Gravity

NASA administrator Cornell responded with a camera-ready smile. He was a political animal, the glad-hander whose personal charm and charisma made him a star with the press and in Washington, where he spent most of his time cajoling Congress and the White House for more money, ever more money, to fund the space agency’s perennially insufficient budget. His was the public face of NASA, while Ken Blankenship, the man in charge of day-to-day operations at JSC, was the private face known only to agency insiders. They were the yin and yang of NASA leadership, so completely different in temperament it was hard to imagine how they functioned as a team. The inside joke at NASA was that Leroy Cornell was all style and no substance, and Blankenship was all substance and no style.

Cornell smoothly responded to Senator Parish’s question. ‘You asked why other countries aren’t contributing. Senator, the answer is, they already have. This truly is an international space station. Yes, the Russians are badly strapped for cash. Yes, we had to make up the difference. But they’re committed to this station. They’ve got a cosmonaut up there now, and they have every reason to help us keep ISS running. As for why we need the station, just look at the research that’s being conducted in biology and medicine. Materials science. Geophysics. We’ll see the benefits of this research in our own lifetimes.’

Another member of the audience stood, and Gordon felt his blood pressure rise. If there was anyone he despised more than Senator Parish, it was Montana congressman Joe Bellingham, whose Marlboro Man good looks couldn’t disguise the fact he was a scientific moron. During his last campaign, he’d demanded that public schools teach Creationism. Throw out the biology books and open the Bible instead. He probably thinks rockets are powered by angels.

‘What about all that sharing of technology with the Russians and Japanese?’ said Bellingham. ‘I’m concerned that we’re giving away high-tech secrets for free. This international cooperation sounds high-minded and all, but what’s to stop them from turning right around and using the knowledge against us? Why should we trust the Russians?’

Fear and paranoia. Ignorance and superstition. There was too much of it in the country, and Gordon grew depressed just listening to Bellingham. He turned away in disgust.

That’s when he noticed a somber-faced Hank Millar step into the auditorium. Millar was head of the Astronaut Office. He looked straight at Gordon, who understood at once that a problem was brewing.

Quietly Gordon left the stage, and the two men stepped out into the hallway. ‘What’s going on?’

‘There’s been an accident. It’s Bill Haning’s wife. We hear it doesn’t look good.’

‘Jesus.’

‘Bob Kittredge and Woody Ellis are waiting over in Public Affairs. We all need to talk.’

Gordon nodded. He glanced through the auditorium door at Congressman Bellingham, who was still blathering on about the dangers of sharing technology with the Commies. Grimly he followed Hank out the auditorium exit and across the courtyard, to the next building.

They met in a back office. Kittredge, the shuttle commander for STS 162, was flushed and agitated. Woody Ellis, flight director for the International Space Station, appeared far calmer, but then, Gordon had never seen Ellis look upset, even in the midst of crisis.

‘How serious was the accident?’ Gordon asked.

‘Mrs Haning’s car was in a giant pileup on I-45,’ said Hank. ‘The ambulance brought her over to Miles Memorial. Jack McCallum saw her in the ER.’

Gordon nodded. They all knew Jack well. Although he was no longer in the astronaut corps, Jack was still on NASA’s active flight surgeon roster. A year ago, he had pulled back from most of his NASA duties, to work as an ER physician in the private sector.

‘Jack’s the one who called our office about Debbie,’ said Hank.

‘Did he say anything about her condition?’

‘Severe head injury. She’s in ICU, in a coma.’

‘Prognosis?’

‘He couldn’t answer that question.’ There was a silence as they all considered what this tragedy meant to NASA. Hank sighed. ‘We’re going to have to tell Bill. We can’t keep this news from him. The problem is…’ He didn’t finish. He didn’t need to; they all understood the problem.

Bill Haning was now in orbit aboard ISS, only a month into his scheduled four-month stay. This news would devastate him. Of all the factors that made prolonged habitation in space difficult, it was the emotional toll that NASA worried about most. A depressed astronaut could wreak havoc on a mission. Years before, on Mir, a similar situation had occurred when Cosmonaut Volodya Dezhurov was informed of his mother’s death. For days, he’d shut himself away in one of Mir’s modules and refused to speak to Mission Control Moscow. His grief had disrupted the work of everyone aboard Mir.

