AMERICA ONE - NextGen (Book 5) Read online

  “And I don’t have the reentry heat on my spaceship like your shuttles have,” added Commander Joot.

  “Something we can’t solve: heading downward, Commander, until we redesign our thrusters, and that’s not going to happen while inside this crater. Mrs. Jones, I will refuel SB-III with a ten percent fuel load. How much fuel did you have when you landed?”

  “The craft took off from the runway with 7 percent fuel, 55 percent power, and landed 31 minutes later showing 3 percent fuel and needing 50 percent power during descent,” Maggie answered.

  “Ten percent should give you at least an hour of atmospheric flight. How do you feel about liftoff with shield extension, and slowly heading up to 10,000 feet? At that altitude, I believe gravity will bring you down again. Igor?”

  “I believe you are right,” responded Igor, looking at readouts from the nearest computer monitor. “Even with 90 percent change in drag and gravity change, SB-III should float back down to Earth by gravity using only horizontal thrusting.” Ryan got on his radio and stopped the shuttle’s refueling.

  “Okay Ryan, out of here! I need to check everybody out,” ordered Dr. Nancy. “Maggie will be first. Why don’t you be her copilot? Igor has been cleared, and where’s my pool?”

  Both Maggie and Ryan were excited. They had a few hours to kill until the heat of the day dissipated, when the Matts would be introduced to the newbies, and so they could go flying. They headed into Base Control for a briefing with Captain Pete and Jonesy up in orbit. Once contact was made, and Mars Noble, Saturn Jones and the two Richmond girls were allowed to join the briefing, it started with Ryan explaining what he wanted Maggie to do. Captain Pete was the first to interrupt Ryan.

  “I just wanted to say something before you continue, boss. I watched both aircraft enter the atmosphere earlier today. One with and one without a shield. There was no difference in radar blips until about 120,000 feet altitude. As usual, SB-III was strong on radar tracking all the way down to about 5,000 feet. Then we began losing her. By 3,000 feet she was off our radars. Commander Joot’s craft began giving us a weak tracking symbol as high as 120,000 feet, and we had totally lost his craft when he called in at 50,000 feet telling us that he was about to begin a hover. I have talked it out with Boris and Fritz up here, and the only answer we can think of is that the shield with the craft inside it becomes a stealth ship as the air thickens around it. There is a lot of difference in air density between those two layers, over.”

  “Interesting,” replied Ryan. “Nothing better than stealth flight down here.”

  The biggest question to be answered by Maggie’s test flight was suggested by Jonesy. It would be extremely interesting to find out what would happen if the shuttle needed to go into laser mode while in descent, and the shield was reduced to allow the laser to extend out of the front of the shield. Part of the tail and the tips of the wings would also be out of the vacuum during atmospheric reentry.

  Maggie had the big question. What would happen if the shield was reduced to zero while in flight, and what would happen to all the thrust as gravity suddenly reared its ugly head? Nobody could answer those questions. Jonesy wanted Ryan to wait on the more dangerous experiments until he had succeeded in bringing the second Matt craft in, and had flown the Matt craft through the more dangerous procedures. He certainly didn’t want his wife flying, even though he nearly admitted for the first time ever that she was as good as he.

  “One more important factor,” added Igor, once flying protocol had been agreed to. “If Captain Pete began losing the commander’s craft on radar at 120,000 feet, then all the ground radars might have lost it earlier. Why?” he asked the others. Nobody answered this one. “If the density of the air around the craft made it disappear, then it could have disappeared faster from down here than up there. It is only a theory, but think of it from this angle; America One is looking down at the commander’s craft, but everybody down here has to look up to follow it. Ryan, your lone radar system was tracking Maggie. You were not tracking Commander Joot. You expected him to arrive right above you, as he did. I believe that if we were tracking his entry from our old base in Nevada, our ground radar would have been looking up, tracking his craft through the thicker atmospheric layers closer to Earth. If his blip disappeared from the above view, through thin to no air, then it could have been harder for the ground radars to track him, maybe losing his entry far sooner from below than above. Remember, he didn’t have a flame entry either; the shield stopped that, so his reentry could not have looked like a reentry at all.”

