IGMS Issue 50 (8 page)

"You mean, water," said one of Groomer's two sidekicks, who had been identified by the name of Broadwell.

"Exactly," Debra said. "Three of the four big moons of Jupiter have an enormous amount of accessible water. Much more than Mars, or Earth's own moon for that matter. Water for living, experimentation, and fuel. And with my advanced fusion thruster design--the details of which are in the folders in front of you--the total trip time to Jupiter really doesn't pose a problem. Even for vehicles with limited available crew accommodations. So, we're looking at months, instead of years. Any astronaut who has done time on either of the International Space Stations wouldn't blink at that duration."

"All well and good," Broadwell said, gnawing at the end of a silver ball point pen, "but this assumes your thruster will work as advertised. So far, all you've shown us are projections based on your own doctoral thesis paper. You've never built a working prototype."

"True," Debra said, "but if I had my own money for a prototype, I wouldn't be coming to companies with my hand out, right?"

"Then why not just ask a manufacturer for a research grant?" said Broadwell's counterpart, an iron-haired woman with the last name Chaffetz.

"A grant?" Debra said, blinking.

"That's a slam dunk, Doctor," Chaffetz continued. "They give out millions in such grants, all to people like you. If your thruster design pans out, you share the patent with them, and everybody makes money. Why peddle this grand scheme for sending people to Jupiter? That's a job for government, not private enterprise."

Debra let her chin sink to her chest for a short moment. This was the part of the presentation she hated the most. Because the whole thing really did come down to that single, damnable question:
How is anyone going to make any money?

Debra swallowed once, screwed her courage to the proverbial sticking place, and looked directly into the skeptical face of her questioner.

"Ma'am, I'm of the firm belief that commerce--in the service of discovery--has been one of the great forces of history. How long since Neil Armstrong first set foot on the moon? Eight decades? And all for the sake of beating the Soviet Union to the punch? Obviously, beating the Soviets wasn't sufficient to keep America, or the world, interested in going to the moon. There has to be more
there
there."

"A good point," said Broadwell. "But again, why shouldn't this be a job for governments? After all, Columbus went to Queen Isabella for ships and funding, not a mercantile conglomerate."

"Sooner or later," Debra said, "businesses--not nations--are going to have to take the lead in outer space. It's why I devoted my entire career as a researcher to conceptualizing my thruster in the first place. I thought that someone with large high-tech industrial assets, and a proven desire to put money into somewhat unorthodox venture capital enterprises, would be up for breaking open a new era in human civilization--permanent exploration and colonization of the solar system."

Groomer and his cohorts just stared.

"Which," Debra continued hesitantly, "leads me to a question of my own. Of what possible interest could my project be to someone like
you,
Mr. Groomer?"

"You said it yourself," Groomer replied, leaning back in his chair with his hands behind his head. Over the course of the presentation, he'd taken his jacket off, loosened his tie, and rolled up his sleeves. Something neither Chaffetz nor Broadwell had done.

"Beg pardon?" Debra said.

"New Zealand versus Burbank," Groomer said. "I mean, who the hell takes a tour to Burbank? Now, New Zealand, whole different story. For Americans especially, New Zealand is an almost mystical destination. Think of all the movies that have been shot there over the years."

Debra waited. She wasn't putting it together yet.

Groomer suddenly sat up and pushed himself away from the table--a surprisingly deft maneuver for a man of his apparent age--and stood up. He went around the table and aimed a finger at the image of the beautiful gas giant planet behind the ship.

"That's New Zealand," he said, tapping the screen. "Mars? Mars is a dustbowl. And the many robot landers we've had slow-poking all over the surface since the turn of the century have made Mars
boring.
We've all seen the pictures and the movies that the probes have radioed back. So, I think you've got it precisely right, Doctor. Why go to Burbank when you can get to New Zealand for not much more?"

"Which still doesn't--"

"Answer your question," Groomer finished for Debra. "I know. Why the hell does a TV guy care about going to Jupiter? Well, to be honest about it, I think it's going to be the greatest, most-watched reality show of all time!"

Debra almost dropped the clicker in her hand.

"You want to turn the Jupiter mission . . . into a trashy reality series?"

Groomer's adventurous smile hardened.

"Sure. Why not?"

"Well," Debra said, "I mean . . . it's just that . . . reality television is . . . I mean, my God, we're talking about junk food for the brain!"

"Would you be less offended if I said this was going to be a
nutritious
televised snack?"

"Like, educational?"

"Sure. We put together an intrepid crew of diverse personalities, including pilots, scientists, and anyone else who might be fit for the trip, and we do segments along their route. Each week the audience gets a half hour of the mission's best material. With a little directorial massaging for drama, of course."

"This won't be a damn crab boat plowing through swells off the coast of Alaska," Debra said. "Have you watched footage from the International Space Stations? Even I get put to sleep by that stuff."

"Trying to un-sell me on the idea?" Groomer said, his eyebrow going up.

"No!" Debra stammered. "No, it's just that . . . this is like Apollo, Mr. Groomer. It's got to have
dignity.
I'm proposing something more awesome than humanity has ever attempted before."

"And the first couple of Apollo missions were must-see programming," Groomer said. "Every TV set in the country was tuned in for Apollo Eleven and Apollo Twelve. But, sooner or later somebody is going to do what you propose to do, and after it's been done three or four times, it's going to get ordinary. It always does. But the first time . . . there's never, ever another chance for a first time."

Debra considered.

