Leonov noticed that Strelkov looked even more perturbed now. Acutely aware as the colonel was that the S-19 was closing fast, the last thing he needed was seeing open friction between his two superiors.
Gryzlov turned his attention to the commander of Mars One. “If the Americans don’t behave as rationally as Leonov here imagines, are your defenses ready to destroy them?”
“Yes, Mr. President,” Strelkov said quickly. “Our Hobnail lasers have more than enough power to destroy the spaceplane if it approaches within one hundred kilometers.” Hesitantly, he offered a compromise. “If the Americans do try a close approach and fail to shear off after being warned, we could activate and fire a single laser.”
“Why rely on only one laser?” Gryzlov asked.
“Because then we could blame the incident on an unintentional malfunction of Mars One’s automated defenses against dangerous space debris,” Strelkov said. “The Americans would find it difficult to prove otherwise… and the rest of our station’s weapons systems would remain hidden.”
Gryzlov nodded his approval. “A good plan, Colonel.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Any comments, Mikhail?” Gryzlov asked, almost offhandedly.
Silently, Leonov shook his head. Strelkov’s proposal threaded the needle between common sense — sitting tight until the Americans grew weary of seeing nothing suspicious on Mars One and departed — and the president’s obvious eagerness to test their new weapons on a real live target. In the circumstances, it was probably the best they could do.
“Very well, Strelkov, you may proceed,” Gryzlov said. “But maintain this direct link to Moscow. And stand by for further orders as the situation warrants.”
Again, Brad McLanahan felt himself pressed back into his seat as the spaceplane’s main engines fired in rocket mode for the third time on this mission. But this time, they shut down after only a few seconds. Numbers and graphics flowed across his display. “Good burn,” he announced. “Our orbit is circularized and stable at three hundred and eighty miles up.”
“Fuel status?” Boomer asked.
Brad paged through to another screen. “Plenty of hydrazine for the thrusters. And we’ve got more than enough JP-8 and ‘bomb’ remaining for additional on-orbit maneuvers and a powered descent. But I’d recommend a rendezvous with another 767 aerial tanker once we’re back in the atmosphere.” He raised an eyebrow. “Unless you want to try making a dead-stick landing like the one Nadia and Constable pulled off in the simulator?”
“Not me,” Boomer retorted, smiling. “A man’s gotta know his limitations and I draw the line at trying to fly this sucker like it’s a glider. Sims are one thing. Reality… well, that’s a whole lot different.” He poked at his own display, transmitting a text to Sky Masters requesting additional tanker support. “In the meantime, let’s do what we came here to do. Can you give me a visual cue to the Russian station?”
“No problem, boss,” Brad said. Their S-19 was in an orbit whose inclination matched that of Mars One, though offset by roughly one hundred miles. Right now they were also trailing the station by twenty miles. On the other hand, their lower altitude gave the spaceplane a slightly higher orbital velocity — not much, just around forty miles per hour. Still, that meant they would pass Mars One in a little over thirty minutes.
Quickly, he instructed their computer to match their known position in orbit with the current estimated location of the Russian space station. Fractions of a second later, it sent a steering indicator to Boomer’s HUD.
Maneuvering thrusters fired as the spaceplane yawed, swinging its nose around until they were pointing almost at right angles to their direction of travel. Bright green brackets appeared in the upper part of their individual heads-up displays — highlighting where Mars One should be. But at this distance and deep in the darkness of the earth’s shadow, it was still effectively invisible to them.
“Any luck with the nav radar?” Boomer asked.
“Little blips and skips,” Brad said. “But I can’t lock the station up. That damned thing is definitely coated with some kind of radar-absorbent material.”
Boomer snorted. “Yeah, that’s just what you’d expect from a peaceful civilian orbital platform.” He shook his head. “Well, let’s see how much info we can shake loose up close and impersonal. You ready on the nanosats?”
Brad nodded. “I’m on it. Spinning them up now.” He began entering the commands that would bring their payload of eight tiny recon satellites to life. One by one, he activated their propulsion systems and electronics. Green lights blossomed on his display. “Good indicators on all eight,” he reported. “Initializing guidance systems.”
More taps on his MFD sent precise navigation fixes to each nanosat’s tiny onboard computer. These computers were essentially derivatives of consumer-grade smartphone technology. Using them to control a spacecraft sounded crazy, except for the fact that the Apollo computers that made it to the moon and back were millions of times slower and less powerful than a modern smartphone.
This time, though, Brad saw only seven green lights. One remained stubbornly red. One of their satellites, one of three rigged to carry a sensitive infrared camera, was refusing to accept data from the S-19’s computer. He tried again. No joy. Without up-to-date navigation data, that particular nanosat was as good as dead. Sure, it could still fly, but God alone knew where it was likely to go if they launched it.
“Well, crap,” he muttered. “We’ve lost Sierra Four. It won’t accept data.” He glanced across the cockpit. “I bet a cable connector jarred loose during one of our burns.”
Boomer nodded. That was a reasonable theory. The need for speed in readying this mission had forced shortcuts in normal procedures — including having Sky Masters technicians double- and triple-check the bracing used to secure their payload under acceleration. Considering the shake, rattle, and roll they’d put the S-19 Midnight through over the past hours, he and Brad were lucky only to have lost one of the eight miniature spacecraft they’d brought into orbit.
He checked the elapsed time since they’d reached this orbit. “We’ll cross into sunlight in ten minutes,” he reminded Brad. “So let’s crank open the cargo bay doors and get these birds in flight while we’ve got some cover.”
“On it,” Brad said in agreement. He punched a control to open the cargo bay. Releasing their tiny recon satellites while they were still in darkness was a good move. True, compared to Mars One or even the S-19, the nanosats were about as big as fleas on an elephant. But they weren’t invisible, and launching a flock of them in full sunlight would certainly catch somebody’s unwelcome eye. Since the whole point of this trip was to recon the Russians’ new space station without unduly spooking them, that was definitely something to avoid.
Through the deck plating beneath his booted feet, he felt a soft rumble as the spaceplane’s cargo doors unlatched and swung open. A light above the control he’d pushed flashed green and stayed lit. “The doors are fully open.”
“Roger that,” Boomer acknowledged. “Launch at your discretion.”
“Launching now,” Brad said. He tapped icons in sequence, releasing clamps that had secured each of the seven functioning satellites in place. Small spring mechanisms ejected them into space one by one.
As they floated free out of the cargo bay, the nanosats’ onboard computers took over. Short bursts from their chemical engines — which used highly efficient and nontoxic AF-M315E, hydroxylammonium nitrate, as a propellant — sent them outward on diverging courses aimed roughly at where Mars One would be in approximately twenty minutes. If all went well, their little flock of satellites would pass on all sides of the station at ranges between fifteen and twenty-five miles.