First Return

15 Friday Apr 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, artificial gravity, astronauts, Claude Dubois, communications, death, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, Earthquake, engineering, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, gravity, Jenna Wade, Jeramy Prater, Joseph Volkov, Ken Hart, Lars Wilson, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Mars time, Megan DeLuca, Nippon, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, Russia, space, space travel, spacecraft, spacecraft design

Mars Date/Time: Year 001, Sur Two, Tuesday, Sol 41 (001.2.41) 12:35 NST
Earth Date/Time: Friday, 15 April 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 177,541,128 kilometers Time Delay: 4 mins 18 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 214,868,624 kilometers

“We’re going to miss you on Mars,” Jenna said to Ken. Ken replied, “Bring me back a souvenir.”

Ken was on a newly created ship christened, Romeo Sierra One. It stood for Return Ship One. It wasn’t a very imaginative name, but it would be the first human inhabited ship to return to Earth from outside the Moon’s orbit. It was also a mission put together in two days.

Romeo Sierra One’s Orbital Transfer back to Earth

Romeo Sierra One is more like a shuttle, than a full ship. There are no Quill sections perpendicular to the core, meaning that the crew of four will be in a weightless environment for the journey back to Earth; however, because Earth and Mars are almost at their closest point in their orbits, the return trip will only be fourteen days. The ship is not using a core Command Section, but is using one of the Quill Auxiliary Command sections that is installed in a core configuration.

The crew of the Sagan was informed on Wednesday of Ken’s mission to return, and Ken asked for three volunteers with specific skills. The ship will be back at Earth Prime two days before the departure of the next Mars Mission, and anyone who wants to come back to Mars on that mission was guaranteed a place on the crew.

Jenna had not informed Earthside ESEP of Ken’s mission, and it was still to be kept secret, but now it was time to let Claude on Earth Prime, and Megan know before they had visual indication of a ship leaving the Sagan.

Jenna asked Communications Officer John Schultz to set up a scrambled video call to both Claude and Megan. When he was ready, she began,

“Claude and Megan. The following message is for your ears only. This is not to be discussed with anyone without my authorization. The embargo is until Sol 54 of Sur Two at 04:00 Noctis Time for need-to-know personnel on Earth Prime, and until Commodore Hart releases the embargo for the rest of ESEP. Pause this message if you need to take measure to secure your communication.

Pause now.

The rest of this message is for Megan DeLuca and Claude Dubois only.

In a few minutes you will probably be receiving reports of a ship departing from the Sagan. For anyone who becomes aware of this, the cover story is that it is a remote controlled ship with Jeramy Prater’s body aboard. That is, in fact, true.

It also carries a crew of four people, one of which is Commodore Hart. He is returning to Earthside to attend to our security issues. Our crew is aware of the mission, but they are under orders to not discuss this with anyone off ship. Megan, please monitor all communication to verify that no one is violating my orders.

They should be docking with Earth Prime on, or about, Sol 55. We have the ETA as 03:35 Noctis Time. It is a short, fourteen day trip. I have given a guarantee that any of the three crew members with Ken, may return on the Data mission that leaves two days later.

Claude, will you make arrangements to shuttle Ken to the surface as soon as possible. If needed, the ship he’s on, named Romeo Sierra One, can rendezvous with a shuttle prior to docking at Earth Prime.

Also note that we are sending the bodies of Lars Wilson and Joseph Volkov back on this ship.

We made this decision two and a half days ago, and I’m sorry I didn’t let you know before now, but we felt it necessary to keep this under wraps. Commodore Hart would prefer to be able to move quickly once he’s back on Earth, and not be under surveillance once he’s on the ground. Megan, please make arrangements for Ken to move from shuttle to his destination unnoticed. He will provide the destination upon arrival.

Sorry for the cloak and dagger, but we seem to be at war, and it’s time for our move. Megan, I saw the message about the new Earthquake in Nippon. Take any action you need to address the situation. I’ll be available for return messages, if needed.”

Putin’s War

12 Tuesday Apr 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space

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2016, death, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Megan DeLuca, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, Pacific Standard Time, PST, Russia, space, space travel, spacecraft, stowaway, Zeke Jackson

Mars Date/Time: Year 001, Sur Two, Saturday, Sol 38 (001.2.38) 14:30 NST
Earth Date/Time: Tuesday, 12 April 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 166,726,440 kilometers Time Delay: 4 mins 12 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 225,683,312 kilometers

Within thirty minutes of Megan DeLuca’s arrival, Santa Clara Valley Medical Center was filled with ESEP Security and San Jose Police. Megan had three layers of vetted ESEP security around her and no one, not even the San Jose Police, were allowed close to her. ESEP administration ran background checks on any hospital staff that attended to her and once cleared, they were given provisional ESEP security badges.

Based on the tranquilizer given to Joseph on the Sagan, the attending physician quickly determined that Megan had been given something similar. She was given a drug to counteract the tranquilizer and she regained movement and speech minutes later.

The toll of the attack at the spa was heavy. Megan’s personal assistant, Emily, was killed. Two ESEP security people were killed in the subsequent bomb blast, and two were injured. Twelve employees and fourteen customers were killed in the blast, and over twenty were injured. ESEP managed to get Emily’s body, and the body of the FSB assassin out before the blast.

It was standard procedure to recover ESEP personnel and anyone harming, or threatening to harm ESEP staff whether they were alive or dead from a scene. Local law enforcement didn’t like the policy, and it was against the law in most countries, but ESEP was able to stretch diplomatic privileges in any situation that involved the security of the internationally operated Mars space program.

Ken gave a briefing to the Command staff of what had been learned in the past day. Ken said,

“…the masseuse had been hired by the spa last month after Megan had been promoted. Apparently the FSB knew she used that spa and set a plan into motion to assassinate her. Some of us believe that they might not have intended to kill her when they put the agent in place. FSB strategy has been to put people in places of contact with the intention of gaining the confidence of ESEP personnel, and then obtaining information, or in an attempt to influence them, but after the breach was discovered at ESEP, we believe the FSB, and most likely, Vladimir Putin, was seeking revenge.

Megan’s personal assistant, Emily, saved Megan’s life by sacrificing her own. She apparently heard the pop when the other masseuse was killed and raised the alarm, then walked in the room, forcing the assassin to deal with her. When the security team reached the room, the assassin was within a second of plunging the hypodermic needle into Megan’s heart.

The method of kill was also meant to send a message. It was the same method used to kill Joseph. Megan and Jessica’s tea was drugged, and the assassin had two syringes. It is believed she planned on killing Megan, and her friend Jessica. Putin wanted to make it clear who was responsible, and wanted to let us know that killing ESEP staff was not enough, but anyone associated with us.

The bomb was meant to be insurance that the job would be done, and meant to cover up any useful evidence that might be left behind. Fortunately, our security team pulled out the assassin and her bag before the bomb went off. We probably won’t gain much useful information on the assassin, because her existence only extends back for three years; however, we are building a solid knowledge of how the FSB plants agents into foreign countries. They have a consistent pattern that law enforcement agencies around the world are using to identify FSB agents.

Already the United States has discovered hundreds of potential FSB agents in the Republican party. Putin’s endorsement of Donald Trump was not a coincidence.”

Ken sat down and Jenna said,

“I think we can relax a little on the Sagan. We lost one of our Command sections, but we were able to recover both ICP drive sections. We will miss Jeramy, and work through that loss, but we can stand down. The likelihood of a FSB agent being aboard is remote. We have vetted all the Charlie One crew and they all have cleared the investigations.

Let’s start focusing on Mars, again. In a little over a week, we will be halfway to our rendezvous with Mars. With the added crew and equipment, our mission has new possibilities. I think we should move our current plan aside and start rethinking the entire mission. Let’s start discussing a new strategy at tomorrow morning’s briefing.

That’s all for now.”

The Command team broke up and began leaving, but Jenna kept Ken. When they were alone she said, “Putin’s not going to stop, is he?” “No,” Ken replied, “I have some ideas of how to deal with him, but I need to be Earthside.” Jenna’s eyes became wide, “We can send you back. We have a spare ICP Drive, but that means you’ll not be going all the way to Mars.” Ken said, “It won’t do any good for me to reach Mars, only to have more people die Earthside.”

Jenna said, “Make your plans and pick out a return crew. We’ll discuss this with the Command team at mess. You have an ideal window to get back. Mars and Earth won’t be this close for two years.” Ken responded, “I know. It seems bizarre that we’ve taken 48 Earth days to get this far, and it will take me a little over two weeks to get back.”

Ken then added, “We should not let Earthside know, yet.” Jenna nodded, “We can keep it quiet until Claude needs to know…Ken, is it as bad as I think?”

Ken said, “If you think we’re at war with Putin, it’s as bad as you think.”

Plan B

09 Saturday Apr 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, astronauts, communications, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, engineering, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, Russia, space, space travel, spacecraft, spacecraft design, Zeke Jackson

Mars Date/Time: Year 001, Sur Two, Wednesday, Sol 35 (001.2.35) 16:26 NST
Earth Date/Time: Saturday, 9 April 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 155,911,752 kilometers Time Delay: 4 mins 12 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 236,498,00 kilometers

There had been no movement in the cargo area, nor any sign of life in the construction pod where Zeke believed Lars Wilson, the FSB agent, was hiding. It had been almost twenty-four hours and Jenna’s Plan A, to nab Lars outside the pod, had failed. It was time to put Plan B into action.

There were several steps to the plan. First, two crew members, Ian and Peyton, were to approach the hatch to the construction pod from inside the cargo area. They would listen and try to confirm that someone was in the pod. Regardless, the second step would involve Jeramy, who was already in a space suit and waiting outside the Quill, near the pod, to attach a tow line.

Zeke was in another pod hiding near Jeramy, holding position with the other end of the tow line attached. As soon as the tow line was hooked up, Zeke will move away from the ship. At the same time, Ian and Peyton will release the docking clamps holding Lars’ pod to the ship, and Zeke will pull it away from the Sagan. Jeramy is also prepared to drill a hole in the pod to breach it, rendering Lars unconscious within a few minutes. This will likely require him to stay with the pod after it detaches. It will all take place in seconds.

Ian and Peyton quietly moved into the cargo area and to the hatch where the pod was docked. The inner hatch was closed and sealed, but they couldn’t tell from the camera view if the pod hatch was closed. If it wasn’t, the plan wouldn’t work because the docking clamps couldn’t be released without both hatches closed.

