The Inner Circle (22 page)

Even though Neil knew the identities of the three men with Armour, the NASA Chief still gave him an introduction.

"Mr. President, this is the man I was telling you about, Neil Peterson," Armour said.

"President Marshall, it's an honor to meet you, sir," Neil said, shaking hands with the president while thinking that he seemed much shorter in person.

"Neil. May I call you, Neil? I'm sure the pleasure is all mine. James has been telling me a lot about you, I hope you'll be able to help us."

Before Neil could ask what they needed help with, James interrupted, introducing Neil to Defense Secretary Henry Wilson and White House Chief of Staff Peter Mansfield. Wilson seemed like a nice, older gentleman who – if Neil remembered correctly from the news – had nearly made his own run for the presidency in the last election. Mansfield, on the other hand, gave Neil a negative vibe from the moment he saw him. The Chief of Staff seemed to be looking over Neil like he was on display, examining him from head to toe with a look of contempt on his face.

What is he studying me for?

"I'm sure you must be very curious about why you’re here today," President Marshall said. "If all of you gentlemen will take your seats, I will explain our predicament to Neil."

The four men did as they were told and Marshall made his way to the front of the room, standing at the head of the table, just to the side of the large projection screen.

"Is everything ready, Earl?"

Earl tapped a few keys on the computer and then turned around to face everyone else. He handed the president a small clicker.

"Yes, sir. I put together everything you asked."

Neil thought that he saw Earl shoot an angry glance in the direction of Mansfield and he wondered if someone else had negative feelings toward the man. But before his curiosity could formulate any possible reasons for Mansfield being disliked, the lights dimmed in the room and a drawing of a spaceship appeared on the screen.

"Tell me, Mr. Peterson. Do you recognize this?"

Neil could not believe what the drawing resembled and he had to blink quite a few times to make sure what he saw was actually on-screen. He wanted to blurt out that of course he recognized it, but there were things about the drawing that were different from what he remembered.

"First of all, this spaceship design is much smaller than I remembered. This particular vehicle would not be able to hold a crew, but if it was significantly enlarged, you might be able to fit as many as five people, along with supplies. It also appears to be one booster short, which might make a return trip significantly difficult. And I'm not quite sure about its purpose, but that long cylindrical tube on the side is new. Besides these changes though, I'd say this spaceship was a replica of the model shuttle I helped design to fly man to Mars."

Neil noticed that all of the men around the table were nodding and grinning, none more so than Armour. Neil felt like he had just answered a difficult question and his teacher was pleased.

"That's very impressive," the president said. "You did a good job finding this one, James. Hopefully he turns out to be the right man for the job."

"Yes, sir. I knew he had potential."

"Is anybody going to tell me what kind of job this is? Are we actually going to send a man to Mars?"

The president moved into the light of the projection screen, part of the Mars module design displayed across his head. He put his hands on the table and leaned forward, glaring at Neil.

"No, we are not sending a man to Mars. Before I go any further, I want to make sure that you understand the confidentiality agreement explained to you earlier by James. We can not stress how important it is that none of this information leaves the room. The five of us are the only people in the entire world who know what I'm about to tell you, and we are taking a huge risk by including you on this."

"You people sure are paranoid," Neil said. "But yes, I understand the agreement."

Marshall moved back out of the picture-stream of the projector and clicked the next button. A picture of space appeared on the screen, one with hundreds of stars spread all around and a small red circle right near the middle.

"Earl, when was this picture taken?" the president asked.

"Just last night, sir."

"Do you know what this is, Neil?" Marshall asked.

Neil squinted to see exactly what the small dot in the middle of the circle was, but he just assumed it was a planet or a star.

"It is neither a star or a planet," Marshall said. "It is a comet named Clement and it is headed directly for Earth."

A comet heading for Earth? That could be disastrous,
Neil thought.

Neil's head was spinning. Less than a month ago, he'd been fired from his job by a legend in the astronaut field. He'd been placed in rehab by this same legend. He'd been brought to a secret underground facility reserved for the President of the United States, who showed up with some of the most important people in Washington. It seemed like every event that took place in the last month of his life was more shocking than the next, but this one was certainly the icing on the cake. Marshall must have sensed all of the questions that Neil's mind was now forming, so he continued to tell him every last detail about the comet, from the time of its discovery to the present moment. With the click of a button, the drawing of the Mars module reappeared on the screen.

"We are now in the process of building this design. Because we needed this done as soon as possible, we had to start off using a preexisting deep space probe that was already in the early stages of development. When all is said and done, we hope to have this probe in space in less than two years, on its way to intercepting Comet Clement."

The lights came back on and part of Neil was expecting a hidden camera crew to storm into the room and tell him that he was just part of the most extensive prank in the history of television. The cameras never came though, and instead, five people stared at Neil and waited for some kind of response.

"I don't know what to say," Neil said, looking around at everyone.

"I know it's a lot to digest at once," Armour said. "But try to think rationally about what you've just heard."

"It's kind of hard to be rational when you've just been hit with a bombshell like this," Neil said.

