Gene frowned. Biomedical sensors were notoriously unreliable, especially since the crew didn’t like everyone knowing their heartbeat and often weren’t too careful about attaching the electrodes. He looked at the front screen. There were still three minutes left in the burn, and that would take them almost to the end of the communications pass. Then they’d have a 23-minute gap until they could talk to them through Australia.
“CAPCOM, let’s wait until there’s forty-five seconds left in this comm pass to update the crew with what we’re seeing.”
Kaz, standing behind the CAPCOM, looked at Gene and nodded. Let the crew work the problem, but backstop them with the latest data from Mission Control before they went silent again.
“Listen up, all consoles,” Gene said, pausing until conversation quieted. “Looks like we’re headed to the Moon, but with bad comms and maybe a hatch problem. We still have Lunar Module extraction and S-IVB separation to get through before we’ll have good two-way communication. We need to help the crew but stay out of their way until they get through this phase.”
He paused and looked around at his team.
“I want a crisp update for them in twenty minutes. All systems abnormalities, and any changes to the flight plan.” He turned to his left.
“And INCO, I want my comms back ASAP. We need to get this flight back to normal.”
The glove was smooth and white, the rubberized fingers bulging with pressure as the cosmonaut held on against the accelerating spaceship.
“Chad! One of the cosmonauts is trying to get in!”
“What?” Chad pivoted his suit hard to see, pushing Luke’s inert form out of his way. “Shit!”
He glanced back at the engine instruments. “We’ve got a minute left in the burn,” he said, “and we’ve got to get air to Luke, fast. Bring the cosmonaut inside, and let’s get the oxygen flowing ASAP!”
Michael pushed the hatch open and held out his gloved hand. The cosmonaut’s other arm came arcing out of the darkness and grabbed it. Straining against the rocket’s acceleration, he helped the cosmonaut inch into the cramped space. Michael yanked the Soviet suit’s life--support backpack in last, trailing on its hoses, then squeezed up and around the cosmonaut’s feet to check that his makeshift pressure seal repair was still in place. He pulled the hatch closed and lunged for the locking handle, rapidly cycling it, counting strokes.
As soon as it was locked, he pivoted and threw open the cabin repress switches to get some life-giving oxygen flowing. Sweating heavily, he reached down and pulled himself back into his seat.
Chad’s voice cut in. “Three, two, one—burn’s complete.”
The sudden freedom of weightlessness was like coming inside out of a gale.
Michael kept his eyes glued to the cabin pressure gauge, which was rapidly climbing towards 5 psi. “Hatch seal’s holding,” he reported. As soon as it passed 3, he reached under the cosmonaut to get to Luke’s helmet. Chad was already there, pulling at the neck latch. As the helmet came loose, Michael guided it up and off Luke’s head.
Michael yanked off his right glove and jammed a finger up under Luke’s jawline, feeling for a pulse.
Nothing.
He used his thumb to peel Luke’s eyelid quickly back, but saw no response. He held his palm over Luke’s nose and mouth. Nothing.
Unlatching and peeling off his own helmet, he grabbed Luke’s jaw with his still-gloved left hand and pushed back on the top of his head with his right; sealing his lips over Luke’s cold mouth, he blew hard into his lungs. He turned, hearing the rattle of the exhale, and then filled Luke’s lungs again.
No response.
Bracing Luke with one hand, he slammed his other into Luke’s chest, trying shock the heart back into action. The thickness of the spacesuit absorbed much of the blow. Their suited bodies bounced off the panels in weightlessness.
“Help me!” he yelled to Chad.
The two of them took turns slamming their gloved fists into Luke’s chest, as Michael repeatedly blew more oxygen into his lungs.
But Luke’s skin didn’t pink up and his eyelids didn’t flutter. Saliva floated from his slack mouth in a sticky, weightless web.
Lunar Module Pilot Luke Hemming, Captain in the United States Marine Corps, veteran of three hours of spaceflight and one spacewalk, was dead.
Bumping against them in the confined space, the cosmonaut was moving, hands twisting to open glove locks, then reaching for the neck handle that released the white helmet, CCCP printed in large red letters across its front.