Carbide Tipped Pens Part 4

No. Kieu's authentication was right: in all the ways that mattered, the man was not, and had never been, Simalli Fargeau. Something, long held against her chest, shattered and broke into a thousand jagged pieces.

"You're wrong," she said, gently. "The sins of the father are his own to carry, and to atone for." Gently, slowly, she drew him into her embrace, feeling the weight and the warmth of him in her arms like a sun-soaked stone. "Welcome back, child. You are here among kin."

THUNDERWELL.

Doug Beason

One of the longtime standbys of science fiction is the story that hangs on a life-or-death problem, and then shows how the problem might be solved by scientific or technological breakthroughs.

Such is Doug Beason's "Thunderwell." The first human explorers to reach the planet Mars are doomed to die because their supply vessel has failed.

Can some futuristic piece of technology save them?

But wait a minute. Beason isn't using futuristic technology; he's describing a technological capability that has been available to us for several decades, but has been discarded because of political issues.

Whether the technology succeeds or fails, however, this story-like all good fiction-deals with far more than gadgetry. The human element is a basic, inescapable factor. As is the Second Law of Thermodynamics: you have to pay for everything you get.

The six-man crew on board the Mars...o...b..ter received the video-feed seven minutes after it was transmitted from Earth, twenty minutes after the supply ship's engines failed to extinguish. Silently watching the transmission, the men in the cramped stateroom shivered. The ship was primarily kept cool to conserve heat. It also helped to mask the smell of six astronauts living in close quarters during the six-month flight.

Six months that now might stretch out to who-knows-what after the failure of their supply ship.

Marine Colonel Mark Lewis, crew commander and mission geologist, displayed no emotion; nor did any of the crew. They had all watched the supply ship on the screen, and they all had counted out the seconds the main engine had continued to burn, a good minute and a half after it was supposed to shut off. They all knew what it meant.

And they all knew there was nothing they could do about it.

So as true professionals, they turned away from the display and pushed off to their stations, preparing for the next phase of their journey-aerocapture around Mars, using atmospheric friction generated from dipping into the thin Martian air to slow them down and pull them into an elliptical orbit.

Colonel Lewis hesitated before turning to his checklist. They had a shipload of work to do before they landed, and there really was no time to send a message back to Earth. NASA would know that they knew about the supply ship, and since there was nothing they could do about it, following the next step on the checklist was the only option that made sense. They'd all known the risks, and they'd all had no second thoughts. Solving insurmountable problems was one reason he'd signed up for the trip, and he'd jumped at the chance to command the first manned mission to Mars.

In his mind this was just a glitch. A big glitch, but a glitch nonetheless.

He wondered if his wife would understand.

From the view on the screen in NASA's DV Lounge, nothing appeared to be out of the ordinary. But everyone knew that something was wrong.

The supply ship bore silently through the blackness of s.p.a.ce. Minutes before, no one in the lounge had seen the propulsive kick from the chemical oxy-hydrogen engine as the mult.i.ton s.p.a.cecraft was inserted into its Hohmann trajectory to Mars. Similar engines had been used dozens of times before, some on unmanned probes to the outer planets or the inner Solar System. JPL's exquisite calculations had placed every probe's position to within centimeters of where they had been needed to rendezvous with Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and beyond.

But now that the supply craft's chemical propulsive burn had inexplicably continued for ninety seconds longer than needed, the unmanned vessel was traveling much too fast to ever be aerocaptured by Mars. There was no reserve fuel left to insert the supply ship into an elliptical orbit, and there was no way to slow the craft, to stop it from hurtling past Mars and into the depths of interplanetary s.p.a.ce.

On a separate, private channel, the NASA Administrator spoke grimly as the silence in the DV Lounge seemed to last forever. Poorly insulated from Washington, DC's stifling heat, NASA's Distinguished Visitors room was nearly unbearable, both in temperature and from shock.

Finally, somebody whispered. "What about plan B?"

