A man's country is not a certain area of land, of mountains, rivers, and woods, but it is a principle; and patriotism is loyalty to that principle.
-- George William Curtis
Dawn rose on a desert cut by the sounds of war jets circling over Mojave Airport. Sunshine illuminated the two F-16's for at least a quarter of an hour before it spilled into the high desert valley.
Larry Poubelle rolled a cigar in his robot hand, sensitive force-feedback circuitry sending impulses to the severed nerves at his shoulder, which in turn transmitted to his brain the sensations of a firm, crinkling cylinder of tobacco turning slowly in his fingers. He did not light up -- Nomad sat fastened atop the 747 now, its fueling nearly finished. At a safe distance stood a swarm of reporters and onlookers, armed with a prodigious array of video and still cameras. One husband and wife pair stood hundreds of yards apart with two cameras set up for wide-parallax 3-D HDTV. All of them pointed their instruments toward one single object of attention. Nomad.
The sleek black upgraded X-15 A-2 rocket plane upon the highly-polished 747 looked like a shark hitching a ride on a whale. This shark, though, sprouted two fat hypersonic drop tanks. Both sported thin coats of frost -- blessedly thin, thanks to the extremely low humidity of the mid-August desert air, the insulating properties of the spun-composite tanks, and the last-minute decision to borrow de-icing machinery from another airport occupant. Every pound of ice that coated either the external tanks or the mid-section of Nomad in which lay the internal tanks represented an extra pound of payload added and several pounds of fuel wasted. Poubelle dared not squander even an ounce.
Chemar strode out of the hangar to stand beside him. Cameras immediately turned to focus on her. She cut a stunning figure in her ebon space suit, helmet tucked under her left arm, right hand clutching the packet of personal items she planned to take with her. Her jet-black hair -- styled short to be comfortable under the helmet and to survive the flight for the inevitable photo opportunities upon their return -- framed her dark face and piercing golden eyes. She wore no makeup, for safety reasons, but on her it did not matter in the slightest.
Together they stood, watching through the frigid clouds of hydrogen and oxygen vapors that mixed so dangerously around the nonchalant ground crew. Several of them were old men, retired NASA and Air Force personnel who had worked on the original X-15 project thirty years before. They darted about prepping the spacecraft and mothership, spirited teenagers once more, with a universe of possibilities ahead of them.
An F-16 flew low over the airport, its weapon pods blatantly loaded with air-to-air missiles, and loudly cut in its afterburners to accelerate straight upward. It reached supersonic speed at five thousand feet, rattling the morning air with a loud sonic boom.
Poubelle shook his head. "Why don't they just pass at fifty feet and light the fumes? That would solve their problem."
"Do you really think they'll try to shoot us down?"
He turned his gaze toward the lifeless hangar where Freespace Orbital once buzzed with activity. "I don't know, kid. Absolute power engenders absolute arrogance."
A plain white sedan crept slowly to the edge of the hangar and stopped. The doors opened to disgorge six men in gas masks and bright yellow hazardous-material suits. They slowly advanced on Poubelle and D'Asaro. One of them carried a sheaf of paper as thick as a phone book.
"Laurence Poubelle?" the one carrying the papers asked.
The billionaire pointed his prosthetic thumb at the name embroidered in gold thread upon his breast. "You've got him."
"Thiel. State Department. We've met."
Poubelle nodded.
"This is a joint effort of the State, Commerce, Transportation, and Justice departments." Thiel waved the thick book. "This is our authority to seize all chattels real and personal including aircraft and hangars belonging to Laurence Poubelle, The Dædalus Project, Incorporated, American Atomic, Incorporated, and other persons identified in this finding."
The eight of them stood in the orange morning light, six yellow, two black, while curious press and public watched. They all noticed the side arms worn by four of the intruders.
