.
10.48 P. M.
The countdown reaches zero.
In the blockhouse, the launch conductor says: 'Firing command!' A crewman pulls a metal ring and twists it. This is the action that fires the rocket.
Prevalves open to let the fuel start flowing. The liquid oxygen vent is closed, and the halo of white smoke around the missile suddenly vanishes.
The launch conductor says: 'Fuel tanks pressurized.'
For the next eleven seconds, nothing happens.
The jeep tore along the beach at top speed, dodging in and out of family groups. Luke scanned the cars, ignoring the cries of protest as his tyres showered people with sand. Billie was standing up beside him, holding the top of the windshield. He shouted over the wind noise: 'See a white BelAir?'
She shook her head. 'It should be easy to spot!' 'Yeah,' Luke said. 'So where the hell are they?'
The last connection hose drops away from the missile. A second later, the priming fuel ignites, and the first- stage engine thunders into life. A huge orange firelick bursts from the base of the rocket as thrust builds.
Anthony said: 'For Christ's sake, Theo, hurry!'
'Shut up,' Elspeth told him.
They were bent over the open trunk of the Mercury, watching Theo fiddle with his radio transmitter. He was attaching wires to the pins of one of the plugs Elspeth had given him.
There was a roaring sound like distant thunder, and they all looked up.
With painful slowness, Explorer I lifts off the launch pad. In the blockhouse, someone yells: 'Go, baby!'
Billie saw a white BelAir parked next to a darker sedan. 'There!' she screamed.
'I see them,' Luke shouted back.
At the rear of the sedan, three people were clustered around the open trunk. Billie recognized Elspeth and Anthony. The other man was presumably Theo Packman. But they were not looking into the trunk. Their heads were raised and they were staring across the sand dunes towards Cape Canaveral.
Billie read the situation instantly. The transmitter was in the trunk. They were in the process of setting it to broadcast the detonation signal. But why were they looking up? She turned towards Cape Canaveral.
There was nothing to see, but she heard a deep, rumbling roar like the sound of a blast furnace in a steel mill.
The rocket was taking off.
'We're out of time!' she yelled.
'Hold tight!' Luke said.
She gripped the windshield as he swung the jeep around in a wide arc.
The rocket picks up speed suddenly. At one instant it seems to be hovering hesitantly over the launch pad. At the next it moves like a bullet out of a gun, shooting into the night sky on a tail-of fire.
Over the roar of the rocket, Elspeth heard another sound, the scream of a car engine being raced. A second later, the beam of headlights fell on the group around the trunk of the Mercury. She looked up and saw a jeep heading for them at top speed. She realized it was going to ram them. 'Hurry!' she screamed.
Theo connected the last wire.
On his transmitter were two switches, one marked 'Arm' and the other 'Destroy', The jeep was on them.
Theo threw the 'Arm' switch.
On the beach, a thousand faces tip backwards, watching the rocket rise straight and true, and a huge cheer goes up.
Luke drove straight for the back of the Mercury.
The jeep had slowed as he turned, but he was still travelling at about twenty miles per hour. Billie jumped out, hit the ground running, then fell and rolled.
At the last second Elspeth threw herself out of the way. Then there was a deafening bang and the crash of breaking glass.
The Mercury's rear end crumpled, it jumped forward a yard, and its trunk lid came down with a bang. Luke thought either Theo or Anthony had been crushed between the cars, but he could not be sure. He was thrown forward violently. The bottom of the steering wheel caught his lower chest, and he felt the sharp pain of cracked ribs. A moment later, his forehead hit the top edge of the wheel, and he sensed hot blood flowing down his face.
Luke pulled himself upright and looked at Billie. She seemed to have fared better than he. She was sitting on the ground rubbing her forearms, but she did not appear to be bleeding.
He looked across the hood of the jeep. Theo lay on the ground in a spread-eagle position, not moving. Anthony was on his hands and knees, looking shaken but unhurt. Elspeth had escaped injury and was scrambling to her feet She dashed to the Mercury and tried to open the trunk.
Luke leaped out of the jeep and ran at her. As the trunk lid lifted, he shoved her aside. She fell to the sand.
Anthony yelled: 'Hold it!'
Luke looked at him. He was standing over Billie with a pistol held to the back of her head.
Luke looked up. The red firetail of the missile was a bright shooting star in the night sky. As long as that was visible, Explorer could still be destroyed. The first stage would burn out when it was sixty miles high. At that point, the rocket would become invisible - for the lesser fire of the second stage would not be bright enough to be seen from the Earth - and this would be the sign that the self-destruct system would no longer work. The first stage, which contained the explosive detonator, would separate and fall away, eventually to splash down in the Atlantic Ocean. After separation, it could no longer damage the satellite.
And separation would take place two minutes and twenty-five seconds after ignition. Luke figured the rocket had been ignited roughly two minutes ago. There had to be about twenty-five seconds left It was plenty of time to throw a switch.
Elspeth got to her feet again.
Luke looked at Billie. She was on one knee, like a sprinter at the starting line, frozen in position with the long silencer of Anthony's gun pressing into her curly black hair. Anthony's hand was rock-steady.
Luke asked himself if he was ready to sacrifice Billie's life for the rocket.
The answer was No.
But what would happen, he thought, if he moved? Would Anthony shoot Billie? He might.
Elspeth again bent over the trunk of the car. Then Billie moved.
She jerked her head to one side, then threw herself backwards, hitting Anthony's legs with her shoulders.
Luke lunged at Elspeth and pushed her away from the car.
The silenced gun coughed as Anthony and Billie fell in a heap.
Luke stared in dread. Anthony had fired, but had he hit Billie? She rolled away from him, apparently unhurt, and Luke breathed again. Then Anthony lifted his gun arm, aiming at Luke.
Luke looked death in the face, and a peculiar calm possessed him. He had done all he could.
There was a long moment of hesitation. Then Anthony coughed, and blood came out of his mouth. Pulling the trigger as he fell, he had shot himself, Luke realized. Now his limp hand dropped the gun and he slumped back on the sand, his eyes staring up at the sky but seeing nothing.
Elspeth sprang to her feet and bent over the transmitter a third time.
Luke looked up. The firetail was a glow-worm in space. As he watched, it winked out.
Elspeth threw the switch and looked up into the' sky, but she was too late. The first stage had burned out and separated. The Primacord had probably detonated, but there was no fuel left to burn, and anyway the satellite was no longer connected to the first stage.
Luke sighed. It was all over. He had saved the rocket Billie put her hand on Anthony's chest, then checked his pulse. 'Nothing,' she said. 'He's dead.'
At the same moment, Luke and Billie looked at Elspeth. You lied again,' Luke said to her.
Elspeth stared at him with a hysterical light in her eyes. 'We weren't wrong!' she yelled. 'We were not
