North Korea
The snow squall subsided. The night cleared. Starlight revealed a light dusting of snow across the ground, partially blanketing some of the damage left by the shuttle's crash landing.
Ron Scott provided what illumination he could from a flashlight. He had holstered his pistol and was conversing with the elderly civilian who had appeared during the snow squall. The civilian exuded an air of dignity despite his shabby clothes. He had not hesitated to fashion a splint from a tree branch for Scott's broken leg. Nearby, Terri Schmidt was nestled in blankets spread across the ground.
Thanks to the endless practice drills back at Houston, Kate Daniels and Bob Paxton were able to methodically carry out the task of spreading scattered leaf camouflage netting across the shuttle. The tricky part was that although the snow melted instantly upon touching the shuttle, it did make the surface slippery in places. But Kate managed to go about her task more or less by rote.
I will get through this, she told herself. She secured her final strip of netting. It was almost impossible to believe that little more than ninety minutes ago they had been lifting merrily off into the Florida sunshine. It was as if they'd landed on another planet or in another dimension.
She thought about Trev. They fought the last time they'd spoken. They were always either fighting or making love, it seemed. They'd met while serving together in the army during the Panama invasion, and were married a month after her discharge from the service the next year. Things were fine at first. Weren't they always? Then she had two miscarriages in two years, and that's when the wheels started falling off their marriage, she came to understand in retrospect. The Galts had been just a "normal" couple in suburban Maryland. Except that while she was exactly the good little homemaker she appeared to be, Trev was anything but a traveling auditor for the government, as their neighbors believed. People outside their marriage attributed Galt's increased dependence on alcohol to his being assigned a desk job. But she traced it to just after her second miscarriage. They'd discussed adoption but nothing ever came of it, because by that time Trev's slide into emotional withdrawal was well underway. She knew how he felt. He sought escape inside a bottle. Her escape-from her feelings and from a troubled marriage-followed her acceptance into the space program. Trev was the most disciplined man she had ever known and so she was at first surprised, then concerned and ultimately frustrated in Washington with her inability to deal with his lapses into drinking and brooding that alternated with the more common periods of sobriety and an obvious restlessness eating away at him. Trev was a man committed to his work. He was the best there was, which is why he had been promoted in the first place, and so he would never think of walking away from his mission. And so a seemingly unbridgeable gulf had widened between them. They'd been unable to break through to each other, to help each other, no matter how they tried. When the time came for her move to Houston, they'd agreed to call it a separation. That was her idea. The rules were that they could each see other people if they wanted to.
In the forty-five days prior to the launch, training had grown intense as the crew concentrated on training as a unit, going through repeated simulations and familiarizations. Four of this crew had their families housed nearby and, for them, time with their loved ones became more precious as the pace of training increased. Which left Kate and Bob Paxton: a lonesome, separated wife and a blond-haired, handsome MIT physicist. Bob's mission assignment was to operate the shuttle's fifty-foot-long robotic "arm," the machine used to release the payload, and to work on repairing satellites. Initially he was well-mannered, pleasant company. She hadn't slept with him, though not for his lack of trying. Before long, he became persistent, obnoxious, until she'd told Bob flatly that she wasn't interested. Finally he backed off. During their final week of training, the crew was quarantined. Only spouses were given "personal contact" badges that allowed them to visit. That's what her last fight with Trev had been about. He had wanted to fly to Houston to see her off. She told him no, that she didn't want him at the launch. It had seemed so important to her that their separation remain total for the six months they'd agreed upon. She had wanted her problems on the sidelines until after Liberty's flight. Their final conversation. Their last argument. Their last goodbye? Rather than attempt to regain intimacy with her husband, she'd been a fool. Trev, I'm sorry. She mouthed the words soundlessly to the icy night sky.
Bob Paxton completed securing his last piece of netting and dropped from the shuttle's wing down to the ground to stand next to her. They wore jackets over their flight suits. Kate had strapped a.38 revolver at her waist. Lines of uncertainty and apprehension marred Bob's movie star features. The immense, vague shape of the shuttle beneath the camouflage netting loomed above them in the darkness like some giant, indefinable beast from a lingering nightmare.
