Blue Hope: (Book 2) (Red Hope) Read online

  “This is the lump-sum payment for Captain Alston’s life insurance policy. It is for twenty thousand dollars.”

  Connie looked scared.

  “There must be a mistake. I mean, I’m sure it was for five hundred thousand dollars. He told me it would be enough to cover college costs for the kids.”

  The man smiled.

  “Yes, but he went with the more affordable policy that didn’t cover accidental death and dismemberment.”

  “But how do you know that’s how he died?” Connie asked with a very upset shrill.

  “Well, in extreme circumstances like this, we have to assume he had a violent death.”

  “You can’t assume…”

  “Ma’am, he died on Mars for Christ’s sake. I assume violent is the only way you die on Mars.”

  “But you can’t just assume!”

  “Mrs. Alston, you are not going to win this argument.”

  Connie burst into tears. “No! This just can’t be happening. We need that money.”

  “You are the wife of a national hero, so let me give you some advice. Please don’t be greedy. I’ve seen this happen so many times, I was hoping you would be different. Think of it this way, you had nothing ten minutes ago and now you have twenty thousand dollars. People rob banks for less money than that.”

  He took the paperwork, put it in a manila envelope and threw it on a pile marked “DONE.”

  “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a busy day ahead of me. The number of my clients dying from cancer has gone through the roof. And I’m way behind on their paperwork.”

  As he stood up, he added, “That reminds me… didn’t Mr. Alston say that he was going to receive a one million dollar bonus?”

  “Well, yes, that’s true, but we’ve spent pretty much all of it on medical bills. And we owed a lot in taxes.”

  “That’s a bummer,” the man said, agreeing by shaking his head up and down. “You’ve got one-percenter problems. Must be nice…”

  Connie’s mom interjected, “Can you please recheck what’s happening here? There must be a mistake.”

  “I’m sorry, ma’am. It’s not me. It’s the policy.”

  Her mom, sensing defeat, continued, “Well can’t you go talk to your bosses at the butt-head factory and see if there was a mistake?”

  “All right, all right, it’s time for you wonderful ladies to leave.” He walked toward the door and opened it, summoning them with his other hand.

  “Then there’s nothing you can do to help us?” Connie cried.

  The insurance man paused and looked over the top of his glasses at the two women. He gave a mischievous smile.

  “I’ll bet you wished you’d never come in here today. Look, I’m afraid that boat has sailed. Good day, ladies.”

  CHAPTER 20

  Office of vending services

  NASA Jennings Manned Spacecraft Center

  Fort Worth, Texas

  Chris stared at his computer screen, pondering how he’d fallen so far from his previous job. He read through the complaint emails that had come in just since 6:00am. His eyes were so heavy — just a little sleep would help.

  Wow, my fellow engineers like to complain a lot, he thought. Are we all like this?

  His desk phone was blinking. He pushed the voicemail button and a loud whining voice rang out – some man complaining that he’d lost 75 cents to a coffee vending machine. Chris noted the address.

  “Let’s see… Building 600, Column 73, Row 40.”

  He stood up, checked the warden’s ring of keys on his belt and walked out of the office. His trip went through the bowels of the building subsystems and, after twelve minutes, he popped out near a remote lunchroom. These were spread around the facility and sat empty most of the day, with only occasional workers arriving to get their caffeine fix.

  Chris found the offending machine. There was a big sheet of paper taped to it with the following message written with a Sharpie: “THIS PIECE OF $#&@ STEALS MONEY!”

  It actually had a handwritten dollar sign, hash tag, etc.

  He removed the paper.

  Chris jumped when a voice behind him announced, “Hey, you better leave that there, mister.”

  It was an old engineer, complete with pocket protector holding a Sharpie. Chris suspected it was the offending Sharpie that created the offending hashtag symbol.

  “Oh, hey. How are you?” Chris asked. “Are you the one that called?”

