“Knife.”
The technician handed him a heavy pocket knife. He opened the large blade, cut the line — then reached for the end of the red line and passed it quickly through the clasps on each walk-around, tying them together. He climbed back into the cage.
“To the end of the manipulator.”
The cage rose and he let the line reel out behind it.
“You got about eight minutes left!” the communications man called out. “It takes us that long for the final check and to close and dog those doors.”
“Almost done.” He slashed the line off and tied the free end to the end of the manipulator. Then he cut off another short length and used it to tie the knife close beside it, dangling free on a foot of line.
“Hey, that's my knife!” the technician called out.
“It's about to take a trip. Put in a statement of charges. Now get us out of here.”
The cage rose up, higher and higher, until it hovered just under the door to the airlock above. The outer doors of the cargo bay were slowly closing at the same time, Decosta put one foot on the rail of the basket and, with the technician steadying him, managed to reach up and grab the opening. Pulling, and pushing against the groaning man's shoulder with one foot, he worked his way up into the airlock, the door slammed shut and sealed right behind him.
“Get up here!” he heard Cooke shouting. “Christ, we're in the countdown. Two minutes to takeoff. I can't wait.”
“Coming. .” the pilot gasped, closing and sealing the door, climbing hurriedly up the handholds on the wall, grabbing out for the lip of the opening in the floor above. He looked up, gasping, into Cooke's strained face.
“Thirty seconds!” Cooke shouted. “Pumps going, ignition coming up, strap in, damn it — strap in!”
Decosta pulled himself into his chair with the last of his strength, grabbed for the ends of his belt — as the engines fired.
Roaring out streams of flame, the Space Shuttle lifted, moved faster and faster, rising up towards its rendezvous in space.
“The Shuttle is go,” Flax said, his words sounding in the ears of all four aboard Prometheus. “One minute into the burn.”
Patrick had flown the Shuttle more than once so he knew what was happening, knew the sensations of the two men piloting her. The first burn, the big kick by the solid fuel boosters. Three minutes of their firing along with the Orbiter engines as well. Then, one hundred and sixty miles down-range…
“Burn out, separation.”
The two big tubes, empty now, arching away, falling back towards the Atlantic Ocean. Then the snap of their parachutes and the slow drop towards the retrieval ships waiting below. But the Orbiter was still climbing, still sucking the last drops of fuel from the external tank, still not in orbit. Any trouble now and the Orbiter would have to fall back to Earth. They wouldn't make it. What was happening?
“I can't hear you, Orbiter, right, okay now. Roger. External tank jettison.”
Engines still firing as the tank fell away to burn in the thin atmosphere. Still climbing, still aiming for orbit insertion. On the way.
“What's that?” Coretta shouted. “Something burning, outside the ports.”
But even as she spoke the shuddering began, hammering and vibrating.
“Atmosphere impact!” Patrick cried out. “Atmosphere---”
The television program director sat looking at his monitor screen and muttered to himself unhappily. What a choice, what a miserable choice. The Vance Cortwright picture was going out now, as well as his doom-laden voice. That was on monitor two. On one he had a picture of Mission Control, everyone busy as hell at the consoles as they had been for the last god-only-knows how many hours. Without voice, Flax had cut them out again. Forget them, the viewers had seen enough of that picture to use again right now. On three a studio with a science fiction author-space expert, ready to go again with explanations and little models and everything. The director had gotten a lot of mileage out of him, and there would be more to go, but not right now with things maybe breaking. Four was blank now, ready to roll any of the special films they had made. They had just used the Space Shuttle takeoff animation, but with the Shuttle Orbiter up there now that was finished. The director cut in on Cortwright's voice while he thought.
“. . dramatic events of the past hours drawing now to a conclusion. A conclusion still clouded with doubt as Orbiter reaches up into space, hurtling after Prometheus, rushing to catch up. Their engines are shut down now as the final calculations are made, calculations that cannot be off by as much as one-thousandth of one percent. For, at this moment, the two spacecraft are in different orbits, at different heights, moving at different speeds. When Orbiter fires her engines again they should lift her up for the final and dramatic meeting that everyone, all over the world, is waiting for. The gallant crew of Prometheus has worked hard, and some have died, to reach this moment in time and space. How unspeakably cruel it would be if victory, life itself, should be torn away from them at this last minute, for they are reaching the end of their painful journey at last. Approaching their last orbit…”
“Start rolling the Prometheus burning film,” the director said into his mike. As soon as the animated drawing of the ship came on he switched to it with Cortwright's voice over.
“… unbreathable at this altitude, as thin and rarefied as the inside of a light bulb. But at the tremendous speed of five miles a second, eighteen thousand miles an hour, that trace of air will be like a solid wall to Prometheus.” The model's nose began to glow and send off sparks. “Heat it up, burn it, eventually to.
Cortwright stopped talking, his eyes widened, and he pressed the miniature earphone harder against his head. When he spoke again he was excited, fatigue vanished.
“It's happened, my God it's happening at this very instant. Prometheus reported atmosphere impact and then their signal faded. We know that the heated, ionized atmosphere prevents communication, that is all it may be. Or the worst may be upon them at last, the fated moment we have all been dreading may be here. This may be the end. And if it is, we can only say that though these people may die, these brave astronauts, they have not died in vain. Because their efforts have kept this giant in the sky up there until now, until this moment when it is hurtling over the empty wastes of the Pacific Ocean. If it falls now no one below will be hurt, the tragedy of Cottenham New Town will not be repeated….”
“Great, really great,” the director chuckled to himself and rubbed his hands together. “They hit while we had the burning animation on. What really great timing!”
“I don't know” Flax said. “Honest to God I just do not know any thing yet.”
“I understand, Mr. Flax, and I do appreciate your position.” Dillwater could hear the exhaustion, the pain, in the man's voice and knew he could ask no more, push him no farther. “This line will be open and I will be standing by, we will all be standing by, waiting for whatever news you may have. We are all praying it will be good.”
Dillwater slowly hung up the receiver and looked at the circle of watching faces. “Nothing additional is known,” he said.
“They have to know!” President Bandin shouted. “Eight billion dollars worth of equipment and they don't have a clue? Can't they just look up, point a telescope?”
“They are doing everything technically possible. We will know what happens in a matter of minutes.”
Bannerman walked over to stare at the big plotting board, at the red circle that was Prometheus's location on last contact.
“They had better find out something pretty soon. If that thing burns now, it will just knock a hole in the ocean. But if it stays in orbit just a few minutes more it's going to come down right on top of Los Angeles.”