Bob wore a pistol in a shoulder holster. He followed Kate's gaze to where Ron Scott and the elderly civilian were engaged in discussion. "I wonder, with the commander's leg busted," said Paxton, "if maybe I shouldn't be the one to assume command."
"Forget it, Bob. Ron's doing fine, even with a broken leg. We'll give him all the help he needs or wants. As far as assuming command goes, as copilot I'm second in command."
"Sure, but we're not in flight. Who knows where we are. We're in the middle of nowhere and you're a-" He let the sentence drop, reconsidering.
"A woman?" she finished for him. "Go to hell, Bob. I'm still second in command."
She strode across to join Ron and the civilian. Bob followed.
Ron interrupted his conversation with the man as they approached. "This is Ahn Chong. We're in North Korea, near the Chinese border. We're near his village." Kate knew that Ron had been stationed in Seoul after the Gulf. He spoke Korean.
"Should we go to his village?" she asked. "Will they help us?"
Scott shook his head, negative. "There's too much to explain right now. We've got to move fast. I've had a chance to converse with this man and to size him up. My gut tells me that we should trust him."
Bob nervously chewed his lower lip. "That'll have to do then. Like you said, we don't have much time."
"He tells me that we should avoid the village. Most of the people there are loyal Party members. Ahn Chong has no love for the Communists. He blames them for the death of his wife. All that matters right now is that he wants us to go with him, says he knows a place where we can hide out. That's where we're going. That landing field we flew over… they'll already be looking for us."
"Bob and I can transport Terri," Kate offered. "What about your leg, Commander?"
"I'll lean on Chong if I have to."
Bob studied Ahn Chong with open skepticism. "He could lead us right to their front gate. Can we really trust the old coot?"
"There's one way to find out," Scott said. "Let's go."
His words had barely been spoken when a faint, strange sound became discernible in the near distance, somewhat distorted by the surrounding mountains. The sound became discernible very quickly, however: the tell-tale whup! whup! whup! of a helicopter, approaching at a high rate of speed from the direction of the airfield.
Beijing, China
Beyond the large bay window on the top floor of the Great Hall of the People, a dull gray dawn crept over the one hundred square acres of Tiananmen Square. Water from last night's rain, in scattered pools across the flagstone, reflected the gloomy light and the ornate incandescent street lamps like mirrors of steel beneath a low, foreboding sky. Orderly throngs of bicyclists and pedestrians hurried about their morning business, overseen by the towering portrait of Mao Tse-tung mounted above the Forbidden City's Gate of Heavenly Harmony.
In the Politburo conference room, two middle-aged men sat at a large table, summoned to a hastily-called emergency meeting. They wore identical green uniforms that bore no insignia of rank. All insignia had been abolished from The People's Liberation Army in 1965, except for a single red star on the cap. Each man's cap was before him on the highly polished table. Opposite the bay window was a wall-to-wall mural of a young, dynamic Chairman Mao leading a column of youthful soldiers on the Long March, pointing the way against a backdrop of snow-capped mountains.
An adjoining door to the office of the chairman of the Central Committee opened and Huang Peng, the defense minister, entered the conference room. In his seventies, Huang was thin-boned with a shock of white hair above a narrow face. He was the second ranking member of the Politburo, responsible only to the chairman himself. The other two stood and did not sit until Huang took his seat at the head of the table.
Huang spoke abruptly. "You are aware of the space shuttle Liberty launched today by the Americans. We have received word that the Americans have lost the shuttle from their radar. One hour ago, they received an emergency distress call before losing contact again for a final time. The transmission has been traced to a sector along our border with North Korea, in the region of Mount Paekdu."
General Chou, a ranking member of the Military Affairs Commission, was the exact physical opposite of Huang. Chou was heavyset and corpulent, with the eyes of a ferret. "Could this be a trick? An intelligence probe by the Americans to test and analyze our response?"