All of the men in the room seemed sympathetic with Neil's silent stupefaction, all except for Mansfield, who seemed annoyed that Neil had nothing to say or contribute. Mansfield's annoyance provided the match to light the flame of thought in Neil's mind and he began to ramble out as many questions as he could think.

"How do you expect a space probe to destroy a huge comet? Wouldn't the comet just cut right through it? And don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining about being told all of this. But why me?"

President Marshall turned to the other men in the room and asked them to leave him alone with Neil for a few minutes.

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George Marshall had always been able to command attention throughout his life by seeming larger than life. He always dressed in the nicest clothes – having recently been voted the best-dressed president of all-time – and he walked and talked with such confidence that it was hard for people to think of him as anything but special. Even when he was standing in the dark, going through the slides and telling Neil about the comet, his presence was awe-inspiring to Neil.

But when the five other men left the room and Neil was alone with the president, Marshall toned down his impressive demeanor and seemed just like another normal guy. Marshall took off his jacket, loosened his tie and sat down in the seat next to Neil.

"Look, Neil. I want to talk to you man-to-man, not President-to-man. To be quite honest with you, I'm tired of having to act fearless and formal when I talk about something that scares the life out of me like this comet.

"Now I want to get down to business. First of all, you noticed earlier how small the designs were for the probe and you also took notice to the subtraction of one of the two normal boosters. James Armour explained to me that this was done because of a weight problem. In order for the probe to make its journey successfully and be able to carry its proper...cargo, the ship had to be designed as light as possible."

"What exactly is the cargo for this trip? I'm guessing that it will be some sort of explosive device?" Neil asked.

"Again, you prove very astute in your assessment. The third thing you noticed was the cylindrical tube on the side of the probe. This tube will house the nuclear weapon," the president explained. "Any thoughts?"

The president seemed to be leading Neil on, almost as if he wanted Neil to figure out what they were doing before he had to say it.

"Well, would one nuclear weapon be enough firepower to destroy a comet that size? And what if something went wrong, would there be enough time to send up another ship in its place?"

Two more logical questions.

"No, to both questions. According to the research into this topic, your first assumption was correct. Shooting a nuclear weapon at the comet would not do the job to stop it. In fact, it probably wouldn't even reach the comet's surface."

"Yeah, too many projectiles floating around to block the missile," Neil said, finishing the thought.

"Exactly," the president said. "Another idea that somebody mentioned involved drilling into the comet and dropping the nuke in, destroying it from the inside."

Neil laughed at this thought and realized that somebody who watched too many movies must have suggested this idea.

"Judging from your reaction, you must know how implausible this idea was. Besides, even if the comet was blown up, it would only crumble into thousands of smaller pieces, all still on a direct – and deadly – path toward Earth."

"Then what does that leave?" Neil asked.

"Deflection."

Neil thought about this for a moment, realizing that the plan of action must be to detonate the nuclear weapon close to the comet and try to hinder its path.

"We've chosen to set off the nuke below and slightly behind the comet," Marshall explained. "We are hoping that the force of the explosion will actually increase the comet's speed and deflect it slightly above Earth. At the worst, we are hoping the comet will only skip off the atmosphere, which would likely cause many of the floating rocks around the comet to strike Earth. This would still cause significant damage but it’s far better than a direct hit."

Could something like this really work?
The whole idea seemed like it should be relatively simple, especially with the technology available today. But if their plan was so concrete, why were they keeping the comet a secret from the rest of the world? Did they think the idea might not work? There had to be something that Neil wasn’t being told.

"So what are the chances of this plan working? And I still don't understand why I was told about this. Sure, I helped to design the plans for the ship, but I'm no engineer, and I don't even know much about deep-space astronomy."

"The two go together. In all honestly, nobody knows the chances of something like this working. Here we are, having to decide the best way to save Earth, and all we know is that this is the only plan that
could
work. But
could
does not mean
will
by any means. James Armour tells me that there is a long list of things that could go wrong and destroy any chance of success.

"We were fortunate enough to discover the comet twelve years before it’s supposed to strike Earth. But for this plan to work, we have less than two years to launch the probe. The comet is still millions of miles away but it has to be intercepted with plenty of time for the deflection to work."

The president explained how far in advance the explosion needed to occur in order for there to be enough time to push the comet off its current path. If the nuke's detonation did not happen or if it wasn't powerful enough to do the job, there would be no second chances.

"That's why we have to make sure it's done right the first time, which brings us to another part of the ship's cargo. But before I get to that, I want to show you something else."

The president turned around in his seat and faced the projection screen again, clicking a button and changing the picture from the probe drawing to a photograph of a little girl. Every thought and every worry about the comet that had been building up inside of Neil suddenly disappeared when he saw the angelic face of his daughter, Emily. Emily looked older in this picture than the one that Neil had received in the mail from her mother nearly a year ago. Her brown hair was much curlier than before and was now well past her shoulders. Her vibrant smile even showed a few missing teeth...

She's happy without me
, Neil thought.
How can she be that happy without her Daddy around
? Although a small part of him felt guilty for hoping his daughter would be miserable without him, Neil couldn't help but wish his daughter needed him as much as he needed her.
Why is a picture of Emily on the screen anyway?