Moonbase (under construction), Control Sphere
Two minutes later
Lieutenant Gay Ellis was seated at what would later become the main console (which was still being finished even while Gay was using it), giving orders in a clear, crisp, professional voice. "Joan," she requested, "find out if requisition Two-Five-Delta-Jay has arrived yet, please."
"It was rerouted and loaded onto the Commander's flight, Lieutenant," Joan Harrington reported smoothly, after checking the LM's cargo manifest. "It's being transferred to the Medical Sphere now. ETA for completion of installation is 0500 tomorrow, lunar time."
"Good," Gay approved, and turned to Nina Barry. "Nina, what about that communications glitch?"
"It seems to have corrected itself, Lieutenant," Nina replied, "but the techs are checking. All channels to Earth and SID are clear. Diagnostic check shows green."
"Very well," Gay noted, signing a report a junior tech presented to her after briefly scanning it. "Any word on the Commander and Colonel Freeman?" she asked.
"Right here, Gay," a masculine American voice interjected, as Straker and Freeman entered the room. He looked around appraisingly, liking what he saw. The last time he'd made an inspection, there were wires hanging out of walls and dust everywhere; now, almost everything was gleaming perfection, and techs (all female, he carefully noted) were hard at work. "Well, it looks as if you've got things well in hand here," he praised her.
She smiled modestly. "I have a good team, sir. No problems reported so far."
"That's what I like to hear," he nodded approvingly; he could practically hear everyone in the room relaxing. "Do you have a minute, Gay? There's something I need to discuss with you. It's, uh, sort of an operational consideration."
Her frown was mild and brief. She knew they were ahead of schedule, so surely there was nothing wrong. "Of course, Commander; we can use my office. Joan, take over, will you?"
"Certainly, Lieutenant," Joan acknowledged.
Moonbase, Lieutenant Ellis's office
"What can I do for you, sir?" Gay inquired, standing at ease before her desk, at which Straker now sat; Alec had taken a chair to one side.
"Well, it's something I just became aware of a few minutes ago," Straker began. "A work party passed us in the corridor to the main hub, and I noticed something odd...they were all women."
"Oh, yes," Gay nodded casually, "most of the work parties are."
Straker frowned - not in disapproval so much as puzzlement. "Might I ask why?"
"It's not a deliberate policy, sir," Gay replied, a touch defensively. "It's...just the way things have worked out."
"I'm not sure I understand; explain, Gay." It wasn't quite an order.
"Actually, Commander, it's quite a long story, and it starts with day one of construction," she told him.
He raised an eyebrow. This sounded more intriguing than he'd expected. He knew Gay Ellis had a tendency to overcompensate, holding as she did a post which not that long ago would never have been held by a woman...however beautiful and attractive she was. But SHADO's personnel department (he could never quite accept the phrase 'human resources' which had recently come into vogue, feeling that it dehumanised people) was backed up by their sophisticated Talent Analysis Placement System software.
Even though it was essentially a prototype and no program remotely like it had ever been written before, TAPS had quickly proven itself to be an invaluable tool for assigning prospective SHADO personnel to positions that best suited their skills and aptitudes, the better to increase the organisation's efficiency and effectiveness (and, incidentally, to reduce the likelihood of treachery - people who were happy in their jobs generally weren't prone to betraying their employers).
TAPS wasn't programmed for gender or any other bias; when Straker requested the best officer for the post of Moonbase Controller, Gay's name was at the top of the list, and as the progressive man he was he didn't give it a second thought. He was determined to forge SHADO into an equal opportunities organisation without making the mistake of over-emphasising the issue (as the UK Government was currently in the process of doing with its anti-discrimination legislation, though it had to be said they meant well and were sincere), and equally determined that it should be a levelling-up, not down.
Western civilisation had, he felt, wasted the potential of skilled, professional women for far too long by refusing to acknowledge that they even existed. He'd once met a woman, a civilian, who'd had the potential to become whatever she wanted and had in fact emigrated to America to do precisely that, yet she'd decided in the end to become a wife and mother...not that she saw that as anything other than worthy of her, nor should she. She'd refused recruitment for perfectly valid reasons, and he'd respected that.
Cherry Bisquet was a woman who commanded respect - not just as a woman, but as who she was.
So, too, was Gay. He'd seen nothing so far to convince him that he was wrong, or that TAPS and/or Personnel had made an error re Gay's appointment.
At least, not so far...
"I must say I'm intrigued now, Gay...tell me about it."
"Initially," Gay began, "the majority of the construction personnel were men. This was an operational necessity given the nature of the work -"
"Digging through basaltic rock in spacesuits," Alec agreed ruefully, "in freezing and/or boiling temperatures - not a job for the faint of heart. I wouldn't have fancied it, I can tell you."
"Too much like hard work?" Gay dared to quip, and Alec chuckled, admitting it. He liked Gay's sense of humour, infrequently displayed as it was.
"Plus there were the radiation issues, weren't there?" Straker recalled now. "Women often want to have kids at some point, and repeated exposure to lunar conditions was deemed unsafe for them in that regard, at least until the first habitat module was completed. And at least men could safely bank sperm samples - we had no facilities then to do the same for ova." His expression was rueful. "There were other priorities."
"True," Gay acknowledged. "Once habitat modules were built and shielding was in place, the gender ratio shifted to about fifty-fifty; we had a pretty even mix of specialists and manual workers. By sheer chance - and, I suspect, a little of TAPS' influence -" she smiled wryly, "some teams were mostly men and others were mostly women, depending on exactly what their operational tasks were.
