‘One hundred and five per cent of rated thrust.’ Wexford again.
‘Mr Burke, you’re about to destroy this ship and kill the hostages on board.’
‘One hundred and seven per cent.’
**
Judd holds onto a thin orange service truss on the underside of the White Room. His biceps burn with the effort. Stepping off the edge of the White Room, dropping out of Tango’s view and catching hold of the truss had seemed like a good idea at the time but now he’s not so sure. He doesn’t know how much longer he can hold on.
The sound of the shuttle’s main engines transforms, hardens. They’re throttling up. It can only mean one of two things and neither is good. The shuttle’s going to launch or explode. Very soon.
**
‘We’re at 108 per cent of rated power, Commander.’
Henri nods to Nico. ‘Throttle up.’
Nico works the MacBook as Henri speaks into his headset’s microphone: ‘Mr Burke, this is it.’
**
Severson stares out the window at the shuttle. Will the Frenchman do it? Did he really go to all this trouble to be a suicide bomber?
Wexford turns to him. ‘What do we do?’
Severson doesn’t know. He hoped Mitson’s fix would do the trick. Quite clearly he had underestimated the Frenchman.
‘One hundred and nine per cent of rated power.’ Wexford’s voice trembles.
If Severson lets
Atlantis
explode there’s no way to walk it back, career-wise. He’ll always be the guy who destroyed a shuttle and killed two hostages in the process, no matter what the official findings. He can kiss his bright future goodbye. He turns to Wexford and nods.
**
The solid rocket boosters ignite and now this really is a going concern.
‘Christalmighty!’ The blast of hot air hits Judd like a sledgehammer. He just manages to hold on to the service truss as the air pressure swings him up and pins him against the underside of the White Room, face first.
He knows there’s no way to switch the solid rockets off, or throttle them back or turn them down. They will both burn their 450 000 kilograms of ammonium perchlorate fuel until it is all gone.
Atlantis
lifts off.
**
13
Rhonda closes her eyes and realises there’s no way for her to enjoy this moment. As much as she loves the launch phase, there’s nothing to feel good about tonight. She can only think this means the end of the shuttle program, or worse, the end of NASA.
**
Judd knows
Atlantis
will only take a couple of seconds to clear the tower. He just has to survive that long. He’s still pinned to the underside of the White Room, gripping the service truss with all his might.
The structure convulses, buffeted by the solid rockets’ exhaust as they heave
Atlantis
off the pad. It’s deafening. Judd once heard that if you looked at the source of a loud noise it would protect your hearing. Judd’s certain if he looked at the source of
this
loud noise he’d lose his sight. The exhaust is brighter than the sun.
The shuttle lumbers into the sky and a wave of superheated air sweeps over him, makes the noise seem like a frivolous concern. The White Room affords him some protection, but the air bakes the skin on his face and hands. Then it’s gone, just like that, along with the air pressure that pins him against the underside of the White Room.
He swings back down. His skin feels like he fell asleep on the beach in the middle of summer but he’s alive, for now at least. He looks down at the flame trench below, tries to divine a way out of this.
**
Severson watches
Atlantis
clear the tower and one part of him wishes he’d let it explode. At least then it’d be over. But now, well, this is just the beginning, isn’t it? This will just go on and on as they search for the shuttle and try to retrieve the hostages and apprehend the hijackers. It’ll be one long reminder that he was the guy who let it fly.
Severson exhales. Maybe
Atlantis
will break up all on its own because the Frenchman doesn’t know what he’s doing. He turns to Wexford. ‘How’s it looking?’
The technician studies the monitor before him. ‘All systems nominal. Perfect so far.’
Of course it is.
Now what does he do? He’s worked too long and hard to let his career end like this. He thumbs his comms box, speaks into his headset: ‘Okay, we track it. I want to know where it is every second. Alert everyone.’
**
Judd’s not sure how much longer he can hold on to this service truss. He needs to get himself into the White Room. There are just two impediments. No, three. First, he can’t think of a way to do it. Second, even if he did his arms don’t seem to have much strength left and third, he can hear footsteps above him. Are Tango in Berlin and his buddy still up there?
A high-pitched whine and a low chunter echo across Launch Pad 39B. Judd looks up and sees a blue Jet Ranger helicopter thump through the cloud of steam and exhaust and hover to a position above the Service Structure. A rope ladder dangles from its open doorway just beyond the edge of the White Room. Yes, Tango and his buddies
are
still up there because they’re about to be picked up.
The rope ladder sways towards Judd. It’s close, but is it close enough? He kicks his legs out, then pulls them back, then kicks them out again, swings back and forth, builds momentum, then launches himself at the ladder.
It lurches out of reach. Someone climbed on above. Judd falls past it, pivots, lunges at it.
The ladder jerks and Cobbin is almost bucked off, halfway to the Jet Ranger above. He holds on tight, doesn’t fall.
Dirk looks down. ‘What the —?’ The German is astonished. The astronaut dangles from the very last rung of the rope ladder, hanging on with one hand.
Dirk aims his pistol at the astronaut as a cloud of steam sweeps in and he can’t get a clear shot. Then he realises he doesn’t need one. He turns and fires at the left side of the ladder in front of him. The rope shatters. He re-aims and fires at the right side. The rope explodes.
He looks down. Through the cloud he can just make out the astronaut as he falls, still holding the severed piece of ladder in one hand.
Back first, Judd plummets through the steam and exhaust towards the launch platform 40 metres below. He doesn’t have time to be scared because he’s trying to figure what his chances of surviving beyond the next ten seconds will be. First, he needs to pass through one of two large rectangular holes in the launch platform that funnel the shuttle’s exhaust into the cement flame trench. Otherwise he’ll land on the launch platform itself and that’ll be curtains. Second, if he can make it through one of the holes there needs to be a few metres of water in the flame trench, remnants from the sound suppression system that haven’t already evaporated from the heat of the shuttle’s exhaust, otherwise he’ll land on cement, which will also mean curtains. He estimates he has a 30 per cent chance of surviving.
