Orena, Royal Palace
"Do you have a report on the San Dorado situation?", Paul asked, rubbing his temples. What he hated most about this job was that when things went wrong, they did that in style. And he still didn't get the hang of sleeping well in times of crisis, even with forty years of experience.
"Yes, sire. We have evidence suggesting the violence was caused by the Rage virus, or something similar to it.", general Kulinsky stood up and handed the King a pendrive, "It's all here."
"Rage? I believe we've been researching it along with the Shroomanians..."
"Yes, this is correct - and BIOCOM has samples of vaccines we developed. Starting full-scale production will take some time, but we have around twenty thousand doses in emergency stockpiles."
"Okay...distribute them to maritime and airport customs offices and such. I want you to figure out who may come in contact with the thing and get them vaccinated. Issue a travel advisory for San Dorado, and get in touch with their government to see if they need any help with containment or investigation of the thing's origin."
Paul's advisors etched down their notes, nodding. This was quickly becoming standard procedure.
"Do we publicize the cause?"
"Not yet. Stay in 'no comment' mode - but don't deny it. We'll have to tell the truth eventually, but I'd prefer to do that after liaising with San Dorado."
Organizing and suggestions took a few more minutes before they moved on.
"The strategic reconeissance airplane tender...", Paul looked at the next item on the briefing's agenda, "Did the military finally agree on what the hell they want? The Parliament would really like to finally close the budget..."
"Uh, yes,sire...", the Defence Minister took a look into his notes, "They want the Spectre and several Dominion Hawks..."
"Huh? I though we made our own UAVs..."
"Yes, but the Hawks are way better than anything Mielec can offer us, and have better electronics. And the Spectres are apparently quite impressive."
"Okay. You can buy the Hawks, but negotiate a good offset deal for spare parts production and such. We can't afford to have Mielec go out of business - same goes for the Spectres."
"Yes, sire. Naturally."
"So...any other matters to discuss?"
"I was asked to present you with the report about the
Archers.", the Defence Minister handed Paul another pendrive, which was added to the pile growing quickly on his desk
"Good. I'll review it later."
Results:
- PeZookia releases travel advisory for San Dorado. The Foreign Ministry makes a call asking WTF is going on, and basically pointing out we know it's a virus.
- Tender closes for strategic aircraft. We'll buy six spectres and forty DominionHawks, but want an offset deal so that our factories can have a piece of the pie, too.
- The military has finished their review of the Archers, and a report will be posted later.
===================================================================
250 kilometers above the Earth
The toilet flushed - which didn't sound anything close to normal. It wasn't really a flush, even - the suction pumps made it sound more like a vacuum cleaner.
Colonel Lev Titov didn't mind, however. He opened the door and floated out of the cabin, bent in half in order to close it, and stuck his head into the re-entry module.
"It's the beginning of a new era, comrade. No more diapers!", he told his PeZookian colleague, Maciej Zakoscielny, who was still strapped into his seat.
"Yeah. I always said this is the single most significant technological innovation of this capsule.", the PeZookian answered, "...too bad it won't make it into the news."
"You can thank socialist technical thought, comrade. The Old Dominion capitalists are still crapping their pants today!"
Maciek tapped the mission clock in response,rather than commenting, "Thirty minutes to re-entry, Lev. How about you stop marvelling at the genius of your engineers and get strapped into your seat?"
The Russian floated back into the re-entry module - significantly smaller than the orbital habitation module attached to the front of the spacecraft - and after a bit of acrobatics, managed to secure the connecting hatch and land in the right-hand seat.
"Okay...rig the spacecraft for re-entry.", Maciek commanded, and both astronauts began running their checklist. For a spacecraft which had four prototypes blow up in spectacular ways, this particular flight was surprisingly problem-free.
"Initiating re-entry autopilot...now.", Lev selected the proper program, and the ship's computer rotated the entire Soyuz assembly into the proper position, "Five minutes to main engine ignition."
Both astronauts worked in silence for a while, checking every sensor and status gauge. Everything seemed okay, and the main service engine ignited on schedule.
"Three, this is Comona - we read you on a proper re-entry trajectory.", the radio squawked once the burn was complete. The capsule was whizzing over Velaria, now covered in darkness - far away to the east, lights of Messican cities illuminated the dark side of the planet. But neither crewmember bothered with the sights - they were already on their fifth orbit.
"Copy that Comona. Moving into checklist section four.", Maciej answered the mission controllers.
"Jettisoning orbital module", Lev reported after flipping a yellow-and-black striped switch. The spacecraft shuddered as explosive bolts threw the orbital module away, along with the most expensive port-a-potty in the world, "Orbital module jettisoned. Switching to internal capsule power. Switching to internal fuel supply. Disconnecting service module umbillical. Jettisoning service module."
Another shudder signified that only the re-entry module remained of the spacecraft. With it went the powerful primary service engine - the only propulsion system capable of altering the capsule's orbit to any significant degree. There was no retreat now.
"Let's hope nobody left a wrench in the mating port this time.", Maciej muttered under his breath. As they passed over the Eastern Seaboard, the capsule began to shudder.
"We're getting some vibration...", Titov announced
"Yeah, it's normal. Velocity looks good, attitude looks good."
The shudder became worse. With a loud bang, something came loose from the capsule's front and flew past the window.
"What the hell was that?!"
"Debris of some sort..."
Suddendly, the capsule began rotating, shifting geometry of the lifting surface. G-forces jumped to 2.4 in a split-second.
"Shit!", Maciej let out, and flipped the switch to manual control. Down in Mission Control, the flight surgeon watched in horror as both astronaut's heart rates jumped.
"Three, your trajectory is drifting! What's wrong?!"
"Something didn't separate properly! We have a disturbed lift surface...goddammit!", Maciej answered via the radio, but was cut off by another loud bang, which signified the last bit of debris being burned away from the surface of the heat shield. The crisis passed as soon as it appeared, and after some maneuvers, Maciej managed to stabilize the trajectory. Five minutes later, Soyuz 3 landed - in the middle of the Atlantic, nearly a thousand kilometers away from its designated landing site in Anatolia.
"Well...this is gonna take a while.", were Lev Titov's first words after hearing of their position.
Result: Soyuz 3 lands safely, but far away from any recovery ship and/or team.