“Frank Williams can’t go into space,” said Max Harding, Mark Pigeon's leading technical specialist apologetically.
Ben stared at the image on his tablet. “Why not?” he asked.
“Too heavy. We've looked at the technical specs of the Mercury capsules. Just bolting one onto the top of a Star Pigeon is a nightmare, by the way. Our rockets were never designed to carry something like that. Mark almost had a fit when he got your email. He thought it was an April Fools joke or something.”
“But it can be done?” asked Ben.
“As a purely intellectual exercise, yes. Probably. Whether it's something a sane man would ever want to do is another matter. But it's all academic, anyway. Frank Williams is too heavy.”
“I did explain that we intend to use a mass dampener, didn't I?”
“Yes, you did. You also said it can only reduce mass by seventy six percent. No more, no less. We’ve modelled stripping out everything we can from the capsule, leaving just the bare shell and the couch. We’ve made life support and communications as minimal as we can. Add it all together, reduce it by seventy six percent and it's still too heavy. The rocket will never make it to orbit.”
“Perhaps when you get your hands on the real capsule you’ll find some more places you can save weight,” suggested Ben.
“Possibly,” conceded the other man, “But it won't be more than a kilo or two. We’d need to save at least twenty kilos to send your man into space. The only way he's going up is if we amputate one of his legs.”
“Is that twenty kilos before you turn on the mass dampener, or after?”
“Before. You need to either find a smaller man or a larger rocket.”
Ben nodded. “We do have a smaller man we could send up,” he said. “Whether he's twenty kilos smaller, I don’t know.”
“Perhaps it's for the best,” said Max Harding philosophically. “The whole idea's insane. And if it goes wrong, if the rocket crashes and your man is killed, the bad publicity might mean the end of the whole company.”
“I promised you that no-one would know about the mission unless it’s a success...” began Ben.
“People will find out! People always find out.”
“But if it's a success, if your rocket plays a part in putting the moon back into its old orbit, I would imagine that the good publicity would be very good for you.”
“That's a very big if, Ben. Towing entire worlds around like cars towing a caravan...”
“You know it's possible. You saw what the Chinese did with their device.”
“Yes, and that’s the only reason we’re having this conversation.”
“If our other man weighs twenty kilos less...”
“The more less the better. I would prefer thirty kilos.”
“If he weighs that much less, will you let us launch him with your rocket?”
“We'd have to talk to the lawyers first. This is a legal nightmare...”
“Fuck the lawyers! Have you seen the projections of what the moon will do to us over the years to come? The decades, the centuries, if it's left in its current orbit? They’re talking about the end of modern civilisation. They're talking about humanity thrown back to the middle ages. Go get a history book, go see what the fourteenth century was like. That's what we're talking about. Plague, slavery, the divine right of kings... it's taken us six hundred years to claw our way out of that. We can't allow ourselves to fall back because of lawyers!”
“Ben, I agree with you, but I don’t make the rules. We have to do what we can in the world as it is. And we still don’t know if the Americans will let you use their mass dampener yet.”
“They will, that's the least of my worries. They've got as much to lose as anyone else.”
“They will, that's the least of my worries. They're good guys. They'd want to help even if they didn't have as much to lose as anyone else. I just need you to do your part.”
“I will do what I can, my friend.” He leaned forward to touch something and the screen went dark.
“Frank will be disappointed,” said Karen, coming forward. “I think he was quite looking forward to it.”
Ben was in no mood for humour, though. “Get them both in,” he said. “I'll explain it to them.” Karen nodded and left the room.
Frank did indeed look disappointed, but the guilt was clear to see as well. “I'm a bloody research scientist!” he said, staring down at his stomach, suddenly acutely aware of his muffin top. “How was I supposed to know I’d have to watch my weight?”
“It's okay, Frank,” said Eddie, giving him a sympathetic pat on the shoulder. “Nobody saw this coming.”
“I'm a fat slob!” said Frank, and the others were astonished to see tears in his eyes. “Too many cakes, too many biscuits with my tea. Never enough exercise. I’m a bloody scientist, not an athlete! How was I supposed to know?”
“You're not fat,” said Karen. “I've seen you naked, remember? It's a small rocket, that's all. Even Eddie may be too big for it.”
“How much do you weigh, Eddie?” asked Ben.
"That day at the beach, I was seventy five kilos."
Ben nodded. “What about you Frank?”
“Eighty nine kilos as of last night.” His face was pained with guilt as he said it.
“Max said we needed to save at least twenty kilos,” said Ben. “Thirty if possible. Go weigh yourself now, Eddie. You were eating quite a lot in Martinique, you were probably carrying a few kilos in your stomach. If you’re sixty nine kilos or under now, we're good to go.”
