Stephen Coonts - Combat

She looked up at the huge spacecraft, perched on the even larger carrier plane. “This makes it real, doesn’t it?” Her tone was half pride, half pleasure.

Ray caught himself about to say something stupid, about to brag about it all being his idea. But it only took one man to have an idea. It had taken a lot more to get it going, and would take that many more to bring it to life.

“It’s starting to be real, Jenny.” He wanted to stay, and talk, and he could see she would if he wanted to, but that wasn’t why they were there.

Wishing each other good luck, they went to work.

His phone rang while Ray was inspecting the hangar. He’d been waiting all day. It was Schultz’s voice, sounding resigned. “They’ve done it again. Check your pad.”

McConnell activated his data pad. “ … have confirmed the latest Chinese claim, made less than fifteen minutes ago. Another ‘American targeting satellite’ has been destroyed, and the Chinese renewed their promise to do the same to every American satellite unless they ‘acknowledge Asian territorial rights.’”

The correspondent’s face was replaced by a press conference, while his voice added, “In response to growing pressure to act, U.S. defense officials today announced a new program.”

Ray’s heart sank to the floor. Has some fool decided to take them public? Automatically, he started walking, while still watching the pad.

The official at the podium spoke. “To deal with this new threat to American commerce and security, an Aerospace Defense Organization has been established under the direct command of General David Warner, Chief of Staff of the Air Force. The other services will also take part. Its mission will be to defend American space assets against any aggression. Here is General Warner, who will take a few questions.”

By now Ray was walking quickly, still watching the pad. He made it to Schultz’s office just as the general was assuring the press that he had no intention of taking over NASA.

Ray’s data pad was echoed by Schultz’s wall screen. The admiral saw Ray and waved him in, with one eye on the screen. The rest of the admiral’s attention was on the phone. “I appreciate the need for security, Mr. Secretary, but the effects on staff morale should have been considered. A little warning would have let us brief them. And I must have your assurance this will not affect our resources. Thank you. I’ll call tonight, as always, sir. Good day.”

Schultz hung up, almost breaking the little handset as he slammed it into its cradle. “Peck assures me this new organization is a blind, designed to distract attention away from us.”

“And get rid of some of the heat DoD’s been taking,” Ray added.

“For about one week, I’ll bet,” Schultz agreed. “As soon as the Chinese shoot down another satellite, they’ll be all over the general, asking him why he hasn’t done something.”

“And what about resources?” Ray asked, concerned.

“Well, he’s going to need people, and money, and I have a hunch

Warner’s going to take his charge seriously. I’d have to agree with him, too. I’m a belt-and-suspenders kind of a guy. So he might get people or gear we need.”

Ray suggested, “Well, can we draw on his program? Use it as a resource?”

Schultz sharply disagreed. “No way. We don’t want any links with them. Any contacts might get traced back. And if we start poaching, we’ll make enemies. We have the highest possible priority, but we can’t throw our weight around. There are people in every branch of the government who would love to see us fail, if they knew we existed.”

Ray sighed. “I’ll put a notice on the local net, and I’ll speak personally to every department head, especially Security.”

Schultz’s attention was drawn to the wall display. A new piece, labeled REACTION, was on. A congressman was speaking on the Capitol steps to a cluster of reporters. Schultz turned up the volume. “ … done the math, this new Aerospace Defense Organization will have to act quickly or we’ll have nothing left to defend.”

Barnes knocked on McConnell’s open door, then stepped in almost without pausing. Everything was done quickly, Barnes thought, with the formalities honored, but only barely.

McConnell, in the middle of a phone call, waved him into a folding chair, the only other seat in the office, then said into the phone, “I’ll call you back.” He hung up and turned to face Barnes.

Expecting to be questioned about the technology survey, Barnes started to offer his data pad to McConnell, but Ray waved it back.

“You’re close to done, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” agreed Biff. “We’ve already started to receive some material. But there’s a lot of follow-up to be done.”

“That’s old business, Biff. I need you to turn it over to someone else as soon as you can.” McConnell paused, but kept looking at him. “We need you to be mission commander for the flight.”

Biff didn’t say anything. He absorbed the information slowly. Although he’d wondered in his few spare moments who would get to fly the mission, he’d assumed NASA would supply rated astronauts.

Did he want the job? Well, hell yes. Biff suddenly realized how much he wanted to fly in space again, and on what would be a combat mission. He knew he could do it. He was a fighter pilot, after all.

McConnell pressed a key on his data pad. “Here’s a list of the prospective flight-crew candidates.” Biff heard his pad chirp and saw the file appear. He opened it and scanned the list as Ray explained.

“Most are already here, a few are not, but all met the criteria Admiral Schultz and I came up with. You’ll need six: A mission commander, a pilot, a copilot and navigator, a weapons officer, a sensor officer, and an engineer. We listed all our requirements. If you disagree with any …”

“Your name isn’t here,” Biff interrupted.

“What? Of course not. It’s not the whole team, just the …”

“No,” Barnes insisted. “You’re flight crew. You should be the engineer. You’re putting her together. You know her best.”

McConnell was as surprised as Barnes had been. “What?”

“Articulate answer, Ray.” Barnes grinned. “Look at it this way. It’s the ultimate vote of confidence. You build it, you fly it.”

McConnell couldn’t say no. “This only fulfills one of my lifelong ambitions,” he answered, a little light-headed.

“One of mine, too. I get to boss you around.”

Mark Markin’s backdrop for his scoop was an artist’s animation of the Chinese ASAT weapon, the Dragon Gun as it had been dubbed in the Western press. The artist had added a hundred-foot-long tongue of flame emerging from the barrel as a projectile left the muzzle. Markin didn’t know if it was accurate, but it looked dramatic.

“With the crisis now into its second month, and seven GPS satellites destroyed, continued inaction by the United States has been taken as proof of their helplessness. Their refusal to act to protect these vital assets has been puzzling.

“But the situation may not be as it seems. Presuming that the administration would not stand idle, I was able to find hints that they may be acting after all. Residents surrounding the Miramar air base east of San Diego have reported heavy traffic at the front gate and cargo aircraft arriving at all hours.”

The image shifted to a picture of Miramar’s front gate. “On a visit to the base yesterday, we noticed increased security, and we were not allowed to take photographs on the base. There are also portions of the base we were not allowed to visit at all. All these provisions were blamed on an increased terrorist threat, but the Marine spokesman could not tell me the source of that threat.