Skyfall

4

All people care about is their own tiny corner of the universe, I. L. J. Flax thought to himself.

“You gentlemen do realize that in just forty-five minutes I must be at the first press conference here for Prometheus? Satellite relays for television, the world press, the works.”

He spoke in English to Vandelft who headed the American engineering team, then turned and said the same thing in Russian to Glushko, his opposite number on the Soviet side. What little they spoke of the other's language had long vanished in the heat of the moment. One from Siberia, the other from Oshkosh — it was amazing how much they resembled each other. Gold-rimmed glasses, thinning hair, tobacco-stained fingers, shirt pockets stuffed with pens and pencils, the inevitable calculator slung like a gun in a holster on each hip.

“I know that, Flax,” Vandelft said, his fingers tapping nervously on his clipboard. “But this won't take fifteen minutes, ten, you've just got to do something. What the hell is the point of a news conference if all the final testing's held up? We're never going to launch on time if that happens.”

“There is no trouble,” Glushko said, his eyes murderous and cold as he avoided looking at his opposite number. “It is the Americans who have stopped the work. We're ready to proceed at once.”

“All right, I'll come, for the sake of unity, peace, mir. Remember this is a joint project so I'd appreciate it if you would both at least act as though you wished to act jointly.” He repeated this in Russian as he lumbered out of the door and into the full heat of the day, the beads of sweat turning to rivulets as the sun smote him. Vandelft was at the tiller of one of the golf carts the NASA personnel used for getting about the sprawling base, and Flax squeezed in beside him. The Soviets scorned this effete form of transportation and Glushko was already on his bicycle leading the way.

You just never get used to the size, Flax thought. And in a couple of days I'm going to be sitting in Mission Control and coaxing this bird into orbit. It's a long way from Pszczyna.

Flax rarely thought of his native town, for America had been his home since he had been eleven. But Poland was the land of his birth, German Poland really and his family had still been considered Germans though they had lived there for generations. His father was headmaster of the local school, an educated man by any standards, and had raised his son the same way. German was spoken at home and Russian and Polish in the streets and in school, so young Flax was native in all three languages, an ability his father had not permitted him to lose when they had emigrated to the United States when threats of war were in the air. Bookish and always overweight, he had few friends, and no girl friends. The refusal of the Army to draft him because he was so fat only added to his humiliation and drove him further into his studies. He was studying engineering at Columbia University then and he smelled opportunity when the first course in electronics was offered a field so new that they didn't even have a textbook and had to work from mimeographed notes done the same day of each class. He had gone into radar research, then, when working for the same army that had refused him entry a few years earlier, he felt that justice was coming his way at last. When NASA was organized he was there at the inception, his technical knowledge and linguistic ability keeping him on top when the German rocket scientists were whisked away ahead of the advancing Russians. After this he had never looked back; some people thought that Flax was Mission Control and he never told them differently. Now with the joint Soviet-American project he was at the peak of his career. But it did get tiring.

The fast elevator shot up inside the servicing tower and they emerged into the air-conditioned comfort of the Prometheus

Assembly Building. PAB was a building without a base, a five-storey structure perched high in the air on top of the servicing tower that enclosed the entire upper structure of the spacecraft. Not only were the immense boosters and core body too big to be put together in a normal Vehicle Assembly Building, but they would have been too massive to move once joined. Therefore they had been assembled and joined in the open with temporary shelters covering the sensitive stages. They had been designed with this in mind and would not suffer from exposure.

But Prometheus itself could not be treated in this cavalier manner. It had been built at the Kennedy Space Flight Center under the usual sterile and controlled conditions, air conditioned at all times to protect the circuitry from corrosion and the computer from temperature failure. After disassembly the various parts had been flown to the Soviet Union by a specially modified fleet of C5-As. Therefore the need for PAB, perched above the rockets, a building with the correct environment where the components could be reassembled.

Technicians moved aside when the three men crossed the floor to the entry hatch. Flax led the way, puffing as he pulled himself through the opening, and looked round the now familiar Flight Cabin.

