“I can’t believe the ministry will let Chelomei keep it.”
“Me, neither.” He stood up, indicating that my time there was ended. “But I couldn’t believe they gave it to that idiot in the first place.”
I laughed at this, and was halfway out the door when Triyanov stopped me. “Yuri — have you had your tonsils out?”
“Yes.” I wanted to ask why, but Triyanov intimidated me. More confused than ever, I left his office and returned to the kindergarten, where my senior colleagues were busy discussing the latest American space adventure.
On March 17, the Americans had launched another Gemini spacecraft, Number 8, piloted by astronauts Armstrong and Scott.
The two-man Gemini program had accomplished most of its original goals — to show that a manned spacecraft could change its orbit and rendezvous with another vehicle, to allow an astronaut to work in open space, and to keep a crew healthy and productive for four days, then eight, then fourteen.
The only remaining goal, and it was a terribly difficult one, was to link two spacecraft. If the Americans couldn’t do this, their whole Apollo lunar landing program would be doomed, since it depended on making rendezvous and docking in lunar orbit.
Armstrong and Scott succeeded in docking their Gemini to an unmanned Agena vehicle within a few hours of launch, an impressive achievement that made me jealous.
Then disaster struck: A thruster on the Gemini started firing on its own, spinning the combined vehicles like a bullet. Mistakenly assuming that the problem was caused by the Agena’s thrusters, the crew separated, and found themselves spinning faster now, with the added danger of a collision with the Agena.
Armstrong finally stopped the spinning, but to do so, he tapped into the fuel intended to steer Gemini through reentry. He and Scott were ordered to return at first opportunity, and they found themselves floating in the Pacific Ocean less than eight hours after their glorious launch from Florida.
It was the first time any manned spaceflight had been cut short by such an emergency — two of ours, by cosmonauts Popovich and Bykovsky, had been shortened by a day or two for less critical reasons, though no one knew this at the time — and the astronauts’ escape from death overshadowed the triumph of the first docking in space. Our newspapers were very critical of the Americans for being so backward that they had to land their astronauts in the ocean, where they could easily drown. I guess this was considered more dangerous than almost being eaten by wolves in the Urals, like cosmonauts Belyayev or Leonov, or practically freezing to death in the wilderness outside of Saratov, like Blackie and Breezy.
The talk quickly turned to Voskhod 3. “It’s too bad we have to let those dumbshit jet jockeys fly the thing,” Yastrebov said. “They’re only better than dogs because they can complain.”
“How does that make them better?” another guy said, to much laughter.
I found this all disappointing — the contempt my fellow “test engineers” had for the military cosmonauts and Saditsky’s clear reluctance to fly Voskhod. It all still looked like fun to me — dangerous fun, yes. Why couldn’t everybody feel that way?
I got home late, and Lev came in even later, looking awful, as if he had slept in his clothes. More precisely, as if he’d been wearing them for days while not sleeping at all. “Let me make you some tea,” I said, not that I was his mother.
“It’s the least you can do,” he said, collapsing into a chair in the kitchen nook. “Since your bosses have beaten us.”
I knew he could only mean the lunar orbit program. “What happened?”
“The Hammer drove out to see Chelomei on Tuesday.” That was the day Cosmos 110 landed. “He told him the Military-Industrial Council was worried about our ability to deliver a manned spacecraft on schedule, and that we were going to have to let the Korolev bureau build it. Launching it on our Proton, of course.
“Chelomei practically tied him up and refused to let him leave the office until he promised to give us two more days to show him our progress.” He yawned and let his head hang down. “Which is where I’ve been for the last forty-eight hours — wiring a test article so it looked like it could fly.”
Lev didn’t seem willing to admit that the council had been right. Chelomei didn’t have a vehicle ready to fly, and wouldn’t any time soon.
“The Hammer came back with a bunch of people from the council and they barely looked at it. So it’s over. The first ship to fly around the Moon will be Korolev’s.”
“If it’s not Apollo.”
“The Americans are so busy fishing their astronauts out of the ocean that we can still beat them.” That was Lev, competitive to the end.
I told him I was sorry, lying only slightly, then said: “Look, at least you got to meet Filin. He liked you, and he’s probably going to take over the bureau. You can come there and build your Moon ship.”
“Yes. And look like a traitor to all the friends I leave behind.”
“Come on! You’re still a student! People do get reassigned, don’t they?”
He got to his feet, a bit unsteadily, as if he’d been drinking. “I’m going to sleep. Then I’ll think about it.”
Lev slept most of the weekend. The Omsk Twins went out of town, so Marina spent the night, which was something entirely new and pleasant. I returned to the bureau the next week and buried myself in work with new energy, ready to get Voskhod 3 flying in spite of all its critics, anxious to storm the Moon.
By Monday, March 28, I had even done more work on my dissertation, and wanted Filin to see it, so I contrived a visit to his office. Naturally, I also hoped to eavesdrop on activities that were none of my business.
I could tell immediately that something was wrong. There were voices coming from inside Filin’s office. Many voices. And Filin’s birdwoman was so subdued I assumed she had suffered a death in her family. “He’ll see you when they leave,” she said, in a voice so pathetic I almost wanted her to be brusque and territorial.
After twenty minutes, Filin’s door opened and eight or nine people came out, mostly bureau engineers and the usual brace of military officers. And one unexpected person — Artemov himself, who seemed momentarily surprised at my presence. Our eyes met for the slightest moment; he blinked, as if a stray shaft of sunlight had pierced his retina, then turned away and continued his conversation.
Afraid of what I’d find, I didn’t want to go into Filin’s office. It was almost as bad as I’d feared: Filin, normally lanky, was bent at his desk like a question mark.
“Hello, Yuri.” He smiled sardonically. “Did you see the big parade?” Out of his office, he meant.
“It was hard to miss.”
I closed the door. The office smelled like cigarette smoke and stale sweat. I handed Filin my papers, which he accepted numbly. Then he seemed to unwind, stretching, as if awaking from a bad dream. “It’s very bad,” he said, sighing with finality.
“I don’t understand,” I said, and I truly didn’t. Filin should have been like a conquering general returning to Rome in triumph.
He waved toward the departed Artemov and company. “The medical institute had a disaster over the weekend. The Voskhod oxygen system had a failure on the nineteenth day of a simulated flight. So no one thinks we can fly that long.”
“Eighteen days is still almost two weeks longer than we’ve flown so far.”
“But only four days longer than the Americans have flown. And that’s assuming we get even that far. Can you imagine what the Military-Industrial Council will be saying if we have to bring the cosmonauts back after ten days? Or a week? We’ll look like failures.”