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“Negative, commander. Both systems show as green based on the passive sensors.”
Commander Palmer takes a deep breath and looks at the controls in front of him for a few seconds before responding. “Heads or tails, Jackie?”
“Commander?”
“Heads or tails? Don’t think about it; just pick one.”
“T—No, heads.”
“Reactor it is.” Commander palmer enters the command to start up the reactor, then pushes himself back from the console and watches the screen with trepidation. “Startup time for both is roughly the same, about ten minutes. With both systems showing green it’s a shot in the dark over which one will work. Maybe both will. Maybe one won’t. Maybe both won’t.”
“That’s certainly comforting, Commander,” Ted replies.
The trio of astronauts float quietly for the next nine minutes and thirty seconds, anxiously awaiting some sign that the correct choice was made. As the startup sequence for the reactor completes, Commander Palmer hears a slight hum as a vibration begins to build within the center of the station. A few seconds later, Ted comes over the comms, nearly breathless with excitement.
“We’ve got systems coming online across the board up here! Environmental systems are starting up now and we should have breathable air any second!”
Commander Palmer sighs with relief and takes a moment to compose himself before responding. “Excellent. It needs a bit of tuning so I’ll be down here for a while. Make sure all of the vital systems are online; there should be a checklist up in command somewhere for this type of scenario. Run it.” Palmer pauses for a few seconds, thinking about what happened on the ISS-2. “Don’t bring up the communications channels yet, though.”
“Don’t… you don’t want to call home?”
“I’ve got a funny feeling about it. Call it a hunch. Just wait for me before booting any sort of ground comms up, okay?”
Ted and Jackie look at each other skeptically before Ted shrugs, accepting Commander Palmer’s instruction. “Will do. See you on the command deck soon.”
Commander Palmer peers through the thick glass at the small reactor, watching as the lights across its surface blink out status codes. He lifts a hand to his helmet and slowly releases the latch before twisting it and taking it off. The air on the station is stale but breathable, and he can feel a slight breeze of freshly processed air from somewhere off to the side.
The three astronauts from ISS-2 are still alive. It’s more than a minor miracle that they’ve survived, but there is still much to be done. The older station needs maintenance and upkeep to house them long-term, and the options for getting back to Earth must be carefully studied and calculated to ensure success. And, in the background, there’s still the question of what exactly happened. Commander Palmer’s mind begins to race with possibilities before he catches himself and focuses on the task at hand.
“Survival now,” he mutters. “Answers later.”
Chapter 8
Washington, D.C.
“Merde!” Dr. Evans hissed, shaking his head at Rick. “What now?”
As Rick sat behind the counter, hand on his pistol, contemplating whether to try and engage the men in and outside the shop, he took a deep breath and listened as the man in the doorway shouted again.
“I said who’s in there? Put your hands up and come out now, or we’ll consider you a threat and open fire!”
Rick grabbed his pistol and passed it to Dr. Evans before whispering in his ear. “If this goes south, make sure you take two or three of them out, okay?” Rick ignored Dr. Evans’ wide-eyed expression and slowly raised his hands over the counter, shouting as he began rising to his feet.
“Take it easy! I’m coming out!”
“Drop your weapons!”
“They’re dropped, they’re dropped!” Rick shouted back at the man as he stood up, wincing and closing his eyes in anticipation of the bullets he expected to come flying toward him. The bullets did not come, though, and he opened one eye and then the other to see three of the men standing in front of him, rifles aimed at his chest as the one closest spoke again.
“Are you alone? What are you doing in here?”
Rick glanced between the men, studying their expressions in the fraction of a second he knew he had to respond. He sensed no malice in their faces, only nervousness and exhaustion. In that instant, Rick decided to try and trust them, hoping desperately that it wouldn’t backfire.
“We have someone wounded back here; she’s trapped under rubble!” He kept his hands in the air even as he turned and looked down towards Jane. Next to her, Dr. Evans looked back at him, his eyes wide as he shook his head.
“’We?’” The man responded. “How many is ‘we’?”
“Three in total,” Rick said. “Myself, a doctor and our friend. We’re just passing through the city; we heard you coming and didn’t know what your intentions were so we hid in here. We were going to try to get out when we realized you were coming closer but the back wall collapsed partially and trapped her.”
