Stormhaven Rising (Atlas and the Winds Book 1) (60 page)

Twitching his head, McDonald flipped the thermal lens in front of his eye and lifted himself slightly to look over a clump of grass. There was definitely something up there. “Looks like it might be a door,” he said. “Don’t think they’d be leaving one of their guns sitting out at night.”

“It’s awful fucking hot, Sarge,” he said.

“Yeah, maybe,” he whispered. He lifted his hand and signaled for his men to fan out, pointing to positions further to the east where they might have better vantage points on the target. Then he pointed toward his eyes with two fingers and jerked a thumb toward the source of the heat, making a wavy motion with his fingers to indicate a thermal target he wanted them to look for.

It took almost ten more minutes for the men to make their new positions and begin advancing toward their goal again. Stealth was a tedious business, but they knew it was always worth the wait. McDonald glanced toward the other men, unable to see them even when he knew where to look. They were a good team. They should be, he’d picked them himself, and had drilled them until they thought as a single unit.

That’s why he nearly shit a brick of titanium when the quiet was ripped open by Crocker sitting up and saying out loud, “Fuck me running, Sarge. It’s a pot of coffee.” Crocker was sitting up at the edge of their target, shaking his head and laughing. The other men rose up on their knees, and he could see them silhouetted against the sky.

“There’s a note here for you Sarge,” he said.

“For me?” he asked, still whispering in spite of the fact that that they’d obviously been made.

“Yep, it’s addressed to Master Sergeant Leonard McDonald,” Crocker said.

“We’ve gone bust,” McDonald said, flipping his radio on. “I repeat, Team One is a dead party.” He stood up and walked up the rise to where the other men had gathered. Sure enough, there were three cups and a small pot of coffee sitting on a rock by the door. There was a fourth cup sitting separated from the others. It was also hot, but smelled like apples and cinnamon. Crocker handed him the note and stepped back while he read it.

“
Good Evening, Master Sergeant McDonald,

“
I thought you could use a cup of real coffee after your long crawl across the field. (I’ve also included an herb tea for Specialist Bowens, since he’s a practicing Mormon). Please keep the cups and enjoy the walk back to camp. Next time, if you call before you decide to drop by, we’ll fix you a decent meal, too.

Sincerely,

Colton Taylor."

“It really is good coffee,” Crocker said, smiling and watching the sergeant come unscrewed. He held a cup out to him, like a peace offering.

“Fuck that,” he said, turning and starting back to camp.

“Hey Sarge, if you don’t want it, can I have it?” Crocker said. He could hear the other two men trying not to snicker.

***

Camp Kryptonite:

Even Abrams was smiling as the four men trudged back into camp. Three of them carried thermos cups, and the Sergeant looked like he was about to commit murder with his bare hands.

“I take it things went well?” Shapiro said. He struggled mightily, trying to keep a straight face while McDonald gave the General his report.

Once he’d finished and the General had sent him away, Shapiro sat down and laughed out loud.

“Damn it Shapiro, this is serious,” he said, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth in spite of his best effort.

“You’ve got to admit, they’ve got attitude,” the agent said.

“Ok, I’ll give you that,” Marquez said.

“You know what should bother you about this whole thing?” Shapiro said.

“That he didn’t send a cup for me?” the General said.

The agent shook his head, still smiling but making a serious point. “How far down into the Defense Network computers did he have to go to find out Bowens was LDS, and why doesn’t he care that we know that?"

***

Lunar Resource Station, Promontorium Heraclides:

Pogo
sat on the pad, fueled and ready as Randy Markham ran through the preflight checklist. He’d spent so much time in the lander and in the
Reliant
that he knew the feel of the ship, its every twitch and shudder. He could feel the propellant pumps switching on by the vibrations in the floor plate. Looking out the window he could see the sag in the landing struts and tell that he was carrying a full load of fuel. This little ship had been more his home for the last month than the LRS. He’d even taken to bunking in one of the acceleration couches rather than inside with the rest of the rapidly expanding crew.

Maybe if Susan had been back he’d have slept inside more often he thought, remembering their two days together in freefall. Part of him regretted not continuing their relationship, even though he knew somewhere inside it would have made things complex. More complexity was not something any of them needed at the moment. With a heavy sigh he pushed the memories back and focused on his startup procedures.

“
Pogo
, stand by, we’re receiving instructions for you from Houston,” Tony sounded cool as usual, but any change in the routine was odd.

“Copy Tony, I’ll keep a cork in it,” he said, glancing at the manifold pressures. All four engines were green. They’d already gotten word of the near-abort of the
Independence
, so the pumps were in the front of his mind. He slid over and thumped one of the readouts. It was about ten pounds light, but that wasn’t enough to make any difference to him. He had eighty PSI of headroom even at full-burn.

“Yeah Randy, I’m uploading a new trajectory into your onboard controller,” Tony said. “Houston is asking that we check out a situation on the backside. Seems JPL lost two satellites back there sometime around when we had that quake this morning.”

“Really?” he said, watching the update load into his computer.

“Affirm. They want you to do a pass over Tsiolkovskiy and run a few images for them.” Tony said.

“Roger on that,” he said, thinking about how far off the orbit of the
Reliant
that would put him. “Any idea what I’m looking for?”

“Negative Randy, they just said you needed to document anything unusual.” The processor gave him a ready-tag and he tapped the countdown actuator.

