Free Stories 2018 Page 3

  “I’m not talking about exploring!” Walt said, voice sharp, the ring moist in his fingers. “We’ve got to get out there, so we can survive. War, environmental collapse, even a passing asteroid . . . we could go the way of the dinosaurs, all in a blink of an eye. This is our one chance.”

  Oscar moved the cane around, slowly nodded. “That’s the problem with chances. They’re like fog. One moment it’s before you, another moment, it’s gone . . .”

  More crackling from the plain speaker.

  A few moments later, the Eagle’s commander simply said: “Ignition.”

  And the LM pilot quickly acknowledged: “Ignition. Thrust at 10 percent.”

  Walt nodded to his guest. “They’re off.”

  “So they are,” Oscar replied, shifting some in his wheelchair. “Godspeed, and then some.”

  Walt leaned forward, feeling like his shirt was going to split apart at the seems, his legs still trembling, and he was glad the old man couldn’t see them shake. He said, “What did you mean back there, about the X factor? What factor is that?”

  “The X factor . . .” The old man’s voice faltered, his breathing labored, rattling. “The X factor . . .”

  The old man suddenly coughed, hacked loudly and sharply, his pale wrinkly face suddenly turning red. Walt panicked, sitting up straight, thinking Oscar was going to have a heart attack and die right here and now in front of him. Holy Christ . . . and with a flash of a hard decision, he knew that if the man croaked in the next few seconds, he wouldn’t call for help. Not until the Eagle had safely landed. If Oscar was dead, so be it. Walt wasn’t going to miss the next few minutes of his life, of history.

  There was a series of deep, rattling breaths, and then Oscar settled back against his wheelchair, his chest rising up and down rapidly, like he had just finished a 100-meter sprint.

  “That’s your X factor . . . the body . . . the pilot . . . always been the weak point, hasn’t it . . .” A line of drool started down the left side of his lip. “You and me . . . the engineers, right from the beginning, designed and tested and re-tested all the gear we shot up into space, even before we knew what kind of hostile environment existed up there. The testing . . . with the telemetry, you could see what piece of equipment worked, what other piece of equipment failed. So you re-worked that failed piece, tried and tested again.”

  Oscar slapped at his gaunt chest. “But this . . . this has always been the weak point, eh?”

  Walt just nodded, glum. “We sometimes call it the G Factor.”

  “I’ve heard that,” and the old man cackled. “We engineers, we always have our special codes and words, eh?”

  Walt didn’t reply.

  On this historic day, he wasn’t an engineer.

  He was just a goddamn babysitter.

  What a story to tell his yet-to-be-born kids, years from now.

  In his years of flying and testing after getting his degree from M.I.T., Walt had been in some tight scrapes before, had felt that bone-crunch of pressure on his shoulders, had gotten scared when a piece of equipment had unexpectedly failed or an engine on an aircraft he had been a passenger on had flamed-out, but nothing seemed to frighten him as much as what he was hearing over the speaker, with the old man staring calmly across from him, like he was visualizing himself being with the crew of the Eagle. Every now and then Walt shivered, and another phrase from his aunt came to him: “A goose walking across your grave.”

  Pretty goddamn heavy and persistent goose.

  “Eagle, this is Houston. We’ve got you now. It's looking good. Over.”

  The LM pilot crisply talked to the commander, voice a bit high pitched. “Okay, rate of descent looks good.”

  Oscar’s eyes were closed. Had the old man fallen asleep? Even now?

  Walt wondered what he should do. Oscar stirred, opened his eyes. “Sorry . . . drifted off there for a moment . . . did I miss anything?”

  “Still descending. Still looks nominal.”

  A nod from the old man. “Just minutes to go. Hard to believe. Just minutes.”

  Walt was going to say something, but the speaker burst out again with static and voices: “Eagle, this is Houston. Roger. You are go. You are go to continue powered descent. You are go to continue powered descent.”

  Oscar nodded with satisfaction. “So close. Maybe they’ll make it, eh?”

  Then it all went wrong.

  The voice of the Eagle’s commander was sharp with concern. “Houston, Eagle. We’ve got a Program Alarm.”

  Houston quickly replied. “It's looking good to us. Over.”

