She couldn’t wait any longer. It was now or never. Kimberly punched the fuel line control state to ON, hoping she’d be able to boost away from the three ballistic warheads’ calculated impact point.
She could barely feel the 100 micro-gee acceleration of the station as the thruster engines engaged, slowly pushing the million-pound station higher, a few scant meters every second. On the screen the dotted line displaying the ISS’s trajectory seemed to creep leisurely as it veered slightly off from the old, projected orbit to a new, longer arc.
CENTRAL POST, INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION
Kimberly’s eyes widened as she watched on the laptop’s screen two of the approaching ASAT warheads blink and make a course correction. They now aimed for the updated future intercept point of the ISS’s new, higher orbit. They would hit in less than twenty seconds.
Kimberly felt her stomach turning over. The two warheads were maneuvering, heading for the station’s new position. She had mere seconds to live.
Suddenly the fourth and fifth warheads’ color blinked green. The approach radar showed that they were no longer accelerating. But even with the station’s new orbit, the ASATs had already made their final course correction and were still arcing toward the ISS’s new, future location.
Unless she could once more change the station’s orbit.
She glanced at the clock. Less than fifteen seconds to impact. She’d have to wait until absolutely the last moment, giving the station enough time to rise above the orbit that the three ballistic ASATs were aiming for, and then cut off the flow of fuel, so the station was no longer rising. With any luck the station wouldn’t reach the spot calculated by the more advanced, fourth and fifth warheads; the change might be too much, too sudden for them to counter.…
Kimberly’s chest was aching as she counted down the final seconds. It would be close, terrifyingly close, but she couldn’t afford to keep increasing the station’s altitude. She just hoped that the fourth and fifth warheads had been programmed to impact the station along its main axis, so they’d have a chance to miss.
At the seven-second mark she cut the fuel. The clock continued to count down as the station settled in its new, higher orbit—but not as high as it had been thrusting toward for the last twenty seconds. Would the warheads miss by only twenty meters?
The clock hit zero and Kimberly felt a shudder run through the ISS.
She heard no sounds of explosive decompression, no tearing of metal or whooshing of escaping air. The station was intact!
She slapped at the graphical interface and pulled up an outside view of the station. The aft array of solar panels had a gaping hole ripped through its middle, looking as though the ASATs had torn through the thin Kapton without exploding. Kimberly realized the warheads were the “hit-to-kill” type, relying on their massive kinetic energy of impact to destroy their targets.
She glanced at the crude feed from the ground, still showing the warheads as they shot past the ISS. Three of them appeared to have flown under the station, while the other two had barely sailed above the main body. Their control systems must have homed in on the broad radar-reflecting cross section of the solar panels.
“I did it!” she shouted. She’d threaded the needle and survived.
Kimberly’s whole body felt as if it were glowing from within. She wanted to turn summersaults in midair. She felt an indescribable elation of relief as she pulled in deep breaths of oxygen.
But the rational part of her mind quickly resumed control. Glancing at the fuel indicator, she saw that she was almost at bingo fuel. At least Scott would be showing up in the Starliner with the extra fuel supply. For the first time in days Kimberly felt that the station would survive. With her in it.
She called up the MCC link and was immediately switched to CAPCOM. Chief Astronaut Tarantino looked as if he’d aged five years in the past few minutes, but a huge grin split his face.
“You did it, Kimberly!” he praised. “Thank God!”
She replied, “I’m ready for Scott to bring in the Starliner. Then we’ll have plenty of fuel to boost back up to altitude, even if the fuel line is still crimped.” She glanced at the clock. “His ETA is still twenty minutes?”
“Yes … but you’ve got to hurry.”
“Hurry? Why?”
Tarantino’s look of exaltation clouded over. “Patricia’s learned that the State Department’s engaged China to use their own antisatellite system as a backup, in case our ASATs failed.”
Kimberly stared at the laptop screen. “You’ve got to be kidding!”
“I wish I were. The Chinese are preparing to launch their Dong Neng-3 ASAT at you on your next pass. You’ve got ninety minutes. Maybe less.”
“What the hell is going on down there?” Kimberly yelled at the screen. “Our own military didn’t stand down and now China’s jumping into the fray? They don’t even have a dog in this fight: the ISS is a U.S. and Russian asset, not Chinese.”
“After China lost their first station when their Tiangong-1 went down, it’s not clear how long they intend to keep the new Tiangong on orbit. I guess that’s precisely why they’re so anxious to help us get rid of ours.”
“I need that kind of help like I need a bullet in my brain,” Kimberly growled. “I’ve still got to de-crimp that line so we’ll have enough fuel to boost to a higher altitude.”
She tried to rein in her emotions, still not fully recuperated from her session with the bends. Now this. At least she’d been pre-breathing pure oxygen now, she thought, but that’s been to help recover from the decompression symptoms, not to prepare for another EVA.
Tarantino’s expression turned stony. “Whatever their motive, State is desperately trying to wave the Chinese off. Defense is working on the issue as well, as well as the President’s National Security Advisor. We’re also trying to get to them through our NASA channels, but the Chinese National Space Administration is giving us the runaround. You’ve got to kick the station as high as you can after you unload Scott’s fuel, so we can convince our own government to step in at the highest level and stop this insanity. But you can’t assume they’ll stop the Chinese from launching.”
“Copy,” Kimberly said sullenly, afraid that if she tried to say more she’d explode. Without another word, she turned her back on the laptop’s screen and kicked off for the Joint Airlock. Scott might not arrive for another twenty minutes, but she couldn’t afford to waste any more time. As much as she still ached from the bends, she needed to prepare for another EVA, this time to finish the job by completely de-crimping the fuel line.
Before she did that, though, she’d have to transfer fuel from Scott’s capsule after he’d docked to the Node 3 IDA. Nothing was turning out to be simple on this flight.
At least Scott was a big boy; once he docked he could start boosting the station as soon as she de-crimped the line. So she had to suit up.
She kicked off for the Joint Airlock and glided to the SAFER unit secured to its wall. The nitrogen-propelled Simplified Aid for EVA Rescue backpack fit onto the outside of her EVA suit and provided a safer, albeit much smaller and less powerful way of moving through space than the old Manned Maneuvering Unit. With time running out, she’d need all the help she could get de-crimping the line.