Carbide Tipped Pens Part 6

The President turned to the screen. "What the h.e.l.l is going on?" His features grew larger as he leaned toward the camera. "You've been building your own nuclear weapon without my or Congress's approval, and now you want to break the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty? Who do you think you are? Do you realize that detonating this device and launching that plate might cause several nations on this planet to a.s.sume they're under nuclear attack, and launch a retaliatory strike against American cities?"

"Mr. President," interrupted Heather, "as Administrator of your National Nuclear Security Agency, I not only have the legal right, but I have a sworn duty to ensure the safety and surety of the nation's nuclear stockpile. I have not designed a new weapon. I have merely appropriated one of our nuclear devices due for destructive testing and have instrumented it so as to fully understand the detonation physics in the event that you authorize an underground test..."

"Underground test? Are you insane? You've got ten thousand tons of metal sitting on top of that high-tech blowhole. It's the world's largest cannonball!"

"It's not a cannonball, sir. It's over eleven kilotons of supplies, mostly food and water-the t.i.tanium plug and steel platform are less than a third of the total weight."

The President looked icy. "Don't split hairs with me. If that thing detonates and something goes wrong, we could find ourselves in the middle of a nuclear war."

"State Department notification of the underground test is ready to be sent simultaneously to the United Nations, and to the world's nuclear powers, sir. Since the US has not fully ratified the Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty, we fully reserve the right to conduct an underground test to ensure the safety and surety of our stockpile. As such, NNSA's legal team has delivered a Presidential Finding for you to sign to authorize the test so that we'll have the legal framework to proceed..."

"This is not an underground test, it's a nuclear-driven projectile! The test hole will vent radioactive material worldwide. Are you crazy?"

Her hands tightly clutched the wooden table as she struggled to remain calm. "Blast doors located under the plug will slam shut just after the plug is accelerated up, preventing anything but superheated steam from escaping from the hole. This technique was perfected near the end of the underground nuclear test campaign in the early 1990s.

"Mr. President, this program will accomplish three high-interest items. First, you'll confirm the safety and surety of our nation's stockpile, showing the world the remaining nuclear weapons you are responsible for are still a viable deterrence, and will only detonate when you want them to detonate; second, you'll provide a highly visible rescue of our stranded astronauts, demonstrating to the world your commitment to use American ingenuity to rescue international astronauts, even as far away as the orbit of Mars." She paused.

The President waited for a moment, his face icily rigid. He leaned into the screen. "And the third high-interest item I'll accomplish?"

"As far as demonstrating your commitment to finally signing the Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty," said Heather tiredly, "you'll not only have a reason to do it, but you'll have a scapegoat to haul up before the international court. Me."

Colonel Lewis moved from the lander and stepped lightly into the Martian soil. Red landscape spread out before him, dotted with rubble, rocks, and what looked like a ridge of rugged mountains in the distance. They'd chosen a landing spot by the pole, where evidence of winter ice had been pinpointed. With any luck, they'd be able to harvest ice for water, and perhaps crack the water for oxygen. Realistically they knew the chance was small and their outlook was bleak; but by attempting to explore and perform what scientific experiments they could, at least they would be busy ... and push away the certainty of death for as long as they could.

The President acquiesced.

Grudgingly.

The countdown proceeded well within the time calculated by the astrodynamicists. The time of launch was set to when the Earth's rotation brought the Thunderwell site into the plane of the ballistic trajectory to Mars. It was like setting off a gigantic cannon, and the initial velocity, angle of the hole to the vertical (with a deviation less than femto-radians), and even planetary gravitational influences, all had to be precisely aligned so that the supplies would hit Mars. It was a modern version of Jules Verne's From the Earth to the Moon. But instead of a nineteenth-century gun launching a bullet to the lunar surface, this was a nuclear-weapon steam piston accelerating eleven thousand tons of supplies to Mars.

The entire Nevada Test Site worked with well-oiled precision, whatever excitement present muted by the knowledge that even with all their attention to detail and exacting preparation, stuff still happened, and the device might not pop off as planned.

Nuclear tests had failed unexpectedly during the heyday of nuclear testing, and it might happen again. But instead of just moving on to another test of an exotic nuclear weapon design-enhanced neutron production, electromagnetic pulse generator, extremely small yield, or even a ground-shattering earth mover-this failure would be the last nuclear shot ever attempted.

