"HOSC operations come in please. Is anybody there?" I began repeating.
Tabitha followed. "Come in Jim. Are you there?"
We kept talking so a constant audio file would be sent through Zephram, over TDRSS, to the HOSC, and hopefully to Jim.
"Tabitha, I'm going to survey the probe while we wait. There might be something on it we could use. Use for what I don't know."
I powered up the forward thrusters and moved slowly around the spacecraft. Where the large thud had taken place was on the ACS Fuel Tankage and Science Instrument section. We wouldn't be measuring the electromagnetic field strength and the gravimetric effects of the warp field today. We sure wouldn't be firing the attitude control thrusters either. The rest of the probe looked okay. I made my way back to the GUI panel and did a system diagnostic using its graphical user interface. The probe checked out, although the warp field coils hadn't been completely connected and the ECCs hadn't been brought online yet.
"HOSC, do you copy?" Tabitha repeated.
"Come on, Jim, where are you?" I looked at Tabitha's DCM.
"Give me the bad news, Anson."
"We still have about three hours of air left. That is plenty of time." I assured her. Plenty of time for what neither of us would admit. It takes days at best, usually weeks, to get a Shuttle ready for launch and about the same time for a Russian rocket. It takes even longer for a Chinese rocket. We discussed the possibility of the Crew Return Vehicle on the ISS.
"HOSC, are you there?" I said. "The CRV could never get to us in time. At full thrust I don't think it could make it to us in three hours."
"Maybe, Anson. Don't give up."
"Who's giving up? Jim, are you there?" I turned to her and approached. I hugged her suit as best I could and touched my faceplate to hers.
"I love you, Tabitha."
"Well, you may not live to regret that." She smiled.
Twenty or so minutes had passed and still no response from the HOSC. We were beginning to think nobody would find the signal.
"Jim, are you there? Huntsville, is anybody there? This is Anson Clemons—come in, Earth!" I was ready to try something else.
"Roger that, Dr. Clemons. This is Mission Control being patched through the HOSC. Is Colonel Ames with you? And what has happened?" It wasn't Jim's voice, but we didn't care. Tabitha took command.
"Mission Control, this is Shuttle Commander Tabitha Ames. The Shuttle Orbiter has been completely destroyed by some type of internal explosion. I repeat. The Shuttle Orbiter has been completely destroyed. The cause is unknown. Dr. Anson Clemons and I are the only survivors. We each have," she looked at her DCM readout, "roughly two hours and thirty-nine minutes of air left. Please advise on possible rescue scenario. The probe ACS thrusters are off-line and out of fuel and O2."
"Roger that, Commander. Understand that we are working on escape possibilities. We will advise you momentarily," Control replied.
"Roger, Houston."
The response came five minutes later—it seemed like forever.
"Colonel Ames, Tabitha, uh, we haven't got a working scenario that will save both of you. If you two have any suggestions, we're open for it down here." Hal Thompson was talking now. He was the boss down at Mission Control. I had met him a few times. He was shooting straight with us.
"Houston, this is Clemons. What do you mean by you can't save us both?" I had an idea what he meant, but I had to hear it.
"We don't have another Shuttle anywhere near ready for launch. We have called the Russians and the Chinese. The Chinese have one on the launch pad but they won't be ready for launch for at least another seven hours or so. The Crew Return Vehicle is your only hope. It's already enroute to your location. The Hohmann Transfer required will take about four hours to reach you and another couple of minutes to match velocities with you. That's all we have right now. Sorry." Hal truly sounded sorry. I knew he was right. I had been running rough order of magnitude calculations in my head. One of us would have to survive long enough for the CRV to make it to us. Only one of us could with the combination of air from both suits—it would be Tabitha. At least she would make it. I told her it had to be her.
"No way! Anson, there's a better solution." Tabitha cried.
"Tabitha. It is the only way. You have a daughter back home. There's no choice to be made here." Heinlein always said (through his character Lazarus Long) that he wasn't afraid of death and that he knew it was part of the deal. I can't say that I'm that philosophical about it. Maybe I'm just not the superman he was. Death scares the living hell out of me. But I had to make sure Tabitha made it home alive. If I didn't do that, what kind of husband would I be?
"Stuff that, Anson. No way, period. End of that. You're the smart one—figure it out!"
"Houston, how long until I have to stop using my oxygen in order to give Tabitha time to wait for the CRV plus a few minutes of extra air?"
"Just a second on that, Anson," Hal replied solemnly.
"We'll see how long we have to work other solutions." I told Tabitha.
"Guys, this is Hal. Flight surgeon says that one of you would have to stop breathing in sixty-one minutes for the other to make it long enough for the CRV to get there."
"Okay, Hal. We have an hour to work this out. Get Jim at the HOSC on the circuit now. He might can help."
"Roger, Anson. It's already done." Hal replied.
"Jim, here, buddy. I heard it all so far. This bites. What do you need from me?" Jim asked.
"I don't know yet, Jim. I do have one question for you though."
"Yeah, what is it?"
"Will you be my best man at my wedding? Tabitha said yes!"
"You got it, Anson! Congratulations. Let's get you home first." Jim said.
No brilliant ideas hit any of us. The one idea I had was to use the large electromagnets in the warp coil to generate a magnetic sail from the material in the upper atmosphere at LEO. The sail would then surf along the Earth's magnetic field. The idea would be to set up a mini-magnetospheric plasma propulsion (M2P2) system. The probe was far too massive and the coils would have to be reconfigured. Another task that couldn't be accomplished from an EMU. I decided then that if I survived this I was going to invent a better damn spacesuit or better yet some sort of magical warp bubble that would wrap around you like Spandex. But, first things first!
"There is no way to adjust the coils to set up the magnetic sail at all? We can't get any thrust that way?" I asked Jim after we'd been through the math a few times. I looked at my DCM. I only had about ten minutes left before the big decision. Tabitha remained quiet most of the time.
"Sorry, Anson. I don't see how you could get in there and redirect the field. Zephram was designed to warp space not build plasma balls. Too bad you can't just warp to the station. Damnit! What are we going to do?"
"What did you say!?"
"I said too bad—" Jim began again.
"Skip it, Jim. I know what you said. That's the answer. We'll warp home!" I cried over the UHF. It could work! I would save Tabitha and myself!
"Anson, you know as well as I do that you can't warp around the Earth. The rotation causes to much frame dragging for you to know where you would end up. You can't warp around the Earth to the ISS or the CRV. Our calculations just aren't sophisticated enough for that," Jim concluded sadly.
"Jim, who said anything about the ISS. I said home. Earth!"