of frigates. “Or something.”
“Black Rod 1, this is Concordia,” came a reply over the loudspeaker. We do not have you scheduled for arrival today. Repeat, we do not have you scheduled for arrival. Cleara
nce to dock is denied. Repeat …”
“Give me that,” the Defence Minister said, snatching the radio from the pilot.
“Concordia, this is the Defence Minister,” he said, interrupting the ship’s transmission. “We have an emergency situation. Please execute priority override four-seven-niner-bravo. Do you read? Please execute priority override four-seven-niner-bravo.”
The radio went silent for a few moments.
“Black Rod 1, we read you loud and clear. Priority override four-seven-niner-bravo has been executed. We have you on approach vector three-zero-seven. Deploying tractor beam to bring you in. Hold tight.”
“No way!” Geoff said. “You have tractor beams?”
“Thank you, Concordia,” the Defence Minister said.
The shuttle shook momentarily as a pale red light engulfed the craft. To either side of them, the fighter escorts broke away from their positions and went off to do something else.
“I guess this is out of my hands now,” the pilot said, letting go of the flight stick.
“Priority override four-seven-niner-bravo?” Tim said.
“It’s a military code reserved for high ranking officers,” the Defence Minister said, handing the radio back to the pilot. “It basically means ‘do as I say.’”
“Does it work on other things?” Geoff said.
“Other things?” the Defence Minister said. “Like what?”
“Well, say you wanted to go to the cinema, but they wouldn’t let you in because the screen was full …”
“I think I know where this is going, and the answer is no. It only works in military communications.”
“A military cinema, maybe?”
The tractor beam began to pull the shuttle towards the Concordia, but the ship was so big that it didn’t seem to be getting any closer in the distance.
“How many ships are there in this fleet, anyway?” Geoff said, admiring the sleek aesthetics of a nearby cruiser as they overtook it. If you tilted your head and squinted, it actually looked a little bit like a big, metallic armadillo.