Chapter 4
Stokes stalked the Zvezda module impatiently as he waited for Houston to get back to him on his earlier report. The images he'd observed were still inconclusive to him and his colleagues working on the ISS, even their resident Cosmologist was baffled by his discovery. Nadya watched him curiously as he tapped absently on the wall of the living chamber while staring out of one of the view ports. She had been confused by the images that he'd shown her, nothing similar had shown up on her telemetry at the Russian side of the station, she had even scanned the same area twice in an attempt to validate his findings, but had found nothing out of the ordinary. "You must be patient Philippe." Stokes glanced at her; the Russian Cosmonaut was the only one who called him by his full first name, his French heritage proudly displayed by his mother who had moved to New York in her early twenties when she'd married his father. He was born in America and hated the name; he preferred Phil or Stokes, his surname a product of that marriage into a well respected American family, but when Russian Cosmologist Nadya Cherenkov spoke, her soft Russian accent almost made the name sound appealing to his ears. He sighed agitatedly as he gently turned to face her worried gaze.
"I know, I know... I just can't think what's taking them so long, it was a routine request for a space walk to fix the imaging sensors, if we don't do it soon the lenses will need replacing and it'll be months before that can be arranged, and we need to know if those images are real or simply sensor ghosts or even debris, there's so much junk floating around up here if something snags our outer shell we'll be in real trouble."
Stephen Porter piped up from his bunk, "There was static over the comms, maybe they're having trouble on their end. You need to relax Stokes; you know what base is like. They will do everything in their own time. "
"Have you asked the Commander if he will authorize you to do the space walk anyway? If I assist you, it shouldn't take more than an hour or so." Nadya spoke up softly; her voice had a soothing effect on the two men, being the only woman on the ISS at the current time, her sharp intellect and dark humour were often a light relief from Frederick's gruff demeanor and their flight Commander Rick Trent's intense seriousness in all situations, even the routine ones, but that was why he was the Commander.
"No..." Stokes pulled a face, "I was trying to put it off, if I had the ok from base he wouldn't have a problem, but I doubt he's going to let me do an unscheduled space walk without prior authorization. He will only start grilling me, about regulations and the dangers of dying in space, like I haven't heard it all before."
Nadya smiled warmly, "I will ask him." She place a hand on his arm as she glided past, "Be patient Philippe." Stokes opened his mouth to stop her, but then closed it again for lack of any better ideas. He shrugged, "Good luck with him, you'll need it."
Flight Commander Rick Trent, did in fact take his job very seriously, having come from a long line of working class men who had toiled long days in factories during Britain's industrial and technological revolutions, he was very proud of the fact he was the only one in his family to go to University, it was even more amazing that he had been chosen out of all other outstanding graduates to partake in an apprentice scheme run by M.I.T, completing the course at the top of his class, he had chosen to join the Royal air force rather than pursue a promising aerospace engineering career. This had put him in good stead when he had decided to retire from the R.A.F. Returning to civilian life to teach Aerospace Engineering and Space Flight; an Engineer's History, at Harvard. He had managed to gain connections to NASA, and after five years he had been declared an American citizen and had once again enrolled in the Air force, this time the US air force, with the sole ambition of becoming an Astronaut. Being one of the leading consultants on the design of the shuttle crafts' space flight capabilities and engine designs he was considered nothing short of a genius by his colleagues, if however, a little reclusive and strange. Rick Trent chose to spend any leave away from civilization, he had a special little place located in the Rocky Mountains, a nice little log cabin of his own where he loved to spend his free time, reading, fishing and hiking. A professional climber, Rick was in the peak of health and fitness and at forty nine years old he could put a lot of his younger colleagues to shame. Preferring the strength of the mind Rick Trent was not one for show boating or any deviation from the set rules and regulations that they had to abide by as Astronauts. This sometimes put him at loggerheads with his more boisterous and eager colleagues, especially Phil Stokes, who although being a perfectly competent Astronaut and one with an astounding brain to boot, had the knack of getting under the Commander's skin with his impractical sense of humour and head strong attitude.
Working quietly with the Japanese Astronaut Maeda Shimizu on the current reoccurring technical problems in the Japanese Pressurized Module of the ISS, they diligently tried to repair the faults in some of their circuitry in order to get the Kibō Japanese Experiment Module Laboratory working to full efficiency again. Trent preferred to work with the quiet Shimizu, always perfectly polite and respectful and extremely logical, he never spoke out of turn and only ever spoke if he had something important to say. They needed no discussion, they were both experts in their respective fields, but these circuitry problems had occurred out of nowhere with no warning and no explanations, the Japanese module had to be isolated to prevent the spread of the electronic failures to the rest of the modules, which would prove to be a serious problem if not dealt with swiftly. Trent was determined to rectify the situation, always one to be in control he loathed anything that didn't have an explanation, he enjoyed a good challenge, but when the lives of his crew were at stake, he took no chances. Intent on his work he did not notice Nadya glide gracefully to his side until she placed a delicate looking hand on his arm. He looked up expectantly,
"Is there a problem Ms Cherenkov?" He eyed her curiously, his slight British accent betraying no amicability, so focused he was on the task at hand.
"I would like to carry out a space walk, to fix the aft telescopic lenses on the far side of the station. If it is debris, it could snag the outer shell and cause more problems for you to fix. If it is not then the lenses themselves could be damaged and most of Philippe Stokes's work will be obsolete for the remainder of our 6 months up here."
