Eagle Station

Miller nodded vigorously. “You can count on it, sir,” he promised. “We’ll—”

Suddenly, a loud roar and crackle of static washed through their headsets. “Loss of signal,” the S-29’s computer confirmed. Now they were on their own, entirely cut off from communication with Earth. And up ahead, hidden somewhere in this torn and tattered moonscape pockmarked by thousands of craters, was a hostile enemy base — a base whose Sino-Russian crew knew exactly where they were at any given moment, thanks to their own satellites stationed high overhead at the L2 point. “Lunar orbit insertion burn in twenty seconds.”

Miller tweaked his thruster controls, aligning the spaceplane as directed by the steering cues that had just popped onto his head-up display. Then his hand settled on their main engine throttles. “Stand by for burn,” he warned. “Ten seconds.”

“We’re still good to go,” Craig told him, checking over her readouts. “All lights are green.”

Indicators blinked on Miller’s HUD. “Throttling up,” he snapped. “Going to thirty percent thrust.”

WHUMMP. The Shadow’s five big LPDRS engines ignited in rocket mode.

Inside the cockpit, Miller and Craig were pushed back against their seats by the renewed acceleration. Although they were only pulling a little over one and a half G’s this time, the three days they’d spent weightless made it seem like more. This same phenomenon had been experienced by some of the Apollo astronauts during their own lunar missions. Steadily, their velocity increased.

Ninety seconds later, Miller yanked the throttles all the way back. The muted roar from the back bulkhead stopped instantly. “Engine cutoff.”

Craig checked their navigation systems. “That was a good burn,” she reported. “We’ve entered a stable, circular orbit sixty miles above the surface.”

There were risks involved in coming in this high, since it automatically increased the distance at which the enemy’s plasma rail gun could hit them. But orbiting lower would have significantly reduced the ranges at which the S-29’s sensors could detect any unusual activity on the rugged, lunar surface. And since this was chiefly a reconnaissance mission, their first and most important objective was to pinpoint the Sino-Russian base and strip away its secrets.

Besides, they both knew, coming in much lower carried its own dangers. Maintaining a stable orbit grew more difficult the closer you got to the surface of the moon. At certain points, there were “mascons”—mass concentrations, or gravitational anomalies — buried below the lunar crust. They had been created by huge asteroids slamming into the still-cooling moon billions of years before. Like hidden tides and jagged shoals, these gravitational anomalies could tug low-flying spacecraft out of orbit or push them disastrously off course.

With their burn complete, Miller rolled the S-29 upside down. This maneuver gave them an uninterrupted view of the heavily cratered moonscape they were flying over. More important, it gave their two-megawatt gas dynamic laser, mounted in a retractable turret on top of the spaceplane’s fuselage, a clear field of fire.

A low whine permeated the cockpit as actuators raised the laser turret into its combat position and locked. “Our laser is online,” Craig reported. “Targeting lidar on standby.” She touched more controls. “Our search radar is active. Thermal sensors are live.”

Miller tapped an icon on one of his MFDs, turning on the spaceplane’s voice command system. “Initiate evasion program,” he ordered. “Synchronize the laser’s fire control system.”

“Evasive flight program initiated,” the S-29’s computer confirmed. “Laser fire control synchronized.”

Immediately, several of the spaceplane’s fuselage-mounted thrusters fired. It jolted sideways and then pitched nose-down. A second or two later, other thrusters fired, bouncing the spacecraft a few yards higher along its flight path. From now on, the computer would randomly activate different thrusters at short, unpredictable intervals — yawing, pitching, and rolling the S-29 through all three dimensions as it hurtled onward above the moon.

Thrown against their harnesses and then tossed wildly from side to side, the two Space Force pilots gritted their teeth and settled down to endure the wild ride. Simulator training and multiple practice attack runs against Eagle Station over the past several months had taught them how to handle the stomach-churning nausea induced by these random evasive maneuvers. But no amount of practice could teach them to enjoy it.

Command Center, Korolev Base

That Same Time