Jarvick stepped off the shuttle bus at the Edwards Air Base parking lot in front of a small building marked CREW TRANSFER STATION. He had spotted a large aircraft on the runway behind this building a half mile before arriving here and couldn’t wait to get a closer look at it. Pushing the double doors open, he was greeted by a security station where he showed his JPL identification and was escorted to a room full of lockers. An attendant that was there greeted him and began to explain what he could expect on the trip and showed him to a locker. Inside was a suit he was told to put on. It was a heavy space suit, with a metal ring for a helmet and mounting for a backpack of some kind. It also had heavy gloves and large, clunky boots that made it difficult to walk. Because he felt as though he was a guest here, Jarvick had made it his personal policy not to remark on Earth’s older technology; so he managed to keep his giggles and snarky comments to himself. Thoughts of returning home came more frequently than before and he worried a little more each day that passed without hearing that a patrol from Gavilon had arrived.
He had joined five other people in a small classroom for a pre-flight briefing, which lasted two hours; where he met the flight commander Karen Johnson. Afterward, all the crew members lined up and walked out onto the runway, where Jarvick saw the enormous space plane sitting on the pavement. It was a monster of an aircraft, three hundred feet long, with a wingspan that was almost twice that. The wings were triangular, or “delta” shaped, like he was told in the briefing; and each one had five large round engines under each one. What made it so unusual, though, was the main fuselage. Where a round tube should have been, there was what looked like a whale; an oversized tube behind a small nose-like cockpit. It really looked like an ORCA with wings. Above the wings, mounted on the huge fuselage, were two long cylinders; obviously the booster rockets. It was sitting on a long runway that terminated a half mile away with a ramp that curved up into the air hundreds of feet. Jarvick was so busy staring at it that he had to be nudged from behind by one of his fellow crew members.
The stairs were pushed up to the crew section, and Jarvick climbed up into the space plane. The flight deck was located in the smaller nose section in front of the balloon-like main fuselage. Since he was just an observer and passenger, his assigned seat was in the back against the starboard bulkhead. The pilot, copilot and navigator seats were forward with some kind of console in front of each one; and the seat opposite Jarvick’s was for the cargo specialist. Before he sat down, he looked through the window mounted in the center of the rear bulkhead and saw the huge cargo bay, massive and empty.
“Okay everyone, seatbelts on and tray tables back to the upright and locked position, we’re ready for departure.” said Commander Johnson. After a few minutes of preparations and radio exchanges, Jarvick could feel the craft begin to move. He could feel the vibrations of the engines and hear a thunderous rumble, thinking it must be deafening outside of the aircraft. The only window to the outside was in the front and he couldn’t see it because of his location. After forty five seconds of shaking and rumbling, the plane tilted upward and he could feel it being thrown into the air. They gained altitude and the flight smoothed out as everyone relaxed and went through their scripted routines. Twenty minutes later Jarvick heard the Commander announce “We have a go for exit, prepare for zero G’s.” then she counted down from ten. When she reached one, she flipped a lever and Jarvick felt himself being pushed back into his seat before he heard the roar from the rear of the space plane. He felt the nose lift up and the force pushing him into his seat became stronger, making it hard to breathe. Three minutes passed, then the feeling reversed and he felt as though he was falling up; they were now outside Earth’s atmosphere and in space.
Jarvick couldn’t get used to being weightless, so he stayed buckled in his seat as he watched the crew go about their duties. They were preparing to capture a malfunctioning satellite, which he understood to be a few miles ahead of them. Robert, the cargo specialist, was standing in front of a rear-facing console looking out the cargo bay window. He had freed up the robot arms that were used to catch and release satellites and he turned to Jarvick and said “Mr. Jarvick, would you like to see Earth from space? I’m opening the bay doors.”
He didn’t want to tell him that he had seen it before, so he got out of his seat and moved toward the window; grabbing whatever handhold he could find. Flying without gravity was a pain in the neck.
“Coming up on Objective one” announced the Commander as Jarvick watched the massive doors open to reveal a view of Earth beyond. Sunlight brightened the interior of the cargo bay and the robot arms were extended out past the edge of the plane. A small satellite slowly drifted into view with the blue oceans below acting as a backdrop. It took a half hour for the pilot to maneuver the ship close enough so that Robert could use the arms to grab the satellite and gently pull it into the cargo bay.
“You’re up Mr. Jarvick” said the Commander. “Suit up, it’s time to earn your ride.”
“Excuse me?” said Jarvick.
“Somebody has to go out and tie down that satellite, and you are to assist Mr. Knudson” the Commander said as she pointed to Robert, as he closed the big bay doors. Jarvick thought They didn’t tell me this as he was getting his helmet on, then he remembered that Ben had arranged this trip and made a point to ask him about it when he got back.
With the satellite secured, Jarvick had returned to his seat to rest. It took them two hours to secure the satellite and now the pilot was maneuvering the ship towards what was left of his.
“What exactly are we going to pick up, Mr. Jarvick?”
Jarvick had prepared a story for this and said “It’s a piece of leftover space debris, the remains of a failed experiment. I need to examine it to see if it’s salvageable or to let it just burn up in re-entry.”
“Roger. I’ll let you know when we get close and it is in sight.”
An hour and a half later, he was called up to the pilot area where he could look out the front windshield; and what he saw floating in space in front of them startled him.
“That looks like a piece of space junk.” said the Commander. “You really want to bring that back?”
Jarvick couldn’t believe what he was seeing; his ship was mostly gone, except the front ten percent, where most of the controls and the propulsion systems were located. The cargo bay, which made up ninety percent of volume of it was gone, but the most important parts were still there. He could see the bridge and the deck below it, but where the cargo section should have been, there was a ragged and torn metal edge where the explosion had ripped it away. It looked like it may even fit into the cargo bay of this space plane. His mouth was wide open, but not for the reason the crew thought; because he now had hope of returning home.