There was no communications equipment as such in the Spacelab. But during medical tests, crew members had been wired not only into the recording instruments onboard Discovery but also to a communications feed that relayed the results directly to physicians at mission control. Settling herself in the chair, Megan strapped down her ankles and one wrist. With her free hand, she plugged a microphone jack into the communications unit on her suit. As far as she knew, the feed sent back digital, not voice, data back to mission control. But then again, no one had ever told her that voice communication was impossible.
Just let someone on the other end hear me, she prayed, and activated the sled’s instrument panel.
__________
“RAID One to Looking Glass, come in.”
The voice of the pilot in the lead Commanche crackled in Smith’s headset. A second later, he heard the Groome Lake tower’s response.
“RAID One, this is Looking Glass. You are in restricted air space. Immediate authorization is requested.”
“Authorization is Brass Hat,” the pilot replied calmly. “Repeat, Brass Hat.”
Brass Hat was the Secret Service code name for the president.
“RAID flight, this is Looking Glass,” the controller replied. “We have positive ID on you. You are cleared to land on runway R twenty-seven, L left.”
“R twenty-seven L left, roger,” the pilot said. “Touchdown in two minutes.”
“Where’s the shuttle?” Smith asked.
The pilot keyed into the NASA frequency. “Thirteen minutes out.”
__________
At mission control, Harry Landon was tracking the shuttle’s progress through the atmosphere on a giant plotting board, where she appeared as a gently descending red dot. In a few minutes, low altitude satellites would be able to transmit pictures. As Discovery got closer, air force reconnaissance planes would roll their cameras.
“Landon?”
Landon glanced up at the commo tech. “What is it?”
“I’m not sure, sir,” the tech replied, obviously confused. He handed Landon a printout. “This just came in.”
Landon glanced at the sheet. “It’s the medical feed from the sled chair.” He shook his head. “It must be a malfunction. Reed is on the flight deck. For the feed to be accurate would mean that someone else is in the sled chair.”
“Yes, sir,” the tech agreed. He didn’t have to be reminded that that someone would have to be alive. “But look at this. The chair’s instruments are on. The heart monitor shows signs of activity— very faint, but activity nonetheless.”
Landon slipped his reading glasses down his nose. The tech was right: the heart monitor was registering a living organism.
“What the hell?”
“Listen to this, sir,” the tech said. “It’s the last few minutes of commo tape. We kept it rolling even though…”
Landon grabbed the headphones. “Play it for me!”
Since the beginning of the emergency, Landon had listened to so many hours of transmission that he could tune out the hiss and crackle that filled his ears. Behind the static he heard something, barely discernible but distinctly human… a voice calling from the ethers.
“This is… Discovery… Spacelab… am alive… Repeat, alive… Help me…”
__________
Jack Riley and his RAID team began jumping out even before the Commanches’ rotors wound down. Smith glanced at the enormous hangars lined up like prehistoric turtles, their roofs painted dull brown to blend in with the desolate landscape. To the south and west were mountain ranges; to the northeast, nothing but desert. Even through the din of men and machinery, there was an eerie stillness to the base.
The team arranged their equipment in a flatbed truck that had pulled up, then jumped aboard for the short ride. Smith and Riley followed in the Humvee.
The hangar’s interior was partitioned to allow the team privacy— and, Smith suspected, to prevent them from seeing what else was stored there. As Riley had promised, a commo console was up and running, manned by a young female officer.
“Colonel,” she said. “You have flash traffic from Bluebird.”
Smith was adjusting his headset when Klein came on. “What’s your status, Jon?”
“We’re getting into our Level Four suits right now. How about the shuttle?”
“It’ll be in the chamber by the time you get there.”
“Bauer?”
“Doesn’t suspect a thing. He’s already suited up and ready to mate the cocoon with the shuttle.”
Smith had seen the blueprints and photos of Bauer’s creation, but he had never been inside it.
