Pegasus in Space (33 page)

P
eter went back to his quarters. He planned to go to the gym and work out on the Reeve Board; he fancied he felt tingling in his chest and upper arms. Or was it a reaction to the pleasant time he’d had with Ceara? When he got in, the message light on his comunit was blinking.

“Pete? Greene here. We got transport at 0300 tomorrow,
Limo-34
. First Base’s in conjunction for another five days so we’d better get cracking if you want to do a walkabout at Oceanus Procellarum. Not that there’s much to see, since they planted the base on the most uninteresting real estate the Apollos could find. Please check in with me.”

The formal request, not the usual flip “catch me, will ya?” that was Johnny Greene’s usual style was, as troubling as it was, in another fashion, satisfying. The general was worried that he had overstepped the parameters of their long association in this morning’s meeting. Ordinarily, Johnny just made a telepathic contact when they were both onstation. And they were going in a Limo, huh? Peter grinned. Maybe he was just in the way of giving General J. Greene a surprise on this Lunar Insertion Moon Orbit shuttle.

When he did make mental contact, Johnny sounded a bit tentative.

Just sent the SA party down. Leitao was totally out of it. Fraga was closer to her than a blister. Wonder if there’s something between them? I’m checking out the crate I’ll be flying
.

I thought the admiral said there wouldn’t be transport until late tomorrow?

I’m speeding things up. Silversmith is checking out our EMUs. I used rank to get the galley stuffed with decent chow instead of standard grub. I bumped one other passenger so we could stow as much of Watari’s wish list as the shuttle’ll take. Since he now knows who to ask, he sent us another list of urgent items. We take ’em with us, he’s got no gripe that you’re joyriding to the Moon
. On a totally different tack, the general added:
Did you have that fried chicken they were serving in the officers’ mess?

Peter hesitated briefly. Had some of Leitao’s paranoia rubbed off on him that morning? Was Johnny serving notice that Peter had been seen with Ceara Scott? Or just being friendly?

Yeah, with the corn bread and pecan pie
.

I missed a good meal and everyone informed me that I had
, and there was genuine regret in his voice.

Does Rhyssa know we’re going to First Base?

Yeah. I had Madlyn tell her that
.

And about the meeting?
Peter really didn’t want Rhyssa to be upset about the responsibilities he had just undertaken.

Noooo, not exactly
, Johnny said, hedging, sounding more like himself.
Madlyn didn’t know either so scuttlebutt’s been contained. For a while
, he added cynically.
We’ll make our getaway before that goes public. See ya down at boat bay twenty-nine, kit and caboodle, no later than 0230. Get an early night. Okay?

Okay!

Curious about which pilot would be flying the
Limo-34
with them, Peter put in a call to Nicola Nizukami, who was certainly quite willing to tell him that Lieutenant Xiang Liu would copilot the flight with General Greene. Peter thanked her, smiling to himself. Couldn’t be better. A Limo had a crew of four and accommodated a dozen passengers, including service personnel who could be counted on to stand a watch. He began to pack, knowing he was limited to one kilo since a Limo’s facilities were spartan. First in was his EMU skin. So he was really going to get to the Moon. Almost absently, he slipped in the papers he’d need.

That done, he decided that he’d better put some time in now on the Reeve Board. He needed a workout if only to get rid of the tissue salts built up by the morning’s tensions. Maybe it would take care of the tingling sensation he’d been getting in his chest. He didn’t have time to be sick or anything. Not when he could get to First Base.

———

J
ohnny made his way to the Limo’s cockpit as the rest of the passengers and crew settled themselves and strapped in. He noted the three seismic engineers from the Japanese army, three servicemen in First Base slate-gray fatigues on their way back after R and R, the two replacement cooks, both women, and the four men who must be the solar heating engineers. Johnny nodded a greeting to the young lieutenant in the copilot’s seat.

“Well, Mr. Liu, I can see that the admiral is sparing none but the best for our jaunt,” Johnny said with a grin. He looked around, noticed that Peter had taken the engineer’s chair and absently waved him out of it. “Peter, that’s the chair for the third officer. We stand three watches on a Limo.” He turned back to Xiang Liu. “Who have we got for third watch—Carnegie?”

Lieutenant Liu glanced at Peter before replying blandly, “Sir, we’re at full complement now.”

“What?” Johnny groaned. “We’re going to fly this tub watch and ward?”