  “So, as far as others might realize, only one of our craft has reentered Earth’s atmosphere?” suggested Ryan, thinking hard. “But two craft disappeared from radar orbiting the Earth?” He got on his mobile radio. “Radio operator, can you patch me into the frequency the Israeli Air Force gave me?”

  “Roger, wait one,” came the reply from a few feet away. Within a minute Ryan was talking to Israel. After short pleasantries he asked his question. “I assume your radars followed our three craft reentering the atmosphere and landing, over?”

  “Three, we only saw one come into your runway coordinates. We thought we saw a second reentry at a far higher altitude earlier, but it disappeared. We put it down to debris burning up. We see debris burning up every hour of every day these days, and especially since you left so much up there. You said three spacecraft, over?”

  “I was only checking to see if you, and countless other radar installations, were following our every move,” replied Ryan.

  After leaving the person on the other end completely baffled, he did the same to Australia on another frequency, and released that he and his team were onto something very new and exciting.

  “Ryan,” asked Commander Pete continuing in Matt, once the flight briefing had come to an end. “I believe that you need to get more people and equipment out of your area before the first attack. The reason VIN and I think so, is that we can halt any nuke missile attack or nuke cube attack against us up here. We are climbing higher, out of harm’s way, but we cannot so easily destroy missiles hugging the ground and directed at you, say, from an aircraft or ship in the Red Sea or Mediterranean. Many of the modern missiles a decade ago were ground huggers, and not pointed into orbit. That means that we might not be able to protect you if there is a missile attack on your position. With Jonesy heading up tomorrow in SB-III, that will clear the new recruits, but what about the rest of you?”

  “Good point,” Ryan replied, “but somebody has to stay here. Also, we have several aircraft here on the ground: the Dead Chicken, the Jonesy family sedan, and the Chinook. Martin and his family are in my jet. Maybe I should get everybody out of here once we get the first message from you that we have incoming. I will work out a faster evacuation plan.”

  Maggie still wanted to do some exciting new tests. Jonesy wasn’t that happy, but he didn’t have much choice. Donning a full spacesuit with helmet with Ryan, they headed out to see if they could learn any more about the shield and how it reacted around SB-III.

  Walking out with Maggie and a technician, Ryan noticed that one of the earthmovers was already heading into a growing hole. As it slowly maneuvered its way down a slope, it disappeared from view.

  They entered the side hatch and Maggie got to work. Ryan wasn’t anywhere as competent as she or her husband flying their shuttle, but he could take over if Maggie had difficulties. There was no one else better than Ryan on the base at the moment.

  “Deploying shield; thrusters winding up to idle; all systems looking good,” said Maggie in Matt over her radio. This was her doing this. On her first shielded flight she had found the controls as easy as without the shield. Whatever she did, it seemed the shield just followed her around like a soap bubble surrounding the craft.

  Commander Joot, who had launched and reentered in his craft several times in his 10,000 year flying career, had given her all the pointers he could before in America One on their long flight back from Mars. He didn’t believe there was
anything the shield couldn’t do. It didn’t matter how fast his ship accelerated or braked, the shield bobbled and moved gently, sometimes swaying here and there, but it never left his craft.

  “Thrusters are warmed up, the shield is extended fully around the shuttle, and all readouts looking completely normal. Increasing thrust to 40 percent…50 percent…54 percent, and we have a gentle lift off. First maneuver is to head straight up to 10,000 feet, over.”

  In Base Control, Igor, who had gone through his checkups, and who now had Ryan’s mobile radio, was wheeled outside the tent. The hard sand base easily took the weight of his wheelchair. He was totally covered in a wide-brimmed hat, dark glasses, and a scarf around his neck to protect his pure white skin from sunburn. So were many of the others watching. Only a couple of the returning crew were left in the medical tent. Dr. Nancy, the Chinook pilots, and Joseph Jones manning the earthmover were either too busy or not able to see the launch.

  “Looking good from out here. You are hovering about ten feet off the sand, over,” remarked the flight controller.