They all went to the lab together, where Eddie stood on the precision weighing scales which read out his weight to five significant digits. They all tensed up with disappointment. The display read over seventy five kilos. Eddie began getting undressed, and when he was standing in his underwear it read seventy four point eight. “Does it have to be twenty kilos?” he asked. “Sometimes they give it a margin for error.”
“The impression I got was that twenty was the absolute minimum,” said Ben grimly. “When did you eat last?”
“I had a couple of sandwiches a couple of hours ago.”
“Don't eat anything else today. Empty your bowels and weigh yourself again first thing in the morning. Don't drink either. Doesn't matter if you’re a bit dehydrated. You can drink as much as you like once you’re up there. I'm sure we can get you down to sixty nine kilos.”
“Yeah, sure.”
“How do you feel about this, Eddie? You volunteered to go up, but that was when you thought Frank was going up. You never thought you'd have to go through with it.”
Eddie's eyes were wide, but he nodded. “I'm still up for it,” he said. “I mean, it has to be me, doesn’t it? There's no-one else, unless the Americans want to send one of their men up.”
"Theirs are also too heavy," said the older man. "My countrymen are rather fond of their barbecues, as you know. There is another option, though. We just send up the two mass dampeners. We tell the guys on the space station what to do. Talk them through it. I’m pretty sure Mark Pigeon would be a lot happier that way. So would the Americans. I get the impression they’re not at all happy with the idea of a foreigner taking their mass dampener into space.”
“And what if there’s a problem? If there’s a problem on the moon? The shuttle’s communications gear was never designed to work over that kind of distance, and even if it does, they say all the lightning could screw up communications. We probably won't be able to advise them from the ground.”
“There might not be a problem,” said Karen. “It might go swimmingly.”
“But if there is, we can't help them from down here if we can't talk to them. Also, they've got to rearrange the whole thing. Turn it from a mass dampener to a mass amplifier, then back again. It's a complicated procedure. No matter how carefully we explain it, they could screw it up in a dozen different ways.” He shook his head. “There's no two ways about it. If we're going to do this, I have to be up there.”
Ben nodded. “If you’re sure you really are willing to go ahead with this..."
“I am.”
“Then we'll proceed as though you’re safely under the weight limit. The plane to Cologne leaves from Leeds airport at eight tonight. The taxi’s already coming to pick you up. Don't eat or drink anything before you weigh yourself tomorrow morning. Empty your bladder and your bowels as often as you can. If you weigh in at sixty nine kilos or under, we’re good. If not, we'll have to have another conversation with Max.”
“People who are hungry and dehydrated don’t think well,” pointed out Karen, though. “If there’s some kind of problem...”
“All he's got to do is sit there,” Ben reminder her. “He won't be like the original Mercury astronauts. There aren't going to be any manual controls. None at all. He won't need his brain until he gets up there. Until then, he’s an astrochimp.”
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“None taken,” said Eddie with a smile.
None meant, Eddie,” said Ben seriously. “This is an incredible thing you’re doing. Whether you succeed or not, whether they let you go up or not, you’re a hero. One day, they’ll make one hell of a movie about you.”
“I really am sorry about this,” said Frank again, staring at Eddie. “I feel like shit!”
“I haven't done anything yet,” Eddie told him. “I'm willing to go up, but so are you. If there was an Ariane eight on the launch pad, you'd be going up instead of me because you’re way more qualified. If I'm a hero, then so are you.” Frank nodded gratefully.
“So,” said Ben to Eddie. “Go pack a toothbrush. The taxi'll be here any minute.” Eddie nodded and left the room.
“How are we doing finding a Mercury capsule, anyway?” Ben asked Karen. “Be pretty funny if, after all this, none of them are still usable.”
“A lot of them aren't,” Karen replied. “They got put in museums, which have a nasty habit of cutting big holes in them so the visitors can see in better. The one on display at the Kennedy Space Centre is intact, though. It's one of three that never went into space, which makes it ideal for us. The Americans seem willing to let us have it, so long as we can meet their conditions regarding the mass dampener.”
“Good. Keep up the good work. Promise them whatever you have to. We need that capsule!”
“They were hinting that they may still want one of their own people to go up in the capsule. They were seriously suggesting getting him under weight with liposuction."
Ben gave a humourless laugh. "And if he dies from a fat embolism when he's in space...?"
"Yeah, but they don't want to let the mass dampener out of their hands. They really, seriously, don't want to let go of it."
“Do whatever you have to to sell it to them. This is too important to let American national pride get in the way.”
She nodded and followed Eddie out of the room.
☆☆☆
“Is there a Margaret Lewis here?” asked the RAF officer.
