Disclaimer: see chapter one
AN: Lucky me. My brother was so nice, and he let me borrow his computer for a few hours since he had no course work. You rock, dude!
Should probably warn you, there is a little bit of strong language in this chapter.
Chapter Eight- The Blame Game
"We're venting something. It could be rocket fuel."
Horror filled every single flight operator in Houston. Chaos ruled, as people tapped mercilessly away on their data panels.
"Alright people!" Gene ordered. "Listen up! There are a variety of things they could be venting. I want to find out what it is, and I want to know it quick! No guesswork! Definite facts! Let's work the problem, not make it worse by far-fetched guesswork." He paced up and down, his head screwed up in concentration.
"It's some sort of gas, not a liquid." Jeff's crackled voice came through the speakers. "It's like a fine mist. Houston, I think it's safe to assume the gas is oxygen."
"OK Orbita, we are going to confirm your assumption." Gene strode over to the oxygen tank panel, and leaned over the engineers. "Orbita, we have confirmed. You are losing oxygen at a steady rate. We will try and find a way to fix the leak. In the meantime, close all tanks down. We cannot risk an explosion."
"Copy that. Shutting down all tanks. Orbita 13 out." The link between mission control and Orbita 13 broke.
Gene turned around, only to find over three hundred pairs of eyes staring at him. "I believe a change in our mission plan is needed." He pulled a marker board towards him, and drew two circles, one slightly smaller and higher than the other one, representing the Earth and the moon. Above the moon, he marked an X. "This is where our men are. I want them to come all the way down here," Gene dashed small hyphen sized lines on the board towards the South Pacific. "Alive, and with fuel and oxygen to spare. Any questions?"
One hand crept up into the air. "What scenarios are certainties, and which ones can we speculate on?"
"Worst case scenario. Go with the worst case scenario until we receive an update."
Once again, babble broke out, the most common phases being thrown around were 'Orbita can't do that' and 'it won't work, there's not much we can do now.'
"Listen people!" Gene roared over the din. "I don't care what any part of Orbita was designed to do; I care about what it can do! Tank engineers; design a makeshift plug out of everything in this box. Get the square peg to fit in the round hole. That's all our men have up there." He shoved a box at the nearest tank engineer. "Hurry. They may not have a lot of time."
For the first time in his whole lunchtime swimming training session, Gordon couldn't move. He was frozen, petrified.
An announcement had just filtered over the school speakers. There had been reports of an explosion on Orbita 13. There were rumours and speculation about the death of the astronauts onboard Orbita 13.
"Gordon," Coach Evans kneeled in front of him. "If you want to stop and get out now, I will understand."
Gordon swallowed past the painful lump that had formed in his throat. "No, Coach, I'm fine."
"Gordon, take five minutes. Get yourself together."
"I said I was fine!" Gordon shouted, his voice reverberating around the pool, causing the other elite swimmers to stop. "I'll keep on swimming until my quota's done!"
Coach Evans nodded in understanding. "Alright Gordon, get going. Three more perimeter laps freestyle, two more butterfly and then the warm down laps."
Virgil's fingers dropped onto the piano keys, ruining his whole piece. He was frozen to the core. Not that Virgil believed the rumours. His dad would be fine. His dad had promised him he would be there for his first concert.
'Dad, I know you're up there,' he thought. 'I'm holding you to the promise you made. Please Dad, I'll play the best damned concert you'll ever hear. Just come back soon.'
John's script slid from his hands. He was in the middle of an English lesson, and his class were putting on a performance of The Merchant of Venice.
"John," the new English teacher prompted. "It's your line."
John shook his head. "No."
"John, is there something wrong?"
"He's not dead!" John yelled. "He can't be!" Silent tears trickled down John's cheek, and he wiped them away angrily, not wanting his classmates to see his tears. "He promised he's come back. He promised."
Scott could feel his hands curling into fists. Anger bubbled and boiled. He knew something bad would happen on this space mission. But he'd never expect this. Not in a million years.
"Lies." Scott whispered. "All lies."
Tom and Jack just looked at each other. What could you say to your best friend, who had just been told his father was possibly dead?
"He's not dead. None of them are. Those reports are lies."
"Houston, this is Orbita."
"We are receiving you loud and clear, Orbita."
"Have you got a solution for us? We'd also like re-entry procedures."
Gene hesitated. "Not yet, Jack. We're still working on it."
He lowered the microphone away from his mouth. "Get me the plug procedures! Who was working on re-entry?"
"We can't." An assistant faltered. "We haven't found solutions for either yet. I can get you an estimate, though."
"I don't want another estimate, dammit!" Gene roared. "I want the procedures! NASA's never lost men in space, and they won't lose any on my watch! The word failure does not exist anymore!"
Frightened, the assistant moved away. "I'll see what I can do."
