Acid Sky (24 page)

‘He’s going round.’

‘Come on, come on,’ Donaldson urged, watching the spaceplane rising up against the crosshairs of the glideslope. ‘Power!’ For a moment, it looked as if they would make it; the spaceplane’s nose was rising as it passed over the threshold, and they could hear the thunder of its engines.

Suddenly the control room rolled hard to the right as an enormous gust seized the carrier and heaved it over. Donaldson and another crewman were thrown against the wall.

‘Hard left stick!’ Conway yelled, but it was too late. A heavy thump, then another, came through the structure from behind them, and the carrier shuddered.

‘Control room! We have a crash on the deck, they’ve hit the deck! They’re coming towards us, they’re …’
the voice disintegrated into a tangle of broken words, before cutting off altogether. The
Langley
continued its roll to the right; the heavy spaceplane was sliding over the wing.

The
Langley
suddenly lurched upright, and then the entire ship was battered by a loud
boom
, and following hard on that, the control room erupted in alarms.

For a moment, nobody said anything; they were staring in disbelief at the growing sea of red text on the control panels. They had never seen anything like this, not even in emergency simulations. Another
boom
, longer this time, shuddered through the ship, and it began to roll to the right again, but the roll kept on going.

‘Bank angle,’
the flight computer added its voice to the strident warning alarms.

Conway recovered first, hauling himself over to the helm position against the steepening tilt of the deck. The autopilot had disconnected, and the helmsman had taken control, holding the steering controls over to the left.

‘Can you get us level?’ Conway gasped.

‘She’s hard over, sir – she’s not responding!’ The helmsman’s eyes were wide as the roll continued. Conway glanced at the engine control panel and saw to his horror that both of the right engines had stopped and were on fire; alarm messages filled the screen. The fires were Engineering’s problem; somehow Conway had to keep the
Langley
in the air with only two engines.

‘Hard left, all rudders.’

‘Sir, that’ll risk—’

‘Do it!’ Conway barked. ‘Forget the manuals; we’ve got to stop this roll. And give me full thrust, both left engines.’

The helmsman dialled in the settings and watched as the remaining engines’ thrust readings rose. The engines were so big that it took several seconds to change power settings. The carrier continued to roll, and was going past forty degrees of bank.

Donaldson pulled his way past the crazily tilted consoles to stand behind them.

‘How bad is it?’ he asked Conway.

‘We’ve lost both right engines and there’s no elevon control on the right wing; it must have been damaged.’

‘I’m losing her, sir!’ The helmsman looked up in panic. ‘We’re going over!’

‘Not if I can help it,’ Conway muttered, and sat down in the right seat, pulling the seat straps over his shoulders. ‘My aircraft.’ Outside, a roar of air started to buffet the front of the ship as the airflow started to break up.

‘Bank angle, stalling.’

‘Have we got full power on the engines?’ Conway shouted. It was becoming hard to hear above the noise.

‘Yes sir!’

Conway pushed the controls forward to keep the nose down in the turn. ‘Loadmaster!’

‘Yes sir!’

‘Pump everything you’ve got into the left trim tanks – don’t stop until the tanks are full. Then dump all our spare fuel; we need to lose as much weight as possible!’

‘Bank angle sixty degrees, stalling.’

‘We’d better transmit a mayday.’ Conway looked at the captain.

‘Yes.’ Donaldson turned to the communications console. ‘Send a mayday, give our position, request the other carriers get over here as quickly as possible.’

‘Yes sir.’

Donaldson turned back to the helm. Was the roll slowing? The carrier was so big that it was hard to tell. But the numbers on the console were slowing; the dumping of excess weight and Conway’s actions were having an effect at last. The roll slowed, stopped, and then started to move back – the carrier was gradually coming upright again. Conway blew out his cheeks in relief. He eased the giant aircraft back to an almost-even keel, and held it there while he sorted the trim. The
Langley
moved about unsteadily while he experimented, until he announced:

‘Okay, I think I’ve got it. We’re flying with almost full left rudder, and all our trim over to the left. I can just maintain altitude, but only in a very slow right-hand turn. If I try to fly straight and level, we just lose altitude.’