  “It's a 1202.” A pause, then with more urgency: “Give us a reading on the 1202 Program Alarm.”

  “Roger. We got you . . . We're go on that 1202 alarm.”

  “Are you sure, Houston?”

  “We’re still go, Eagle.”

  Walt’s hands started quivering. He put them in his lap so the old man couldn’t see them. Just like his legs. Oscar sighed. “That was close. Very close, eh?”

  “Yes. Very close.”

  Oscar leaned to one side, like he wanted to hear better from the speaker. The static and voices continued.

  “Okay, Houston. We’re at five thousand feet. One hundred feet per second descent rate is good. Going to check my attitude control. Attitude control is good.”

  “Eagle, you're looking great. Coming up nine minutes.”

  A pause.

  “Eagle, Houston. You're go for landing. Over.”

  “Roger,” the LM pilot replied “Understand. Go for landing. We’re at three thousand feet.”

  “Copy that Eagle.”

  Walt took a deep breath. His chest ached. He wondered what it was like, outside that door, with his fellow engineers and technicians, listening in and watching the telemetry. Imagine the excitement he was missing!

  “How much longer?” Oscar asked.

  “Just a few more minutes, that’s all.” He looked at the old man’s face, try to gauge what was going on behind those filmy eyes, what that ancient brain was thinking, seeing, remembering.

  Walt said, “A few more minutes,” he repeated. “Can you believe it?

  “You get to be my age, son, you can believe in almost anything.”

  Then it was the LM pilot’s turn, voice high-pitched coming out of the speaker. “We’ve got a Program Alarm. It’s a 1201.”

  “Roger, that Eagle. A 1201 alarm.” A long, long pause, then the CapCom’s voice, hesitant, shaky: “We're go on that alarm. Same type. Same type. We're go.”

  “Houston, this is Eagle. What’s going on with those damn alarms?”

  “Eagle, Houston, we’re still a go. Still a go.”

  Oscar shook his head, the ebony cane trembling in his old hands. “Don’t like it. God, I don’t like it.”

  Walt said the only thing that made sense. “Neither do I.”

  And in the next few terrifying minutes, Walt recalled a high school history class, of seeing an old, old black and white movie newsreel, seeing the death of the Hindenburg, how the flames started so very small at the tip of the zeppelin, and then how it all went to ashes, in just a matter of seconds.

  The LM pilot started narrating their descent: “Altitude is 700 feet, 21 feet per second down, 33 degrees.” And in reply from the commander, “Damn, that’s a pretty rocky area. Where the hell are we? How’s the fuel?”

  “Eight percent.” A few seconds later, the LM pilot said, “One hundred feet, 3 1/2 down, 9 forward. Five percent of fuel remaining. Quantity light is on.”

  Houston urgently interrupted. “Eagle, you’ve got 60 seconds of fuel left.”

  A sharper hiss of static, then: “Houston, this is Eagle. Lots of boulders here. Lots. We must have overshot our landing area.”

  “Eagle, we acknowledge,” Houston replied, voice nearing panic “Thirty seconds left for fuel.”

  “Too many boulders. Too many! We’re going to abort.”

  The LM pilot said: “No, you can do it, Neil, we can . . .”<
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  “Too late . . . damn it too . . .”

  A mix of voices, yells, another burst of static.

  Silence.

  Hissing continued from the speaker.

  “Eagle, this is Houston. Over.”

  “Eagle, this is Houston. Over.”

  Walt’s mouth was dry. He had to work to talk. He finally said, “I . . . I can’t believe it . . . Oh my God . . .”

  Oscar’s voice was suddenly sharp and crisp, like he was the engineer in charge of old. “Quiet, boy! Let’s hear what’s going on.”

  “Ah . . . obviously a major malfunction of some sort. Eagle, this is Houston, over.”

  No reply.

  Walt’s eyes were filling with tears. All the planning, all the preparation, all the writing and testing of procedures, over and over again . . . and to come to this?

  He looked to Oscar’s face.

  The old man was silently weeping.