The Honorable Heather Lewis turned away. "Didn't you hear the Administrator? That was plan B," she said bitterly. She closed her eyes, trying to erase the image from her mind. On the screen, the s.p.a.cecraft was little more than a dot, jumping around on the monitor because of the vast distance.

Dammed technology, she thought.

All because of a ninety-second increase in the burn. A minute-and-a-half mistake, and six lives snuffed out. Six astronauts, the first manned mission to Mars. And her husband, Colonel Mark Lewis was one of them.

Heather's military deputy, Brigadier General Mitch.e.l.l, lightly touched her arm. "Ma'am, the press is gathering outside. They've either heard about the failure or they've suspected something's wrong. I suggest we get you back to the Forrestal Building." The Department of Energy headquarters building housed the Honorable Heather Lewis's agency and would be a refuge from the press corps.

Heather nodded, trying to focus. "Can't we ignore them?"

General Mitch.e.l.l shook his head. "Probably not. They smell blood, and you'll be running a gauntlet, Dr. Lewis."

"Then let's just push our way through them."

"Once they discover that the chemical engine on the supply ship failed, they'll ask why you killed NASA's nuclear propulsion program," Mitch.e.l.l cautioned. "It's the second chemical failure in a row, and ultimately they'll blame you. They'll say that a thermal nuclear engine wouldn't have failed."

Heather stiffened. "That was years ago and doesn't have anything to do with this situation." This is about my husband and five other astronauts! Not about a political decision she'd made years ago. Then, the administration had been willing to do anything to prevent technology related to nuclear weapons proliferating to terrorists.

"Then when they corner you, don't acknowledge anything. Remember-technology is never foolproof. Everything fails, even throttles on chemical engines that have always worked before."

Heather nodded.

In a fail-safe effort to place humans on Mars, NASA had launched a supply ship four months before the manned mission left Earth. That way, the manned s.p.a.cecraft would not have to carry the entire three years of supplies needed for a round-trip mission to Mars. The strategy was to position the first supply ship into Martian orbit, and the crew would rendezvous with the ship once they arrived four months later. A docking procedure NASA had perfected since the Gemini era.

The six-person crew was two months into their mission when the first supply ship's engine failed to fire and it pranged into the Martian surface. But no worry, the backup-"plan B"-the second supply vessel, was launched within weeks, while the crew was still on their way to Mars.

There were enough provisions on their own ship to last them over a year, and the newly launched ship would provide more than enough supplies to ensure their return-extra propulsion, consumables, and enough margin for them to bring more rocks and dirt back to Earth than all the lunar material brought back from the Apollo missions combined.

Two supply ships, one launched before the manned mission and the other after. In theory, it was a fail-safe, no-sweat solution to a problem for which NASA had prepared for decades.

Until now.

Heather straightened and drew in a deep breath. "Let's do it." Head held high, she strode purposely out of the DV Lounge.

Camera flashes popped, reporters elbowed their colleagues to gain position. A striking blond woman in a red jacket shoved an oversized mike into her face.

Heather pulled herself up as the gauntlet squeezed shut.

"Dr. Lewis! Dr. Lewis!" The blond reporter placed herself center in the camera's field of view and said breathlessly, "This was the last opportunity to mount a rescue operation using chemical propulsion..."

Heather frowned. "Rescue? The last I heard, the crew is doing fine and the Discovery doesn't need a rescue mission."

Someone murmured off-camera, "They will once their food starts to run out."

Another microphone was shoved in her face. "Madam Administrator, Robert Ziebart, s.p.a.ce Nuclear Power On-Line. As the head of the National Nuclear Security Agency, do you now regret your decision to veto NASA using a nuclear propulsive engine for mankind's first manned Mars mission? A nuclear thermal engine would have cut the transit time to Mars to weeks, instead of six months and would have provided many more options for a risk-free s.p.a.ce flight-"

"Nothing is risk-free," interrupted Heather. "The President appointed me to this position to draw down our nation's nuclear footprint, not grow it. And proliferating nuclear technology into s.p.a.ce would have enormous consequences-"

Someone whispered, "More enormous than your husband's impending death?"

