The Complete Heritage Trilogy: Semper Mars, Luna Marine, Europa Strike. Ian DouglasЧитать онлайн книгу.
I copy that four-five meters at one mps.”
In fact, rather more Hermes flights were made to the ISS each month than were American Shuttle II or Star Raker flights. For a time, US involvement in space had been on the decline.
Of course, the discoveries on Mars had changed all that. Hell, in another few years, if things kept going the way they were now and the international situation didn’t turn into a war, the ISS would be a true city in space, and Gresham would be thinking about retiring to the Moon or Mars.
Hermes 101 was slated to bring up a load of fresh water, half a ton of other consumables—food, mostly—and a set of replacement solar panels for main arrays worn out by the constant sandblasting that years of circling the Earth brought it.
There were also four people on board, replacements for four of the six ESA scientists currently on the station. The ISS complement currently numbered six Europeans, two Japanese, two Manchurians, three Russians, and five Americans.
“ISS, Hermes One-zero-one. Range two-one meters, closing at point four mps.”
“Copy, Hermes. Two-one meters at point four mps. Suggest you yaw one degree starboard and slow to point two mps.”
“Roger, ISS. I comply. Yaw, one degree starboard. Range now one-seven meters, closing at point two mps.”
Slowly, the blunt face of the Hermes grew larger in the window, its gently sloped hull white above and black below, a white acquisition strobe pulsing brilliantly above and behind its cockpit. Beyond, the blue Pacific was growing masked by clouds…the ocean vanishing beneath the vast, counterclockwise spiral of Hurricane Julio.
“Ten meters. Point two mps in approach.”
“You’re looking very good, Hermes. Bring her on in.”
The shuttle’s nose vanished behind the blunt projection of the station’s docking module. The shuttle’s airlock and docking tunnel were mounted vertically behind the cabin, in the cargo bay. Gresham now directed his full attention to one of the television monitors on his console, the one showing a camera angle looking straight down the docking collar, a view already blocked by the immense bulk of the Hermes orbiter. Slowly, slowly, the shuttle’s docking collar slid into view, slowed…steadied…then grew larger as the Hermes began snuggling up closer to the far larger ISS. Gresham gave the final countdown. “Three meters…two…one point five…one meter. Point five meter…contact light! I have contact. I have five green lights on the capture latches. Hermes One-zero-one, you are hard-docked. Welcome to the International Space Station!”
“Merci beaucoup, ISS. It is very good to be here.”
“I’m reading equalized pressures on both sides of the lock. You may come aboard when ready.”
“We come.”
Gresham shut down the console, removed his headset, and prepared to go and greet the newcomers. Visitors were always a high point at the station. “Hey, Colonel? Smitty.” It was Wesley Smith, one of the NASA engineers on board, calling over his coverall’s electronics. “I’m at the docking module. I, ah, think you’d—”
The transmission cut off. Puzzled, Gresham began pulling himself hand over hand across the control center. Nakamura and Taylor, the other two on duty in the control center, looked up.
“Probably a com failure. I’ll be right back.” Head-first, he dove through the deck hatch and entered the spine passageway, the main highway that extended from one end of the station to the other. Twisting left, he pulled himself with three months’ practice toward the docking module….
…grabbed a handhold and yanked himself to an abrupt and bobbing halt. Four men in black armor with light blue helmets spilled into the corridor in front of him, moving clumsily in microgravity and with the burden of the assault rifles they carried strapped to their sides. A fifth armored man appeared, propelling Smitty—who looked terribly vulnerable and scrawny in his NASA blue coveralls—ahead of him.
“Colonel Gresham?” a voice said, slightly distorted through a suit’s external speaker.
“I’m Gresham. What is the meaning of this?” Later he would realize how terribly trite that sounded, but at the time he could think of nothing more inventive.
“I am Colonel Cuvier, of the European Space Command. This facility is now under my control, and you and your people are my prisoners.”
“What the fuck do you think—”
“Please, Colonel,” the figure said, gesturing with an assault rifle. “It is war, and we have just…how is it you American military people put it? We have just taken the high ground.”
More UN troops were clambering through the hatch from the Hermes shuttle now, and Gresham’s mind leaped to the absurd image of boarders in a ship-to-ship action in the days of sail.
And there was not a damned thing he could do about it. No one on the ISS was armed, except for these armored troopers pouring through from what was supposed to have been a routine supply shuttle.
“Playing pirate, Cuvier?”
“No, Colonel. We are winning a war before it starts.”
The way he said it sent a chill down Gresham’s spine.
TUESDAY, 5 JUNE: 1615 HOURS GMT
The Pentagon
1215 hours EDT
Kaitlin Garroway was beginning at last to recover from her jet lag. It had been a week since she’d returned to the US to be greeted by a whirlwind of meetings and conferences, first with Commandant Warhurst himself, then with various military officers and civilians who’d debriefed her on what she’d seen in Japan, whom she’d talked to, and what the more cryptic portions of her father’s message might mean. She’d been as helpful as she could…and thank God that she hadn’t seen much in the way of military preparations. She didn’t want to be in the position of an American spy when the information she provided might be used against Yukio.
Fortunately, all she could tell them was that the base at Tanegashima had been closed to all outside communications, which they would have been able to verify other ways…and that the mood of the people, in particular, the people of the Ishiwara household, had not been notably belligerent or anti-American. She still found it hard to believe that Japan would join the UN crusade against the United States.
For the past week, she’d been staying at the Warhurst house out in Warrenton, Virginia, a twenty-five-minute maglev commute from the Pentagon. She’d protested that he didn’t need to do that, that she could take a hotel or even return to Pittsburgh, but Warhurst had insisted.
She liked the Warhursts. She had the feeling that they were struggling to pull their lives together after the tragedy that had just overwhelmed them. Stephanie, Warhurst’s wife, went out of her way to make Kaitlin feel at home. Over the course of the week, she found herself growing closer both to Stephanie and to Janet, their daughter-in-law, who was also staying in Warrenton, and even young Jeff was glad to have found a new chess partner. The Warhursts’ sincere welcome warmed her, all the more once she became aware of the grief they all suffered. She’d known that an American had been killed during the embassy takeover in Mexico City…but not that he’d been the son of the commandant of the Marine Corps.
Montgomery Warhurst seemed to be carrying the loss well, though he did wear an air of quiet sorrow. Maybe that was why she’d finally agreed to stay in Warrenton for a while; she found it hard to refuse anyone who was hurting so. In any case, the commandant seemed to feel that she could yet be useful in communicating with her father, and if there was any chance at all of finding out what was going on on Mars, she was determined to grab it.
After a week, though, she’d begun wondering when she could get back to Pittsburgh. Not that it was urgent—her job didn’t start for another month—but she was beginning to feel like a fifth wheel at the Warrenton place. She was surprised, then, when Warhurst called her early one morning and asked her to meet him at the Pentagon…for