The Tranquillity Alternative by Allen Steele Page A

event that something got fucked up in the course of the next few days.
    In short, everything was going according to plan.
    Dooley rose from the chair and strode to the door. The helpful young man in the blue blazer was waiting just outside the office, eager to escort him back to the ready room. “Your sister?” he asked as they began to stride down the hallway.
    “Oh yeah,” he replied, tucking his hands in the pockets of his jumpsuit. “You know family … just can’t leave you alone.”
From You Will Go to the Moon by Mae and Ira Freeman (Beginner Books, 1959)
    This is how you will go to the moon.
    Here is the rocket that will take you up into space.
    It is a tall, tall rocket.
    It is as tall as ten houses.
    The rocket has 3 parts.
    You will go way, way up to Part I.
    The rocket men will take you up.
    They will take you up in a little car.
    Come on in.
    Come into this little room.
    This is where you will sit.
    You will sit here with the rocket men.
    The men will show you what to do.
    The men will show you where to sit.
    Hook on that belt.
    Hook it tight!
    Get set to go!

FIVE
    2/16/95 • 0617 EST
    “O KAY, THAT LOOKS GOOD … Commander, move a little bit to the left, please … look up at the rocket now, yeah, that’s good … no, don’t look at me, look at the rocket! … okay, that’s great, that’s terrific …”
    And now here they were: Conestoga ’s flight crew, fresh off the vans which had transported them from the O&C Building to the Atlas launch complex, reluctantly posing for a TV camera below the base of the mobile launch platform. Egrets and sea gulls circle the tall silver-blue shaft of the rocket, their harsh cries mocking them, and a handful of pad technicians in color-coded hard hats lean against the platform railing, barely able to hide their amusement.
    Alex Bromleigh stood a few feet away, peering through the eyepiece of his Sony camcorder as he sought to orchestrate Parnell, Lewitt, and Ryer. Only Paul Dooley had been spared from the photo op; he stood nearby, nervously gazing at the broad round base of the ferry rocket, while Bromleigh called out directions.
    “Next thing,” Lewitt murmured to Parnell, “he’ll want us in swimsuits.” He turned his head to spit on the tarmac. “I can’t believe we’re doing this.”
    Parnell nodded. It was a waste of precious time and everyone knew it, but it was one more photo-op which had been scheduled by the NASA Press Office for the benefit of the ATS documentary team. There would be more like this one over the next few days, though, and they would have to get used to it.
    He gazed off at the nearby beach, where pale morning sunlight dappled the receding tide. A ZV-8P Airgeep cruised low over the sands; a NASA security officer leaned out of its open cockpit, using a metal detector to sweep the perimeter of the launch pad for bombs. No one had forgotten the time an anti-space fanatic had damaged this same pad with four pounds of Semtex he’d managed to hide on the beach the night before a launch. The Airgeep moved out of sight behind the rocket, its twin horizontal blades disturbing a flock of gulls, and Parnell stole a glance from behind his sunglasses at Berkley Rhodes.
    The correspondent stood behind Bromleigh’s camera, checking her notes as she prepared for the interview she would soon be doing. With her perpetual smile and young Barbara Walters looks, it was tempting to write her off as just another TV bimbo, yet Parnell had slowly come to realize over the past few weeks that there was much more to Rhodes than met the eye. There has always been friction between the American space program and the press, going back before Chet Aldridge had dumped a pitcher of water in Walter Cronkite’s lap on live TV. One group was committed to keeping their lips buttoned, the other to blabbing everything; little had changed in the basic nature of that relationship even after the Space Force was phased out and NASA had taken its place.
    To be fair,