Giddeon (Silver Strand Series) (23 page)

There wasn’t much time before the optimum week that was the launch window.

The Earth moves around the sun at a speed of 18 miles a second, so if the window passed, it would add incredible amounts of distance every hour to the path a vehicle would have to take in order to reach the asteroid.
 

Ray’s engineers worked non-stop on their landing craft, and had the dispersal systems, power sources and communications equipment all configured.
 
The thing they had the most trouble working out was how to attach the Lander to the rock.
 

The gravity would be almost non-existent, there, so that couldn’t be relied upon.
 
There was no way to drill into the rock and anchor to the body… that could be accomplished… due to weight restrictions for the Lander.
 
The same with magnetism.
 
Electromagnets would require too much energy and too much weight… not to mention all areas of the asteroid may not be sufficiently composed of iron to garner an attraction.
 
In addition, the surface was most likely to be uneven, and control of the craft’s attitude would be an issue.

Once, again, it was Raymond Bradford that came up with the solution.

In the forward part of the vehicle would be two canisters containing separate polymers within an open-ended skirt, of sorts.
 
Upon releasing a valve, the two semi-fluids would undergo a chemical reaction forming a thick, viscous goo on that end.
 
The forward section would be transformed into a sticky pillow that would become the base of the Lander.
 
This would negate the need for acrobatics and rotations of the probe when it attached to the asteroid.
 
Also, the material would provide a cushioning effect for what was hoped to be a minor impact.

Basically, Ray was going to glue the Lander to the rock.

Leveling rods in the edge of the skirt could be used to orient the system to the surface, and allow for optimal dispersion of paint and Mylar.
 
The ion engine on the other end of the craft might also be adjusted to angle the force of its thrust by way of a radio controlled coupling.

*****

The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry… especially if there are those that secretly want to help it go awry.

Most mice and men don’t have Giddeon and Mia looking out for them, though.

*****

Had Ray gone ahead with his launch at the pre-ordained time and date, a tiny, heat-seeking missile would have undetectably streaked through the air and punctured the exterior of the propellant tank of the rocket, causing catastrophic failure.

As a matter of a fact, that is exactly what happened… except it was the wrong rocket.

Like I said, Ray’s a good poker player.

*****

Giddeon and Mia had informed us as to why the government was so easily persuaded by Ray.
 
It wasn’t necessarily the information that he had imparted to them on his escorted trip to
Washington
.

It was because they, themselves, had a ‘Plan B’.

If, after calculations by a pool of government scientists, the data showed that it was better to leave the asteroid on its original course rather than to attempt a redirection, an ‘accident’ could be arranged that would end the mission.

A new generation of small, virtually undetectable missiles had been developed by a major defense contractor.
 
It left practically no signature on radar, and, in the daylight hours, was almost impossible to visualize.
 

*****

News vans, spectators and well wishers gathered near Ray’s land on the appointed day.
 
They were quite a ways from the actual launching area, since he owned almost 20 square miles and his facilities were smack dab in the middle of it.
 
Bradford
had gotten his start in the field of private rockets by launching communications satellites.
 
Over thirty rockets had been deployed by his team, with only one failure… a pretty good record.
 
There were two assembly hangers… huge, tall buildings that housed the equipment, satellites and rocket stages as they were built.

*****

Most of the Occupy crowd was there, and ‘Elvis’ kept them entertained throughout the morning.
 
It was a rock and roll atmosphere, to say the least.
 
All of the major and minor networks had journalist teams present, but really had no one to interview as Ray and his scientists were all sequestered away, preparing for launch.
 

Lots of people had a few seconds of fame as news people made their way through the crowd doing impromptu spots.
 
Elvis, of course was a favorite.
 
When a beautiful anchor lady asked what he would sing after lift-off, he replied with that one-sided smile and an acappella line …

“A hunk, a hunk of Burning Love!”

*****

At 11:59 the rocket engines fired up, right on schedule.
 
From miles away, people looked through telescopes and binoculars and a cheer arose, as did the rocket.
 
