Page 109

Gordon walked over to the lead Auriga engineer, ignoring all the panic and saying, “What happened? Why didn’t it go?”

The engineer had told Gordon he believed he’d found a firewalled workaround for the abort sequence, as that protocol was shielded from the other systems precisely to avoid it being corrupted or accidentally initiated, and he was sure that his workaround was valid.

The engineer said, “The protocol is fine; we just can’t get to it.Believe it or not, the initiator—and I literally mean the button that’s pushed—is tied into the primary system.”

“You mean into the system being hijacked by the ransomware?”

“Yeah. Tripping the switch sends a signal along the primary system to the abort protocol, so right now it’s the damn button that’s preventing us from aborting.”

“What’s next? What else can you try?”

“We’re doing everything we can to get that abort signal to trip.” He looked up at a giant digital clock on the wall, the numbers rolling down through ten minutes, then said, “Unfortunately, I don’t think we’ll fix it while they’re in orbit, which means even if we can get it to abort later, we’ll only be saving the space station. The people on the capsule are dead.”

Gordon nodded, realizing Auriga was about to have their ownChallengermoment. He felt sorry for them and for NASA, as this would set back space exploration for decades, leaving China as the undisputed leader. He felt a pang of guilt, realizing that there were four souls on board that spacecraft who were about to die.

He heard someone shout from the other side of the room. He turned, seeing a man standing up and pointing at his computer. He said, “Hey, my screen’s clearing. I have control. I say again, I have control.”

Then another engineer said the same thing. Then one after another began cheering, like they’d just watched the capsule splash down. Gordon looked at the time and said, “Send them around again. Send them around again. Don’t let them break orbit. Give yourself time to make sure all systems are go.”

He looked at the clock, saw it pass through three minutes, and screamed, “Send them around again!”

The lead engineer began shouting commands as the clockticked through zero. He called up to the capsule, saying, “Valkyrie One, Valkyrie One, what is your status? Have you broken orbit?”

Through the speakers in the walls, the entire room heard Fabio calmly say, “Nope. Looks like we’re looping the earth again.”

This time the cheers were a crescendo.

Wanting to see the real-time results of his handywork, Dylan Hobbes was mesmerized by the live stream video Gordon had established from mission control. When he heard the cheering, then the latest exchange from the spacecraft, he threw the laptop against the wall, shattering it.

How in the hell had they cracked the code?They had no skill at his level of expertise—and even he couldn’t have cracked that encryption in the timeline they’d had available. Somehow, they’d either gotten lucky, or Branko was trying to erase his tracks from having had anything to do with the attack.

That must be it. He learned of the true target, saw his friends getting killed, and decided to check out completely.

In the end, it didn’t really matter how. It was done, along with his mission. They’d think it was the Iranians who had backed down, and the entire situation would be defused.

Unless he reinitiated. He still had the original ransomware computer in the lab, and it still had the wormhole into the gateway of Auriga. The question was when to initiate.

He looked at the smashed laptop, then went to a locker and pulled out another one, loading the live stream from mission control. The screen cleared and he saw the celebration still going, the relief clearly evident on everyone’s faces.

In the corner he saw Gordon Dillard arguing with the lead engineer. He couldn’t hear what was being said, but he could clearlysee Gordon wasn’t happy. He waited until the conversation was over and Gordon had gone back to his desk at the top of the room. He pulled out his cell phone.

“Gordon! Looks like the Iranians backed off. Good news!”

“Yeah, it’s good news. We have control of the capsule now and can bring it down safely, but these idiots want to continue.”

“What do you mean?”

“Skyler is saying he wants to continue the mission.”

“You’re kidding. Bring the damn thing home right now. You have no idea what that malware corrupted. If you have control right now, you need to use it.”

“That’s exactly what the astronaut said, the one in charge of the mission inside the capsule.”

“And? What happened?”

“Skyler Fitch overruled him, saying it would be a public relations disaster for his company. He’s basically saying this is just a reset, and that we’re all systems go.”

“But the astronaut’s in charge, right? Skyler’s just a paying passenger.”