Never By Blood

By Noel Carroll

For Therese Elliott nightmare has gone beyond dream to gruesome reality. She is desperate in her need to know, not only what triggered the dream but why she finds it so impossible to let it go. And why she knows with a fatal certainty that, if it is not quickly sorted out, the Atlantis with her astronaut husband aboard will be sent crashing into the International Space Station.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Noel Carroll
• Release date: Aug 2, 2010
• ISBN: 9781452368757

Noel Carroll

About The Authors For years the husband-and-wife team, Noel Carroll*, has published novels and short stories in two genres: thrillers and science fiction. A third genre, humor/satire, permitted them moments of fun and mischief. Although unwilling to abandon fiction, they steadily gravitated toward political commentary, first in opinion editorials and then in a full-length non-fiction work (“If You Can Keep It”). All their novels, short stories and essays have received highly favorable reviews, many being awarded five-stars. They currently make their home in Ponce Inlet, Florida. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEErCnUycaE) *a nom de plume (Noel and Carol also write under the names John Barr and N.C. Munson.)

Book preview

"She would not live out the day.

There was a force within this tiny outpost of space-age humanity

that could not be stopped."

NEVER BY BLOOD

Strap on your shoulder harness and get ready for a non-stop thriller

Keep(s) you guessing until its final pages

Descriptive style…fluid pace

"To all readers who enjoy fast paced action,

international intrigue and suspense, with a dash of romance."

Scribes World

All the hallmarks of a great whodunit, international thriller

A multi-layered exercise in what excellent writing is all about

A most amazing read

Midwest Book Review

An excellent out of this world romp

Chillingly believable

Gives this skeleton some meat that most mysteries don't usually take on

Sime~Gen

Nicely paced, well written

Keeps the reader guessing … well worth reading

A. A. Showcase

ALSO FROM NOEL CARROLL:

Novels

Circle of Distrust

Accidental Encounter

Broken Odyssey

Starve The Devil

The Exclusion Zone

Coming Soon: A Long Reach Back

Short Stories

Slipping Away

The Galapagos Incident

Silent Obsession

Recycled

The Collection

Butterflies

Stairway Through Agony

Beyond Sapiens

End of The Beginning

By Invitation Only

Humor-Satire

Hey, God; Got A Minute? (as John Barr)

Soul Food

Political

If You Can Keep It

Reviews Of Other Noel Carroll Novels

BROKEN ODYSSEY

"Masterfully engineered tale

First class dialogue, spine tingling action"

Book Pleasures Reviews

"Excellently crafted

Keeps you on the edge of your seat"

Simi-Gen

STARVE THE DEVIL

"Quick-witted writing style.

Keeps nails short and edges of seats warm"

eBooks NBytes

"Not sure what worries me more, that I can actually

see something like this happening in the world today, or

that I understand the president’s action and partially agree."

Roundtable Reviews

THE EXCLUSION ZONE

"Hang on to your hats, as this book will blow you away!"

"Picks up the reader from the first page"

"Non-stop action plot"

Midwest Book Review

"A fast paced thriller with a mesmerizing arc"

"Knits characters and scenarios expertly together into a woven tapestry

of an international political thriller"

eBooks NBytes

NEVER BY BLOOD

By Noel Carroll

Published by Noel Carroll on Smashwords

ISBN: 978-1-4523-6875-7

Also available in print under ISBN: 0-9658702-5-1 or ISBN-13: 9780965870252

Copyright © 2002 by Noel Carroll

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

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Cover by KC Creations

Acknowledgements

We wish to give thanks to the people and institutions who contributed in subtle and not-so-subtle ways to the making of this novel. They include the FBI, the North American Space Agency (NASA), Britain’s Scotland Yard and a few courageous individuals in Beirut Lebanon.

*********

1

Twenty-five days before

the launch of the shuttle Atlantis

All Therese Elliott could remember was the now, and the now was dominated by confusion and pain.

And death!

There was no doubt in her mind that the man was dead. Floating in the air not three feet away, his red-rimmed eyes were open and accusing and his face was twisted into a blend of agony and surprise. His casually-dressed frame, large for a shuttle astronaut, was bullying its way from one instrument-laden bulkhead to another only to ricochet off to follow a new path—perpetual motion in a surreal setting. Pushed out in front of him and extended to just above eye level, one hand moved slowly across his body as if trapped in an eternal wave. The sight brought on a moment of panic as Therese tried to remember the rule on how to control nausea in a weightless environment.

