Lights in the Deep by Brad R. Torgersen Page A

pack of puppies.
    “Colonel Zaslavskaya,” said one of her aides, “this is Mr. Washington, formerly of the—”
    “—United States Navy,” she said, extending a hand to me. I shook it, and suddenly the decade between us evaporated.
    “NASA test pilot corps, at your service, ma’am,” I said, not quite believing.
    “Gentlemen,” Raisa said to her entourage, “would you excuse us?”
    The Israelis gave us room, going off to mingle with the many Houston and Cape eggheads who had come with me on this trip.
    “You never told anyone the truth,” she whispered.
    “Seemed better that way,” I said. “You’re still using the name, I see.”
    “The Israelis treated me like a queen after we parted company. Made me an instant officer in the IAF. Said I was their key to keeping up with the rest of the West in space.”
    “What are you doing here?”
    “What do you think, lump-head? I am here about your shuttle.”
    “Oh.”
    “Did they not tell you that your Reagan White House has requested that an Israeli pilot be sent, for the Skylab missions? As a show of solidarity with Israel?”
    “No, they didn’t tell me that. Raisa…you don’t think the Soviets will care? I mean, I think they’d recognize one of their own, once the photographers and the newspapers got wind of this decision.”
    “I am Israeli citizen now. Cosmonaut Zaslavskaya…she is dead. If the Soviets do want to complain, what can they do? Go to war for me? Their economy is stressed to the point of breaking, and they are being eaten alive in Afghanistan. I think I am a low priority for the Politburo.”
    I smiled at her. Genuinely, and with great enthusiasm.
    “So,” I said, rubbing hands eagerly together, “you’re going up with us on the shuttle.”
    “Only if you approve, I am told.”
    “I think I might be convinced to allow it, but under one condition.”
    “And that is?”
    “Dinner. Just the two of us. Tonight.”
    “What about your wife?”
    “Cheney will be thrilled to find out what’s happened to you. I told her all about you when I got back the first time.”
    “A partner in silence, she is?”
    “Yes. But she’ll want to know everything. And so will I.”
    “It is a date , Amerikanyetz. If so, you must tell me all about walking on the moon.”
    “It was gray and it was flat.”
    She slugged me so hard in the chest I coughed and spilled my coffee.
    “Sorry,” I said, laughing. “I’ll tell you all about it. I promise.”
    ▼ ▲ ▼ ▲ ▼
    Stan Schmidt told me this was a very good story. He also said he wasn’t going to buy it. Why? Because Analog didn’t do a lot of alternate history, and when Analog did do alternate history, it had to be extraordinarily alternate. Which Gemini 17 isn’t. Or at least, I don’t think it is. I didn’t change much about the 1960s, save for one important thing: I kept John F. Kennedy alive. Once I did that, I extrapolated a raft of potential results. Such as a second Cold War front in Cuba, to match that in Vietnam. Which would of course tax the resources of the United States such that the big Saturn V boosters might have seemed like an unnecessary “pie in the sky” expense. But the U.S. was still desperate to beat the Soviet Union to the Moon.
    What might have happened?
    I am an enormous fan of the movie The Right Stuff.
    I pictured a sequel to The Right Stuff , with President Kennedy alive, and all of my speculations coming into play.
    How would NASA have tackled the challenge of going to moon if the U.S. government did not create a budget for an Apollo program?
    There are actual notes left over from that era, delineating a proposed solution using extant Project Gemini boosters and spacecraft—with a few modifications.
    Once I got a look at those, my imagination was off and running.
    Also: how topical could I be, given the timeframe?
    We came close to having some black American astronauts during the Apollo era. What if one lonely black pilot were promoted into a vacant