"02 - Birth of an Age" - читать интересную книгу автора (BeauSeigneur James)

Chapter 4

Eve of Destruction

July 2, 2021 Ч Sacramento Peak Observatory in southern New Mexico (11:36 p.m. local time, 6:36 a.m. GMT)

Mary Ludford wiped the tears from her eyes and looked in the bathroom mirror to check her appearance. Her eyes were red, but that could easily be attributed to lost sleep; the past ten days had been punctuated by early mornings and late nights. Though she repeatedly questioned her qualifications to be the recipient of so much attention, since the release of the news of the approaching asteroids, the media had made her an international heroine, and her lack of adequate rest was simply the price the world demanded of its luminaries. Now it would serve as a convenient excuse should anyone notice her red eyes. Exhaustion was certainly an easier explanation than admitting that she had been crying.

Despite the distinctly non-heroic nature of her discovery, it was, after all, Mary who had first spotted the oncoming asteroids and had thereby given the world the time needed to prepare a defense. Besides, it was in the very nature of the media to want to put a human face on such a complex issue. So there was Maty Ludford on the covers ofNewsWeek, Time, and NewsWorld; on the

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morning news/talk shows; on numerous television and radio specials about the asteroids; and at center stage, offering her commentary as the missiles were successfully launched to destroy the third asteroid, 2021 KF. The launches had gone flawlessly. Each missile was fired in a precisely timed sequence and then, after orbiting the earth, sent on its way toward the threatening mass 74 million miles from earth. Success seemed certain, and so, after the experts were questioned and the explanations given, after the "man in the street" was interviewed and the concerns and confusion of the world aired, again the media returned its attention to Mary Ludford.

With the destruction of the third asteroid, 2021 KF, all but a fait accompli, all of the attention should have provided Mar)' Ludford with a time of excitement and diversion, an enchanted time of posh hotels and expensive restaurants, of meeting the famous and powerful. But one thought had haunted her from the first time the spotlight was cast her way. What would happen if her father saw her on television? Would he try to call her? At first she was afraid that he would call. If he did, what would she say? Could she even talk to him with all the anger she harbored toward him for abandoning her and her mother? Later she determined that if he did call, she would tell him off and then hang up on him. That would show him. In her mind, she rehearsed what she would say and even practiced slamming down the phone receiver. And yet later she paced anxiously, fearing that he would not call. If he did, she thought, abandoning her previous plan, maybe they could talk. Maybe he had an explanation for why he left. It couldn't have been a good reason but it might at least have been understandable, one that she could bring herself to forgive, providing of course he was adequately repentant.

But now she knew that she had only been fooling herself. It had been nearly three weeks since she was first interviewed on international television, and her father had not tried to contact her. He could not have missed seeing her on television or in the magazines or newspapers. Now here she was making a fool of herself, wasting tears on someone who apparently didn't care whether she even existed. Once again she concluded that when and if he did ever call, she would tell him off and then hang up. It did not even occur to her that in her resolve to stop thinking of him, she

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was restarting the cycle where she had begun it. In truth, she could not give up hope.

Satisfied that she was as presentable as possible and with a self-deceived determination not to spend any more time agonizing about her father, Mary Ludford left the restroom to rejoin the scientists and news media in the conference room of the Main Lab building where they had met to go over last-minute details. Afterward, they would split into groups and move to the three individual facilities that would be involved in the night's activities. When she arrived she found that the meeting had already broken up and the conference room was deserted.

Mary walked slowly northwest along the road, past reporters' vans and then made her way along the wooded path toward the Hilltop Dome. Those who lived and worked at the observatory had gotten used to the thin air but for those who were unaccustomed, Sacramento Peak's altitude of 9,700 feet above sea level did not lend itself to brisk walks. Behind her stood the rather out-of-place looking Grain Bin Dome, Sacramento Peak's first observatory, so-called because it had been constructed from an agricultural storage shed. Farther back stood the John W. Evans Solar Facility, a much more traditional-looking building which ordinarily was involved in the research of the sun's photosphere, chromosphere, and corona. To her left, Sacramento Peak's most distinguishable feature, the pearl-white Tower Telescope facility, soared upward 130 feet into the night sky. Inside the facility, the telescope extended down into the mountain through an open shaft for an additional 325 feet. It was an amazing piece of equipment but was highly specialized for use in solar observations and hence would not be useful for tracking and observing asteroids. It alone among Sacramento Peak's four observatories would be unattended tonight.

