Gravity. Part 23

The hairs on the back of his neck were bristling. Numbly he reached for the telephone.

"Connect me to the White House," he said. "I need to speak to Jared Profitt."

His call was answered on the second ring. "This is Profitt."

"We've a.n.a.lyzed the DNA," said Roman.

"And?"

"The situation is worse than we thought."

Nicolai paused to rest, his arms trembling from fatigue. After months of living in s.p.a.ce, his body had grown weak and unaccustomed to physical labor. In microgravity there is no heavy and little need to exert one's muscles. In the last five hours, and Luther had worked nonstop, had repaired the S-band antennas, had dismantled and rea.s.sembled the gimbal.

Now he was exhausted. Just the extra effort of bending his arms in the turgid EVA suit made simple tasks difficult.

Working in the suit was an ordeal in itself. To insulate the human body from extreme temperatures ranging from -250 to 250 degrees Fahrenheit and to maintain pressure against the vacuum of s.p.a.ce, the suit was constructed of multiple layers of aluminized Mylar insulation, nylon ripstop, an Ortho-fabric cover, and a pressure-garment bladder. Beneath the suit, an astronaut wore an undergarment laced with water-cooling tubes. He also had to wear a life-support backpack containing water, oxygen, self-rescue jet pack, and radio equipment. In essence, the EVA suit was a personal s.p.a.cecraft, bulky and difficult to maneuver in, and just the act of tightening a screw required strength and concentration.

The work had exhausted Nicolai. His hands were cramping in the clumsy s.p.a.ce suit gloves, and he was sweating.

He was also hungry.

He took a sip of water from the mouthpiece mounted inside his suit and released a heavy sigh. Though the water tasted strange, almost fishy, he thought nothing of it. Everything tasted strange microgravity. He took another sip and felt wetness splash onto his jaw. He could not reach into his helmet to brush it away, so he ignored it and gazed down at the earth. That sudden glimpse of it, spread out in breathtaking glory beneath him, made him feel a little dizzy, a little nauseated. He closed his eyes, waiting for the feeling to pa.s.s. It was motion sickness, nothing more, it often happened when you unexpectedly caught sight of earth. As his stomach settled, he became aware of a new sensation. The spilled water was now trickling up his cheek. He twitched his face, to shake off the droplet, but it continued to slide across his skin.

But I am in microgravity, where there is no up or down. Water should not be trickling at all.

He began to shake his head, tapped his gloved hand on his helmet.

Still he felt the droplet moving up his face, tracing a wet line over his jaw. Toward his ear. It had reached the edge of his comm.-a.s.sembly cap now. Surely the fabric would soak up the moisture, would prevent it from trickling further a All at once his body went rigid. The wetness had slid beneath the edge of the cap. It was now squirming toward his ear.

Not a droplet of water, not a stray trickle, but something that moved purpose. Something alive.

He thrashed left, then right, trying to dislodge it. He banged hard on his helmet. And still he felt it moving, sliding under comm a.s.sembly.

He caught dizzying glimpses of earth, then black s.p.a.ce, then earth again, as he flailed and twisted around in a frantic dance.

The wetness slithered into his ear.

"Nicolai? Nicolai, please respond!" said Emma, watching him on the TV monitor. He was turning around and around, gloved hands battering frantically at his helmet. "Luther, he looks like he's having a seizure!" Luther appeared on camera, moving quickly to a.s.sist his EVA partner. Nicolai kept thras.h.i.+ng, shaking his head back and forth.

Emma could hear them on UHF, Luther asking frantically, "What is it, what is it?"

"My eara"It is in my eara""

"Pain? Does your ear hurt? Look at me!"

Nicolai slapped his helmet again. "It's going deeper!" he screamed. "Get it out! Get it out!"

"What's wrong with him?" cried Emma.

"I don't know! Jesus, he's panickinga""

"He's getting too close to the tool stanchion. Get him away before he damages his suit!" On the TV monitor, Luther grabbed his partner by the arm.

"Come on, Nicolai! We're going back in the air lock." Suddenly Nicolai clutched at his helmet, as though to rip it off.

"No! Don't!" screamed Luther, clutching at both of his partner's arms in a desperate attempt to restrain him. The men thrashed together, umbilical tethers winding, tangling around them.