  “Yup, that was me. This machine has taken my 75 cents at least once a week for the past few months.”

  “Have you tried one of the other vending machines?”

  “Why should I have to do that? I’m not the one at fault in this equation..”

  “Yes, Mr…. Franklin, I understand,” Chris said, squinting to see the engineer’s badge. “I’ll see what I can do, but please use another machine until we get this one fixed up. Our repair budget is a bit tight right now.”

  “I don’t care about your repair budget. This machine robbed me of my hard-earned money.”

  Chris grew frustrated.

  “Look, I get it, I’m going to try to get it fixed.”

  “Well, you better because if you don’t I’m going to talk to your boss and get your lazy butt fired.”

  Chris stopped fiddling with the machine’s change box and turned toward Mr. Franklin again.

  “What?”

  “You heard me. This machine stole my money!”

  “Sir, it took 75 cents,” Chris said. He reached into the machine and removed three quarters and handed them to the engineer.

  “Doesn’t matter,” the engineer said. “I’m still gonna call your boss.”

  Chris’s foot fidgeted, his temper going beyond his control.

  “My boss? MY BOSS? You mean the president of this damn country?”

  “Not anymore, you loser.”

  “What? Look, buddy, I was in charge of all of NASA just a few months ago! How dare you threaten to get me fired over three freakin’ quarters?”

  “No need for that lang—”

  “Shut up, asshole,” Chris said, so mad that his veins were throbbing in his neck like ropes under his skin.

  The engineer set the three quarters down on the nearby counter top and said, “Here, you take it. You need it more than I do.”

  The engineer disappeared into the depths of the concrete columns.

  Chris was all alone again.

  He put both hands on the front of the machine and took a deep breath. He let out a guttural yell as he pushed the machine backward until it fell over. The glass did not break.

  How disappointing, he thought to himself.

  Chris took a long hike back to his office. It’d been many years since he’d lost his temper in public, especially at a coworker of some sort — it violated all of his Dale Carnegie training courses. He sat down and logged back in to his computer. The clunky vending-machine management software was on the screen. Chris set up a service repair call to diagnose what was wrong with the coffee machine. There was no menu option for “I wrecked it.”

  Chris sat quietly for an entire hour, ignoring his emails. He drew doodles portraying the arc of his career, starting with a cheering college graduate, a rocket to Mars, and then crashing into a paper cup of coffee. He ruminated on the tragically dull path his life had taken — he was now a curiosity around the facility. People whispered when he walked past. He appreciated the humming sound from his computer — it didn’t gossip.

  Chris jumped when his phone rang.

  “Hello. Vending services. How can I help you,” Chris said sarcastically, rolling his eyes.

  “Hey Chris, this is Alexis, the new director of NASA.”

  “And my ex-wife,” Chris added.

  “Yes, that is true. And your new boss. Are you busy right now?” she asked.

  “Let’s see,” Chris paused for effect. “I’ve got seven misbehaving vending machines and three microwave ovens that keep overcooking Hot Pockets.”

  Chris
heard the new NASA director laugh on the phone. He missed that laugh so much.

  “Well don’t let me distract you from your busy day ahead of you,” she chuckled.

  “All joking aside, what’s up?”

  “Well, Chris, did you know that the Little Turtle spacecraft transmits a special signal when it gets near Earth?”

  “Yes, of course, that’s the short-range beacon signal,” Chris explained.

  Chris heard Alexis tapping on a keyboard and clicking a mouse.

  “Well,” she paused. “I’m looking at a computer screen that’s lit up with the beacon signal from the Little Turtle.”

  “Are you serious?” Chris asked in a bewildered tone.

  “Looks like our astronauts might be paying us a surprise visit after all this time.”

  Chris chimed in, “Where are you? Are you in New DC or here in Fort Worth?”

  “I’m at the new mission control center, across the street from you.”

  “The microwaves can wait. I’ll be right over.”