It slowly lumbered into the blue,
Texas
sky, a magnificent sight for those on the ground.
 

Sure, enough, ‘
Burning Love’
began to blare from the speakers, but before the crowd and Elvis could get to the chorus, the condensation trail above them took on an odd pattern.
 
It then dispersed into white streams very similar to those produced that day when the space shuttle Challenger did the same thing…

Explode in the sky.

The music ground to a halt, and for a few seconds, silence ruled the Southwestern landscape.
 
People began to point and question.
 
Some began to cry.
 
Others hugged and some just shook their heads.
 
They all knew what had happened, and their hearts fell as one…

Like
Icarus
when his wings melted.

*****

Raymond Bradford made an appearance at the gate, and gave a press conference.
 
The billionaire, and his scientists that were behind him, looked devastated as he relayed how much time and preparation had gone into the rocket.
 
Ray also stated that he hoped that
Russia
would be successful with their launch, which was slated for a few hours, hence.
 
He looked like he had gone days without sleep.
 
When the apparently exhausted man had finished speaking and answering questions, he turned and made his way to his Range Rover, and then slowly drove back towards Mission Control.

*****

The people slowly dispersed, and all eyes turned towards
Russia
.
 
The failure of Ray’s rocket blanketed the airways.
 

*****

The exact same fate befell the Russians.
 
One minute into the launch, their rocket came apart.
 
Bits and pieces were strewn over a wide swath of
Siberia
.
 
Teams were dispensed to see what could be recovered that might be radioactive in nature.

*****

Conspiracy theories, already in their infancy after the
Texas
launch, screamed into full existence in capital letters all over the internet after the Russian failure.
 
People could hardly believe that there were two back-to-back catastrophes in such a short period of time.
 
In the resulting coverage and confusion over the events, no one really noticed the flame that rose into the mid-night sky over
West Texas
.

The mission, code-named ‘Melody’, flew unceremoniously into space, dropping magnesium flares and radio burst disrupters in its wake as a precaution.

*****

The magnesium flares could be seen from quite a distance, but the rocket’s fire was quickly obscured by cloud cover.
 
There were reports of lights and flame from residents and police officers in the region, but no official explanation was given, by Ray or the government.
 

Of course, this only added to the conspiracies already bubbling in the ether.

Ray took it upon himself to fly to
Washington
and tell them how the cow ate the cabbage… that’s a Southern expression that means telling the unvarnished truth.
 
It stems from an old joke in the 1940’s about a travelling circus that had an elephant escape and get into a near-sighted woman’s garden.
 
She called the police and said there was a large cow in her yard digging up her cabbages with its tail.
 
When asked what the cow was doing with the cabbages, she replied,

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you!”

Where she thought those cabbages were going was the same place Ray advised the President and the Secretary of Defense to put their plans of any future interference.
 
He had men in place to make calls to the Russian premier… to inform him of what had happened to his first decoy rocket and then let them draw their own conclusions as to what had happened to their mission from that information… if any actions were taken against him.

As it stood, no one knew a vehicle was on the way to the asteroid, and it would remain that way.
 
Ray knew when to back off and offer an olive branch, so he proposed a collaboration with NASA, because information from The Hubble Telescope and other monitoring devices would be most helpful to his scientists.

In the end, they came to an agreement… an agreement which the President honored, by the way.

The Secretary of Defense, however, couldn’t help but wonder about the billionaire’s intelligence information.
 
No one, other than a select and trusted few, knew about the stealth missiles that had brought down Ray’s decoy and the Russian rocket.
 

On his own, he decided to try and find out.
 
To him, it was a matter of national security… not to mention wounded pride.

*****

I was elated when I discovered that I could sometimes get across the divide and into
Giddeon’s
brain… or, at least into his ear.
 
Other than the poor little girl from the future that died in my arms, I had never had any interaction with anyone real.
 

I’m not sure you giving Greg your name and number counts as interaction.
 
That could have been a coincidence.
 
Also, the monsters don’t count, either.
 