Sacramento Peak Observatory, which for seventy years had functioned almost exclusively as a solar observatory, was not the only facility which would divert its attentions from its normal pursuits. Over 200 observatories around the world were participating, many of which specialized in other fields of astronomy and had never been involved in the study of asteroids.

Despite the thin air, Mary decided to walk beyond the Hilltop Dome to the scenic overlook halfway between the dome and the Tower Telescope. The night was clear and she could see for miles

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across the white gypsum sands of the Tularosa Basin to the San Andres and Organ mountains to the southwest. The lights of El Paso, Texas, glowed in the distance to the south. Turning her eyes toward the northern sky, she paused to look at the two objects that had pulled her out of her quiet study of receding galaxies. Both asteroids had been visible to the naked eye for the last two nights, but now they were unmistakable in the northern sky, shining brightly just above the horizon and nearly due north. In their current positions, the second and smaller asteroid (202IKE) was actually higher in the northern sky than the first (2021KD). As the earth continued its orbit, however, 202IKE would appear to drop below the first, and three hours after 2021KD streaked across the western hemisphere, 202IKE would drop below the horizon and traverse its path across the eastern half of the world.

Mary walked back to the Hilltop Dome and went in. As she entered the facility she looked at the large wall monitor, which showed a telescopic view of the asteroids' approach. In addition to performing numerous tests, surveys, and studies, the observatories along the paths of the asteroids acted as tracking stations, following the asteroids' approach and providing a satellite feed to the other observatories and television stations around the world. The Hubble telescope was moved to a polar orbit to provide the best view of the asteroids' northern approach to the planet. Initially, the asteroids were both within the field of view of the orbiting telescope's optics, but as they moved closer, it became necessary to focus on only one at a time. Now in the final hours, the Hubble would focus its attention on the first asteroid until it had passed beyond the earth, and then quickly it would be rotated to focus on the second asteroid.

Television coverage included two satellite channels showing an uninterrupted picture of the asteroids' approach. Until recently, when the asteroids had begun to take on some form, it had been a rather unimpressive scene, appearing as no more than two tiny points of light on an otherwise blank screen. What made it interesting to watch were the two digital counters in the lower right corner of the picture as they clicked off the distance between each asteroid and the earth. Sixty-five thousand miles per hour naturally seemed fast to most viewers, but even seasoned experts were heard to exclaim when they first witnessed the counters clicking off the miles at a rate of eighteen per second. Other television stations ran

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special programs on the asteroids and gave frequent updates on their approach.

Despite the extensive coverage, many people wanted to see the asteroids firsthand and stores quickly sold out of amateur telescopes and high-powered binoculars. Some mild hysteria resulted as a few over-excited and inexperienced stargazers spotted various objects, both real and imagined, which they mistook for additional asteroids headed for the earth. But that was not the only hysteria. Despite repeated assurances to the contrary from the United Nations and from scientists around the world, some members of the public insisted that the event marked the end of the world. Others saw the event less as something to worry about and more as an excuse to drink and revel at raucous end-of-the-world parties.

Local authorities also noted that the increased sales of telescopes and binoculars were accompanied by a sharp rise in reports of "peeping-toms" as well as exhibitionism by those hoping to be spied upon. Police had little time to spend on such offenses, however, due to a sharp rise in more serious crimes, such as murder, rape, and robber}', perpetrated primarily by those who reasoned that, considering the possibility that the world might end, they should enjoy to the fullest what was left of it.

Many of television's daytime dramas rushed to write the approach of the asteroids into their story lines, and one long-running soap opera, which began each program with a view of the world spinning in space, added to the scene a computer-generated image of the approaching asteroids.