Heather opened her mouth to retort, but stopped. No emotion, she thought. Keep it in. Just get out of here. She pushed the gaggle of reporters aside and plowed through the bevy of people.

Outside NASA Headquarters, General Mitch.e.l.l opened the limo's door for Heather and joined her inside the stretched car. Snapping his seat belt, he turned to her and enumerated the highlights of the impromptu press conference: "Great response: saying your husband's mission has not failed, especially since there are still options for rescuing them. Also, you did well in offering no apologies for vetoing the nuclear engines, but you might want to rethink-"

Heather jerked her head up. "What do you mean there are other options for rescuing them? There are no other options."

Mitch.e.l.l fell silent.

Heather felt her face grow red. "Didn't you hear the NASA Administrator? They can't even scrub the mission-even if they tried to slingshot around Mars as a return-to-Earth, they don't have enough fuel to slow down!"

A long minute pa.s.sed. General Mitch.e.l.l pressed his lips together. "There are ... other, more controversial ways to get supplies to Mars. But if you're worried about proliferating nuclear technology into s.p.a.ce, then I think this other option is a non-starter. Dead on arrival."

Heather leaned back into her seat. "If you're thinking of using a variant of nuclear propulsion, then forget it. When I vetoed using that technology four years ago, the engines were dismantled, the nuclear material was returned to the Nevada Test Site for storage. It would take over a year to pull that program back together if not longer-and that's not including the five years it would take to build it."

"I wasn't thinking of nuclear propulsion. At least in that sense."

She glared. "Then what are you thinking about, General?"

Mitch.e.l.l hesitated. A light rain fell outside the limo, making the Washington, DC, streets appear to glisten. Red taillights blinked as the traffic inched ahead. The general leaned forward. "Our nuclear labs-Lawrence Livermore, Los Alamos, and Sandia-generated a dozen ideas after the atomic bomb, to use nuclear explosions for peaceful purposes."

Heather snorted. "Right. Programs like Plowshare, to dig big ditches using nukes. The only problem was that tons of radioactive material were generated that made those sites unusable for a thousand years. That's one of the reasons why we can't allow any of these crazy retro-nuclear programs to be resurrected."

Mitch.e.l.l shook his head. "Actually, you're right on that point. There were some pretty wild ideas, most of them not even vetted to pa.s.s the commonsense test before they were pursued. Like trying to drill for oil in Colorado by setting off a nuke underground-but with the result of contaminating an entire oil field."

"So what's your point?"

"The point, Madam Administrator, is that one of those crazy ideas makes sense. Not that we should always use it, but perhaps we should reconsider in times of great national necessity." He waited a beat. "Perhaps in times such as this."

Heather steadied herself as their limo swerved to avoid a car that pulled out from behind a bus. Even in the rain, Const.i.tution Avenue was lined with tourist cars and buses. Teenage and preteen school kids milled around the national mall, most without umbrellas and soaking wet, but enjoying their school trip to the nation's capital.

She nodded. "Go ahead."

Mitch.e.l.l debated how to present the controversial idea. If he delved into too much detail, she'd dismiss the concept, and bin it with all the other crazy rescue schemes she'd hear over the next few days. But if he allowed her to think things over, get her head straight after this disaster, then he might have a chance to sell it to her.

It just might work. It was a tactic he'd used throughout his military career to convince people to consider out-of-the box solutions: isolate them from the cacophony of chatter, present the idea in a measured way, and allow them to weigh the pros and cons themselves-without anyone yelling a sales pitch in their ear.

He didn't make general by rolling over and allowing the system to grind to a halt through inaction.

Mitch.e.l.l let out a deep breath. "You've had enough for now, ma'am. Anything I tell you now would be melded together in that big melting pot of same-priority decisions: everything is equally important, and everything gets the same amount of a.n.a.lysis, no matter what the consequence. You try to make a decision now, and people like that reporter who jumped on you will just heap it on more-just higher and deeper."

Heather looked incredulous. "You're not going to tell me what I can do to save my husband?"