As they approached they realized that the pod hatch was open. Peyton backed out of the area and let the team know the situation by using a coded message. She said, “Zeke, I can’t meet you for dinner. If you’re willing to wait, I can meet you later.”

Plan C was trickier. It meant that Ian and Peyton would open the hatch and try to grab Lars. Two other crew members joined them for the assault. Ian and one of the Charlie One crew members, Diego, stood ready to move into the pod, while Peyton stood behind them with holding a taser over their shoulders. She would shoot Lars and paralyze him, while Ian and Diego leapt into the pod and grabbed him. The fourth person, another of the Charlie crew, Sam, would open the hatch. Once they had the hatch open, the docking clamps could not be released, even if he managed to get the pod hatch open.

Sam held up five fingers to give them a silent countdown from five. Sam folded in her thumb, then one finger at a time. When she made a fist, she pressed the button and the hatch began softly clicking, then the hatch began to open…and then it stopped. Sam saw it first, a small wire was keeping the hatch from opening. She grabbed the hatch and took the pressure off the wire. She said, “It’s a booby trap!” They all froze.

Ian made a quick survey of the interior through the partially opened hatch. Lars was not in the pod, but there was a device wired to a small fuel pellet. It was luck and fast action that prevented the wire from pulling out and triggering the device. It looked to be a simple trigger. The wire was hooked on the hatch and it was just a matter of unhooking it. It was a trap in case someone got too curious about the pod, and it almost killed at least four people.

Peyton called again, this time her voice was less convincing. She said, “Uhm, Zeke, I’m not sure if we can meet later. I have a new problem to deal with and I need to call Jeramy for advice. I’ll call you when I’m done.” Sam immediately called on her tablet, “Zeke and Jeramy, I’m with Peyton. Just stay there and we’ll come to you.”

Sam immediately began typing a message to the entire team. It said,

“Lars not on pod. Booby trap w fuel pellet. Unhooked trigger wire. Close hatches & release pod? Z pull pod away? J ride pod out & open pod & dispose of bomb?”

Within seconds came the response from Jenna, “Go.”

To Catch A Boris

08 Friday Apr 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, astronauts, Earth Space Exploration Program, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, HD cameras, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Noctis Labyrinthus, NST, space, space travel, spacecraft design, stowaway, Zeke Jackson

Mars Date/Time: Year 001, Sur Two, Tuesday, Sol 34 (001.2.34) 17:04 NST
Earth Date/Time: Friday, 8 April 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 152,306,856 kilometers Time Delay: 4 mins 12 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 240,102,896 kilometers

Because Zeke was an expert on stowing away on a ship, Jenna used him as a resource to develop a plan to catch the alleged stowaway that came with the Charlie One ship. Zeke knew that it was too risky to hide in one of the Hab Quills. The combination of people and cameras in those areas would make it an unlikely hiding place.

Unfortunately, those are the areas that were under surveillance, in the belief that the FSB agent was one of the crew. Most of the cargo Quills were also poor places to stay for an extended period because they were areas of severely restricted life support. Some Quills had been sealed and had no life support. Others were under conditions that would be unbearable for extended periods.

One of Zeke’s first questions was whether or not a construction pod was missing from Earth Prime. Claude confirmed that one was missing. Once he knew that, he guessed that Lars Wilson used the construction pod to access Charlie One. This was how Zeke was able to avoid security and cameras to board the ESS Queen Elizabeth II.

New protocols had been put in place to avoid someone to repeat Zeke’s trick, but those protocols had been suspended because of the emergency. It was the next day after Charlie One undocked that a post-launch inventory discovered the missing pod, but since all personnel were accounted for on Earth Prime, the issue was put aside.

Zeke believed that Lars was using the construction pod to live in, and resupplying it from a cargo area. Using the cameras on the exterior of the ship, they determined that the missing construction pod was, in fact, attached to a cargo section that had been part of Charlie One.

When Zeke told the Command team he added, “This is the bad news. A construction pod can do a lot of damage. Just using it to ram a ship could create enough structural damage that the ship might not be able to fire up the ICP drive for fear of tearing the it apart. If Lars knows we’re on to him, and he’s on the pod, he has a weapon we can’t defend against.”

Ken said, “We could wait until he’s out of the pod, but he’s a threat every moment until we grab him.” Zeke said, “I have an idea, but it’s risky. I know Lars, and I’m a better pod driver than he is, so if I can come up on his blind side, and if someone is there to hook up a tow line, I can pull him off and keep him away from the ship.”

Jenna said, “You’re right, that’s very risky. If he got lucky, he could ram you.” Zeke replied, “I’m confident he doesn’t have the skill, and if we could cause a small breach on his pod he would only have seconds before he would be unconscious.”

Jenna said, “Any other ideas?….Okay, let’s see if we can catch him outside of the pod, first. Let’s not be too aggressive. Station people away from the cargo area, but close enough to move in behind him if he leaves. We’ll keep an eye on the area with our cameras. He he moves, we’ll grab him. Then if he doesn’t do anything, we’ll go with Zeke’s plan in twenty-four hours. Zeke, work out a detailed plan with Anna and Ken. Let’s keep this quiet until we’ve got him. I don’t think we have another FSB agent aboard, but let’s assume there is, and that he can contact Lars.”

Another Rat

07 Thursday Apr 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, astronauts, communications, death, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, Russia, space, space travel, spacecraft, spacecraft design, stowaway, Wendy Stevens, Zeke Jackson

Mars Date/Time: Year 001, Sur Two, Monday, Sol 33 (001.2.33) 17:43 NST
Earth Date/Time: Thursday, 7 April 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 148,701,960 kilometers Time Delay: 4 mins 12 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 243,707,251 kilometers

Two days had past and they still didn’t know who killed Joseph Volkvo in the brig. Knowing there was a murderer on board was bad, but knowing that the murderer was probably tasked with sabotaging the mission meant that at any moment a catastrophe could take place.

The Director’s Mess was just about to start when Jenna, Ken, Naomi, Anna, and Wendy received a Priority call from Earthside. They all went up the Command deck to take it at Jenna’s workstation. Most of the message had been received, but because of the four-minute delay, the message was still downloading. Naomi started the message, which was a split screen image of Megan transmitting from ESEP in France, and Claude transmitting from Earth Prime in orbit around Earth.

Megan started to talk, “Director, Commodore Dubois has new information about who might be your murderer. Claude, go ahead.” Claude said,

“First, let me apologize. We should have caught this earlier, but this person is obviously good at deception. We had a worker, by the name of Lars Wilson…at least that is the name we have for him. When we lost transmission with you, he received news of a family issue that required him to return to Earth. We thought he left on a shuttle and was on Earth. After we discovered the breach, we found several emails that indicated that he was either being influenced by a FSB agent, or he was a FSB agent. When we tried to track him down, we were told that he was camping in a remote area in Wyoming.

While we were trying to reach him, we also backtracked his movements and discovered that he did not arrive with the Earth bound shuttle. We interviewed the captain and he said that they had received word, before they left Earth Prime, that Mr. Wilson would be on a later shuttle. We now know that message to be fabricated.

We have done an extensive search of Earth Prime and he is not on the station. We can only conclude that he snuck aboard Charlie One and is now on your ship. Again, my apologies.”

All four were dumbstruck. They had thought the FSB agent was one of the known crew members, but now they learned that the murderer was a person hiding on the ship. Jenna tapped her pad and in a second a voice said, “Good evening, Director.” Jenna said, “Zeke, I need you on the Command deck now.”

The Twin Protocol

06 Wednesday Apr 2016

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2016, astronauts, Charlie One, counseling, crew morale, death, Earth, engineering, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, FSB, HD cameras, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Mars time, murder, mystery woman, Naomi Flores, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, Russia, sabotage, space, space travel, spacecraft, spacecraft design, Spy, twin protocol, Wendy Stevens

Mars Date/Time: Year 001, Sur Two, Sunday, Sol 32 (001.2.32) 18:21 NST
Earth Date/Time: Wednesday, 6 April 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 145,097,064 kilometers Time Delay: 4 mins 12 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 247,312,688 kilometers

“Jenna, they found the mystery woman,” Ken said as he joined the Director’s Mess, “Unfortunately, she was killed and put in a convenience store dumpster in Reno, Nevada. Two men were seen dumping the body and attempting to pour gasoline and light it, but the clerk on duty chased them away. He got the license plate, but the car was stolen.”

Roman said, “She had to know she was expendable when we discovered the breach.” Ken added, “I suspect she didn’t even try to get out of the country. They’re trying to find out who she was, but it’s likely everything about her was fiction.”

“What Putin saying about all this?, asked Lanny. Jenna replied, “He denies everything, and says it is ESEP propaganda; however, the reality is that Russia is feeling the heat from the rest of the world. the FSB had agents implicated in every member country, but China.” Ken added, “The links from the FSB agents embedded in ESEP led to exposure of their network worldwide. It was a massive blow to their spy network and they are still uncovering more Russian rats.”

“What about our people on board?” Anna asked. Ken answered, “We’re still interrogating people, but everyone seems to have an alibi and we can verify their stories. We have a few people who were alone in their quarters and we are focusing on them, but whoever murdered Joseph was a pro and he knows our ship.”

Anna asked, “But what about emails and text messages? Don’t we have leads there?” Jenna said, “Megan is looking into that, but other than a few attempts to influence people, the crew appears clean. They are focusing on the Charlie One crew now. That would have been the easiest route to put an agent on board.”

Jenna then sighed, and said,

“We have to face the reality that whoever we are dealing with is not going to be caught easily, and every moment is an opportunity to sabotage us. For that reason I’m going to establish new security protocols. Tonight, I am going to establish a curfew at eight PM. All off duty staff are to be in their quarters or in the company of another person. Tomorrow, at six AM, all crew members will be restricted to their area of operation and anyone needing to move through the ship must follow the twin protocol….yes, all movement throughout the ship must be in groups of at least two people or more. I already have added one person at the monitor bay watching the whole ship, but their job will be easier if we don’t have lone wolves going through the ship. Engineering has worked out additional safeguard to the ICP drive, power, and life support.”

Naomi said, “Eventually, this guy’s luck is going to run out.” Jenna replied, “On the contrary, time is on his side.”