She was about to take a deep breath to fight it off when the thought of what might be mixed in with that breath, floating evidence of the corpse’s mortal struggle, made her hold back. In any event, it was not needed; the moment passed.

That the man was dead was surprising; that he was floating was not. Although never having been in space before, Therese was familiar with the nuances of shuttle travel, this the result of her husband’s abundant enthusiasm.

But it’s Mike who should be here, not me.

Shifting focus to her pain, Therese grimaced at the sight of bruises still in the process of forming just beyond the sleeves of her loose, blue knit shirt. More could be felt on her upper and lower torso and on her left hip just below where her bulky sweat pants began. A touch of a finger to her lower lip hinted at a swelling that had not yet reached its limits, and there was a throbbing at the back of her head that she knew would only get worse.

A crash? No, not possible. At close to eighteen thousand miles an hour, you get more than bumps and bruises!

There was an annoying fog in her eyes, and it would not clear no matter how much she tried to blink it away. But then a blow to the head would do that. She tried to remember what her husband, a physician as well as an astronaut, had taught her about concussion. The symptoms were there, including the loss of memory.

There is nothing about this voyage that I remember.

Some of the fog was real. Not only was she trapped in an overgrown thermos bottle but in one that did not pay its electricity bill. It was dark inside the shuttle, the only light available leaking in from the outside: stars and reflections from the night side of the Earth some two hundred and twenty miles below. No sound either; no radio chatter; no hum of instruments to prove life-support was still being maintained; no hustle and bustle of fellow astronauts going about the business of staying alive in an environment that was both hostile and unforgiving.

And no Mike!

Reluctantly settling her eyes on the dead man, Therese saw that it was fifty-two-year-old Fred Oberly, Mike’s mission commander and a friend to them both. On top of Oberly's head, where at a younger age hair would have prevented it from being seen, there was a small, white bandage, new and looking out of place on a dead man. It was like a beacon urging her forward, and she responded by moving her weightless body to where she could lift its edges and take a closer look. She saw a small break in the skin, put there by some kind of blunt instrument that was either not blunt enough or wielded with too much enthusiasm. It reminded her of the pain on the side of her head, and she explored the area with her fingers to see if she might also have a bandage. She did not, but there was a sensitive lump to testify to the blow she must have received.

She looked again at Oberly’s wound and saw that any blood that might otherwise have flowed had been held in check by a thick creamy substance that looked familiar; probably Avitene—Mike used Avitene to treat cuts on boxers during prizefights, one of his passions.

But why was it used here? Chances are that blow killed him before any blood could begin to flow.

The thought died in the air as a scene of horror flashed behind Therese’s eyes: violence in quick-time with herself as participant rather than victim. Faces passed by quickly, too quickly to be identified, each with eyes burning and lips moving in anger or in protest. And blood, lots of it, some being shed as she watched and by her own hand. Emotions, dormant until now, pushed through whatever protective shell had held them at bay, and Therese felt fear, fear that she would not live out the day, that there was a force within this tiny outpost of space-age humanity that could not be stopped.

Movement outside the spacecraft, felt as much as seen, another beacon she had no power to resist!

Carefully avoiding the dead body that had not yet found its rest, Therese pushed toward one of the two aft viewing windows, feeling as she did so like a puppet on a string. A part of her wanted to back off, to return to whatever void had preceded her awakening to this madness, but a greater part wanted to know; needed to know. This was her life; it was Mike’s life, and whether either of those lives were to continue was to be decided here and now.

Easily seen because of the starlight reflecting off his bright white spacesuit, one of the crew tugged against a badly shredded tether, his form otherwise as still as the dead man beside Therese. Another tether hung loosely in space, its near end connected to the shuttle but its distant end, the end that should have an astronaut attached to it, shredded and empty. Therese examined the Remote Manipulator System Arm, the robotic lifting device that had likely caused the damage. It was fully extended but out of action.

She could not see the face inside the space suit and thus could not tell which of the two astronauts scheduled to perform spacewalks it was. She could not even tell if it were a man or a woman—there were two women assigned to this crew, one of whom would be out there now.