"But over the subsequent few months, I started to notice a peculiar pattern: teams which mostly consisted of women were experiencing lower rates of illness, accidents and stress-induced fatigue. One of TAPS' operational parameters, I'm told, can be summed up in non-technical terms as 'go with what works', so fill-in staff and replacements tended to be of the opposite gender to the people they were filling in for or replacing. As a result, the ratio started shifting in favour of women...and more work was getting done.
"I was baffled - I still am - but I simply accepted it, as it was working and we were making up lost ground. At the moment the ratio is approximately four to one, and seems to have stabilised at that figure...and we're currently three days ahead of schedule."
She very carefully did not add '...despite suspected Alien-related delays and snags'. She didn't need to - there had been one or two incidents she and Straker both were certain had been caused by them. The Aliens definitely knew about SHADO and were doing what they could to derail the entire project, utilising agents on Earth and Moonbase, although the latter were considerably easier to identify and eliminate.
It was immediately obvious that by far the most efficient way to achieve their goal would be to detonate an Interceptor warhead, which was why the munitions store was constantly guarded by fully-armoured soldiers with orders to shoot to kill anyone who attempted unauthorised access...or anyone the Commander ordered them to shoot. One member of the Security Council who was openly sceptical about SHADO (as if they weren't all sceptical to some degree) had asked why the Interceptors were even there when it was as yet impossible to track UFOs accurately, and Straker's offhand reply was: "Well, it can't hurt to try, and we might just get lucky."
"Oh, there are some men? So where are you girls hiding them?" Alec couldn't resist quipping.
Gay actually laughed briefly, before remembering Straker was there and catching herself; she'd always liked Alec. He'd once made a friendly pass at her, the sort generally referred to in SHADO as JFC (Just For Coffee), and she'd seriously considered accepting, his notoriety as an inveterate womaniser notwithstanding. "Oh, they're primarily in the lower chambers, sir; currently most of them are working in the Interceptor hangars."
"No harem, then? Pity," Alec kidded once more.
"Lieutenant," Straker inquired severely, "you're surely not suggesting that men are more prone to illness, or more careless?"
"No, sir," Gay assured him, "more that women seem to be - I emphasise 'seem', Commander - less prone, and more careful, at least on Moonbase."
"Hmm," Straker mused, "had you not added that 'seem' qualifier, Gay, I might have accused you of sophistry. Go on."
"I've, um, discussed the matter with Dr. Jackson..." She trailed off, knowing as she did of Straker's antipathy towards the strange, enigmatic Slavic doctor, but he simply nodded for her to continue. "His theory is that there's something about the lunar environment that is more inimical to men than women, possibly the feeling of confinement - though of course no-one diagnosed with claustrophobia would ever be assigned here."
She paused tactfully; Ed Straker was rumoured to suffer from the condition himself. Again, though, he did not comment.
"Also, women are better at communicating, and building support networks among themselves, than men are," she continued, "it seems to help. He's suggested there may be, well, hormonal issues, too."
Straker and Alec glanced at each other. Neither trusted himself to say a word. They were both trying, very hard, not to think the male chauvinist thought: PMT.
"So that's basically it, sir," Gay finished tentatively. "Of course, as Moonbase Controller the disposition of personnel is my responsibility..."
Dammit, she's overcompensating again, Straker groused to himself. I'll have to talk to her about that, sometime before Moonbase is certified operational. She's expecting me to overrule her on this, and given those new equality laws I guess I should.
But then, the politicians who drew up those laws never imagined them being applied on the Moon, did they? A unique situation demands a unique working policy. If it works, it works, and Henderson can complain all he wants...and I bet he will. He wasn't all that sure of Gay at first.
Besides...my objections to Jackson are personal, if I'm honest with myself. I don't know why, but I don't trust the man. Maybe it's that he seems too close to Henderson, I don't know. But he knows his job, I can't deny that. So if he thinks there's a real effect at work here, and it's a positive one, it'd be stupid to rock the boat. There's too much at stake. For the moment, we'll see how it goes.
He made his decision, which was to back her to the hilt. "Yes, you're quite right, Lieutenant. In my judgement, I believe you should proceed as you think best." He smiled reassuringly, and was pleased to see her relax. "After all, you are ahead of schedule. I wouldn't dream of complaining about positive results."
"Thank you, sir," Gay murmured, clearly surprised, but she quickly regained her aplomb. "I have prepared a draft report on the phenomenon, sir; you should have the final version by next week."
"Fine," Straker remarked, while musing wryly that Gay's 'draft' and 'preliminary' reports had a habit of looking like the final versions right from the start, so meticulous and thorough was she. He'd wondered more than once if it would save time and effort if he simply asked her to leave them at the 'draft' stage...
Moonbase, Central Park
Present day
"...and that's the way it's stayed. Once the 4:1 ratio was established, it just refused to shift - every time we tried, Moonbase's operational efficiency took a hit...and SHADO couldn't afford to risk that," Kelly explained. "No other ratio seems to work as well, though I have to admit we still don't really know why. Finally Straker went to Personnel and ordered them to maintain that ratio no matter what. They actually had to rewrite TAPS slightly so it'd keep the ratio constant."
"I see," Ambassador Ibáñez nodded, bemused. "Even after forty-two years, Commander, it all seems so incredible."