  Walt wiped at his eyes, bent over, turned down the speaker’s volume. Long minutes passed in silence before the door to the tiny office slammed open. A man came in, followed by a woman. The man was short, plump, with closely-trimmed black hair. His face was sweaty, red, and he wore a zippered light green jumpsuit with Air Force flight patches, even though he was no longer active in the service. The woman next to him was also short and plump, and wore a similar jumpsuit.

  Her nametag said P. O’HALLORAN. DataGlasses hung from a strand around her neck. His nametag said N. GIVENS. He swore and said, “That was a shitty sim, Walt.”

  Walt said, “It was a perfect sim. You and Pam just couldn’t handle it.”

  Givens strolled in further, standing right next to Oscar. He ignored the old man. “What kind of goddamn training program puts us in a simulator with technology more than a half century old? Tell me that!”

  The woman slipped on a pair of DataGlasses, blinked a few times, cocked her head, and said, “That sim wasn’t fair! It was too old . . . . Neil and I did our best!”

  Walt felt Oscar staring at him and also felt the sudden, unexpected weight of history bear down on his shoulders. He felt a terrible urge to play with his M.I.T. ring and ignored it. “The sim had nothing to do with being fair or unfair.”

  Before Neil could reply, Oscar spoke up, voice weak but strong. “Excuse me . . . excuse me . . . young man, can you tell me how many flying hours you have?”

  For the first time Givens seemed to realize Oscar was there. Face still flushed with anger, arms crossed, he glanced down and said to Walt, “Who the hell is this fossil?”

  “He’s a guest of the Director. He worked here years ago . . . before it became a museum, before the Director bought it.”

  Givens grunted and Oscar pressed on. “Please . . . tell me . . . how many hours have you had flying?”

  There was now pride in Givens’ voice. “Close to four thousand,” he said, voice smug. “More than anybody else out there who signed up for this mission.”

  Walt interrupted. “Good for you,” he said. “Armstrong had three thousand, and he didn’t screw the pooch like you did, Neil.”

  O’Halloran took off her DataGlasses. “If we had the right technology and support, that landing would have been simple!”

  “But it wasn’t a simple landing, was it,” Walt said.

  O’Halloran said, “You made us use ancient technology, what do you expect?”

  “We expected you to land like the original Eagle,” Walt said. “Look, with all of your technology and support, where have you flown, Neil?”

  “You name it,” he said, voice sharp. “Iraq. Iran. Afghanistan. Nigeria. And you know it.” The Air Force pilot took a breath, went on. “This is goddamn ridiculous. Asking us to prepare for a Moon flight by using a sim and gear from the first landing is like asking me to prep for a Nigerian air support mission by taking up a P-51 Mustang.”

  Oscar whispered, “Have you ever done that? Take a Mustang or anything else up in the air? A Piper Cub? A T-6 trainer? Anything?”

  “I did what was required,” Givens said. “I fulfilled my training. Finished third in my class.”

  Walt couldn’t help it. He lost it. “That’s right! You completed your training . . . to be a goddamn gamer! You sit on your ass in a comfortable chair, cold Coke at your side, in a pilot cubicle on a base somewhere, and you play with your keyboard and joystick. I’ve gone over your records, Captain Givens. You’ve been shot down eleven times in your career . . . without getting a fingernail broken. Because it was your platforms that were hit, not you.”

  Givens replied but Walt talked right over him “Neil and Buzz and Mike, they were real pilots, damn it. What was once called old stick and rudder men. If the systems failed, if the computers got backed up with too much data flow, they still had the instinct, the training, the capabilities to complete the mission, a quarter million miles from home. But now we have you . . . and we have to plan for the G factor. Gamers.”

  Walt looked at the angry Givens, and his angrier co-pilot, O’Halloran, and he said, “You’re both skilled, capable, and good at what you do. Which isn’t being a pilot for a Moon mission.”

  Givens said, “Well, we’re the best the Company has, and if they want new footprints on the Moon, they’re going to have to give us more realistic sims, and more realistic procedures.”

  He left the office, followed by his LM pilot. They didn’t close the door behind them.

  Walt looked to Oscar, whose cane was trembling in his shaking hands Walt felt so weary. “Well, that’s that. If those two get their way, the cost of going back is going to increase a lot . . . as well as the risk . . . one computer foul-up, one burnt chip, one programming hiccup, and they’ll drive their landing craft right into the regolith.”