More movement, this time beyond the spacecraft, something distant but closing. Like the shuttle, it was buried in the night side of Earth, but not so much that Therese could not pick out its spidery arms spreading outward against a backdrop of stars. It was the International Space Station and the shuttle was moving toward it at an alarming rate.

Before Therese had time to consider this new twist, the spacewalker slipped his mangled tether then began drifting toward the slowly-turning planet far below. Therese watched him move away, aware that there could be only one end for him. He would become Earth’s first (or perhaps second—the other spacewalker was nowhere to be seen) human shooting star as he tumbled into the atmosphere and evaporated in a flash of fire. And unless something was done to divert the shuttle, it and the International Space Station would soon follow.

Therese pushed away from the window in horror, the move ending in a jolt as she crashed against the opposite bulkhead. Three dead out of a crew of six. Two not yet accounted for. Badly in need of company, she headed for the bottom half of the cramped capsule, pushing through the air to the starboard interdeck access hatch then head first down to the middeck as if this were a route she took every day.

But it was even darker here than on the flight deck, and a buzzing appeared in her head as she scanned the room, barely able to see and afraid of what the shadows might reveal. As her eyes adjusted, one of those shadows became another of her ill-fated colleagues.

Howard! Howard Parkney. You shouldn’t be here.

Like the corpse on the upper deck, Parkney was drifting without purpose, his body occasionally brushing too close to a switch and threatening an action which, in a fully-powered ship, might spell disaster. His eyes, although seeing nothing, were half open, and like his dead colleague he wore a bandage, this one in the center of his forehead—he would have seen the blow coming.

Therese’s mouth turned dry as she moved within range then, in a moment of fear-driven frustration, grabbed the bandage and yanked it clear. Another small cut and another smear of Avitene to restrict blood that could never have flowed. She released the offensive bandage then watched as it drifted in her direction, the action eerie and threatening.

Sensing a presence behind her, Therese whirled to face whatever it was, her eyes wide and her heart racing. There, moving toward her and now only inches away, was the last member of the team, Thomas Karak, the mission’s pilot. One arm was stretched above his head as if readying a blow.

Even while knowing Karak was dead, Therese squirmed and twisted in the air wanting desperately to avoid contact—Karak’s body was moving at her as if intent upon a violation it was no longer capable of performing. The collision, when inevitably it came, was made worse by the blood, bright red and moist, that clung to Karak’s hair and forehead. Some of it spread to the hand Therese raised to protect herself, and yet additional molecules splashed into the air making breathing an unpleasant prospect.

Penetrating her haze of fear and disgust, Therese noted that there was no bandage on Karak’s head. It was as if his slayer, seeing that the blood was unstoppable, had given up. Looking further, Therese saw a small leather sack trailing the corpse. It was some six inches long and bulging at one end, and there was enough blood clinging to its surface to brand it as the murder weapon.

All dead; only me still alive.

In a flash of insight, the origin of which she had no hope of discovering, Therese knew she was not in her own body. She also knew that the human shell she wore belonged to a killer. Desperate in her need to know, she searched for something that might serve as a mirror, eventually moving back to the flight deck where it was easier to see. The overhead observation window was a mirror of sorts, but all she could see in it, besides the approaching space station, was a scratchy hint of the human being that was herself.

Then she noticed the writing in the window's upper edge, a confusing assemblage of words penned in a strong hand, the neatness of the letters suggesting it was the life’s work of the author to have it seen and understood. It took a moment of straining her eyes against the darkness, but soon the phrase, auto-da-fe appeared. Therese knew it meant act of faith, but what its author had in mind by posting it here she hadn’t a clue.

As happens every ninety minutes when orbiting the Earth, the sun began to rise; there was light for the first time since this ordeal began. Fearing that it would as quickly be snatched away, Therese raced to find a way to discover who she was. She turned to the HUDs on the forward instrument panel, Heads Up Displays, television tubes used to present information in a easily viewed form. If she could get the sun to light up her face, it might reflect in one of the screens.

But as she struggled to make it happen, the spacecraft and all the horror it housed within its fortified walls began to fade.

No, not yet! Please!

Indifferent to her plea, the fading continued, and with only seconds remaining to discover the truth, Therese grabbed at the HUD screen and pulled herself toward it. It appeared to work; she could see the outline of a human face, the face of a murderer. The fading made it difficult to know for sure, but the glimpse she got made her think the final curtain was descending upon her world.