"Welcome to my world," Kelly chuckled wryly.
Moonbase, Control Sphere
A few minutes later
"And this, obviously, is Moonbase Control," Kelly told Ibáñez as they entered, his sweeping gesture taking in the myriad consoles and the massive 3-D tactical display. "Moonbase's commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel Gay Bradley," he introduced them. "Gay, this is -"
"- Ambassador Ibáñez, yes," Gay smiled. "Welcome to Moonbase, sir."
"Thank you," he smiled in return. Joan Harrington and Nina Barry were also introduced. Neither showed the effects of the years, partly because of the longevity treatment and partly as a result of several years' exposure to a gravitational field only 80% of Earth's strength. Had Kelly not known better, he'd have pegged either of them at late thirties, max, rather than the sixty-odd he knew they were. "Are all the ladies as charming as these?" Ibáñez asked Kelly slyly.
"Nah," Kelly grinned, "some of 'em are positively delicious."
There was general laughter, all too brief, before routine Moonbase business intruded. "2237 hours, Colonel," Joan reported professionally; generally no-one bothered to address her as 'Lieutenant Colonel', and Gay had never seen fit to raise the issue herself. Patrols were regular, but as a precautionary measure the exact times were selected randomly by SID; it wouldn't do for Moonbase to be too predictable.
"Very well," Gay acknowledged. "You've come at just the right time, Ambassador, to witness the deployment of SHADO's most expensive, capable and utterly essential hardware." Kelly allowed himself a brief, covert grin on hearing Gay's order of priorities...the same as his own. She pressed a key. "Interceptors: immediate launch. Begin regular patrol."
"Roger that, Mum," a familiar voice sounded merrily over the intercom.
Gay's long-suffering sotto voce sigh of "Harmony..." was barely audible. It wouldn't have mattered if she hadn't said it; even when she didn't say it, she did. Joan and Nina hid their smiles with the ease of long practice.
"My daughter, Harmony," Gay explained lamely to Ibáñez. "She's the flight leader, but she doesn't always respect proper communications protocol." Or any other, for that matter, she didn't say.
Ibáñez looked politely puzzled. "There has been no alert, has there?"
"No," Kelly put in, "this is just a routine patrol - can't be too careful."
Interceptors now on the pads; launch commencing, SID soon reported. The tactical display confirmed it; three arrowheads representing the Interceptors were displayed heading away from the Moon. Patrol course confirmed as Zero-Seven-One, Two-Nine-Eight, Blue, SID added.
"Copy that, SID," Interceptor One - Harmony - acknowledged.
"Forgive my curiosity, Commander, Colonel," Ibáñez ventured, "but...does not that pilot sound rather...young?"
"She is," Kelly told him casually, "she's not quite seventeen, but for all her youth she's a fully qualified Interceptor pilot." As the man's jaw dropped, he added ruefully, "Long story."
No-one would ever forget it, though. As recent as it was, it already had the status of a legend.
He took Ibáñez to one side and explained...
Free space, near the Lagrange-4 Point - Interceptor Live Fire Exercise
Four months ago
The missile hit dead-on and the target drone exploded handily, as had its two predecessors despite all attempts at evasion. "Got 'im!" was the Interceptor pilot's cheery report.
Detonation positive, SID chimed in, a little late. Direct hit. Target Three destroyed.
"Good shot, Three," Lew Waterman, flying Interceptor Two as assistant instructor, complimented her.
"You're suckin' up again, Lew," Harmony couldn't resist quipping, "an' I have to say that it's workin'."
"Leader to Three: clear the comm channels," Mark ordered, but not harshly. There was no point. He knew his daughter; no amount of cajolery or threats could quell her mischievous tendencies. Anyway he could afford to cut her a little slack - she was three for three on successful interceptions, which was much better than most cadets generally managed at this stage of their training.
Interceptor tactics had, of necessity, changed with the introduction of the ICD and associated technologies; computer control was now generally reserved for long-range interceptions, whereas in dogfighting the onus for targeting and manoeuvres had to lie primarily on the pilot. This unfortunately introduced the element of human error, but long-range interceptions were literally hit-and-miss affairs anyway, as they had been from the beginning, and so the risk was accepted. Ironically, engaging in dogfighting actually increased the odds of a kill owing to the greatly reduced firing range.
Besides, one pilot's error could be corrected by his/her comrades if need be; no Interceptor pilot flew alone, and a UFO missed by one could be picked up by another. Interceptor pilots' training emphasised the need for teamwork more heavily than any other profession in SHADO. There were no wildcards, mustangs or loners in the Interceptor squadrons - there was simply no place for such, skilled fliers though they often were.
No-one mentioned the fact that those three detonations had just cost several million dollars. The debate about live fire exercises had been raging between military top brass and their civilian superiors ever since firearms and military forces had been invented, and showed no sign of ending anytime soon. But numerous studies and hard experience, both within SHADO and without, had demonstrated undeniably that there really was no substitute for live fire exercises, expense notwithstanding...even when the live fire in question was nuclear. It was a grim equation of cost balanced against necessity, and necessity always won out in the case of SHADO.
It was now the only military body in the world which routinely detonated nukes at all, let alone in live fire exercises. NORAD was well aware of nuclear explosives detonating in or near Earth orbit, but upon determining the unique signature of said explosions - this signature being created by the specific mix of fissile materials in the warheads plus the remnants of any UFO destroyed - they always went unreported, as per standing orders at the highest level.