Margaret stood and waved to him. He saw her and came marching over, weaving his way between the couple of hundred bedraggled refugees sitting on folding chairs and boxes that filled the hanger. Some of them were still eating packets of crisps and chocolate bars from the vending machines the RAF people had broken open for them, that being the only food available. Pretty much everything in the kitchens, except the packets of dried soup they'd already eaten, had been destroyed by the tsunami. More food had been promised, but no-one seemed sure how long it would be before the delivery truck arrived. At least clean water was no problem. The underground pipes had come through the crisis unscathed, and several people had already taken the opportunity to wash the salt out of their hair.
Margaret’s children and their spouses looked up as the officer arrived. Cathy was breast feeding Timmy while keeping a look out for anyone who might find it offensive, but everyone sitting nearby was carefully looking in another direction. The officer also carefully avoided looking at her and kept his attention fixed on Margaret. “My name is Flying Officer Stewart. We have your husband on the line. He's anxious to speak to you.”
“Paul!” She replied in delight, jumping to her feet. “Is he okay?”
“If you'd like to come with me, ma'am, you can ask him yourself.”
Margaret nodded. “I'll tell him you’re all okay,” she said to the others.
“Tell him to take care up there,” said Richard.
Margaret promised she would and then followed the officer across the huge room towards the giant doors. They were closed to keep the cold wind out, but the officer opened a smaller door to let her out, then followed after her.
Outside, it was snowing again and she pulled her coat closer around herself against the cold. He led her across the tarmac towards another building whose lower windows had been broken by the wall of water that had crashed against it but which seemed otherwise undamaged. It looked old. At least a hundred years old, she thought. They'd built strongly back then. Not like nowadays when buildings had to be cheap and quick to put up.
She saw a line of military men standing a couple of hundred yards away in a gap where the fence had been swept away by the tsunami. They were holding back a small crowd of locals who seemed intent on getting in, although not so much that they were willing to challenge the guns the guards were carrying. “Trouble?” she asked.
“They think we have food and shelter. We don’t, but they don't believe us.”
“Some of them look injured.”
“Yes. They know we've got a doctor here, but there’s not much he can do for that kind of injury except what they’ve already done for themselves. Stop the bleeding and splint broken bones.”
“Do you have pain killers? Antibiotics?”
“Enough for our own personnel. Not enough for everyone in the area. They'd do better going to the refugee camps. They’re set up to deal with large numbers of people.”
“Weren't some of the camps swept away by the tsunami? There must be an awful lot of people out there whose homes were destroyed. They thought they were safe, above the twenty metre mark.”
“Yes, and they have my sympathy but there’s nothing we can do for them.”
He marched on, leaving Margaret stared at the shouting, angry people, with nothing now between them and her family but a thin line of soldiers. Then she hurried to catch the officer up.
Inside the building, the ground floor had suffered water damage and had largely been abandoned except for a few armed guards to keep people away from sensitive areas containing equipment that, although ruined and useless, would still be useful to an enemy. The officer led her up the stairs to the first floor, though, where the sounds of activity could be heard. The officer opened a door and Margaret saw a group of men gathered around a man sitting at a desk on which an ancient piece of electronic machinery was humming to itself. It looked like the kind of radio she’d seen in second world war films.
“Lucky we still had that,” the officer said. “Nobody knew it was still here except one old caretaker who's been working here for about fifty years. They dusted it off and found it still works. Amazing stroke of luck.”
“So long as there’s someone on the other end, listening,” said Margaret.
“Right. They got in touch with a ham radio operator living in an area where the phones still work and got him to make a phone call to Northwood. They dug up a similar set from somewhere and bingo! We're back in contact with the world.”
One of the men in the room turned to look at them. A far more senior officer, Margaret thought, if his uniform was anything to go by. “Margaret Lewis, Sir,” said Flying Officer Stewart.
“Thank you for coming,” the senior officer said, offering his hand. Margaret shook it. “My name is Group Captain Arndale. If you'll please take a seat, we'll see if we can get your husband back on the line.”
He gestured to a chair at the side of the room and Margaret sat in it. Flying Officer Stewart then gave her a little wave as he turned to leave. Margaret smiled back at him, then returned her attention to the ancient radio set.
The operator was talking to someone, but the voice that issued from the speakers was so distorted and filled with static that she could barely make it out. The operator told the person on the other end that she was there, and the crackly voice told him to wait for a moment. A long time then passed during which nothing happened. A tense silence fell as everyone in the room listened for the hiss and crackle to resolve itself into a human voice again.
Margaret stood and walked over to where a junior officer was tapping something on a tablet’s virtual keyboard. He hurriedly blanked the screen as she approached. “Sorry to disturb you,” she said. “I know you must be busy. I just wondered, what's going on out there? Out in the world, I mean?”
“We don’t know much,” he said apologetically. “Since the tsunami, that thing’s our only contact with the outside world. We’ve only had news of London, really.”
“So what's going on in London?”