My God, it's Mike!

Therese Elliot, Associate Professor of Medieval Religions at Villanova University, lay in bed staring at a ceiling she could not identify, her emotions running too high to even try—the fear and revulsion would not let go. It had been a dream, a horrible dream, both real and unreal at the same time. The unreal was obvious: her being in space and in another person’s body, her husband’s. But the real was … too real.

Where the hell did that come from?

She took a number of deep breaths needing to calm herself. Only when she felt a touch of sanity in an otherwise insane moment did she look over at the person beside her. Mike was smothered in pillow and his breathing was slow and deep—at least she had not cried out in her sleep. They were huddled together in one of two beds crowded into the motel’s modest living quarters.

She remembered now: last night's party, the reception for family and friends of those involved in the Atlantis launch. It had lasted well into the night. In training or not, these guys could party!

She had had fun and, yes, a little too much to drink, but she was sure she had stopped short of dancing on the tables. No, it was something else. Something said or done, an idle comment, a joke, something her subconscious picked up and turned into a creepy nightmare.

She closed her eyes but could not shut out the thought that something horrible was about to happen, that there had already been set in motion such events that a disaster was now all but inevitable, that the shuttle she rode in her dream was doomed to end its existence as a gigantic fireball, taking the International Space Station and her husband along with it.

2

Twenty-five days until launch

Inside the Vehicle Assembly Building, the largest and most visible of the many buildings at Kennedy Space Center, the aft skirt of first one then the other solid rocket booster, or SRB, was set into position on the Mobile Launch Platform. Eight huge bolts, all with a set of explosives at each end, guaranteed that the skirts would stay put until the moment of launch. As usual, the technicians worked hard to get it done, then even harder to make sure it was done right. When balance was assured—all the weight of the shuttle would be borne by these two pods—the solid-fuel components, four on each booster, were then stacked one on top of the other. Three other sections were added, the final one a nose cap containing the parachutes that would save the spent SRBs and thus permit them to fly again another day.

The huge external tank, having already been checked out in another part of the assembly building, was worried into place then attached to the SRBs. It would hold the liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen needed for the shuttle’s three main engines, although the loading of fuel would not begin until launch was reasonably certain, about five hours before lift-off.

The final shuttle component, the Orbiter, having already undergone a checkout in the Orbiter Processing Facility, was patiently towed to the assembly building, raised to a vertical position then carefully mated to the external tank. When the last bolt was put in place and tightened, the collection of solid rocket boosters, external tank and orbiter officially took on the designation of space shuttle. The Atlantis was now ready to be transported to the launch pad.

3

Twenty-four days until launch

You’re awfully quiet, Terri. Mike Elliot had noticed the difference in his wife since soon after the Florida sun snaked past the drawn curtains of their comfortable motel room and weaned them from their sleep. Terri’s morning smile had been less than it usually was, and she showed no willingness to engage in the early-morning horseplay that had become routine during the three years of their marriage. Worse, she was too ready to jump into battle, first with him over his alleged hogging of the motel’s only sink, then later with an airline attendant over a matter of seating. Even considering the extent of their partying the previous night, this was very unlike her.

Terri was thirty-four years old versus his forty-one, yet this was for each a first marriage. For Terri a loveless childhood with parents indifferent to the point of cruelty, brought her to view marriage with more than a little skepticism. On his part, he had simply been too busy, first with medical school and residency and then with getting a practice going. And when he discovered he was more interested in research than patient care, there were more years of getting established elsewhere.

Terri was as appealing a woman as Mike had ever known. Her features could not be called beautiful, but they conferred upon all who stopped to look—and many did—a feeling that it was not a wasted effort. Her lips were a bit on the full side for such a slender face, but her habit of stretching them slightly to one side made her seem always a step away from breaking into a lopsided grin. A little over five-feet four and not quite a hundred and twenty pounds, Terri was slim, even petite. Kittenish as well. Mike smiled as he thought of how easily she used this to get her way. And how willing he was to let it happen.