"Have we received word from Houston?" He enquired curtly.
"Nyet, they have not responded to numerous attempts at communication."
"Why do you need to fix his telescope?"
She smiled warmly, "I require it for research and comparative data for my cosmological analyses. It would not please my government if I had to put my work on hold for defective American equipment. Besides would it not be better to have Philippe occupied while you maintain repairs on various systems, it better to have him off station for two hours no?" Still smiling, her eyes danced playfully in amusement, well aware of the older man's vague dislike of his American colleague. Trent clenched his jaw tightly; he hated to allow unscheduled space walks, but his dissatisfaction of having Stokes wondering around the station for 6 months with next to nothing to do bothered him even more.
"You have two hours. Get out, fix it and get back in. Get Fred Zeiger to monitor your progress from the command centre. I want a report when you're done." Nadya nodded curtly before vacating the module leaving the Commander and Shimizu to their work.
All Stokes could think about as he stepped into the air lock with Nadya, was how he had once blacked out in an underwater training exercise due to having a mild Claustrophobic episode in his cramped space suit. It nearly had him stricken from the program, he had forced himself to overcome this one fear that he'd never had complete control of and had made sure it had never happened again. 'Great time to be thinking about that.' He thought with a grimace, as the vast emptiness of space came into view. The air lock door opened silently and the two tethered Astronauts gently pushed off into the vacuum.
"Lovely day for a stroll, no?" Nadya mused, her voice tinny over the comms system in the suit. Earth was spinning unnoticeably beneath them, a beautifully blue orb that always made Stokes catch a breath whenever he looked upon it with devotion and awe. He followed his companion, "Yeah, weather's just breezy out here, should've brought a picnic."
Nadya was all business as they gently floated towards the aft end of the space station, making sure to stay close to the shell and to use the hand grips at all times. Frederick Zeiger's deep, rumbling voice sounded quite subdued in their helmets.
"Your looking good out there, the sun will be coming into view in a few minutes as we shift to daylight orbit, get your visors down now." Both Astronauts complied, even at this distance the Sun was still powerful enough to damage their retinas if they allowed themselves to be caught with their visors up. "We're coming round to the Astronomical platform now." Nadya voiced calmly, "Tethers are locked and we're tied down, heading out to the telescopic lenses, few more feet at least."
"Suits are at optimum, giving your thrusters a 2 second burst to make distance, face into the station." Zeiger was cool and collected. "Facing in Fred we're good to go here, you better not be doing one of your puzzles while we're out here working." Stokes was feeling jovial as he teased the German.
"I need to keep both eyes on the ball Stokes, just in case you have another panic attack and I have to pull you back in." Nadya chuckled lightly. "Hey! Below the belt man, why'd you have to go bring that up?"
"Don't dish it out if you can't take it Stokes." Frederick was audibly amused at having the upper hand for once; sitting back at the control centre he smirked as he watched carefully out of the view port all the while maintaining all the vitals for both space suits. "Thruster boost in T-minus 5 seconds. 4, 3, 2, 1" Their suits pushed away from the station sharply, the thrusters cut out almost as soon as they had started. "Alright Fred, we're in position. Getting a visual on the lenses now." Nadya updated as they went, both Astronauts took hold of the telescope and gently pulled themselves to face the imaging lenses. Stokes frowned, "I don't understand…"
"What is it?"
"The lense is fine, there's nothing wrong with it, no debris, dirt, scratches or nothing, it makes no sense."
"What caused your blurry images then?"
"They must have been actual telemetry."
"But that can't be…" Nadya's voice trailed off as Stokes slowly pivoted himself to face in the direction of the lenses. "It saw something, Nadya, something was out here." Stokes lowered his tone warily. He felt a tug at the bottom of his space suit, "Hey!"
Nadya turned sharply to face him, "What is it?"
"Something, just tugged me I felt it."
"This is not the time for jokes Mr Stokes." Nadya's tone was sombre and irritated, "I'm not really, hey!! It did it again what the hell!" Spinning round he pushed from the telescope sending himself further out from the station, his eyes met the glowing red optical sensors of a small metallic looking insect.
"What the hell is that!?" He exclaimed. Nadya turned to stare, her eyes wide with fear, her brain not registering what she was seeing, a loud electronic scream shot through their comm system. Crying out in pain and shock, the Astronauts clawed at their helmet, without thinking Nadya launched herself back to the platform the tether dragging the shocked Stokes behind her.
"Stokes! Come on, move! I can't drag you the tether will snap." Landing heavily against the platform she turned to stare at her comrade, her eyes caught sight of the creature that had caused Stokes to freeze in fear. His voice sounded over the comm. "Don't do that, please don't cut that…No…noooo!!!" In horror she watched as the evil metallic insect cut through their tethers and proceeded to cut through the tether tying Stokes to the station. "Nooooo!!!" Her voice pierced through the comm as the tethers gave way and Stokes unable to grab on to anything began to float away from the station. In a desperate attempt she pressed the booster button on the sleeve of her space suit, and clicked the manual override, activating it and with all her might launched herself at Stokes who was drifting away from her like a discarded rag doll. The creature pitched a screech before shooting back to the station and proceeding to rip off a small panel before crawling inside.