Peter cleared his throat. “The admiral thought I could stand in.”

“You?” Johnny’s green-flecked amber eyes widened. “Peter, flying a Limo is serious work, it’s—”

“Ninety-eight percent boredom and two percent sheer terror,” Peter said, finishing Johnny’s famous quote. He pulled some flimsies from his pocket. “Here’s my flight certificate, simulator log book, and rating.”

Behind him, Liu nodded and smiled encouragingly.

Johnny spluttered. “But those ratings have to be signed—”

“By Admiral Coetzer himself, sir,” the lieutenant said. “He’s taken a great interest in Mr. Reidinger’s progress.”

Johnny narrowed his eyes at the young lieutenant. “And what do you have to do with this?”

“Xiang was one of my three flight instructors,” Peter replied. “Don’t you remember encouraging me to learn more while I was busy healing?”

“Coming up on our launch window in two minutes, sir,” Lieutenant Liu reported in a circumspect tone of voice, forcing the general to make a decision.

Johnny frowned.
Peter, you don’t
have
to do this, you know
.

But I
do!

General John Greene pursed his lips tightly. After some moments he nodded abruptly. “Very well, Mr. Reidinger, is the ship secure?”

Peter suppressed an exhilarated grin, forcing himself to check the engineering gauges. “Cargo locks secured, port side passenger lock closing—now!” he said, adding formally, “Sir, the ship is secure.”

“CIC’s hailing us, sir,” Lieutenant Liu said, tapping his headset.

Johnny tensed to respond and then sat back, waiting. Peter didn’t need the hint to know that as junior he was responsible for all radio traffic. He adjusted his headset and responded, “CIC, this is
Limo-34.
”

Admiral Coetzer himself responded. “Roger,
Limo-34
, what’s your status?”

Peter turned to Johnny. “CIC asks what’s our status, sir.”

“And what is our status, Mr. Reidinger?” Johnny replied, continuing his own test of Peter’s knowledge.

Peter glanced over the control panels. Environmental: green, Electrical: green, Nav. and Comm.: green, RCS: green, Main engines: green, Computer—

“Sir, there’s a fault on main processing unit two,” Peter said.

Lieutenant Liu glanced up from his preflight check, toggled a switch, and went back to work.

“Taking MPU Two off-line,” Liu announced. He muttered, “We’ve got five more.”

“Sir, our status is green,” Peter said. “Will you check me?”

Johnny smiled. “Yes, Mr. Reidinger, I check you. Our status is green.”

“CIC,
Limo-34
reports status green.”

“Roger,
34
, you are cleared for departure. Once clear, contact Padrugoi Departure on 120.4,” the admiral replied.

“
Limo-34
on 120.4,” Peter repeated, punching in Padrugoi Departure’s frequency on the second radio. To Johnny he said, “Clear for departure, sir.”

“Roger,” Johnny said. To Liu, “Unlock clamps two forward, three aft, four aft, and one forward.”

Liu ran quick fingers over the control panels. “All clamps unlocked.”

Johnny pursed his lips for a moment, then said, “Mr. Reidinger, take us out.”

Again Peter had to suppress a surge of excitement as he punched in the
codes to power his thruster control panel. “Mr. Liu, are we scheduled for a standard departure?”

“Yes,” was the prompt reply.

Peter nodded, put in the standard codes he had memorized under Xiang Liu’s guidance, and radioed CIC. “
Limo-34
is free and thrusting negative-y at five point zero meters per second on standard departure vector.”

Peter half expected Johnny to quiz him for saying “negative-y” instead of “down”—a question he’d been asked many times in training and he had his answer ready. “Down” is too vague in space; saying that you’re thrusting on the negative-y axis states exactly what you’re doing relative to Padrugoi—which is the largest craft.

And all spacecraft maneuvers use the largest craft’s frame of reference—a very good explanation!
Johnny agreed with a chuckle.

Peter was chagrined to discover that his subvocalization had been so loud that Johnny had heard it.

“Roger,
34,
” a new voice, not the admiral’s, responded. “Radar has a clean separation. You are go for de-rendezvous maneuvers.”

