Chapter 44: Flying High

“Do you have it all figured out?” Jeryl asked as she peered over my shoulder at the wire-frame model of PTO-1, our orbital lab.

“I think so,” I said as I pointed at the screen. “We’ll have to shift some modules, but the re-configuration will give us a lot more long-term growth options.”

Right now, we had four types of modules in orbit. One was a junction module, a six-meter rounded cube that had a docking ring, standard power and environmental connectors and a pressure door on each of its six faces. They were the joints in our overall design.

We then had a power module that housed a fusion reactor as well as stanchions for back up solar panels. One of the tricky issues with using fusion for our power needs was that we still needed large shaded areas to radiate excess heat to space. The back-up solar array provided that shade while also generating electricity. The engineering module, as we called it also held our other environmental systems to provide CO2 scrubbing, waste recycling, and other habitation systems. We had settled on a standard size of modules as tubes, five meters in diameter and twenty-five meters long. We repeated the standard docking configuration at each end, allowing us to create longer tubes without a junction module if needed.

The other two modules currently in orbit followed the same size and shape, but one was specialized for research lab space, and the other was our new habitability module. It provided a little better living accommodations for the crew. Until we had launched the hab module during the last season of the Interns, our lab staff had been using a converted lab module as living space as well. We had kept the crew to two people except when an orbiter was visiting.

The original configuration that we had orbited consisted of two engineering modules, attached together, with a junction module at one end. Two lab modules had formed a T-shape from the junction module. When our new habitat went up, we had attached it to the junction module, creating a three-armed cross at the top of the engineering stack. This was fine for testing, but we wanted to provide for better separation of habitat and lab space now that other firms and countries were looking to purchase or lease space from us.

“We’ll keep the engineering modules connected with the junction module at the ‘top’,” I said as I pointed at the diagram. “We’ll take two new junction modules up and attach them where the lab modules are now.” I clicked a button on the screen and showed the two modules pulling back as new junction cubes slid into place.

“The labs will connect to one of the new junctions, I’m calling it ‘charlie’, and the two hab modules will be connected to the other, called ‘beta’.” The diagram now resembled an ‘H’ with the engineering modules sticking out perpendicular to the cross member made from the three junction modules. “We’ll be able to add up to three more hab or lab modules to beta or charlie, and still have three docks available on the alpha junction module.”

“Five hab modules? That’s room for up to forty people on the station at once! Can the two engineering modules support them?”

“Easily. Consumables will be the limiting factor, but we’ve got pretty reliable provisioning now that the third orbiter is in the rotation. Of course, I won’t staff to that level until we get the emergency capsules certified and attached at the end of each module. We need to make sure the crew can get down if there is some sort of catastrophic issue up there.”

Jeryl nodded. “So, when do we do this re-configuration?” she asked with a little smile.

I flipped to another document on the computer. “We’re sending the new junction modules up next week and bringing down the lab module that was serving as crew space. That mission will establish the initial re-configuration. Then the following week, we’ll take up the second hab module. You and I will be the only station staff for two days until the second, new lab module comes up.”

Jeryl gave me a quick hug. “And then we really will do it high above, and all around the world,” she said with a kiss.

I smiled and shook my head.

“Do you need me to come back?” Billy asked over the video link. She was in New York after her trip to interview and work with the BBC news staff.

“No, why?” I asked. Her call had been insistent, but I was more than a little confused by it.

“The news.”

“What news?”

“The Wall Street Journal is running a story today on the balanced budget proposal being a result of you requiring gold for generators.”

“Wow, that happened a lot faster than I imagined. Have you read the story?”

She nodded.

“Is it fair and balanced?”

“As far as I know. It paints it as a good thing for the country in the long term, but possibly disruptive for the market in the short term.”

I nodded. “Okay. Stay out there with what you’re doing. I’ll avoid the press, and let you know if I need you back. Are you learning much?”