As in any other Flight Cabin the controls and instruments dominated everything. Yuri Gagarin went into space as a passenger facing a panel with twelve different instruments. Things had changed a bit since his time. Systems of all kinds proliferated and with each new system came controls, with the controls meters and readouts, until every available inch of space on all sides of the two pilots' couches was thick with them. Just learning the position and function of the instrumentation required thousands of hours of study, then hundreds of hours in the Flight Cabin Simulator putting this knowledge into practice.

“Just look at that,” Vandelft said, angrily. “Look how the Russkies have fucked everything up!”

“Fook up!” Glushko shouted. In his months working with the Americans he had at least picked up that much English.

“Gentlemen, please,” Flax said, patting the air with both hands, trying to hush them. “I see the problem, the matter under discussion. Now if you both kindly shut up we'll see what we can do about it.”

He had to find an answer that would satisfy both parties — and it would not be an easy one. Under every switch, dial or readout a clearly lettered plate was fixed describing its function. Labels such as PDI ABORT or RCS did not make much sense to a layman but they were vital to the pilots. Next to each of these abbreviations was the same information spelled out in Cyrillic. But something new had been added.

On all sides, under and around the original labels, there were bits of paper that had been pasted on. Some of it was yellow paper, others ruled sheets from notebooks, and all of it covered in crabbed Russian handwriting.

“The whole thing looks like a notice board in a supermarket,” Vandelft said. “Are we selling spare tires and baby sitters or are we flying a goddamn spaceship?”

“These are necessary because of the inadequate information and labeling in English,” Glushko shouted, his voice drowning out the other engineer's. “My technicians must check the circuitry and for that the labeling must be in Russian. Besides — see — you do the same thing! So why should not we?”

He pointed triumphantly to some neatly lettered bits of card that Patrick Winter had attached to some of the most important readouts he would use in takeoff. Specific information about limits that should not be exceeded, figures to be watched.

. “I don't think this is quite the same thing,” Flax said, raising his hand as the Russian engineer started to protest. “However we can compromise. Your labels stay up as long as your technicians are working here. Then they come down — all of them. What benefits them on the ground has nothing to do with the need of the Soviet pilot in flight. Glushko! Hear me out before you stamp off in a huff. The paper labels come down, but your pilot may attach any special labels she might need, just as our pilot has done. They can discuss it and we'll all abide by their decisions. Okay?”

They would accept the compromise, they had to. He looked at his watch. Good Christ! He was late already.

They had started without him. The auditorium was half filled with newsmen and photographers, bright under the big lights for the television cameras. The platform seemed even more crowded than the audience as all officials of the partner nations who could, got into the act. Top NASA brass was matched by their opposite numbers in SCSE, the Soviet State Commission for Space Exploration. The astronauts and cosmonauts seemed lost in the crowd. There was an empty seat next to them they had saved for him. Flax hated making a late and obvious entry, particularly since everyone would find him more interesting than the Soviet official now nattering away. It couldn't be helped. He took a deep breath just as someone touched him on the arm. An MP captain stood there, flanked by two sergeants. All three wore sidearms.

“Top Secret communication, sir, from the code room. Could I please see your ID.”

“For God's sake, Captain, you've known me for over a year…” The protest faded away in the light of the officer's impassivity and Flax fumbled out the card. The captain studied it carefully, as though he had never seen it before, and nodded.

“Sergeant, note this number, then the time and date.”

Flax moved from one foot to the other as the sergeant took out a pad and slowly wrote down the particulars. Only when this was done did the officer unlock an attaché case chained to his wrist and take out a sealed buff envelope that was stamped TOP SECRET in angry red letters. Flax stuffed it into his pocket and turned away, but he wasn't through yet.

“Please sign the register, sir. Here… and here… and initial in this box… and here on the second sheet.”

Finally free, Flax walked swiftly down the aisle, uncomfortably conscious of the heads turning curiously to follow him. Only the minister droned on, unaware. Flax stood at the foot of the steps and waited until the red light blinked off on the camera doing a panoramic shot of the entire stage and the light came on the close-up camera covering the politician. As fast as reasonably possible he climbed the stairs and rolled across the stage to his seat. Ely Bron, in a well-tailored and obviously expensive charcoal gray suit, leaned forward and whispered in his ear.

“I hope she was worth the delay, Flax. Can I have her name when you get tired of her?”

“Shut up, Ely. You're a real pain in the butt,” he hissed back.

