Asteroid Crisis Read online

She operated the joystick and found it disorienting to separate her reflexes from the operation of the waldo. Instead of making a smooth motion in whatever direction she wanted to go, the robotic arm moved in three discrete directions: up-and-down, back and forth, or side-to-side. In order to position the grasping fingers where she wanted them, JJ had to do combinations of the steps.

  “It’s kind of like those claw games at the arcade!” Tony said. JJ rolled her eyes. She was having a hard time grabbing the rocks with the claw, and didn’t need her efforts diminished by calling this a game.

  Tony chuckled when she made some blunders, and she got frustrated.

  “Be quiet!” JJ blurted. Catching herself, she forced herself to be calm, to concentrate. “Sorry, Tony,” she said, focusing on the rocks.

  “No worries. It took me awhile to get it, too.”

  When she finally adjusted the grasping claw over a rock sample, she double-checked the position of the metal fingers, then used a separate control to clamp the robotic grip. It took her two tries, but finally she held the rock sample in her waldo grasp. She set it on the tray of the laboratory balance, then meticulously lifted and placed counterweights to determine the exact mass of the rock. When she felt it was taking too long, she let out an exasperated breath. “I could do this all in a minute, if I could just use my own hands!”

  “You’re doing fine,” Tony said. “Better than fine, actually. Really well!”

  After she had determined the mass of the rock, JJ surrendered the controls to Tony for the second part of the experiment: placing a sample into a beaker filled with water in order to establish the volume of the rock. Simple arithmetic divided the measured mass by the volume to find out the density, the mass per volume. Armed with that piece of information, they looked up the density of specific rock types on a geologic table and found a number that matched, as well as a physical description that matched. They congratulated themselves on identifying the sample as granite. Figuring out an actual answer after so much work made JJ very happy indeed.

  “Pfft. How is this going to help us stop an alien invasion?” Song-Ye muttered from the adjacent lab station, where she and Dyl were completing a similar experiment, while King worked at a glove box, another sealed compartment with thick padded gloves that protruded inside.

  “Before you can do more complicated experiments, I need to make sure you know the basic science,” Commander Zota said.

  “We’re all impatient, Commander, because we know that the stakes are so high,” JJ said.

  Zota gave them a smile. “I understand your urgency, cadets. Very well, follow me. Let me show you something.” He led them back to his office, where he stood before the mysterious locked steel door. He removed a set of keys from his pocket, sorted through them, then inserted a key in the lock and opened the door. His figure blocked the view for a moment until he stepped aside to let them see a separate small room. Inside the cramped space stood an exotic boxy piece of equipment adorned with glistening spiral tubes. A faint glow of internal circuitry was visible behind translucent panels. The controls were covered with symbols like the ones they had reviewed earlier, but more complex.

  JJ caught her breath, amazed, immediately recognizing that this device had not been built by human engineers.

  “Is that it?” Dyl blurted. “The Kylarn time machine?”

  “It’s what transported me back from the future.” Zota turned to look at them, narrowing his eyes. “It’s how I escaped. And I find a certain irony in the fact that we’re using Kylarn technology to change history—for the better, I hope—so we can fight the invasion when it comes.”

  “We’ve already changed some significant things in the future,” King pointed out. “Thanks to our missions, Earth got an early warning about the hidden Kylarn base on the Moon, and we kept the aliens from taking over the space station.”

  “Our most important mission is here in this time,” Zota said, “but the future is also important. I know you’ve grown attached to the people there. At first, I intended these missions to serve an instructional purpose only, but I know you want to help the future you’ve visited as well. I have adjusted this machine so that its projection field—the volume that it grabs and transports to another time—is right here inside the Challenger Center’s transport room. When a class goes through that room, they pretend they’re aboard a spacecraft and we give them the illusion of an adventure in another place. For you cadets, though, it’s real.”

  “It sure is,” JJ said.