  “Copy that, increasing thrust…. 60 percent, sixty-five, Wow! This is like a high-speed elevator, not a helicopter liftoff…70 percent and holding at 70.”

  The spectators on the ground watched as SB-III headed straight up as if launched from a catapult. Within seconds the craft disappeared above them into the blue sky.

  “Confirm 16,000 feet?” asked Igor. He couldn’t believe his eyes.

  “Roger, passing through 17,000 and reducing thrust back to 51 percent,” Maggie replied. “Sorry guys, it was just too fast to control, and there were absolutely no Gees on my body. Confirm, Ryan?”

  “It was utterly unbelievable, more like watching a movie than being a participant. Now holding at 17,800 feet,” said Ryan in Matt, but he reverted to English for his next order, as Beth couldn’t speak Matt. “Beth, you there?”

  “Reading you loud and clear,” was the reply from the airfield.

  “Grab a couple of the empty 44-gallon gas drums hanging around and lift them in the chopper to the eastern end of the runway. Place them one foot from the end of the tarmac and back away. I want to see our mother ship’s accuracy in case we are attacked, over.”

  “Copied that, will have them ready in ten minutes, over,” Beth responded.

  “America One is not available; we are though if you want us to blast something,” said Allen Saunders above in SB-II, and in Matt.

  “Thanks, we are doing accuracy tests down here,” replied Ryan. “How long before you are out of range?”

  “Sixteen minutes. My buddy in the same craft as ours will then be in attendance. The mother ship is 20 minutes after that.”

  “Roger, prepare to fire on eastern edge of new runway in fifteen, but wait for my command, over,” replied Ryan. “Maggie, we have nine minutes to wait; we have enough fuel, so what tests can we do?”

  “Watch this,” she smiled and began turning the craft to port. Without losing altitude, the bubble moved gently around them, and she turned 360 degrees in one direction, then the same in the opposite. Then she brought the nose up, and moving the thrusters from vertical to thrust behind them, she reduced the power to 50 percent to avoid climbing. “We are now pointing in a perfect launch direction, Ryan. All I have to do is to increase thrust and up we go. We are actually dropping by 4 feet per second, so I’m increasing thrust. There, we are again stationary at 52 percent but unfortunately moving horizontally across the ground at about 15 knots. I’m not yet perfect, but with practice I could get us motionless.”

  Ryan became excited. “Maggie, increase thrust by twenty percent for ten seconds then reduce it back to fifty percent,” he replied. Maggie did so and literally they watched as the altimeter began to spin. They felt no movement inside the craft. The bubble around them wobbled somewhat then stilled.

  “You guys going home?” asked Igor, shocked at what they were doing.

  “Altitude 29,000 feet, vertical speed 290 knots, reducing down to 50 percent,” said Maggie over the internal intercom. “We are fine up here,” she said over the radio.

  It took three minutes before their vertical speed reduced to near zero.

  “Cans ready at edge of tarmac. Chinook heading back 1,000 feet. Do we need to give you more room, over?”

  “Negative,” replied Allen Saunders from above, and in English. “I have the cans and you visual.”

  “Ready to fire. Seven minutes before we are over the horizon,” he said to Ryan in Matt a moment later.

  “Roger that, Allen, hold your fire for sixty seconds,” Ryan ordered on the radio in Matt. “Maggie, reduce the shield back and position the craft to fire laser at the runway,” he continued so that everyone could hear.

  Maggie positioned the nose down directly toward the end of the runway, locked the two drums into the targeting coordinator, prepared a sequence of six three-second bursts, and moments later Beth saw the cans vibrating in front of her at the end of the runway.

  “No difference in flight control while the shield is pulled back to fire. Five percent of the craft is out of the shield. Firing complete. Increasing shield.”

  Beth and Monica were shocked at how little force had hit the drums when they both ran up to check the hits. They did vibrate and bounce around, but the holes in the cans were patterned, five in one and one in the other, all within a foot diameter.

  “Two minutes to out-of-range,” said Allen Saunders in English. “I see two bodies heading away from the target area. Ready to fire, over.”