“Yes,” she said with real excitement in her voice. “I’ve got so many ideas and things to sort out. This is going to be a bigger project than I first thought. The editorial staff is going to have to be distributed as well as the writing staff. There is no way a central editor is going to be able to oversee fifty groups of branch reporters. We might need to have an editor per state, with a couple of reporters rolling up to them. It’s one model I’m thinking about.”

“Okay, that sounds interesting. Don’t fixate on one solution too soon. Keep that as an option, and come up with a couple of other approaches as well.”

Billy nodded. “I’ll do that. So, no comment I can share while I’m here for other reasons?”

I smiled. “Officially, no comment. If the Journal has questions, you can broker an interview. How’s that sound?”

She grinned. “I’ll handle it, boss. One other thing, I’m getting a lot of questions about when you’ll be filing for an IPO. Any comments I should be aware of?

“No plans at this time,” I answered.

“Gotcha.”

I ended the call and immediately my phone rang. It was Kelly.

“Hi, Sis,” I said as I picked up the handset and headed out of my home office to the patio. It was not yet officially fall, but was cooling off nicely. I sat on one of the chairs enjoying the morning light. Jeryl was spending the morning getting the kids ready for school and had insisted on taking them in after being away for two weeks. I had intended on having a couple of calls with Hunter and the team in Ireland before heading into the office.

“I thought you were keeping this quiet until the holidays,” she said, ignoring my pleasant greeting.

“I was. Billy just told me about the story in the Journal. I don’t know their source, but suspect it was a politically motivated leak.”

She shook her head. “I don’t think it was my party. I just got three calls as soon as the papers hit certain steps. They were all pretty pissed off at my dear brother for spilling the story before they had their sound-bites ready. I’ve got three news vans outside already.”

“Interesting. If it wasn’t the Dems, it must have been the Republicans. Why would they want to dilute the credit for a balanced budget?”

“You’re assuming it was orchestrated. It could have been some staffer currying favor with the press.”

I nodded. It was possible. “So why are they camping on your doorstep? No one had reached out to Billy or our PR department yet. It’s the politics they want comments on.”

It was Kelly’s turn to pause. “The Clinton campaign is going to make an announcement today. This story is likely to make whatever they were going to say be second page news.”

“Which helps both the Republicans and some Democrats.”

“And puts me in front of the cameras before Bill is,” Kelly admitted.

“Did your staff make the leak?” I asked. I was a little amused by the thought.

“No, God dammit! I’ve talked to one person since you and I spoke last, and that was just a hypothetical conversation.”

“Who called you this morning?”

“The minority leader of the house, the minority whip, and Al Gore.”

“So, the entire Democratic leadership called you as soon as the story hit the streets? What did they say?”

Kelly was quiet for a moment. “Gore told me to keep quiet until they sorted positions out. Gephardt asked how I thought we should spin the story. Wendell suggested I get in front of it and put a positive light on the change being forced on the country. He had a lot of background on how your early work helped Detroit and made American manufacturing return to the forefront of the world.”

“Sounds like he had put a lot of thought into it. It’s almost as if he was well prepped to talk to you once the story broke.”

Kelly took a sharp breath.

“Why would the senior senator from Kentucky be pushing me forward to become a voice within the party? He has always said he was less focused on national issues than Kentucky issues.”

“And yet he is the second most powerful Democrat in the Senate. He knows how to play the game.”

“I never thought of it that way,” Kelly admitted.

“So, some faction of your party wants you to either defy the leadership by going against Al Gore’s directive, or they want you to set a path for the party by going straight to the public.”

“Or they want me to fall on my sword by trying to do both. Shit!”

“What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know.”

“Can I help?”

The line was silent for nearly a minute.

“Is the article accurate?”

I laughed. “I haven’t even seen it, actually.”

I could imagine Kelly shaking her head at me.

“Okay. The part I’m most interested in is the statement that foreign governments approached you with the offer that ultimately resulted in you changing your policy. Is that much true?”

“You know it is.”

“So, it is an economic attack instigated by foreign powers,” she concluded.

“No. The idea originated in Australia. I told you that.”

