“So did they brief you on what to expect during splashdown?”
“Yes.” Stepanov held up a sheaf of papers on NASA letterhead.
A pause.
Kaz tried a different tack. “Been to Hawaii before?”
“No.” Not unfriendly, just a clear vibe that he’d been doing something worthwhile and was politely waiting for Kaz to leave so he could get back to it. Like an interrupted professor.
“Okay, well, let me know if I can help.”
The Russian had nodded and thanked him.
Not a chatterbox.
Kaz and the doctor climbed up into the helicopter and took their seats, opposite Al and the Russian, on the simple green webbing on metal frames that ran the length of the crew cabin. The crew chief gave them a short briefing on emergencies and handed them uninflated life jackets and earplugs as the five big rotor blades started turning above their heads.
The attaché listened attentively, then comfortably donned the safety equipment and did up the heavy shoulder and waist straps unaided.
Not Stepanov’s first rodeo.
The Sea King lurched up off the pavement, pivoted in place, tipped forward and accelerated out to sea.
Chad looked out the window of Pursuit. The Moon behind him had shrunk to the size of a dime against the blackness. Ahead, what had been a thumbnail-sized marble, blue with white and green-brown highlights, was growing and resolving itself rapidly into the easily recognizable coastlines and country shapes of Earth; it felt like he was walking towards a lit globe on a darkened shelf.
He’d steered the ship to skim exactly against the side of that ball, where it would just brush the upper tendrils of the atmosphere. The ultimate high-stakes billiards shot: miss wide and they’d carom off into space with not enough oxygen to last until they could make it back. Hit with just a bit too much angle and the ship would dig in, disintegrating into flames under the violent deceleration.
He smiled at his reflection, repeating in the multilayered glass. He’d done everything perfectly. Been up for every challenge they’d thrown at him. And with the final test still coming, he was ready.
He glanced at Michael and Svetlana, thinking about the incomplete picture they each held in their heads, shaping their predictable choices and actions. He looked at Earth again, his smile growing wider. The Soviets thought they were directing what was going on—that they could control him! The Americans had arrogantly set the mission’s parameters, yet needed someone who could actually do it.
I was chosen for this!
His life, from childhood until this exact moment, was like a movie script where he’d been the inevitable action hero.
Action hero. The words echoed in his head. He hadn’t thought of himself that way before. But that’s who he was. It was perfect. At every turn he’d taken the right action, moved forward, left the others behind—before they even knew what was happening.
And he was about to do it again. He had a plan that would achieve all the goals, and then some. He’d used this return trip, these two days when everyone else had just dozed and twiddled their thumbs, to dig into the details and come up with the right actions. His crew would be helpless to stop him.
He half closed his eyes and pictured it, his hands subtly performing the motions as if he were a conductor directing an orchestra. Reach here, move that, see this, say those words. A symphony of his own making, the ship responding, his actions setting the course of history.
A small thought popped into his reverie, unbidden. His smile faded and he frowned, picturing what it meant. He walked through the plan, seeing how it would unfold with this unwanted input, clicking through if/then statements, churning the wheel, checking the readout, then changing assumptions and rerunning it. Repeating until he had a way to make it work. As he saw the solution, his smile returned.
He checked his watch—enough time before tomorrow’s main event.
One last look at himself in the window, the growing brightness of Earth highlighting his face, the endless darkness behind.
Action hero.
First nights on ships always kept Kaz awake. He wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was the new sounds, the different motions of this particular hull in the water, the hardness of the thin Navy-issue mattress on the berth. From experience he knew it would be better the second night, and after a few days he’d sleep soundly. But for now, he was restless in the darkness of his small cabin aboard the USS New Orleans. He opened his eyes wide. Weird, he thought, not for the first time. An inner room on a ship with watertight closed hatches made for total darkness. He could feel that his eyelids were open, but his eye could see absolutely nothing.