  “You are clear to fire once the ground personnel are safe,” replied Ryan as Maggie brought the shuttle back to horizontal. “Take her back in, Maggie,” he said over their internal intercom.

  Again the drums vibrated and bounced around slightly just before Allen Saunders said that he was heading out of range. Michael Pitt’s voice came over the radio, also in English, and asked if he could do some target practice. Ryan gave permission and again the drums vibrated. He asked Beth to collect the cans and return with them to the crater. Ryan knew that the world had been listening in, and hoped that the two shuttles in space firing one after the other had given his enemy food for thought.

  As Maggie decreased the thrust to fifty percent, the shuttle didn’t descend. “Okay! She’s not wanting to go down,” she told Ryan. She decreased the thrust another ten percent, and still nothing happened.

  At idle thrust, the craft began to descend, but only a foot a minute, and Maggie sighed with relief, her mind racing trying to understand why. “Ryan, I just realized something we hadn’t thought about our space directional thrusters; the tiny thrusters can go in any direction. I will warm them up and see what changes. I know they cannot be used in atmospheric conditions, but as far as they are concerned, there is still a vacuum around us, just like in space, and they shouldn’t burn up.” Ryan nodded. At this speed of descent, he was glad they were only at 31,000 feet.

  Both Ryan and Maggie knew that these dozen one-inch-wide jets could not be used inside Earth’s atmosphere, that’s why nobody had thought of using them. These tiny thrusters were used extensively in space keeping the ship aligned and on track. Between all 12 of them they had the equal of about six pounds of thrust.

  Maggie brought them online and pointed three of the tiny thrusters along the roof of the shuttle skywards. She dialed in full power and the shuttle doubled her descend rate to two feet a second.

  “At this rate, I’ll head back to the galley and cook us a meal. We will be up here all night!” suggested Ryan.

  “Just hold on your horses, boss, I’m pointing the nose down five percent.” The descent doubled, and then at 35 percent nose under horizontal, the maximum she could force the nose downward, the forward thrusters pushed them in a downward slope. Maggie then closed down the small thrusters and increased the rear ones back to fifty percent. In a winding pattern, it took the shuttle fifteen minutes to descend to 15,000 feet. At this altitude, the shuttle began to fall.

  “Shuttle stable and
on hover,” said Maggie watching her gauges, and Ryan was shocked to see that they were only 10,000 feet or so above the desert floor and the crater was nowhere in sight.

  “Where are we?” Ryan asked Igor in Ground Control in Matt.

  “We can’t register you on radar. We see your telemetry but cannot see you on radar, over. We actually don’t know where you are,” replied Igor in the same language.

  “I have you on our laser camera,” said Captain Pete from above. “We were following your blue bubble, then it just headed out of our tight screen at a rapid rate. I now have you visual. Hold on, I’ll pan the viewfinder out. There is the crater, about 190 miles southeast of you, a heading of approximately 110 degrees from your current position, over.”

  “Wow! You are a real backup,” replied Maggie. “Okay! How the hell did we get so far over here and away from the crater? Heading back now, six percent fuel remaining.”

  Even Commander Joot was puzzled two hours later in the flight debriefing. It was being held in an enclosed area of the main tent after Maggie had brought the shuttle back into land breathing hydrogen fumes. Everybody had very little to say until Igor’s suggestion gave at least a possible answer.

  “I believe that the laser firing had something to do with it,” Igor suggested. “Your computers are acting extremely slowly and it seems are not telling you of your movement direction over land as they usually do. Part of your ship outside the shield could have made your craft act like a rifle’s recoil as the bullet leaves the barrel. Inside the shield nothing was amiss: as you fired, I believe the recoil on the atmospheric areas of your shuttle shot you backward, and you didn’t notice as you increased the shield.”

  “Wow!” was all Maggie could say.

  “We couldn’t see you from the ground at over 25,000 feet. You and the bubble were too small to visualize with the naked eye and by then it was too late, I couldn’t find you on the radar, or even when I was given the binoculars. You must have moved horizontally at a rapid speed.”

  “Next time, Maggie, we do the same test at 10,000 feet,” said Ryan.