“So make it small,” Lewis said. “It just needs to poke a hole in the inner airlock door. Any hole will do. If it blows the door off, that’s fine. If it doesn’t, the air will get out slower, but for longer. The momentum change is the same, and we’ll get the acceleration we need.”

“Pressurizing Airlock 2,” Vogel reported. “How will we activate this bomb?”

“Johanssen?” Lewis said.

“Uh…,” Johanssen said. She picked up her headset and quickly put it on. “Vogel, can you run wires into it?”

“Ja,” Vogel said. “I will use threaded stopper with a small hole for the wires. It will have little effect on the seal.”

“We could run the wire to Lighting Panel 41,” Johanssen said. “It’s next to the airlock, and I can turn it on and off from here.”

“There’s our remote trigger,” Lewis said. “Johanssen, go set up the lighting panel. Vogel, get in here and make the bomb. Martinez, go close and seal the doors to the reactor room.”

“Yes, Commander,” Johanssen said, kicking off her seat toward the hallway.

“Commander,” Martinez said, pausing at the exit, “you want me to bring back some space suits?”

“No point,” Lewis said. “If the seal on the bridge doesn’t hold, we’ll get sucked out at close to the speed of sound. We’ll be jelly with or without suits on.”

“Hey, Martinez,” said Beck over the radio. “Can you move my lab mice somewhere safe? They’re in the bio lab. It’s just one cage.”

“Copy, Beck,” said Martinez. “I’ll move them to the reactor room.”

“Are you back in yet, Vogel?” Lewis asked.

“I am just reentering now, Commander.”

“Beck,” Lewis said to her headset. “I’ll need you back in, too. But don’t take your suit off.”

“Okay,” Beck said. “Why?”

“We’re going to have to literally blow up one of the doors,” Lewis explained. “I’d rather we kill the inner one. I want the outer door unharmed, so we keep our smooth aerobraking shape.”

“Makes sense,” Beck responded as he floated back into the ship.

“One problem,” Lewis said. “I want the outer door locked in the fully open position with the mechanical stopper in place to keep it from being trashed by the decompress.”

“You have to have someone in the airlock to do that,” Beck said. “And you can’t open the inner door if the outer door is locked open.”

“Right,” Lewis said. “So I need you to come back inside, depressurize the VAL, and lock the outer door open. Then you’ll need to crawl along the hull to get back to Airlock 2.”

“Copy, Commander,” Beck said. “There are latch points all over the hull. I’ll move my tether along, mountain climber style.”

“Get to it,” Lewis said. “And Vogel, you’re in a hurry. You have to make the bomb, set it up, get back to Airlock 2, suit up, depressurize it, and open the outer door, so Beck can get back in when he’s done.”

“He’s taking his suit off right now and can’t reply,” Beck reported, “but he heard the order.”