The Russian sat down, to a mild flutter of applause, and was replaced by a NASA official who said approximately the same things the other had, only in English. Flax mopped sweat from his head as subtly as he could, and waited for his breathing to calm down. Then he remembered the communication in his jacket pocket.

SECRET was stamped over almost every paper he touched, but top secret with all the signing and guards and such was much more rare. Whatever it was would surely be a bit more interesting than the speeches. He slipped the envelope out of his pocket and, in the concealment of his crossed legs and massive hands, managed to work it open and take out the message inside. He waited until the close-up camera was on the speaker, then swiftly read it.

Then read it again, sweat bursting from every pore.

After that he just sat numbly until Ely tapped him on the arm.

“Flax, wake up, you're on. Give 'em hell, boy.”

Flax walked slowly to the podium and adjusted the microphone in front of his lips. Cameras clicked and the blank eyes of the television cameras stared directly at him. The whole world was watching. He coughed a bit into his hand then began to speak.

“As the man in charge of Mission Control it is my job to act as liaison between the crew of Prometheus and the machines and men on the ground, link the two into a single functioning unit. My job here today is to introduce the astronauts and cosmonauts who will be on this first flight. However, before I do, I would like to read to you from a communication I have just received from the Space Center in Houston. As you can see there are only five people beside me on the platform where there should be six. Doctor Kennelly, the space physician who was to go in Prometheus, has been suddenly taken ill. It's not serious, not serious that is in that he is in no danger. He was operated on yesterday for appendicitis with certain complications and the prognosis is for complete recovery. However he will not be in any condition for this flight. Therefore another NASA doctor has been appointed in his place. As you all know we have standbys for everyone on this mission, since the health of any single individual cannot be allowed to affect the entire operation. I will now read to you from the communication I have just received.”

Flax took out the sheet and the cameras clicked even faster.

“It begins with a description of Dr. Kennelly's condition, then adds, 'Considering the present incumbent inoperative procedures have been optioned for qualified trained backup replacement now en route Houston Baikonur ETA 1500 hours your time. Replacement physician is Doctor C. Samuel attached Houston Space Medicine Research Center. Doctor Samuel is 32 years old and a graduate of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. After graduation she interned at Johns Hopkins Hospital…' “

A rising murmur from the press cut him off as those who understood English caught the meaning of what Flax was saying. The simultaneous translation droned on and short moments later the Russian speakers jerked to attention and the murmur grew. Flax stood silent and immobile and waited for silence.

“Ely, did you hear that,” Patrick said angrily.

“Politics, my friend, politics.”

“You're damned right! A woman cosmonaut one up to Moscow, so as soon as Doc Kennelly got sick they must have started scratching around in every NASA lab to find a woman to slot into the program in his place. She can't have been trained so quickly. They're going to sell Prometheus down the river just to play politics one more time….”

“If I may continue,” Flax said. “After graduation Doctor Samuel interned at Johns Hopkins Hospital. All of her biographical material is in this message and will be available to the press after this meeting. Doctor Samuel is a midwesterner, that is she grew up in Detroit although she was born in Mississippi. Before going to Johns Hopkins for pre-medical training she obtained a BA in education at Tuskegee Institute.”

Only the Americans were completely aware now, the rest of the international audience listening and taking notes. Ely sat so quietly his silence was a message. Patrick's jaw was tensed so hard the muscles stood out in ridges. Nadya, sitting next to him, heard him curse under his breath. Now she was angry too.

“Why do you speak like that?” she whispered. “Don't you think a woman is fit to come on this flight? Are women inferior?”

“Politics. They're playing politics.”

“So what if it is politics? If she is qualified it is a very good thing.”

“But don't you realize just how dirty a game they're playing? The Soviets have a woman on this flight, so they must have a woman too. Only they've gone one better. This will really buy the votes and put the finger in the old Russki eye.”

“Why are you so vicious?”

“Why? Didn't you understand? Didn't you hear the name of her school, Tuskegee?”

“I did, yes, but I do not know this center of education.”

“Well I do. It's black. An all-black school. Now if you don't think replacing a pot-bellied Irish-American with a black woman isn't playing politics, then I'd like to know just what in hell is?”