The Beacon: Hard Science Fiction by Brandon Morris (red white and royal blue hardcover TXT) 📕

would take until the air pressure in the large volume of the space glider hull had fallen by half... and there were definitely oxygen tanks that would counteract it.

From behind, a woman leaned forward and waved her arms. “Do something! Now!” she shouted.

Peter forcefully pushed her back.

“Oh my God, the pilot is dead!” the woman exclaimed. “There’s a hole in her shoulder. And in her seat. I saw it!”

“I’m still alive,” Francesca said. “Stay seated and keep your mouth shut.”

The woman fell silent. A man intoned a loud prayer, but no one responded.

“In front of me, the compartment in the footwell,” Francesca said.

Peter unbuckled his seatbelt, leaned over, and felt for the compartment. There it was. He flipped it open and saw a medpack with a red cross, and a package with a tool symbol on top. He picked up the medpack, but Francesca shook her head.

“First, the repair.”

“Okay.”

He tore open the repair package. A spray can lay at the very top, a hose attached to its nozzle.

“Yes, that’s what you need,” Francesca said.

He shook the can and leaned across the cockpit. The object had come in pretty flat, so it must have been in orbit. Some satellite or spacecraft with the same orbit must have lost it. He held the end of the hose to the hole and pressed the spray button. Dense, gray foam poured out of the hose and stuck to the inside edge of the hole. The longer he pressed, the smaller the hole became.

Then the spray can was empty, but the hole wasn’t closed. The remaining opening measured maybe half a centimeter. At least he had reduced the cross-section to one-fourth.

“Do we have any more of these?” he asked, shaking the empty can.

Francesca shook her head. “Not that I know.”

Presumably, the engineers assumed that the spaceship would never survive this large a hole. But had he made it small enough yet?

Peter reached into his pocket for his handkerchief to wipe the sweat from his face. It was a nice cloth fabric that absorbed moisture very well.

Inspiration hit: Peter took one of the four corners between his thumb and forefinger and twisted it the way he sometimes did to clean sticky mucus from his nose. The twisted cloth was just the right size for the damage in the windshield. He moistened it with spit and fed the tip into the hole.

The whistling stopped. He pressed the fabric more tightly into place.

Francesca pointed to a roll of tape. He used several pieces to secure the handkerchief, although that was not necessary because the cabin pressure pushed the tip into the hole.

“Thank you,” Francesca said. “We were lucky. Ten centimeters further down, and it would have hit the instruments.”

“Five centimeters and it would have hit your lung.”

“I’m expendable. Without the technology, the ship would have had a hard time finding its way home.”

“Isn’t there a remote control?”

“Yes, there is. At some point, they’ll probably fly these gliders without pilots. But for now, I’ve got Mission Control to take care of things. Thanks, Peter. It was a good thing I had you next to me, wasn’t it?”

“Right now, we’re going to take care of your shoulder,” Peter said.

“There’s not much to do there. It was a straight-through shot. I just need a painkiller.”

He opened the medpack, pulled out an appropriately labeled syringe, and handed it to her. Francesca, who was looking pale, jammed it into her thigh.

“There. It’ll get better,” she said, wresting a smile from herself and turning on her microphone.

“Dear passengers,” she said, “we have had a minor incident, but it has since been resolved. We are out of danger, and you can take off your masks again. Is everyone okay?”

One after the other they reported. All of them had survived the collision. Only one of the men had vomited. Peter only now realized that he still had the radio on his lap. He pulled the USB, pocketed it, and stowed the radio back under the seat.

“Good. Unfortunately, our orbit is now nearing its end. I ask you to fasten your seatbelts again. The descent will be a bit rougher than the ascent. But in return, we will be able to admire the earthly landscape in all its beauty.”

Peter looked out the window during the entire descent. He had thought Francesca was joking. After all, they were headed for the New Mexico desert.

But it was true. After their close call up in space, the Earth seemed all the more beautiful.

An ambulance, surrounded by a small crowd of people, was waiting at the exit. Francesca didn’t miss the opportunity to say goodbye to all the passengers. The dark spot already stretched almost to her hip, but she didn’t let on. Then she was escorted to the ambulance by a man in a white labcoat.

An older man identified himself as the head of Spaceport America. He thanked all of the passengers for their prudence.

Then he turned to Peter. “Mr. Kraemer, we appreciate your extraordinary help after the collision,” he said, reaching out to shake Peter’s hand. “We would very much like to invite you on another flight so that you can fully enjoy the experience as well.”

“I can’t complain at all,” Peter replied. “It was only a small hole after all. I enjoyed the flight very much.”

“Well, if you change your mind, drop me an email. Maybe your partner would like to travel with us one day?”

The man handed him a business card. Peter looked at it and pocketed it. What he’d like was to go to his rental car, now. There was time to make it to Albuquerque today, where he had to return the car. Maybe he could still get a flight to Houston from there.

“Well, thank you for your hospitality,” he said.

“Just a minute, Mr. Kraemer. I’ve got some reporters here who want to ask you a few questions. It’s not every day, after all, that an object hits a civilian space flight, and then a passenger repairs the spacecraft.”

A motley group surrounded him,