Terri could look sexy in anything, from a formal gown to an old sweatshirt, the latter her preference on most days, sometimes even when she was teaching. Terri was a sometime-Protestant teaching in a Catholic university. She taught middle-ages religions, how they evolved and what effect they had—and continued to have—on humanity. Mike had great respect for how vigorously she held on to her independence, refusing to voice opinion on any one religion even while aware of the University’s bias. It put her in the minority, but this bothered her not at all. It was just another battle in a life that had been full of them.

Finally responding to Mike’s question about her unusual quiet, Therese forced her concentration away from the puffs of cloud hanging lazily beneath the aircraft. Nothing serious, Mike, just something on my mind. Her smile was less than her normal lopsided one, as if to say she would prefer he let it go at that.

Not surprisingly, he did not. On a scale of one-to-ten?

She laughed, then conceded with, Okay, I had a dream that’s left me thinking. She told him about it, leaving out nothing, including how much it bothered her. The husband might protest, but the physician in him would understand.

Marrying Mike was the best thing that ever happened to her, even if it had taken a while to realize this. The differences between them were less meaningful than the similarities, among the latter a strong need that neither had previously been aware of: a need to confide, confide in someone close, confide anything and everything, from the serious to the mundane—verbal diarrhea, Mike called it.

The principal difference between them was in the way they grew up. She hated her childhood; he loved his. While he always had the support of loving parents to fall back on, she was saddled with two self-centered individualists who seldom hid their resentment of the surprise child who interfered with their freedom to do exactly as they liked whenever they liked. Although her conscience bothered her to say it, Therese hated them for the paucity of love they were able to show, and she hated the institution that had permitted them to bring a child into the world, a child they obviously had never wanted. That she reversed this at-one-time irreversible opinion toward marriage continued to amaze her. There was something about Mike, a willingness to understand her feelings and what had caused them, a compassion she had not even known was part of the human experience—her parents were anything but role models. There was also, she had to admit, a strong sexual attraction, although that of itself would not have coaxed her toward marriage.

She was sure Mike did not understand the slight shake of her head, a smile just barely accompanying it. Not only had she abandoned her decision to stay single forever, but she was loving every minute of it. She was a woman very much in control of her life, even if she could not shake a constant fear of impending loss, of having her past fall back on her, this time to crush her for good. Mike’s invitation to go into space, a tribute to his scientific achievements, was to her a cruel trick of the gods, setting up a scenario whereby that loss was now possible.

Their young married life had changed dramatically as of the day Mike was appointed to the Atlantis crew, now two years in the past. He was still the fun guy she had married, but his boyish enthusiasm was, to her at least, tainting his sense of caution. She had come to think he would agree to ride that ship into space even if its wings were removed.

Then there was his absence from home for training. Understandable but…lonely. After so many years of study, which she now knew was a need to hide from her past, she wanted the fun play that she and Mike always seemed to fall into at the end of a long day, during the shared preparation of a special dinner, and of course, in bed.

She looked over at him, her face showing an impishness he could not begin to understand. She would not be disappointed when his little space toy returned to Earth and they could get back to their life.

This would be the cap of Mike’s young medical career, and she knew that, knew how important it was to him. And to the world—long periods of weightlessness had revealed a number of serious problems: cardiovascular deconditioning, muscle atrophy, minerals leaching from bones, a slowdown in bone formation. NASA and its partners, Russia, Europe, Japan and Canada, had long wanted to get a handle on the problem. Now, thanks to Mike's discoveries, they were close to proving that the worst of it could be reversed, that man no longer need fear long periods of weightlessness, that journeys to other worlds could begin. Mike was to apply his theories to the crew currently winding down a four-month stay on the International Space Station. He would treat them for the seven days the two space vessels were linked together then monitor the results once back on Earth.

So engrossed was Therese in private thoughts that she missed Mike's reaction to her dream.

I said, ‘what were you drinking last night?’

She chuckled. Lots! But I’m serious, and on a scale of one to ten, this is an eleven. She did not add that her sense of impending loss had been inflamed.

Mike’s smile evaporated as he tried unsuccessfully to engage her eyes. Terri, you had a bad dream. That’s all it was.

She nodded in agreement but then contradicted this by frowning and saying more sharply than she’d intended, Don’t you think I know that? It’s the why of the dream that bothers me, why my mind chose that as a subject for ghoulish review.

Mike’s expression was an opinion in itself; he did not regard this as unusual considering what was about to take place. But aware that platitudes were not what Terri wanted to hear, he followed this with, The why is not difficult, Terri. You’re worried about me riding a flaming rocket into the inhospitable hell of space.