“I don’t think you did. It doesn’t matter anyway. I was thinking through the line the Republicans would have taken if they were having it forced on them. It would be a rallying cry not to give in to foreign influences.”

“How is a balanced budget economic war?” I asked.

“It’s not. It a defensive move to an economic attack on the dollar.”

“By Australia?”

“By the world. It’s a result of our foreign policy being out-of-synch with the world economy. We’ve been pretty heavy handed for the past couple of decades, using economic means to bring about the downfall of the Soviet Union, forcing the petro-dollar on the world economy, stacking the rules of the IMF.”

Her rhetoric was a little troubling to me.

“Where is this going, Kelly?”

“I’m getting context. If this is an attempt to make me irrelevant to my party, I need arguments on why it matters. If it is an attempt to make me set a direction, I need to position a balanced budget as being smart in the context of the world stage. A balanced budget is smart fiscal policy. That’s a given which politicians like to forget. I need to make the trimming of social programs palatable to the entitled class that forms the base of my party. In World War II, people made sacrifice for the greater good. The Republicans are going to resist cutting the military budget. I can counter that with a ‘good of the country’ approach, that balancing the budget is the best defense against a new type of conflict.”

I kept my fears to myself as she spoke. I could imagine her pacing in her home office as I watched the sun crest the peaks east of our house.

“I can work with this, Paul. It might be messy, but I can work with it.”

“To what end?”

“I think to putting me in contention to be on the ticket next fall.”

“How is the mission going?” Jeryl asked as we sat in her office having sandwiches.

“Good. It looks like they have the old hab-lab on the orbiter and have finished the initial reconfiguration. Tom and his lab assistant are the caretakers this week until you and I take up the new hab module on next Wednesday.”

“Alison will be back from D.C. on Monday night. You and I will fly out for Kenya Tuesday morning after getting the kids off to school. Who else will be going up with us?”

“Terry and Sam are the flight crew, along with Hunter sitting in the engineer’s seat. Tamara and Allen will be crew to assist with the initial connection and check-out. Delilah Simpson will be going along as our remote expert. She’s actually done most of the reconfiguration work for us.”

“I think I met her during my training.”

“It’s possible. She is working on cross-training for the engineer’s seat as well. This trip, she’s going to monitor and coach Allen. We need to get some other people experienced in using the robotic arm and RPV pushers.”

“RPV?” she asked.

“Remotely Piloted Vehicles. They are little spaceships we attach to the modules to maneuver them into position when the arm is not a good solution. It’s still early stages, but we are thinking about using them for some challenges with the space cadets.”

Jeryl laughed and made a scolding motion at me. “If you ever call them that on air, they will be ‘Space Cadets’ forever. We will never be able to call them anything else again.”

I winked at her. “It’s easier than calling them orbital apprentices.”

“Well, remember that they’ll have a lot more hours than either of us in six months. Who will be the ‘space cadet’ then?”

I smiled.

“We had an interesting call this morning,” I said. “Lockheed wants their own lab module.”

“Really? What sort of terms are you looking at?”

Straight to business, as always. “It’s a little premature, but we’re looking at a cost-plus model for fabrication of the module, and then regular commercial terms for launch, habitation and re-supply.”

Jeryl thought for a moment. “I think we should reevaluate what we are considering standard for habitation and re-supply. We need to depreciate out the hab module costs, as well as the lifting capacity for the resupply missions. While it’s just been our people, we’ve been keeping the line items separate for tracking, but not really calculating charge-backs to research for them.”

I nodded. “What are you thinking? A day-rate?”

She nodded. “Keep the launch costs of their people separate, but allocate a portion of the depreciation to them. What’s our module lifespan?”

“We’re assuming seven years before we replace or refurbish them.”

Jeryl grabbed her laptop computer and typed for several minutes.

“Shit, that’s nearly two-hundred thousand per person per month, just to cover the habitat module costs.”

I nodded. “We think we can lower the manufacturing costs, but that sounds about right for now.”