The quiet only magnified what everyone knew: that this was the last option to rescue six astronauts on Mars who had no other chance.

"Sixty seconds, General. STRATCOM acknowledges all declared nuclear countries-the UK, China, Russia, India, Pakistan, and France-have been appraised." The controller coughed. "And a courtesy notification has been sent to the IAEA, Israel, Brazil, j.a.pan, Iran, and North Korea. This is your last chance to abort."

Mitch.e.l.l glanced to his left at Heather. The Administrator stood silently watching the array of screens as if she hadn't heard. Her arms crossed, muted light reflected from her face. No emotion hinted that her husband's fate depended on the wildly improbable and unconventional delivery of supplies, or that her personal fate was dictated in breaking the as yet unratified International Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty.

General Mitch.e.l.l nodded to the young female controller when Heather remained mute. The digital clock ticked past the fifteen-second mark. "Carry on." He turned back to the screens. Ten seconds.

It took place in less than a second.

Electrons trickled into explosive wires that detonated an array of lens-shaped explosives. The precisely a.s.sembled array of incredibly symmetric high-explosives-especially manufactured by Los Alamos National Laboratory-detonated in fine-tuned precision.

Within milliseconds, the conventional, non-nuclear explosives compressed the plutonium pit that served as the kernel for the atomic cascade, resulting in a runaway nuclear detonation. Gamma rays streamed out of the nuclear explosion, racing into the ten-meter-radius tunnel and interacting with everything in their path. Water instantly converted to superheated, high-pressure steam and an enormous shock wave radiated outward.

Simultaneously, electrical signals ignited other explosive charges that started the ma.s.sive blast doors at the top of the tunnel to start to slam shut. If successful, the heavy doors would close just after the steam had propelled the plug and steel plate into the atmosphere at over twelve kilometers a second, but before any radioactive debris from the blast vented into the atmosphere. Timing was of the essence, and microsecond timescales mattered in balancing critical hydrodynamic phenomena.

Throughout the confines of the mile-deep tunnel-with nowhere to go but up-the superheated steam pushed against the t.i.tanium carbide plug that sealed the top of the bore hole. As if powered by a supersonic ram, the steam accelerated the plug against the steel plate.

A roiling, smoke-laden column erupted from the Nevada desert, looking like a giant Roman candle as the aerosh.e.l.l accelerated up, blasting through ten kilometers in less than a second.

But within milliseconds after the initial seventy-two thousand gees imparted by the nuclear-powered steam piston, a small, asymmetric distribution of ma.s.s caused a pressure differential across the steel plate. Exceeding the von Mises yield criteria, the growing difference in pressure created a fracture line. Within eight seconds, as the supplies burst through the first one hundred kilometers of viscous Earth atmosphere, the plate cracked into seven discrete parts. The aerosh.e.l.l fractured and was peeled off the plate of supplies.

The plate's center of ma.s.s still headed for Mars, but slowly breaking off into distinct chunks, the supplies now resembled more of a shotgun blast than a single bag of manna.

In the meantime, radioactive steam, wall debris, and other material not captured by the explosive doors that slammed shut at the top of the bore hole, spewed into the atmosphere. Carried by easterly winds and the jet stream, the contaminated material drifted toward the most populated parts of the US.

Senate Hearing Room, Russell Office Building The small hearing room was crammed with people. Staffers stood against the back wall as news media crouched on the floor in a no-man's-land between the senators and the table where Heather and her deputies were seated.

The chairman pounded on the gavel. He leaned over the wooden desk that separated him and his congressional colleagues from the NNSA personnel. The murmuring silenced as the chairman looked at Heather over the top of his gla.s.ses. "This report from your own agency, Madam Administrator, indicates that more radiation was released into the atmosphere by this Thunderwell disaster than from Three Mile Island. Now what do you say about that?"

Heather straightened and leaned into her microphone. "Considering that the radiation level outside the gate to Three Mile Island was just over the amount of radiation you'd get from flying over the Rocky Mountains, a factor of ten times that amount is still less activity than the j.a.panese nuclear release from the 2012 tsunami."

The chairman reddened. "I can hold you in contempt, Madam Administrator."