Any NORAD personnel who attempted to inquire further into the origin of these mysterious explosions tended to be reassigned at the very least...usually to the opposite side of the world.
However, given the differing characteristics of chemical and nuclear explosions in vacuum, using chemical warheads in live fire exercises - as the IAC and the UN would both have preferred - was no substitute at all. Despite the fact that there was no air in space through which shock waves could propagate, a nuclear blast in vacuum was nevertheless many times larger in volume than a chemical explosion...which meant that if new pilots went straight from practising with chemicals to using real nukes, there might be a false sense of security in terms of their craft's proximity to the warhead when it detonated (to say nothing of possible radiation exposure). It was of course unacceptable for an Interceptor and its pilot to be caught in the very blast they'd set off!
Besides, it was totally impossible to pack enough chemical explosive into an Interceptor missile's warhead to even come close to simulating a nuclear blast without incurring an unacceptable mass penalty - the required explosive charge would mass far more than the Interceptor tasked with deploying it...!
There was also the small but not inconsiderable risk that one or more UFOs might interrupt such an exercise, in which case chemical warheads would be utterly useless (though they were good enough in atmosphere for Skyfighters and the Mobiles to use conventional missiles, as UFOs couldn't fly at FTL speeds in Earth's atmosphere and therefore weren't shielded by their version of the ICD).
It had never happened so far, but there was always a first time, and in that event the cadet might have to join the attack, inexperienced or not. Oddly, there was a standing order to the effect that a cadet should not do so, but since the occasion had never arisen it had never become an issue.
Civilians would doubtless have been somewhat dubious, to say the least, of the notion of placing several hundred megatons' worth of nuclear destruction in the hands of a sixteen-year-old girl, though...
"Okay," Harmony reported determinedly, swinging her Interceptor onto a new course, "new target showing on One-Two-Nine, Two-Three-Six, Blue - altering vector to engage now."
"Roger that," Interceptor One returned, pleased with her performance...if not her less than perfect observance of proper communication protocol and formality. Then a thought struck him, and he took another look at the tactical display. That's odd, I could've sworn the DDU hasn't deployed any more yet..."Wait - Leader to Three: what target?"
"Got a target on One-Two-Nine, Two-Three-Six, Blue - he's in range, an' he's mine. Closing to target, gonna pop 'im like a soap bubble!"
With a sudden feeling of dread, Mark queried the Drone Deployment Unit's telemetry; it confirmed his awful suspicion.
Only three drones had been deployed so far. The fourth was still being prepped for launch!
That had to mean -
No! Dear God, NO!
"Harmony!" he called urgently, fear for his youngest daughter stabbing at him. "Break off! That one's REAL!"
But it was too late.
Moonbase, Control Sphere
One second later
RED ALERT! RED ALERT! UFO on positive track, bearing One-Two-Nine, Two-Three-Six, Blue, speed SOL 6 and reducing, SID reported urgently. Range: 200,000 miles and closing! Repeat: UFO is within defensive boundary! RED ALERT!
For barely half a second, everyone in the Control Sphere was paralysed with shock. Then the Control Room exploded into feverish activity.
"Tracking!" Joan called out sharply, her fingers flying nimbly over her keyboard. "Contact confirmed! Trajectory confirmed!"
Nina showed an uncharacteristic degree of nervousness as she cried, "Jesus Christ! It's right on top of us!"
"Harmony, get out of there!" Gay yelled, frantic. "SID, where the hell did it come from?!"
Unknown at present, SID responded, UFO maintaining course and closing.
"Harmony, we can't cover you!" Mark cried, as he and Lew embarked on a desperate high-G turn without waiting for orders, ignoring the strident warnings of their flight computers. "Vector off! Select Zone Five and make the turn!"
"I can't," Harmony reported tensely, "he's too close! If I break off, he'll be all over me!" There was no fear evident in her young voice, only determination, as she finished: "Going for intercept."
Glances of worry and doubt were exchanged throughout the Control Sphere and the whole of Moonbase at this announcement. As good as Harmony had already shown herself to be, she surely wasn't ready to tackle a real UFO yet.
Mark agreed. "Negative, Three! WAVE OFF! That's an order! Harmony -!"
But it was no longer possible, as SID's tactical projection showed. Nor were the other two Interceptors in any position to help; as was all too clear from the display, the UFO had deliberately drawn Harmony away from them. But Gay still demanded confirmation: "SID, intercept vector for Interceptor One?"
Intercept vector NEGATIVE; Interceptor One is out of range. Required course change would result in catastrophic stress and danger to pilot from excessive G-force.
That was true; the ICD dealt with most but not all of the G-force, and thus it was still a problem, which was why the new flight suits had been developed. The ICD could bend, but never break, the laws of physics, even in the pocket universe it created around the Interceptor. There had to be a certain amount of what the theoreticians called 'reality bleed', i.e. a leaking of the laws of the conventional space-time metric into the pocket universe...because if that were not the case, then that universe would become sealed in on itself, effectively turning into a black hole and making the Interceptor's escape impossible even if the ICD field was shut down. The practical upshot of this was that G-forces could not be entirely eliminated.
Minimum intercept time: 128 seconds, SID finished.
Gay's voice rose in fear for her baby girl as she ventured, "Interceptor Two?"