"You know," Poubelle said, rolling the cigar in his titanium fingers, "that I'm not going to flop over and give up just because you wave around the eructations of a bunch of government attorneys who aren't competent to maintain a private practice." His eyes gazed into Thiel's with a disturbing mixture of aristocratic calm and hellish menace. "It's a funny thing about dawn over the desert. First there's no wind at all, then little gusts puff this way and that as patches of earth warm up to create thermals. Right now, I feel a slight breeze blowing the rocket propellant away from us. Then again, maybe I'm wrong and it's blowing fumes toward us."
He raised his arm and pointed the finger with its built-in cigar lighter toward the government agents. Smiling, he said, "Shall we find out which way the wind blows?"
Thiel shook his head and laughed, albeit nervously. "You wouldn't blow up you and your plane and your girl there."
"And you wouldn't dream of firing those guns in an explosive atmosphere, would you?" Poubelle turned to walk toward Nomad's boarding ramp, D'Asaro in step with him.
Thiel snorted in annoyance. "Cuff 'em, guys."
The four gun-toting agents rushed forward. From out of the crowd flew a half-empty soda can, hitting one of them, causing him to stop and turn toward the onlookers.
Thiel raised his hands and waved them authoritatively at the throng. "This is an official government seizure under the RICO--"
A beer bottle clipped the mask over his ear. He reflexively wiped the brew from the rubber garment and jumped to dodge another missile.
Dozens of people, young and old, rushed under the perimeter rope and surrounded the six agents, yelling, spitting, and throwing snack foods.
One of the agents, hit in the back of the neck by an unopened beer can, slapped leather.
"No guns!" Thiel yelled shrilly, tearing his gas mask off to be heard above the din. "Let's go. He's been served." He stared up at the warbirds circling overhead. "Let's leave him to the big guns."
Taunted and jeered by the mob, the canary-colored crew silently climbed into their car and locked the doors, then cautiously backed away.
Poubelle and D'Asaro ascended the stairway leading up above the 747 to the cockpit of Nomad, seventy-five feet above the runway. From that vantage, they surveyed the skies.
The F-16's joined up and flew wingtip-to-wingtip down the runway fifty feet above the concrete. The noise was deafening.
"Nice air show, huh?" Poubelle yelled to the crowd after the roar died down.
"What are we going to do, Larry?" Chemar's voice lost some of its confidence.
"They won't intentionally collide with us, and I know Bischoff has enough nerve to fly the jet without letting them get to him. What someone might order them to do with those missiles-- or what they might do under stress -- is anybody's guess. In any case..." He gazed at the golden Sun in the east, at the vast blue sky laced lightly with high-flying cirrus, and then at his beautiful Chemar. "It's a good day to die."
Her aureate eyes widened as a fierce smile grew to efface all fear. "Let's go blow up," she said, putting an arm around his waist and waving the other at the crowd.
A cheer arose, then almost as suddenly fell silent. Everyone's attention shifted from the piggy-backed aircraft to the runway. Poubelle and D'Asaro turned to see what drew the crowd's interest.
The taxiways had become, in just a few minutes, a traffic-jam of airplanes all advancing toward the main runway. One by one, they made it to the runway, gunned their engines, and lifted off into the sky.
"We have an escort squadron!" Poubelle stared in astonishment at the procession. "There must be dozens of them!"
The drone of the aircraft taking flight, though, was quickly overwhelmed by something louder, vaster, and more encompassing. Poubelle and the others looked east, into the rising sun, and saw it darken.
From the east -- and the north and south and west, for that matter -- swarms of aircraft of all descriptions converged on Mojave like sea gulls on a locust hunt. Unable to maneuver at their high speed in such clogged airspace, the F-16's circled about inside the shrinking perimeter, then once more cut in their afterburners to roar straight upward, shooting out of the vortex at near-transonic speed.
Hundreds, perhaps thousands of aircraft filled the sky in a counter-clockwise flight pattern. General aircraft -- Pipers, Cessnas, Beechcrafts, Northrops, Taylorcrafts -- flew low and slow in their own particular circle. Farther out flew the powerful old warbirds: Spitfires, Zeros, P51-D's, Mustangs, Messerschmitts, and MiG's. Corporate jets formed a higher, wider shell: Learjets, Cessna Citations, Beech Starships. Even airliners including old DC-3's, DC-9's, MD-11's, Airbuses, 747's, and L-1011's -- some chartered to view the event, others actually veering in from their flight paths for an unscheduled thrill -- heeded the distress call broadcast the night before by ham radio, telephone tree, The Net, and other ways.