“But Paul, that’s assuming 100% occupancy of the eight sleeping berths in each module. We aren’t even planning to keep them that occupied, so the money needed to cover our cost is higher.”

“For now. I think we can drop the manufacturing costs by 20% by the time we are building our fifth hab module. Also, once we have a baseline on the maintenance and wear, we should know if we can extend the service life before refurbishing. Even if we only get seven years from them, the refurbish costs should be roughly forty percent of the original cost, or less. That brings living volume costs below seventy-five thousand a month.”

Jeryl typed some more.

“So, in a new module, we’re looking at a three-night stay costing around twenty thousand dollars.”

I nodded, assuming her math was correct. “That sounds about right.”

“Paul, at those prices, we can sell tourist capacity. We’ve already started getting enquiries from the millionaire club. Without having a product to sell, we’ve had offers of nearly a million dollars for a three-night stay on orbit.”

“You’d have to look at the total number; training, orbiter costs, hab module costs, consumables, insurance. I’m thinking a million sounds about right.”

“Do you think I should talk to Hilton or Marriott? I think there are enough millionaires to make a market, so long as we already have power and infrastructure on the station. Even selling some of the open berths when we aren’t using them might be beneficial.”

“How, besides making money?” I asked. Our power sales were already ‘printing money’ for all intents and purposes.

“Good will, for one thing. It also makes it cheaper for others who want to buy longer-term research stays in orbit by offsetting some of the manufacturing costs.”

I nodded. That made sense. “But how are you going to feel about selling a luxury commodity at those sorts of prices? I mean, we have our true cost per kilo to orbit below a hundred dollars. Wouldn’t we be better off sending an orbiter of tourists up for a day at a time?”

Jeryl got thoughtful. “Let me look at a few possible scenarios and then we can see what we think the tourism business might become. We aren’t going to have spare capacity for a little while, but once the orbital apprentices are done, we could have several berths a month open. I’ll work them up and we can talk later.”

I smiled and leaned over to give her a kiss.

Four days later, we were in Kenya after a brief refueling stop in Ireland. Hunter joined us for the next leg of the flight.

“Quite a bit warmer here,” Jeryl commented as we debarked from the GS-3. Fall had definitely arrived in Park City with lovely, cool nights. The temperature and humidity at the Kenya facility were both much higher.

“Don’t get too used to it,” Tamara teased. “We’re only going to be here for a few hours before we’re on the orbiter and away.”

“Are you excited to go back up?” Jeryl asked as Allen and I followed them down the steps.

“Absolutely. I was afraid Paul was only going to let me go up a couple of times. This will be my third trip to the station.”

“One more trip to orbit, and you’ll be a ‘Space Ace’,” I teased.

“Don’t I have to shoot someone down to be an ‘ace’?” Tamara asked.

“One of the pilots, maybe Terry, coined the term. Make five trips to orbit instead of shooting someone down. Evidently, they have a little rivalry with NASA now. Only a couple of their astronauts have that many orbital missions. Our folks like rubbing their nose in it,” I said. “In a subtle, professional way, of course,” I added with a laugh.

“Well in that case, I can hardly wait to be a Space Ace,” Allen said. “I’ve had some dealings with NASA as we’ve done mission planning. Some of them can be royal pains in meetings.”

“We should discuss that after this mission. They are gearing up for some additional missions of their own. We’ll take over the ISS resupply missions starting in January. They also are designing some new modules that they want us to lift for them.”

“Why don’t they just adopt our standard configuration?” Allen asked.

“Good question. Like I said, we’ll need to discuss it in a couple of weeks. For now, let’s stay focused on this trip.”

“Right,” Jeryl said. “I’m supercargo. You guys all have real jobs to do.”

“Oh, you have a real job, too,” I said with a smile. “You need to apply that critical eye of yours to our procedures and then once we are configured, you’re the one doing the habitability checklists to ensure we are ready for occupants.”

“But I haven’t been checked out on the systems or procedures.”

“Exactly. You have no preconceived notions. You own the checklists, and I and the others will perform the steps.”