Death By Polymer

05 Tuesday Apr 2016

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2016, astronauts, biology, Counselor, death, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, HD cameras, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Mars time, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, physician, Russia, space, space travel, spacecraft, spacecraft design, Wendy Stevens, Zeke Jackson

Mars Date/Time: Year 001, Sur Two, Saturday, Sol 31(001.2.31) 19:00 NST
Earth Date/Time: Tuesday, 5 April 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 141,492,168 kilometers Time Delay: 4 mins 12 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 250,917,584 kilometers

Dr. Kayla Summers had experience in an investigative criminal lab as part of her preparation for the Mars mission. It was assumed that some of the crew might die, and that sometimes their deaths would be undetermined. Her training was to pay attention to small details that might tell the story of the cause of death.

In the case of Joseph Volkva, his death was not obvious. He was found lying on his bed in the brig, not breathing. The first person to find him was Ian who was his guard. He had assumed that Joseph found a way to kill himself, but there were no visible signs. He called Dr. Summers immediately.

It took Kayla about a minute to rule out suicide. She noted he looked too relaxed for normal sleep and that meant he was probably drugged before he died. She then searched his body for an injection site. She found it in his chest. Whoever killed him was not hiding the location of the fatal injection.

When Jenna arrived she asked the obvious question, “How was he killed.” Kayla replied, “He was drugged…I’m guessing orally, then they injected something directly into his heart. I won’t know more until I do the autopsy.”

Later Jenna got Kayla’s report. It said he had been tranquilized with the drug mixed in Tequila. After he became immobile, he was injected with a polymer substance that filled the heart and flowed to the lungs. The polymer took a few minutes to harden, but death probably occurred within a minute. Once the polymer was injected, he could not have been saved. The method was meant to leave nothing to chance.

When Jenna met with her Command team for the morning briefing she was looking for answers. Jenna asked, “We know Joseph was murdered, and we know how he was killed, but how did anyone get to him without being caught on camera? He was under constant video surveillance and was checked on every half hour.” Ken replied,

“He met with Wendy from 16:10 to 17:18. We know that he was given a meal at 18:12. Peyton said one of the Charlie One crew delivered the meal to him, we know he ate the meal and Peyton collected the food container and returned it to the mess at 18:28. According to the video he must have been given a workpad with the food container. He turned his back to the camera holding the food container and put it under his pillow.

He was checked on every half hour until he went to bed at 22:12. At 11:46 he put the workpad in front of the camera with a device similar to what Zeke used. The tablet was playing a loop of him sleeping in the dark. At 04:23 someone removed the tablet and left the brig.”

Naomi asked, “What about all the other cameras on the ship. Anyone moving in that Quill had to be seen.” Ken shook his head and said, “That’s what is strange. We see someone move down and then back up, but they have some type of cloth or bag over them. The fabric completely covered them. We can’t even tell their height or weight. When they got to the core they disappeared.”

Roman said, “What do you mean, they disappeared?” Ken replied, they covered the cameras in the core section at the end of that Quill, and we don’t see them come out that core section. It wasn’t until after we found Joseph dead, that anyone noticed the cameras were covered. We have people moving into that core section, but we can account for everyone that went in or out of that section. There was no one who left that section without already entering it.

Jenna said, “We have a murderer on board, and they are likely a Russian agent. Their job isn’t over. I think we can assume they were Plan B for the Russians. No one is safe until we find them.”

Containment

03 Sunday Apr 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, communications, Counselor, crew morale, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Mars time, Megan DeLuca, Naomi Flores, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, space, space travel, spacecraft, Wendy Stevens

Mars Date/Time: Year 001, Sur Two, Thursday, Sol 29 (001.2.29) 20:17 NST
Earth Date/Time: Sunday, 3 April 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 134,282,376 kilometers Time Delay: 4 mins 06 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 258,127,376 kilometers

The Command team of the Sagan had gathered in the Director’s quarters after mess. All of them were aware something significant had been happening on Earthside during the day, but communication from Earth had been sparse.

Jenna began the meeting,

“As you are probably aware, there has been a lot of security activity going on back on Earth. After we discovered the saboteur on Charlie One, we began a broad investigation into possible security breaches. Last night we were informed of a significant issue that involved the woman connected to our saboteur. Ken, would you brief them.”

Ken said,

“The sister of the saboteur had been visited by a woman, who we now believe to be an agent of the Russian FSB, the successor of the KGB, and she encouraged his sister to tell him to take action to force our mission to be aborted. We believe that the woman was really pushing him to do more than sabotage, but that she didn’t want the sister to think they were asking him to sacrifice himself. The woman gave her $10,000, and said she would be back in two weeks, hopefully to celebrate her brother’s success.

Because of this security breach, we sent out our people to our suppliers to see if there were any more security issues and we got lucky. A recruiting firm in San Jose was given $10,000 for every applicant hired by ESEP. The firm was sent people who would tell them that ‘Dina’ sent them. The applicants had impressive aerospace and science backgrounds, and ESEP had hired almost all of the people sent through this agency. The owner of the agency identified the same woman as his contact as the woman whom had visited our saboteur’s sister.

In reviewing the agency’s records, we discovered that 33 people had been hired who we believe were trained agents of the FSB. We immediately took custody of 28 of them and seized all their records and electronic devices. Three others took their own life before we could arrest them, and two others were able to elude us.

What we have discovered is a massive effort to infiltrate ESEP. We believe that up until recently, the FSB was focused on industrial espionage; however, they clearly have shifted to a mission of sabotage in order to slow us down. We have evidence that the plane crash that took the life of the Director and some of our senior people was not an accident.

It will take us some time to identify how far the FSB have infiltrated, but there is no doubt that we have not eradicated the threat.”

Jenna said, “Megan has sent us an update.” Megan’s came up on Jenna’s largest screen. She began,

“I assume you are now aware of that the FSB has been infiltrating our organization. What you may not know is the scope of the infiltration, nor how long they have been doing it.

Based on emails, phone records, and hiring information, the Russian FSB has had agents in ESEP for at least five years, and maybe more. The 33 people we discovered have been working a network of people, some may not realize it. Based on emails sent to the engineers that participated in the management coup, an effort to plant seeds of confusion, and disillusionment with the ESEP leadership have been occurring for years.

Some FSB agents have been working a network of people to gain information, and some have been building confusion and resentment. Since last night we have been watching all emails for particular activity and we have found several people who may either be FSB plants, or are being manipulated by FSB agents inside ESEP.

We now believe that FSB has been manipulating at least 5,000 of our team members. We believe that Joseph Volkvo was identified and set up by a FSB agent in ESEP. It will take us months to identify which people the FSB agents have manipulated, and we will have to create educational programs on how to identify FSB agents inside the organization.

It has become obvious that FSB is aware they have been caught. We have many employees who are disappearing. As of the last count, there are 41 people who have not shown up for duty, and we have lost contact with them. There has also been a rash of burned homes and apartments of ESEP employees that have disappeared.

Interpol is taking the lead on the investigation; however, the FBI is now posting the names and images of the suspected FSB agents at all U.S. airports, ports, and border crossings.

That’s all I have for now. I’ll have more at the morning briefing.”

Jenna said, “That’s all for now, we’ll talk about this in the morning…Ken, Naomi and Wendy, would you please stay.” The rest of the Command team left and then Jenna said, “Wendy, I have blocked all your incoming and outgoing emails since last night. We need to talk.”

The Break

02 Saturday Apr 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, communications, Counselor, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, space, space travel, spacecraft, Wendy Stevens

Mars Date/Time: Year 001, Sur Two, Wednesday, Sol 28 (001.2.28) 20:56 NST
Earth Date/Time: Saturday, 2 April 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 130,677,480 kilometers Time Delay: 4 mins 06 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 261,732,272 kilometers

The two ESEP security people had entered the office of SpaceTech. It was an employment agency that found temporary and permanent employees for high-tech industries. SpaceTech was a major recruiter for ESEP on the West Coast, and it was established by two people who left another recruiting agency to specialize in finding people for ESEP and their suppliers.

Bob Williamson became the sole owner of the company, after his romantic relationship with the other founding partner ended. He had three recruiters working for him now, but he was ESEP Recruiting’s main contact.

He welcomed the ESEP people into his office and asked them to sat down. He was nervous, but he didn’t want to show it. “How can I help you?,” he said. One of them replied, “Mr. Williamson, we won’t take up much of your time. We are making security audits of our suppliers, and if we could just ask a few questions, we’ll be on our way.” Bob smiled and said, “Fire away.” The other ESEP person said, “Mr. Williamson, have you ever been approached be someone who ask you to send certain applicants to ESEP…maybe they even offered you extra money to do it.”

The ESEP team could tell that Bob was surprised by their question. He became visibly nervous. Bob felt his core sink, and suddenly he was trying to remember what he did that might be illegal. He tried to seem calm when he asked his next question, “Is that illegal?” The first man said, “Probably not; however, it is an important that we learn about the situation. So you have had someone ask you to send us certain people?” Bob said, “Yes, there is a woman who represents someone who is trying to help people get high-tech job at ESEP, but they are doing it to help these people…and they all have excellent qualifications.”

The other ESEP person pulled out a picture of the woman at the Maui airport and said, “The woman doesn’t happen to look like this does she?” Bob’s eyes grew large and he said, “Yes, that’s her. Who is she?” At that one of the ESEP people stood up and went outside Bob’s office to make a call.

About five minutes later Commodore Ken Hart received an urgent message from his Earthside security office. It said,

URGENT! We have a hit on the woman. A recruiter at SpaceTech has ID’d her as one who has been supplying ESEP people with excellent qualifications. Protection and recovery protocols ordered. Determining size of breach. FBI informed. Containment in process. Will duck blind SpaceTech for as long as possible.

Ken contacted Jenna and Wendy to meet. A few minutes later they gathered in Jenna’s quarters just as Paige was leaving. Ken said,

“We may have a major breach. A few minutes ago one of our Security teams found a recruiter who has been sending us applicants supplied by our mystery woman. We don’t have any information yet, but we are taking the recruiter and his staff to a safe location to be interviewed, and put in our own people in his office. We are also copying all their records. We should be able to find out what agents of FSB have been sent to us, and if we’re lucky we might be able to get the woman.”

Jenna said, “How quickly can we arrest the planted employees?” Ken said, “We have teams ready to go once we have names, and we won’t stop with just those hired. We will go after anyone sent by the woman. My best guess is that we have about six hours to act before FSB begins to realize something is happening.”

Jenna said, “When will we know more?” Ken said, “I’ll have them give me an update by midnight.” Jenna said, “Let’s keep this between us and meet again at midnight.” Wendy and Ken left. Jenna contacted Naomi and said, “Naomi, manage all Comm traffic until further notice. Let Ken and my traffic flow. Redirect all other traffic through me.”

