Cave Bears of Kennedy Space Center

De-Orbit Burn

This is another tale of the Kennedy Space Center's multiverses, both in the distant past and the far future.
Follow ghosts, demons, gods, AIs, tourists, DNA experiments, vamps, and witches as they travel the multiverse only to discover their interconnections as allies and enemies across an endless history or future.

Every story is the true story.

De-orbit burn

"Houston, we are go for the de-orbit burn," said Marcus into his helmet mike.

"Copy Shuttle, proceed with the burn," came the instructions from Texas.

Marcus rolled the space shuttle over and activated the OMS Pods to slow the orbiter down. The hypergolic liquid-propellant rocket engines of the Orbital Maneuvering System roared to life.

Eileen, the shuttle co-pilot for this mission, monitored the ship's speed and recalculated the glide to Kennedy.

"It will be a three-minute and twenty-seven-second burn," said Eileen.

Marcus looked at Eileen; she had masked the worry, as did Marcus, who placed the gut terror in a tiny seal-proof location under his navel. His fear, that tiny vellum-wrapped knot of terror, would not be allowed daylight until he set foot on the shuttle runway. He could puke it free. Fuck it if he was embarrassed.

All eight astronauts on board had discussed the ice damage to the shuttle's thermal protection tiles. Discussed the very real possibility that their amazing space glider may not reach humid Canaveral.

Well, the ground engineers had assured them the damage to the heat shield was minimal.

Such was the power of eternal hope, that element that had pulled humanity through untold ages of child-birth, saber-toothed tigers, hurricanes, and ancient human-powered crossing the vast Pacific Ocean or glaciers of the new world. The hope, the knowledge, they would survive. Survive no matter the odds, despite the blood, fangs, or broken heat shield tiles starring in their faces.

At the end of the OMS burn, Marcus re-oriented the orbiter into forward, right-side-up free-flight.

"Houston, we will talk to you once through the fire," and nudged the orbiter into Earth's gravity well.

Gliders, no matter how fancily named, only had one chance to hit the Florida runway. In the space shuttle's windows, the blue-green planet below them blurred to carmine red and orange glowing from the re-entry friction.

Marcus looked at one window that carried his reflection and almost shouted. Instead of the standard spacesuit helmet over an orange pressure suit, he was staring at a giant bird head, a hawk, or something else. Hallucination was the sign that he was losing the battle with fear. He raised a gloved hand to his helmet and felt the soft feathers. The arrogant eyes of a raptor, a sharp-beaked falcon, a proud killer looked at him in the reflection.

I'm losing it, he said to himself.

Marcus dared a glance at the co-pilot to see if she also saw a giant bird

Instead of the co-pilot, there was a stranger in a silver-tin foil-looking suit.

"Where is Eileen!" sputtered Marcus.

The stranger in the tin-foil suit jumped at Marcus's reaction and lifted her space helmet visor. Red curls were plastered to the woman's forehead. A single bead of sweat lifted from her forehead and floated about the cabin.

"You asked for my help," said the woman. "You do not recall?" The stranger sniffed the air, "It smells like an outhouse in this shuttle ship, you call it."

"Who are you?" asked Marcus. Suddenly relieved that it was not some green alien inside the silver suit that he now recognized as an early space program suit—John Glenn's suit, name tag and all.

"Who are you?" he asked again, almost shouting. His hallucination had pushed him to near panic.

"Ophelia, Olympia, whatever name you prefer. I am here to help, to rescue you."

Ophelia wrinkled her nose at the odor of the shuttle.

A carmine-red-headed woodpecker landed upon Marcus's seat and pecked a few times upon his seat.

"How did that get on board?" he sputtered. The same type of woodpecker that had caused so much damage to the space shuttle's fuel tanks, pecking thousands of holes, delaying this very flight to place a top-secret DOD satellite in orbit.

The woodpecker flashed carmine eyes at Marcus and Ophelia.

"No!" screamed Ophelia. "No, no, no, no, not that, not tha.......

The birds, the fucking birds, and the red eyes, her brain's way of telling her, of warning her a seizure was imminent, a brainstorm of neuron short circuitry that would only last a few moments. But we could both die on this ship of fools.

A claxon suddenly went off in the cabin, a breach alarm, the breach alarm that meant doom.

Ophelia turned her sweaty head in alarm at the gravitational sound wraiths that suddenly were eating at the ship from below, like a storm-driven treasure ship shattering upon unseen reefs.

Superheated plasma filled the cabin in slow motion as twisting, curling, sinuous clouds of destruction.

"I had to slow time," said Ophelia, and she ducked under a beautiful scintillating curl of death. "We could both die on this doomed ship; perhaps the dexterous few can be saved."

