Gravity by Tess Gerritsen

flight deck’s overhead window for visual approach as they neared the ISS docking module. This was the most delicate phase in the complicated process of rendezvous. Atlantis had been launched into lower orbit than ISS, and for the last two days she had been playing a game of catchup with the hurtling space station. They approach her from below, using their RCS jets to fine-tune their position for docking. Emma could hear the whomp of the thrusters’ firing now and felt the orbiter shudder.
    “Look,” said Dewitt. “There’s that solar array that got dinged last month.” He pointed to one of the solar panels, scarred by a gaping hole.
    One of the inescapable perils of space is the rain of meteorites and manmade debris. Even a tiny fragment can be a devastating missile when it’s hurtling at thousands of miles per hour.
    As they drew closer and the station filled the window, Emma felt such overwhelming awe and pride that tears suddenly flashed in her eyes.
    Home, she thought. I’m coming home.
    The air-lock hatch swung open, and a wide brown face grinned at them from the other end of the vestibule connecting Atlantis with ISS. “They brought oranges!” Luther Ames called out to his mates. “I can smell’em!”
    “NASA home delivery service,” deadpanned Commander Vance.
    “Your groceries have arrived.” Bearing a nylon sack of fresh fruit, Vance floated through Atlantis’s air lock into the space station.
    It had been a perfect docking. With both spacecrafts traveling at a speed of 17,500 miles per hour above the earth, Vance had approached ISS at the delicate rate of two inches per second, up Atlantis’s docking module to the ISS port for a good, tight lock.
    Now the hatches were open and Atlantis’s crew floated one by one into the space station to be greeted with handshakes and hugs, and the welcoming smiles of people who have not seen new faces in over a month.
    The node was too small to hold thirteen people, and the crews quickly spilled into the adjoining modules.
    Emma was the fifth to cross into the station. She popped out of the vestibule and inhaled a m?lange of scents, the slightly stale and meaty odors of humans confined too long in a closed space.
    Luther Ames, an old friend from astronaut training, was the first to greet her.
    “Dr. Watson, I presume!” he boomed out, pulling her into a hug.
    “Welcome aboard. The more ladies, the merrier.”
    “Hey, you know I’m no lady.” He winked. “We’ll keep that between us.” Luther had always been larger than life, a man whose good cheer could fill a room.
    Every one liked Luther because Luther liked everyone. Emma was glad to have him aboard.
    Especially when she turned to look at her other station mates.
    She shook hands first with Michael Griggs, the ISS commander, and found his greeting polite but almost military. Diana Estes, an Englishwoman sent up by the European Space Agency, was not much warmer. She smiled, but her eyes were a strange glacial blue. Cool and distant.
    Emma turned next to the Russian, Nicolai Rudenko, who had been aboard ISS the longest—almost five months. The module lights seemed to wash all the color from his face, turning it as gray as the gray-flecked stubble of his beard. As they shook hands, his gaze barely met hers. This man, she thought, needs to go home. He is depressed. Exhausted. Kenichi Hirai, the astronaut from NASDA, floated forward to greet her next. He, at least, had a smile on his face and a firm handshake. He stammered a greeting and quickly retreated.
    By now the module had emptied out, the rest of the group dispersing to other parts of the station. She found herself alone with Bill Haning.
    Debbie Haning had died three days ago. Atlantis would be bringing Bill home, not to his wife’s bedside, but to her funeral.
    Emma floated across to him. “I’m sorry,” she said softly. “I’m sorry.” He merely nodded and looked away. “It’s strange,” he said. “We always thought—if something