Intercept time: 113 seconds. Alert: UFO changing course; new bearing One-Two-Eight, Two-Three-Four, Blue, speed SOL 5. Predicted target: Interceptor Three, confirmed. UFO will enter strike range in thirty-eight seconds.
"What about you?" Gay snapped, knowing too well she was grasping at straws.
SID sounded almost regretful as it reported: This satellite's weapons are armed (Straker's doing, in 1988). However, UFO is out of range. Interceptor Three cannot rendezvous given current position and flight vector. Thirty seconds to UFO strike range.
"The relief pilots?"
Joan fielded that one. "They're on their way, Colonel, but they're too far out to help."
"Can we launch Beta Flight?" Gay suggested desperately. But Nina shook her head in despair.
"We can, but they won't get there in time to do any good. She's on her own, Colonel."
"Oh, God..."
Gay stared helplessly at the tactical display, and a relatively trivial thought crossed her mind:
How are we going to tell Cara her baby sister is...is...
Even in the privacy of her own head, she couldn't bring herself to say it.
None of them, however, had taken Harmony's courage, reflexes, quick thinking and natural skill into account in their pessimistic predictions of what was about to occur. Most people her age have a natural confidence and ebullience, a belief in their own invulnerability, but Harmony's had been stripped away by Phil's murder - she knew all too well how easily people could die.
Nonetheless, she wasn't too worried that she might.
Her confidence stemmed from her self-knowledge of her skills and her faith in her Dad's training, to say nothing of the capabilities of the beautiful machine she was flying. She'd already programmed onboard missiles for impact detonation; the UFO was closing steadily. She was, she knew only too well, going to get one and only one chance at this. It was so close she could see the damn thing.
It wasn't all she could see - a spot of light bloomed abruptly on the UFO's edge.
She correctly intuited what it meant -
Fuck, it's gonna fire!
- and jinked to port, just in time; the actinic blue-white energy bolt barely missed, vaporising the paint on her starboard wing and illuminating the cockpit briefly.
As it did, she had an idea.
It'll be way too close...but if I don't do somethin', I am so toast. I can't turn or he'll be up my ass, and not in a good way!
She quickly reprogrammed her missiles for proximity detonation with a thumbstroke on the joystick. "Eagle Three - Fox One, Fox One!" she cried, and fired twice, jinking again as she did so. 'Fox One', a traditional fighter pilot's term, meant in SHADO pilots' vernacular that the missiles were unguided, dumb. Their primary advantage was that they could fly much faster, as they weren't taking the time to constantly check their own or the target's position.
Guided missiles, 'Fox Twos', were much more accurate and virtually guaranteed to score a hit even at superluminal velocities, but the trade-off in speed could be a major factor in head-to-head engagements such as this one. She needed at least some distance between them to take the damn thing out - else it'd likely take her with it.
Assuming she could take it out, of course.
One missile was picked off by the UFO as she'd anticipated, but the other got through, detonating close in. The UFO was forced to swerve or be caught in the explosion, swinging rapidly back onto its attack vector once it was clear.
In doing so it passed briefly through her sight window, as she'd intended. For just a moment, it was square in her sights.
The spot of light bloomed again.
She knew instantly she had no chance of evading the blast. Nor would her ICD shield hold, not at this range.
It was far too close, but there was no other option.
She fired without hesitation.
The UFO also fired, but too late. Its blast set off the warhead just as the missile reached the UFO.
From Mark's helpless viewpoint, it appeared as if it were Harmony's Interceptor which had exploded into a colourful ball of flame and debris; it was strangely beautiful, considering it marked his youngest child's death. His scream of despair and loss was anguished, primal -
- and matched by his daughter's yell of triumph.
"Oh, yeah! Totally IN your FACE, creep! How'd you like that, huh?" she exulted, executing a spectacular triple roll as she emerged from the fiery bloom of nuclear destruction which was all that remained of the UFO. Her Interceptor was badly scorched and showed a degree of surface damage, but that was all; its shielding had mostly held despite the explosion's proximity.
No-one knew exactly how the Alien energy weapons could trigger nuclear explosives, but this wasn't the first time they'd seen it happen and Harmony wasn't the first Interceptor pilot to exploit the phenomenon to tactical advantage. Later examination showed internal radiation readings to be higher than usual background, as might be expected, but the levels were not dangerous - a few days of iodine supplements were all she needed in the way of anti-rad treatment, and the Interceptor's damage was purely superficial.
Certainly there was nothing wrong with her; she was still exultantly crowing, "Fox-One right up your skinny green ass! Eat hot nuclear death, alien scum!"
"What -? Harmony?!" Mark cried in shocked relief. He'd been sure they'd lost her.
"Whoo-HOO! Did you SEE that, you guys?! I SO got 'im!" She sobered, and impishly reported, "I - I mean, uh, Interceptor Three to Leader: target destroyed, sir."
SID reported belatedly:
Detonation positive. UFO destruction confirmed. No other contacts detected within sensor range. Stand down from Red Alert.
Contrary to all military protocol, cheers and spontaneous hugs broke out in Moonbase Control and, indeed, all over Moonbase. It was the closest Gay ever came to crying on duty.
SHADO HQ, Commander's Office
Eight hours later
Initially, for his part, Kelly had only one, furious question: "WHERE THE FUCK DID IT COME FROM?!"
"I - I don't know, sir," Gay told him lamely, unable to meet his eyes, "we're still working on that."