Helicopters hovered at the periphery: Bells, Sikorskies, Hueys.
Even homebuilts got into the act, displaying their bizarre designs and varying flight characteristics. Low-winged Lancairs, Zodiacs, Sonerais, KR2's, Zenairs, and Glasairs roared about. High-winged Avids, Wag-A-Bonds, Kitfoxes, RANS's, and Coyotes floated like butterflies. Seawind, Buccaneer, and Osprey amphibians looked like hyperthyroidal gooneybirds. Brand new Davis Gemini flying wings and venerable Long-EZ's buzzed and hummed, along with Cozys, Infinitys, Solaris, and other strangely shaped experimental planes. Velocity and Challenger and Quicksilver ultralights, Air Command, Ken Brock, Air & Space, and Barnett gyroplanes, Bensen Gyrocopters, Rotorway Executive and Cobra two-seat helicopters, Revolution one-seat eggbeaters, and nameless innovative abominations that creaked and shuddered.
One old and patched Vari E-Z carried a lean, henna-haired grandmother who piloted barefoot, but stayed in tight formation with the youngest and best of them, her face an ethereal mask of pleasure.
Biplanes existed in a class by themselves, bringing an anachronistic, barnstorming touch. Classic Nieuports, Jennies, a Sopwith, a pizza-financed team of ærobatic Stinsons, several Pitts Specials, and even a cherry-red Fokker Triplane buzzed in close with their engines chugging.
Fastening their five-point harnesses, Poubelle and Chemar locked on their helmets and ran the last check of their onboard computers. The fueling team down below gave them thumbs up and withdrew, other members of the ground crew retracting the gangway and unchocking the wheels of the 747.
"All right, Karl, talk to me." Poubelle cycled the canopy shut. Unlike the original X-15, it hinged in the front to minimize the chance of a catastrophic release. An integral part of the escape/reentry pod, it had to stay on no matter what.
The pilot of the Boeing, Karl William Bischoff, fired up each of the jet engines in turn once the cryogenic fuel tankers had pulled away to a safe distance. "Pipe down, Larry, and let me do my job," he said in that calm, dead-level voice cultivated by airline pilots. "Mojave Tower, this is Dædalus One, we are ready to taxi."
"Roger, Dædalus One," the tower replied. "And watch out for that cloud of gnats out there. ATC has given up any hope of controlling them, and Edwards is just noting N-numbers of as many aircraft as it can for subsequent FAA action. Be advised you are flying in military-operation airspace if you exceed twelve hundred feet AGL."
The 747 with its unrefulgently black companion slowly rolled away from the hangar. Cameras clicked, whirred, and hummed as the crowd -- swelling larger minute by minute -- grew ever more excited. The morning sun, high enough above the horizon to glow its familiar yellow-white, glinted off Nomad's polycarbonate cockpit ports. Poubelle and D'Asaro gave one last wave to the throng and turned to focus total attention on their primary task: not blowing up.
"Fly Swatter One to Fly Swatter Leader," one of the F-16 pilots radioed to his commander as he escaped from the tightening circle of civilian aircraft. "Be advised that maneuvering to pin down target impossible without significant collateral damage, over."
"Fly Swatter One, state target's position, over."
"Halfway down the runway, taking off."
"Fly Swatter One and Two, pull back and monitor the situation until target reaches flight level four hundred, over."
"Roger, Fly Swatter Leader."
Fly Swatter Leader circled overhead at 60,000 feet in a NASA U-2, taking in the big picture, but counting on the F-16 pilots to provide up-close information. From the greater-than-eagle's vantage, the U-2 pilot saw an unbelievable clutter of aircraft all around the Mojave Desert. Scanning the general aviation frequencies, he picked up at least a dozen near hits and what might have been two actual mid-airs. A low count considering the unprecedented congestion.