‘Well done. Just keep us flying.’ Donaldson clapped Conway on the shoulder, and turned to the rest of the room. ‘Get me the tower.’

‘The tower’s gone, sir.’

‘What do you mean, gone?’

‘I mean it’s missing sir – broken off completely. The spaceplane crashed into it and took it off at the base.’

Donaldson’s face paled as he heard the words, but the external camera displays were telling him the same thing – there was nothing left of the tower except a jagged stump, and both the engines on that side were belching smoke into the sky behind them. The wing—

Jesus. The wing.

The leading edge had been torn open and the wing ribs exposed where the spaceplane had tumbled over it. In the distance, on the wing’s trailing edge, he could see that the main elevon had gone completely, and one of the others was badly damaged and stuck in one position. The surface was covered with gouge marks and was missing panels. It didn’t take an aerodynamicist to know that the wing was only producing about half the lift it should. And if it stalled, if the airflow over its surface broke up and the lift collapsed, then the carrier would flip over and go straight down.

‘Helm,’ Donaldson said, as calmly as he could. ‘Right wing is severely damaged. Watch your angle of attack. Let us turn if you have to, but keep the airflow moving over the wing.’

‘Roger that. Can we get any thrust from three and four?’

‘Negative. Four’s in pieces and three’s shut down, both look like they’re on fire. The right main elevon is missing, and the one next to it looks like it’s jammed. Don’t let the airspeed drop, that wing will stall if you give it the slightest chance. Damage control!’

‘Sir.’
Neale’s voice came on the intercom.

‘What have we got?’

‘Sir, the corridor to the tower’s breached but the pressure doors are holding. Radiation leak and reactor fire in engine four but temperature’s dropping. Engine three shutdown, fire is out. One and two are holding. Mains bus B is offline but power is holding.’

‘Casualties?’

‘Seven missing in the tower, including Captain Shaffer. Plus the crew of the spaceplane. Three crewmen injured in the hangar and the galley, one serious.’

‘Deck elevator?’

‘Operational. We can launch aircraft.’

‘How many aircraft have we got?’

‘We’re checking them over now. They were all chained down for the storm, but Zero Nine broke free and hit the hangar wall, so we’ve only got eight operational. Zero Four’s still missing an engine but we can get it flying if we have to.’

‘Roger.’ Donaldson considered for a moment, glancing down at the radar display on the chart table in the centre of the room, and then he looked round at the control room personnel. ‘Okay. Listen up. Open pressure doors down the port side of the ship so that we can get casualties to sick bay. Bring generators up to maximum power. And I want heads of all sections, and all our pilots, here to the control room in five minutes.’ He paused. ‘And get me the captains of the
Wright
and the
Curtiss.
’

The
Langley
continued its fight to fly in the turbulent air at the edges of the great storm. The thick trails of smoke from its shattered engines subsided to a faint trickle, but the giant carrier was heeling over slightly to the right. It pursued a slowly curving course that took it round closer to the storm. Below the carrier, tonnes of stored liquid propellants fell away in great streams of boiling gas, to lighten the ship and make it easier to handle.

Elsewhere over Venus, the
Wright
and the
Curtiss
altered course and raced towards the
Langley
. The huge storm prevented the
Curtiss
from flying the most direct route, and even the
Wright
would take nearly two hours to get here. Somehow, the
Langley’s
surviving crew had to keep the stricken carrier flying until then.

Ahead of the
Langley
, the sky had turned a dark grey. A slowly turning maelstrom of dark cloud, shot through with lightning, dominated the skyline, stretching out towards the horizon on either side.

‘So you see our situation.’ Donaldson glanced round the chart table at his senior officers and pilots. Neale, the engineering chief. Conway, who had managed to bring the carrier under control and had now handed it back to the helmsman. Shaffer was missing of course, and Donahue was in the sick bay tending the injured. Coombes stood by the door, well away from the captain. Gray and the other Frigate pilots had gathered at the end of the table, most of them silent after hearing the news about Shaffer and the crew in the tower. The chart table displayed a plan view of the
Langley
, with the damage marked in red.

