Executive Intent

At the very same time, three miles away, a rocket shot from an upraised launch tube, flew on a cushion of compressed gas for a dozen yards, then ignited its solid-fuel motor and streaked into the sky, heading almost straight up. Compared to the hot glow of the petroleum-gas fire, the DF-21’s motor exhaust plume was a tiny dot, and because the rocket continued to climb straight up, it did not create a very long streak in the sky when viewed from above. The first stage burned out within three minutes, and the second stage accelerated the rocket to ten times the speed of sound. A protective nose cap prevented any heat damage to the sensitive seeker in the nose as it rose through the atmosphere.

At Mach 10 and an altitude of 150 miles, the second stage burned out and the payload section began its hypersonic unpowered cruise, following its inertial guidance commands with refinements provided by datalinked steering commands from a Chinese radar site in Myanmar. The payload section continued its climb to 400 miles altitude.

Soon, the chase would be on.

ARMSTRONG S PACE STATION

THAT SAME MOMENT

“Nuts to that, General Greene,” Kai said half aloud after he broke the connection to AFRICOM. “Seeker…?”

“A warning has gone out to Space Command and U.S. Strategic Command with all the pics, sir,” Seeker said, “and a general alert has gone out via secure instant message to all major commands’ ops centers on our list, including AFRICOM. The alert reports detection of a convoy of Chinese ships apparently bound for Mogadishu, Somalia, escorted by four Chinese warships, detected by TacSat-3 but not backed up by any other electronic or visual data.”

“Good enough for now,” Kai said. “How’s our sensor coverage of the area around that convoy?”

“Stand by, sir.” Seeker entered numerous requests into her console; then: “Averages only eleven minutes per hour, sir. High of eighteen minutes. Look angles are no better than nominal.”

“That’s better than anyone else, but still pretty poor,” Kai said. “Weapon-status report?”

“Stand by.” A few moments later: “Self-defense interceptors on all garages and Armstrong are all reporting green except for Kingfisher-Eight, which is reporting a launcher continuity failure,” Seeker said. “ABM interceptors are reporting in the green except for Eight and Four, whose ABMs were downloaded for routine maintenance. All Mjollnirs are reporting in the green on Kingfishers Two, Four, Six, and Ten, still down on Eight until we can restore continuity. That’ll take an EVA.”

“I want Eight back up and running right away,” Kai said. “Boomer…”

“My Stud can be ready to go in one hour once I swap out the payload, General,” Boomer said.

“Seeker…?”

“I’m getting it now, sir,” Seeker said, again typing furiously on her console. This took a bit longer than the other calculations, but soon: “If we can position in thirty minutes, we can rendezvous with the fuel load already on the Black Stallion. It’ll take three orbits in the transfer to catch up with Kingfisher-Eight. If we miss it, it’ll take another twenty hours to get into position from Armstrong.”

“Boomer…?”

“We can leave the payload in the bay, suit up, and do an EVA from the Stud’s cockpit,” Boomer said. “As long as the tech can fit his tools in the cockpit, we can do it. He might have to strap them on his lap.”

“Get on it. I’ll have a tech meet you in the locker room.”

“On the way.” Boomer detached himself from his anchor position and propelled himself toward the spaceplane service module.

“Seeker…”

“Already got Lieutenant McCallum on his way to spaceplane servicing, sir.” A moment later: “Sir, SBIRS reports a large thermal event in south-central Myanmar.”

“Any tracking data yet?”

“None, sir. Signature is still very hot and not moving. Could be a ground fire.”

“Any launch sites nearby?”

“The only known ones are considerably farther south: a Chinese antiship site at Henzada and Mergui, and a suspected Chinese antisatellite site under construction north of Rangoon.”

“They could have built a new site and we haven’t spotted it,” Kai said. “Let’s report it to STRATCOM and SPACECOM, keep an eye on it ourselves, and start surveillance of that area for any signs of new construction.” He thought for a moment. A little voice in his head reminded him that he did not believe in coincidences-but Myanmar and Somalia…? “Are we going to pass over that area soon, Seeker?”

“Negative, sir, not for another…” She entered commands into the computer, then: “…fourteen hours.”

Kai nodded, but something was still nagging at him. “Still no track data on that event?”

“None, sir. Still large and stationary. Looks like an industrial fire-it’s just as hot as it was when it was first detected.”

“Did SBIRS-Low pick anything up?”

“No SBIRS-Low spacecraft are in range.”

“How about our sensors?”

“The closest one is Eight, and it’s shut down. Six will be in range in four hours.”