Shadow Command by Dale Brown

Author:Dale Brown
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Published: 2011-12-05T20:53:25+00:00

SPACEPLANE

T H AT S A M E T I M E

“Two minutes to re- entry initiation, crew,” Major Jim Terranova announced. “Re-entry countdown initiated. First auto countdown hold in one minute. Report when your checklist is complete.”

“S-One, roger,” Macomber responded.

“How are you feeling, Whack?” Terranova asked.

“Thanks to copious amounts of pure oxygen, a little Transcen-dental Meditation, not using the eye-pointing electronic checklists, and the mind-numbing routine of still more damned checklists to perform, I feel pretty good,” Macomber responded. “Wish this thing had windows.”

“I’ll put it on the wish list, but don’t count on it anytime soon.” 2 0 0 D A L E B R O W N

“It’s a pretty spectacular sight, guys,” Frenchy Moulain said.

“This is my eleventh flight in orbit and I never get tired of it.”

“It looks pretty much the same after the first orbit,” groused Chris Wohl. “I’ve been on the station three times, and it just feels like you’re standing on a really tall TV tower, looking down.”

“Only the sergeant major could minimize a sight like this, ” Moulain said. “Ask to spend a couple nights on the station, Whack. Bring lots of data cards for your camera. It’s pretty cool. You’ll fi nd yourself waking up at all times of the night and scheduling window time a day in advance just to take a picture.”

“I doubt that very much,” Macomber said dryly. He received a notification beep in his helmet. “I’m getting another data dump from the NIRTSats, guys.” NIRTSats, or Need It Right This Second Satellites, were small “microsatellites,” no bigger than a refrigerator, designed to do a specific task such as surveillance or communications relay from low-Earth orbit. Because they were smaller, carried less positioning thruster fuel, and had substantially less solar radiation shielding, the NIRTSats stayed in orbit for very short periods of time, usually less than a month. They were launched from aircraft aboard orbital boosters or inserted into orbit from the Black Stallion spaceplanes. A constellation of four to six NIRTSats had been put into an eccentric orbit designed to maximize coverage of Iran, making multiple passes over Tehran and the major military bases throughout the country since the military coup began. “Finish your checklists and let’s go over the new stuff before we get squished again.”

“I don’t think we’ll have time unless we delay re- entry for another orbit,” Terranova said. “You’ll have to review the data after we land.”

“Listen, we have time . . . we’ll make the time, MC,” Macomber said. “We already launched on this mission without any proper mission planning, so we need to go over this new data right away.”

“Not another argument,” Moulain said, exasperated. “Listen, S-One, just run your checklists and get ready for re- entry. You know what happened last time you weren’t paying attention to the fl ight: your stomach gave you a little warning.” S H A D O W C O M M A N D

2 0 1

“I’ll be ready, SC,” Macomber said. “Ground team, fi nish your checklist, report when complete, and let’s get on the new data dump.

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