The commander looked over at his co-pilot and frowned. Pasha was waiting for an answer. He had just asked about their crew mates’ odds of survival. Pasha couldn’t have been thinking clearly. They all knew the odds.
“Honestly, none,” answered Commander Rogers. “We’ll await confirmation of casualties until we plan any memorials. I don’t want any of you under the illusion that someone may have survived re-entry with a blown-out cockpit in an uncontrolled spacecraft.”
“Commander, I captured a few images of the station’s outer damage,” said Reece, trying to get his mind and theirs off the heartbreaking topic. “I’ll explain what we need to repair.”
“Alright, show us what you’ve got,” replied Commander Rogers.
“They should’ve uploaded to the station’s primary and backup mainframes almost immediately,” said Reece. “Thomas, can you pull them up on the overhead display?”
“Sure thing,” Thomas replied as he navigated the touchscreen at the control room’s primary workspace.
Soon, the first image appeared on the overhead. Reece began explaining the damage as well as his recommended fix actions. Once they finished analyzing each image and Reece’s plans, they scheduled the repairs. First, they would stage all the equipment and supplies he would need. Next, Reece would repair the gaping hole in the airlock module.
Commander Rogers would do a full inspection of the lab during this time. They needed to determine how much internal damage there was. He would need to flood the lab module with the atmosphere from the adjoining garden module. The life-support in that module was down and was slowly venting atmosphere. Reece would either do internal repairs of the lab or external ones on the garden and the lab in one EVA. It would depend on what Commander Rogers discovered in his inspection.
“Okay,” announced Rogers. “I need Thomas, Reece, and Stephanie to go and get some chow. When you’re finished, Reece, I need you to start staging everything you’ll need for the repairs. Thomas, Stephanie, I need you two to return here and relieve the rest of us so we can eat.”
Silently, the trio made their way to the mess hall. They barely spoke and ate their food mechanically, numb from the sudden loss. The shock was beginning to sink in, and Reece felt dazed. He cleaned up, mumbled a farewell, and went to the engineering section. Reece found all the tools and materials and staged everything at the EVA airlock. It took him three hours. When he had just about finished, Commander Rogers approached him.
“It looks like there was some interior damage to the lab. It wasn’t noticeable earlier because the atmosphere had just started to vent, and the damage was behind a rack of science equipment.”
Of course, Reece already knew some of this but played dumb, just in case.
“The airlock still takes priority, but the interior damage to the lab will need to be repaired before you repair the external damage. There may need to be some bending of metal. That would be much harder if the repairs were completed in the opposite order,” explained the commander.
“Okay, that sounds about right,” replied Reece. “By the way, everything is ready for my EVA.”
“Danielson, how long will it take to finish the repairs on the airlock breach?”
Reece started doing the calculations out loud.
“Forty-five minutes to get to the breach and prep it for the patch. Twenty minutes to get each sheet moved down to the breach. Thirty minutes to weld each in place. And another fifteen minutes to return me and all the required tools to the airlock, so… about three and a half hours.”
“Okay, that sounds pretty fast. Are you sure you’re up for it?” asked the commander.
“Yeah, it needs to get done,” replied Reece. “Besides, I need to keep my mind on task.”
“Understandable, Reece. You have my condolences. They were all good men… great men. And I understand you and Angel had become close before he left. I don’t know what happened aboard the Hermes, but that doesn’t change what we must do. Go ahead and suit up. I’ll return to the control room and get everyone set for another zero-G activation. Godspeed, Danielson.”
“You too, sir.”
Commander Rogers nodded his head towards Reece in acknowledgment and turned towards the passage back to the control room. He left just as Reece opened the EVA suit closet. A few minutes later, Reece was wearing the suit and floating in zero-G.
The tricky part was coming up. He needed to navigate the required materials and tools for each trip to the airlock breach without causing damage to the station or himself from the heavy steel plates. Even with no gravity, they still could easily attain enough momentum to cause serious injury or damage. He carefully pried one of the plates off the wall where he had temporarily affixed them and slowly guided it into the airlock. Once he had the plate positioned, he grabbed his torch. Reece had everything he needed. Now he just had to make sure it was all secured.
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He checked that his tool bag was clipped to one of the EVA suit’s connection loops. Next, he attached ropes to the plate and the welding torch. Then he clamped the other ends to the EVA suit’s loops. Finally, he held everything still while shutting the inner bulkhead door and securing it. Taking a deep breath to calm his nerves, he opened the outer bulkhead and guided the items slowly out of the airlock.
Once outside, he carefully went to the airlock breach, taking it painstakingly slowly. It was precision work guiding everything along. After an eternity, he finally arrived at the gaping breach. While pinning the plate down temporarily, he used the torch and hammer to heat and pound the remaining framework back into place. He spent the next half hour welding the first plate into place. So far, so good.
