Rescue Mode - eARC Read Free Page B

the best hydrogen-oxygen rockets. It’s actually a lot safer with the nuke, saves us months of travel time.”
    Suppressing a wince at the word “nuke,” Treadway forced a smile as Benson pointed out the ship’s propellant tanks, the payload section that held the smaller vehicle that would actually land on Mars, the square flat panels of the radiators that got rid of the ship’s excess heat and the bigger, darker oblongs of the solar panels that would generate electrical power for the spacecraft.
    “Why the solar panels?” Treadway asked. “Doesn’t the nuclear reactor generate electrical power?
    With a shake of his head, Benson replied, “The reactor is for propulsion only. It’s not bimodal. The engineers decided it would be too expensive and complicated to make it do both.”
    They slowly walked along the length of the spacecraft, the floating cameras following them, while Benson explained each segment of the ship.
    “How long is this bird, anyway?” Treadway asked.
    “Two hundred meters, from the end of the main thruster nozzle to the tip of her nose,” said Benson.
    “Two hundred meters . . .”
    Benson’s lips twitched in what might have been a smile. “That’s right, you Americans aren’t accustomed to the metric system.” He frowned in silence for a moment, then said, “It’s roughly six hundred and fifty-six feet.”
    “About an eighth of a mile.” Treadway grinned, a trifle smugly. I can do arithmetic in my head, too, he told Benson silently.
    Smiling back at him, Benson said, “Yes. Almost two and a half football fields.”
    As they neared the spacecraft’s front end, Benson pointed to the metal gridwork boom that held the various attached components.
    “The truss is the ship’s spine,” he explained. “It’s got to be strong, yet light.”
    Playing the straight man, Treadway asked, “What’s it made of?”
    “MWNT,” answered Benson. Before Treadway could respond, he explained, “Multi-walled carbon nano tubes. Four times stronger than the best metal alloys, yet lighter than any of them.”
    “Nano tubes?”
    “Like Buckeyball fibers.”
    “Oh.”
    At last they reached the habitation module, a smallish cylinder near the front end of the spacecraft.
    “Eight men and women are going to live in that little bubble for nearly two years?” Treadway prompted.
    “It’s not that little,” said Benson. “There’s a privacy cubicle for each member of the crew, plus a wardroom, control center, workshop and labs, and an observation blister.”
    “Can we go into the habitation module?”
    On that cue, Benson replied, “Not the one in the mockup, up there. But we have another mockup of the module by itself, over there.” He pointed across the floor. “We can go inside that one.”
    “Cut!” cried the director, from behind the monitor set up in the corner of the hangar. “Take ten and re-spot the cameras. We’ll pick it up inside the module.”
    Treadway gave Benson a reassuring pat on the shoulder. “You’re doing fine. Great.”
    Benson grimaced. “I’d rather have a root canal.”
    The director pressed his hand against the communications bud in his ear, then said to Treadway, “New York’s happy. They think we’ll getthe biggest chunk of VR Netviewers when this airs tonight.”
    Treadway broke into a genuinely pleased grin.
    It was a tight squeeze inside the habitation module, with three of the cameras bobbing along with them. The director had squeezed into the module, too, telling them he wouldn’t miss this opportunity—at least not for anything less than an Emmy award.
    The module was compact, but efficiently laid out. Benson showed them the control center, with its consoles and display screens, the workshop and minuscule laboratory for the two geologists and their one biologist. Then they went a few more steps back, to the wardroom.
    Treadway looked at the circular table and eight chairs.
    “Chairs? They don’t have chairs in the International Space Station.