Delta-v, page 19
Jin nodded. “It is an interesting design. Perhaps one day our children will get the chance.”
Tighe frowned. “But is it ethical to send children?”
Jin looked appalled until he saw Tighe grin. Then Jin laughed. “Very funny.”
CHAPTER 17
First Light
SEPTEMBER 22, 2033
Gabriel Lacroix gazed across the faces of his charges. “It has been a long winter for us all. However, the Earth-bound phase of your training has finally come to an end.”
James Tighe and the other trainees stood at ease in dress blues in the dining hall. Lacroix and the entire training staff were gathered at the front of the room.
“Although just eighteen of you will be extended a contract to continue training in low Earth orbit, please know that were it economically feasible, Catalyst Corporation would send you all. Your work here has been outstanding, and those of you not selected today will receive preferential consideration for future expeditions.”
Future expeditions. Tighe clenched his jaw. He knew these eighteen orbital training tickets were the only real thing about the program.
“Because this is an FAA-approved spaceflight-participant training program, all of you will receive civilian spaceflight certifications, qualifying you for employment with an increasing number of NewSpace startups. And of course, you will all receive your training completion bonus.”
The trainees exchanged impatient looks.
“As I read the names of those selected for orbital training, I ask that you maintain the same spirit of camaraderie and professionalism you have demonstrated throughout this program.”
The tension in the room was thick.
Lacroix glanced at a simple index card. “The following trainees have been selected to continue to low Earth orbit training . . .”
Everyone held their breath.
“Dr. Nalini Mishra.”
Someone behind Tighe gasped in excitement.
“Dr. Dirk Geissler.”
Another stifled gasp of joy.
As the names continued to be called out, Tighe began to detect a pattern.
“Dr. Yseult Sartre.”
Ivy League geologist.
“Dr. Abidan Berkovich.”
Ivy League astrophysicist.
Tighe wondered why he was surprised. The company had opted for the overachievers—the traditionally successful. It was the way of the world. He’d fallen for Joyce’s pitch.
Lacroix continued to read off the names, but Tighe’s only surprise was that Isabel Abarca and Jin Han were not among the eighteen selected. Both of them had world-class CVs and real-world experience. Sevastian Yakovlev may have been a veteran cosmonaut, but he was maxed out on radiation exposure. Adedayo Adisa was brilliant but a black hat hacker from the slums of Lagos. Nicole Clarke was basically an oil hunter. David Morra, an ex-soldier. Eike Dahl, an EMT. Chindarkar . . . well, Chindarkar also had an impressive résumé.
Soon Lacroix finished. Not a single one of Tighe’s circle was chosen—and in a way, that made sense. No matter where he went, Tighe always seemed most at home among outsiders.
“Congratulations to those of you chosen, and for the rest of you”—he then held up what looked like a silver gift card—“you will receive, as a personal gift from Mr. Joyce, a travel voucher good for round-trip business-class airfare anywhere Joyce airlines flies.”
Tighe noticed Jin staring at the floor in front of him, fists clenching and unclenching. Nearby, Tsukada was clearly trying to rein in tears—her rejection consigned her to suffering Tighe could only imagine.
Lacroix then announced, “Selected candidates please move to Barracks D.”
The company staff applauded, and the selected trainees leaped for joy and hugged one another, laughing and shouting all around Tighe.
Tighe turned toward Morra—who appeared stunned by the sudden turn of events. “Well, that’s nine months we’re not getting back.”
Across the room, Abarca nodded and shook Mishra’s hand. It still mystified Tighe. Both surgeons—but Mishra was also a concert violinist. Why that would be useful in space was anyone’s guess.
Eike Dahl stepped up to Tighe and noticed where he was looking. “Let’s get out of here.”
The next twenty-four hours in the barracks were like a wedding reception and a funeral booked at the same address. The music and laughter from Barracks D was hard to miss.