Fly Swatter One and Two stayed above the majority of aircraft that flew between 800 and 10,000 feet above ground level, watching and waiting.
The mothership rolled into takeoff attitude and after what seemed like eons broke free of her earthly bonds and rose into the sky. The bright 747 and her sleek black partner (midriff and drop tanks frosted white, which imparted a stretched-penguin look to it) performed a gradual left-handed climbing turn to enter the inner wall of the swirling vortex of aircraft.
"This is amazing," Chemar muttered into her headset.
"Yep," Poubelle said. "Looks like we got us a convoy. Imagine this many people with nothing else to do on a Monday."
"Cut the chatter, Nomad," Bischoff interjected, "and check propellant top-off."
Poubelle winked at the pencil-sized flight recorder camera mounted atop his instrument panel. "Hey -- what am I paying you for?"
Bischoff shot back with good-natured terseness, "And what are you buying?"
The cylindrical curtain of aircraft widened to give the 747 reasonable maneuvering space, yet hung in close enough to prevent a clear shot by any adversary. Chemar took a moment during a lull in her duties to scan the airwaves. On the general aviation frequencies, nearly all the pilots maintained silence, working furiously on their see-and-be-seen techniques. The frequencies used by the higher-flying airliners buzzed with more plane-to-plane discussion, especially concerning the parentage of the F-16 pilots and their superiors back in the District of Columbia.
As soon as the ungainly piggyback plane passed through 2000 feet above ground level, they entered Complex One-Alpha Military Operations Area. Their radios suddenly crackled with threats.
"All unidentified aircraft, this is Edwards RAPCON. You are ordered to return to point of origin and surrender to military personnel. You are in an MOA and subject to federal authority. Violation of this airspace will result in retaliatory action."
In a show of Gandhian æronautical solidarity, none of the escort aircraft complied.
Chemar switched to one of the satellite news channels piped into Nomad from the 747's antenna array and discovered that one of the planes circling about them carried a reporter broadcasting live. He nearly prattled with excitement.
"Oh, people, I wish I could point this camera in every direction at once! Those of you with three-dee at home can see what I mean. We are literally swimming in a sea of airplanes. Look! Look! The Dædalus planes are overtaking us! There they go! Ooh, ooh, magnificent!"
"What is it about space flight, boss, that makes some people discuss it in orgasmic tones?"
Poubelle made a tsking sound. "A member of the Mile High Club needs to ask. When did you stop flying in your dreams?"
"Never. I still dream I'm falling, but just before I hit, I bounce back up and take off."
"Exactly," he said. "Most people lose those dreams when they pass through puberty. The true believers are still haunted -- and driven -- by that dream."
"Then explain airline pilots -- they don't dream at all, I've heard."
"Hey," Bischoff protested. "I represent that remark! There's a big difference between us."
"Such as?" Poubelle asked.
"Such as, I may be crazy enough to fly you up, but not enough to sit on ten tons of explosives and strike a match!"
One of the monitors in the launch complex at Vandenberg displayed the aerial view of the scene over Mojave. Few of the personnel gave it more than a cursory glance. Too many other details commanded their attention.
Sherry Cooper darted from console to console observing the operations of Freespace Orbital personnel and the military and NASA employees. Behind her flapped the ends of the ankle-length turquoise knit sweater she wore unbuttoned almost like a cape. From beneath its folds trailed a long, coiled black cord connected to her headset. The intercom communicated with each of the four channels.
"Roger, Range Safety," she said on Channel One. "We'll have COLA for you shortly." The collision avoidance analysis came from Space Command Western Range and provided vital confirmation that Aurora would not hit any other orbiting object. From where she stood, she could see the range safety officer -- once more Lt. Rollins -- in charge of the flight termination system: the explosive charges that would blow Aurora to bits in the event of any deviation from her flight path.