  Being analytical, King studied the controls on the Kylarn time machine. “When you escaped, how did you figure this out?”

  “The time machine controls look complicated, but are actually fairly simple for someone who understands the Kylarn language,” Zota said. “Most of the tentacled drones that do the work are not actually very intelligent.”

  “They’re definitely ugly,” Tony said.

  “And also, because they use tentacles instead of hands, fingers, and thumbs, the mechanics are kept straightforward. We were prisoners in the research camp for such a long time that Toowun and I learned the basics. It is essential to press the right sequence of symbols to activate the main power source.” He pointed to a flat area that did not look at all like an on button, but had a series of Kylarn symbols. Dyl got out his index cards and began sketching the alien design.

  Pointing to another cluster of symbols, Zota said, “This one changes the year, calibrated on the Kylarn calendar. The years on their home planet are longer than our years, and they use a different numbering system, but I figured out how to convert them.” He patiently explained other symbols, and Dyl made notes of them all.

  “It’s like that Simon game my parents used to play when they were kids,” Tony said.

  “Simon?” Zota asked.

  “It’s nothing,” Tony said, embarrassed that he’d brought up an old game Zota would never have heard of.

  “What’s more theoretical, though,” Zota continued, “is where to go in the future. Because you’ve changed the timeline, I can no longer calculate with certainty what’s going to happen. So I’ll need your help—and I’ll have to trust you.”

  From a side compartment in the Kylarn time machine, he withdrew five small handheld devices, like bracelets, which he distributed to each of the Star Challengers.

  JJ held hers up, saw the blinking light of its circuitry, and immediately recognized it. “Mira had one of these. She sealed herself in the node room and activated it then she was gone.”

  “It’s a beacon, a locator,” Zota said. “If you activate it, the time machine can find you and bring you back. Now, since I know where the ISSC is, I’ll send you there first. Go and learn what’s happened since your last mission. I’ll transport you to two years beyond where you were previously.”

  “The asteroids were going to strike Earth within three years,” King said. “We want to allow ourselves enough time.”

  “The question is whether we have enough time at all,” Song-Ye said.

  “That’s why we’re going to investigate,” JJ added. “So you’re saying there’ll be other parts to this mission, Commander?”

  Zota nodded. “We need to find out how Earth has decided to deal with the asteroid impact. Even though it’s no longer my true future, I still feel for those people. I know what they’re going through, and I want you to do whatever you can to help them. But you must come back safely, so you can spend your lives preparing your own generation.”

  “If we don’t do it right, can’t we just use the Kylarn time machine to return to the same point in the future and try it again?” Dyl suggested.

  Zota frowned at him. “That is not the way the time machine works. No do-overs. That would create a new level of danger for you.”

  “I’m ready to do whatever we need to do,” Dyl said. “Any day we can give those squidbutts a black eye is a good day to me.”

  ***

  Six

  Even though the Star Challengers had done this twice
before, JJ felt more excitement than ever—less anxious mystery, more anticipation.

  The first time Commander Zota had used his hidden time-travel machine to send them to Moonbase Magellan in the future, she and her friends had expected nothing more than a realistic and entertaining Challenger Center simulation. The second time, traveling to the space station, JJ had known what she and her companions were in for, but their adventure aboard the International Space Station Complex had changed everything. In addition to learning about living in microgravity and functioning aboard a complex orbiting facility, they had seen the extent of the continuing alien invasion plans. Worst of all, they had learned of an opposing group of humans bent on scuttling the efforts of the Star Challengers.

  This time, with the asteroids approaching, JJ and her friends knew that the fate of the Earth itself was at stake.

  “Weightless again,” Song-Ye said, not looking forward to her queasiness in space. “My stomach prefers gravity.”

  Dyl was the next to enter the connecting room that served as the “transport shuttle” for students and field trips going through a Challenger Center exercise. JJ’s younger brother leaned his crutches against the outside wall, and Song-Ye held out an arm to give him support as he moved ahead. “I won’t be needing those on this mission,” he said. “If you ask me, gravity’s not all it’s cracked up to be. You need to lighten up on your weightlessness problem.”