  CHAPTER 21

  Little Turtle Spaceship

  Two weeks away from Earth

  “What are you scribbling?” Adam asked. His salt and pepper hair had gone stark white since leaving Mars.

  Yeva sat on the floor, lightly. The MM10 motors pushed constantly, accelerating the rocket just enough so that one wall of the ship was definitely considered the floor. She stopped writing and looked up at Adam.

  “It is likely that this ship will make it back, but we won’t. Our luck is too bad. So I am writing a history of everything that happened to us.”

  “Everything?” Adam asked, wondering if she would include the details about how he betrayed her on Mars.

  “Yes, everything,” she said slowly for emphasis. “Even when you abandoned our agreement to first set foot on Mars together as a team.”

  She looked back down at her notepad and started writing again.

  “Well, maybe I should start writing too?” Adam declared.

  Without looking at him, Yeva answered, “Absolutely. Write your lies. It will be up to history and God to decide who to believe.”

  If the Little Turtle spaceship was a patient in a hospital, the condition would be listed as critical, but stable. Their low-power automated beacon signal seemed to be transmitting, but it didn’t contain much information. With their long-range antenna gone, they had no hope of real communication with Earth until they were a few days away from arrival. At that point, their short-range antenna would normally provide all of their communication needs.

  Except, of course, their transmitter was partially broken. The “Push-to-talk” button functioned, but the microphone wasn’t working. Adam surmised that condensation was wreaking havoc with the electronics just as it had done with several of their sensors – shorting them out like a glass of water spilled on a toaster.

  Adam sat down near Yeva and tried to look over her shoulder at what she was writing. She leaned away.

  Adam cleared his throat with a cough and said, “We should talk about the whole ‘stepping on Mars first’ thing. I guess I lost my balance.”

  She looked at him incredulously.

  “Oh yes, you mean how you leaped ahead of me to get all the glory?” she asked. Yeva started flipping back to the front of her notebook, then held up the notepad to face Adam.

  “See!” she screamed. “That is on page one!”

  “Okay, okay, fair enough,” Adam said. He stood up and climbed the short ladder to the pilot seat.

  They’d left Mars many months ago and by their estimates, would arrive on Earth in two weeks or so — assuming that the guidance computer was working properly. They had dialed down the oxygen to make sure it would last them for the unexpectedly long return voyage. This resulted in them feeling lightheaded sometimes and occasionally euphoric.

  “Hey Adam, do you know the difference between airplanes and spaceships?”

  “Huh? Is this a joke?” Adam asked from the pilot’s seat. He turned to face her.

  “No, it is not a joke. I said, do you know the difference between airplane flight and spaceflight?”

  Adam nodded. “Yes, of course, one is through air and one is through a vacuum of space.”

  “I mean with regard to the pilot.”

  “What are you getting at?” Adam asked.

  “With airplanes, you are in total control of where the plane goes and what it does. It’s usually very safe and quite fun,” Yeva said, now smiling. “But spaceflight — the astronaut’s only goal is to not die. That’s it. You’re along for the ride and all you can hope for is to not die and return back to the wonderful Earth.”

  Adam smirked.

  “Yeva, that’s an interesting way to look at it – but we still have control of the spaceship. Most people consider space flight to be very exciting. It has its moments of terror I guess,” Adam said. “If we do get back, my space flying days are over. Hell, my flying days are over. I won’t even get on an airplane.”

  “That’s an excellent promise. I hope you keep it.”

  Yeva put her notebook in a small metal briefcase that had “Turoskova” stamped into the outside. She dragged her hand across the name label to wipe away the condensation that gathered on every metal surface in the ship. The briefcase had a three-number lock on it and she spun the dials. She looked up to see if Adam was watching.

  He was, but he looked away instantly.

  With a shove and hoof, she stood up and bounced across the floor toward the only porthole window that wasn’t cracked. She stared out longingly for that blue dot in front of them, barely blinking. As the return trip wore on, Yeva spent a lot of time staring out that porthole. Her home planet couldn’t come soon enough.