Fool’s Day

01 Friday Apr 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, astronauts, communications, death, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Joseph Volkov, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, sabotage, saboteur, space, space travel, spacecraft, traitor, Wendy Stevens

Mars Date/Time: Year 001, Sur Two, Tuesday, Sol 27 (001.2.27) 21:34 NST
Earth Date/Time: Friday, 1 April 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 127,072,584 kilometers Time Delay: 4 mins 06 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 265,337,168 kilometers

Joseph Volkvo had been separated from his crew for almost twenty-four hours. He had been questioned about his girlfriend and his loyalties. The questioning had only been been for about an hour last night and then he was confined to a spare quarters on the Sagan under guard. He knew he was in trouble, but he didn’t know had bad it was.

During the day he had been given food, and allowed to go to the bathroom, but he was not allowed access to anyone, nor was he allowed to communicate back to Earth. It was now 9:30 at night and he was summoned to the Director’s quarters.

Jenna, Ken, Naomi, Wendy, and Anna were already there. He was told to sit down in a seat facing Jenna workstation. Jenna brought up a video of his sister. She began to speak,

“Joseph, I am safe. ESEP had people come to take me back to the mainland. They tell me that my life was in danger, but that not being held hostage. They are offering to protect me, and I will be allowed to go almost anywhere in the world under a new identity. They say that if you accomplished your mission for the FSB, that I would have been killed because I could identify the agent that visited me. I know this is true. They say that once that agent is caught, the less reason the FSB would have to kill me. They have also arrested your girlfriend.

It is over. We should cooperate with them. They have pictures of her at the airport when she left Maui. They will find her. I hope all is well.”

The message ended. Joseph looked up at Jenna and said, “So you’re holding her hostage.” Jenna shook her head and said,

“She wouldn’t even be involved in this if the FSB hadn’t brought her into it. Don’t you get it? The FSB can’t be associated with sabotage of the Mars mission. The entire world would be coming down on Russia if they were exposed. There were three options. If you sabotaged this mission she would have been killed within hours, if you had tried and failed she would have been killed, or held hostage until you got back and then they would have killed both of you. If you decided not to do anything she would have been killed to cover their tracks. You put her life in danger. We’re trying to save her, you fool.”

Joseph laughed, “Maybe some things are worth dying for. Maybe I don’t care.” Jenna leaned down to him and said,

“For your sake, I hope you care. I don’t think you understand our situation here. As of last night you are no longer a member of this crew, and only members of the mission are going to Mars. Your sister is cooperating and as long as she does she will avoid charges of espionage. If she stops cooperating she won’t be a hostage, she’ll be an inmate. What I’m asking for is simple. I want to know how you met your girlfriend and what you know about her. I want to know what she asked you to do, or what she implied you should do, and I want to know what you know about FSB operations. You have to convince me you are worthy of being on this mission and you have a long way to go.”

He smirked, “What are you going to do push me out into space?” Jenna looked him in the eye and said,

“Put yourself in my place. You have limited resources and a dangerous multi-year mission to Mars. Now you have a saboteur on board that will be a constant threat to the mission and the lives of the people on board. What would you do?”

Charlie One’s Red Flag

30 Wednesday Mar 2016

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2016, astronauts, Charlie One, Counselor, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Joseph Volkov, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, Russia, space travel, Spy, Wendy Stevens

Mars Date/Time: Year 001, Sur Two, Sunday, Sol 25 (001.2.25) 22:51 NST
Earth Date/Time: Wednesday, 30 March 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 119,862,792 kilometers Time Delay: 4 mins 00 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 272,546,960 kilometers

Zeke had worked with Anna and Keira to establish protocols on merging Charlie One with the Sagan. This time the integration would all take place over the next hour. Charlie One stood a kilometer off to the side of the Sagan and it finished a six-hour deceleration to match speed with the bigger ship.

Ken crossed from his workstation to Jenna’s and said, “Can we talk in your quarters?” Jenna looked surprised, but got up immediately and they started down the Quill. On the way Ken called Wendy and ask her to join them.

Wendy was just a few feet behind them as they climbed off on to the level of Jenna’s quarters. After they all entered and the door was closed Ken began to talk, “We may have a problem. You asked me to look at the Charlie One crew from a security-risk standpoint, and I believe we may have one of their crew that could be a problem.”

Jenna responded first, “What type of problem?” Ken said, “Joseph Volkov is the Captain of the ship. He was selected because they had no experienced Captains immediately available, and he had pilot experience. It was a risk, but they decided that if a Captain was needed, another ship would be sent.” Wendy said, “That doesn’t seem to be a problem.”

Ken nodded and said,

“No, but he was a pilot for the Russian Air Force, and washed out of the Russian astronaut program. He flew for Aeroflot for a while, then he moved to the United States. NASA wouldn’t let him into the program because of his background. We let hired him and he was competent as long as he was sober, but he’s had a few issues with drinking. About a year ago he apparently had a girlfriend that straightened him up and he was doing better, but in a review of his emails, it seems she’s been pushing him to get on a Mars mission.

His sister moved to the United States at the same time he did and she now lives on Maui. Recently, she pushing him to remember his birthright and recently told him that their aunt from the home country sent them $10,000.”

Jenna said, “Let me guess, they don’t have an aunt.” Ken replied, “They don’t have any relation. They didn’t when they came here in 1998. Also, the girlfriend…she doesn’t exist prior to three years ago.”

The Smell of Musk

19 Saturday Mar 2016

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2016, China, communications, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, Elon Musk, engineering, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Mars time, NASA, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, Russia, science, space, space travel, spacecraft, spacecraft design, SpaceX, United States

Mars Date/Time: Year 001, Sur Two, Thursday, Sol 15 (001.2.15) 05:55 NST
Earth Date/Time: Saturday, 19 March 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 80,208,936 kilometers Time Delay: 3 mins 30 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 312,200,816 kilometers

“What did you find out about Musk?,” Jenna asked. Ken replied, “We’ve confirmed he is talking to the Russians. He also contacted at least two of our suppliers and tried to work out an exclusive arrangement with them if they dropped our account. He’s actively working to sabotage us, but I think there is more to it than what we’ve found so far.”

Roman had just walked in to Jenna’s quarters for the morning briefing from Megan. He asked, “Who are we talking about?” Jenna said, “Elon Musk. We’re on his enemies list.” Roman replied, “That’s not good. He doesn’t like to play fair.” “What do you know?,” Jenna asked.

Roman replied, “I know he’s smart, and he likes taking advantage of the stupid. He played several states against each other when he was making noise about building his lithium battery plant, but the only place that had an active lithium mine in the North America was in Nevada. Nevada already had no income, corporate, or tax, but he managed to sucker them into over a billion dollars in tax breaks, even though it made no sense to build the factory anywhere in but Nevada. Then he contracted with a minor lithium mine in Mexico to put pressure on the Nevada lithium mine. He bullies people, and he seems to enjoy it.”

Ken added, “He is talking to the Russians about a partnership with SpaceX, and he’s trying to interfere with our suppliers.” Roman replied, “That sounds like Musk. If he follows his pattern, he’ll make a big show of it and try to manipulate people by scaring them.”

Naomi broke in to the conversation, “Director, I have Megan’s briefing ready.” Jenna said to everyone, “Let’s get started.”

Naomi started the recording and Megan’s image came up on the large monitor,

Good morning. The first item today is Elon Musk. We have learned that he is trying to create a private-based, joint space venture with Russia, China, and the United States. He is asking the United States and China to cut off funding to ESEP immediately, even though they have a five-year commitment. He has been working on this for some time, but has been aggressively pursuing his goal since your remarks on the Charlie Rose show. He also has contacted almost half of our suppliers and is offering them eight percent more per contract than what ESEP is offering. He also is posting bail and providing legal assistance to the ESEP engineers that were involved in the management coup. Apparently, he plans to tap them for their knowledge. He also is talking to Donald Trump. We don’t know what that is about, but I suspect ESEP is going to become the target of U.S. conservatives. We’re following the situation and our PR team is coming up with some ideas. I’ll be interested to see what your reaction is to this…

Jenna suddenly interrupted, “Naomi, pause that, please.” Naomi paused the playback, and Jenna continued, “I know what we need to do, but I want to hear everyone’s thoughts. Let’s deal with this now and get ESEP Earthside to start moving on it.

Ken said, “His whole game is to bluff people into doing something. We need to be careful at how we react.” Naomi added, “But we can’t ignore it. That also plays into his game.”

Jenna said, “We’re not going to play his game, we’re going to play ours.”

Morning Briefing

18 Friday Mar 2016

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2016, astronauts, communications, Earth Space Exploration Program, Elon Musk, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, NASA, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, space, space travel, spacecraft, spacecraft design, SpaceX

Mars Date/Time: Year 001, Sur Two, Wednesday, Sol 14 (001.2.14) 06:33 NST
Earth Date/Time: Friday, 18 March 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 76,604,040 kilometers Time Delay: 3 mins 16 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 315,805,712 kilometers

The Command team had gathered in Jenna’s quarters for the morning briefing from Megan. Morning shift did not begin until 8:00 AM NST, but because Jenna was now the ESEP Director, they had to be ahead of the Earthside ESEP administrators, so the day now started at 6:00 AM for her team.

Megan was going over the status updates she had received,

“The target date for launch of the Mars Computer Complex is now Sol 51 of this month. All three segments will be launched on that day. Earth Prime’s Computer Complex will go up five days later. Claude told me yesterday that they will have the ship ready to leave orbit by Sol 58. It will arrive at Mars at Sol 4 of Sur Four, or July 7th.

Because they need to follow human stress protocols for the G-load of the computer systems, that ship will have a crew. Claude is working with the engineers on the configuration, but it looks like the ship will be about the size of the QE II. The name of the ship?…are you ready for this?…it is to be called Data…after the Star Trek android character.

On board the Data should be most of the replacement and administrative personnel you’ll need. They won’t have much time to train.

As for my personal assistant staff, thank you. It’s going to take some time to get used to, and I still think this is a revenge thing on your part, Jenna, but I suppose it is necessary. I’ve never felt so safe or pampered.

Regarding the new Mars schedule, Earthside seems to be in agreement that everything on the accelerated plan can be done on time. The target date for the next mission is now Sol 2 of Sur Four or July 5th. We are now looking at an early or mid-August launch for the 4th mission, and an 5th mission in late October or early November.

This is pushing our launch facilities up to capacity with two to three launches per day. Chile is moving forward to building two more launch pads and we are about to break ground on our Nippon launch facility.

