“—if I’m readin’ this right, you guys could launch right now and hit damn near the minimum. The contour at January 22, in a couple days, is just a bit higher than the absolute minimum. I read it to be eight kilometers per second of velocity needed. That’s versus waiting for the bargain rate on March 14, uh, 6.1 kilometers per second. Now, I know that’s not a minor difference. My guys tell me so we’re talking maybe seventy-five percent more fuel needed. Not a small order.”
“Energy goes as the velocity squared. You bet is not small,” Viktor said.
“Impossible,” Raoul said flatly.
Axelrod came from a business culture where much could be bought with smiling self-assurance, Julia realized. He was emphatically not a scientist. Deep down, she suspected, he believed that nature could be cajoled into behaving differently if you just found the right approach. He looked grave, then earnest, then respectful—the same sort of lightning-quick repertory she had seen from him in their first solo meeting. She did not doubt that he genuinely felt all those things, either. She had watched him carefully for years now, under the unique need to fathom his true meaning when she could not immediately interrogate him.
Finally, he beamed with renewed confidence. “But somewhere between now and March 14, there’s a place where you guys can launch. I dunno where. I leave that to you.” He leaned toward the camera, arms crossed. “But as soon as you can get off, do. Beat Airbus back, if they’re planning to try a smash-and-grab operation. Hell, you get home quicker, anyway!”
Raoul froze Axelrod’s confident smile. “So he has learned some orbital mechanics.”
“Not very well,” Viktor said. “Those total flight lengths, the diagonals—they show even Axelrod that if we leave earlier, we take more time.”
Marc chuckled. “Maybe he thought we wouldn’t notice?”
“No, I doubt that,” Julia said. “He’s not a detail thinker.”
“You got it,” Marc said.
“He’s hiding a lot of anxiety,” Julia said.
“Has thirty billion dollars on the table,” Viktor said.
“So he probably figures the earlier you leave, the sooner you get there,” Raoul said. “He didn’t notice that the earlier launch dates are all further above the ‘200 DAYS’ diagonal.”
“We leave earlier, take longer, arrive little earlier,” Viktor pondered.
“How’s our incoming velocity?” Raoul said. “Can’t read that from these pork chop plots.”
“Will have to check,” Viktor said. “All would bring us in with small speed. Between them all, is maybe one kilometer per second difference.”
“Any trouble with our aeroshell?” Raoul pressed him.
Viktor shook his head thoughtfully. “No, is rated high. We can burn off the delta vee easily. Like coming back from moon almost.”
“Okay then,” Raoul said decisively. “We can do what he wants.”
“Not so fast,” Viktor said. “Matter of margin here. I like to have extra fuel, maybe twenty percent.”
Raoul said, “That’s a lot—”
“For ship standing on Mars for years, not so much,” Viktor shot back.
Raoul glanced at the others. “We could drop our mass load some.”
“Not much,” Marc said. “It’s just food, water, mostly.”
“Personal effects, it’s maybe enough to make a one percent difference,” Raoul said.
“If drop all, could be,” Viktor said.
Julia could tell Viktor was sitting back, letting the talk run to see what would come out. Even she could not read him all the time. Maybe that was the signature of a good captain. “I’ve got very little disposable.”
“The most we have, masswise, is Marc’s samples,” Raoul said, not looking at Marc.
“Hey, the Mars Accords require those,” Marc said.
“Not all of them,” Raoul said.
“Damn near.” Marc stood up. “I’m not compromising—”
“No point to argue,” Viktor said smoothly. “I set safety margin. Marc, I need the total mass you’re carrying back anyway.”
Marc bridled. “You’re not thinking—”
“Right, am not thinking. Just counting. Let me see total mass from everybody.”
“You’re going to shave the margin that close?” Julia asked wonderingly.
“I think about it.”
“Next we’ll be discussing Raoul’s big old coffee mug,” she said in an attempt at lightness.
It failed badly. Raoul’s face clouded.
Julia said, “Just kidding. What bothers me about this talk is that I’ve got plenty to do on the vent life. I need a month, easily, to—”