**
The Jet Ranger punches through the wall of steam and thunders away from Launch Complex 39B. Big Bird is at the controls. Behind him in the passenger compartment Dirk and Cobbin quickly assemble something. They all wear headset microphones.
Dirk speaks into his: ‘What’s our ETA?’
Big Bird scans the ground below. ‘Five seconds.’
Dirk heaves a FGM-148 rocket launcher to his shoulder and points it out the open door.
He pulls the trigger and the Javelin missile explodes out of the launch tube and slams into a towering vertical antenna that gracefully collapses in a shower of sparks.
‘Reload.’ Cobbin jams another missile in place and Dirk fires. This Javelin slams into a large antenna dish. It keels over and crushes a second dish beside it.
‘One more.’ Cobbin reloads the launcher and Dirk fires again. Another antenna dish explodes in a gigantic ball of fire.
The German takes in what remains of the Merritt Island Spaceflight Tracking & Data Network station. Called MILA, it is one kilometre from where
Atlantis
just launched and relays all spacecraft communications to Mission Control in Houston. Or it used to. It’s now a burning wreck and won’t be relaying anything to anyone for a very long time.
Dirk speaks into his headset: ‘MILA is clear. Let’s go for extraction.’
‘Roger that.’ Big Bird tips the Jet Ranger into a steep bank and it thunders away.
**
Severson stares out Launch Control’s main window as the giant fireball dissipates into the night sky. ‘What just happened?’
Wexford’s eyes don’t leave the monitor in front of him, his voice reed-thin: ‘MILA is down.’
‘When’s it going to be back up?’
‘No, no, I don’t mean offline. I mean down. Destroyed.’
‘Excuse me?’
‘Everything’s gone. Tracking, the shuttle’s vitals. All of it.’
Severson needs a moment to process the information. He finds his seat, sits hard. With MILA gone the tracking system’s orbiting satellites have no way to relay their information to the ground. ‘So we have no way to track
Atlantis
?’
‘Not that I can see.’
Severson bows his head and studies the cheap grey carpet beneath his shoes. He’s astonished at how well the Frenchman thought this through. The preparation. The organisation. The execution. Intricate. Sophisticated. Flawless.
It’s great news. No one could hold him responsible. The whole thing’s too big, too elaborate, too well planned. He did the best he could under appalling circumstances. Hell, he should be commended.
He raises his head and tries to conceal his grin.
**
Atlantis
surges towards the heavens. It’s already 110 kilometres high and travelling at 13000 kilometres an hour.
Henri is jammed into his chair. He weighs triple his usual mass as the ship pulls 3Gs. He focuses on the LCD screen before him. ‘Main engines throttling down.’ It’s a precautionary measure, to pull the engines back to 65 per cent of thrust to avoid unduly stressing the shuttle’s airframe or its occupants.
Even with the foot off the accelerator
Atlantis
still builds speed through the thinning air, its trajectory now almost horizontal as it trades altitude for velocity.
Henri surveys the screens before him. The five on-board computers have run their assigned programs and the engines have performed as designed.
‘We are go for main engine cut-off.’ The flight computers order the shuttle’s fuel valves to close and the main engines shut down. Instantly the occupants are thrown forward, strain against their harnesses as the 3Gs of pressure is released.
‘We are go for external tank separation.’ Henri feels a light shudder as the explosive bolts that hold the now empty external tank to the shuttle fire. The tank is released and drops away, begins its long fall to the Atlantic below.
They have reached a height of just over 300 kilometres, travelling at 30000 kilometres an hour. Henri feels himself become weightless and it is wonderful. Finally, after years of planning, they are in orbit.
The Frenchman smiles his Mona Lisa smile but that will be his only celebration. There is much to do.
**
The Jet Ranger settles on the long grass.
Dirk steps out, GPS unit in his hand, torch in the other. He quickly moves into the darkness.
Tam raises his head to a sound, forces his eyes open. ‘Who’s that?’ His words are laboured. He tries his best to focus on the figure that crouches before him.
‘It’s Dirk. What happened?’
Tam’s breathing is shallow. ‘Bitten. Cottonmouth.’
‘Christ.’
‘Least it wasn’t... an American alligator.’ Tam grins to himself.
‘Where’s Gerald?’
‘Dead. In a tree.’ Tam studies the German. ‘Glad you’re here. I need a doc.’
‘I know. I’ll take care of it.’
Relieved, Tam nods and lets his eyes close. ‘Okay. Good.’
‘You did well.’
‘Thanks, man.’
Dirk draws his silenced pistol, points it at Tam’s temple and pulls the trigger. Tam’s head snaps back and he sags to the ground.
The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.
Tam knew it coming in. They all did. There was no time in the schedule for a visit to a doctor and no point anyway. When you got bit by a cottonmouth you stayed bit.
Dirk stands, rests a foot on Tam’s chest and rolls his body into the cement shaft. He waits for it to hit the bottom then turns for the chopper, his expression grim. He’d always liked Tam. He hasn’t felt this bad since he cut down the oak.
**
It all goes away. The stress that has preoccupied Rhonda over the last two years, the by-product of preparing to fly a two-week mission to the International Space Station. It vanishes, like smoke on the wind.
It is replaced by something else, something terrible, an altogether different kind of stress. Not knowing. Why is she here? Why was her life spared when others weren’t? Why did her best friend betray her? What do these hijackers want? And what has happened to Judd?