Quill manufacturing is ramping up. Our biggest problem has been the American-owned, investor-run, companies. We are fortunate that the former Director established a policy of minimizing our relationships with investor-run companies. Fortunately, our suppliers in France, Germany, Spain, Nippon, Great Britain, and Korea have stepped in to pick up the slack.

Earth Prime has been using the new procedures in assembling the ships and it is shaving months off the schedule. Claude is very happy.

Elon Musk is upset about your SpaceX remarks on Charlie Rose. Apparently, your point that his entire program is based on reinventing thirty-year-old space technology sent his stocks into free fall. I think he’d like to come up and give you a good lecture…if he had a craft that could get out of low Earth orbit.

NASA is not too happy with you either, but I suspect their employees know that your analysis of their program is spot on.

That’s all for now. I’ll talk to you later this morning, unless you have something more urgent. Have a great day!”

Ken looked at Jenna and said, “We need to talk about Musk.”

Daylight Saving Day

13 Sunday Mar 2016

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2016, communications, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, space, space travel, spacecraft, spacecraft design, Time

Mars Date/Time: Year 1, Sur Two, Friday, Sol 9 (001.2.9) 09:46 NST
Earth Date/Time: Sunday, 13 March 2016 2:00 PM PDT
Distance traveled: 58,579,560 kilometers Time Delay: 3 mins 00 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 333,830,192 kilometers

Daylight Saving Time on Earth does not impact ESEP. The entire organization operates on Noctis Standard Time, which is not affected by Earth time zones, nor annual changes in time for the seasons of Earth. In addition, the Mars landing site is close enough to the equator that there is no reason to impose a Daylight Saving-type change to the standard time.

However, an adjustment to the location of ESEP’s operation is advantageous in keeping Earth in synch with the mission. A Mars day is about 40 minutes longer than an Earth day, so every eight days or so the administrative functions on Earth is moved west in order to keep the Mars day aligned with the Earth day. The day of the swap is known as the Daylight Saving Day, as it is done to keep Earth-based ESEP functions in the daylight when the Mars landing site is in the daylight.

Currently, the administrative functions are handled out of the San Jose ESEP Center in California. At 12:01 AM NST it will switch to Kumamoto, Japan. A handful of administrators will leave San Jose at about 4:00 PM NST today and arrive in Japan at about 3:00 AM NST (6:00 AM JST.) At 6:00 AM NST (9:00 AM JST) the day shift will begin for ESEP.

It was during the last swap from the twin Operation Centers in Figueres, Spain and Perpignan, France that one of the three planes carrying the administrative team crashed in the North Atlantic. Today was haunted by the fact that it was the first Daylight Saving Day since the tragedy.

While it was on the minds of the Command team listening to Megan De Luca, it didn’t seem to faze her as she was explaining,

“Director, I understand your concerns; however, the more this has been discussed, the more logical it seems. The one issue is computer power. As we move into longer and longer transmission delays, the infrastructure needed to support an offworld centered administration becomes a critical issue.

The solution seems to be a triple-redundant computer system. This would mean computer centers on Earth, in orbit above Earth on Earth Prime, and a computer center on Mars. We had discussed the computer center on Mars as part of the establishment of self-sufficient colonies; however, what we are talking about now is sending the infrastructure up as soon as we have it built. This also means that a significant element of colonization will now be in place years before we planned.

Establishing ESEP administration offworld also means establishing support staff on Mars ahead of schedule. Development and Exploration would be concurrent. Life support and food resources would become a high priority. None of this is a negative, it just means we are moving faster than we originally planned. Let me know if we can move forward on this. It is pending your approval.”

Naomi was the first to speak,

“Director, Paige will be the lead on the computer system and Earthside has discussed this with her. Based on her recommendation, they could have the hardware ready to leave Earth orbit by the second or third week of Sur Three. I’m not sure when it would be in Mars orbit, but it would be a shorter trip than ours, so it would be there soon after we have established our landing site.”

Roman Gomez followed up,

“Director, the timing of it is good. They are talking about a three section Quill, and it would be best to land it close to our base, so connecting it up would be less complicated than bringing it in later. They expect Earth Prime’s computer center to be operational by the time we arrive at Mars.”

Jenna said,

“Alright, it’s a go; and Megan, I want this to be an open decision, with it revisited after we arrive at Mars. None of us really know what our lives will be like once we start putting people on the surface. I’ll assume the Directorship on those conditions. Also, let’s move up the next mission. Roman, I need you and Lanny to come up with a priority list of what we need and when we need it. Assume we will have four more missions by the end of this year, and a January mission. Look at equipment, supplies, and personnel.

Kayla, your medical center has now become a full-fledged hospital. Find out what we need for 400 people on Mars by Sur One of Year Two. Wendy, you need to look at staffing and facilities for your team. Assume two bases, four outposts, and multiple remote operations by the start of Year Two.

Ken, I’m not sure we can keep you as Commodore on Mars Prime. Look for a replacement and the timing of getting them to Mars. Same for you Naomi. Roman, at one point the engineering team discussed using Storm Crater as a city center and covering it with a transparent dome. Would you and Lanny look into the idea and decide whether we would be better with excavating living spaces underground or using a crater and building in to it.

Now, Megan, let’s talk about Daylight Saving Day.”

Under New Managment

12 Saturday Mar 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, communications, counseling, Counselor, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, engineering, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars Mission 2016, Mars time, NASA, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, science, space, space travel, Time, Wendy Stevens

Mars Date/Time: Year 1, Sur Two, Thursday, Sol 8 (001.2.8) 11:23 NST
Earth Date/Time: Saturday, 12 March 2016 2:00 PM PST
Distance traveled: 54,974,664 kilometers Time Delay: 2 mins 48 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 337,435,088 kilometers

Mr. Duncan’s suicide was the bad end to a series of tragic events. It exposed the frailty of some of the people in ESEP. People who had been important gatekeepers in the decision-making process had suddenly turned on the central goal of the organization, only because the organization had grown past them. Instead of protecting the mission to Mars, they were trying to end it because they wouldn’t let go.

This frailty was not lost on the member countries of ESEP. The shock of the management coup began discussions of security and protocols. The Executive management was now split between the newly created Council, and the Interim Director, Jenna Wade, and her crew. The Council consisted of Division Executives and two representatives of the member countries.

Throughout the crisis and the fallout, Jenna and her staff were the heroes. To the ESEP member countries and the Council, the process of selecting a new Director to replace Jenna seemed pointless. An idea grew that the solution to finding new leadership for ESEP had already been accomplished when Jenna and the Mars Mission crew took back control of ESEP.

Jenna laughed and said, “That’s absurd!”

Megan’s image was on the screen in front of Jenna. Megan had just explained the agenda item for tomorrow’s Council meeting that would make Jenna the permanent Director of ESEP. Megan wouldn’t hear Jenna’s reaction for another three minutes, but she could have guessed what it would be, and she knew she would have some more explaining to do.

Ken said, “No, actually it makes perfect sense. ESEP was vulnerable because people had access to key people and critical systems. With you offworld, and the Sagan controlling ESEP computers, any attempt to attack the company is almost impossible unless they destroy every communication system on Earth.”

Jenna’s Command team was gathered around for the morning briefing from Megan, and heard the idea at the same time Jenna did.

Wendy said, “And from a management perspective, it pushes back daily decisions to the people who are closest to the issues, so only the big decisions go to the top. It is ideal for a more efficient model of management. Because you’re too far away to nitpick on details that you don’t need to know, everything moves faster.”

Jenna said, “Because I’m not around to make a remark about the windows being dirty, no one scurries to clean the windows, because it’s not important to the objectives. I see your point, but what happens when we get to Mars? I can’t run ESEP and our first exploration of Mars.”

Wendy replied, “Why not? You’re at the tip of the sword. Where better to direct the operations of the Exploration of Mars than from Mars. It is one of the best management models I have ever heard.”

Jenna looked at her team and said, “What about all of you? This is putting an extra workload on all of you. We are going to have busy days setting up on Mars.” Lanny, the Director of Science for the mission said, “I’d much rather be setting up are experiments on Mars knowing that you’re commanding all of ESEP’s resources, rather than being second guessed by my colleagues on Earth. Roman added, “We’re not going to be following their playbook in the Engineering Division when we get to Mars. I like the idea of them as consultants, not overlords, and if they select a Earthbound Director, that person is going to want to justify their existence by nitpicking what we are doing. With you as the Director, I’m confident that our workloads will be easier rather than harder.”

Jenna shook her head, and said, “First it was Commander, then I was a Rear Admiral, now I’m being asked to be the ESEP Director and Governor of Mars? Does anyone else see a problem here?”

Seven people in unison said, “No.”

Housekeeping

11 Friday Mar 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, astronauts, communications, counseling, crew morale, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars Mission 2016, Mars time, NASA, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, science, space, space travel, spacecraft, Time, Wendy Stevens

Mars Date/Time: Year 1, Sur Two, Tuesday, Sol 6 (1.2.6) 13:01 NST
Earth Date/Time: Thursday, 10 March 2016 2:22 PM PST

Jenna and Wendy left her quarters and climbed up to the Mess. Jenna asked, “What’s the deal with everyone telling me to eat?” Wendy said, “You can thank Kayla. We’ve all been briefed to be your welfare team. Megan has asked for daily reports.” Jenna said, “Megan. I love her, but does everyone realize she is our master?,” then Jenna continued, “That reminds me….” Jenna called Ken. Ken answered, “What can I do for you Director?” Jenna hesitated. It had only been today that everyone began using her official title at Megan’s insistence. Jenna wasn’t used to it. Jenna replied, “Are you on the Command deck?” Ken said, “Yes.” Jenna said, “Good, if you have a few minutes I need to talk to you.” Ken replied, “Acknowledged.”

Wendy and Jenna were in the Mess and Wendy told her to go on. She would bring her lunch. Jenna climbed onto her workstation deck and saw Ken waiting for her. Jenna called John Schultz, who was a Comm Specialist for the mission, but now was handling Comm duties that would normally only be seen at one of the ESEP Centers on Earth. Jenna said, “John, I need to transmit to Earth Prime Actual, encrypted and priority.”