"It got within two hundred thousand miles before being detected! Where the hell were Moonbase and SID - asleep?! I want Moonbase on full alert until you've got the answer," he snapped. "Interceptors are to maintain constant patrol until then, or until I order otherwise. Deploy the surface defences, too, just in case. Ground all cadets until further notice."
"I already gave those orders before leaving Moonbase, sir," she murmured contritely; they'd seemed only obvious and sensible - in several important respects she and the Commander thought much alike. So she'd simply given the orders she knew he would have. Then she found the courage to ask: "Sir, what about Cadet Bradley?"
The change of subject discombobulated him somewhat. "What about her?"
"She disobeyed a direct order," Gay answered, more assured now. "Her flight clearance is revoked. I intend to hold a disciplinary hearing -"
"No," Kelly interrupted flatly.
Gay stared at him as if she'd suddenly discovered he was an Alien. "Sir?"
"No," he repeated. "On what grounds are you going to charge her? As I recall, she got the damn thing."
"She disobeyed a direct order from her squadron leader," Gay protested. "Surely that's all I need?"
"Oh, let's not discuss the real issue," Kelly retorted, seeing where she was going and why. She'd inadvertently given the game away with that last bit of phraseology. "If the hearing finds against her she'll be grounded, probably permanently - thus 'vindicating' your original position." He glared at her. "A position, we both know full well, which was based more on your concern for her as your daughter than on any operational considerations!"
Forgetting herself, Gay snapped, "How dare you?!"
"I'm the Commander of SHADO," he shot back coldly, "that's how, Colonel!"
There was a shocked pause, as if neither could believe what the other had said.
But Kelly wasn't in the mood for this; they'd both gone too far there, and they both knew it. He sighed and rubbed his aching forehead. "Gay, let's take this off the record and dial it down a notch or two, eh? Sit down, please."
She didn't reply or move at first, but the sincere contrition in his voice, and the look in his eyes, moved her to sigh in turn and nod in assent, and so she sat.
"Your argument has always been that she's too young to serve on the front line...although she wasn't too young to score a kill, apparently. Look, from a human standpoint I agree with you, dammit - she is too bloody young!" Kelly admitted freely. "But we have to look at this from SHADO's perspective, too, and the brutal truth of it is that she's the most skilled natural Interceptor pilot we've seen since - well, since Mark, to be blunt. We need that kind of talent, especially as I'm pretty sure, and TAPS agrees, she'll eventually make as good an instructor as she is a pilot."
"Sir, she disobeyed orders," Gay protested again, refusing to let go of the issue.
But Kelly had had enough; he barked, "Oh, for God's sake, Gay! Did you actually review the tactical logs? I doubt it - if you had, you'd have seen she had no choice!"
"I'm sorry?" Gay asked in honest surprise.
"TacCom," Kelly ordered briskly, "access flight logs, Interceptor Three - last engagement. Display on my station. Here," he indicated, turning the screen for her as the Tactical Computer obeyed his order, "we have the Moon, SID, and the Interceptors, with the Drone Deployment Unit here. The UFO came in on this vector, passing the DDU, and got well within our defence envelope before being picked up.
"Harmony changed course to intercept, thinking it was another target drone - an entirely understandable assumption given its vector; it must've looked as if the DDU had deployed it, which I'm sure was their intention - so she took this vector." The display showed how close Harmony's Interceptor and the UFO had been. "At this point it was realised the UFO was real. Now, what was she supposed to do?"
"Take evasive action," Gay answered instantly. "For a cadet under instruction, standing orders are never to engage an incoming UFO in the unlikely event," she paused ruefully, but Kelly made no comment, "that it gets that close undetected."
"I've never agreed with that," he growled sourly, shaking his head irritably. "The Aliens don't care if they kill an experienced pilot or a rookie; they'd be more after the Interceptor than whoever's piloting it. Remind me to rescind those orders, Gay - damned if I know how they got into the regs in the first place," he mused. "In the meantime, go on."
After rising and studying the tactical display briefly, Gay decided, "She could've selected...let's see...Zone One, Two or...yes, Five, to turn and escape." The display changed to delineate the escape vectors she had suggested as she keyed in the relevant commands. She stepped back from the console and resumed her seat, and Kelly nodded at the display, realising the error she had made...and Harmony had not.
"All well and good, Gay...except for just one thing." She gazed at him in puzzlement. "She was flying an L-79, not an L-80," he pointed out tersely.
Gay paled.
"Oh, God...so she was," she now recalled numbly. Somehow she'd forgotten that, but it changed everything.
Harmony should have been flying the newest production model, the L-80, which had been developed and finalised two years ago - and had in fact been slated to do so - but literally minutes before launch Interceptor Three had demonstrated a peculiar instability in her avionics. On detecting this, the ONDAS (ONboard Diagnostic Analysis System) had immediately declared her UTF, 'Unfit To Fly', and locked her controls as a safety measure, automatically informing Moonbase Control and Captain/Flight Leader Bradley of its action.
Given the fact that a UFO had subsequently shown up, they were both wondering now if this really was the coincidence they'd thought it was. It was unlikely SHADO harboured Alien saboteurs, especially on Moonbase, but unfortunately not impossible.
However, it wasn't possible for Harmony to fly one of the relief L-80s for the simple reason that, as per standard procedure, the relief squadron was already on patrol in order to provide cover to Moonbase until the exercise was concluded...in case any UFOs showed up.
