Red Horizon: The Truth of Discovery (Discovery Series Book 2) Read online

  “Ah yes, you’re referring to the Polo One incident,” Rock said.

  “Yes, I thought we were done with that by now.”

  “We are never really done, though the investigative branch has been more detailed than normal. You can’t blame them after the first fatality since the Lunar and Mars missions started.”

  “I understand. I assumed the findings may ground me based on what happened.”

  “You think you’re here to be grounded?” Rock was surprised.

  “What else could it be?” Jules looked at him seriously. She was dressed in her business casual, which was unusual for the agency, as she usually wore her jumpsuit when on the center’s grounds. The investigative branch was a hybrid of NASA, the NSA, and the NTSB, overseen by a congressional subcommittee due to the amount of funding spent on the missions, as well as the nature of their operations. Space was harsh, and it required strict oversight.

  Rock looked at her carefully before leaning back and addressing her. “Look, Jules, I called you here to offer you first seat on the Red Horizon.”

  Jules’s mouth opened and then closed again, and then her eyelids narrowed. “Are you joking with me, Rock?”

  “I’m dead serious,” he said. “I received authorization from the president herself to make the final selection based on my assessment of the crew’s training, abilities, and experience. I know it’s a bit early after losing one of your crew, but the investigative arm issued an internal report faulting the incident on micro meteors. The final report won’t be out for months yet, but the president asked for something preliminary in order to move forward with the mission.”

  Jules also leaned back in her chair, and Rock watched as her top leg bobbed up and down as her interlaced hands rested on her knee. She looked pensive for a moment before finally replying. “Did you discuss this with any other candidate?”

  “You’re referring to Sullivan?” Rock asked.

  “Yes,” Julie admitted.

  “No, I don’t want to rock the boat needlessly, if you refused or felt you weren’t up to the responsibility.”

  Julie understood what the NASA director was referring to. If she turned him down or had changed her mind in light of the fatality to Sanchez, then he didn’t want Sullivan, or any other crew member, for that matter, to know that he had offered the top position to someone else. It could prove to be a distraction. “Why me, Rock? Neil has been training for this for years.”

  “He has, and I intend to move him to second seat. He’ll still go on the mission.”

  “Why not first seat?”

  Rock took his turn to look at his chosen commander for the entire mission and give her an honest answer that didn’t seem politically incorrect. “Quite frankly, Jules, I decided I want you up there for several reasons. First, you’re the most qualified shuttle pilot we have, not to mention you have certified on the Horizon as well. Also, and probably most importantly, is that I need a mission commander who won’t take gruff from our military companions.”

  “You mean one who won’t take shit,” Jules corrected him.

  “Yes,” Rock agreed. “That is rather coarse, but accurate. I also need someone who can hot seat on both the Horizon and the landers. Look, I also intend to have you first step onto the planet. Do you understand me?”

  Julie nodded in unison with her leg. “You know how badly I want this, don’t you?”

  “I do, and I’ll need an answer right away,” Rock said.

  “You have it,” she responded.

  “You don’t want time to discuss this with your family?” he asked.

  “It’s been discussed, several times already. They are on board with my decision.” Jules finally stopped her leg bobbing and sat still in her seat, watching Rock attentively.

  “All right, it’s none of my business. I know you have younger children, and if our thirty-day window passes, then you’ll be out there for over a year and a half longer. Please consider that when making your decision,” Rock said.

  “It’s done. Will you accept it now?”

  “Accepted, and congratulations, Jules.”

  “Thank you, Richard.” She leaned forward, and they shook hands again.

  “Look, one more thing,” Rock said, folding his arms and looking across the table at his newly appointed mission commander. “This is for real. The major upset me with that stunt he pulled, but he made a good point. We can’t afford to be complacent or incompetent.”

  “I agree,” she said.

  “I’m not privy to everything going on out there. The NSA and the Security Council briefs me on need-to-know basis. But from what I’ve heard, the Chinese and the Russians are carrying nuclear missiles and are prepared to fight with hand-to-hand weapons in adverse environmental conditions if necessary.”

  “I’d think they are preparing so much against one another.”

  “They are. The briefs I see mention that they see each other as the greater threat, and they see us a major competitor but minor instigator, and their military preparations have reflected that,” Rock said.

  “Well, if that stunt, as you call it, has any merit in its demonstration, then I think we’ll be fine with Major Carter and his men up there,” Jules said.

  “You’re good with that after what happened yesterday?” Rock asked.

  “I am. No need to worry about that anymore,” she said.

  Rock shifted gears for a moment. “You feeling all right after your extended flight?”

  “I’m fine, just tired of the usual tests,” she said. “Blood this, tissue that. Plus they make us walk and then run to show we still have control over our extremities, but that’s not the worst.”

  “What would that be?” he asked.

  “What doctor came up with the bowel test is beyond me,” she said.

  Rock laughed. “I know. I’ve read the results, and it’s beyond me to answer. We just have to accept some of the medical parameters for release when coming Earth-side.”