"There is that possibility," Huang acknowledged. Like them, he was a chain-smoker. The room was hazy with cigarette fumes. "If it is a trick, it is an audacious one. The Americans have officially notified us. Thus far none of this has been made public, but of course it will only be a matter of hours before the world learns of it."
Li Juntao, seated to Huang's left, was the third ranking member of the Politburo, which made him the army chief of staff. His compact, stocky form was all muscle. "The Americans have requested our cooperation?" He spoke with a heavy Cantonese dialect.
"They have demanded it."
Chou bristled. "They are in no position to demand anything. Our refusal would force them to act. Their only response would be to lose face or mount an incursion. They dare not risk a military confrontation with China."
Huang placed a fresh cigarette in an ebony holder. He touched the cigarette with flame from a lighter and replied through a plume of exhaled smoke. "The chairman and I are of the opinion that they would take such a risk, if they were certain that their shuttle did go down within our borders."
"What if the shuttle went down inside North Korea?" Li asked.
"We have contacted Pyongyang, as did the Americans. They claim to know nothing of it. But frankly, comrades, what the Koreans say is immaterial. It does not matter whether the shuttle went down in China or in North Korea. What need only concern us at this time is that a thorough search be initiated at once, and that every effort be expended to locate and secure the shuttle and the American defense satellite onboard, or its remains. There is the possibility that the pilot may have succeeded in setting the spacecraft down relatively intact. As you are aware, our space program is primitive in comparison to the West. We would find much aboard Liberty that would be extremely useful to China, equipment and information that the Americans would otherwise hardly be inclined to share with us."
"If the shuttle went down within our territory," Li began, "why hasn't our radar-"
"The shuttle was equipped with technology to evade radar."
Li frowned. "I served in Shenyang Province, the region of which we speak. There is extremely rugged terrain on both sides of that border. Finding the shuttle, if it is there, will not be easy."
"No one has suggested that it would be." Huang spoke curtly. "I am aware that you are familiar with that area, General. Therefore you will report at once to our regional headquarters at Shenyang. This matter will receive top priority and classification at every level."
La blinked his surprise. "Comrade?"
"You will meet with the regional commander to initiate a full-scale search and salvage operation without delay, mountain by mountain, valley by valley, if necessary." Huang paused for emphasis. "You will search along both sides of the border."
Li's frown deepened. "That would constitute a Chinese invasion of North Korea."
"The peasant filth who rule from Pyongyang will not acknowledge it as such, especially if they do know where the shuttle is located. They are the ones who will not risk a confrontation with us. North Korea's military is formidable, but their government is bankrupt. They would not exist as a nation had we not come to their aid during their war with the Americans. Yet they were so quick to turn from us for armament and money when the Soviet Union was strong and we were not. Now they would come crawling back to us. No, we need not concern ourselves with those bastard sons of mother China."
"The Americans then," said Li. "They will do anything to get their astronauts back, dead or alive. You're right, Comrade Defense Minister. The Americans will invade China or North Korea, if we force their hand."
Huang smiled tersely. "Let the Chairman and myself concern ourselves with that, comrade. Who is to say, perhaps you find only wreckage and human remains with nothing salvageable. If that proves to be the case, China will gladly return the useless remains to America as a gesture of humanitarian goodwill. But first it is imperative that we find the Liberty."
"We will not be able to stall the Americans for long," Chou said.
Huang nodded. "That is why time and thoroughness are of the essence. General Li, the shuttle or its wreckage must be found."
Li rose from his chair. "I leave immediately for Shenyang. I will locate the shuttle. Nothing will stop me. But I do have one question, comrades. What if there are survivors?"
"That would be highly unlikely," said Huang. "But if that is the case, you will advise us and the situation will be dealt with."
"In what way, may I ask?"
"That need not concern you at this time, Comrade General. Every possible contingency is being considered. Go now. The stakes are high and there is no time to lose."