Eagle Station

“The American spaceplane is maneuvering evasively,” Major Liu Zhen announced. He was monitoring the tracking data passed to them from the Kondor-L radar satellite, stationed nearly forty thousand miles away at the Lagrange-2 point. Like everyone else in the base except for Colonel Tian, he was wearing a bulky pressure suit as protection against explosive decompression if the habitat module was breached during the battle they all expected.

Tian himself had donned a full EVA-rated space suit, leaving only his helmet off for the moment. He held it cradled under one arm.

“What is the range to the enemy S-29?” Lavrentyev asked.

“Sixteen hundred kilometers, and closing at one point six-one kilometers per second,” Liu told him. “We will have a clear plasma rail gun shot in just over eight minutes.”

Captain Dmitry Yanin looked over from his own station. “Should I bring our fire control radars online now?” For the next several minutes, the tracking information provided by the Kondor would give them a reasonably accurate picture of the developing tactical situation. But when the time came for action, only Korolev’s own ground-based radars could provide the fire control data the plasma gun needed in battle. Even at the speed of light, it took nearly a half second for a radar return to reach the Russian satellite and then be repeated back to Korolev Base. And by that time, the enemy spaceplane would already be more than six hundred meters away from its reported position. Relying on the Kondor satellite’s radar data in combat would be like expecting a rifleman to hit a moving target after he’d closed his eyes a half second before pulling the trigger.

“Not yet,” Lavrentyev decided after a quick glance at Tian.

Tian nodded. “There is no point in alerting the Americans now, Dmitry. We’ll let them come farther into the kill zone.” For a few seconds, he stared over Liu’s shoulder, watching the blip representing the S-29 as it orbited toward them. The Americans were following the lunar equator, about five and a half degrees of latitude south of their position on the rim of the Engel’gardt crater. He turned back to Yanin. “At their current altitude and speed, how long will the Americans be in plasma gun range before their laser can hit us?”

“Nearly three minutes,” the younger cosmonaut replied.

“And how many times can you fire the rail gun in that time?”

“Eight times,” Yanin said. “It takes roughly twenty seconds for our fusion reactor to recharge the weapon.”

Tian frowned. “Only eight shots.”

“Yes, Colonel.”

“Can you guarantee a hit with one of those first eight shots, Captain Yanin?” Tian asked quietly. “Against an unpredictably maneuvering target?”

For a moment, Yanin hesitated. “My computer is analyzing the S-29’s evasive maneuvers now, sir — using the radar data we’re collecting. If it can crack the random-number generator the Americans are using in the next few minutes…” His voice trailed off. Then he shook his head. “No, Colonel. I can’t guarantee a hit, not before that spaceplane gets much closer.”

Tian nodded somberly. He looked across the tight, crowded command center at Kirill Lavrentyev. “You see the tactical problem?”

The larger man grimaced. “Unfortunately, yes. We are just as vulnerable to their attack as they are to ours.”

“More so, I suggest,” Tian pointed out. “The Americans can dodge. Stuck down here on the surface, we cannot. And as soon as we open fire, they will know the exact coordinates of our plasma rail gun — and our radars.”

“But our orders—”

Tian shook his head dismissively. “Our orders do not require us to commit suicide, Kirill. Which is the likely outcome of going off half-cocked and opening fire at the first possible moment… in the faint hope of scoring a lucky kill. We need to fight this battle with our brains instead of our balls.” Rapidly, he outlined the tactics he proposed.

When he finished, Lavrentyev nodded thoughtfully. “Da, to, chto vy govorite, imeyet smysl. Yes, what you say makes perfect sense.” He forced a thin, humorless smile. “After all, why shouldn’t we make these Americans take all the risks first?”

Forty-Two

Shadow Bravo One, over the Far Side of the Moon

Several Minutes Later

The S-29B Shadow jolted downward and then rolled onto its left side — leaving Major Hannah Craig able to see only a narrow slice of the lunar surface they were flying toward at more than thirty-six hundred miles per hour. She just had time to get a hazy impression of sharp-edged smaller craters strewn across the vast interior of a much older, far more eroded basin. And then the spaceplane’s thrusters fired again, pitching its nose back up and to the right.

“Christ almighty,” she muttered. “I hope the computer knows where we’re headed, because I sure as hell don’t.”