Ken said, “What’s up?” Jenna said, “I want you to work with Claude on something.” Jenna’s tapped an icon and a screen came up, “Transmission to Earth Prime Actual, Priority, Encoded – Delay 2 mins 36 secs” Jenna looked at her camera and said,

“Claude I’m asking you and Ken to work together on Megan’s detail. I know we have her under protection, but I’d like Ken to have someone he personally knows and trusts to lead her security team. Likewise, I need you to identify someone you know and trust to be her personal assistant. I trust her to find people who can assist her with her schedule and workload, but she is a critical link in ESEP’s continued operation, and I don’t think she places a priority on her needs. Set her up with team of five people managing her personal/work life interaction. I want them to report to Wendy and Kayla on a daily basis. I need all of them vetted with Ken. To be clear, she is to be covered by top-tier security and welfare. We cannot afford to lose her under any circumstances.

Also, I’m denying your request of your last message. I’m afraid transporting Mr. Duncan to Earth Prime and accidentally losing him out an airlock may send a message that we’re being to soft on him. My plan is to take up our friend’s in Chile who have offered to take Mr. Duncan on the high plateau, strip him, stake him to the ground, and cover him in honey. They say it could be days before the ants take enough blood for him to bleed to death. Jenna out.”

She looked at Ken, who had been smiling at the last topic, and said, “She may fight us on this.” Ken replied, “Megan’s smart. She’ll know why we’re doing this, and she’ll accept it. The key will be finding people who can know when to let Megan be Megan, and when to step in. Good call on involving Wendy and Kayla. Offworld oversight is the best security we have now.”

Wendy brought Jenna’s lunch and Jenna thanked her and sat down at her workstation. All the workstation chairs had a frame the size of a food container that could be pulled out. In addition, workstations had built-in water dispensers for hot and cold drinking water. Jenna invited Ken and Wendy to sit in chairs designed to allow a small group of people to sit and talk with the Admiral at her workstation.

Jenna looked at Wendy and said, “Claude and Ken are going to set up a personal assistant team for Megan. I’m also asking Ken to personally set up her security team. The personal assistant team will be reporting to you and Kayla.” Wendy smiled and said, “Is this to get her back?” Jenna replied, “Actually, I thought of this yesterday, but I forgot to take care of it. Her monitoring my welfare reminded me.”

Jenna turned to Ken, “What’s the status of the investigation?” Ken said,

“As far as we can determine the plane crash was an accident. Based on communications we reviewed, Mr. Duncan was the first to be informed and he took control. I don’t know at what point he decided to make it a coup, but it seems it developed over a period of hours. By six that morning he was fully committed and ordered the passengers on the first two planes to be held upon landing.

I have a team reviewing the past six months of the people involved to determine if there has been any plan brewing, but it seems that everyone was loyal to ESEP until Nick allowed the mission to have priority decision-making. At that point, the organization fractured in a power struggle.

Everyone we know to be involved is under arrest somewhere. My team has tabs on all of them and none of them can be released without that law enforcement agency notifying us. In some cases it seems we have people who were just following orders; however, after Mr. Duncan began acting as ESEP Actual, it should have been obvious to anyone that he was not qualified to assume those duties. We may have cases coming to the Council for leniency.”

Naomi came down to the Admiral’s deck and Jenna motioned for her to join them. Ken continued,

“Right now we seem to be secure company-wide. Part of that is due to the fact that Paige holds the leash of the ESEP computer system and no one can try anything without her knowing it.”

Naomi broke in, “Sorry to interrupt, Director, we just got word. Mr. Duncan was found dead in his cell. It was suicide.”

Moving On

10 Thursday Mar 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, communications, Counselor, crew morale, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Mars time, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, science, space, space travel, Time, Wendy Stevens

Mars Date/Time: Year 1, Sur Two, Tuesday, Sol 6 (001.2.6) 12:40 NST
Earth Date/Time: Thursday, 10 March 2016 2:00 PM PST
Distance traveled: 47,764,872 kilometers Time Delay: 2 mins 36 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 344,644,880 kilometers

“This is awkward trying to have a meeting when we are dealing with a five-minute round trip delay in transmission; however, our new format seems to be working. I would like Megan to continue to chair the new Council and I will observe meeting. I will transmit questions and concerns through Megan during the meeting and make remarks at the end of the meeting. Since I will abstain from all votes, the Council can make decisions without waiting for my vote.

With the exception of emergency issues, all agenda items must be submitted to Megan by 14:00 the day prior to the meeting. All items should only have a three-minute summary, and the rest of the information should be attached to the agenda item with a file.

As for the interim staff structure: Megan De Luca is now Earth Liaison for ESEP, Ken Hart is now ESEP Director of Security, Naomi Pierce is now my Chief of Staff, Paige Flores is now ESEP Chief Information Officer, and Anna Flores is now Mars Mission Operations Executive. The rest of the Mars Mission crew is expanding their roles during the interim.

I would ask the Council to work quickly to restore ESEP’s leadership, so that everyone can return to a normal schedule. I appreciate everyone’s dedication to ESEP and the Mars missions. It is incredible that we are back on schedule, less than a week after losing seven of our top leadership, and putting down a management coup. Thank you to all of you and your staff.”

Jenna ended her transmission and looked to her left, where Wendy was waiting. Wendy said, “Did you ever think that going to Mars, meant you had to run the whole, damn thing?” Jenna just looked down and shook her head. She then said, “Nick was my anchor. He was the one who cleared my path. I don’t know how long I can go without him there.”

Wendy said, “Well, that’s a side of you I don’t need to see.” Jenna looked up in surprise. Wendy continued,

“I’ve never seen a person like you. People hardly know you and they want to work with you. Sure, Nick was good at greasing the track and clearing the trash, but his motivation was to help you. You have a unique ability to do the right thing and Nick knew that, so he tried to help you. Now you are surrounded by ‘Nicks’ who all are motivated to help you, and you are mourning the loss of one person. Yes, you need the time to mourn for Nick, but you are not one person acting alone. Everyone else has had the same loss, but they are rallying around you. We remembered Nick two days ago and celebrated his life. Unfortunately, you, of all people, can’t linger on his loss. We will remember him many times over the next few years, but now you have to move on.”

Jenna said, “If I were a normal person, I would be angry right now.” Wendy smiled and said, “Jenna, there is nothing about you that’s normal. Let’s go grab some lunch.”

An icon was flashing at Jenna’s workstation. Jenna tapped it and said, “What’s next, Naomi?” Naomi replied, “You should grab some lunch and come up to the Command deck. I need to brief you on some important messages.” Jenna sighed and said, “On my way.”

The Message

08 Tuesday Mar 2016

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2016, astronauts, communications, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, engineering, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Mars time, NASA, Noctis Standard Time, science, space, space travel, spacecraft, spacecraft design, Wendy Stevens

Mars Date/Time: Year 1, Sur Two, Thursday, Sol 1 (1.2.1) 17:39 NST
Earth Date/Time: Saturday, 5 March 2016 3:47 PM PST

Jenna took a sip of tea and said, “We need to find out what is going on back on Earth.” The seven of them had gathered in her quarters to assess the situation at ESEP. ESEP had taken over control over the Sagan’s systems, but Paige had made sure they could only make temporary changes. ESEP could access ship cameras; however, Paige had improved upon’s Zeke’s usage of recording video and when ESEP pulled up any camera, they only saw what Paige wanted them to see. Currently, ESEP’s view of the brig showed the Admiral and the Commodore pacing, sitting, and talking, while both were in the Admiral’s quarters planning on how to respond to the coup by Mr. Duncan and unknown individuals on Earth.

Wendy said, “I could try to contact some people on the ground team, but I don’t know who might be complicit with Mr. Duncan.” Naomi said, “Any call from anyone on the ship is going to be routed through ESEP and they will monitor those communications.”

Jenna’s door chimed. Jenna found Paige waiting outside. Jenna brought her in and said, “What’s up, Paige?” Paige had a funny expression and said, “We got an audio message from Earth, but it wasn’t through ESEP. It came from the European Space Agency. ESEP deleted it almost immediately, but they don’t realize that they only are operating in a dummy block of software, so we still have the message in our system.” The door chimed again. Wendy crossed back to the door while Jenna said, “Paige, pull up the message.”

Jeramy was at the door. Jenna waved him in. He realized that he was interrupting something and waited. Paige played the message and Jenna recognized the voice immediately. It was Megan, Nick’s assistant,

“Admiral or Commodore, I don’t know if you will get this message, but I had to try to contact you. As you are probably aware, the Director and seven other top ESEP administrators were killed when their plane crashed somewhere in the North Atlantic. I was on one of the two planes that made it and I was aware the plane was missing before we landed in San Jose. On landing, we were held for debriefing; however, in hindsight, we were essentially kidnapped. I was told that since Nick was no longer the Director that I was relieved of duty and put on leave until such time that my position with ESEP could be determined. I don’t know that the crash was an intentional act, or just an opportunity for certain people to take advantage of; however, a few key people are using the crisis to seize control of ESEP. At this point, the people who supported Nick and his administration are locked out of ESEP. I don’t know what is happening with your mission, but I do know that many of the people involved have been very unhappy about our decisions in the past few weeks and would rather see the mission return to Earth. Good luck. I will contact you with more information when I have it. Good luck.”

Ken said, “Can we contact her through the Europeans?” Naomi and Paige, both shook their heads and Naomi said, “If we do, ESEP will also get the message and they will know the game were playing.” Jenna said, “I wish we could take over ESEP computers like they think they’ve taken over ours.” Paige said, “We can…well, I need a way to access their system, so they don’t realize it.” Jenna said, “What do you mean?” Paige replied, “I need to send them a normal file with code attached that will unlock their system and mask my manipulation…oh, and I need a transmission to piggyback on while I’m rewriting their code.”

Jeramy said, “Could it be a file of firing data?” Paige said, “Yes.” Jeramy smiled, “Mr. Duncan has sent me a message to reconnect the ICP drive to the computer. I was going to delay him by asking the Engineering to check my firing data to confirm the rack configuration. I could also send a transmission asking them several questions about the return and fuel required for the firings. I could talk for at least ten minutes.” Jenna looked at Paige, “Will that work?”

Paige said, “Easy peasy.”

First Holiday

05 Saturday Mar 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, artificial gravity, astronauts, communications, crew morale, Earth Space Exploration Program, engineering, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, NASA, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, Pacific Standard Time, science, space, space travel, spacecraft

Mars Date/Time: Year 1, Sur Two, Thursday, Sol 1 (1.2.1) 15:52 NST
Earth Date/Time: Saturday, 5 March 2016 2:00 PM PST
Distance traveled: 29,740,392 kilometers Time Delay: 96 secs
Distance to Mars Rendezvous: 362,669,360 kilometers

Keira and Zeke had been sent to inspect the four construction pods. Zeke took the opportunity to give Keira a quick orientation on the construction pods and what they could and couldn’t do. She and Zeke had a pilot to pilot understanding and she worked with Zeke a few times at Earth Prime, so they had already developed a friendship.

