Orbital

Twelve Target Practice

I look around the room as everyone waits for me to fill in the blanks. “You’re saying it was shot down?”

“Precisely. Because 17 was about to be destroyed, it may have provided a perfect opportunity for a foreign power to test a space-based system,” says Saul.

“Why risk it? Shooting down another country’s hardware seems like a way to start a war,” I reply.

“True. But strategically, the circumstances provided an interesting opportunity for them. Because the satellite was in the process of rapid de-orbiting, it was highly unlikely we would even notice it took place.”

“But you did…”

“Yes. We suspect they thought the risk was worth taking because of another factor. The GRDs are very heavily shielded from this kind of thing — or at least are intended to be. They play such a vital role in battlefield communications, they’re the first thing you’d want to take off the chessboard. If you were an entity that wanted to see if your tech could take one down, this was the ideal opportunity.”

“And they did…”

“Yes. It would seem so. We want to know by whom and how.”

“And I’m here, because?”

“We have questions. You have experience with space-based lasers.”

“I guess you could call it experience.”

“We’ve read the reports, David, but could you fill us in?”

I look across the table to my keeper, Kevin Flavor. Last time I was in a position to speak my mind, he threatened me with a trip to a Federal prison — ironically I was saved by the president of Russia.

“Go ahead, David. You can tell them everything.”

Huh? That’s a change. This must be serious.

“Well, for starters, when I left the Korolev — the K1 — in the Unicorn spacecraft I had to turn the heat shield towards them because they used some kind of laser to puncture my hull.”

“A chemical laser in their secure module,” says Claire Russel. She’s in her mid-thirties with jet black hair and has been watching me with very intense blue eyes since I entered the room.

“Yeah. I guess that’s what it was. Even with the heat shield blocking it, there was an energy spike. Thankfully I was able to get out of range. But then I had to change my trajectory because I was told the Russians, the ones that thought I’d stolen their cryptographic wafer, sent their kill sats to intercept me.”

“Those are their SRX8’s. They have a chemical oxygen iodine laser onboard and can be used for space and atmospheric targets,” she explains.

“So I take it you’re the laser expert?”

She gives me a faint smile. “Please continue. You had one other encounter?”

“Yeah. When I was in the 777 cockpit.” That I cough, stole… “I was targeted by a bright green laser that I believe was intended to blind me and cause me to crash.”

“That was probably a copper vapor laser aboard a Russian surveillance satellite. The optics would seem to be dual use.”

“I guess so. If I hadn’t been looking down at the time, I don’t think I’d be here. Anyhow, that’s my experience with lasers. I know more about being at the receiving end than the sending. So, I guess you can add yet another laser to the Russian’s arsenal.”

There’s silence in the room. A few people steal glances back to the head of the table where Beth Saul is seated.

She speaks up. “This is where it gets complicated. Victor, please explain.”

He points to a new slide on the screen. It shows a map of what look like satellites and orbital trajectories. “This is from a satellite array that I can’t tell you the name of. It’s at a much more distant orbit and monitors all the other satellites around the Earth. One of the sensor systems is designed to target specific satellites and monitor infrared energy output.” He aims a laser pointer at a bright burst. “We call this CS626. This was captured at the same time as the GRD experienced its malfunction. The line of sight is perfect and we can even see that the satellite changed its trajectory slightly to line up with 17.”

“Your smoking gun,” I reply.

“Yes. And it’s Chinese.”

“So the Russians aren’t the only ones with this kind of tech.”

“Definitely not,” says Russel with a smirk. But I get the impression she’s talking about the US.

“This is where it gets complicated,” says Saul. “Go ahead, Dr. Russel.”

She flips back to the spectrum slide and zooms into the cluster of dots above the UV section. “Crystal or dye-based lasers use impurities to finely tune them. It’s this variation in chemistry that gives them different properties. When it comes to solid-state lasers, there’s a seed that you start growing a crystal from. This requires a very precise recipe and growth strategy. The laser that hit the GRD was using an exotic Alexandrite crystal with a very, very specific formula. I believe that it’s one that I developed called Silver Glass.”

I can finally understand the anger that’s been under her surface. “They stole it from you?”

“We believe so,” says Saul. “But as Dr. Russel was explaining, each laser has its own fingerprint. While the instruments onboard the GRD were sensitive enough to detect the general category, they can’t tell us what seed stock they used.”

“Dumb guy, here. What does that mean?”

“It means that if we know precisely what formula their crystal is based on, we can pinpoint at what stage they stole Silver Glass from me,” says Russel.

“So…knowing that will help you narrow down the potential suspects…”

“Considerably,” replies Saul.

Flavor speaks up. “David, finding out how they stole it is very critical to our intelligence efforts. This person or persons could have access to a number of other technologies that are vital to our security.”

“Sounds like it. If there’s anything else I can tell you, just ask.”

All eyes are on me. I get the feeling I’m missing the elephant in the room.

Saul nods to me. “The only way to know for sure how they stole it is to have direct access to the laser onboard the Chinese satellite, CS626.”

“I see…oh hell no…” It just hits me. “Is that why you asked me here?”

“David, right now there’s nobody more experienced with this kind of operation than you.” She locks eyes with me, “And that’s why we need you to go back up.”