“
Pogo
, you’ll take it twice around the block and make a midcourse burn that will drop you just above and ahead of the
Reliant
. From there you get to drive,” Tony said. “Say hello to the big blue marble for me."

“Copy that, LRS,” he said, leaning back into his seat. “The controller is up and I’m out of here in twenty-six.” He watched the power and fuel umbilicals spring back, and heard their covers snap closed. The engines started vibrating just before the igniters kicked in, and he shot up off the pad. It wasn’t the bone-crushing acceleration of a liftoff from Earth, but it was still respectable, especially to his lunar-acclimated body. Even the 1.5 G that
Pogo
generated made him feel almost ten times his own weight. Fortunately it only took him sixty-five seconds to make orbital speed and he was back in freefall.

He cut loose from his seat and watched the landscape passing only a few miles below him. Orbital altitude on the moon could actually be as low as you wanted. From barely skimming over the mountains and craters, all the way up to the more sedate orbits that the Lunarcom sats occupied. He called up a position plot that showed him where he was. He knew all the landmarks on the nearside from pole to pole, but other than the equatorial region of the farside, he wasn’t sure he could pick Tsiolkovskiy out without help.

He shouldn’t have worried. The burned area took him almost four minutes to fly across. Burned was the only way he could think of to describe it. It looked like the dark black ash that covered the ground after a forest fire, and it spread almost to the horizon.

He tried to get a signal, but Lunarcom II was dead.
Maybe that’s one of the missing satellites?
he wondered. So instead of transmitting, he recorded the images they’d asked for, along with his commentary, and had it ready to beam down as soon as he had a LoS on Earth. He was sure that Houston would know what to make of it, even if he had no clue.

“LRS to
Pogo
. Do you copy?” Tony’s voice came over the radio almost a minute before he’d officially come out from behind the moon. He looked at his position. Lunarcom III was ahead of him, and Tony must have been watching for his transponder bounce.

“Yeah, Tony. I got you.” Randy said, compressing his observation file and getting it packaged for zipcast.

“So what was it?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” he said. “About all I can say is it looked like something blew up out there.”

“Say again,
Pogo
. Did you say something blew up?"

“Affirm on that LRS,” he said. “There are no new craters that I could see, but the whole area around Tsiolkovskiy looks slagged. I ran some quick numbers and it looks like the fireball had to be more than 250 miles in diameter."

“Stand by again, Randy,” Tony said. “Houston is sending you more new orders.”

“I guessed as much,” he said.

***

Camp Kryptonite:

Takao Mito was a patient man and it was a good thing. He’d arrived at the turn-off to Stormhaven four miles from their community just before noon. Six hours later he had just gotten his first glimpse of his destination. He’d talked to more military guards than he’d seen anywhere outside the Middle-East. He’d been there once on a trip to negotiate with the Israelis on astronaut training, and vowed he’d never return.

The last checkpoint they had to clear was a ludicrous gate set up in the middle of an open field. A lone corporal stood guard watching them approach. He walked up to the driver’s side window of their van and rapped lightly, waiting for the chauffeur to roll down the window. “State your business in the Camp,” the Corporal said.

“Diplomats,” the driver said. His English was better than he let on, but they’d decided that the less he said, the better their chances of getting through to the people who could let them in.

“Excuse me, Corporal Reed,” he read the man’s name from his uniform. “I am Takao Mito, a Diplomatic Attaché from the San Francisco Consulate. I am here with my staff to check on the well-being of our citizens inside Stormhaven.”

“With all due respect sir,” Reed said. “I recognized your Diplomatic plates and those fancy flags on your fenders. But, I’m going to have to say that it’s not likely you’re getting inside over there anytime soon.”

“Excuse me?” Mito said. “I have been charged with the responsibility to verify that the Japanese people who reside within Stormhaven are not suffering as a result of this siege.”

“Yes sir. I understood you the first time,” the Corporal drawled. “Even though you’ve made it this far, you’re just going to have to turn around and head back to that Consulate of yours. This is a military Command Center. We don’t just let anyone come waltzing in here, no matter what flag they might be waving.” He stepped back and gestured for them to turn around. They didn’t move.

“Perhaps I didn’t make myself clear,” Reed said. He unslung his rifle and squared his shoulders. “You have about two seconds to get moving, or I’m going to turn this into an international crisis.” They still didn’t move. It was time to see if he was serious or just bluffing.

The Corporal grabbed the mic on his shoulder. “Com I’ve got a van full of Japanese Diplomats out here telling me they’re looking to get into Stormhaven. You want I should show them the error of their ways?” He paused for several seconds, nodding his head. Presumably he was listening to instructions. He walked back up to the side of the van. Two Humvees rolled up in a cloud of dust on either side of them.

“You’re to proceed to the Command Tent,” he pointed up the rise to the largest of the tents. “General Marquez thinks he can explain the situation better than me.” He kicked the log out of the crossbucks and they rolled up the hill, escort vehicles flanking them.

Mito’s hope dissolved even before he got out of the van. He knew Victor Marquez. The Commander of US Space Command had toured JAXA’s launch centers less than a year ago.

The General would know he wasn’t a diplomat.

***

Changing the Game Again

ISS Alpha:

It hadn’t been the first time a shuttle had trouble during launch, and in reality they knew it wouldn’t be the last. Any time you strapped a half million pounds of explosives under your butt and expected to ride it into the heavens, you were going to have to understand that you might be riding it to Heaven instead. Fortunately this time, they made it to the right one, but that didn’t mean it hadn’t scared the hell out of them in the process.