Silver Tower

CHAPTER 27

"Ann? Can you hear me?"

The intercom had gone dead. The lights were completely out now except for one or two remaining emergency lights. He had no way of knowing if the SBR or Skybolt had worked. He didn't even know if she was still alive.

Suddenly Saint-Michael's huge sophisticated space station seemed like an orbiting mausoleum, and all he could think of was finding her and getting out of this dark, entombing crypt.

Ever since the command-module crewmembers had evacuated the station, Saint-Michael had been wearing the bottoms of his spacesuit. He now made his way over to where the upper half of his suit was floating, slipped into it and joined up the two halves. While breathing oxygen from his POS he connected his gloves, communications headset and helmet in place and activated his life-support backpack. He then moved toward the hatch leading to the connecting tunnel.

He passed through the connecting tunnel and had just entered the engineering module when the entire ceiling seemed to explode on top of him. He caught a glimpse of a projectile shooting straight through the module and crashing through the deck. The Velcro-covered floor seemed to erupt and buckle like hot tar. Sparks filled the cabin. A PRESS warning horn sounded, followed by a FIRE warning light that flickered on and off. In a few moments the only lights on in the module were the two warning lights, creating an eerie strobe-light effect. Saint-Michael had to overcome the sudden disorientation and will his legs to move. Carefully he climbed through the shards of metal, plastic, wiring and other debris now floating throughout the galley module and made his way to the hatch to the Skybolt module. Smoke began to billow through the galley as he peered through the thick Plexiglas window into the module…

Ann was suspended about a foot from the ceiling, her arms and legs dangling like a puppet's, her POS system hovering near her neck; Saint-Michael noted with relief that her mask was on. She was not moving. A few blobs of blood encircled her forehead.

He opened the hatch, closed it behind him and made sure the Skybolt module began to repressurize itself. When the pressure was nearly normal he slid down the narrow aisle between the massive electronics racks and pulled Ann to him. He quickly checked her POS connections and found them secure. Further examination revealed a large cut and a bump on her left temple.

He touched his helmet to her POS faceplate. "Ann, can you hear me?"

After a long, tense wait he noticed her neck and face muscles jerk, and then her eyes opened.

"You all right?"

"I… I hit the instrument panel… big explosion."

"We've got to get out of here. Can you move?" She nodded, reached out with a foot to find the floor was still several feet above the deck. "I can move you, want to get you into a rescue ball."

"Skybolt… it works, Jason. I fired… it fired."

"Easy. Never mind Skybolt. Those spaceplanes are shooting up the modules. This one could be next." He unstowed a rescue ball from a yellow-painted container mounted on the module ceiling. "Can you seal yourself up inside?"

She nodded weakly, her labored breathing fogging the POS face mask.

Another explosion rocked the station, and with it the station's spin seemed drastically to change direction. Saint-Michael had to hold himself steady until his body caught up with the new wobble in the station, then he opened the rescue ball.

"Curl yourself up around the POS pack." With his help she wrapped her arms and legs around the POS pack and lowered her chin on the top of it. "Don't forget-seal up the ball when I cover you with it, and keep checking the pressure gauges. Keep the ball at seven p.s.i. with your POS if you need to."

With Ann in a fetal curl a few feet from the deck, Saint-Michael enclosed her with the rescue ball and zipped it closed around her. He could feel her fumbling with the ziplock-style pressure seal inside as he steered her over to an oxygen panel in the Skybolt module, plugged an oxygen hose into a pressure fitting on the ball and began to inflate the rescue ball. He noted the ball's small pressure gauge steadily rise, pumped the ball up to one standard station atmosphere and checked the seal again. It looked like a big beach ball.

Leaving Ann connected to the oxygen fitting, he bypassed the safety interlocks and undogged the hatch leading to the engineering module. The galley had completely lost its pressurization, and judging from the occasional explosions he heard, the rest of the station was probably just as dead. Only one last possibility for survival. He disconnected Ann and her rescue ball from the oxygen supply and carried her through engineering and the connecting tunnel to the docking module.

Through the wireless intercom came a stronger, firmer voice: "Jason…?"

"How you doing?"

"I see stars every time I blink my eyes, and my head hurts like hell. Where are we going?"

"Enterprise. "

"Didn't the Russians attack it?"