‘They have a very close marriage,’ said Hank. ‘I can tell you now, Bill’s not going to handle this well.’

‘You’re recommending we replace him?’ asked Gordon.

‘At the next scheduled shuttle flight. He’ll have a tough enough time being stuck up there for the next two weeks. We can’t ask him to serve out his full four months.’ Hank added quietly, ‘They have two young kids, you know.’

‘His backup for ISS is Emma Watson,’ said Woody Ellis. ‘We could send her up on STS 160. With Vance’s crew.’

At the mention of Emma’s name, Gordon was careful not to reveal any sign of special interest. Any emotion whatsoever. ‘What do you think about Watson? Is she ready to go up three months early?’

‘She’s slated to relieve Bill. She’s already up to speed on most of the onboard experiments. So I think that option is viable.’

‘Well, I’m not happy about it,’ said Bob Kittredge.

Gordon gave a tired sigh and turned to the shuttle commander. ‘I didn’t think you would be.’

‘Watson’s an integral part of my crew. We’ve crystallized as a team. I hate to break it up.’

‘Your team’s three months away from launch. You have time to make adjustments.’

‘You’re making my job hard.’

‘Are you saying you can’t get a new team crystallized in that time?’

Kittredge’s mouth tightened. ‘All I’m saying is, my crew is already a working unit. We’re not going to be happy about losing Watson.’

Gordon looked at Hank. ‘What about the STS 160 crew? Vance and his team?’

‘No problem from their end. Watson would just be another passenger on middeck. They’d deliver her to ISS like any other payload.’

Gordon thought it over. They were still talking about options, not certainties. Perhaps Debbie Haning would wake up fine and Bill could stay on ISS as scheduled. But like everyone else at NASA, Gordon had taught himself to plan for every contingency, to carry in his head a mental flow chart of what actions to follow should a, b, or c occur.

He looked at Woody Ellis for final confirmation. Woody gave a nod.

‘Okay,’ said Gordon. ‘Find me Emma Watson.’

She spotted him at the far end of the hospital hallway. He was talking to Hank Millar, and though his back was turned to her and he was wearing standard green surgical scrubs, Emma knew it was Jack. Seven years of marriage had left ties of familiarity that went beyond the mere recognition of his face.

This was, in fact, the same view she’d had of Jack McCallum the first time they’d met, when they’d both been ER residents in San Francisco General Hospital. He had been standing at the nurses’ station, writing in a chart, his broad shoulders sloping from fatigue, his hair ruffled as though he’d just rolled out of bed. In fact, he had; it was the morning after a hectic night on call, and though he was unshaven and bleary-eyed, when he’d turned and looked at her for the first time, the attraction between them had been instantaneous.

Now Jack was ten years older, his dark hair was threaded with gray, and fatigue was once again weighing down on his shoulders. She had not seen him in three weeks, had spoken to him only briefly on the phone a few days ago, a conversation that had deteriorated into yet another noisy disagreement. These days they could not seem to be reasonable with each other, could not carry on a civilized conversation, however brief.

So it was with apprehension that she continued down the hall in his direction.

Hank Millar spotted her first, and his face instantly tensed, as though he knew a battle was imminent, and he wanted to get the hell out of there before the shooting started. Jack must have seen the change in Hank’s expression as well, because he turned to see what had inspired it.

At his first glimpse of Emma, he seemed to freeze, a spontaneous smile of greeting half-formed on his face. It was almost, but not quite, a look of both surprise and gladness to see her. Then something else took control, and his smile vanished, replaced by a look that was neither friendly nor unfriendly, merely neutral. The face of a stranger, she thought, and that was somehow more painful than if he had greeted her with outright hostility. At least then there would’ve been some emotion left, some remnant, however tattered, of a marriage that had once been happy.

She found herself responding to his flat look with an expression that was every bit as neutral. When she spoke, she addressed both men at the same time, favoring neither.

‘Gordon told me about Debbie,’ she said. ‘How is she doing?’

Hank glanced at Jack, waiting for him to answer first. Finally Hank said, ‘She’s still unconscious. We’re sort of holding a vigil in the waiting room. If you want to join us.’

‘Yes. Of course.’ She started toward the visitors’ waiting room.

‘Emma,’ Jack called out. ‘Can we talk?’