  Nobody on Earth knew they were still alive. That would soon change.

  CHAPTER 22

  New Mission Control Center

  NASA Jennings Manned Spacecraft Center

  Fort Worth, Texas

  Chris could pick Alexis out of any crowd. She was exceptionally short, the result of a childhood adrenal gland disorder. She would’ve been even shorter, but doctors caught the problem in her teenage years, accelerating her growth to the point where she eventually reached a height of four foot ten inches.

  What she lacked in height, she made up for in ambition. As college graduates, Chris and Alexis both rose quickly through the ranks at NASA, unaware of each other’s existence until they met at the Oshkosh International Airshow, held in Wisconsin every July. Separately they’d been invited to the semi-secret dinner held by the Laminar Flow Believers Club. They exchanged business cards and formed a relationship that ultimately had them married in the test section of a wind tunnel.

  Their careers continued on a stratospheric trajectory within NASA. Chris eventually became the administrative director, thanks heavily to having been a college classmate of president Daggett Jennings. This began a competitive rift between the overachieving husband/wife team that eventually led to mutual contempt and then divorce. Chris still quietly adored her, even though he’d lost nearly everything but his car in the divorce. She even took half the penny jar.

  Chris wound his way through the mission control desks until he reached her. She’d pulled her brown hair back into a ponytail and was knelt down on one knee as she typed on the computer and moved the mouse around the screen.

  She glanced over when he arrived.

  “Oh hey, glad you’re here,” she said. “Look at this.”

  Chris looked over his glasses at the computer screen. He saw a live plot updating left to right. It was a typical hilly radio wave signal that looked like a lulling ocean wave. However, the waves were jammed together in clumps.

  “When did it start coming in?” Chris asked.

  “Yesterday. It was faint at first,” she said, tapping on the screen. “But today it’s really strong. The funny thing is that it went off for a few hours this morning. Then on and off in random succession. It’s been back on for hours now.”

  �
�You mean like Morse Code on and off?”

  “No, we have some ham radio guys here and they said it’s just random, no Morse Code patterns.”

  “Okay. Well, the beacon signal is supposed to contain data about the condition of the Little Turtle spaceship. Have you processed the signal?”

  “Working on it right now,” Alexis said. She stood up, searching for somebody.

  She yelled out, “Hey, telemetry guy! Have you processed the beacon signal for me yet?”

  A man with a buzz cut on the other side of the room nodded his head and began walking toward Alexis. He arrived with a sheet of paper.

  “Hi, director,” he said anxiously. “And hi, former director. The beacon signal is listing the condition of the various systems. There’s a lot of damage onboard.”

  “Life support?”

  “That is surprisingly still working, but barely. The oxygen levels are really low and the humidity is off the charts. Half the MM10 engines are not working either. That explains why it took so long to get back to Earth.”

  Alexis nodded her head up and down to show understanding. “Have you triangulated distance?”

  “We estimate that at the current speed, the ship will be here in about ten days.”

  “Have you tried voice communications?” Chris asked.

  Alexis rolled her eyes. “Yes, obviously we’ve tried that. All we’re getting is static with occasional pop sounds.”

  The telemetry guy added, “Even if they made it on the ship, they’re most likely dead by now.”

  Chris chuckled.

  “What’s wrong with you?” Alexis asked. “How could you possibly laugh right now?”

  “I can tell you two things for sure,” he stated. “The voice communication radio on their ship is broken. And the crew is still alive.”

  Alexis looked confused. “What makes you so sure? I think the beacon signal is an autopilot thing.”

  “That’s true to a certain extent. Except the autopilot only turns it on when it’s two days from Earth. However, this ship is still ten days out. Somebody flipped on the power switch. You said the voice signal has been going on and off in quick starts? Somebody is trying to fix the entire radio system and they’re powering it on and off in the process.”