Zeke was telling Keira a story about a pod pilot that failed to close the pod’s interior hatch before undocking when they both were ordered to report to the Auxiliary Command deck.

As they floated down the core they noticed the lights were down near the hab sections. The only thing glowing were the color coded gravity indicator lights running down the Command Quill. They headed down into the Quill to determine the problem, but at the entrance to the third section there were two people in space suits blocking their way. The sun visors were down so they couldn’t tell who was in the suits.

The space suit on their left held out its hand. His voice was coming through the ship’s intercom and he said, “Halt! You are not one with us!” The second space suit pointed at Keira. It was a female voice and they recognized it to be the First Officer, Anna, who said, “What is your name Earthling!” Keira kind of smiled and said, “Keira?” Anna then insisted, “YOUR FULL NAME!” Keira shrugged and said, “Keira Choi.” Anna fired back,”Your REAL Full Name!”

Keira was a little mystified. Her father was Korean and her mother was Japanese, but Keira had lived in the United States since she started school. Her first teacher called her Keira, which she discovered made it easier to fit in with the other kids. She hadn’t used her real first name in two decades. Keira quietly responded, “Mariko Choi.”

Zeke was a little surprised by this revelation that Keira’s name was not Keira, but he didn’t have long to consider it as the male spacesuit pointed at him and demanded, “WHAT IS YOUR FULL NAME?” Zeke looked at him and said, “Ezekiel Apollo Jackson.” The voice continued, “Mariko Choi and Ezekiel Apollo Jackson, you are to go immediately to the Command deck and await your trial!”

The two in spacesuits moved aside and Keira and Zeke continued down the Quill. The sections were still dark until they reached the Command deck in section five, but lights in that section came on as they passed through the threshold. Crew members were standing at the edge of each deck as they moved into the section and came to the Rear Admiral and Commodore’s deck.

There the Director of Science, Lanny Deaton, and the Director of Communications, Naomi Pierce had them move on to the deck where Jenna and Ken were standing. Ken began, “Mariko Choi and Ezekiel Apollo Jackson. You stand accused of failure to be assimilated. How do you plead?”

Zeke timidly said, “Guilty?” At this all the crew began stomping their feet and yelling out “Guilty!”

Ken said, “Mariko Choi and Ezekiel Apollo Jackson you have been found guilty…” At this Keira said, “I didn’t say I was guilty.” At this Ken said, “A Denier! She must be cleansed! Take her to the showers! At this crew members moved in to Keira and started to take her off the deck and she yelled, “WAIT, WAIT…I’m guilty, I’m guilty, just like Zeke.” At this the crew moved away from her and Ken resumed, “As I was saying, you have been found guilty and are to be sentenced immediately! Rear Admiral Wade, the suspects are guilty and await your sentencing.”

Jenna stepped forward, held a cup with a clear liquid in it and said, “Crew of the ESS Carl Sagan. We have two that have been found guilty of failure to be assimilated. As today, the first day of Sur Two, is declared to be Assimilation Day, I, as Rear Admiral of this mission to Mars do assign the sentence for Mariko Choi and Ezekiel Apollo Jackson be made to drink this Potion of Assimilation.”

At that point she gave the cup to Keira who tentatively sipped from the cup to the boos of the crew. Jenna put the cup to Keira’s lips and tipped it up until she had emptied it. A small amount spilled from each corner of her mouth and she shuddered as she swallowed it. Naomi stepped forward and filled the cup halfway. Jenna turned to Zeke who reached for the cup and downed the contents without spilling any, then he held out the cup to Naomi for more. Wild laughter broke out among the crew.

Amid the noise and celebration all monitors in the Command section went black. Everyone stopped and looked at the blank screens. Seconds later all the screens were filled with the following message:

“COMMAND CODE“

The Second Push

26 Friday Feb 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, Anna Flores, artificial gravity, astronauts, communications, counseling, Counselor, crew morale, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, engineering, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, ESS Queen Elizabeth II, explosion, firing, fuel pellet, gravity, HD cameras, ICP, Jenna Wade, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Mars time, NASA, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, pellet, science, space, space travel, spacecraft design, Wendy Stevens

Mars Date/Time: Year 1, Sur 1, Wednesday, Sol 53 (1.1.53) 21:01 PM NST
Earth Date/Time: Friday, 26 February 2016 2:00 PM PST
Distance traveled: 2,021,171 kilometers

It was time for the second big push to Mars. The uninhabited ESS Carl Sagan successfully left Earth orbit at 7:42:58 AM NST and was chasing the QE II for a rendezvous in three days. The Sagan was up to its planned speed at 150,204 km/hr. The QE II had a two-day head start but was poking along at only 41,039 km/hr. Now it was time for the QE II to pick up the pace.

The mishap of two days before was on everyone’s mind. Twelve fuel pellets had been lost when the blast door was failing to close and then recycled the system to fire another pellet with the same outcome. The crew caught the problem within seconds, but it almost ended the mission.

Jeramy Prater, the Munitions Officer and the Engineering team fixed the problem and the gun was given new instructions to not fire a second pellet if the first one failed. Still, he wasn’t taking any chances of losing more fuel.

Prater stood in his spacesuit looking out the gap that the pellets would flow through in a moment. It was not a recommended place to be during active propulsion, but by being here during the firing, he could stop the process if it misbehaved again.

He looked up at the gun above him. The racks of fuel pellets and the push mechanism were in position for firing. In front of him were four guide rails for a push plate that kept the pellet from deviating from the path of the ‘barrel’. Two days ago this push plate caught the rack and went out of alignment causing the pellet to hit the blast door as it exited.

Everything looked ready for the ICP to fire its series of pellets. Jeramy checked to be sure he was clear of the pellet barrel. It would be a short day for him if he got in the way of a departing pellet. In his glove he held his safety tether that would keep him attached to the ship.

On the Command deck the pilot, Keira Choi, contacted Jeramy. “You set, Mr. Prater?” He responded, “I’m a go here.” Keira looked at the First Officer and nodded.

Anna looked at the Ken and said, “We’re good to go, Commodore.” Ken responded, “Ms. Flores, take us to 147K.” Anna opened ship wide communications and said, “All stations, all hands, stand by for ICP firing. Ms. Choi, give them a countdown.” Keira said, “Aye, aye.” Anna and Ken looked at each other and she shrugged. This “Aye” response was not what they were accustomed to with their former Pilot.

Keira gave the countdown,

“In 23 seconds,….15 seconds….10,…9,…8,…7,…6,…5,…4,….3,…2,…1,…Fire.”

Suddenly a voice called over the speakers, “MAN OVERBOARD, WE LOST HIM!” Ken yelled, “BELAY THAT ORDER!,” but his words were slower than Keira’s reaction. She had aborted the detonation at the first sound of crisis. She knew that there could be only one crew member at risk of going into space.

Instantly all eyes looked at the aft monitor and where there should have been debris and smoke from an explosion there was a tethered spacesuit thrashing wildly within a few meters of the explosive pellet. In the silence on the Command Deck everyone could hear desperate gasps over the speakers.

Jenna took control. “Prater, are you okay?” The only response sounded like a man drowning. Again, she called, “Jeramy, ANSWER ME!”

Wendy Stevens had been talking to Jenna a few seconds earlier interrupted, “Admiral, I don’t think he can.” Jenna knew what Wendy was implying. She locked eyes at Wendy and said, “Can you bring him down?” Wendy immediately pulled up her pad and hit the COM icon and said, “Mr. Prater, this is Wendy,…..I’m afraid you don’t have permission for a spacewalk.”

Jenna fired an icy look at Wendy and said, “You’re making jokes?” Wendy held up her hand to cut the Admiral off.

At first there was silence. The gasps on the speaker had stopped. Then a short laugh, followed by a longer one, followed by a continuous laugh. At this point everyone looked in disbelief, then smiled, then wild laughter broke out.

Jenna got herself under control and then waved to the crew on deck to be quiet. Jeramy’s laughter subsided and he said through breaths of relief, “Does…this…mean..I’m not going to die?” Wendy said, “Well, I can’t guarantee what’s going to happen once we have you back on board….the Admiral looks pretty pissed.” Wendy and Jenna looked at each other and smiled.

Jeramy said, “Ya, understood. Permission to come back on board.” Jenna nodded to Keira, who said, “Permission granted.” Jeramy quickly remarked, “Keira, you must have fast hands…I should be in little pieces right now.” Keira smiled. Then Jeramy said, “I think I can reach the pellet tether, do you want me to bring it in?”

In unison five voices all responded, “NO!” Ken said, “Prater, I want you to treat that pellet like a Rottweiler with a new bone…just back away from it and don’t make it angry.” “Aye, Commodore.” Prater replied, “I’m on my way.”

48 Seconds of Failure

25 Thursday Feb 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, Anna Flores, artificial gravity, astronauts, Commodore Hart, communications, Counselor, crew morale, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, engineering, ESEP, ESS Carl Sagan, ESS Queen Elizabeth II, gravity, Jenna Wade, Jeramy Prater, Keira Choi, Ken Hart, Mars, Mars Mission 2016, Mars time, NASA, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, Paige Flores, science, space, spacecraft, spacecraft design

Mars Date/Time: Year 1, Sur One, Tuesday, Sol 52 (1.1.52) 21:39 NST
Earth Date/Time: Thursday, 25 February 2016 2:00 PM PST
Distance traveled: 1,036,235 kilometers

The good news was that the ESS Queen Elizabeth II was on her way to Mars. Current velocity was 41,039 kilometers per hour. They had grazed past the Moon eighteen hours ago and it nudged their path enough to put them where they needed to be in order to rendezvous with Mars less than four months from now.

The bad news was that they might not be going to Mars. Less than 24 hours ago they were supposed to fire three series of pellets that exploded behind the ship to bring them up to escape velocity from the Earth. The first two series happened just as the engineers and munitions people had designed. A pellet was pushed out the aft section on a tether, a blast door closed, and the pellet was detonated at a precise distance. In milliseconds the computer analyzed the results and selected the next pellet based on explosive power and sent it out the aft to a precise distance. It took about seven seconds between the firings of each pellet.

Earth to Mars in 110 days

The first series was six pellets and the second series was ten pellets. Those sixteen worked perfectly. It was the third series of twelve pellets that were threatening a premature end to the mission.