"Enterprise won't get us home," Saint-Michael said, opening the hatch to the docking module at the end of the main connecting tunnel, "but maybe it can save us. My spacesuit has enough air — and power for only seven hours. Enterprise, even damaged, has enough air and water for thirty days and it still has the thruster power to keep itself in orbit. It's our chance until—"

She wondered why Saint-Michael had suddenly stopped in midsentence. Then she understood… He had carried her into the docking module, where the burned-up bodies of Bayles and Kelly still lay. She almost imagined that she could see the crewmen trying to crawl back to Silver Tower for safety, chased by the wall of flame from Enterprise's destroyed fuel cells… Saint-Michael's eyes were drawn to the distorted faces, the sightless eye sockets, the scorched Space Command uniforms, the gnarled, bony hands. Gently lifting his precious cargo over the charred remains, he realized that the woman he carried in that plastic and canvas rescue ball could just as easily have been one of those bodies on the deck beneath him.

As he made his way down the docking tunnel into Enterprise's air locks and into the shuttle itself he saw that the hungry fire had blackened everything.

"Are we in Enterprise yet?" Ann asked. He could not answer, and she did not press the question.

Montgomery, Wallis and Davis were still strapped in place, melted POS masks on their chests. The fuel-cell explosion in the lower deck storage area had torn apart Enterprise's middeck. The air was filled with floating debris that would never settle, never fall.

"I'm going to leave you on the middeck," Saint-Michael said. He let her float between the airlock hatch and the ladder leading to the upper deck, plugged the rescue ball into another oxygen supply hose and activated the oxygen supply. Enterprise's oxygen supply, he noted with relief, still seemed operational. "You can recharge your POS pack with the hose inside the ball. I've got to… to see if Enterprise is flyable. "

Ann did not acknowledge. She knew what he really had to do — move the bodies of Will and Sontag out of the charred cockpit.

One missile left.

General Alesander Govorov took every last second available to him before breaking off his systematic attack on the American space station. He had plunged Scimitar missiles into all but two of the station's eight pressurized modules, making sure that all within range were at least punctured. The two modules remaining were both on the outside of the revolving station and were therefore moving the fastest and were harder to hit, so he had targeted easier modules, the ones closest to the central keel, with his few remaining missiles.

Clouds of debris hovered everywhere around the torn-up space station. A sparking relay junction or fuel cell occasionally erupted somewhere on the keel, and pieces of the space-based radar, communications antennas and heat-exchange radiators fluttered in the weightlessness of space as if pushed by some strange, unearthly wind. The station's rotation was erratic. Originally centered directly along the central keel, now it was a wobbly, off-kilter eccentric spin. The space shuttle was still attached to the docking port, but the cockpit windows were dark and lifeless and the battered, ruptured nose insured that the shuttle was useless.

Govorov had established contact with Soviet Space Defense Command shipborne tracking stations just after Voloshin had disappeared. The ground-tracking stations were not as sophisticated as the American Tracking and Data Relay, Satellite system, TDRS, or WESTAR, so voice and data contact with small, low-powered craft such as the Elektrons was intermittent at best. They could not help with Voloshin's disappearance. They were also no help with a plan to dock with the Soviet Union's orbiting module. Besides, Govorov found he did not have the fuel to risk a long, protracted hunt for Mir, so his only option was to deorbit.

"Elektron One, this is Glowing Star Command Control."

"Go ahead, Control."

"Elektron One, we are recommending another orbit to align in the slot for deorbit."

What? This was crazy… "Control, I don't have the reserves for another two hours in orbit. I need to deorbit on this turn in the slot. What is your reason for the delay?"

"We are showing a possible obstruction within ten kilometers of your computed descent path, Elektron One."

"An obstruction? Another spacecraft?"

"Affirmative. We predict that the object could be within five kilometers of you when you begin your deorbit burn. Please state your intentions."

Govorov took a firm grip on his control stick. It seemed the fight was not over. "Can you identify the object, Control? Its point of origin?"

"Negative. It is not a known orbiting spacecraft. It has appeared in your vicinity within the hour, very close to your present flight path. "

"I want a vector toward the object, Control, immediately."

"Say again, Elektron One."

"I want a vector toward the object. I intend to engage the… obstruction."

"Yes, sir. Stand by."

When Govorov received the range and vector coordinates to the subject, sweat broke out on his forehead. It had indeed moved very close to his flight path — dangerously close. It was less than thirty kilometers away, no more than five thousand meters from his own altitude.