The round trip for the second plate went much smoother, but welding it into place still took a long time. The third plate seemed to be going even smoother. Right as he was putting it in position, however, his grip slipped. The heavy plate quickly floated away from him and the station. He anticipated the strength of the tug and grabbed onto the nearby rungs with both hands. Luckily, he had also managed to slow the momentum of the heavy object before losing his grip. Even so, once the plate reached the length of the rope, it tore Reece from the rungs he was holding onto.
He was still tied off. That was the only thing that saved him from drifting off into open space and to his slow death. He took a deep breath and slowly pulled the plate back to himself. Hugging the plate against his body, Reece carefully pulled himself and it back to the station. He made a second attempt at the patch job, taking extra care. This time, he finished it by successfully welding the last steel plate into the remainder of the gap. He had done well prepping the plates. They fit perfectly, effectively sealing the gap. He double-checked his welds to make sure they were airtight. Finding no issues, he contacted Thomas.
“Station Control?” called Reece. “The repair is complete. Do you copy? Over.”
“Copy that, we read you. What’s the situation? Over.”
“Fairly good. Can you re-pressurize the airlock module? I need to make sure that my welds are completely airtight. Over.”
Thomas did just that. Once the airlock reached enough pressure, out-gassing revealed two pin-hole leaks. Using the torch, he melted the surrounding metal into the two small holes, and the leaks stopped.
“All done. Give me fifteen minutes to get back inside. I’m starving,” replied Reece. “Over.”
“Copy that, Reece, and… good job. Come on back,” replied Thomas with relief in his voice. “You earned your dinner tonight. Over and out.”
Fifteen minutes later and Reece was safely inside Zhengzhou Station. He already felt the gravity system spinning back up. Reece breathed a sigh of relief as well. He believed that the hard part was over. Once gravity had been completely restored and Reece had stored his EVA suit and tools, he returned to the control module.
When he got there, he was greeted by Commander Rogers. Thomas, Naeva, and Stephanie were also stationed in the control room.
“Nice job, Danielson.”
“Thanks, Commander. Say… have we had any updates on the search for the Hermes’ crash site?”
“Nothing yet,” chimed in Thomas. “But it’s still early.”
Naeva stood up from her console and approached Reece.
“You must be famished. I was about to head to the mess for some dinner. Why don’t you come with me? I could use the company.”
Reece looked at the Commander, who nodded in return.
“Alright,” Reece said to the seemingly wistful lady. “Lead the way.”
The two left for the mess hall together, Naeva uncharacteristically silent. Three people were already eating when they arrived. Pasha was having a heated discussion with Zia and Aika over what they had heard in that last communication with the shuttle before the horrible incident.
“I’m telling you, I clearly heard Angel yell ‘you bastard’ right at the end of that transmission. “There was some sort of altercation between him and someone else, and… Taylor was trying to keep it under wraps. Why else would he act like nothing was wrong right up ‘til the end?” said Pasha in exasperation.
“Okay, okay,” replied Zia. “But it’s so little to go on. We still don’t know much about what transpired. And even if we did know, I’m not sure it matters anymore.”
Pasha hung his head in defeat as Reece and Naeva quietly approached the kitchenette to collect and prepare their food.
“Fine. I just hope whatever it was, wasn’t important,” replied Pasha dejectedly. “That it wasn’t something we need to know.”
“Fair enough,” replied Zia with a slight nod of acceptance.
“Look, it’s not worth arguing about,” added Aika. “I think we’re all just emotionally strung out after what happened. I get it. We just shouldn’t bicker among ourselves. This is hard enough without that.”
“Good point,” sighed Pasha. “Leave it to Aika to be the rational one here. It just hurts, you know. Especially since we don’t know what happened, and they haven’t even located the shuttle yet.”
“My wife would say we need that to help find closure,” Zia chimed in. “We can begin the healing process. For now, though, we just need to stay focused on doing our jobs.”
“Speaking of focusing on our job,” added Aika as she looked directly at Reece without expression. “Shouldn’t you be repairing the damage to the station?”
Somewhat taken aback by her accusatory comment, Reece replied, “Yeah, I’ve finished with the shuttle airlock. I’m headed to the lab once I get something to eat. How’re you all holding up?”
“As well as might be expected,” replied Pasha. “How about yourself?”
“Well, like you were all saying,” said Reece. “I’m trying to stay focused on my job.”
“On that note, I’m going to get back to mine,” added Aika, and then she rose and began cleaning up.
“Yeah, I think we’ve been here long enough,” Zia added as she rose.
Pasha followed suit. Once Reece and Naeva were ready to eat, the mess was empty except for them. Naeva gave Reece a sly grin.