  JJ admired Dyl’s positive attitude after recovering from the car accident that had severely damaged his leg. The young driver who’d been texting while driving had altered her brother’s life, crossed off a great many items from the list of things he could do. He might eventually have additional surgeries that could strengthen his ability to walk, but he would never run or ride his bike as easily as he had on that fateful day. In orbit, though, Dyl regained his freedom of movement, just like anyone else. During his recovery and physical therapy, he had done exercises in a pool, where he was buoyant—but nothing was like swimming around in zero-G.

  “Next stop, the future.” Tony flashed a smile at JJ. “And this time, I’m not going to be taken by surprise.”

  “I can’t wait to see what they’ve changed at the space station,” King said. “There isn’t much time, but I have faith that the human race can pull together and solve the problem.”

  “As in, putting aside their differences and looking at the big picture?” Song-Ye let out a snort. “You should hear my father talk about some of the other diplomats, everybody arguing about silly little things.”

  “Let’s hope an invasion fleet of squidbutts is enough to make them put aside old quarrels,” JJ said, her mouth a terse line. She grasped one of the wall handles. “Everybody hold on.”

  Commander Zota stood at the door of the transport room that led into the classroom mockup of a moonbase or space station control center. “Learn and experience what you can, but most importantly find out how the combined space programs plan to defend against the oncoming asteroids. Then activate your pingers, as I’ve shown you—I’ll retrieve all of you cadets. Afterward, I can send you forward to the next part of your mission.”

  ‘“Mission sounds so formal,” Dyl said. “I prefer to think of it as an adventure.”

  “We’re not doing this for fun, Junior,” Song-Ye chided.

  Dyl snickered. “You mean you didn’t have fun when Red Spot sticky-globbed you to a wall in the ISSC?”

  “Next time I’ll remember to duck,” she shot back.

  “If you cadets are quite ready…?” Commander Zota said, then waited until they all acknowledged. He closed the door, sealing them inside.

  JJ knew that Zota would be returning to the time-machine controls and setting the date and the coordinates to the space station complex in the future. The alien device would project some sort of field to transport them more than a century ahead. Having experienced it twice already, JJ knew she and her friends wouldn’t feel the time-travel jump, but when her stomach lurched and she suddenly felt herself falling in all directions, she knew they had made it back up to the orbiting facility. She found herself spinning and disoriented; her feet lifted in the air.

  Dyl let out a long sigh and immediately nudged himself, drifting across the cramped chamber until he bumped into the opposite metal wall. They were crowded inside one of the node rooms, a connecting chamber between modules on the ISSC.

  “First piece of good news—the space station is still here,” Song-Ye said.

  “It’s a bit cramped,” Tony said. As he moved, he jostled against JJ, and they all bumped and bounced into one another like too many fish in a fishbowl.

  “We don’t know who’s aboard.” King pressed his face to the window port on the hatch. “There could be a new Kylarn welcoming party out there.”

  But the hatch controls blinked, and the metal airlock door opened. They found themselves facing the skeptical physicist, Dr. Kloor, who looked decidedly uneasy. Next to him floated Stationmaster Noor Ansari. The familiar chief smiled at them, relieved.

  Without greeting the Star Challengers who filled the node room, Kloor turned to Ansari. “Just as I thought, Stationmaster—trouble was bound to show up sooner or later.”

  ***

  Seven

  The International Space Station Complex had changed dramatically in the eighteen months since their last visit. Earth was throwing significant effort, funding, and resources into the revitalized space program. JJ was glad to find out that the ISSC’s crew complement had doubled since then, and ground-based monitoring stations and the orbiting space station remained on high alert.

  “Looks like they’re finally taking the Kylarn threat seriously,” King observed, when the five Star Challengers reached the central command module.