‘We can stay in the air – just. If we attempt to maintain a straight course, we have to sideslip the ship, we increase our drag, and with just two engines, we lose altitude. If we maintain our altitude, we can’t hold our course, and we steer in a gentle turn – right into the centre of the storm.’ He switched the view on the chart table, and pointed to the storm system ahead of them.

‘Can we get either of the engines restarted?’ Gray asked.

‘Negative,’ the engineering chief broke in, ‘Number four’s gone completely, and number three’s just scrap metal; it’ll never turn again.’

‘If we had one engine working each side, we could maintain altitude and direction, but with the damage to the right wing, and no engines on that side, we’re dangerously unstable, especially in this turbulence,’ Conway added. As if to underline his point, the
Langley
rocked suddenly beneath them, and Conway glanced anxiously over to the helm.

‘The good news is that we still have power and we can launch aircraft,’ the captain continued. ‘I have considered the options and I do not see any alternative but to evacuate and make for the other carriers. We will enter the storm in less than one hour, and in our present condition, we will be unable to control our attitude and we will break up. I’ve declared an emergency, and both the
Wright
and the
Curtiss
are making their way over here as fast as they can. We can’t take landings as our arresting gear is damaged, so it’s up to us to get everyone off the ship as fast as we can. Does anyone have any better ideas?’ He looked round the table, but nobody spoke.

‘Very well then.’ He paused for a moment, staring at the chart table, before looking up again. ‘As captain of this vessel, I order an immediate abandon ship. Take as many people as you possibly can in each aircraft. Neale, Yates – damage is on the starboard side, so you will marshal everyone in the lower port side corridor outside the hangars. We’ve rehearsed this before in emergency drills –’ he looked at each of them in turn ‘– so follow the procedure. I will stay here with Colonel Conway and co-ordinate the evacuation. Donahue and the medical cases are to go in the last aircraft, and they’ll need the seats removing for any stretchers. Is everyone clear on what they have to do?’

There were nods and Yes Sirs from round the table.

‘Very well then. Let’s do this.’

The meeting broke up, and Donaldson went back to the commander’s seat. Now that he had taken the decision, the terrible decision that every master of a ship dreaded having to make, he felt somehow calmer; there was nothing he could do now but ensure that everyone got off safely.

At least they had power, he thought. And some time. They could get everyone off in thirty minutes if they had to, although he was concerned about any damage that the crash might have caused to the flight deck.

A klaxon sounded behind him, making him jump. It sounded twice more, and then Conway’s voice sounded authoritatively throughout the length of the ship:

‘Attention, attention. All crew to muster stations. All crew to muster stations. Abandon ship, repeat abandon ship. Assemble in the port corridor, port corridor. This is not a drill.’

Almost immediately, the responses started to come in from the crew chiefs, acknowledging the order. The red lights on the situation board began to go green as the first musters started to assemble.

‘Control, Engineering.’

‘Captain here, go ahead.’

‘I’m back in the engineering control room now, captain. I’m closing the react valves to the refineries and shutting the converters down.’

‘Roger.’ That was the final act. Once the main valves were closed and the refinery shut down, they wouldn’t be able to make air or water. The carrier was finished as a home for them.

‘And I’m running the generators up to one hundred and ten percent. That’s as much as they’ll provide continuously. I’ll lock out the controls and then I’m going to the muster station. Do you need me for anything more, captain?’

‘No, that’s it. Thank you Jim, you’ve done a great job.’

‘I’ll see you in the hangar, sir.’
There was a pointed pause.

‘Yes. Yes, of course.’

So this was what it felt like, he thought. This was what it felt like to lose your command. You never really thought that it could happen to you, even though you practiced these things in the simulator, day after day. Engine fires, hull breaches, crashes on the flight deck, fire in the refinery, fire in the hangar, electrical power failure, smoke in the air conditioning, man overboard. That one was a laugh. They had to have a procedure for it, to keep the folks back home happy. But everyone here knew that, if you ever fell overboard, the only procedure you could follow was to hold the funeral.