“Roger that.” Scott felt somewhat relieved: Now smoothing over international relations was Simone’s problem, not his. But as a retired three-star Air Force general who was currently NASA Administrator, she’d been doing that all her career.
“So what else do I need to know?”
“I’ve tasked everyone here in the center to do everything they can to update the projected impact point, from engaging the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for real-time continuous feed of atmospheric density to working with the Air Force Space Command—who’ve already volunteered access to their classified orbital databases, as well as their Space Fence sensors. Their onsite liaison has been extremely helpful in getting us access.”
“Good,” said Patricia. “I’ll speak to the Director of the National Reconnaissance Office and have them work with Johnson as well. They should be able to refocus their assets on helping us.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She hesitated. “There’s something else. I can’t be getting down into the weeds over here. I’ve got to work with the White House at a strategic level to coordinate NASA’s interactions with the media and our international partners, as well as running the agency. Scott, you were just up on the ISS, and you’ve done a great job during this crisis. I want you out here as my liaison with the National Security Council, be my conduit to understand what they’re planning and what they should be doing. Get to Washington, stat, as fast as you can and head on over to the NSC—I’ll have Headquarters pave the way.”
“Copy,” Scott said. “I’ve got a go-bag here at the office, so I’ll file a flight plan and take one of the T-38s VFR direct to Andrews. I should be there in a few hours.”
The Administrator switched off. Because Simone was a military officer during her own astronaut days, Scott assumed that now that she’d given the order there would be no question in her mind that it would be followed to the last detail. Luckily his small overnight “go-bag” was nearby, a habit he’d picked up while pulling alert during his F-22 days.
Next shift’s CAPCOM had just entered the MCC and was making a beeline to relieve him. George Abbey, Director of Johnson Space Center, Chief Astronaut Fred Tarantino, the head of the astronaut office, as well as four other astronauts, the head of the flight director’s office, and a half dozen staffers followed as well. Scott would brief them all and then be on his way to Washington.
Scott took off his headphones, pushed up from his seat, and moved out to do just that.
FLASHBACK: “NEVER GIVE UP…”
Newly promoted Major Scott Robinson was leading a flight of four F-22s over the ocean, escorting a Navy P-3 intelligence-gathering plane near the man-made islands that the Chinese had built in the South China Sea.
On the last few such intel flights, Chinese fighters had “accidentally” buzzed the unarmed Navy plane, flying close enough to raise the pucker factor even in the highly experienced commanders of the P-3s. Scott’s orders were to protect the four-engined “snooper” and avoid any problems.
Contradictory responsibilities, Scott thought. But as he flew high above the steel-gray water he grinned to himself. Free as a bird, he thought. Far away from the cares and worries below. As a black Air Force flier, he knew all the subtle—and some not-so-subtle—snubs and hostilities of his fellow officers.
But up here it was different. Up here it was you and your aircraft, and all that other crap was a world away. Back on the ground, when some punkass cracker slighted him or made him the butt of a practical joke, Scott took it in good humor—until he got a chance to get even.
They started calling him Basher because of his attitude. “Never give up, never give in,” was Scott’s credo. With a smile.
Ten miles out, Scott was finally able to visually ID the five Chinese MiGs his flight had first tracked over a hundred miles away on radar. With their onboard sensors, he and his wingmen had long since divided up the MiGs between themselves on who would shoot who, should the situation deteriorate; it was time for the merge.
The warning signal beeped in Scott’s earphones. His plane was being painted by Chinese air-to-air tracking radar.
Seconds later the Chinese leader buzzed Scott, flying canopy-to-canopy, inverted so close that Scott caught a glimpse of the pilot in his bulky flight suit as he whizzed by. Scott immediately slammed his fighter in a high-gee turn and within moments had the MiG in his sights.…
Accidentally—purely accidentally, he later swore—Scott touched his M61A2 20-millimeter cannon’s trigger button. A stream of tracers lanced out after the MiG, missing it by a fair margin but close enough for everyone in the air to see.
The Chinese fighters broke off and headed home.
There was hell to pay at flight ops when Scott landed, but the furor died down after the big brass realized that the next intel flight was left alone. Nor were the P-3 missions ever bothered again.
“Never give up, never give in,” Scott told himself. Up the ante until somebody folds.
The higher-ups were not amused. They never sent him out on an intel escort mission again. Scott saw a roadblock looming in his career path.
One way to get past a roadblock is to go around it.
The Air Force had no objections when, a few months later, Scott applied for NASA’s astronaut corps. The Air Force promoted him to lieutenant colonel and bid him a cheerful farewell.
Basher became a Space Cadet. But he didn’t change. He was always the best at everything he’d tackled, and he made sure everyone knew it.
Then he met and fell in love and married fellow astronaut Kimberly Hadid.
And he still didn’t change.
JAPANESE MODULE (JPM)
With her feet floating out behind her, Kimberly desperately tapped away at the laptop’s keyboard. She kept her eyes glued on the high-resolution monitor as she typed, her frustration mounting with every passing moment.
She had tried every path she could think of to break into Farid’s speech, frantically anxious to override his transmission so she could get out the word that she was still alive, that she had barricaded herself from the two killers, that she was trying everything in her power to stop them.
But every software attack she made—either through a direct, front-door attempt or by a covert, backdoor effort designed to be undetected—was immediately countered and stifled. She was stopped cold, as though they had been anticipating her every action. It was as if they were playing chess and they were reading her mind, keeping three steps ahead of her.
She tried to be more creative, tried altering their transmission to Earth by introducing modulated interference or random increases in power in order to send out distress signals. She even tried overriding the ISS antenna.
Nothing worked. Either Farid and Bakhet blocked her from accessing the subroutines she tried to modify, or they cut her off completely. She felt her frustration grow; nothing she tried seemed to work. She wondered how long the two murderers had trained for this one specific task: anticipating that someone might somehow survive their cold-blooded killing spree, and keeping any effort by that survivor to stop them at bay.
Their transmission blinked off and Kimberly saw that once again all the links to Earth were down.