Morra sat in the corridor outside Barracks A. Tighe, Jin, and Abarca leaned against the wall nearby, sipping shots of tequila the company had issued them. Morra just kept shaking his head. “I did this for my daughters. To leave them something.”
Tighe gripped Morra’s shoulder. “We got some money. That’s something.”
Morra covered his head with his arms.
Tighe looked across the corridor at Jin, who was pacing, cursing between his teeth at intervals—looking more angry at himself than anything else.
* * *
—
The next morning forty hungover graduates left their training uniforms and equipment behind in the dorms and entered a coatroom. There, they donned insulated jumpsuits, parkas, face masks, gloves, and goggles.
Company staff escorted the entire group aboard a large cargo elevator. After the doors rolled closed, the car ascended through 200 meters of ancient ice. As the elevator boomed to a stop, the doors opened and a biting cold enveloped them.
They moved through a corrugated steel building whose interior was supported by steel beams to withstand powerful surface winds. They then passed through a thick door to stand on ice beneath a cloudless sky. Dawn filled the horizon with a reddish glow.
It was the first time in half a year that Tighe had seen sunlight. He, Morra, Abarca, and the others stood watching in silence for several moments before they were nudged along by company staff—joining the others as they marched, single file, toward a C-130 cargo aircraft that idled noisily on a nearby skiway.
* * *
—
After an eight-hour flight, the passengers bundled up and sleeping on the cargo deck, the C-130 landed in Christchurch, New Zealand. Everyone took off their parkas as the C-130 taxied for several minutes, and the plane finally came to a halt, the engines winding down.
The weary trainees stood, but a company staffer shouted, “If you are not among the eighteen chosen for orbital training, please remain seated. Orbital trainees, please check in at the cargo ramp. Orbital trainees only, please.”
Tighe and Morra exchanged looks and sat back down. The “chosen ones” moved toward the rear of the aircraft. After several minutes getting changed into fresh blue jumpsuits emblazoned with the Catalyst Corporation logo, the orbital trainees were organized into three rows of six. Someone called out, “Smiles, people!”
A hydraulic motor whined and a beam of sunlight cut into the gloomy cargo bay as the ramp lowered onto the tarmac. Warm air flowed in. It was a bright spring day.
Tighe saw a phalanx of media, dozens of camera lenses aimed at the asteroid-mining trainees as they disembarked from the aircraft into what was apparently a press conference already under way. Nathan Joyce stood with a microphone, waving for his chosen ones to come on down, his voice booming over speakers. “Ladies and gentlemen, Catalyst Corporation’s trained asteroid miners!”
The orbital trainees were met with a smattering of applause.
Someone tapped Tighe on the shoulder. He looked up to see a Catalyst staffer pointing the way toward an open side door in the fuselage.
“Please disembark this way. We have paperwork for you to sign.”
Tighe, Morra, Jin, Abarca, Adisa, Chindarkar, and the others moved single file through the narrow cabin door and out onto the tarmac. The air was mild and the sky overhead was blue. The surrounding landscape was flat and green.
Adedayo flashed a bright smile. “It is good to be back on Earth.”
Jin nodded toward Tsukada, who appeared to be in mourning. “Speak for yourself.”
As they walked along the tarmac, a man in a suit and tie came alongside Tighe. “Mr. Tighe?”
Tighe nodded.
The man pushed a business card into Tighe’s hand and spoke with a Kiwi accent. “Tim Hartig, Harbinger Aerospace. We’re a NewSpace startup specializing in satellite maintenance and logistics.”
“Okay . . .” Tighe took a look at the card.
Hartig gestured toward the distant press conference. “Tough break about Catalyst, but something tells me they’re not heading out to the asteroids anytime soon. And if I’m not mistaken, you’ve just been flight certified at Nathan Joyce’s expense.”
“That’s right.”
“We’d like to discuss the possibility of you signing up with us. We’re looking for highly qualified candidates, and we have competitive pay, good benefits, profit sharing.”
