Stephen Coonts - Combat

“It’s good to see you smiling, Biff.” McConnell’s voice would have startled him a few moments earlier, but Barnes felt himself relaxing a little.

McConnell sat down in his designated chair, then clapped his hands. “Attention please! We’re short of time, so we can’t arrange a ceremony, but I believe these are yours.”

Everyone’s eyes followed McConnell as he handed a small box over to Barnes. As Biff’s hand touched it, a photoflash went off, and he turned in his seat to see a photographer behind him, smiling, his camera still ready.

He opened the small dark box to see a pair of golden oak leaves.

“We thought Defender ’s mission commander should be at least a major.” Admiral Schultz stepped into Barnes’s view, reaching out to shake his hand.

Barnes, surprised and pleased, automatically tried to stand, but was blocked by the console.

“At ease, Major,” smiled Schultz. “I’m glad to be the first one to say that.” As Biff took the admiral’s hand, both automatically turned their faces to the cameraman, and the stroke flashed again.

“Thank you, sir.”

“Don’t thank me, thank Ray. He’s the one who insisted you should wear oak leaves. A full year ahead of zone, isn’t it?

“And by the way,” Schultz said, raising his voice so the flight crew could all hear him clearly, “you’re all going to get astronaut flight pay, backdated to the day you reported here for duty.”

It was Ray’s turn to look surprised. Schultz just smiled. “You had a good idea. I had a good idea.”

“Preparations to launch the only available replacement GPS satellite have brought a storm of criticism down on the administration. With only two days until the generally agreed-on deadline date, some observers have interpreted this as a desperate attempt to buy time. Others have suggested that this satellite will be used as part of a U.S. offensive, or that the satellite is being wasted in some American act of defiance.”

Senator Rutledge’s image, at the podium of the Senate floor, thundered with indignation. “Has our leadership lost all sense of reality? Having lost billions of dollars’ worth of hardware, we’re about to throw away another few hundred million. This is more than insanity.”

Markin’s image reappeared. “Congressional support is growing for some sort of accommodation with the Chinese. Few here believe the not-so-secret Defender project will ever get off the ground. The latest buzzword around the halls of Congress is ‘the new reality.’”

General Shen watched Markin’s report with pleasure. American political will was beginning to weaken. Pan Yufeng, however, did not see it as clearly.

The Party Secretary, along with his aides, had watched the piece, with Chinese subtitles added. He’d only seen the problems.

“Why are they launching another navigation satellite? And how real is Defender ?” He turned to face Shen, his tone accusing. “Your entire plan was based on the premise that the Americans could do nothing before we gained control of orbital space.”

The man’s frightened, Shen realized. He’s betting his political life on something he doesn’t really understand. He’s used to controlling everything, and he can’t control this. He’s already trying to set me up, digging my grave if this fails.

“We do control space, Comrade Pan.” Shen controlled his voice carefully. He had to be respectful, but the Party Secretary needed a dose of backbone. “Right now, we can kill anything in low or mid-level orbit. Soon, we’ll be able to attack even geosynchronous satellites.

“This conflict, any conflict, is about wills. We want to impose our will on the Americans. We’ve shown them how vulnerable they are in space, and how that vulnerability affects them down here. They are starting to realize that. Their will is starting to break.

“Defender is their last hope. We’re ready for it. We know enough about the VentureStar design to guess at her performance, and we know they’ll be launching from California. Within minutes of her launch, we’ll be able to take action.”

Ray McConnell tried to stay focused on the tour as Jenny Oh explained the Battle Center’s status. He hadn’t seen much of her in the past two months, although they were on the same base, working toward the same goal. He’d wanted to see her, of course, but he didn’t need distractions.

Originally, she’d been assigned to set up the communications network that would support the mission. It was an immense job. She had to integrate links between Air Force’s Space Command, Navy tracking stations, NASA, and even some civilian facilities. It had to be done quickly and with the real purpose secret.

All that data would be fed to a single point, the Battle Management Center, and her task had such an impact on the Center that she ended up taking over that, too. She’d done both jobs well, almost elegantly.

They’d set up the Battle Center in an empty service school. The classrooms and offices were taken over by the support staff, and the large central bay, which had housed a simulator, now held the command display. The building itself looked weathered, worn, and misused by its new occupants. The few windows had been covered, and other modifications were left raw and unpainted.

She’d met him at the door, standing proudly under a sign that said “Battle Management Center.” He’d been glad to see her, of course, and had felt a little of the tension leave. He’d smiled, but it might have been a little larger than he’d intended. She smiled back, but it was a tired smile.

She seemed different, and he realized she looked harder, a little thinner, and wondered if the strain showed on him as well.

Jenny led him down the central hallway, past security, past rooms crammed with electronic equipment or people hunched over workstations. There was more security at the door to the Display Center, and a vestibule that served as a light lock.

They entered the darkened two-story room in one corner. An elevated scaffold had been erected that ran around three sides of the room. It was about fifteen feet wide, with a waist-high rail on the inside edge. The fourth wall was lined with gray equipment cabinets, and Ray could see more boxy shapes tucked under the scaffolding.

Jenny trotted up the steps to the scaffolding, putting them one story up, then led Ray along the walkway. Desks lined it, facing the center, with an aisle behind them. “This section’s communications, that’s electronic warfare, that’s intelligence.” They turned the corner. “This wall is spacecraft systems. We don’t get a tenth of the telemetry that NASA gets, but we still monitor critical systems.”

They turned the last corner, and she pointed to the last group, on the third side. “Admiral Schultz and his staff will sit here. I’ve got communications rigged to the White House, the NMCC, and to all the major commands.”

He looked around the space. Everything was neatly arranged. The cabinets were fully installed. They’d even taken the time to paint safety warnings near the stairways. “It looks great, Jenny. You’ve done a wonderful job.”

“Don’t praise me yet,” Jenny replied. “It’s looked like this for almost a week. The real test is what’s inside.”

She walked over to one of the desks, labeled “Staff,” and picked up a virtual-reality headset. It was an older model, and still had a cranial framework to hold the eyepieces. Slipping it on easily, she pulled on the gloves and touched a switch on the headset. He heard her say “Begin test three bravo.”