Griggs and Diana had joined Emma at the TV monitor, and the three of them watched in horror as the drama unfolded outside the station.

"Luther, the tool stanchion!" said Griggs. "Watch your suits!" Even as he said it, Nicolai suddenly and violently twisted in Luther's grasp.

His helmet slammed into the tool stanchion. A stream of what looked like white mist suddenly spurted out of his faceplate.

"Luther!" cried Emma. "Check his helmet! Check his helmet!"

Luther stared at Nicolai's faceplate. "s.h.i.+t, he's got a crack!" yelled. "I can see air leaking out! He's decompressing!"

"Tap his emergency 2 and get him in now!" Luther reached over and flipped the emergency oxygen supply switch on Nicolai's suit. The extra airflow might keep the suit inflated long enough for Nicolai to make it back alive. Still struggling to keep his partner under control, Luther began to haul toward the air lock.

"Hurry," murmured Griggs. "Jesus, hurry." It took precious minutes for Luther to drag his partner into the crew lock, for the hatch to be closed and the atmosphere repressurized. They didn't wait for the usual air-lock integrity check, pumped the pressure straight up to one atmosphere.

The hatch swung open, and Emma dove through into the equipment lock.

Luther had already removed Nicolai's helmet and was frantically trying to pull him out of the upper torso sh.e.l.l. Working together, they wriggled a struggling Nicolai out of the rest of EVA suit. Emma and Griggs dragged him through the station and into the RSM, where there was full power and light. He was screaming all the way, clawing at the left side of his comm-a.s.sembly cap.

Both eyes were swollen shut, the lids ballooned out. She touched cheeks and felt crepitusa"air trapped in the subcutaneous tissues from the decompression. A line of spittle glistened on his jaw.

"Nicolai, calm down!" said Emma. "You're all right, do you hear me? You'll be all right!" He shrieked and yanked off the comm cap. It went flying away.

"Help me get him onto the board!" said Emma.

It took all hands to set up the medical restraint board, strip off Nicolai's ventilation long johns, and strap him down. They had fully restrained now. Even as Emma checked his heart and lungs and examined his abdomen, he continued to whimper and rock his head from side to side.

"It's his ear," said Luther. He had shed his bulky EVA suit and was staring wide-eyed at the tormented Nicolai. "He said there was something in his ear."

Emma looked closer at Nicolai's face. At the line of spittle that traced from his chin, up the curve of his left jaw. To his ear.

She turned on the battery-powered otoscope and inserted the earpiece into Nicolai's ca.n.a.l.

The first thing she saw was blood. A bright drop of it, glistening in the otoscope's light. Then she focused on the eardrum.

It was perforated. Instead of the gleam of the tympanic membrane, she saw a black and gaping hole. Barotrauma was her first thought. Had the sudden decompression blown out his eardrum?

She checked the other eardrum, but it was intact.

"I'm puzzled," she turned off the otoscope and looked at Luther.

"What happened out there?"

"I don't know. We were both taking a breather. Resting up before we brought the tools back in. One minute he's fine, the minute he's panicking."

"I need to look at his helmet." She left the RSM and headed back to the equipment lock. She swung open the hatch and gazed in, at the two EVA suits, which Luther had remounted on the wall.

"What are you doing, Watson?" said Griggs, who'd followed her.

"I want to see how big the crack was. How fast he was decompressing." She went to the smaller EVA suit, labeled "Rudenko," and removed the helmet. Peering inside, she saw a dab of moisture adhering to the cracked faceplate. She took out a cotton swab from one of her patch pockets and touched the tip to the fluid. It was thick and gelatinous.

Blue-green.

A chill slithered up her spine.

Kenichi was in here, she suddenly remembered. The night he died, we found him in this air lock. He has somehow contaminated it.

At once she was backing out in panic, colliding with Griggs in the hatchway. "Out!" she cried. "Get out now!"

"What is it?"

"I think we've got a biohazard! Close the hatch! Close it!" They both scrambled out of the air lock, into the node.

Together they slammed the hatch shut and sealed it tight. They exchanged tense glances.

"You think anything leaked out?" Griggs said.

Emma scanned the node, searching for any droplets spinning through the air. At first glance she saw nothing. Then a flash of movement, a telltale sparkle, seemed to dance at the furthest periphery of her vision.

She turned to stare at it. And it was gone.