I’m still not positive that they are from anywhere else other than my own imagination.

But, to have Giddeon repeat the words I had taken from Alternate Dad… that was electrifying.
 
I was on a high for days.
 
I would try to get him to say other things, but for the most part was unsuccessful.
 
Every now and then there would be a parallel flow to our verbiage, but it wasn’t word for word like with the song.

Anyway, after percolating for a while, it occurred to me one day that maybe there was a connection of some type between Giddeon and Alternate Dad.
 
A thread that held them together in the web of reality.

A shining, glistening filament… a silver strand.

*****

So, I decided to see if it worked both ways.

*****

I whispered into Alternate Dad’s ear when he was playing the guitar… no luck.

I whispered into his ear when he was talking on the phone… no luck, again.

I whispered into his ear when he was dreaming… no luck with that, either.

Finally, one day, he had a pen and paper in his hand.
 
I don’t know if he was going for a song lyric or a poem… maybe he was just going to make a list of things to buy at the store… but I whispered the first thing that came to my mind.
 
What I thought it was that Greg and his subconscious must have said when they saw you for the first time…

 
“She was beautiful.”

*****

And, that was what he wrote.

I saw him looking off into the distance as if seeing the scene in his mind.
 
Then, he took the pen and wrote another line.

‘Sitting there at the table, with a menu in her hand.’

That was what I had been visualizing.
 
My eyes grew wide as I watched the writing utensil continue on.

‘I could almost imagine the DNA in each and every one of her cells cranking out transcripts… transcripts that would be translated into proteins that all knew just exactly where to go and exactly what to do in order to construct such a magnificent creature’.

*****

He finished the first chapter of the book, and it was almost exactly as it had happened.
 
I knew, because I was there.
 
The stumbling request for an autograph.
 
The amused reaction of my other half (you).
 
The giving of your name and number to him on that little card.
 

I didn’t have to whisper into his ear when he was writing.
 
I just had to remember what happened.
 
Maybe it was like a download, because I didn’t even have to be around, sometimes, when it happened.
 
It was amazing… because I would just sit there and picture scenes and out they would come.
 
Every now and then he wasn’t in the mood to write, and I would be patient to not try and push it.
 
I could tell when that was happening, because that was when clumsy sentences and inaccurate scenes, which he would later erase and revise, would occur.

Mostly, though, it was a smooth process, if a bit slow.
 
I ‘helped’ him with his writing for over a year.
 
The odd thing was… Giddeon never caught on to what Alternate Dad was doing.
 
He never seemed to check a time or a timeline that included the book or the writing of the book.
 
He was pretty busy trying to figure out how to get Greg back to you, but, still, it wasn’t like him to miss things like that.
 
It could have been a coincidence, but, even today I’m not really sure if it was.
 

*****

I never was filled with patience like you and Gid… or even Giddy, for that matter.
 
I wanted the process to go faster.
 
You ever notice how your son hardly ever cried when he was little?
 
Even when he was wet and needed changing.
 
He seemed to realize that you would come to his aid in good time, and just went about his business of watching whatever it is that he watches.
 
I guess he didn’t inherit that from me.
 
Serenity, that is.
 
I don’t really have much patience; especially for writing a book.
 
A song, I can handle… that’s usually quick.

Anyway, my budding author seemed to hit an impasse about three quarters of a way into his novel.
 
That was about the time that Greg had kind of begun to go downhill at the rehabilitation center and you were engaged to your fiancé.
 
I knew what the problem was… he had almost caught up to actual events.
 
He couldn’t write about what hadn’t happened…

At least, that’s what I thought.

*****

In fits and starts, the writing had gotten pretty much simultaneous with where our two boys were in their quest to return Greg to the solid side of things.
 
Even, a little ahead.
 
I didn’t believe it, at first, but, sure enough, when I checked, their reality unfolded exactly as described on the word processing file… in real time, in that other dimension (Alternate Dad had switched over from long-hand, early on), and sometimes just a little bit before.

Things really began to get interesting when we all visited the movie theatre of the future.

*****