“Jon, there’s something you need to know— and hear,” Klein said. “A few minutes ago, Landon received communications from inside the Spacelab. It was a distress signal. We’re running tests right now. I don’t want to raise your hopes, but the voice sounded like Megan’s.”
Sheer joy surged through Smith. Yet at the same time, he was aware of the possibly deadly consequences of this development.
“Has Landon told Reed about this?”
“Not that I know of. Communications are still down. But I should have told Landon to keep quiet in case contact was reestablished. Wait one.”
Smith tried to rein in his clashing emotions. The idea that Megan was alive brought him hope. At the same time, if Reed somehow discovered this, he would still have a chance to kill her before he left the shuttle.
“Jon? It’s all right. Landon says the link is still down. I confused the hell out of him by ordering him not to talk in case it comes back up, but I have his word that he won’t tell Reed a thing.”
“Anything on those voice tests?” Smith demanded.
“So far they’re inconclusive.”
“Can you play me the tape?”
“It’s pretty scratched up.”
Smith closed his eyes and listened. After a few moments, he said, “That’s her, sir. Megan’s alive.”
___________________
CHAPTER
THIRTY ONE
___________________
“Looking Glass, this is Eyeball. Do you copy?”
“Eyeball, we read you five by five. What do you see?”
“Discovery has just broken cloud cover. Trim is good. Angle of descent good. Speed good. She looks to make a pinpoint landing.”
“Roger that, Eyeball. Maintain surveillance. Looking Glass out.”
The exchange between Eyeball, the lead air force chase plane that would escort the shuttle, and the control tower at Groome Lake was listened to intently by a number of people.
In the observation bunker, the president glanced briefly around the room. All eyes were on the monitors that showed Discovery cutting through the air. On another screen he saw Dr. Karl Bauer about to leave the decontamination area, called the prep room. The president took a deep breath. Soon… very soon.
Wearing a Level Four biohazard suit, Bauer entered the short corridor between the prep room and the massive, vaultlike door that would allow him to enter the cocoon. Reaching it, he glanced up at the wall-mounted camera and nodded. Slowly the door began to open, revealing a cavity cut into the concrete wall. One end of the cocoon was attached to the wall of the cavity, the edges sealed to the concrete. Bauer stepped into the cocoon and immediately the door began to close.
Ahead, he saw a long, blue-lighted tunnel. When the door was firmly closed and locked, he walked along a rubber-padded runway. The walls of the cocoon were constructed of heavy gauge, semitransparent plastic. Looking through them, Bauer could see the vague outlines of the vast holding area, lit up by giant floodlights. As he moved toward the cocoon’s decontamination chamber, he heard a low rumble. More light poured into the bunker as the runway ramp was lowered.
“This is Bauer,” he said into his headset. “Do you copy?”
“We read you, sir,” a tech in the observation bunker replied.
“Has the shuttle landed?”
“It’s almost on the ground, sir.”
“Good,” Bauer replied, and continued walking to the cocoon’s decontamination chamber.
On the other side of the base, Smith was listening in on this exchange. He turned to Jack Riley. “Let’s mount up.”
The team scrambled into two double deuces with canvas covers. Smith would have preferred to use the more nimble and speedy Humvees instead of the trucks, but given the team’s bulky biohazard suits, space was a problem.
The hangar doors opened and the small convoy, with Riley in the lead Humvee, pulled out into the desert night. Rocking back and forth on a bench in the back of the truck, Smith tried to keep a small, Palm Pilot-type monitor as steady as he could. The shuttle was just three thousand feet above the desert floor. Its nose was angled up slightly and the landing gear was locked down. As hard as he tried, Smith couldn’t keep his thoughts away from Megan. He knew that his first instinct would be to rush into the orbiter and search for her. But doing so would only jeopardize her life. He had to get to Reed first and neutralize him. Only then could he go after her.
Smith recalled Klein’s objections when he had told him what he intended to do. The head of Covert-One shared Smith’s concern for Megan, but he also knew the danger that Smith would be exposing himself to.