"I meant no disrespect, Senator. You asked what I had to say about the comparison of radioactivity released from Three Mile Island. The fact is that the containment vessel at TMI did a remarkable job of doing what it was designed to do, and as such the radiation levels near the facility were relatively small. In the same manner, the blast doors at the Nevada Test Site, although not perfect, did an extraordinary job of containing a nuclear blast of over a half-megaton-and produced far, far less fallout than any aboveground test the US ever conducted."

"I wouldn't call the meltdown of a nuclear power plant benign, madam."

"Compared to a nuclear explosion, it is, Senator."

The chairman pounded his gavel. "Enough! Do you have a clue as to the severity of your actions? Regardless of how much you downplay the venting of a nuclear explosion, the fact is that radiation levels have been raised across the US, and clouds of nuclear debris are drifting eastward toward our allies and friends. You've not only put millions of people at risk by exposing them to the unknown effects of nuclear fallout, but you've singlehandedly broken the Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty, a cornerstone of the peaceful relations.h.i.+ps our world currently enjoys."

Heather leaned into her microphone. "You're well aware the Test-Ban Treaty has never been ratified by the Senate, Senator. And as far as the amount of fallout, anyone who flies cross-country receives more radiation damage from cosmic radiation than they ever will from the Thunderwell venting. You can haul me up before a Congressional hearing, but when you do, you can't twist facts to push a political agenda. And you certainly can't use me as a scapegoat when I'm trying to do what our nation should have been doing all along-everything we can to save human lives, the American and international astronauts who are relying on us."

The hearing room was silent. The only sound was from the low hum of the recording equipment and the thrumming of the building's ventilator. Sitting next to Heather, General Mitch.e.l.l got her attention and nodded at a flush-faced staffer who hurried in from the back.

The chairman was handed a note. He nodded, then turned his attention back to Heather. His voice seemed to have brightened. "Are you through, madam?"

Heather drew in a breath. "Yes, sir, I am."

"Very well." He held up the paper given to him by his staffer. "I've just been handed a note from the NASA Administrator. It seems that radar imagery from the military's Haystack radar confirms that the Thunderwell payload of supplies are slowly dispersing, and there's a good chance that none of the supplies may reach Mars." He looked over his gla.s.ses at Heather. "As altruistic as you may be, young lady, not only have you broken the law and put countless humans at risk, but it now appears that you've done it all in vain. For your own sake, you should hope we can keep you in the US when you're hauled to court ... and not appear in front of an international tribunal." He showed the hint of a smirk. "I understand they can be quite ruthless." He banged his gavel. "I call for a one-hour recess."

"Copy," clicked Colonel Lewis. Although it took a good eight minutes for the signal to arrive at Mars and another eight for the response to reach Earth, when appraised of the rescue attempt and the breakup of supplies, the Mars commander showed no emotion.

Just like his wife.

It was cla.s.sic Heather: short and sweet.

The memo to the Secretary of Energy read, "I respectfully submit my resignation, effective immediately, for personal reasons."

Two weeks later she entered the minimum security prison facility just north of Pleasanton, CA.

The US refused her extradition to the international tribunal.

Three months later Data from MIT Lincoln Lab's Haystack radar showed a surprising result: chunks of steel plate that had fractured during the ascent no longer drifted apart. The slowing of the chunks had been previously noted, and at first the data was dismissed as an artifact of scintillation, the random dispersion of radar due to fluctuations of the Earth's ionosphere. But the data grew more p.r.o.nounced as corrections were applied and as time pa.s.sed. It took weeks to verify the readings, but when the data were released, a theory based on a gravitational asteroid-rubble model was simultaneously published in Nature and Geophysical Review Letters explaining the debris aggregation phenomenon.

According to the orbit determination and propagations performed by Caltech's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the center-of-ma.s.s was predicted to intersect the northern Martian limb and with the supplies no longer drifting apart, there was a non-zero chance that at least a third of the supplies would impact the planet.

Brigadier General Mitch.e.l.l, now a.s.signed to the Pentagon as a special a.s.sistant to the Air Force Chief of Staff before his forced, impending retirement from active duty, wrote Heather a note with the news.

Hundreds of kilometers from the landing craft, gigantic puffs of dust peppered the Martian surface. Seismometers recorded shocks emanating from thousands of locations, as if the planet were being bombarded by a swarm of meteorites.