He activated his laser designator and opened his cargo-weapons bay doors once again. He thought he knew what this oncoming spacecraft was. For several years the Americans had had a fighter-based antisatellite missile in operation. Fired from a high-performance F-15 fighter, the missile could seek out, track and destroy many kinds of Soviet satellites. Enhancements to the American ASAT weapon reportedly included a much higher altitude capability, a larger warhead and a more maneuverable design. It was supposed to be as long as a Thor space-based missile, perhaps ten to twelve meters long, but not as large in diameter and aerodynamically shaped for carriage under an F-15 like a flying torpedo.

It had to be an American retaliatory response. The Americans were mounting their ASAT attack at the one point in his mission when he was the most vulnerable: just before deorbit. Low on fuel, maneuvering to enter the deorbit slot, busily inattentive to everything else — a perfect time to strike. Well, the Americans were going to get a surprise. He would be the hunter instead of the hunted…

"Elektron One, spacecraft is at your altitude, inside twenty kilometers, slow moving… now on collision course. Repeat, collision course. You are on an intercept heading, twelve o'clock, now eighteen kilometers."

Govorov put his laser viewfinder on widest possible arc… At the extreme magnification of the laser designator appeared a large, bright object moving across the stars at the very rim of the earth. As it came slowly into range he could make out its smooth, oblong shape and a circular device on one end — an active radar-homing device or infrared seeker? At fast he worried that he might be engaging someone's low-orbiting satellite, or perhaps even a reconnaissance "ferret" satellite, but this thing was unlike any satellite he had ever seen. It was not pointed directly at him, but the laser rangefinder reported it was definitely moving closer. He placed the aiming reticle directly on the nose sensor of the weapon, received a READY beep in his headset, rechecked his weapons panel and at a range of fifteen kilometers fired his last Scimitar missile.

The hypervelocity missile tracked precisely on course, following the laser beam directly to its target. Govorov watched it all the way to impact. The missile plunged through the circular device at the nose of the spacecraft and sliced through it like it was paper. No explosion, only a puff of metal and some escaping gases. The spacecraft began to wobble a bit — obviously its directional control now destroyed — but otherwise it continued on course. Worried that the device wasn't yet dead — perhaps it had some sort of proximity detector or last-track-to-target capability — Govorov maneuvered well above the spacecraft, then rotated around so he could watch it. The device did not follow him. A few moments later it was safely underneath him, now noticeably wobbling. Its altitude had already decreased — it would not be long before it reentered the atmosphere. There was no proximity explosion, no terminal or kamikaze detonation. Govorov reminded himself to inform Soviet intelligence of this new type of American spacecraft. He wanted more information on it, wanted to know what its capabilities were. Right now, though, he had to concentrate on the instructions the ground controllers were sending him in preparation for deorbit. As he maneuvered to begin his deorbit burn, he thought that even with the unexplained loss of Voloshin and Elektron Two, the mission had been a success…

Ann had been hanging in the same place on Enterprise's charred middeck for an hour. Saint-Michael had passed by her several times during his grisly task, twice from the middeck level and a few times from the flight-deck level. A bad cramp had developed in her left thigh. She said nothing. Saint-Michael's job would be tough enough.

Finally she heard the more familiar whine of circulating pumps and electronic equipment, and through the vinyl and canvas surrounding her she could see a few lights wink on. Just the sound of something operating made her hope…

"Jason?"

"Power is back on," he said. "We still have half our air supply left — two weeks' worth. Not as much as I'd hoped for but… plenty of thruster power, except for the nose RCS.

"What about…"

"They're all in the docking module on the station."

"I'm sorry, Jason."

She could imagine the pain in his face. Armstrong Station, Skybolt, the Persian Gulf, Iran — even the earth seemed so very far away. What was left was a burned-out space shuttle. Seven charred bodies—

"I found something," Saint-Michael said after a moment. "There was an extra spacesuit on board that wasn't damaged in the fire. I can still pressurize Enterprise's airlock. You'll be able to change in there."

He carried her into the airlock and soon after that the airlock was pressurized enough so that she could unzip the rescue ball and climb out.

"Now I know what a butterfly feels like getting out of the cocoon."

"I think you've set a record for sitting in a rescue ball."

When he spoke she noticed that his breathing seemed to be a bit heavier, labored. "Matter of fact, I don't think a rescue ball has ever been used for real…"

"Jason, are you all right?"

He seemed not to have heard her. "Hang on, I'm going to disconnect from Armstrong. The automatic system is out, I'll have to do a brute-force disconnect." She felt a shudder and heard a loud metallic popping sound as Enterprise broke free of the docking clamps.

