Free Below Mercury by Mark Anson Page A

commit to a landing. We have tried to maximise—’
    ‘Look, just cut to the bad news. How much hovering time do we have?’ Clare’s voice interrupted.
    The mission planner stopped, and he glanced at the back of the room first, before answering Clare’s question.
    ‘It’s going to be – sub-optimal. We calculate that with your fuel margins, and projected allowances for error, you’re looking at a little over – ah, ninety seconds.’
    ‘ Sub-optimal?’ Clare threw her pen down. ‘Have you any idea how little time that is when you’re looking for a landing site?’
    Rawlings nodded, and opened his mouth to reply, but Clare carried on, her voice rising: ‘Let me spell it out for you. Even if we hit the de-orbit burn spot on, and we descend into the crater without wasting any fuel, we’ve got to locate the landing pad in the dark. There are no landing lights on the pad. Call that thirty seconds, if we’re extremely accurate with our navigation. A quick circuit round the pad to make sure it’s safe to land, and that there’s no obstacles to an abort. Another sixty seconds. And that’s it – we’ve used up our ninety seconds. That is just not enough margin. Minimum rules for manned missions are—’
    ‘—being revoked for this mission,’ Helligan’s voice cut Clare off. Helligan waved at Rawlings, and the lights came back up in the room.
    ‘This isn’t a routine flight, boys and girls,’ Helligan continued. He stood up and walked slowly round to the front of the room as Rawlings sat down. ‘This is a cutting-edge exploratory mission to an abandoned, probably wrecked, base with no operational refuelling facilities. You’re going to be close to the limits of fuel the whole way.’
    He let his words sink in.
    ‘Now, the captain here—’ he managed a little smile as he paused, ‘—has reservations about what we’re asking her to do. I’d like to remind you that all of you are volunteers and you’re under no obligation to proceed. If any one of you wishes to leave the mission team, I for one will have no problem in accepting that.
    ‘But let me make one thing clear. You bail now – right now – or you carry on with the training. If we spend all this time and money in preparing you for this mission, and then you pull out at the last minute, then I will personally ensure that you never go into space again, and that your superiors are left in no doubt about your prospects for future advancement. Do I make myself clear?’
    He looked at them all in turn, receiving answering nods and affirmations. He finished up with his eyes on Clare.
    She stared back, hating Helligan with a seething anger that wouldn’t go away.
    ‘Yes, sir,’ she said, leaving the gap between the words as long as she dared.
    Helligan’s porcine eyes narrowed.
    ‘You were saying, captain?’ he asked, his voice and gaze like steel.
    ‘I was pointing out that ninety seconds of fuel leaves barely any decision time, sir.’ Clare’s voice was quiet, but clearly audible in the hushed room.
    What’s wrong, Foster, aren’t you up to it? Are you so worried you’re going to crash, that you’ll abort the landing unless you’ve got five whole fucking minutes to work yourself up to attempting it?
    Helligan’s voice blasted back at Clare, but it was just in her head. Helligan hadn’t spoken. He was still looking at her, as if weighing her up.
    ‘Yeah, it’s not long, Foster,’ he said, ‘but we need someone who can deal with that. You told me you were up for this mission. Is that still the case?’
    All around her, the other faces looked at Clare.
    What was she to do? They were all waiting to see how she responded. Should she tell them how dangerous this landing could be, how there was a good chance that they could go past the point of no return, run out of fuel, and be stranded? Or that if she tried to land on rough ground and didn’t get it perfectly right, they could roll onto a wingtip, and it would all be over in