Station Breaker

60 Mission Statement

While I help fill Prescott's head, people begin to file into the hangar as Markov and Admiral Jessup call in favors. There are eight Navy and Air Force personnel who have clearly worked together before. It's a testament to the amount of trust they have for the two men that they're ready to jump in and get to work without a lot of questions.

Jessup walks each one by me, says something to the effect, "You've never met this man before," and they give me a nod then go about their business setting up an impromptu tracking station in the control room and making sure the DarkStar and its shell are flightworthy.

The manuals are tossed back and forth between us as we try to make sure all the systems are up and running.

Few of them were the original members of the Space Ops crew and the exact specifications are a complete mystery. For all we know, turning the thing on could cause it to blow up.

Prescott puts on the suit and starts to drill, running through the switches and referring to the manual. I want to point things out to him, but know better. If Bennet taught me anything, it's when to back away and let the student teach himself.

"You want me to give you twenty?" I ask Prescott.

"That'd be great," he replies, running a finger down a line of text.

I look over at Laney as she confers with some techs about the spacesuit radio equipment. She might possibly be the most informed person here.

The authority she's been given is a testament to how dire the situation is and the confidence Markov has in her. I think it's well-placed.

The back door raises to let the carryall truck inside. I use the opportunity to step outside and get a breath of night air.

The Cape has always been a special place for me. The launchpads and buildings are spread out between mangroves and serene bays. It's an odd mixture of nature and technology, the past and future.

To the north, the gleaming complexes for NASA, iCosmos, SpaceX and others are brightly lit. I can spot two BFRs, "Big Fucking Rockets," standing on the launchpad waiting to fly into space. Each one weighs more than a battleship and is half as tall as the Empire State Building.

We live in an incredible age. People like Laney get it, so do some of the general public. But I think they're still in that early phase like the internet in the 1990s.

Yes, they know space is an industry now. Sure, they may know of someone who is peripherally involved. But they don't realize how big things are going to get.

If you look in the right direction you can see the US/iCosmos station as it flies by. Every other week a BFR launches with more hardware for it. When it's finished, the K1, the ISS and all the other space stations before will seem like tiny preludes to the future.

The US/iC will rotate in space, giving it artificial gravity. I think the moment people on Earth realize there are people walking around, behaving very much like life down here, yet in space, they'll begin to understand what it's all about.

The US/iC is just the first of many stations being planned. Smaller ones, bigger than the K1 and the ISS, are already coming online. There's even talk by the Chinese to build something even more massive than the US/iC — an actual city in space.

Then there are the spacecraft being built in orbit — ships for going beyond our orbit, to the Moon and the outer planets.

It's an exciting time to be alive.

"It'd be a shame to lose all this," says Laney as she manages to sneak up behind me on her crutches.

"Yeah, I was just thinking about that. This EMP would be bad."

"Technically it's an NMP, a nuclear magnetic pulse, but yeah." She nods to the people in the hangar. "There's a good team in there. Captain Baylor, she's smart. She'll be handling operations."

"With your advice, I hope." I seriously mean that.

"Oh, yeah. They're too short-staffed to kick me out. Let's just hope we can pull it off."

"You're a real trooper. A couple hours ago you had no idea what you were going to get pulled into."

She lets out a laugh. "Are you kidding? This is the kind of thing every space geek dreams about. Well, that and aliens coming down and asking me to go for a joyride. Heck, it's good to be part of something."

I take a look at the people going over equipment, inspecting the DarkStar and planning Prescott's mission. "Yeah. I'm just glad I don't have to be in hiding anymore. At least not here. Not in front of them."

"It must have been hell," says Laney.

"You have no idea. I'm just glad…"

"You don't have to run anymore?"

"Well, I'm worried what will happen if the crazy Russians set off the nuke. That's for sure. But it's nice to stand still for a moment."

I'm still worried that at any moment we're going to be raided by a bunch of soldiers descending from Black Hawks. At least I won't be alone.

Markov joins us outside. "There they are. The fugitive and his accomplice. Have you told everything we need to tell our Space Commando?"

"I'm letting him go over a few things without me breathing down his neck," I reply.

"And he is ready?"

"He'll have to be. There's only so much you can teach someone in this short amount of time. It took me years to get into space."

"Indeed," says Markov. He turns back around and returns to the hangar.

"I guess I should see if there's anything else I can tell Captain Awesome."