Five minutes later Ann emerged from the airlock in her spacesuit and made her way to the upper flight deck, where she found Saint-Michael strapped into the left-hand commander's seat punching instructions into the digital autopilot. He motioned for her to sit in the right-hand pilot's seat. As she passed the center console and began strapping herself in, she looked out the front cockpit windows and caught a glimpse of Armstrong Station.

"My… God…"

"They did a job on her, that's for sure," Saint-Michael said. "They hit almost everything mounted on the keel — radiators, comm antennas, fuel cells, fuel storage… One of the SBR antennas seems okay. Good, they didn't get everything. But they put holes in all the modules except for the laser module and the MHD reactor. Looks like they got the Skybolt electronics module, too."

"Well, there's a hole in it, but them may not be extensive damage — Jason, are you all right?"

Saint-Michael was shaking his head, blinking his eyes, and licking moisture from his upper lip. "I've got a headache, is all…

"Check your oxygen."

"I did," but he rechecked it. "On and one hundred percent. Good blinker light." He tried not to notice her worried look. "I've got the lifeboat's rescue transponder tuned in but I'm not receiving it yet. We've got to try to contact someone on the ground to arrange a linkup with the lifeboat and send up a rescue craft."

"Okay… just tell me what to do."

"'Switch over to air-to-ground frequency one and keep trying to raise someone. Try both air-to-ground channels. That Soviet missile ripped out most of the antennas on the bottom of the Enterprise, but the ones on top should work. I'll try the satellite network again." The two worked apart for several minutes until a hiss of static and a faint, heavily accented voice made Ann jerk upright. "Jason, I've got someone."

"Which channel?"

"It's… air-to-ground two. I've got it set to UHF."

Saint-Michael quickly reset his comm switches to the same settings. "Any station, any station. This is United States Space Shuttle Enterprise. Repeat, this is United States Space Shuttle Enterprise. Come in. Emergency. Over."

Through waves of squeals and static they heard: "Space Shuttle Enterprise, this is NASA Dakar. Repeat, this is NASA Dakar. We read you. Over."

"Dakar, this is Lieutenant General Saint-Michael. Request a kilo-uniform-band satellite data link with any available network. This is an emergency. Over."

"Copy, Enterprise," came the heavy accent. "Requesting Ku-band data link. Dakar is not Ku-band capable. Stand by."

A few moments later a different controller came on, this one with a definite American accent: "General Saint-Michael, this is Kevin Roberts, GS-17, senior communications officer. Sorry, sir, but we weren't expecting a UHF call from any American spacecraft. We're triangulating your position. We should have a Ku-band link with TDRS East in a few minutes. Can you tell us the nature of your emergency?"

"Yeah… Armstrong Station has been attacked. Nine fatalities, repeat, nine fatalities. Shuttle Enterprise with two on board is damaged and unable to deorbit. Space-station lifeboat with four on board is in orbit. I want to join with the lifeboat and wait for rescue shuttle sortie."

"Copy, Enterprise." The signal was getting stronger. "Enterprise, we have triangulated your position. TDRS link in progress. Stand by."

"Have you heard anything from our lifeboat, Dakar?"

"Negative, Enterprise. We were pretty lucky to hear you in this backwater joint. I'll relay your query to Rota for immediate reply. Understand you want immediate linkup with the lifeboat."

"Affirmative, Dakar. Enterprise standing by."

The wait did not last long. "Enterprise, this is Falcon Control, Colorado Springs, on air-to-ground channel one. How do you hear?"

"Loud and clear, Control." Saint-Michael switched his comm panel over from the direct line-of-sight UHF channel to the main TDRS system, which relayed voice and data through four geosynchronous satellites to a master ground station at White Sands, New Mexico. As if in reply, the computer monitor belonging to the shuttle's general navigation computer began to display several hundred lines of position and navigational update information. For the first time in hours Ann looked hopeful.

"Have you been informed of our situation?" Saint-Michael said.

"Affirmative, Enterprise. Atlantis will be airborne in twenty-four hours to retrieve you."

"Copy." Saint-Michael tried to sit back in his seat, appeared to be exercising his hands and arms inside his spacesuit. "I'm receiving… receiving computer input."

"Jason?" Ann said.

He turned halfway toward her. "I… I feel weak… my head… hurts bad." And then he stopped moving.

"Jason?" She unstrapped and moved her helmet closer to his, staring into his face. Oh, God… it was twisted and contorted, obviously he was in great pain. "Jason, can you hear me?"

"Get me… get me off the flight deck… airlock… max pressure, hurry." One of his eyes rolled back up into his head, and he began to shiver, an oppressive, body-contorting shaking.

