‘And what’s to say that somebody hasn’t taken control of precisely those ten satellites?’
‘Nothing. That is to say, everything! You know how many satellites you would have to knock out to cut off the whole of the Moon from the Earth? Gaia doesn’t actually have a libration problem, it’s in visual range, so it can be reached at any time by TDRS satellites, even without LPCS. Except we no longer have a connection with Gaia either.’
‘So someone must be blocking—’
‘—terrestrial satellites too, yes, that’s one hell of a lot of codes, but yes, I think so. It’s just not a lot of use to them in the long term. They could attack TDRS headquarters in White Sands and paralyse all the Tracking and Data Relay Satellites at a stroke, but then we’d just switch to ground stations or civilian stations like Artemis, which are equipped with S-band transponders and pivotable antennae. How would anyone interfere with all of those?’
‘That’s precisely the problem,’ said Edda Hoff. ‘We’re in touch with every available ground station in the world. There’s no contact up there.’
‘After the breakdown of the conference system we immediately informed NASA and Orley Space in Washington,’ said Jennifer. ‘And of course the Mission Control Center in Houston, our own control centres on the Isla de las Estrellas and in Perth. Nothing but radio silence.’
‘And what could be the reason for that?’ Jericho rubbed the tip of his chin. ‘If not interference with the satellites?’
Merrick studied the lines in his right palm.
‘I don’t know yet.’
‘Are Peary Base and Gaia cut off from one another as well?’
‘Not necessarily.’ Norrington shook his head. ‘There’s a non-satellite laser connection between them.’
‘So if you got through to the base—’
‘Our message could be passed on to Gaia.’
Jennifer leaned forward. ‘Listen, Owen, I won’t deny that until a moment ago I had some doubts about whether the evidence you have points convincingly to a threat to Gaia. You three could have been a gang of hysterical fantasists.’
‘And what’s your opinion now?’ asked Tu.
‘I’m inclined to believe you. According to your file, the bomb has been dormant up there since April of last year. The opening of Gaia was actually planned for 2024, but the Moon crisis thwarted that one. So it would make sense to detonate the bomb now that it’s finished. As soon as we get a warning through to the hotel, someone sabotages our communication, another clue that it is going to happen, but above all that someone’s got their eye on us, during these very seconds. And that’s extremely worrying. On the one hand because it suggests that we have a mole in our ranks, on the other because it means that someone up there will try to get the bomb into Gaia and set it off, if they haven’t done so already.’
‘Listening to Vogelaar,’ Norrington said, ‘you’d see the Chinese everywhere.’
‘Not impossible.’ She paused. ‘But Julian already suspected someone before the connection was severed. A guest. In fact the guest, the last to join the group. The perpetrator might be known to us.’
‘Carl Hanna,’ said Norrington.
‘Carl Hanna.’ Jennifer nodded. ‘So please be so kind as to get hold of his papers for me. Screen the guy, I want to know what he had for breakfast! Edda, put me through to NASA and issue orders to the OSS. Our people or theirs need to send a shuttle to Gaia.’
Hoff hesitated. ‘If the OSS has capacity at the moment.’
‘I don’t care whether they have capacity. I just care that they do it. And straight away.’
Aristarchus Plateau, The Moon
The rover Julian had mentioned was parked in the dugout, but the second was stranded on the runway, scorched as if it had got in the way of a shuttle jet. All that remained of the third one, however, was a pile of junk. Debris lay scattered all around the place, so Momoka immediately set off in search of Locatelli’s remains. She scoured the area in grim silence. After that it was agreed that Locatelli wasn’t here, and nor was any part of him.
They all knew what that meant. Locatelli must have managed to get on board the shuttle.
They listlessly trawled through the hangars. Clearly the Schröter spaceport was still in the finishing stages. Everything suggested that airlocks and pressurised habitats were planned, so that people would be able to survive here for a while, but nowhere was there a sign of a life-support system. A cold room, for the preparation of foodstuffs, lay abandoned. The section of the hangar in which the moonmobile was parked was identified by inscriptions stating that grasshoppers should have been stored there, but there was no sign of one far or wide.
‘Well,’ Evelyn observed caustically, after glances into steel containers that should have contained spacesuits revealed nothing but a yawning void, ‘theoretically, at least, we’re in safety. The whole thing should just have happened four weeks later.’
‘Is the stupid moonmobile really all we’ve got?’ groaned Momoka.
‘No, we’ve got more than that,’ said Julian’s voice. He was walking through the next room with Amber and Rogachev. ‘You should come over here.’
‘Nothing that flies,’ he went on, ‘but a few things that drive. That burnt rover out there hasn’t got any prettier, but it does work. So along with the one in the hangar we’ve got two. And look what Amber has found: charged replacement batteries for both vehicles, and in the boot of the undamaged rover enough extra oxygen for two people.’
‘There are five of us,’ said Momoka. ‘Can we connect the tanks to our suits in alternation?’
‘Yeah, that’s fine. The supplies wouldn’t get you to Gaia, and the rovers would be worthless in the Alps. But whatever happens, our supplies will be enough to take us to the mining station.’
‘And does anyone know the way?’
Amber waved a stack of slides around. ‘These guys do.’
‘What,maps?’
‘They were in the rover.’
‘Oh, great!’ Momoka snorted. ‘Like Vasco da Gama! What sort of crap technology is that, when you can’t even program in your journey?’
‘The technology of a civilisation that increasingly confuses its achievements with magic,’ Rogachev coolly. ‘Or might it have escaped you that the satellite communication has gone down? No guidance system without LPCS.’
‘It hasn’t escaped me,’ said Momoka sulkily. ‘And incidentally, I’ve got a constructive remark as well.’
‘Let’s hear it.’
‘We can’t really make ourselves comfortable in this mining station, can we? I think we’ve got to make contact with the hotel, and that doesn’t seem to be happening at the moment because of the satellite strike. So how are we going to get to the hotel under our own power?’
‘What are you getting at?’
‘Are there any flying machines in the mining station?’
‘Maybe some grasshoppers.’
‘Yeah, those’ll get you around the Moon just fine, but at a snail’s pace. Except, if I remember correctly, the helium tanks are taken to the Pole by magnetic rail. Right? That means there’s a station there, and a train goes from there to Peary Base. And from Peary Base—’
Julian said nothing.
Of course, he thought. That might work. How obvious! Hard to believe, but just for a change Momoka really had come up with something constructive.