This time her chuckle had little humor in it. You’re a big help!

Then you admit it does have to do with husbands in space?

She turned to face him, suddenly willing to make eye contact. Of course I’m worried, you idiot. What wife wouldn’t be? But that’s not the whole problem. I feel something is wrong and my mind is trying to tell me about it.

An alert psyche, prompting the subconscious to recognize and review the obvious.

Stop talking dirty.

You never complained before.

The smile that had only begun to join her face fell back to a frown. Okay, I agree that my ‘psyche’ picked up something at the reception last night, and that it’s trying to fill the rest of me in on what that something is. But that only proves I have a right to be concerned. All is not kosher here; something is going to happen, something bad.

Oh, come off it, Terri.

"Dammit, I am not talking premonition! Or even intuition."

Or occult?

I don’t think this is the least bit funny, Mike! You know damn well that people miss things in conversation that the subconscious picks up. And that it can plague them with an uncertainty they can’t explain but can’t let go. That’s what I’m feeling now. My subconscious picked up something, and I need to find out what it is.

I buy that, but I also buy that you’re more susceptible to suggestion than you would normally be. He paused for a second then said, Look, Terri, astronauts are not chosen by lottery. Each candidate is investigated carefully and thoroughly, and that means his private life as well as his professional one. My astronaut playmates are not closet psychos.

Her face cleared as she asked, What did you tell them about our private life?

You’d blush for days if I told you. But stop trying to get on my better side. Concentrate on what I said. Don’t let a dream ruin your day. The look on her face made him add, Christ, you’re thinking longer than a day, aren’t you?

She took a deep breath then let it out slowly. "Everything you said I’ve already told myself a dozen times, but a part of me refuses to believe it. That dream was too vivid, too draining emotionally; too much of it remains unexplained. Like the fact that Parkney was there. And that you were the murderer—if that wasn’t you I saw in the mirror, then you’d have to be one of the bodies floating around outside the capsule."

I’m not scheduled for an EVA.

But you trained for it.

In case of emergency only.

A bunch of dead bodies doesn’t sound like an ‘emergency’ to you?

Terri, it was a dream!

Well, what about Parkney? What’s he supposed to represent?

Mike shrugged then said, A replacement for someone. It happens.

Therese could see in the look that followed that he wished he hadn’t said that. But she had already been thinking along the same lines. He could be a replacement for you. Parkney was a Ph.D. not a medical doctor, but that mattered less to Therese than the possibility that this risky job could be passed on to someone other than her husband. Feeling guilty at the thought, she wondered whether Parkney had any one waiting for him at home.

The grimace Mike was unable to hide proved she had hit close to home. Now that would bother me more than being one of your floating bodies.

Not funny, McGee! Anyhow, why would his image appear in my dream? I know of no one who’s even close to being bumped; why would my subconscious seize on that?

You’re looking at this from the wrong angle. The fact of Parkney being there weighs out on my side of the argument. There are two women assigned to this mission, and if one is on EVA and you represent the other… He held up his hand as if to stave off the comment he knew was coming. "I know you think that was me in the mirror, but you admit you only saw it for a ‘split second,’ your words. And if it were not me, that means I have been replaced. Either way it fits what a part of you wants to happen: either I’m still alive in the spacecraft or I never went. Your subconscious is merely trying to protect your wonderful jewel of a husband."

I think I’m going to puke.

Fact is fact.

She turned in her seat to face him, then said with no trace of humor, Okay, Mr. Wonderful, let’s talk fact. How can you know for sure that one of your colleagues is not incubating a deep-seated mental illness, one that will flare up under severe stress—and I think ‘riding a flaming rocket into the inhospitable hell of space’ fits within the category of stress?

Mike smiled. To him, this entire conversation was silly; they were discussing a dream as if it were recorded fact. Look, you can never rule out the possibility of mental illness in anyone, but the kind of scrutiny NASA puts us through makes this highly improbable.

But still possible.

If you consider that the possibility of insanity extends to me as well then, yes.

Oh, God, now I’m really worried!

He let his eyes bulge as he said, All I vant is your blood."

Not my body?

First things first.

A number of minutes passed with nothing further being said. The only noise