"Sure thing."
"Okay. Moyer, get into a space suit. You're our life insurance." The young tech nodded and hurried off to where one of the space suits had temporarily been stowed in a corner of the command module. "I want rescue balls within immediate reach."
"Space command tracking vehicle within two miles vertical, sixty miles horizontal," Walker reported. "Tracking reports vehicle is under power and maneuvering."
"Jerrod, get Enterprise the hell out of here."
"Tracking reports three more vehicles maneuvering within—"
"Ann isn't on board yet, Jason."
Saint-Michael got both transmissions at the same time, pressed his earset closer to hear better. "Say again, Jerrod—"
Will repeated the message. Before Saint-Michael could explode he heard, "Fifty miles, now at our altitude. Collision course. Repeat, collision course. "
"What the hell…" Saint-Michael turned quickly to station-wide speaker intercom. "Ann Page, report to the command module immediately. Acknowledge."
No reply. The general knew he had to force himself to put her out of his mind and concentrate on the attack. He turned back around toward the master SBR display. "Jake…"
"SBR lock-on, Skipper. Laser target discrimination in progress."
Tethered one hundred yards below Silver Tower, the Thor space-based interceptor-missile garage had obeyed the steering commands sent to it by the station's powerful phased-array radar and had pointed the business end of the garage toward the oncoming antisatellite vehicle. When the SBR locked on, it also slaved a neutral particle-beam laser projector onto the Soviet space vehicle. At that point the laser illuminated the three-ton Gorgon missile, and special sensors analyzed the reflected laser energy. A solid object large enough to damage the station would reflect a different wavelength of energy than a less substantial, lightweight decoy. Once the decoys were discovered, Armstrong's weapons could be employed against only those objects that were a real threat to the station. The whole process, from lock-on to lethal target verification, had taken only seconds. "Forty miles… thirty miles… target discrimination is lethal positive. Thor one auto launch…"
After launch commit was given, the missile's last check was target discrimination. Once targets were checked as lethal, the SBR then automatically issued attack commands to the Thor missiles. The first Thor interceptor missile shot free of its garage, accelerating rapidly to its top speed of over four miles per second. The one-hundred-foot diameter steel mesh net had hardly fully deployed when it hit the first Gorgon ASAT vehicle head-on. "Direct hit." But there were no victory cheers. This wasn't, after all, a planned exercise like their first operational test with friendly Trident D-5 missiles. "Transmit warning message to Space Command, Mission Control, and JCS," Saint-Michael said. "Tell them we are engaging—"
A loud bang and a warning buzzer sounded from the environmental control panel. "What the hell was that…?"
"Rupture in the Skylab module," Marks reported. "Rapid pressure loss… almost zero now…"
"Jason, this is Will on Enterprise. We were hit by projectiles from that Gorgon just before it was destroyed. Minor damage to our right wing leading edge."
"SBR has multiple inbound targets locked on," Jefferson reported. "Range eighty miles. Target discrimination in progress."
"Cabin pressurization in rec section of Skylab, module down to zero," Marks updated. "Skylab module sealed off. I think we took one of those Gorgon projectiles."
Saint-Michael looked grim. "Damn it, we've got to get Enterprise out of here." He switched to stationwide intercom. "Ann, where are you? Report, damn it."
Silence.
"Target discrimination lethal positive for three inbounds—"
Jefferson had just finished his report when his computer monitors showed three automatic Thor missile launches. "Thors two, three, and four away… straight track…"
"Space Command acknowledges our warning message."
"Direct hit on number two… miss on four. Miss on number four—"
"Manual launch," Saint-Michael called out. "Jake, you got it."
Jefferson's fingers manipulated his control board. "Thor five away. Reacquire target four… Switching to auto track—"
"Target three direct hit." Followed by dozens of bangs and scraping noises on the hull and throughout the station. "More flak from those Gorgons," Marks reported. He checked the environmental control panel. "Leaks in the upper connecting tunnel. Cargo shovel defueling system has a shortcircuit. Major damage throughout the Skylab module."
"SBR tracking four inbounds," Walker said. "Range of closest target eighty miles—"
"Snared target number four," from Jefferson. His dark blue flight suit was already soaked with sweat.
"Only five more Thors," Saint-Michael said. "I don't like the way the math is working out here."
"We've got ten more Thors stored on the keel," Walker reminded him.
"They might as well be on earth," the general said. "We've got no one to load them onto the garage."
"Enterprise could do it…"
"It would take too long to load those missiles with the manipulator arm. If we only had—"
"I'll go," Moyer said suddenly. "Shouldn't take me too long…"
"It'll take you all day to load ten missiles by yourself," Walker told him.
"At least I can load a few."
"We can't spare you," Saint-Michael said. "If we run out of missiles and we're still under attack, we abandon the station. Period—"
"Target discriminating on four inbounds… showing two decoys. Repeat, tracking two decoys."
"Decoys?" Marks said. "They put decoys on an ASAT launcher?"
"A decoy can still do damage."
"But we don't have the Thors to spare," Saint-Michael told Walker. "Target the other two."
"Rog… Selective targeting option running… Thors six and seven away…"
"Warning message, Skipper," Walker broke in. "Recheck on that last target discrimination. Now showing all four as lethal positive."
Saint-Michael looked dead ahead. "Launch commit on all targets. Check the neutral-particle projector, find out what happened—"
"Thors eight and nine away. Straight track."
"Direct hit on targets five and six…"
"Miss on target seven, clean miss on seven."
"Manual launch Thor ten," Saint-Michael. ordered Jefferson. "Make this one count, Jake."
No shit, Jefferson thought, but said nothing as he ejected the last Thor interceptor missile and sent it toward its target. "All Thors away."
"Miss on target eight!"
All heads turned to Colonel Walker as he gave that last report. "Clean miss, General. Targets seven and eight appear to be… to be following an evasive course. Still at seventy miles range but closing slowly."
Jake Jefferson looked stunned as he watched his console. "Skipper, I don't understand it. One second, Thor number ten was heading straight to target number seven, and the next, it was gone. I've lost contact with it."
The realization was not long in coming. The fact that the targets were evading confirmed it. They were dealing with Elektrons… The Russians had launched two armed Elektron spaceplanes at them…
It was Colonel Ivan Voloshin who launched the first Bavinash Scimitar interceptor missile in space combat. Ironically, Silver Tower's crew would never realize the honor they did the Soviet pilot by launching a Thor missile at him.
Both Govorov and Voloshin had immediately detected all ten Thor missile launches. The Elektron's simple but highly effective infrared tracker and laser range finder had picked up the fast-moving devices easily and computed Scimitar launches against each Thor missile. But Govorov's orders had been to save as many of each Elektron's ten missiles as possible and not use them against a Thor missile unless attacked directly. Voloshin's single Scimitar missile followed the laser beam locked onto Thor number ten and destroyed it — Govorov guessed that the Scimitar hit the Thor missile directly, not just snagging on its large net.