Sherry gazed across the launch control room toward Thom Brodsky, whose nervous glance back at her confirmed that he stood ready to assist with her daring and dangerous plan.
Colonel Alan Shepard Lundy watched the proceedings from a vantage point near one of the computer banks. On the large wall screen that looked almost like a window, the squat, sky-blue rocket sat on its simple launch pad surrounded by cryogenic mist. The bright glow of morning illuminated its southeastern side to cast a long shadow across the concrete launch complex. In the distance, the space shuttle Atlantis stood huge and regal attached to its rust-colored ET and twin white SRB's amid drifting billows of light ocean mist and ground fog.
Lundy had fallen in love, though he would probably never use the term, with Vandenberg in his months commanding the base. The vision of it serving as a true, functioning spaceport filled him with a joyful anticipation constantly allayed by his awareness of the political and military realities he would witness on days such as today. He was about to watch another rocket company bite sea foam.
"COLA is clear," Lt. Rollins confirmed.
The launch director, once again Captain Fortney, spoke on Channel Four. "Confirm clear COLA, confirm downrange clear. Watching the situation over Mojave. Restart clock. T-minus ten minutes and counting."
Sherry leaned over the man in charge of monitoring tank pressure. "LOX tank full," he said. "Hydrogen tank at three-quarters."
The countdown proceeded flawlessly as Sherry's level of anxiety increased. She floated, almost, in a light-headed yet utterly aware state of intense consciousness.
"T-minus one minute," Fortney said on Channel Four.
Someone on Channel One said, "Uh, Captain, I have a mandatory abort on the command receivers."
Sherry, prepared for betrayal, put her plan into action. "No abort," she said in a husky voice over Channel One. "All systems go." She sidled over to the range safety officer.
Capt. Fortney, hearing the exchange not on his headset, but somewhere in the room, said, "Who's calling an abort, please?"
Lt. Rollins quickly responded -- on Channel One -- "Abort due to command transceiver call on Range Safety."
Hearing nothing over the intercom, Fortney repeated, "Who's calling abort?"
"No abort. It's just TM." Brodsky -- on Channel Four -- sounded calm and authoritative.
Confusion spread across the network and launch control. On one channel, all appeared well; on another, conflicting calls for an abort.
"T-minus thirty seconds," Sherry interjected. "All systems go for launch. Internal power. Pressure nominal. Telemetry flowing."
"We understand abort," a confused voice said on Channel Two.
Fortney covered up his boom mic and shouted, "Do we have an abort or not?"
Lt. Rollins began to shout his reply when something hard pressed against his spine at heart level. He heard the familiar snap of a thumb safety sliding to the decidedly unsafe position.
Sherry Cooper whispered to him with a voice as cold, fluid, and deadly as liquid hydrogen. "You can be a hero to your leaders by aborting the launch -- and die not knowing it -- or you can be a hero to the future by doing nothing -- and live to see it."
Rollins sat frozen at the controls, his hand in place over the red FTS button.
"T-minus fifteen," Fortney announced. "Are we go?"
"We're go," said half a dozen voices over all four channels.
"No abort," Sherry said coolly.
"Range safety?" Fortney inquired.
Sherry pressed her late husband's Astra .380 more firmly against Rollins's back.
"Range safety says go," the lieutenant uttered hoarsely.
"T-minus ten, nine, eight..."
Sherry gazed up at the monitor. In the fascination of the moment, she still possessed the presence of mind to whisper into Rollins's ear, "Move your hand six inches away from the FTS switch. Now."
"Three seconds. Ignition sequence start."
"Valves open," a voice on Channel One said. "Release clamps."
"...two," Fortney continued, "one, ignition."
"LH flow one hundred percent--"
"Clamps away!" one of the Freespace people yelled.
Sherry stared breathlessly at the monitor as clouds of steam exploded from beneath Aurora. The white billows hid the robin's-egg spacecraft for an instant. Then, above the cloud, the graphite-grey tip of the spaceship poked upward.
