Jack McDevitt - The Moonfall

Then he was out among the stars. Earth, blue and serene, floated almost directly ahead.

Saber sighed happily.

"Too soon," he said.

To underscore the point, a slab of rock the size of a pickup spun out of a dark cloud and took off an auxiliary antenna. It would have done much worse, but Tony reacted quickly and rolled away.

• • • SSTO Arlington Flight Deck, 20,000 kilometers from Luna. 10:36 P.M.

The leading edge of the blast was expanding at almost three hundred kilometers per second. Two other spacecraft were in its path, Arlington, a little over an hour away; and Rome, which had gotten about a six-hour start.

There hadn't been much George Culver could do to protect his plane other than put as much distance as he could between himself and the Moon. The short, stubby wings that supported the SSTO in atmospheric flight had retracted, antennas were down, passengers had been warned of approaching turbulence.

In this case, the term was a mild understatement. Behind them, the entire universe seemed to have lit up.

Mary wiped her lips with the back of her hand. "I don't know," she said, watching it roll toward them.

They'd stayed too long. There hadn't been enough time to get everybody off, but no one had wanted to admit it. They should have left with Rome, just cut their losses and gone. But who was going to make that kind of decision?

"Hang on." It was all George could think of to say in the instant before the wave washed over them. Astrolab. 10:37 P.M.

The AstroLab was located in central Massachusetts, not far from the Quabbin Reservoir. It was housed in one of those garish ultramodern steel and glass abstract buildings, designed to demonstrate a kind of mathematical flow but which really only succeeded in marring the landscape. It would have looked good on Boston's Commercial Street. But among lakes and forest it was an abomination. It reminded Wes Feinberg of a swirl of lime Jell-O.

At the critical moment in the event, Feinberg did something that those who knew him well might have predicted: He left the turmoil of the Astrolab, where his colleagues were crowded breathlessly around the main display, watching raw data flow in through radio, infrared, and X-ray telescopes, from ACCD's CMM photon counting systems, and UV detectors. And he wandered out to the north walkway.

It was a cool night, and he was glad he'd worn his woolen sweater. He pushed his hands into his pockets and looked out over the trees. Where the Moon had been, there was now a blood-red cloud, lit by inner fires. It was expanding and it cast a ruddy glow across the forest.

The facility had filled up and overflowed with people from coastal areas and with some locals who sensed it was the right place to be on this night. Feinberg had talked with several. None admitted to believing there was serious danger to the world; yet here they were, well inland. Better safe than sorry, they told him. The American motto: Safety first.

He could see flashlights in the parking lot. People were herding together, watching the event, ooohing and aaahing. Cries of "Look at that," and "It's beautiful" filled the night air. Campfires burned in the surrounding hills and back on the picnic grounds. There were occasional flashes as people tried to take pictures of the event. SSTO Rome Passenger Cabin, 143,000 kilometers from Luna. 10:38 P.M.

Tashi Yomiuri had thought about trying the stunt that Keith Morley had pulled, but in the end, prudence had held sway. Now, watching the eruption on her monitor, she knew she'd made the right choice to put a decent amount of distance between herself and that inferno. Morley's broadcast had just been cut off at the source, and while Bruce Kendrick talked as if contact would be restored momentarily, Tashi believed that her colleague was gone. Posthumous Nobel? Maybe. Probably. But it wasn't the price she was prepared to pay.

There'd been a Pool arrangement, and all networks had been carrying the Morley report. But her producer back in New York had alerted her to be ready to go, now that Morley would no longer be a factor. "We'll want a blow-by-blow of what's happening," he'd said. "You're as close as anybody." He sounded exhilarated. "What can you see? What are the reactions of the passengers? Anybody breaking down?"

She didn't really know what was happening. The only view she had of events was what the networks were providing. A few minutes earlier she'd seen a flash outside her window, like summer lightning, but now there was nothing except a glow on her raised tray. Earlier, she'd interviewed Rick Hailey, the vice president's press advisor, who was up in the front of the plane. But it had been relatively tame. Hailey was too old a hand to say anything out of the way. The government would respond appropriately, he assured her, the nation was fortunate to have strong leadership at this critical juncture. That sort of thing.

She'd gotten a far better interview from Slade Elliott. He'd surprised her by admitting that, sure, he was scared, wasn't everybody, but he'd talked to the pilot, John Verrano, and Verrano seemed both competent and confident.

Would he like to have Shadow along this time? Shadow was the self-aware TV starship in which Captain Pierce and his oddball crew roamed the galaxy. "Sure," he grinned. "This kind of flight would be small potatoes for Shadow."

Tashi also recognized two of Charlie Haskell's Secret Service detail, the big one they called Sam, and an attractive young woman who looked like innocence personified.

There'd been some empty seats on the plane, so Yomiuri had been able to keep access to the aisle. She had a camera, and if the spacecraft started to rock, she'd get some good coverage and maybe come out of this pretty well after all.

Within minutes after Morley's signal had been lost, they brought her up live on the Pacific News Network. She described the mood in the plane, making much of it up because there was no unified mood. Some people were merrily oblivious to the danger, others were terrified. But Tashi painted a picture of passengers hanging tough because it made good press, and because it wasn't that far from the truth anyhow, if you could draw a line more or less down the middle.

She was interrupted by the PA: "This is the captain. Ladies and gentlemen, we'll probably be doing some maneuvering during the next few minutes. It might get a little rough; we expect it'll be something like running through a storm. I want to assure you, however, that you're in a very well built plane, and we'll come out of this in good shape. Meanwhile, I'd like you to secure any loose articles so they don't injure you or anyone else. Please be sure your tray is up, and everything not fastened down is in an overhead bin. We'll let you know when we've gotten through this."

Yomiuri took a deep breath and went back to her play-by-play. Her earphones pinged and her producer spoke to her: "Tashi, we're going to switch over to the Pool."

She would be going global. "Okay," she said.

"In one minute. Clyde Sommer's your anchor. FYI, as far as we can determine, nobody's reestablished contact with the Micro or with the other plane."

That produced a chill. "I'm sorry to hear it."

"It's likely just the general turbulence. Maybe they're okay, maybe not. We expect to lose you in a couple of minutes, too. Your signal, that is."

Her heart skipped an extra beat. "Right," she said.

"Twenty seconds."

"Okay. I'm ready to go."

She listened to the countdown in her earphones, imagined Clyde Sommer, the network anchor, seated at the prime desk in New York. Just before she went on, she removed the right earphone and slid it up on her head so she could hear what was going on around her. "This is Tashi Yomiuri, on board a space plane approximately ninety thousand miles from what used to be the Moon. We are currently running at about fifteen thousand miles an hour before a hurricane of fire…"