John Varley - Red Thunder

“Who’s in…” Alicia looked around at us. “It’s you, isn’t it?”

“So far, I figure we’re a limited democracy. Limited, because I told you I have to make the final go, no-go decision… aided by Jubal, who has the only vote that counts about that. And I did set that one condition, that your parents had to be aware of what we’re doing. Sorry, Kelly.”

Kelly shrugged. She wasn’t likely to ever join Travis’s fan club, but over the last weeks she seemed to have resigned herself to not going. She seemed to be putting herself into the work wholeheartedly. At least, if this was how hard she worked when she was half hearted, then wholehearted would be a wonder to see.

“I nominate myself to be captain of this boat. That means, I make the final decisions on how the ship is made and I’m in charge of the mission from Earth liftoff to Earth landing, with the powers of a ship’s captain as established in space law.”

“Second the nomination,” Alicia said.

“All in favor…” I said, and everybody said, “Aye.”

“Thank you,” Travis said. “It probably sounds silly to you, but it’s like the contract we signed. It has to be written down. Some situations we could get into, I’d need to expect… to count on… total, unquestioning obedience, just like a Navy ship of the line. Get your dad to tell you how that works, Dak, and fill the others in.”

“Will do, Captain Broussard.”

This time Travis didn’t correct us, as he had done when we called him Colonel. I realized he was dead serious, and I figured he was probably right.

“Here on the ground I’m not a dictator, okay? You can question orders, refuse orders, even jump ship entirely, fold up your tent and go home if you don’t like the way I’m doing things. But after launch, if I issue orders I will expect them to be obeyed.”

Nobody objected.

“Fine. Next, I nominate Kelly to be project manager.”

[234] “Thanks, Travis,” Kelly said, with a look that could melt through steel.

“She will be in control of building the ship. She will coordinate everything, she’ll have to be familiar with all the hundreds of tasks this project entails.”

“I second the nomination,” I said. There was a chorus of ayes again.

“Which is pretty much what I’ve been doing”-she held up her hand to silence Travis-“and yes, I agree it needed to be formalized. So I accept. And I have a suggestion to make.” She turned to Alicia.

“You’ve done a great job on the environment systems. But now I’d like you to turn your work over to Manny and Dak. I want you to go full-time on the medical stuff we discussed a few days ago. By launch time, I want you to be qualified as an EMT. You’ll be the medical officer.”

“Great idea,” Travis said.

“Well… okay,” Alicia said. She seemed a little conflicted, worried that Kelly was pushing her out of work she wasn’t qualified for, but relieved at the same time to be back at work she could understand. She already had some training as a nurse, and she was a natural for it.

“Anything else?” Kelly asked, and I realized she had taken over the meeting. Which was exactly what Travis had wanted and expected.

“Yeah,” Dak said. “I got a question for Trav… sorry, for the captain.”

“Don’t worry about the captain stuff till we’re aboard,” Travis said.

“Whatever. I hope this isn’t out of line, you don’t have to answer it if you don’t want to… anyway, you say you’re worried the Ares Seven will blow up… and your ex-wife is aboard. I figure I’d be pushing this thing a little harder, maybe be willing to take some chances… you know what I’m saying?” Dak looked embarrassed to have brought it up. But it had bothered all of us.

“No problem, Dak, you’ve got every right to ask about that.” He took a deep breath. “It was a messy divorce, friends. I don’t love her anymore, don’t even like her very much. We’d probably have broken up anyway, even without the drinking… but it was the drinking did it. [235] That’s why I barely have any visitation rights with the girls. And the judge was right. I was the party at fault, even though she is a bitch.

“And she is still the mother of my daughters, and I want her to stay alive if for no other reason than that. Her death would hurt them. For that matter, I want them all to stay alive and healthy… but we can’t do it by blasting off in a home-built spaceship and then die freezing when it falls apart.

“The morals of rescuing people are hard to define precisely. You hear about it, three or four people drowning, trying to save one guy who may already be dead. Helicopters crashing trying to pull people off the roofs of burning buildings. If I’m going down a cliff face to rescue a stranded mountain climber, I have the right, even the obligation , to see that my rope is sound. Do you see what I’m saying?” Dak nodded, looking embarrassed.

“The odds of rescuing the Ares Seven if a disaster does happen… the odds are terrible.” I think we were all surprised, though I had wondered about it. “Most accidents I can envision would kill them all, instantly. But say there are survivors and they’re just drifting, helplessly, with no rocket to power them… just finding them is highly problematic. You can’t really imagine how vast space is, even here in the cozy little solar system. Friends, what we’d all better do is cross our fingers and hope Jubal is wrong, because our chances of rescuing them are small.”

We all thought that one over. None of us liked the sound of it.

“So this idea of being there to get them out of a jam…” I said, and didn’t know how to finished the sentence. Travis did it for me.

“… is the only reason I’m still in this at all , and the only reason I will push as hard as any of you, maybe twice as hard, to get this thing built and on its way. I want them to live, so badly that I’m buying into what is probably the most cockamamie idea since Queen Isabella hocked the crown jewels.”

“Sorry, Travis,” Dak said.

“Don’t be sorry. When in doubt, ask. Any more questions?”

“I’ve got one,” I said. “Dak and I are stumped when it comes to space suits.” I told him my notion that unless we stood on the Martian [236] surface, our trip would be suspect. He grinned slowly, and then slapped me on the shoulder.

“You’re a worrier, Manny, aren’t you? Well, the funny thing is, I think you may have a point there. But I got an order for you. Stop worrying. About the suits anyway. I’m putting myself in charge of suits from this moment, and you are not to think of it again until you see them. Okay?”

“Okay.” Worrier? Well, I guess so. My life thus far had certainly prepared me to be a world-class worrier.

“All right, boys and girls, class dismissed. Go home, get some sleep, I’ll see you back here tomorrow morning.

“And you know what? Maybe we’ve got a chance of going to Mars!”

I HAD THOUGHTwe were operating in high gear the two weeks Travis was gone. Turns out I didn’t even know what high gear was.

Early the next day Travis sent me and Kelly out to the airport to meet a plane full of Broussards. We went to the general aviation terminal, got there just as a Gulf stream private jet was landing. First out was Caleb Broussard, followed by Grace and Billy. Then we were introduced to Exaltation “Salty” Broussard. He was a small, quiet man, almost completely bald, and didn’t look anything like Jubal and Caleb.

Last out of the plane was Gloria Patri “Patty” Broussard-Wilson, an attractive blonde in her late thirties who could have been Caleb’s fraternal twin. She was the pilot of the plane. It belonged to her employer and she had borrowed it for a few days, to pick up Caleb and Grace in Fort Myers and Salty in Huntsville, Alabama, so they could all drop in and visit brother Jubal and cousin Travis. She let me and Kelly go aboard and look around while the baggage was being unloaded. There was a bar, a full-service media center, and all the way in back, a bedroom. This is the way to travel, I decided.