Sensors on board the still-orbiting mothers.h.i.+p showed that the puffs of dust made a pattern, commensurate with the center-of-ma.s.s distribution of the supplies. A few of the supplies splashed heavily into the surface-metal tanks, scaffolding, and parts that had been packaged to withstand the rapid transit of the Martian atmosphere and burrow into the ground. Other provisions of dried food, water, and expendables had been enveloped in giant twin-hulled balloons that had inflated while being slowed by specially designed parachutes. The balloons bounced crazily across the Martian surface, rebounding or striking outcrops of rocks and quickly deflating.

Chunks of steel plate, glowing red hot from screaming through the thin atmosphere, preceded the supplies and created craters hundreds of feet across. Between the seismic data and overhead sensors, the locations of the supplies were quickly calculated.

Emotions in check, Colonel Lewis ordered two of the crew to remain with the lander and ordered the rest to accompany him on the Martian crawler to investigate one of the nearer impact sites. They didn't know how much, if any, of the supplies had survived the journey, or in what shape anything would be, but it gave them hope that their mission might extend well beyond what they had thought only a few minutes before.

Pa.s.sed through channels to her minimum security cell, Brigadier General Mitch.e.l.l's memo to Heather described what her husband's crew had managed to find.

Sitting on the single bed in her stark cell, Heather leaned back against the bare, white wall. She closed her eyes. If she kept up her good behavior, she might be released by the time her husband returned.

And there was little doubt in her mind that he would.

THE CIRCLE.

Liu Cixin*

Translated by Ken Liu

For of all sad words of tongue or pen, The saddest are these: "It might have been!"

Maud Muller (1856) In the early years of the fifteenth century-eight decades before Columbus's voyages to the New World-the Ming Empire of China sent "treasure fleets" across the Pacific and Indian Oceans.

Commanded by the eunuch Zheng He, these fleets were composed of huge oceangoing junks, many of them with crews of a thousand men. By the hundreds, they sailed to Indonesia, Malaya, and the east coast of Africa. Some believe they may even have touched on the western coasts of North and South America.

While their ostensible purpose was to obtain treasure and initiate trade and diplomacy with distant lands, Zheng He's fleets also compelled fealty to the Chinese emperor.

The treasure fleet expeditions were ultimately halted by Xuande, grandson of the Yongle Emperor, and the Confucian bureaucrats who now controlled the government ordered the treasure fleet burned.

All that is worth knowing and having, the bureaucrats decreed, is right here in China. Sailing beyond China's coastal waters was a burden to the depleted treasury.

Within a century, European explorers, in their much smaller s.h.i.+ps, began the colonial era that humbled China for nearly five hundred years.

If the Chinese had continued the work of their treasure fleets, China might have colonized Europe. You and I would be speaking Chinese today.

It might have been.

Liu Cixin's stylishly told tale, translated into English by Ken Liu, tells of another "might have been," also set in China, long ago.

Xianyang, capital of the state of Qin, 227 B.C.*

Jing Ke slowly unrolled the silk scroll of a map across the low, long table.

On the other side of the table, King Zheng of Qin sighed satisfactorily as he watched the mountains and rivers of his enemy being slowly revealed. Jing Ke was here to present the surrender of the King of Yan. It was easy to feel in control looking at the fields, roads, cities, and military bases drawn on a map. The real land, so vast, sometimes made him feel powerless.

When Jing Ke reached the end of the scroll, there was a metallic glint, and a sharp dagger came into view. The air in the Great Hall of the Palace seemed to solidify in an instant.

All the king's ministers stood at least thirty feet away, and in any event, had no weapons. The armed guards were even farther away, below the steps leading into the Great Hall. These measures were intended to improve the king's security, but now they only made the a.s.sa.s.sin's task easier.

But King Zheng remained calm. After giving the dagger a brief glance, he focused his sharp and somber eyes on Jing Ke. The king was a careful man, and he had noticed that the dagger was positioned such that the handle pointed at him while the tip pointed back toward the a.s.sa.s.sin.

Jing Ke picked up the dagger, and all those present in the Great Hall gasped. But King Zheng sighed in relief. He saw that Jing Ke held the dagger only by the tip of the blade, with the dull handle pointing at the king.

"Your Majesty, please kill me with this weapon." Jing Ke raised the dagger over his head and bowed. "Crown Prince Dan of Yan ordered me to make this attempt on your life, and I cannot disobey an order from my master. But my great admiration for you makes it impossible for me to carry through."

King Zheng made no move.