  “The destruction of Moonbase Magellan was enough to wake everyone up,” Stationmaster Ansari said. “But even in times of great urgency, the governments of Earth often take too long to get major programs moving. Fortunately, many entrepreneurs and private companies recognized the potential disaster and acted immediately, assigning some of the best researchers and significant money to building up the support industries to meet our needs.”

  As they pulled themselves into Central, the ISSC’s nerve center, JJ and her friends saw familiar faces, including communications specialist Anton Pi, Dr. Romero, and Specialist Lifchez. They exchanged warm and excited greetings, while a dozen new crewmembers regarded the young people with skeptical looks. After the last two missions, Stationmaster Ansari had issued a detailed report to Earth authorities, so everyone on the station knew about this handful of ambitious teens who had such a baffling habit of arriving and disappearing at unexpected times.

  Although Ansari believed that the Star Challengers were true allies, the crew’s easy and naive acceptance of Mira last time had taught them all a lesson. Security Chief Napali now had a team of four combat-trained men and women who could defend the station if the Kylarn ever tried to capture it again. In addition, the combined space agency had installed some emergency defenses to protect the station from an alien attack: an array of small rocket-propelled missiles was mounted to one of the modules on the ISSC. They could shoot at any oncoming Kylarn starfish ships that might try to cause trouble. So far, though, the system hadn’t been tested in actual combat.

  A replacement surveillance satellite, Eye in the Sky II, had been constructed and launched in secret under tight security so that no saboteur like Mira could expose it. The spy satellite had unobtrusively drifted across space until it reached the gravitational stable point L-5, ahead of the Moon in its orbit. The images from the satellite showed the extensive alien lunar base with its convoluted structures, spaceship landing zones, mines, and factories—a termite-nest of squidbutt activity.

  “I will personally vouch for all of you,” said Ansari, “but we’re keeping an eye open for Cadet Mira—or anyone else who might intend us harm.”

  “If you wouldn’t mind, Ma’am, we could use a quick briefing,” King said, sounding busines
slike. “What exactly has happened since our last visit?”

  Dr. Kloor made a sound of disbelief. “How can you come here so unprepared? It’s not as if we keep our operations secret—this is a worldwide emergency.”

  “We’ve, uh, been kept out of the loop,” JJ explained quickly.

  “Then you all must have been in suspended animation,” Kloor replied, shaking his head, then paused. “Is that the real answer? Is that why you haven’t aged a day since you left the station last time? It’s been almost two years.”

  Feeling alarm, but knowing she shouldn’t give away any answers, JJ avoided the question, “I’m sorry, but we really can’t give you any information.”

  “It’s classified. We could tell you, but then we’d have to shoot you,” Dyl quipped.

  Song-Ye rolled her eyes; everyone had heard that line before. “Not funny, Junior.”

  Kloor turned to Ansari. “Stationmaster, it’s absurd that these kids won’t trust us when they ask us to accept them at face value.”

  “It’s not that we don’t trust you,” JJ said. “I … we have … orders.” How did military people put it? “Telling anyone could adversely affect the mission.” Dr. Kloor didn’t look convinced, and even Ansari, their closest friend among the personnel aboard the station, seemed disappointed by JJ’s evasiveness.

  “We do know there are three asteroids heading straight toward Earth,” Tony said. “And everybody here is obviously scrambling to do something. Can you get us up to speed?”

  King added, “How are you going to make sure those rocks don’t hit the planet?”

  “We’ve already sent three automated probes to study the composition, size, and shape of the incoming asteroids,” Ansari said. “We adapted some old designs for comet flyby probes and used the blueprints to build new probes. Those probes have gathered vital information. In order to deflect the asteroid orbits, we need to know the parameters: the geology of the rocks, the density, the general structure.”

  Pi looked up from the comm station. “We had to know how solid the asteroids are. We’re planning to use massive explosions to shift their orbits, and we had to determine whether the asteroids would be deflected or just broken apart.”