Zach Hughes - Pressure Man

Acceleration was smooth and more rapid than a conventional rocket. The moon’s gravity was a mere feather of force to be brushed aside by the brute power in Kennedy’s drive.

Up and out she went smoothly. Neil goosed her, and the sudden acceleration pushed the crew against the backs of their seats. She was in position to turn, to assume the stance for the long, hard drive for acceleration which would take her to a rendezvous with Mars. She did it with only a fraction of her available muscle, a creature of free space, proud, beautiful, huge. There she lay as the crew examined her from stem to stern.

Although she handled like a dream and was doing great, Neil Walters was still aware that he was flying an untested ship with a crew aboard. He knew that Kennedy had been a crash project, and he didn’t like flying the results of crash projects. He knew his space history. The first crash construction project produced the Vanguard series of rockets, and he’d seen the old films of Vanguards melting down on the launch pad. Crash programs did that. In the 1950s, the United States had pushed hard to catch up with the Russians, who had put a dog, Laika, into space with a total payload of over one thousand pounds. Up to that point the prestige of the United States had rested on a super job of jury-rigging by a crew under Wernher von Braun. They used spit and scrap wire, antique rockets, a lot of determination and imagination, and placed thirty-point-eight pounds of payload into orbit with a tiny Jupiter C.

Von Braun proved that crash techniques do not always fail, but still there was the Vanguard, which blew with spectacular regularity to prove that if you persist in crash techniques in things as complicated as space hardware you’re going to have a few loud bangs.

The big question in Neil’s mind was this: Was the Kennedy an inspired job of jury-rigging in the von Braun mold, or was she a Vanguard? If she stayed in one piece and performed, future historians would call her a technical miracle. If she blew, or simply fizzled, brought down by the failure of one tiny and relatively insignificant system somewhere deep inside her, they would go back to calling her what she was called in the beginning, Folly .

She checked out. Doris’ computer ticked out, for the automatics, course settings and power settings and thousands of pieces of individual information which formed the word “Go.”

Neil missed the familiar bellow of burning rockets, soundless in space, loud and all-pervasive inside a ship. His eyes squinted again as he activated her and started her on that long, long drive. His voice was professionally calm. His words went to the crew and on a tight beam back to Lunar Control.

“All systems normal, all systems go.”

The next pucker period began, an attempt to get the big bird up to cruising speed without blowing her wide open. It was more than just opening a throttle, but it was handled, in its complexity, by the shipboard computers, matching power to stress, every action monitored in a half-dozen ways, both electronic and visual. The ship hummed with that inaudible energy and began to move, faster and faster, the acceleration creating an artificial gravity pushing the crew members backward in their seats.

She didn’t blow. Neil kept the crew working long hours during that initial period of acceleration. She reached cruise speed sixty-five percent faster than conventional ships and was moving faster than anything man had built. Every system was checked and rechecked, tested in flight.

At last Neil was satisfied. Rotating watches began, and some of the crew had time for a nap. The Kennedy performed as if she’d gone through the most thorough flight testing.

Neil took first watch. Dom, who had the second watch, knew he would be unable to sleep. He stayed near his panel, checking stress and loading. Paul Jensen kept an eye on the powerplant. Only Doris and Art retired to their cabins.

It was J.J. who took the call from Lunar Base. Even before the message was complete, his hand flicked an alarm and the lights flashed and the alarm whooped throughout the ship.

With the crew at emergency quarters, J.J. fed the message from the base into the sound system.

“ John F. Kennedy , this is Moon Control.”

“Moon Control, this is J.F.K .”

“ J.F.K ., Admiral Pinkerton speaking. Please alert your crew. We have received a bomb threat. Repeat, there is a bomb threat directed against the Kennedy .”

“I am now going live to Moon Control,” J.J. said. “Moon Control, this is Kennedy . Details, please.”

“ J.F.K ., a team of Earthfirsters have seized control station eight-five with its communications intact. We estimate the number of terrorists at five. We are in contact with them. They have made two demands. One, the Kennedy returns moonside. Two, we broadcast, and I quote, ‘our guilt,’ unquote, to the world.”

J.J. shook his head impatiently. “Details on bomb threat, please.”

“Stand by, J.F.K . The following is a recording of our communications with the terrorist in control of station eight-five.”

There was a click and then an excited young voice. “Moon Control, Moon Control, this is the voice of freedom. Listen carefully. We are in control of station eight-five. We are heavily armed. We can resist any attack. Listen carefully. The folly of imperialism, the spaceship you call the John F. Kennedy , will be destroyed unless you meet the following requirements. One, you will order the Kennedy to return to Moon Base immediately. Two, you will broadcast to the world an abject apology for your wastefulness in allowing such a crime to be perpetrated on the people of the Earth, for using materials and money which should have gone to feed our starving millions. Three, you will provide a ship of the Explorer class to transport this group of freedom fighters to a free port Earthside.”

The voice of Admiral Pinkerton was back. “We had them repeat it. He repeated it word for word as if he were reading.”

“Moon Control, did you ask for details about a possible bomb on board the Kennedy. ”

“That is affirmative. They merely read the message again.”

Dom cut into the communications. “Admiral, this is Dominic Gordon. Can you patch me into direct contact with the terrorists?”

“That is affirmative, Captain Gordon. In fact, they have the facilities to monitor this channel in station eight-five.”

Dom tended to forget his new rank.

“I want to speak with them direct, admiral,” he said.

“Hold one. You will be notified when we’ve established contact.”

As Dom waited, the others were already in action. The Kennedy was the most instrumented ship ever built, and it was possible to check every inch of her with instruments. Signals were sent. Servos probed and measured. Every gram of material aboard the ship was recorded carefully in Doris’ computer. She worked rapidly. She had the computer check everything aboard, clothing, personal effect, supplies. Every gram aboard was recorded, and two checks did not find even a tiny additional amount of mass. The check was complete before the radio patch was made.

“Dom,” Doris said. “There’s nothing aboard this ship we don’t know about.”

“Unless it was integrated into a structural piece during construction,” Dom said. “Then it would show as a portion of the original mass.”

“My guess is that they’re bluffing,” J. J. said.

“It’s a good possibility, but can we gamble on it?” Dom asked.

“If we give in and take her back, she’ll never leave the moon again. If we make that broadcast to the world it will have the same effect as blowing her up in space,” J.J. said.