  But Oscar was somewhere else.

  “Oh . . . that sim . . . brought back so many memories. . . .” He smiled and another line of drool started down his face. “You young pup, you know your history don’t you . . . about the real pilots we had back then . . . and that was key . . .getting the right folks in place to take care of that X factor.”

  Oscar coughed and wheezed, softly this time, not as harsh. “I remembered being here, in this very same building . . . watching the landing . . . seeing it succeed . . . and some of us . . . we were so proud . . . this was our first step . . . we had the heavy lift rockets . . . we had the infrastructure . . . soon . . . in just a couple of more decades . . . we’d be on Mars . . . we’d have a base on the Moon . . . oh, yes, we didn’t have the amazing technology of today . . . but we had the men and the women . . . but we didn’t have the political will . . . we didn’t have the grit . . .”

  He took another, rattling breath. “Fifty years apart . . . you and me . . . and the others . . . fifty years apart, and that dream . . . what’s that they say? A dream deferred is a dream that dies?”

  Walt wiped at his face, stood up and went to the wheelchair. “I thought today would be a celebration, to show you what we could do again, with the old sims, the old equipment,” he said, voice thick with emotion. “I’m sorry. We failed you.”

  Oscar grabbed his wrist, with a surprisingly strong grip for an old man, lowered him down so his whisper could be heard.

  “No, son, we failed you.”

  The room was quiet again, except for the hiss of static and the sound of urgent, inaudible voices coming from the old NASA speaker.

  Then Walt stepped around and in front of the old man, and then squatted down.

  “Oscar?”

  “Yeah?”

  There was something in those old eyes, inquiring and skeptical but . . . hopeful?

  Walt grabbed the man’s right hand and said, “We failed you today. But I’ll be goddamned if me or anybody else in the Center is giving up either. We’re going back. There’s been detours and setbacks—like today—but damn it to hell, we’re going back, and we’re going back to stay. Just you see.”

  Oscar smiled. “I should live so long.”

  “You better.”

 
The Midshipman

  David Drake

  "I can see he's a good officer; but is he lucky?"

  Attributed to Napoleon

  "Woetjans!" Bosun's Mate Runcie shouted as he came out the forward dorsal hatch of the battleship Renown. "Where the bloody hell is—oh! There you are, Woetjans. We got a new midshipman here, McKinnon. I want you to teach him the ropes."

  Ellie Woetjans was within an hour of the end of her watch, but she wasn't surprised that Runcie had just put her on a task that'd take her three hours to do right. The bosun's mate didn't like her, maybe because he knew that despite his rank and experience, Able Spacer Woetjans could've done Runcie's job better than he could.

  Woetjans stepped down onto the hull. She'd been inspecting the running rigging of Dorsal A while the antenna was extended here in Harbor Three on Cinnabar. She eyed her new charge without enthusiasm.

  Mckinnon braced to attention as she looked at him, but he met her eyes squarely instead of keeping them straight ahead. He was five nine or so and probably 21—the usual age for graduation from the Academy. Though he wasn't overweight, Woetjans thought he looked a bit soft.

  Anyway, physical fitness was a good place to start. She opened one of the equipment lockers set around the base of the antenna and said, "Okay, kid. Pick a pair of gauntlets and lets see how quick you can skin up to the masthead."

  "Yes, ma'am," Mckinnon said. He squatted to review the selection of rigging gloves in the locker, then picked a medium pair. Dorsal A had two sets of ratlines, aft and starboard. The kid put his hand on the aft set, but Woetjans said, "Take the others. I'm going up these to watch you."

  The Mckinnon nodded, then started up the starboard lines, using his hands for balance but climbing with his legs. The rigging was woven beryllium monocrystal. Though strong and tough, individual strands frayed and broke. The gauntlets protected the kid's hands, but if his arms or legs brushed a break standing proud, it would lay him open.

  Woetjans could see that Mckinnon was being careful about how he moved. That was common sense, but this was a test of how he performed under stress. If she'd read the kid as a different sort of person, she's have reached over and whacked him on the ass with a length of cable, but there was another way to deal with the likes of Mckinnon. Woetjans started climbing at speed.