Ann moved free of the right seat and fumbled at his straps.

"Hurry, Ann… hurry for God's sake."

"What is it, Jason? What's wrong?"

"Nitrogen… too much nitrogen… not enough prebreathing oxygen… oxygen…"

He began to fumble for his spacesdIs oxygen controls. "My suit pressure. … suit pressure… increase…"

She reached down to his spacesuit control panel on his chest and moved the suit pressurization selector to PRESS, increasing the suit's pressurization to maximum, nearly nine p.s.i.

What had he said? Get him to the airlock. She lifted him up, an easy task in microgravity, brought him over to the ladder, then carried him down to the middeck level and into the airlock.

By this time he was unconscious. She sealed the airlock behind her and studied the airlock controls. She had received briefings on how to operate the shuttle airlock, but that was a long time ago… Finally she found the right switches and set the controls to maximum pressurization. While pure oxygen was being pumped into the chamber and the pressure slowly increased, she switched communication controls on her spacesuit chest panel from IC to A/G. "Control, this is Enterprise. Emergency."

"Enterprise, this is Falcon Control. Dr. Page, is that you?"

"Yes. General Saint-Michael is unconscious. He passed out a few minutes ago complaining of extreme pain. We're in the shuttle's airlock with the controls set at emergency pressurization. "

"Copy, Enterprise. Stand by. We're calling the flight surgeon now.

The wait was not long. "Enterprise, this is Doctor Haroki Matsui. Is General Saint-Michael wearing a spacesuit?"

"Yes."

"Did he complete the proper prebreathing before wearing the suit?"

It was then she finally realized what was happening. Dysbarism, the bends, occurred when the body was moved from normal atmospheric pressure to an area of lower pressure. If the pressure was low enough — as it was when wearing a spacesuit — nitrogen in the bloodstream, which was denser than other dissolved gases, would bubble out of solution. Tiny bubbles of nitrogen would then float through the bloodstream, lodge in blood vessels or joints, grow larger and cause tremendous pain. In many cases nitrogen bubbles in the brain caused nitrogen narcosis, which made the victim feel angry or scfiizophrenic.

Prebreathing oxygen before putting on a spacesuit was critical to flush nitrogen cut of the bloodstream. The normal prebreathing time was two hours before exposure to a low-pressure regime. Ann had been spared the effects of dysbarism because the rescue ball had been inflated to one standard atmosphere with pure oxygen, which she had been breathing for hours. But Saint-Michael had been wearing a POS off and on before putting on his spacesuit, which did not provide enough time to flush the deadly nitrogen from his bloodstream. So he had had absolutely no protection. The physical labor he had done on Armstrong Station and on Enterprise only made things worse…

"No, I don't think he prebreathed properly," Ann said, having sorted it out. "Then it's dysbarism. You've done the only thing you can do for him now. Listen carefully. When the pressure in the chamber exceeds ten p.s.i., the pressure in the airlock will be greater than his suit's pressure. Remove his helmet and yours. Monitor the airlock pressure to make sure it climbs to at least twenty p.s.i. on the emergency setting. If it falls below ten p.s.i. for any reason, seal him back up in his spacesuit and set his suit controls to EMER again. Understand?"

"Yes."

"Keep him quiet and immobilized as much as possible. You'll be in there for at least twenty-four hours until the rescue craft reaches you. How do you feel?"

"I feel like I wish you guys were here now."

"No pain in your joints? Lightheadedness? Nausea?"

"No, no…"

"You should be okay if you follow the same regime as prescribed for the general. We'll fly a hyperbaric chamber up with Atlantis in case he hasn't recovered by then."

"Thanks," Ann said. Then had a sudden thought: "Can you retrieve the lifeboat with a hyperbaric chamber in the cargo bay? Will there be enough room?"

No reply. "Control? Do you copy?"

"Falcon here, Enterprise." The controller had come back on the channel, and his voice was muted, a monotone. Ann felt a shiver, anticipating what was coming next.

"Dr. Page, we lost contact with the lifeboat some hours ago. We were in radio contact with them shortly after separation from Armstrong Station. About a half-hour later they said they… sustained some damage. We lost control soon afterward."

"I see." Her body went limp. "Control, what sort of damage? What… happened?"

There was a moment's pause, then, "The last survivor, Airman Moyer, said they were under attack from a Soviet spaceplane. It apparently fired a single missile into the lifeboat. They didn't have time to get into spacesuits before their air ran out. There were no survivors…