"Thank you." Gene lifted his microphone to his mouth. "Don't worry men, we'll get you them soon enough. In the meantime, we want you to go into the LLC and stay there."
Pulling his mike away from his mouth, Jack turned to his flight partner. "Nothing. They have absolutely nothing for us." Jack made no attempt to hide the venom in his voice.
"I'm sure they're doing their best." Jeff soothed, re-reading his emergency procedures manual, sitting in his command chair in the Command Module. "This must be a first for NASA."
"No kidding, Jeff." Jack replied sourly.
"Guys, guys, have they got something for us?" Nick crawled up from the LLC. Both Jeff and Jack shook their head. "Listen, they're not going to get something to us. They can't. Our trajectory's wrong. We try and use the moon's gravity to slingshot us around, and we'll skim straight off Earth's atmosphere."
Jack and Jeff stared stupidly at Nick. "How'd you work that out?"
"I'm not stupid! I can add!"
"Nick, they have half the PhDs in the country working to save us. We'll be OK." Jeff reassured.
"Yeah," Jack agreed. "Houston says we're right on course."
"And what if they made a mistake, huh? And there was no way of correcting it. You honestly think they'd tell us?" Nick retorted; his temper frayed. "There's no reason for them to tell us! Why should they? It's not going to make that much of a difference, is it?"
"What are you saying, they won't tell us? That's bull and you know it." Jack responded hotly, his temper about to fray as well.
"Nick, we have just over nine hundred things to do. We are on number thirteen. You are talking about number eight hundred and ninety nine." Jeff interjected calmly.
"Meanwhile I'm trying to tell you they've made a mistake on our course. I'm trying to tell you we'll skim off Earth's atmosphere. NASA knows it, and that's why we don't have a damned entry plan!"
Jeff drew in a deep breath, his nostrils flaring out. "That's duly noted, thank you Nick."
Knowing it was futile to try and reason with them, Nick turned around, banging his head on the tunnel linking the LLC and the Command Module. "OW!" He howled. "Useless piece of shit!"
"Hey!" Jack yelled, his temper finally snapping into two. "This piece of shit is the thing that'll get us home. 'Cause that's the only thing we have now!"
"And what is that supposed to mean, Jack?" Nick spat.
"Oh, I think you know what I'm saying." Jack narrowed his stormy eyes.
"Now hang on, all I did was stir the tanks."
"What were the readings before you hit the switch?"
"Don't tell me how to do my job!" Nick flared. "They told me to stir the tanks, so I did!"
"You didn't do any of the checks or gauge readings, did you?" Jack asked rhetorically. You didn't know what the hell you were doing! Now look at the mess we're in!"
"Nick," Jeff said quietly. "Stop blaming yourself, OK? It's not solving anything."
Nick ignored Jeff. "This is NOT my fault!" He roared, staring straight at Jack.
"No-one is saying it is you're fault." Jeff placated. "If I was in the command chair, I would've stirred the tanks."
"Yeah, well, tell him that." Nick jerked his head towards Jack.
Jack held up his hands. "All I asked was for the gauge readings. And he DOESN'T know!"
"We're not doing this, gentlemen. We are NOT going to play the blame game here! We are NOT going to lose our tempers, because that doesn't solve anything! Try to stay alive, people!" Jeff yelled, silencing them all.
"Orbita, this is Houston. Do you read?"
"Are we on link?" Jeff shouted.
"No we are not on link with Houston."
"Yes Houston, of course we read." Jeff joked calmly into the mike. "We also watch TV and play video games. What have you got for us?"
"We want you to shut down the engines in the Command Module, Nick. There's no way we can fix the Command Module. Jeff and Jack, we want you to re-route the remaining oxygen back into the Lunar Landing Capsule. That piece of tin just became your lifeline."
"Nick to shut down Command Module, and Jack and me to re-route remaining oxygen into the LLC." Jeff paused. "Houston, do you have a re-entry for us?"
"Not yet. We'll let you know as soon as we get one. Houston, over and out."
"Nick, get to it." Jeff ordered, before swimming up the tunnel.
"Told you. Told you they didn't have a plan." Nick muttered under his breath, after making sure Jack and Jeff were out of earshot. He worked in silence, morosely shutting down and turning off all the engines and support machines. The last thing Nick had to turn off was the lights. The Command Module was plunged into darkness. "Houston, all machines have been turned off. There is no power running right now in the Command Module."
"Good work, Nick. Now, get yourself up to the LLC."
"Roger that." Nick looked around the broken, darkened shadows surrounding him. "This is Orbita 13, Command Module, signing off."
AN: Like Shaking Foundations, this story may not have super fast updates. I just have to see when my brother feels like sharing his computer with me. I apologize in advance for the long gaps in updating. Please review.