Putting her in an L-79 was the next best thing - certainly events had transpired in such a way that she would surely have been killed had she been flying an L-77 or the L-78 prototype and only able to fire once, to say nothing of the speed disadvantage. The older Interceptors were being retained temporarily purely for training purposes, serving primarily to teach basic flight manoeuvres, but once SHADO's funding permitted the construction of more L-80s, the L-77s and L-79s would be honourably retired and decommissioned. As a precautionary measure in case UFOs did show up, the instructors always flew the newest craft.
"Yeah, the L-79 doesn't have the same turn capability and isn't as fast," Kelly remarked, though of course Gay already knew that. "Watch what would've happened if she'd selected Zone One..."
The display showed the simulated Interceptor struggling to make the required turn, G-forces approaching critical levels. The UFO had no such problem, and fifty-two seconds later it achieved a kill position and fired a shot straight up Harmony's tailpipe. Her simulated Interceptor blew up in a simulated explosion.
"Zone Two, same story. Forty-eight seconds after she's started the escape turn, the UFO's in a position to deliver a broadside shot. At that range there's no way it would've missed. As for Zone Five, the best option of the three..." Again, the Interceptor could not make the turn and still escape; its icon was tagged with a red warning label indicating excessive G-forces exerted on the pilot.
"Even wearing one of the new flight suits, which she wasn't as it shouldn't have been needed during a live fire exercise - hmm, we should revise that regulation, too - she'd likely have passed out for a few seconds. During that time, the UFO could then take this vector and go for a tail shot, counting on her failure to evade, or continue on its original vector and be perfectly set up for a broadside sixty-five seconds after she'd started her turn. Either way, she'd have been toast; Mark and Lew were too far away to help."
"Oh, I see...yes," Gay admitted.
"So the intercept vector was in fact her only real option. If the UFO had been detected even twenty seconds earlier, she could have selected Zone Five and gunned it for rendezvous with One and Two, or even with SID. But it wasn't; it was too close for her to escape on any vector. In my judgement, therefore, Cadet Bradley's actions were entirely correct and justified by the tactical situation.
"The usual reason an officer disobeys an order, I've noticed from history, is because s/he is possessed of information the CO didn't have when giving the order. In this case, Harmony remembered she was flying an earlier Interceptor model...but you did not. You, and possibly Mark as well, were essentially counting on her to perform a manoeuvre which she knew was impossible!"
"That...that's true, sir," Gay conceded. She knew it was true because she knew the L-79 and its capabilities better than almost anyone.
After all, she'd helped design the thing.
"In any case, I for one would rather a pilot disobey an order, saving herself and her Interceptor in the process, than blindly obey it and pay the price for not exercising the judgement required by the situation at hand," he emphasised that last. "Thus there will be no disciplinary proceedings. Am I clear, Colonel?"
She didn't reply immediately. He knew from her anguished expression that her ingrained sense of duty was fighting a thermonuclear war with her equally strong maternal instincts. She wanted Harmony grounded to keep her as safe as she could be, while knowing she was being entirely unfair. But 'I was only following orders' was not an acceptable excuse for unacceptable conduct in SHADO; Ed Straker had seen to that. He'd never wanted unthinking automatons in SHADO, and Kelly shared his sensibilities on that score, in spades.
Any officers who couldn't think for themselves and exercise their judgement, going By The Book all the time, were liabilities at best and serious dangers at worst. He wasn't a military man as Ed had been, but he knew that there were times an officer had to disobey orders. The kicker, of course, was that s/he had to be certain it was the right and proper thing to do, a decision usually based upon information the CO didn't possess but the situation was such that there wasn't time to impart it to said CO.
On the other hand it was unlikely Harmony had given the matter a moment's thought, actually. She'd simply gone with her instincts...as had every natural fighter pilot in history before her.
And she'd been right to do so. The flight log analysis proved it beyond question.
"Gay," he asked, more gently, "am I clear?"
Finally she sighed. She was entirely in the wrong, and had to admit it now. "Yes, sir; I'll have her flight clearance reinstated immediately."
"Oh, I think you can do more than that. Effective immediately, she's to be awarded her wings," he ordered firmly. "Not only that, but I want her included on that patrol roster. They'll need every qualified pilot available, and it'll be useful experience for her."
"You mean - declare her as a qualified pilot?"
Kelly nodded.
"Commander," she pointed out feebly, "she hasn't even finished her training!"
"So what?" he shrugged. "This has always been a possibility: that a cadet on a training flight could end up in a real dogfight. That's one of the two reasons cadets use real nukes. You know, one of these days," he swore savagely, "I'll figure out just how the hell the Aliens keep gate-crashing our live fire exercises!"
He felt an old scar, an unwanted souvenir of just such an event, twinge slightly (as it always did whenever he thought about that day; both Jackson and Harriet insisted this was psychosomatic, but he wasn't so sure...).
"Gay, hasn't it always been the unwritten rule among the Interceptor pilots that a rookie remains a cadet until s/he scores a kill? Make The Kill, Make The Grade, isn't that what they say?"
That was true, Gay knew, and so she nodded. The tradition, one of many to which the pilots subscribed, had arisen naturally, as these things always tended to do among combat pilots; there was no regulation to that effect but Gay, like many a commanding officer before her, was wise enough not to interfere with such matters. Combat pilots, especially Interceptor pilots, were a breed unto themselves, with their own unwritten - but utterly binding - rules, mores and customs.