"Is your broadcasting corporation ready to put its money where your mouth is?" Debra asked. "It might cost billions."

"Hundreds of millions at the worst," Groomer said. "And maybe not even that. Anything the government can do, private business can do in half the time for a quarter of the money, at double the quality."

Now Debra raised an eyebrow.

"So says the overly optimistic businessman," she said, an edge of sarcasm in her voice.

"Look, do you want this project to get off the drawing board or not?" Groomer asked. "Because I'm not here to argue politics with you."

Debra looked at him, and the lines at the corners of his brown eyes. Her father had also had those lines. They were the lines of a man used to smiling. They gave Groomer a warm, almost spritely quality.

"Yes," she said. "I do."

"Great," Groomer said, "then cancel your flight back to California. We're going to get started right away."

His hand thrust out towards her, and for the second time that morning, Debra felt his firm grip on her palm.

Groomer hadn't been kidding.

What might have taken years of protracted federal agency planning, Groomer's corporate enterprise accomplished in months. Ironically, Groomer's people contracted hardware and software from many of the same companies that had rejected Debra's fusion thruster design in the first place. But as long as Groomer's money was good, they were suddenly all for it: no risk for them, they were merely building the parts and putting them into space.

Within a year, the frame of the spaceship
Determination
was being constructed in Earth orbit, using the original International Space Station as scaffolding. And already, Groomer's reality television producers were milking the project for ratings. The word had gone out like a media bomb:
Daring media mogul to attempt impossible with Hail Mary voyage to the outer solar system; all of humanity invited for a ringside seat.
The broadcasts from the assembly sessions at the ISS weren't precisely American Idol, but the producers were slick with their craft, and the ratings--while starting out modestly--crept up the charts, week by week.

For her own part, Debra was immersed in the nuts-and-bolts construction plans for her thruster. The modules and other components for the
Determination
were off-the-shelf, and Russian rockets were fairly cheap. But the thruster . . . that was the key item, and something which had never been used in space before, much less on the ground. It relied on a specialized three-stage process that Debra had innovated as a graduate student. And while the fuel tanks and other items might have been fairly standard equipment, the reactor itself was not.

The day they shot the reactor core into orbit, Debra was a nervous wreck. Groomer joined her at the rail to the walkway near the Russian launch site he had rented for the project's use.

"If it blows up, we'll just build another one," he said, running a hand along Debra's shoulder to reassure her.

"This single reactor core cost as much as all the money yet spent on the whole show to date," she said. "Even you don't have bottomless pockets."

"True," he said. "But the thing is turning into a hit now. Advertising dollars are rolling in. We've been contacted by fast food chains, sports stores, pharmaceutical companies, soda manufacturers, and everyone else who wants to donate goods or services to my grand, new space effort."

"You mean," Debra said dryly, "they want to get their products in front of the cameras for some free advertising."

"Didn't I just say that?" Groomer said, grinning.

Debra shook her head, a frown on her face.

"Look," Groomer said, "I know you think it's uncouth for a bunch of logos to hijack the 'dignity' of your mission, but how the hell else is anyone supposed to make this work? You said, back when you pitched the project to me, that commerce in the service of exploration is one of the great forces of history. Well, here we are again. Columbus and his men wanted a faster route for the spice trade. Families rolled west in wagons, looking for farmland and gold. We're going to Jupiter because nobody ever has before, and we're doing it without having to beg for subsidy."

"Some marooned ex-NASA guys want seats on the trip," Debra said.

"So do the Chinese and the ESA," he replied. "I'm considering it. But then again, I don't want a bunch of military types pulling rank on
my
ship."

"Why would they have to be military?" Debra asked.

"All those people are, invariably. Current service, prior service."

"And that's bad?" Debra asked. "You know, Ben, I've done some checking on you, since the first time we met. You spent a little time in the Navy, when you were younger."

"Yup," Ben said. "Was proud to have done it. Hated every minute of it too."

Debra stared at him, confused.

"You'd have to have served to understand," he said. "Anyway, Deb, the point is, I don't want this mission to turn into an explicitly federal U.S. thing, nor an ESA thing, nor any other kind of government effort. Hell, why are we even calling it a
mission
? Sounds like we're loading up with guns and oil, so as to steam out to the coast of some dictatorship somewhere and start shelling the beaches. This is supposed to be peaceful and fun!"

"It would be more fun if I could go along," Debra said quietly, almost to herself.

Groomer looked down at her, his face suddenly turned serious.

"That can be arranged," he said.

"No," she said. "I applied to NASA once, a long time ago. Couldn't pass the first round of tests."

"Since when are their standards supposed to be
the standards
for everybody else? How the heck are we going to actually found permanent colonies
anywhere
in the solar system if barely one person in a hundred thousand is 'qualified' to go up? Look, do you think you could learn to stand weightlessness?"

"I hate roller coasters. They make me barf," she said.

"Me too," he said. "But do you think you could get over it?"

Debra considered. Then a bright light sparked in the distance, followed by jets of white vapor and dust shooting away from the base of the Russian booster as it slowly lifted off from its pad and rose into the blue sky.

"For a chance to see Jupiter and its moons up close," she said, "I think I could get over anything."

"You may have a harder time getting over being on camera, than being in space," he said.

"Crap," she said, "I had forgotten about that."

"Well, think it over. The crew goes up later this year, once our construction people have the reactor core fitted and the fuel tanks filled. Seems appropriate that the woman who invented the motor be there to help the mission on its way. Every ship needs a chief engineer, right?"