"Liftoff!" Capt. Fortney said with a surge of enthusiasm. "Liftoff at twenty-nine minutes past the hour."
Everyone not intimately involved in monitoring the ship's systems stared at the wall screen with tense awe. Now the entire ship lifted clear of the smoke, rising on a nearly transparent flame like a bolt into the blue. The camera angled to follow its ascent.
"Good burn," someone reported. "Fuel flow nominal."
Fortney glanced at the readout superimposed on his work station screen. "Altitude eight hundred feet. Go, baby!"
Rollins edged his hand toward the abort switch. An increase in spinal pressure let him know that Mrs. Cooper was not inordinately distracted by the splendor of the launch.
Colonel Lundy, observing the manner in which she leaned closely to Rollins and the way her right elbow extended backward under her long sweater, realized that she had taken his sub rosa advice and indeed was paying close attention to range safety. He smiled. His father would have been pleased, he believed, to see someone get results from the bureaucracy through such direct action.
"Holy Chao!" Bischoff said, seeing a white contrail rise out of the west. "What's that?"
Poubelle scanned the sky, saw the rocket's ascent, and instantly knew its origin. "That's Widow Cooper's Aurora."
"It's heading north," Chemar noted. "Doglegging to avoid us?"
"She's inserting it into a polar orbit, along the course a tour ship would take. Maximum ground track coverage. Maximum scenery."
"Ah."
Everyone onboard the two planes -- except occasionally Bischoff -- watched the bright point of light for as long as their climbing turn allowed, then waited impatiently for the scene to reappear in their left quadrant as they came about. By the time they saw it again, the ship ascended almost to invisibility.
"Good show," Poubelle said. Glancing at the altimeter, he added, "We're coming up on our own little moment of truth here."
At 12,500 feet altitude, many of the smaller aircraft had leveled off -- open or unpressurized cockpits prevented many of them from flying higher without supplementary oxygen, though some hung in knowing that they had either half an hour or 1500 feet before oxygen became legally required. At 14,000 feet, those die-hards dropped out. When Dædalus One hit 18,000 feet and entered the positive control area, their escort consisted of corporate jets, airliners, and a few pressurized, turocharged piston planes. These scores of loyal fellow travelers tightened up their formation from a cylinder to a roughly spherical shape, most of them circling and climbing through the same altitude as the 747, some in a tighter turn far above and some mirroring the action farther below. The two F-16's orbited the protective shell, sometimes testing its integrity -- and the pilots' nerves -- by banking in closely and breaking away or rushing straight toward the equator of the sphere, pulling up on afterburners, and arching over in an outside loop. Then they power-dove down the other side, rotated 180°, and pulled an inside loop under the south pole region of the lowest aircraft. It kept everyone on their toes.
"Fly Swatter One and Two," the voice of their commander radioed. "Shortly before launch, target will have to break away from the pack. At that time, you have authorization to paint the target, over."
Not privy to the military-frequency communications, one airline pilot in the convoy kept up a running monologue for the benefit of his half-fascinated, half-terrified passengers.
"It makes you wonder," he said in that back-porch conversational tone some sky jockeys affected, "whether the government's so determined to keep Americans out of Space that they might try firing missiles in proximity to fully-loaded commercial aircraft." He did not realize that his comments -- picked up by reporters with radio scanners -- bounced the planet in real time via satellite news systems.
Leaving the Military Operation Area behind at Flight Level 180 -- 18,000 feet -- ended the stream of dire warnings from Edwards RAPCON. That tedious chore they handed over to the FAA.
"All unidentified aircraft, this is Lancaster Radio. You are in Positive Control Airspace without IFR flight plans or clearance. Those of you with transponders will be contacted for FAA action. Military authority has superseded and informed us you are subject to military response. That is all."
Lancaster Radio repeated the warning a few times before giving up. The two F-16s continued their maneuvers, emboldened by the diminution of the protective shell as more aircraft dropped away until only a fleet of corporate jets and a handful of airliners remained.