Jeryl smiled. “I can do that.” It was just like prepping my race car all those years ago.

We all dropped our stuff in the accommodation shelters and then joined the staff and crew in the dining area for a light dinner. It was good to renew acquaintances and meet some of the new staff, but we called an early night and retired to be fresh for our 3:00 AM wake-up calls to support the 9:00 AM launch. That would be 0600 GMT, which was the clock we operated on in orbit, and midnight in Park City, where we had woken up. We needed our sleep.

A few hours later, we were up and prepping for our flight. As supercargo for the actual flight, Jeryl, Tamara, and I had relatively little to do. Allen was shadowing Delilah, checking out the diagnostics on the robotic arm and verifying proper storage and fuel state on the four RPVs on the mission.

“Time for final bladder checks,” Tamara teased an hour before the launch. In the next thirty minutes, we would take our place in the acceleration couches. On earlier flights, we had full biological support, i.e. urine pouches, adult diapers and pressure suits. In the past six months, we had relaxed to simple flight suits, but would still be strapped in for launch. Besides, we were still pulling over four-gees, and it was just common sense to go to the bathroom before such a trip.

We made use of the facilities and then climbed into the orbiter. We had changed the configuration quite a bit for crewed launches. The PT-O unmanned orbiters still had a vertical take-off, horizontal landing configuration, but we had finally settled on the HT-HL model for manned flights. The sleek merger of a lifting body and delta-wing with engines embedded in the lower portion of the wing looked ungainly on the ground, but was a thing of beauty in the sky.

“Let’s get everyone strapped in,” Terry said as he welcomed us aboard. The flight crew was already in the cockpit performing pre-flight checks.

We moved to the mid-deck, below the cockpit. It was configured for up to eight passengers, though we only needed four seats for this trip. Everyone stowed their mesh bag of personal items under the seats and then strapped themselves in before donning the light-weight communication caps with the voice activated throat mics. I could hear the flight crew going over their checks in my left ear. I checked my channel by flipping a thumb switch on the armrest. After hearing the light chime in my right ear, I spoke.

“Passenger comm-check, this is Paul,” I said softly.

“Loud and clear, Paul,” Delilah said. While she was on the flight deck, she had no pre-flight duties and was tasked with making sure the passengers were checked in. Allen, as her understudy on the flight was performing the in-cabin checks and reporting to her on a separate channel.

It took us less than ten minutes to get settled. Delilah came down once Allen was strapped in and had checked his comms, then double checked everything else.

“Good job, Allen,” she said once she was done. “I’ll see you up top once we are in orbit.”

“Roger,” Allen said.

Then we waited.

“We should add windows,” Jeryl said.

“Maybe the next version,” I replied. “We’re already working on designing a new version.”

“If we want to enable tourism, we’ll need a view,” Jeryl quipped.

“How about a full-on tourist module in the cargo bay?” I asked.

“But they couldn’t see out during launch or landing then,” she said.

I nodded. Right now, we had clamshell doors to protect the cargo bay, similar to how the shuttle had operated.

“We’ve got some options. The doors are only needed if we have to protect the cargo bay. I’m thinking we could pull them off and make the tourism module fit precisely and have it structurally able to withstand re-entry forces.”

“I’d like to take a look at what you’re thinking,” Jeryl said.

“Of course.”

“Golf Sierra Niner, you are cleared for taxi and take-off,” I heard in my left ear. “Winds are from zero seven eight at two. Airspace is clear.”

“Golf Sierra Niner, roger, over,” Terry replied.

There was a little lurch as the brakes came off, and we began to roll away from the hangar. While we did not have windows, in some regards we had better visibility thanks to the video monitors showing us the cockpit view plus the outside feeds the control team was using.

We watched in silence as we taxied to the end of the runway and turned toward the sunrise. Terry did not stop once the turn was complete, but advanced his throttles smoothly and we surged down the tarmac and practically leapt into the sky. Modest gee forces pushed us back against our seats as we continued to accelerate.

Minutes later, we were over the coast and still climbing.

