I asked Sergeant Oleg what he was up to, realizing that I had never been quite sure of his job. It was not technical; he seemed a bit too grimy to be allowed into the assembly buildings. He could have been a guard, but here again his appearance worked against him; he would never pass an inspection. My guess was that he was a truck driver. “Hunting,” he answered, proving me wrong in an instant.
“What is there to hunt around here?”
“Damned little. But the dukes want fresh meat for their table, so…” He shrugged. I almost laughed at “dukes,” wondered if he meant the Baikonur generals, or the many visiting civilian nobles. Probably both. “I’m off to the east. They’ve got a license for saigak at Dzhusaly.” Saigak were a species of deer native to that area, perhaps fifty kilometers away, the location of the downrange tracking stations.
“Won’t you need a rifle?”
“They keep the official rifle locked up there.”
“Where’s your truck?”
He hefted his knapsack. “They can’t spare a truck for me until I’ve got a kill.” And he took off walking, heading in the general direction of China.
Those of us in the recovery team gathered at the new and freshly painted Area 82 assembly building late the next morning for the launch. All the preparations went smoothly; except for the fact that everyone’s attention kept drifting to the Universal Rocket on its pad, it might have been any lazy Saturday afternoon in spring — perfect for a subbotnik, helping the farmers plant crops.
A horn sounded somewhere in the distance at the five-minute mark. We all shaded our eyes in the bright sunlight, and at a few seconds after noon we saw bright fire from the base of the Proton. For the longest time, the rocket sat there spewing clouds of steam, building up thrust. Then it slowly began to rise as the sound and vibration reached us: a rapid but violent popping that only hinted at the power needed to send this beast into the sky.
And into the sky it went, faster and faster, until it was just a contrail heading wherever it was Sergeant Oleg went. We found ourselves clapping. “That’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” a female voice said.
I thought no more about that voice for the moment, since I had to follow the rest of the team back around to the front of the building where the cars and buses were parked. There we waited, until another group emerged from the building itself with the news that the L-1 spacecraft and its Block D stage were safely in orbit. The vehicle was to be publicly known as Cosmos 154.
Only then did I recognize the face that matched the female voice I had heard. It was Uncle Vladimir’s beautiful lady friend from State Security. “Katya?”
Pale blue eyes narrowed, she glanced at me for a moment, obviously having no idea of who I was. “Vladimir Nefedov’s nephew—” I started to say, when she brightened. “Yuri! Hello! I wondered if I would see you here!”
With all the high-ranking officials swarming over Tyuratam and Baikonur with their “secretaries” or girlfriends, the launch center was hardly an all-male environment. But Katya was literally the first woman I had conversed with in all my previous travels, other than the occasional key lady or shopgirl.
It turned out that Katya was staying at the same hotel as I was, having come along with a group from the Academy of Sciences. We arranged to meet later that night, if all went well.
Unfortunately, all did not go well. Returning to the hotel, I learned that the Block D upper stage had exploded when reignited to boost L-1 toward the Moon. This left me with no L-1 to recover, since the damaged spacecraft was now wobbling uncontrollably in the wrong orbit, and would reenter the atmosphere when and where the laws of physics, not the flight-control center, chose.
In spite of the failure — or perhaps because of it — Katya and I met that evening in the lobby of the hotel. I was going out for a walk and she was coming in with her group of scientists. “When will be you be off duty?” I asked, assuming she was serving as State Security control over the scientists.
“I went off duty when the spacecraft blew up,” she said. “I’ll meet you down here in ten minutes.”
True to her promise, she returned shortly, hair brushed and lipstick freshened, looking more like a movie star than ever. She was also carrying a bottle of Georgian wine. “A gift from an admirer?” I asked, wondering if Uncle Vladimir was that admirer.
“How ever did you know?” And she smiled.
“I hope he won’t be upset that he’ll be missing out.”
“If I’m happy, he’ll be happy.” She linked her arm in mine. “I believe your mission is clear.” To make her happy? In what ways? I think I blushed.
Attached to the hotel was a café where I had eaten quick breakfasts, never dinner. But there were few dining options in that part of Tyuratam in those days, so I had no real choice but to take Katya there.
Either we were early, or the various military and civilian officials were busy drowning their sorrows, because the café was half-empty. Nevertheless, we stood in line to get a table, then stood in line to order. Finally we were able to sit and open our wine, knowing it would be a long wait for our actual meal.
“How have your scientists been behaving?” I asked, trying to be as sociable as possible without mentioning State Security.
“They were quite good until news of the failure hit them. Now I suspect they’re behaving badly, though God knows where. Go ahead, taste it.” She had poured the wine, which was sweet and fruity, typical Georgian stuff I knew from my teens. “I don’t work for your uncle, by the way.”
I blushed again. “I assumed you did.”
“I work at the Space Research Institute on studies of the surface of the Moon. We had a camera aboard your spacecraft that was supposed to take pictures and help us finish our maps.”
“How did you meet Vladimir, then?”
“The cameras came from a military satellite, so we had to decide who would have access to the raw photos. Your uncle and I were both on the committee.”
I hadn’t realized Uncle Vladimir reached into other areas of the space program but then, I really knew almost nothing about his responsibilities. Or powers.
But as we talked, I thought less about my uncle and more about Katya. She had graduated from Bauman and had even studied under some of the same professors. She knew Filin (though not Artemov) because she had done graduate work in the Korolev bureau on the very first Luna probes, which were the first in the world to hit the Moon, then fly around it and take pictures of its “dark” side. She had joined the Space Research Institute when it was founded three years ago, something she openly admitted she regretted: “Science is the poor cousin in the space business. The engineers do whatever they want and only throw the military enough bones to keep them paying the bills. We are only brought out when some idiot Westerners visit Moscow and want to see a ‘space center’ and the geniuses of our program.” She sounded more amused than bitter. Then she raised her glass. “To the next L-1.”
Maybe it was the wine or the beautiful spring evening or the gypsy music being piped into the café, but I found myself completely entranced with Katya, in spite of the ten-year age difference.
Eventually our food arrived, and we soon found ourselves with empty plates and an equally empty bottle of wine. Since there was still a rosy light in the western sky, I suggested a walk outside.
We could hear voices from the open windows of the ten-story apartment buildings nearby. Occasional bits of music. Shouts and laughter that came from the hotel, along with the sound of at least one smashed glass.