“How are they going to get back?”
The ship’s boat will be provided with mass drivers mounting microwave antennae that can be remotely…” Turi John stumbled, and consulted his teleprompter. “Sorry. That would be coherent beams of microwaves from the ship’s power plant that would be remotely controlled to track the mass drivers. What sort of power plant, here? Solar power, the most environmentally friendly kind. That great sail will focus the raw sunlight falling on an area of 3.14 million square meters to provide our crew with the power they need to thrive and survive, and eventually, to come back to Earth. The trip home will take longer, but it is, in principle, entirely safe.”
He looked around the auditorium, amazed to find the reporters were hanging on his every word, dismayed to see the attendees of the next function filtering in. “With this project we will, of course, greatly improve our understanding of the material science and the physics of the starship we seek to build. More important, the crew on the prototype will learn invaluable lessons about living in space. Once they are orbiting Diomedes, our crew, drawn from the nations that will be contributing plutonium rocket fuel, will have completed that first mission. As they dig into the surface of Diomedes to mine water and soil for agriculture, they will be learning what the crew of Starship Orion will need to know to survive around Alpha Centauri.” That wraps it up, thought Turi John. Now what was my finish? His eye caught the teleprompter. Oh yes. “There are those who say that the people of Earth will get no material benefit from this. I say that if the Starship Orion does not return so much as a single out-of-focus picture it will have still been of inestimable benefit to humanity for what it has taken from them.” He looked over his audience to see a naval officer making the finger-across-the-throat sign. “The sailors at the rear of the room have some fact sheets for those who are interested.”
The secretary of the Navy, a good old boy from South Carolina who wore a hairpiece colored a decade or two younger than his hair, sat in his tall leather chair behind his huge mahogany desk and glared at Fontaine. “What the hay-ull is the idea of this, admiral?”
We aren’t on a first name basis anymore? What a pity. “Look, Delay, you were the one who said I had to take on this Ramos fellow. You talk to him, why don’t you?”
“I don’t need to talk to Doctor Ramos, Harry, his undated letter of resignation has been in the secretary’s safe since the little greaser came on board.” Fitzgerald de la Haye’s soft accent thickened with anger. “Ah need to talk to yew!”
He wants me to humbly beg his pardon, thought Fontaine. Well, the little son of a bitch can kiss my ass. “So?”
“You ain’t making this any easier on yourself, boy. Did you authorize that damned press conference this morning?”
“Verbally. Doctor Ramos was supposed to submit to me the text for vetting, but he never got around to it.”
“Oh. He never got around to it, did he, Harry? And you just let him have that press conference of his without any idea of what the man was going to say?”
Fontaine smoothed back his white hair. “That looks to be what happened, Delay.”
“Did you, Ah say, did yew have any idea what the man was going to say?”
Tell the truth and shame the devil? “Of course I did, you damn fool. Turi John Ramos ran his mouth flat out the whole time he was in my shop.”
“Ah, shee-it. Admiral, it was your bounden duty to keep that boy’s trap shut, his nose clean, his ass out of trouble. That speech he gave was on all the TV shows, and it makes us look like a pack of idiots here at Dee-fense…” Secretary de la Haye sat back in his chair, scowling. “Harry, I’m sorry, but you got to take the fall for this.”
My computer is already cleaned out, and my hardcopy files as well, thought Fontaine coolly. I can walk out of here any time I damn please. “If you say so, Delay. I’ll put in my leave slip right away.”
“Leave slip? I want your resignation, boy!”
The pouchy grey eyes looked amused. “Oh, really? I have enough leave to cover me over my retirement date, Delay. That’s as close to resignation as you’re going to get.” He reached into his pocket. “Indefinite sick leave. You’ll need to authorize it, of course.”
“Whut the hay-ull? What is this, Harry?
“A leave slip. Don’t you political types believe in paperwork?”
The secretary of the Navy crumpled the slip into a ball of paper and threw it at the waste basket. “You’re not getting out of here that easily, boy. There’s flak to catch, and yew are going to be up in front to catch it! Once you get sick of it, you miserable bastard, once you got yourself bloody well fed up, then you can resign!”
“This trial balloon of yours was a stupid, pernicious idea,” said the secretary of defense. “Nevertheless, some people who ought to know better are clapping like trained seals at this display of unexpected brilliance from your Navy Department, Mister de la Haye.”
The secretary of the Navy blotted his forehead with his handkerchief. “I’ll issue a statement killing it immediately, sir. Or I’ll have Rear Admiral Fontaine repudiate his work for us. No problem.”
“Getting the genie back in the bottle may be harder than you think. The Russians, of all people, have said that this seems to be an excellent solution for the disposal of their inventory of pits—those grapefruit-sized balls of plutonium left over from the Cold War.” He paused. “They are a bit of a security problem, of course.”
“And the French,” added the secretary of state. “The French support the Russians, claiming they would welcome this opportunity to dedicate their own stockpile of fissionables to what they describe as ‘this humane and civilized use.’ ”
“Well, uh, I’m sorry that the idea is making waves,” said de la Haye. “But it isn’t a program, or anything. It’s just an idea—isn’t it?”
The secretary of state doodled on the yellow pad before him. “Well, my information is that the Russians are going to present it as a formal proposal in the UNNDC.”
“That’s blue smoke and mirrors. My Gawd, where did you git holt of a tale like that?”
“The Russian ambassador asked me. Since it was an American—he called it an initiative rather than a trial balloon—if we were going to move on it immediately, Mister de la Haye. When I said we were presently taking the matter under advisement, he asked if we would mind if his country formally introduced our proposal.”
De la Haye’s mouth fell open. “What did you say?”
A shrug. “I told him we’d get back to him. He said he hoped it would be within the next day or two, because our ‘initiative’ is very popular. The Russian Parliament has already passed a sense of the Duma resolution supporting it.”
“Are the Russians committed to actually giving up any pits?” asked the secretary of defense.
“Nooo, but some of them are sure thinking about it.”
“My Gawd. What about the Geneva Convention that says we can’t do it?”
A shrug. “The Russian ambassador thinks the Geneva Convention is going to be modified to permit preparing a prototype starship in the very near future.”
“Well,” said the secretary of defense, groping about in the cloud of gloom for the possibility of a silver lining. “In that case, maybe we can get a little money out of Congress to fund the sucker?”
“Well, hell,” said Senator Metcalfe, the chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, a fashion plate straight out of Arizona Highways from the pearl grey Stetson on the top of his head to the ostrich-skin cowboy boots on his feet. “They put too much celery seed in the coleslaw, again. Proper barbecue needs a nice sweet slaw.”