"Fly Swatter Leader, this is Fly Swatter One. We have transient windows of opportunity now. Do we have permission to lock on, over?"
"Negative, One. Hold off until target breaks free, over."
At FL 450, Bischoff leveled the 747 and brought it out of its extended turn at a heading of 90° -- due east. The other aircraft cleared a path for it and fell into formation along its left and right wings at a safe distance of one-half mile. The airliners pulled away. Only a dozen jets remained of the thousands of airplanes that had joined in. These carried corporate executives and high-flying playboys (and a playgirl or two), all friends of the equally wealthy and flamboyant pilot of Nomad. Despite the presence of armed fighters, they treated the event as a champagne excursion. And now they awaited the grand finale.
"Well, Larry," Bischoff said jauntily. "Here's where I bid you a fond farewell and haul my donkey back to base. Chemar -- be prepared to lend him a hand... in case his fake one falls off!"
"You slay me," she said in a deadpan tone. "Make sure your flying doesn't."
"All right, kids," Poubelle said, commanding the onboard computer to cycle its checklist. "Here's where we see whose rocket is faster. Top off tanks."
Pumps onboard the 747 fed more cryogenic propellant and oxidizer to the interior and exterior tanks to replace what boiled off during the ascent. The tanks sealed shut and the feed lines retracted, followed shortly by the external power connection.
"All power on internal," Chemar noted. "APU's operative. Drop-minus four minutes and counting."
While Poubelle and D'Asaro ran through their final countdown, Bischoff brought the 747 to its service ceiling and then exceeded the altitude by another 500 feet. "Flight Level Four Fifty-Five and holding."
At Drop-Minus one minute, he lowered the plane's nose to increase airspeed and allow for a positive separation.
"Nomad, we are at five hundred-eighty knots passing through FL four-fifty."
"Roger." Poubelle spoke in clipped, terse sentences now, his attention utterly concentrated on the spaceplane. "Drop-Minus thirty. Turbine lights green. Pressure green. Control surfaces functional."
"Six hundred knots, FL four-forty."
"Stand by for separation."
Poubelle's hands -- real and robotic -- tensed. His left lay poised near the ignition switch, his right on the control stick. Behind him, Chemar took a sudden breath loud enough to hear over the intercom.
"I love you," she whispered breathlessly.
"T-Minus zero," Poubelle said. "Drop."
A trio of gunshot-like explosions reverberated through the hull as explosive bolts severed the connections between Nomad and the 747. Poubelle edged back on the stick and the spaceplane pulled upward as the Boeing dove down and banked to the right.
"Clean separation," Bischoff radioed. "Now give 'er the spurs."
Chemar watched her FMS screen, then cried out in sudden terror, "They've painted us!"
Fly Swatter One acquired its target and locked its missile radar onto the black arrow. His thumb hovered over the firing switch as he decreased his angle of attack to gain airspeed and close in on his victim.
"Fly Swatter One," the voice of their leader radioed. "Confirm you've engaged the enemy. Fire at will."
He glanced up from the screen to peer through the canopy at the aircraft ahead. It lifted gracefully away from the 747, two fat fuel tanks attached to its underside. She was daughter to the X-15, all right, all grown up and more beautiful than her mom.
Inside his pilot's soul, somewhere deeper than his military training ever reached, lay the heart of a young boy who first saw the X-15 hanging high overhead in the Smithsonian and who gazed in awe at its singular beauty.
His killing thumb wavered.
"I love you too, babe," Poubelle muttered to his co-pilot as he threw the switch forward.
The engine lit and -- even at idle -- crushed them with a two-gee acceleration. The computer took over and throttled the engine up to 100% rated thrust over the span of three seconds.
"God!" Chemar groaned as the g-forces mounted.
Poubelle said nothing as he fought to breathe, maintain consciousness, and perform what decision-making functions he needed to while software and hardware controlled their ascent.
"Fly Swatter One, fire your missiles!" The order came through as a near-shriek.
"Sorry, Leader," the pilot replied, removing his thumb from the button. "Lost my radar."
