“The nuclear missile has been launched, ladies and gentlemen. Its engine is now firing,” the announcer said. He struck Aki as if he were doing the play-by-play for an oddball Japanese gameshow. She knew that only the guidance control engine was being activated because the missile was too close to use its nuclear-powered engine. After a few minutes, a white flash could be seen from the back of the missile as it gained distance from the Millikan. By the time the missile traveled two hundred kilometers, it was no longer distinguishable from the surrounding stars. At that point, a second flash burst into view, a pure-white ball of fire that dissipated quickly. Sighs of disappointment percolated through the crowd until the announcer bellowed that the powerful explosion had been a success. Applause and cheers came from all sides. Aki sat down for a bit. Most of the spectators remained standing.
Next was a demonstration of the spiderweb. Since the web was almost imperceptible to the naked eye, an infrared camera was used to capture the image, then the image was enhanced so that the metal webbing was visible. Ten kilometers from the ship, the web was deployed. Given the size of the giant web, it unfurled at astounding speed. To Aki’s ears the crowd seemed more impressed by the spiderweb than the nuclear missile. There was a short break. Aki sat quietly, knowing that the main event was slated for nine o’clock.
“What you’re looking at now,” explained the announcer, “is an image from seven minutes and thirty seconds ago. This is the UNSS Thompson, which is currently near the Vert-Ring. The massive device it is carrying on its back is our very own graser, ladies and gentlemen! What an incredible sight! It almost looks as if the graser is transporting the Thompson instead of the other way around.”
The long, narrow ship looked like the stem of a wine glass protruding from the back of the graser. During an actual attack, a second ship, the UNSS Becquerel, would link with the Thompson. Together the Becquerel and the Thompson would form the final line of defense, attempting to intercept the Builders.
“The UNSS Thompson is currently unmanned. It’s being controlled from the UNSS Becquerel, located thirty thousand kilometers behind the Thompson. The targets being used for tonight’s demonstration are three spent fuel tanks positioned some two thousand kilometers ahead. The ship should be ready to fire any minute now.”
Three egg-shaped objects spaced some distance apart from each other came into view. A countdown timer appeared in the lower right of the screen. As the clock neared zero, silence fell upon the stadium. Only the faint sound of traffic and other random background noise coming from the city were audible. As soon as the countdown reached zero, there was a blinding flash.
When the view of space returned, the fuel tanks were nowhere to be seen. The scene was replayed in slow motion several times. The blast vaporized the tanks in a mere five one-thousandths of a second. The vapor from the explosion dispersed at the breakneck speed of ten kilometers per second, leaving the vidlink’s field of vision instantaneously.
“Unbelievable, ladies and gentlemen, truly unbelievable! We have just witnessed the incredible power of the graser. Needless to say, the graser firing test has been a complete success! You have been a witness to the true potential of humanity! The Builders are about to meet their match!” The deep and booming amplified voice of the announcer, which was overwhelming in and of itself, collided with the roaring exultation of the crowd.
Aki wondered if people could possibly be this obtuse. Perhaps the UNSDF had discovered how to trigger the graser, but no one knew how the collimation device worked or how to recharge it. She wondered how many people were aware of the flaws in the plan. The military had been sly, convincing hundreds of millions of viewers that slicing the graser from the Island and carrying it to a new location meant that the military knew what it was doing. The situation was certainly not going to be that simple.
Aki stared up into the clear, cold darkness of the night sky. Above the nocturnal skyline, she could make out Orion. Next to Orion’s belt was a new star that was shining almost as brightly as Sirius. Although the composition of the light could not be determined with the naked eye, Aki remembered the nausea she had felt when she read the analysis of the data collected by the satellite telescopes—iron, lead, aluminum, hydrogen, silicon, carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen. The Builders were burning the elements that made up their ship, probably even themselves. The light carried proof of the atomic decomposition. The Builders were willing to sacrifice 99.99 percent to ensure that one ten-thousandth would arrive at the destination. How are you managing to do this? Why are you so utterly committed to coming here?
She sensed one thing for sure. The Builders were not lacking for backup plans. When the lasers from their deceleration system had not arrived, the Builders had put their mission ahead of their lives and resorted to nuclear-pulse propulsion to slow themselves. A new group of lights appeared in the southwestern horizon.
“Look, there in the sky! Our ships are about to do a flyby.”
Aki watched the exhibition play out with its incredible precision. Four hundred kilometers above the earth, the UNSDF battleships were aligned in a parking orbit alongside their support ships. Aki counted seventeen lights in all. She wondered if the demonstration was planned for this moment because the ships were visible from North America. As lost in the spectacle as anyone else at the stadium, Aki snapped back to reality when somebody grabbed her arm.
“I’ve been looking for you!” It was Collins, her bodyguard. “What were you thinking, alone in a crowd of this size?”
“Sorry, Collins.” Aki followed his lead as he escorted her out. Looking up to the night sky again, she got into the car that had been waiting for her.
ACT XI: NOVEMBER 23, 2037
THE DECOR IN the Strategic Air Command Director’s office was modest. In one corner sat an antique Rand McNally globe encased in glass. The brightly colored globe was the only object in the room that caught Aki’s attention. In contrast, the northern exposure offered a breathtaking view of the main hall below. Standing at the window, Aki realized that the hall was large enough to house two large tanker ships. UNSDF Fleet Headquarters was, in essence, a self-sufficient underground city. The threat of an attack by the Soviet Union during the Cold War paled in comparison to the potentially catastrophic severity of the current situation. Even if Earth underwent an attack by kinetic energy weapons or nanomachines that stripped away the planet’s atmosphere, this facility was prepared to endure the attack and sustain five hundred people for up to two years. For a moment, Aki wondered whether the five hundred would try to rebuild or exact revenge, but she quickly realized the answer.
Even though it was highly automated, the interplanetary nuclearpowered battleships housed here still needed at least sixty specialists, including relief personnel, to keep them running properly. The UNSDF faced substantial logistical challenges in operating and coordinating the actions of its nine battleships simultaneously. The weapons on each of the battleships were essentially spacecraft unto themselves.
In addition to the Battleship Group, there was also the Tactical Situation Group, which collected and processed data from the twenty-seven terrestrial and eighteen orbital observation stations. Together, those observation stations monitored the Builders’ ship, Mercury, Venus, various parts of the Vert-Ring, and the area of the inner solar system. Their monitoring processes were managed by computers working in sync with forty human beings to sift through the exabytes of data that poured in.