“Control, this is Golf Sierra Niner, we are at angels three-zero-kay. All systems green. Requesting clearance for orbit, over.”

“Golf Sierra Niner, this is control. You are cleared for orbit, over.”

In my right ear, I heard a chime as the pilot toggled to the all-ship channel. “We are cleared for orbit. Standby for acceleration.”

I smiled at the phrase. We were already accelerating, but I knew what he meant and why he announced it. I could feel the power to the engines increase as we accelerated and began to nose up. The pressure on our bodies climbed until we were experiencing a little more than four times the force of gravity.

The original PT-O orbiters could get to orbit in just under two minutes, at roughly nine-gees acceleration. We took a slower approach at four-gees, but our ride to low earth orbit was still only a little more than three minutes.

I watched the monitor with one view pointing aft from our wing-tip as the earth receded below us. I knew the procedures we were following, but the sudden loss of acceleration and floating sensation of being in orbit was still a little surprising.

“Engine cut-off,” Terry announced needlessly. “Control, this is Golf Sierra Niner. In orbit at angels six zero zero kay. Orbital checks in progress before proceeding to station, over.”

“Golf Sierra Niner, this is control. Copy and concur, over.”

Our orbital safety checks took less than ten minutes. We then accelerated again until we were on an intercept orbit for the station. Roughly an hour after launch, we were closing on the station and fully engaged in the procedure to attach the new hab module.

Three hours after we started, the module was attached and we were docked.

“Good job, everyone,” I said as we moved into the junction module and looked around the station. It seemed strange to not be greeted by anyone. The regular crew had left with the old hab-lab module last week. A caretaker crew had been monitoring the station from the ground.

“Tamara and Allen, you have the regular station checks,” Delilah said as she handed Allen the plastic-coated check-list.

“Paul and I have the hab modules,” Jeryl said as she floated toward me. “We’ll start with hab-one. Hab-two is off limits until we check it,” she finished.

It was the plan. We would make sure we were fully familiar with the check list by running through it on the module that had been in orbit for nearly two months before moving to the newly attached accommodations.

It took three hours to finish the first module checkout. Partly because we wanted to make sure it was right, and partly because we found ourselves making notes on how to improve the module. It was the first time either of us had been in it without the benefit of gravity.

“Wow,” Tamara said as she saw the pages of notes we had taken. “It looks like someone will have a lot of work to do before the next module is made.”

I smiled. “We’ll compare them to the notes from the last intern team that came up with the module. I’m sure there are a lot of duplicates. It’s always good to have fresh eyes on things like this as well, however.”

Allen laughed. “You really do the same things you tell the interns to do, don’t you?”

Jeryl smiled. “It’s worked so far.”

We ate quickly, using the hab-one galley area and then were back to work checking hab-two as the rest of the crew finished the housekeeping chores.

“At what point does having a galley and exercise gear in each module become too redundant?” Jeryl asked as we finished our check on hab-two.

Our configuration had a common galley and food storage, as well as mounted exercise bike and treadmill in the center of the module with four individual berthing areas on each side of it. The eight occupants of the module would each have a private sleeping area with storage. A sanitary facility, with a zero-gee shower and toilet was at one end. The second end had additional storage for supplies and emergency support items.

“I like the redundancy. Right now, if there is a station wide problem, we can support everyone in the unaffected hab modules. Just like we have solar back-up for the fusion plant, each hab module is a back-up for food and support. Maybe our second station will be different, but for now, I’d prefer to keep the redundancies we have.

Jeryl nodded.

“Then I think we need to start designing that station. We’re going to learn a lot over the next year with this one. Design time is the right time to apply what we learn, not during the next build phase.”

“I agree,” I said as I tucked the checklist into its holder by the galley station.

I spun slowly toward her and reached out to pull her in for a hug. She smiled and gave me a kiss before pushing away and floating toward the opposite bulkhead.

“None of that until we’re alone,” she said with a teasing tone. “Unless you think the zero-gee shower needs to be checked again from the inside?”

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