Without a word, Fly Swatter Two locked on to the rapidly departing target and launched its missiles. Two ATAM's rocketed away from the F-16's weapons pylons and streaked toward the hot infrared source above and ahead of them. They accelerated to their maximum velocity, straining to gain on Nomad, which thundered through Machs one and two in its first twenty seconds of flight and now rose at a 45° angle through FL 700. At Mach 2.5, the engine sucked dry the contents of the hypersonic propellant tanks. Their job done, they separated with alarmingly loud clunks. Friction heating swiftly warmed them to furnace temperatures and tore them into chaff. That chaff collided with one of the missiles, detonating it in a spectacular high-atmospheric blast.
The other missile flamed out and drifted ballistically upward for a few thousand more feet before arcing ignominiously over to drop several hundred feet below its apex. Its self-destruct mechanism blew it to harmless scrap.
"Gee," Fly Swatter One radioed to his companion. "I guess it's catch-and-release day."
Nomad's cockpit rattled and hummed, creaked and popped, shuddered like a mustang with the chills. When the hypersonic drop tanks cut loose, the thrust increased with yet another slam of acceleration.
"Mach four," Poubelle noted through gritted teeth. "Mach five."
"Fifty miles altitude. There's no atmosphere left," Chemar growled.
"All right! Two miles per second. APU warning light on two! Wait. It's OK now. Three miles per second. Three point five. Halfway there."
"Sixty miles!"
They spoke to each other as if they traveled alone, even though millions on the ground listened in, courtesy of the satellite news medium. No flight center with hundreds of employees existed on the ground to control the spacecraft; a single computer onboard handled attitude, trajectory, navigation, fuel management, and the thousand details relating to the furious energy that roared from the engine.
From the lower vantage of the 747, Bischoff and his co-pilot watched the pure white exhaust plume, the only visible indication of Nomad's whereabouts. It curved upward into the big sky, far outpacing the slower airbreather. As had every other airliner pilot that day, though, Bischoff's thoughts wandered to the amazing feat of Marcus Grant. He marveled at the notion that one could build a full-sized space station on the ground and lob it into Space in a single piece. He wondered whether it would ever happen again... and if he could make the grade as pilot on one.
The six-minute burn lasted for æons. As the rocket ravenously consumed fuel and oxidizer and thus mass, the constant thrust on an ever-lighter spaceplane meant that the acceleration and g-forces crept upward with every second. Chemar had no idea how long the ton of sand had lain on her, but there had to be an end to it. The sensation, not painful or even particularly uncomfortable, nonetheless made for difficult breathing and laborious movements in her limbs. The most interesting and annoying sensation occurred in her breasts; even though she could not see over the bottom edge of her helmet, she felt as if some powerful lover's hands pressed them relentlessly against her ribs.
She gazed upward through the canopy and saw stars. Not the pale, twinkling, timid stars of an earthly night, but the stark, sharp, unwavering brilliance of starlight uninterrupted in its journey through the cosmos. The veil of air, veil of worldly tears and woe, pierced by the arrow that was Nomad, lay behind and below her as she raced away from all worry.
"Six miles per second!" Larry called out with difficulty. "Almost there! Fuel looks good. Attitude... good. Alpha and theta both on the mark. Six point five."
The groaning, creaking, popping sounds inside the cockpit abated as the ship's mass decreased. The roar of the engine a few yards behind them drowned out all other sounds.
Then, as if it had come loose and dropped away from them, the engine's roar muted until only the sound of the turbopump whining to a halt filled their ears. Their weight diminished to earthly proportions, then continued to decline. Chemar soon felt light-headed, dizzy. It was not a sensation of falling, but of not quite knowing which way was down.
"Burnout!" Poubelle announced. "Orbital velocity! We made it, babe!"
"Thank God," she whispered. Then she looked once more out of the canopy. The stars drifted from port to starboard. "Are we losing our yaw stability?"
He gazed at the stars, at the Sun, at the Earth. Then he glanced down at the flight management screen. "Hmm..." was all he said.