General Mitch.e.l.l pulled his mouth taut. "I will. But I'll explain once we're outside the beltway, when you can see for yourself, and weigh the priorities of this solution against its own merits."

He pulled out his government smartphone and swiped at the screen. He tapped in a list of orders to Heather's personal staff. "Your 'go' bag"-the ubiquitous suitcase containing a week's worth of clothes that high-level political appointees always kept close-"is in the trunk. We can be wheels up at Andrews in an hour, and land you just after lunch, local time. It's an overnight trip at the worst, or I can get you home by two a.m. tonight-which would beat some nights you've gotten home from work since starting this job."

"Four hours to get where? Even my G-650 can't get us to the West Coast in four hours. Five minimum with headwinds. I don't know what aeros.p.a.ce contractors you want to visit in California, but there's no need to travel. They've all got offices in DC."

"You're right, but we're not going to LA. I need to get you to Nevada, before the political machinery cranks up, and starts telling you what you ought to think."

"Nevada? What's in Nevada that can help us get to Mars-Area 51?"

"The Nevada Test Site, where the last US nuclear explosion took place in 1992. You visited the site after you were first confirmed ... and it might just be where you find a solution to saving your husband's life."

Heather blinked, uncharacteristically at a loss for words. "What?"

"Thunderwell," Mitch.e.l.l said. "I'll explain once we get there. Then you can decide."

Two more weeks until they reach Mars.

The manned part of the journey was going like clockwork, exactly as planned. It was the supply vessels that drove them to take drastic measures. They were mere hours into the emergency, but he'd cut the oxygen back to 20 percent, right next to the bare minimum of the 19.5 percent they'd need to survive. Mountain guides and cold-weather scientific expeditions lived on that amount of O2 for weeks at a time. They couldn't do it forever, but it was a stopgap measure to give them time to consider options.

They laid out their failsafe alternatives, dubbed plans A, B, and C. Just as the manual prescribed. And like all professionals, they didn't dwell on failure, but only on what it took to ensure success.

Heather and General Mitch.e.l.l landed at Creech Air Force Base, an hour's drive north of Las Vegas, but only minutes from the entrance to the Nevada Test Site, or NTS as the sprawling desert testing facility was known. Established January 11, 1951, by the Atomic Energy Commission, the NTS was pocketed with radioactive craters, produced from over nine hundred atomic bomb experiments conducted from 1951 to 1992.

Since nuclear testing stopped in 1992, the NTS was mostly vacant, void of the activity that once permeated the site. Aside from infrequent, non-nuclear underground experiments that peppered the NTS, the NTS resembled more of a ghost town than the once glamorous center for nuclear weaponeers.

General Mitch.e.l.l moved quickly around the car and opened the door of the government SUV for his boss. With her hair pinned back and sungla.s.ses, Dr. Heather Lewis looked more like the Harvard-trained political science professor she was, rather than a high-ranking political appointee who ran the US's nuclear weapons enterprise.

Heather stepped unsteadily down into the dirt. Mitch.e.l.l led her by the elbow up a small rise. Their shoes kicked dust into the air as they walked around scrub brush. Stopping at the crest, they gazed across a brown, desert valley onto a spa.r.s.e collection of aluminum buildings that dotted the landscape. A large drill bit, some thirty feet across, lay on its side next to one of the buildings. Two yellow cranes were fastened to safety hooks on a concrete pad.

Mitch.e.l.l pointed at the ma.s.sive drill bit. "We drill shafts twice a year, ten meters in diameter down to a depth of about half a mile. It keeps a small cadre of techs current on their skills."

"To house non-nuclear underground experiments," Heather said. "Like you said, I haven't been out here since I was confirmed. Four years and it doesn't look any different." She turned to the one-star general. "I hope you didn't bring me all the way out here to sell me some idea cooked up by the nuclear labs to keep this place alive."

"No, ma'am. But you did need to come out here to see the scale of what you need to do-if you're going to not allow your husband to die."

Heather reddened. "As if I have any say in the matter. You said yourself we couldn't resurrect the nuclear engine option in time to save the crew."