One change already made was an added explosive warhead to the Scimitar missile, needed because some midlevel engineer had noted that fifteen Scimitar missile hits on the space station Armstrong did not produce the devastation everyone had expected. With new explosive Scimitars in the Elektron's cargo bay, it was that much more dangerous to fly, but that was always the way. The better, the more dangerous.
Govorov also knew that careers were made by those eager to make such refinements, and sometimes those men would steamroll over those in their way. He was on the lookout for such men, but at the same time he was careful not to hold on too tightly to his precious Bavinash missiles. Progress, for better or worse, was inevitable.
More important, his big gamble had paid off. Even in the Soviet military hierarchy those with the guts to stand for what they believed in could have some success. High rank usually meant heavy inertia, and the members of the Kollegiya had more in common than they would ever want to admit.
But leaders could reward, as well as strike down — when they perceived their own self-interest. Govorov, once commander of a small tenant unit at Tyuratam, now was commander of half of the entire base — over two thousand square kilometers, a dozen launch pads with support equipment and two thousand men and women — and he could summon as much hardware as he required from any corner of the Soviet Union to fill those launch pads. On his own authority, he could launch a half-billion kilograms of men and machines into earth orbit. He could do everything and anything except attack a foreign spacecraft, and then he needed only the word of one man, the general secretary of the Soviet Union himself, to attack any spaceborne target he felt was a threat to the nation.
It was a level of responsibility unprecedented in the Soviet Union — and, with very few exceptions, anywhere else. American nuclear submarine commanders, under extreme circumstances, could launch an attack in time of war; the commander of the American strategic bomber forces could launch his planes at his own discretion to improve their survivability in case of attack or natural disaster; the three Israeli fighter-bomber theater commanders could assemble their stockpiled nuclear weapons and launch an attack if provoked or in danger of being overrun. But not one of them had the power to take command of outer space. Only Marshal Alesander Govorov of the Soviet Union had that.
Take command of outer space. Govorov reflected on the implications of that as he moved down the main concourse toward the launch control center. He had been in the control center only a few minutes later when Colonel Gulaev approached him. "Sir, launch-detection report has been relayed to us by our reconnaissance satellites. The spaceplane America has launched from southern California…"
Govorov glanced at the chronometer over the command center consoles. "Ninety minutes later than their announced schedule. Has the launch been confirmed by any other means?"
Gulaev checked his watch. "Yes, sir. Agents in place near Edwards Air Force Base reported it to intelligence, and the news reports of several countries were filled with detailed descriptions of the launch." He paused. "Trouble, sir?"
Govorov's earlier mood quickly melted away.
"Do you think the late takeoff is significant?"
Gulaev shrugged. "The most important, the most widely publicized space flight by the outraged Americans, and it takes off ninety minutes late… It could be, sit."
Govorov nodded, went quickly to a computer-monitor at the extreme right end of the master command console, moving a technician aside as he scrolled through the display. "These tracking data are hours old," Govorov said.
Gulaev moved to his side and noticed that his superior was checking the orbital status readouts of the space station Armstrong. "We can update the data in three hours," Gulaev told him, checking the chronometer again. "But the station's orbit is erratic and its altitude is decreasing rapidly. It's becoming harder and harder to track."
Govorov studied the information. Armstrong was, miraculously, still in one piece, judging by the signal strength of the radars tracking the station. It seemed they would need to redefine what they considered the upper limits of the atmosphere. One hundred thirty kilometers was the usual altitude where atmospheric heating due to friction should cause damage to a spacecraft, but it was also generally acknowledged that the upper atmosphere was not flat like a desert but as craggy as the Himalayas: in some spots it only extended to eighty kilometers, in others perhaps a hundred fifty. Earth's atmosphere, as Govorov had observed many times from space, was like a boiling cauldron. Clouds revealed only a small fraction of the real turbulence in the sky. Surely the American space station should have impacted with enough of the higher peaks of the atmosphere to cause some damage. Apparently, it had not…?
A vague sense of unease began to grip Govorov as he recalled his words to Colonel Voloshin — something about the space station Armstrong remaining a threat as long as it was in orbit. For the past few weeks he had allowed himself the luxury of thinking the station was doomed, that his two-ship attack force had inflicted a mortal blow. But the station was still aloft. Was it also still a danger?
Logic said no. The station was mere hours from reentering the atmosphere. The crew of the spaceplane America had little time to retrieve the bodies of their dead crewmembers, let alone boost the station into higher orbit. Their late takeoff was like a death sentence for the station. No, he had accomplished his mission… The station was just taking a little longer to expire.
He took a deep breath, nodded to Gulaev. "Be sure careful records are made of the spaceplane's progress. I will be in quarters."
A few more hours, Govorov thought as he left the command center for his waiting vehicle. Just a few more hours…
It was long, long after America had reached orbit that Ann was able to recover fully from the sheer excitement of the launch. Marty Schultz almost had to shake her to get her attention. "We're in orbit," Marty said. "Sorry to startle you but I haven't seen you move in a few minutes."
"I feel drained, like I just ran a marathon."
"Well, it's not your usual shuttle launch, for sure."
That, Ann decided, was a rank understatement. Unlike the shuttle, which gradually climbed into orbit, the spaceplane America sprinted into orbit. From the moment the rocket engines were ignited on the sled that propelled the spaceplane down the long launch track in the high southern California desert, she had felt the crushing "g"-forces pin her body to her seat. America had been boosted from zero to two hundred miles per hour in less than fifteen seconds… It was nearly impossible to believe that seven hundred thousand pounds of machine could be accelerated at such a rate.
She'd thought the "g" s would diminish after they'd lifted off the rocket sled, but they hadn't even begun to slacken. The first indication of a force even greater than the rockets on the sled came when the center scramjet engine ignited. The three-hundred-fifty-ton spaceplane bucked like a living thing, lurching so hard that the hydraulic "g"-dampeners in Ann's seat could hardly absorb the shock. One hundred miles an hour of airspeed was added to the forward momentum of the spaceplane in the blink of an eye. Her "g"-suit had immediately inflated to keep her from blacking out, and if her face mask had not shot oxygen under pressure into her lungs she would have suffocated. As it was, her rib cage felt heavy as lead and breathing was suddenly impossible. When the other two scramjet engines ignited shortly afterward, her "g"-dampening seat had hit its limit and her body was forced to endure the ever-building, crushing pressure. She had had to perform an "H-maneuver," whereby blood was forced to the upper body and head by partially closing off the trachea, and then grunting against the pressure. She glanced sideways during the ascent and saw Horvath's chest heave and flutter as he performed the maneuver too.