Jack sat at the surgeon's console in Special Vehicle Operations, tension growing with every pa.s.sing minute as he watched the clock on the front screen. The voices coming over his headset were speaking with new urgency, the chatter fast and staccato, as reports flew back and forth between the controllers and ISS flight director Woody Ellis. Similar in layout to the shuttle Flight Room and housed in the same building, the SVO room was a smaller, more specialized version, manned by a team dedicated only to s.p.a.ce station operations. Over the last thirty-six hours, since Discovery had collided with ISS, this room had been the scene of relentlessly mounting anxiety, laced with intermittent panic.

With so many people in the room, so many hours of unrelieved stress, the air itself smelled of crisis, the mingled sweat and stale coffee.

Nicolai Rudenko was suffering from decompression injuries and clearly needed to be evacuated. Because there was only one lifeboata"the Crew Return Vehiclea"the entire crew was coming home. This would be a controlled evacuation. No shortcuts, no mistakes. No panic. NASA had run through this simulation many times before, but a CRV evac had never actually been done, not with five living, breathing human beings aboard.

Not with someone I love aboard.

Jack was sweating, almost sick with dread.

He kept glancing at the clock, cross-checking it with his watch.

They had waited for ISS's...o...b..tal path to reach the right position before vehicle separation could proceed. The goal was to bring the CRV down in the most direct approach possible to a landing site immediately accessible to medical personnel. The entire crew would need a.s.sistance.

After weeks of living in s.p.a.ce, they would be weak as kittens, their muscles unable to support them.

The time for separation was approaching. It would take them twenty-five minutes to coast away from ISS and acquire GPS guidance, fifteen minutes for the deorbit burn setup. An hour to land.

In less than two hours, Emma would be back on earth. One way or another.

The thought came before he could suppress it.

Before he could stop himself from remembering the terrible sight of Jill Hewitt's flayed body on the autopsy table.

He clenched his hands into fists, forcing himself to concentrate on Nicolai Rudenko's biotelemetry readings. The heart rate was fast but regular, blood pressure holding steady. Come on, come on.

Let's bring them home now.

He heard Griggs, on board ISS, report, "Capcom, my crew is all aboard the CRV and the hatch is closed. It's a little cozy in here, we're ready when you are."

"Stand by to power up," said Capcom.

"Standing by."

"How is the patient doing?" Jack's heart gave a leap as he heard Emma's voice join the loop.

"His vitals remain stable, but he's disoriented times three. The crepitus has migrated to his neck and upper torso, and it's given him some discomfort. I've given him another dose of morphine." The sudden decompression had caused air bubbles to form in his soft tissues. The condition was harmless, but painful. What Emma worried about were air bubbles in the nervous system. Could that be the reason Nicolai was confused?

Woody Ellis said, "Go for power up. Remove ECCLES seals."

"ISS," said Capcom, "you are now go fora""

"Belay that!" a voice cut in.

Jack looked at Flight Director Ellis in confusion. Ellis looked just as confused. He turned to face JSC director Ken Blankens.h.i.+p, who'd just walked into the room, accompanied by a dark-haired man in a suit and a half dozen Air Force officers.

"I'm sorry, Woody," said Blankens.h.i.+p. "Believe me, this is not my decision."

"What decision?" said Ellis.

"The evacuation is off."

"We have a sick man up there! The CRV's ready to goa""

"He can't come home."

"Whose decision is that?"

The dark-haired man stepped forward. He said, with what was almost a quiet note of apology, "The decision is mine. I'm Jared Profitt, White House Security Council. Please tell your crew to reopen the hatches and exit the CRV."

"My crew is in trouble," said Ellis. "I'm bringing them home."

Trajectory cut in, "Flight, we have to go to sep now if we want them landing on target."

Ellis nodded to Capcom. "Proceed to CRV power up. Let's go to sep." Before Capcom could utter another word, his headset was yanked off and he was hauled from his chair and pushed aside. An Air Force officer took Capcom's place at the console.

"Hey!" yelled Ellis. "Hey!" All the flight controllers froze as the other Air Force officers immediately fanned out across the room. Not a weapon was drawn, but the threat was apparent.

"ISS, do not power up," said the new Capcom. "The evacuation has been canceled. Reopen the hatches and exit the CRV."

A baffled Griggs responded, "I don't think I copied that, Houston."