Гарри Гаррисон - Skyfall

“Gregor's right,” Patrick nodded into his private darkness. “We have to proceed as though the Shuttle will never arrive. If it does get here in time, well then well and good. But if it doesn't then all our reasons for going ahead with HOOP-SNAKE still hold. It will take some time, so I suggest you start at once.”

“How long?” Coretta asked.

“Considering the fact that neither of you has had EVA experience it could be three or four hours.”

“What do we have to do? I still have no real idea of the whole thing.”

“The program is explained here in great detail,” Gregor said, holding up the sheaf of printout.

“For you maybe, baby, but that stuff is worse than Greek to me.”

“I better take the time to explain,” Patrick said. “You should grasp the principles before you proceed. Are you acquainted with the operating principle of the nuclear engine?”

“Just the theory,” Coretta said. “Hydrogen is used as a nuclear moderator as well as fuel. Those quartz tubes, some of them were broken, are what they call the light bulb. The uranium isotope in granular form is mixed with neon gas in the tubes, that's where the reaction takes place. This heats the tubes up, how hot…?”

“Three thousand degrees.”

“A little on the warm side. Outside the light bulbs is a hydrogen atmosphere which gets hotter, meaning it gets bigger, meaning it gets pressurized in the chamber and goes squirting out the hole in the back and we get pushed along and that is that. Right?”

“Perfectly right, nice and simple. The whole process is much more complex and detailed but that doesn't matter a damn right now, since all you and Gregor have to do is bugger it up and turn it into a bomb.”

“How do we do that?”

“In four stages. First you will have to space walk and make an access to the pressure chamber. This will mean cutting into one of the cones. It will be hard, but it can be done. One of you will have to use the Astronaut Maneuvering Unit, the AMU, in order to reach the area. Then, Gregor, what comes next? My memory is shot.”

It wasn't memory, it was pain. The drugs were wearing off and his eyes ached so much it was difficult to think. Gregor had read the program to him once, he remembered it clearly.

Patrick just had difficulty talking. He would need another shot soon, but had to put it off as long as possible. He was too groggy afterwards. Gregor flipped the pages and touched a line with one long finger.

“Entrance must be made and the quartz tubing broken away to enlarge the chamber. Although very resistant to heat the material of the light bulbs is most frangible. When this has been done a four-meter section of U-235 storage tubing is removed and rolled upon itself until its diameter is approximately forty centimeters in diameter…”

“You lost me with that one, Gregor.”

“It's plastic tubing,” Patrick explained. “It is the container for the uranium fuel. You can't store the stuff in a tank or it goes critical and goes bang. So it's in this plastic tubing that's wrapped around the base of the ship. A section of the tubing, with the fuel, has to be cut off and rolled up into a compact mass.”

“Just a minute,” Coretta said. “If I recall my atomic medicine crash course that can be dangerous. Won't it blow up?”

“Not yet. There will be greater activity, but it won't go critical.”

“Whoever is doing the rolling is going to be mighty sick.”

“Whoever is doing that is going to be dead,” Patrick said grimly. “A lethal dose in minutes. But it won't really matter.”

“I guess it won't,” Coretta said, trying to match his calm. “It will take hours for even that kind of dose to kill someone. But the whole ship will blow up well before that.”

“That is correct,” Gregor said, turning to the last page. “When the fuel is ready the flow of hydrogen must be turned on from the controls here. Then the mass of fuel is thrown forcefully into the pressure chamber. That is all.”

“All?” She was puzzled. “What happens next?”

“The hydrogen in the chamber acts as a moderator, slowing down the radiation that has been escaping up to this point. The mass of U-235 goes critical…”

“And goes bang. An atomic explosion. I get the picture. So when do we get started?”

“Now,” Patrick said. “Someone please tell me the GET time.”

The Payload Changeout Room was just being locked into place against the Orbiter when the Launch Controller, Gordon Vaught, climbed onto the spidery steel framework. He was a big, solid man, with muscles and tendons furrowing and cording his bare arms. Born and raised in Dothan, Alabama, just a few hundred miles from Cape Canaveral, he was used to the damp tropical climate, was scarcely aware of it. He pushed through the airlock into the cooled and sterilized atmosphere of the Room. The clamps were being thrown that sealed the entire structure tight against the body of the Orbiter. Colonel Kober was supervising the operation. Kober was a short, nasty type who was always in uniform, always fresh-pressed and spotlessly clean. Vaught knew that he had a good mind, had an engineering degree as well as his military rank, yet he still disliked him immensely. The feeling was mutual. They worked together because they had to, but that didn't mean they had to enjoy it.

“You preparing to remove your payload, Colonel?” Vaught asked.

“We are, Mr. Vaught.”

“How long before you get it out and we can seal the doors?”

“We will do it as fast as possible, if that is what you were asking.”

“I wasn't. I was sort of interested in a figure. Minutes, hours, days, you know the sort of thing.”

Kober flashed the big civilian a cold look of loathing, brushing back his toothbrush moustache with his knuckle as he spoke. “An estimate, of course. Taking into mind past performance. Disconnect the utility bridges, attach supplementary power, unbolt, unship; move to the pallets, close up — it will be a good two-hour job.”

“We don't have two hours to wait. I'm starting fuel now.” Vaught turned away but Kober's harsh words stopped him in his tracks.

“You cannot do that and I absolutely forbid you to. Civilian control on this project is lax enough as it is, but I will not permit criminally dangerous procedures that might endanger this project or my personnel. Do you understand, Vaught?”

“Do you understand, Colonel, that my first name is Mister as far as you are concerned. I want to hear you use it. As to your forbidding me to do anything, why you got as much

chance as a hound dog winning an elephant farting contest. The fueling starts now.”

“You cannot. It is forbidden. I'll contact…”

His voice shut off sharply as Vaught closed the airlock door. My oh my, the man did rile easy. It really was a pleasure to get the toe of the boot into him. Vaught pulled the CB radio from the holster on his belt and thumbed it on.

“Station two. Are the feed lines connected yet?”

“Last one going on now, Cordon.”

“Good. Make sure your men on top are watching the bleed valves and start pumping. I want that fuel in there just as fast as you can get it.”

“Right.”

Vaught put away the radio, then leaned on the hot metal of the railing and looked at the bird. The square bulk of the Payload Changeout Room was locked against it, covering most of it, with just the nose cones of the three big boosters rising above it. The Orbiter was well hidden. The tiered form of the servicing tower stood beside it, now a scene of organized bustle. Underground fuel lines would bring the liquid oxygen and hydrogen, liquid only when kept at hundreds of degrees below zero. Fueling must have begun because a white plume of vaporized gas puffed out of a relief valve high above. Begun. Now it would be at least three hours before the tanks were filled. Three hours until the tanks had to be filled because that was the time of the only window they could use, the few minutes when the Space Shuttle had to be launched to hurl itself into space on an accurate course, to rise up and arrive at the same moment in space and time as Prometheus which would be hurtling up from behind. One chance at a meet, and only one. Well he would do his part, get the bird fueled and counted down and ready to fly when they needed. If the military payload was removed in time. Observation satellite they said, big hush deal with MPs with sidearms around all the time. Something more than a usual observation satellite the rumors said. He didn't know or care. All he wanted was it out of the way in time.