“Everything seems to have pretty much ground to a halt. The tsunami swept right up the Thames and inundated pretty much the whole city. All business has stopped, all trade and traffic. There's six million people doing nothing but trying to clean up the mess, get the city back in business. They might just succeed in time for the moon's next close approach, when we'll go through it all again.”
“But hopefully without a tsunami next time.”
“Hopefully, but they say Los Angeles is going to get a big earthquake every time the moon passes by. Maybe Denmark will also get an earthquake every time. Maybe we'll get a tsunami every time.”
“They say we'll have a super low tide next time, instead of a super high tide. They say we'll almost be able to walk to Europe across the north sea.”
“Maybe, but there’ll be other super high tides. One perigee in four, they say. One every four months or so, and maybe a tsunami every time. Everything within fifty miles of the North Sea may be permanently uninhabitable.”
“That'll do, Wilson,” said Arndale sharply, and Margaret apologised before returning to her seat. The Group Captain came over to her, though. “We have your husband on the line,” he said. He gestured for her to approach the machine. “Press that button to talk, release it to listen.” She nodded. “Sorry about the quality, but they’re patching it through half a dozen different systems to get through to us. They must be really anxious to keep your husband happy.”
“I can't imagine why. I’ve got no idea what he’s doing up there at the moment. The last time we spoke, he said that all normal operations had stopped. They're just doing basic housekeeping up there.”
“Well, there must be something big in the cards, although I'll probably never find out what it is. Anyway, we'll leave the room to give you some privacy.” He gestured for the other men in the room and they all quietly filed out, the last man closing the door behind him.
Margaret sat in the chair and picked up the microphone. Crackles and static were coming from the speaker. She listened carefully but there were no voices in it. “Hello?” she said into the microphone. Nothing happened, and she remembered she was supposed to push the button. She did so, then tried again.
Silence fell while her finger was on the button, but the static returned when she released it. This time, though there was a familiar voice in it. “Maggie?” she heard Paul saying. “Is that you Mags?”
“Yes, it’s me,” she replied, vast relief sweeping over her. “We're all fine. Everyone here at Cranwell is fine.”
“Thank God!” Paul replied after a brief delay. The speed of light again. “When I saw the tsunami on the news I almost freaked out! I was so worried! Hazel's okay? And Richard?”
“They're both fine. Cathy and Len as well. And Timmy. We got a bit wet when the wave hit but we’re all fine.”
“Where are you now?”
“Still at Cranwell. We’ve got the whole air force looking after us. We're as safe here as anywhere.” I hope, she thought, remembering the hole in the fence and the soldiers holding the crowd back. “So, what's going on up there? Are you okay?”
“We're fine, Mags. A bit busy at the moment. They want us to take apart part of the space station and attach it to one of the shuttles. Lots of cutting and welding. We're attaching two things that were never meant to go together. Benny nearly had a fit when they told us! He's normally so calm and reasonable, but when they told us what they wanted us to do he actually swore.” He laughed and Margaret laughed back, each of them simply pleased and relieved that the other was safe and well.
They spoke for half an hour or so, until Group Captain Arndale knocked politely on the door and entered. “I'm afraid we need the machine for Air Force business,” he said. “We gave you as long as we could.”
“Thank you very much,” said Margaret. She spoke into the microphone again. “They say I have to go now,” she said. “Take care up there, Paul.”
“And you,” her husband replied. “Give my love to the others. And please thank the Air Force people for giving us this chance to speak.”
“He's right here, Paul, and he heard you.” She beamed at the Group Captain, who smiled back. ”Love you, Paul!”
“Love you right back, Mags! See you soon.”
Margaret put the microphone down on the table and rose from the chair. “Thank you so much, Group Captain.”
“Very glad we were able to help, Ma'am. Stewart will show you back to your family.” He gestured for the Flying Officer to enter. Margaret smiled to the Group Captain one last time, then followed the younger officer out of the room.
“I hope you know how privileged you are,” he said as they made their way back down the stairs. “Pretty much the whole business of the air base was put on hold while you had your little chat.”
“Paul said something big was in the air,” she replied. “I think he's right.”
“So do I. The moon again, would be my guess. Like the Chinese. There's a plan B in the wind.”
“And they want him able to concentrate on his work, not worrying about us. I hope they’re not going to expect him to risk his life. With so much at stake, they might think the lives of a few astronauts is a small price to pay.”
The idea hadn't really occurred to her until she heard the words coming out of her mouth, but once she'd said it she found herself thinking that it made an awful kind of sense. Her stomach suddenly knotted up with anxiety.
“I'm sure he’ll be fine, Ma'am.”
Margaret couldn't get the idea out of her head, though, and fretted all the way back to the hanger. She didn't notice that the crowd being held back by the guards had grown, therefore, and was becoming much more agitated. The Flying Officer did notice, though, and there was a frown of worry on his face as he escorted Margaret the rest of the way back to her family.