Peter knew from his long hours in the simulators that the motions of the two spacecraft in close orbit were not at all intuitive. In fact, in order to slip behind Padrugoi,
Limo-34
would have to speed
up
—and it would take a wild ride around the front of Padrugoi before the shuttle got behind the space station. But first the Limo would have to crawl to a safe distance from the Station before it could fire its thrusters. Moving at a meter a second, it would take over three minutes—Peter checked the countdown clock—before the shuttle could begin the de-rendezvous maneuver that would put Padrugoi safely out of harm’s way.

There was an age-old tradition in military and paramilitary services of hazing any new trainee or officer. Because of his duties and peculiar condition, Peter had escaped that. John Greene felt that most of the hazing he had ever seen had been cruel and a waste of effort all around. With one exception.

“Mr. Reidinger, outline our flight profile,” Johnny ordered.

“Yes, sir,” Peter replied. “Our de-rendezvous maneuver will move us from a circular orbit identical to Padrugoi’s to an elliptical orbit with an apogee 5,000 kilometers above Padrugoi’s orbit—and change the time it
takes to orbit the Earth from eighty-eight minutes to one hundred and forty-two minutes.”

Johnny motioned for Peter to continue.

“That burn is designated OAM-1,” Peter continued.” The next burn occurs at the top of that orbit, seventy-one minutes later. The purpose of the burn is to change the inclination of our orbit from Padrugoi’s 28.5-degree inclination to the Earth to the Moon’s five-degree inclination—so that we are in line with the Moon.

“That burn is designated OIM-2, orbital inclination maneuver two,” Peter went on. He could feel Xiang’s approval. He didn’t dare reach for Johnny’s yet. “Seventy-one minutes after that we will be back at our closest point to the Earth—”

“Where will Padrugoi be then?” Johnny asked quickly.

Peter had his answer ready. He’d done his homework. “Padrugoi will be at the same altitude but two hundred and twenty degrees away from us.”

“Why?”

“Because our elliptical orbit takes longer to complete than Padrugoi’s circular orbit. Padrugoi will have made a full orbit and nearly two-thirds of its next one before we’re back down to the same altitude,” Peter answered smoothly. He took a deep breath and continued. “At that point—if all systems are go—we will initiate our translunar orbit insertion and head out to the Moon. That burn will be TLI-3. Just short of five days from now—by 36.5 minutes—we will be on the far side of the Moon and initiate our lunar landing insertion burn, designated LLI-4. At that point, barring some short maneuvering burns to handle the effects of lunar mass concentrations, we’ll be locked in for a landing at First Base fifty-nine minutes later.”

“And how much fuel will be required?” Johnny asked, continuing the interrogation.

Peter refused to be rattled. The admiral had lectured him on fuel requirements often enough.

“Our propellant to payload ratio is 2.00,” Peter said, “but because we also want to take the Limo with us, we have to provide fuel for it, too. So the total propellant ratio is 2.21.”

“And how much fuel should we have on board?”

Peter sensed a trick question. “Our fuel is liquid hydrogen, which we
burn with liquid oxygen. We burn twice the volume of hydrogen as we do oxygen.
Limo-34
in its current configuration masses 2,203.5 kilograms, and our payload including crew and passengers masses 11,004 kilograms. Total final mass at First Base will be 13,207.5 kilograms. Or 13.2 metric tonnes. That will require 3,246 kilograms of liquid hydrogen and 25,968 kilograms of liquid oxygen.”

He glanced at his display “But we are carrying a ten percent fuel reserve that changes the fuel loading to 50.1 metric tonnes.”

“What’s Limo stand for?”

Peter grinned. “Lunar insertion, Moon orbit, sir.”

Johnny allowed the silence that followed to stretch out uncomfortably but Peter knew he’d answered correctly and fully. “Sir, we are in position for OAM-1.”

“Roger,” Johnny said, “initiate OAM-1.”

“Aye, sir,” Peter said, aware that he had passed the test. “Departure, this is
Limo-34
, we are go for OAM-1.”

“
Limo-34
, OAM-1 at your discretion,” Padrugoi Departure responded.

Peter let
Limo-34
’s remaining five computers start OAM-1. When the shuttle’s three main rocket engines fired off with a gentle kick, Peter added, “OAM-1.”

“Roger, OAM-1 for
Limo-34,
” Padrugoi Departure confirmed. As soon as the engines shut down, Departure radioed back. “Our computers have you in the green on that burn,
Limo-34.
”

Peter checked the shuttle’s computers. He frowned, ran diagnostics on MPU Five, and said, “Computer five is voting against the solution, sir.”