  “If I have an issue, I’ll take a laxative,” she said, smiling at him.

  “Or extra fiber, if it’s the other way around.” He smiled back at her.

  “Either way, please leave me be,” she said.

  “Well, it’s good to hear that you’re feeling well. I’ll need you focused when you boost.”

  “I’ll be ready,” she said. “What’s the plan with the rest of the crew?”

  “You already know that Sullivan will be moved to second seat,” he said.

  “Did you ask Craig?”

  “I talked it over with him, but he isn’t interested,” Rock said. “We will invite Wilson and Porter to handle our technical and mechanical positions, and then I was thinking of having Maria Mayer as our science officer.”

  “That leaves the medical,” she said.

  Rock nodded. “Hill.”

  “Really?” She sat upright, and her surprise caught Rock off guard.

  “Is there something wrong?” Rock asked.

  “No,” Julie began. “It’s just that everyone was betting . . . I mean, the primary discussion for this was between Morrison and Bernard. Hill is rather . . . young for the position, is he not?”

  “I don’t know,” Rock said. “I think forty is old enough, don’t you?”

  “Come on, Rock, you know what I’m getting at. The other two have at least a decade or more of experience over Hill.”

  “I know, but they have less than half the time logged in flight that Hill has . . . combined,” Rock pointed out.

  Julie nodded and looked down, bringing one of her hands to her chin before responding and looking Rock in the eye. “I didn’t realize he had logged that much time.”

  “He has, and this is no slight on either of the other two gentlemen. I simply think that we need a more practical crew, and I was hoping Hill fit the bill better, especially considering that I was offering you first seat.”

  “Offered,” Julie corrected her boss.

  “Do you object?”

  “Not a
t all, though we came down together, and he was quite flustered as to why he was being recalled. He thought for sure that he would spend the next month or so up there till the mission doctor arrived,” Julie said.

  Rock knew that their mission protocol meant that certain positions had to be filled around the clock, and it was widely, and correctly, assumed that anyone selected to perform skeleton crew duties the month before launch was simply holding the position down till the selected candidate arrived. Morrison had been called on duty, and scuttlebutt had Bernard as the preferred selection.

  “Good, let’s keep it that way, then. I’ll need you to group your crew together, then, and start a briefing. We’ll need to meet with Major Carter’s folks later today and then set up a schedule for prep time and off time.”

  “Looking forward to the downtime,” Julie said.

  “Also, Rhonda has a file for you on your way out. It has the basic manifest for the Horizon, as well as personnel folders on your team. There is a rather lengthy report on the flight path, orbital insertion specs, and the dates and times for the resupply ship burn using the Hohmann orbit. If everything goes as planned, then it won’t arrive till after you’ve already left Mars orbit, but it will be our insurance just in case.”

  “Is the mission profile updated, or does it still show the extended stay scenario?” she asked.

  “It’s been updated since we have a different crew and equipment manifest, but it still allows for us to keep a contiguous presence on Mars if necessary. That will be our call after we get up there and assess things a bit. Right now, we’re hoping for a four-month burn, no more than thirty days on station, followed by four more months back.”

  “Otherwise, we’re stuck for a very long time,” Jules noted.

  “Right,” Rock said. “That’s why we have to ensure the supply ship makes it just in case. Any of a number of things can go wrong and screw up our orbit window. We’re lucky to have this short of a flight time as it is.”

  “Yes, rocket technology has improved considerably, though I’d prefer to have had that new VASIMR drive or nuclear rocket instead.”

  “We didn’t have time,” Rock said. “We’re lucky we threw close to a trillion dollars at this in the meantime. The chemical rockets aren’t ideal but put up enough propellant to accelerate and slow down, and almost anything is possible.”

  “Does the Horizon have enough to stick to mission parameters?” Jules asked.

  “Propellant?” Rock asked, and Julie nodded. “Yes, we’ll have to cannibalize a bit from the two lunar orbiters, as well as take almost the entire reserve from the moon, but we’ll have enough, though our reserve will be only eighteen percent and not thirty-three percent. You need to read that update as well and let me know if you’re good with it.”

  “Do we have a choice?” she asked.

  “We always have a choice,” Rock said. “Just depends on if we want to get there before or at the same time as the Russians and the Chinese.”

  “Speaking of which, we need to see what they do as well, right?”

  “Yes, that too. We won’t know for sure the level of progress on our mission parameters till after we investigate the alien transmission site,” Rock said.

  “Anything new from the Mars surveyors?” she asked, referring to a series of mapping and photographic satellites already placed into Martian orbit.

  “Not yet,” Rock said. “The signal has been intermittent as you know, and it’s still localized to the Tharsis Montes region, specifically the middle of the three volcano-type mountains, Pavonis Mons.”

  “I know. I saw the initial report and thought that was an interesting place for a signal transmitter. I would have thought the tallest peak on Olympus Mons would be more logical,” she noted.

  “Only if height was the sole factor,” Rock said.

  “What do you mean?” she asked.