Tighe noticed that other folks were speaking to Morra, Jin, Abarca, Yak. He listened as they continued toward the terminal.
CHAPTER 18
Legacy
Erika Lisowski guided her rental car, passing houses that looked unchanged from twenty years earlier. She parked along the narrow, curbless street and noticed several elderly men and women hugging good-bye as they got into their cars.
Her grandfather was still popular among NASA retirees. He had stories. Good stories—from the golden age of space. Her granddad had been in the control room when Armstrong landed on the Moon.
Lisowski grabbed a wrapped gift from the passenger seat and entered the ranch-style house into a crowd of family. She spotted her mother and father engaged in an argument in the kitchen—the same argument they usually had in any situation requiring their cooperation.
Her father spotted her and glanced at the clock. “Jeez, E, you missed dinner. I thought you were taking the morning flight.”
She kissed him hello. “I told you I had a meeting on the West Coast.”
“Make the contractors come to you.”
Her mother hugged her. “Let her be, Barry.” She looked her daughter over. “You look terrible! Have you been sleeping?”
“It’s good to see you, too.”
“Don’t touch that!” Her mother slapped her father’s hand away from the remnants of a birthday cake. “Your daughter hasn’t had a piece yet.”
Cousins, nephews, and nieces called out from the living room on seeing her and hugged her hello. “Hello, sweetheart!”
“Better late than never!”
“Shame you missed dinner.”
Her cousin Ron showed off his infant boy—who was adorable. Ron was in his early thirties and worked as a technician at the SMAB—the Solid Motor Assembly Building—out on the cape. Before the shuttle program was canceled, her father had had a lot of pull there. Lisowski, too, was third-generation NASA.
Her father leaned close as she entered the kitchen again. “Go out and say hello to your grandfather. He’ll be happy to see you. Remember: it’s his ninety-fourth.”
“I know how old he is, Dad.”
Lisowski opened the familiar sliding screen door, and as she moved into the backyard, she could see toddlers moving about with their young parents. She spotted her grandfather watching from his wheelchair near the garden.
Gerard Zygmunt Lisowski, PhD—Gerry to everyone who ever knew him. His parents had immigrated to the United States during World War II, bringing her grandfather along with them as an infant. A mathematics prodigy, Gerry had altered the trajectory of the entire family—graduating from Princeton and joining the Apollo program as a young aerospace engineer.
After years of having him look over her shoulder while she did her math homework, Lisowski knew just how sharp his intellect still was.
He regarded her through rheumy eyes as she approached—and finally deciphered her face in the semidarkness. His craggy face brightened, and he croaked, “Erika, sweetheart.”
She walked over and hugged him gently. “Happy birthday, Dziadek.”
“Now I am happy. Where have you been off to?”
“California. I had meetings with commercial space firms there.”
“Ah. Anything interesting?”
“The usual boring stuff. Did you have a nice birthday dinner?”
He waved her off. “I don’t enjoy food like I used to.” He looked up at the night sky. “Okay, let’s see how well you remember. What star is that?” He pointed.
“You know that’s not a star. It’s Jupiter. And that’s Mars over there.”
He snorted. “Very good. Can you still find Sirius?”
She got her bearings in the night sky and pointed. “Canis Major . . . and there’s Sirius right there. The brightest star. That’s an easy one.” Lisowski looked down at him and smiled in contentment. It had been so long since she felt like an eight-year-old girl. Back then her world was full of dreams without complications.
Her grandfather searched the night sky, but soon his smile faded. “My time’s running out, Erika.”
“Please don’t say that. You know it upsets me.”
“It upsets me, too.” He squeezed her hand—then paused as he noticed her other hand was behind her back. “What do you have there?”
“Nothing.”
He sat up in his wheelchair. “Now, come on. If it’s a gift, you’d better give it to me now, or I might not live to see it.”
“Stop joking like that.”
He waved an arthritic hand. “You know how much I look forward to your gifts. You’re the only one who knows what to get me.”
