“Oh, hell, I know it is a fact. The nonsense part is that the million hits meant a damned thing. How many kids are in the public-school system in the U.S.? Hmm? Do you know that statistic?” Gary tapped his knuckles on his desk when he asked.
“Uh, no, Gary. I don’t.” Caroline looked perplexed, as if she didn’t see the relevance.
“Well, I do. I’ve studied this industry long and hard. The public doesn’t give a damn about the robot rovers. The so-called success was due to every science teacher in every public school having the fifty-four million students in the U.S. log on to the Web and write a homework essay about it. That is how the thing got so many hits. And clearly, less than one fiftieth of the students managed to do this. But the fact that the hits lasted a couple weeks probably accounts for a lot of them.” Gary wrapped his knuckles against the desk with each point he made.
“I agree with Gary on this. And look where they chose to land!” Paul finally joined in. “They landed in the desert, for God’s sake. You know what the official NASA mission description for the rover mission was? Rhetorical question. Don’t answer. I can tick them off one at a time. Let’s see…Number one, to prove that the development of faster, better, and cheaper spacecraft is possible for a cost under one hundred and fifty million dollars. Number two, to show that it is possible to send a load of scientific instruments to another planet with a simple system and at one fifteenth the cost of the Viking missions. Those damned things were just under a billion dollars back in the seventies. And number three, to demonstrate NASA’s commitment to low-cost planetary exploration by finishing the mission with a total cost of under like three hundred million dollars or so, I forget the exact number. Oh, and that was including the launch vehicle and mission operations. Do you see anything exciting in that? Oh, and by the way, land in the desert so there will be no way that anything exciting will be found.”
“This is good stuff, Paul. What else? What about the desert?” Gary asked. Caroline just shook her head at the both of them.
“Well, they landed in the desert, right? What do kids want to find in space? What do old people want to find? What does everybody want to find? Aliens! Everybody wants to see aliens, dammit all to hell. Don’t lie and say you don’t.”
“Uh, Paul,” Caroline muttered.
“Let him finish, Caroline.”
“So, nobody really believes we’d find aliens on Mars, but what about life? We might find life. At least water, which everybody wants to believe is the key to finding life. Any kid with a good pair of binoculars can look at Mars on a clear night and tell you where you should land your spaceship if you want to find water.” Paul looked around to see if they understood him. The businessman and the marketing major didn’t seem to get it. So he told them. “The polar
“You about done, Paul?” Gary smiled at him. “If you need me to, I can get Burt Rutan on the phone, and you and he can go off on NASA and how they screwed us out of going to space. It would be therapeutic for both of you.”
“What?” Paul was surprised. “I thought you were on my side.”
“Paul, I’m on the side of my company making a whole bunch of money,” Gary said, not really tongue-in-cheek. “And if it means we need to cheerlead for NASA for a while, then that is the side I’m on. I don’t really care if they have done what they should’ve done in the past. They are what they are, and they are the nation’s space agency. We are a space company. Therefore, all things space are good! Sis boom bah! Rah rah rah!” Gary waved his arms like he was wielding pom-poms.
“So, what are we saying?” Paul asked.
“Don’t be so slow, Captain.” Caroline smiled at him. “This is marketing, Paul. We have to market ourselves positively. Negative campaigns are never as successful as positive ones. All things space are positive. They must be. From now on.”
“You understand us, Paul? I let you vent for a while. That’s good sometimes. But it must be done in private. Now, forget about all that and start studying the cool things, the unique things, the amazing things that NASA has done and is doing. They
“I see,” Paul said, still not really seeing.
“Make sure you do, Paul,” Caroline added. “Thinking about the cool things when you discuss NASA will change that expression on your face.”
“You don’t get it yet, Paul,” Gary said. “Focus on the good NASA is doing overnight, and then you’ll see. Have a safe flight out. I’ll see the both of you tomorrow.”
Chapter 7
Paul Gesling was glad to be back in Nevada and away from his metaphorical near-death experience at the hands of CEO Gary Childers in Kentucky. The desert was familiar territory and one in which he felt perfectly at home. And he also preferred being on the “engineering” side of the massive facility and not the “passenger training” side. He wasn’t due to be there with the whiny rich brats, aka customers, until tomorrow.
Gesling, like most Americans, had watched the moderately publicized landing of NASA’s Altair the day before with a mixture of amazement and disappointment. Amazement at what humans could accomplish when challenged and that we were finally on our way back to the Moon. Disappointment with the time it took for America to get back to where it was in 1972. Overall, the landing was flawless—except that there were no human astronauts on board. That in itself was a big enough flaw to keep people from tuning in. Americans, hell, the rest of humanity, could not care less about another robot probe sending back video images of a place that it seemed nobody would ever set foot on. On the other hand, playing it up as the precursor to the very near manned flight did spark some optimism around the country. At least it boosted Paul’s flagging enthusiasm about what he and his crew were soon to accomplish themselves. They were about to take five paying customers on nearly a weeklong fly-around of the Moon. It was to be their own Apollo 8 moment.