  “We can’t tell for sure, but there is another indication of a potential infrared source that is not ambient in nature to its surroundings located at the western head of the Valles Marineris.”

  “That wasn’t in the report I read.” Julie leaned forward.

  “No, it was added later. I suspect that by the time you arrive, we may actually have more than one target for you to recon in order to complete the mission objectives.”

  “Are we compensating for this with our landers and rovers?” she asked.

  “As best we can. For now, as long as they are within five hundred miles of each other, then we can cover both. It’s best if you read the report and familiarize yourself with the updated objectives and milestones.”

  “One more question,” she asked.

  “Sure,” he said.

  “We going to keep the imperial unit or go with metric?

  “Well, due to the intense nationalistic pride that these space missions have generated in our respective populations, the president and Congress have chosen the imperial form of measurement, but you already knew that.”

  “I was worried you’d change it up on us at the last minute, sort of like what you did with the flight crew selection.”

  “No, I don’t think we’ll be changing the instrumentation before you leave.”

  “Yeah, well, NASA almost named our ship the Marco Polo,” she said, suppressing a chuckle.

  “That wasn’t us,” Rock said, smiling in return. “We needed public support, and I had always objected to running a competition online to name the ship.”

  “It almost backfired, and Death Star came in a close second,” she said.

  “We managed to rally Red Horizon to third place. That much, at least, helped save us,” Rock said.

  “Not before it took an act of Congress to overturn the name change,” Julie said, referring to the fact that Marco Polo took first, followed by Death Star, and then Red Horizon, which was an academic favorite. “Ares this and Ares that was way down on the list, as so many science fiction books had been written with the Ares mission or the Ares rocket or the Ares spaceship, that the public was eager for something different and creative.”

  “Yeah, but Congress worked slowly, so by the time they had disqualified the first two names, the shuttles had already been built,” Rock said.

  “So why did we keep them named the same?” Julie asked, tilting her head slightly.

  “Who knows?” Rock said. “I think the public, and us, for that matter, simply got used to calling them Polo One and so forth.” The ships were abbreviated from Marco Polo One to just Polo One, as using their full names was rather labor intensive over the radio.

  “Well, I’m rather fond of them,” Julie said.

  “I agree. Do you have any other questions, then, for me?” Rock asked.

  “No,” she said, looking around his office for a moment before returning her attention to him. “I can only say thank you and let you know that I intend to see this mission succeed.”

  “I know. You’ve worked hard the last few years to see us progress to where we are now, even though most indications were that others were being trained to man this mission. I can only imagine how hard it was to stick with the program and make it a success with the thought that someone else would step in and take it over. I say this because I think you deserve mission command.”

  Jules nodded and smiled at him. “Thank you. I will do everything in my power to see this through.”

  “I know you will,” Rock said. “We have work to do, and time is running short. Have Rhonda call Commander Sullivan for me on your way out.”

  “Will do, Rock,” she said, standing and picking up her case before walking to the door. She opened it and then stepped through, but turned back for one last word. “The Sovs and he Chinese will never see us coming.”

  The door closed, and Rock muttered under his breath, “I hope so.”

  Chapter 14

  Contemplate

  Vostochny Cosmodrome

  Siberia, Russia

  In the near future, Year 4, Day 60

  It had been well over a mo
nth since Vlad met with his new crew members, and they ran tabletop exercises for the critical mission scenarios that had been identified by the High Council. Vlad had flown between Vostochny and Moscow weekly, working on ensuring that every item on the primary manifest had been properly loaded, launched, and received by the Red Star’s working crew.

  The crew worked round the clock on flight simulators for landings as well as running tests and scenarios based on what they could encounter on the planet. The Soviets found themselves seriously behind on anything to do with the Red Planet, as the last two decades they had focused their space programs on studying Venus and even Mercury. The Americans had landed enough of their damn landers, rovers, and probes on Mars over the last few decades that Vlad thought that if they collected them all together in one spot, they would fill up a large parking lot. The American obsession with the planet was unhealthy.

  The Chinese weren’t in much of a better situation either. They had only landed a single probe and one rover on the Martian surface, with two other failed attempts. Vlad wasn’t sure if fifty-fifty was better than never having made the attempt, though Russia did have a half-dozen satellites orbiting the planet, from a scientific weather one to a radar mapper. They at least had a presence enough to see what was happening on the surface, though the periods of blackout time were fairly large considering their orbits.

  The lone alien signal was no longer broadcasting and had stopped three weeks prior. It was not a major issue, as every one of the world’s superpowers had already mapped and marked the exact location of the signal years earlier. What was interesting now was the infrared signature coming from the extreme western end of the immense canyon known as the Valles Marineris.

  No spy satellite, radar, photographic, thermal, or otherwise could detail what was there due to the angle of its location. The best they had was the thermal cameras that registered a heat source under the northern wall of the canyon, leaking out intensely into the open area of the canyon itself. Dmitry had said that even the American satellite in polar orbit, which had the best view as it rose from the South Pole and flew north, could not get a visual on the site. They would be just as surprised as his team, or the Chinese, when they arrived.