“Well, in that case . . .” She held out a small box wrapped in blue foil. “It is a gift.”
He looked at her. “Is it, now?” He extended his hand.
“Careful. It’s heavy for its size. Do you want me to open it for you?”
“Not on your life.” He hefted it in both hands. “Ooh. It is heavy.” He examined the box’s weight distribution by turning it one way, then another. “Not titanium. No . . . Now, let me guess.”
“You won’t guess. You’d better just open it.”
“Hmm. I say it’s . . . a challenge coin from the Blue Gemini project.”
“Now, where on Earth would I get that?”
“eBay. Some might even be authentic.”
“Interesting guess, but wrong.”
“How about a model of the Dyna-Soar?”
“Wrong again. You’re thinking in the wrong era.”
“Really?” He looked even more curious. “Not a shuttle tile, I hope. But, no—this is too heavy.”
“Dziadek, please open your present.”
“If you insist . . .” His spotted hands scraped away the foil. Underneath was a rosewood box. He looked up at her one more time and then opened the lid to reveal an expertly milled piece of metal the size of an avocado. He lifted it from its blue velvet pedestal. It had intricately curving metal tines. He turned it end over end, studying its surface. “How was this cast?”
“It wasn’t. It was formed by laser chemical vapor deposition.”
He appeared to have lost his world-weariness as he studied its surface. “It’s beautiful. So perfect.”
“It’s made of Inconel.”
He looked up. “And what is it?”
“It’s a sensor housing—made for the prow of the first commercial deep space vessel. A gift to you, Dziadek, from the ship’s builder. He wanted you to have it.”
His hands trembled as he held it. “Oh, Erika . . . it’s magnificent.” After a few moments he gazed into the night sky. His eyes teared up. “Goddamnit . . . I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry.” She put her arm over his shoulder and looked up at the sky with him.
“We were right there, Erika.” He looked to her. “We could have done it. I’m so sorry that we didn’t. I’m so sorry, Erika.”
“No, no.” She hugged him. “No, Dziadek, please.”
“We could have done it.”
“I know you could have.” She looked him in the eyes. “I know.” She leaned her head against his and then sat with him, watching the heavens.
CHAPTER 19
Decompression Cycle
OCTOBER 18, 2033
After a week of windsurfing and relaxation on Hamilton Island in Queensland, Australia, James Tighe was beginning to put his half year beneath the Antarctic ice sheet behind him. Part of the Whitsunday Islands near the Great Barrier Reef, here it was hard to imagine that cold even existed.
Tighe strolled the warm sand of Whitehaven Beach with Eike Dahl and David Morra. A little ways behind them Isabel Abarca and Jin Han laughed as Nicole Clarke chased Amy Tsukada with some sort of sea creature held in her hand. As usual, Tsukada had her earbuds in.
“Stop!” Tsukada raced through the shallows.
“I just want to show it to you.”
“Get away!”
Clarke had anchored their rental sailboat—a forty-four-foot Sunsail—just off the beach with practiced ease. She’d captained much larger vessels. Adedayo Adisa waved to them from the boat. Yakovlev and Chindarkar were sunning themselves on the deck.
Tighe realized it might seem odd to outsiders that, after spending nine months in training together, the group would spend their R & R together, too. But it felt natural.
He wasn’t normally fond of the beach scene, but Whitehaven Beach was different—part of a marine park, it was pristine, perfect, and unpopulated. There wasn’t a house or building anywhere on the island—just 5 kilometers of tranquil sand.
For the first time in his life Tighe was actually on vacation. He wasn’t here to explore a new cave or to wrangle his way onto an expedition—or to crash on a friend’s couch. He came here to enjoy life. And friendship. It felt good.
Morra shouted, “Hey, Nic, give it here . . .” He sprinted on his carbon fiber prosthetic legs, grabbing a starfish from Clarke and swiftly catching up to Tsukada—who dove into the water to escape.
