“Fuck it, Natalie, that’s got nothing to do with it!” He leaned forward, visibly angry, unhappy. “You know, you, and the other women, would get on a lot better around here if you didn’t walk around with such goddamn immense chips on your shoulders.”

She glared at him. Muldoon sat tall in his chair, trim, sharp, irritated, studying her frankly, his blue eyes empty of calculation. He really believed that he was benefiting her with such advice, she saw; he couldn’t see anything wrong with what he’d said.

She didn’t trust herself to speak.

Later, in the dingy apartment she was renting in Timber Cove, she tried to get drunk, and failed.

Her life was going steadily down the toilet. At thirty-four she was getting old as a practicing scientist, and her academic career was probably beyond repair; her commitment to the space program — all those hours in sims and survival training — meant the time and energy she’d had to devote to her research just wasn’t enough, and she knew that her papers, briefer and sparser every year, just weren’t enough to enable her to prosper if she returned to a university.

And what had it all been for? She’d just lost her one chance — limited as it was — to get some genuine space experience.

She was farther from Mars than ever.

It looked as if she’d blown it, as if she’d made one damn foul-up in her life after another.

Mike Conlig was ancient history. But she was still on her own. Generally that suited her.

But, God, she missed Ben.

Monday, December 6, 1982

HEADQUARTERS, COLUMBIA AVIATION, NEWPORT BEACH

The MEM simulator at Newport was an ungainly assemblage, without much resemblance to the sleek lines of the final spacecraft shape. It looked like a car smash, surrounded by the blocky forms of mainframe computers, all laid out in this corner of the echoing, refurbished manufacturing shop.

Ralph Gershon clambered out of the simulator, pissed as all hell. “That fucking thing is a lemon,” Gershon said. “A big fat lemon, JK.”

JK Lee was waiting for him at the hatch, his round face creased with anxiety. “Christ. Talk to me, Ralph.”

“Look,” Gershon said, “the simulator’s supposed to match the real thing — that’s the whole point — it’s no good looking for your left-hand joystick here when on the real thing it would be placed over there. JK, you have to keep these things up-to-date with the changes you’re making to the design.”

“Hell, I know that, Ralph. But what can I do? The MEM design is still so fluid that there are always a couple of hundred changes outstanding, and so the sim never catches up with the real thing…”