As with the previous two series the pilot, Keira Choi had programmed in the firing sequence before initiation. The computer had established that the first two series had been too sweet, meaning the impact the explosions had on the velocity was greater than expected. They now needed the final series to be ‘sour.’ This involved the munitions person, Jeramy Prater, setting up a different rack of pellets, which required giving the computer new instructions. They had four minutes between the second and third series of firings to accomplish the changes.

Jeramy had a problem with the computer accepting the changes and did not have time to do a visual check of the pellet racks. When the time came for the series to fire the computer pushed out the first pellet and did not fire because the blast door did not close completely. The computer sensed the failure to detonate and compensated by immediately releasing the tether on the first pellet and pushed another pellet out with the same result. Every four seconds the computer pushed out another pellet with no detonation. In 48 seconds the ship lost twelve pellets.

Keira and Jeramy worked frantically to shut down the Impulse Cycle Propulsion or ICP drive. Jeramy was able to visually inspect the rack with cameras in the propulsion drive and within seconds he determined that the rack was slightly out of position. That caused the pellet to slide out and tap the blast door causing it to fail to completely close.

Jeramy and Choi had determined the problem, fixed it, and had a plan to resume the process within 115 seconds. On the Command deck Choi said, “Commodore, we have the solution. I can manually fire.” Ken looked at his First Officer, Anna, who watched Keira work through the problem, she gave a nod to say she agreed with Keira. Ken then looked at Jenna just as she was getting a text message from Nick the Director at ESEP Center on Earth and it said,

“ESEP advises ABORT.”

Jenna glanced at the message. ESEP had no authority to order any action. This was, as it said, an advisory; however, it meant that the smartest minds on Earth were giving her a course of action that could not be lightly ignored. Jenna didn’t hesitate. She knew what Keira had planned to do and agreed that it was an acceptable solution. Jenna didn’t need to say anything, but she wanted it to be clear this decision was on her.

“DO IT!”

In the next two minutes Keira manually ordered the computer to fire a pellet, detonate it, and then evaluate the result. She then ordered the next firing and the computer made the calculations of which pellet and how far away to detonate it. The process was slightly slower than the computer-managed firing, but produced the desired results.

Keira announced, “We are at speed and on course, Commodore.” Jenna looked at the Comm Director and said, “Naomi, Code Alert and tie in ESEP Center.” Naomi tapped on her pad, and said, “All hands, all stations, CODE ALERT from Admiral Wade.” Jenna then touched her tablet and said, “All departments, we need a full assessment of the event and of our current status. Report every at every quarter hour to your Director until further notice. All Directors report to my quarters immediately. Expect a long night.”

By midnight the failure was completely understood and a solution was devised and tested. The issue was that they were only at escape velocity from Earth and in two days they would have another firing, followed by a third series and in five days. They had lost twelve pellets which reduced their margin of safety inventory by a third.

ESEP Center was advising that the ESS Carl Sagan not initiate the Orbital Transfer Firing in two days, and that the ESS QE II begin operations to return to Earth.

Jenna relieved the crew and Command team at one AM. She decided that they would start again tomorrow and reassess the status of the mission with a decision to be made by the end of the day.

It was now after 9:30 PM NST and the entire crew was either in the Command deck section, or on monitor from their assigned station. Jenna began,

“Our current status is that with the failed third firing yesterday, we have lost a significant portion of our fuel safety margin. We feel we have addressed the issues of the ICP and resolved them; however, if we return we can be back to Earth in a few days and ESEP’s plan is to refit and relaunch us early in Sur 2. All of you have reviewed the report of our situation and have contributed to the assessment of your department. We now need to decide. Do we go or abort?”

Before her words had stopped echoing in the ship Paige Flores said, “Go.” within ten seconds everyone on the crew had joined the chorus of “GO!”

Ken and Jenna smiled at each other. This was the best crew. Jenna looked at Paige and said, “Ms. Flores, would you connect me to ESEP Center.” Paige smiled and said, “Yes, Ma’am!” Nick’s image came up and Jenna said, “We’re going to Mars. What’s next?”

Rat Trap

19 Friday Feb 2016

Posted by Paul Kiser in Book, Earth Space Exploration Program, Mars, Mars 2016, Mars calendar, Science Fiction, Space, Space, Virtual Adventures

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2016, artificial gravity, astronauts, communications, Earth, Earth Space Exploration Program, ESEP, ESS Queen Elizabeth II, gravity, Jenna Wade, JPL, Ken Hart, Mars Mission 2016, Mars time, Mr. Duncan, NASA, Noctis Labyrinthus, Noctis Standard Time, NST, security, space, space travel, spacecraft, stowaway, Time

Mars Date/Time: Year 1, Sur One, Thursday, Sol 47 (1.1.47) 01:30 NST
Earth Date/Time: Friday, 19 February 2016 2:00 PM PST

CODE ALERT! Text in three parts to follow:

CODE ALERT – PART ONE: Closeout of ESS Queen Elizabeth II will occur today at 16:00 NST. All Earth Prime team members should have inspected and finalized all areas on the ship by 13:00 NST. No non-mission equipment should be left on the ship. Please account for all tools, suits, and other Earth Prime equipment and notify the Earth Prime Director’s Office of any missing items.

CODE ALERT – PART TWO: All non-essential personnel should be off ship by 12:00 NST today. Final inspections of all cargo areas will occur from 08:00 to 11:00 NST and Hab area inspections will occur between 10:00 and 13:00 NST. Inspection teams will work from stern to aft closing out areas behind them.

CODE ALERT – PART THREE: Security personnel will be at both entrance hatches at 12:00 NST today. All personnel must have proper authorization to enter the ship. At 16:00 NST all hatches will be closed and sealed. No one may enter the ship without pre-authorization of the Nick Castillo, Director of ESEP, Rear Admiral Jenna Wade, Commodore Ken Hart, AND Commodore Claude Dubois. Ship will depart from port at 10:35 NST on Sol 49.

The Code Alert was broadcast at 01:30 NST. It was now 05:34 NST and Jenna was rereading the Code Alert. She had read it yesterday after Duncan sent the final draft to her, Nick Castillo, and Claude Dubois. As she sipped the morning tea she wondered if it would work.

Early yesterday morning one of her crew had discovered evidence that someone was trying to stowaway on her ship. The person had left equipment in a cargo area that would keep him or her alive in an unheated and stagnant air environment.

In three days the ESS Queen Elizabeth II will leave the Earth Prime spaceport and because she will be under her own power, life support functions such as circulating air and heat will be shut down in some cargo areas. It was in one of these sections that equipment had been found that would keep someone alive for a few days.

Whoever was responsible was clever. They chose an area that none of the crew would have reason to enter. They had some type of quick attachment device that allowed them to put a tablet in front of the camera playing a loop of the cargo bay. A person would have to be the monitor to catch them putting the tablet in place and with almost 100 cameras in place, no one was going to catch it.

It took several replays of the video of the cargo area to catch the moment the tablet was put in place and it was not removed for 29 hours, so it was impossible to track down the person based on the time the camera was disabled. The person also managed to avoid all other cameras leading to that section. This person was good.

After the equipment was discovered yesterday morning, Duncan ordered it left in place. He had a hidden camera with a motion detector installed with a view of the equipment. Duncan left two security people hidden away near the cargo quill ready to arrest the person if they came back to check on the equipment. The perpetrator didn’t.

Time was running out. The person would likely board the ship just before departure from the spaceport. That would make him or her easier to catch, but it would mean the QE II would have to return and redock, which had never been done before. Ships are constructed with the first section already docked at the spaceport. Docking the mass of the entire ship would be nearly impossible. They had to catch the person before the QE II undocked.

Duncan decided to try to trap the person at the closeout. By having the inspection of the cargo areas end at 11:00, and the putting Security in place at the ship entrance hatch at 12:00, he felt that the potential stowaway would try to check on his or her equipment during the hour after the end of the cargo inspections, but before Security took positions at the hatches.

Jenna, Nick, and Claude all agreed, but now Jenna was having doubts. This person was not stupid and they had avoided detection on a ship covered in cameras. Somehow it didn’t make sense that they would fall for the trap.

Jenna dressed for the day and headed to the Command Commons area to grab some breakfast. Only Ken, Nick, Claude, and her knew about the plan to catch the stowaway. One of her reserve crew members knew about the equipment, but he was told to not discuss the situation with anyone. Most of the Command staff came to the Command Commons area while Jenna was there, but she kept the conversation on the closeout events, and avoided any hints that a significant security issue was overshadowing the day.

The morning kept the crew busy with the closeout procedures, but at 11:00, Jenna and Ken announced that they would have a working lunch in her quarters. The two of them climbed down to the Commons area to get a lunch ration, prepared it, then headed down to her quarters.

Once there she contacted Duncan and Nick and pulled up the camera feed from the hidden camera. Jenna knew that nothing had happened or else she would have been called. She looked at both of Duncan and Nick on the monitors and said, “You don’t mind if we eat, do you?” Nick said, “No.” Duncan was unresponsive. Jenna was concerned that if they didn’t catch him or her the departure schedule might have to be pushed back, but at this point it was up to Duncan, and she and Ken would just have to focus on their jobs.

Over the next hour Ken, Nick, and Jenna talked about mission issues. None of them were significant, but lately all their conversations had been about major issues. This was one of the rare times when they could chat about the mission rather than discuss the mission.

At 11:58 NST, Nick said, “It looks like our person didn’t take the bait.” Duncan replied, “It doesn’t make any sense. He has to know that his stuff could have been found. He should have come.” Jenna joined in, “May he’s changed his….” Jenna looked closer at the monitor and then said, “Mr. Duncan, what is that flashing icon at the bottom of the screen?” Duncan casually answered, “That’s just the motion detector icon.” Jenna tried again, “But why is it flashing.” Duncan thought for a moment, “Uhm, well it flashes when it senses….wait, we would see the person…unless….but he couldn’t have…he doesn’t….” Jenna interrupted him, “Mr. Duncan, he has fooled your camera and he’s there.”

Before Jenna had finished Duncan had sent the signal to his staff on board. Hopefully, it would not be too late.

Noctis on Mars

~ A Real Time Virtual Mission To Mars

Tag Archives: Ken Hart

First Return

Putin’s War

Plan B

To Catch A Boris

Another Rat

The Twin Protocol

Death By Polymer

Containment

The Break

Fool’s Day

Charlie One’s Red Flag

The Smell of Musk

Morning Briefing

Daylight Saving Day

Under New Managment

Housekeeping

Moving On

The Message

First Holiday

The Second Push

48 Seconds of Failure

Rat Trap