Any pilot who hadn't yet scored a kill was still treated and addressed as 'Cadet', even if they'd gone a year without a kill after finishing flight training - that was the current record, though the pilot in question had finally gotten his chance and quickly caught up to his peers during two months of virtual blitzkrieg when the Aliens mounted an attempt at siege tactics against Moonbase.
"But it goes the other way, too: a trainee who's scored a kill can't be called a cadet," Kelly continued. "If we deny her, we denigrate every other Interceptor pilot, and that can only hurt morale. Believe me, we cannot afford that."
"I suppose not, sir," Gay conceded.
"On the other hand," he shrugged, "you're absolutely right - she hasn't finished her training yet. So just list her as a pilot under instruction, or something like that. But the one thing she is not, not any more," he finished sternly, "is a cadet. She made a kill - that alone qualifies her. It wasn't luck, it was sheer skill - and nerve."
"Yes, sir," Gay surrendered. It was true, and she knew it. She'd lost this one.
His face and voice softened on seeing her defeated, worried expression. "Gay, we need her. She's clearly a natural; she responded in exactly the way we'd have expected from a seasoned pilot - she instantly and correctly evaluated the situation, exercised cool judgement and employed masterly and, I might add, highly effective tactics. Hell," he mused, "I don't think even Mark could've done better."
Nor do I, Gay thought ruefully, though she was loath to admit it out loud. She was, if truth be told, torn between worry and pride; Harmony's superb performance, quick thinking and coolness under fire had frankly amazed her.
"We can't afford to waste or sideline that kind of talent," Kelly concluded, "not now."
He cursed mildly to himself for the slip caused by stress and fatigue; no-one other than Alec was supposed to know yet about his ongoing concerns re the Aliens' long-term strategy, though he'd decided to tell Paul and Virginia once they returned from furlough. But Gay was too keenly observant to miss such a slip, of course; she asked quietly, "So the rumours are true, sir? We are expecting an invasion?"
He sighed resignedly and outlined the latest tactical analyses, emphasising that she wasn't to discuss them with anyone since nothing was certain and they were dealing in probabilities only. But he'd underestimated her own analytical skills somewhat; she nodded and said, "I'd reached similar conclusions myself based on recent UFO activity patterns; this latest attack fits - most likely it was a field test of whatever new technique they're using, with the possible bonus of an Interceptor's destruction."
"Find out how they did it, Gay," he entreated her with quiet urgency, "and fast. Obviously, if they did it once -"
"- they can do it again," she agreed grimly, "and then they just might take the chance for once of repeating a near-successful tactic."
"They might indeed," he concurred, "and next time it might work. Unless we figure it out."
She stood with a new determination. "We're on it, Commander."
A few hours later she and the Moonbase staff arrived at the answer after gathering, processing and analysing every scrap of data relating to the incident. When the UFO's trajectory was carefully backtracked it was discovered to have passed directly through the L4 position, for "no readily apparent reason -" the researcher addressing Gay began.
"No! They never do anything without a good reason," Gay interrupted grimly. "Check it out immediately!"
Though it had been proposed many times no space station had yet been established there, or at the corresponding L5 point, and so it had been of little importance to SHADO - until Moonbase R & D abruptly discovered that it formed a natural blind spot to Utronic beams. If a UFO kept this spot between itself and SID, the satellite would never see it. There was also some degree of interaction with the L4 Kordylewski Dust Cloud, one of Earth's two so-called 'extra moons'.
L4 was a gravitational focal point, and tests showed that the conflux of gravitational forces was sufficient to affect Utronic transmissions; the UFO had used the effect to completely evade detection until the last moment. To the shock of the Moonbase command personnel, when an LM (with Interceptors, including Harmony's, flying escort) arrived at L4, it disappeared from every Utronic scanner for several seconds until it passed beyond the range of the effect. It turned out that Harmony's targeting scanner had only picked up the UFO at all because she was so close to it.
Professor Phyllis Anderson, Moonbase R & D's Director, sheepishly admitted that this phenomenon shouldn't really have been surprising; the clear link between gravitation and Utronic theory had been established by the derivation of the artificial gravity theory from Virginia Lake's original research. Utronic transmissions were affected by space-time curvature, i.e. gravity, much as electromagnetic waves were - just not to the same degree or anywhere near it, and not in quite the same way.
It wasn't long before a simple countermeasure was devised, in the form of a small Utronic radar relay equipped with station-keeping thrusters, linked via Utronic beam to SID. A similar relay was placed at L5, which also showed the effect. While a UFO could of course destroy either or both, the loss of signal would obviously alert SID, which could then immediately deploy a replacement and declare Red Alert.
Kelly's only, sour comment when the Alien tactic was elucidated was:
"They don't miss a trick, do they?"
Moonbase Control
"After that," Kelly told Ibáñez, "we had to make her a pilot. That's the Interceptor pilots' unwritten rule: Make The Kill, Make The Grade."
"And she did make the kill," Ibáñez remarked, nodding.
"Direct hit," Kelly confirmed, "without computing a trajectory first, at that. Of course the missile she launched was a Fox One, i.e. unguided, but it was so close it didn't need to manoeuvre anyway. Gay," he smiled at her, "and Moonbase's R & D team worked out pretty quickly how the UFO slipped in like that, and devised a countermeasure."
"As has happened before," Ibáñez recalled, "I've read briefings about other such exchanges. An ongoing arms race, is it not?"
"Damn right," Kelly agreed grimly.