Freed from the sheath, her gladius severed the harness that held Marcus secure for landing at Canaveral and the return of gravity.

More scintillating fingers of destruction twisted towards them as she felt her brain enter her gravity well of rigid muscles and bitten tongue.

"Return-to-launch-site," her brain commanded because her tongue was lock-jawed as she fell into a forced reboot. She visualized the colonnaded outside entrance of the Launch Control Center and pulled the two of them to home.

Cave

A glowing pit of embers gave off warmth, and the indirect moonlight that slanted through the cave opening provided enough light for Marcus to work on his spear, a flint-tipped razor fluted to punch through mammoth or sloth. The first faint orange-yellow of dawn showed snow-covered pinewoods and a distant herd of nervous horses. They smelled something on the wind.

Cat or short-faced bear? He glanced at his other spears leaning against the cave entrance, moon-shadowed and deadly.

"Do you remember our love Marcus?" said Ophelia, who worked on a hide with a bone tool.

"Where are we?" asked Marcus, suddenly aware that he was no longer in a dying space shuttle. His surroundings had changed, and he held a spear in his hands, a spear as familiar as a lover. He could hear the slow gurgle of water deep in the rocky cavern. The glaciers were melting. Why did he know that?

"Why, this is a Kennedy, before there was a Kennedy," purred Ophelia.

Her face was camp smoke, grit, and charcoal-stained, with her henna-red hair pulled back by a strip of leather, and she was beautiful.

The cave held another occupant, a captive stranger, a woman with long blond hair who chewed on the end of a braid in speculation. She was also beautiful yet exotic with feral sexuality. Like all her people, she had pale skin and eyes. She had no chin to speak of, heavy brow ridges, and a nose too long. Her pretty forehead sloped backward.

She watched him like a leopard watching a roebuck.

Marcus was startled; she was.....she was what? The future Marcus knew she was different. The past Marcus knew her name was Eye-Leen, a skilled magician, mid-wife, and eager lover when Ophelia was ill.

A cave bear growled outside.

Marcus gripped his spear and dipped a pine pitch torch into the embers, instantly lighting the cave interior and the magical paintings of animal and falcon-headed shamans—cave paintings that cured epileptic seizures.

"Yes, I remember our love," said Marcus as he stepped into the dawning with fire and spear. A pair of snowy owls hooted monkey-like and flashed carmine eyes.

"Every spear cast a long shadow," said Ophelia, and she lit her own pine torches and stepped out to assist; be it of joy or pain, she followed infinitely.

Outside of the cave, the myriads of crimson and gold reflected across the lake, bringing, calling the sunrise.

Eileen of the honey-hair stepped outside to assist Marcus and Ophelia. Well, to kill Ophelia and help Marcus. The hunter would be hers and hers alone.

Her long, yellow hair fell in soft braids on broad shoulders, her every nerve tingling with rage, excitement, and love. The bear, she noted, was one of the destroyer types—the hybrid of white and brown bears, more deadly and larger than the parents.

Like me, she thought, spinning her sling-like wings of silver.

Marcus, her hunter, bravely prodded the bear with his spear. The destroyers were unpredictable. The bear might leave; the bear might ignore the sharp spear and pounce. The very reason her people faced bears with specially carved stones and slings.

But first, the woman must die.

Eileen spun her sling, an easy kill to the back of Ophelia's head. Eileen released her stone only to realize her target had rushed at the bear, who had finally tired of Marcus's spear and grabbed the hunter with powerful bone-crushing jaws.

Ophelia bent to jab her torch into the eye of the bear and was hit a glancing blow from both Eileen's sling-stone to the head and swatted by the enraged bear, who roared in pain at the ruined eye.

Marcus, on his back, scrambled for his spear and lifted it just the bear raised to its full height, roaring in pain, pounced on Marcus, impaling the flint-tipped spear into the jugular. The bear pushed downwards, hot air and blood washed over Marcus, and dripping jaws pushed towards him.

"Help me, Ophelia," hissed Marcus. The torch had worked once to slow the bear.

Suddenly a rock impacted the side of the bear's head. Then another and another-accurate powerful strikes that would have killed a man or lesser animal.

Eileen used the last of her secret hoard of carved stones, then shouted and howled in delight, fury, rage, and passion as the wounded bear wrenched the spear from Marcus's desperate grip and lumbered away with the spear still impaled through the neck.

Proud of her prowess, she flashed strong white teeth between carmine lips, flinging her arms to the dawning sky. Eileen howled untamed, wild, noisy, and fearless, with bright melodious satisfaction.

"I am hunter!" she yelled in her people's language, the clicking words of the horse hunters.

Marcus, panting and bleeding, looked upon the azure-eyed woman with honey-colored hair, chin tilted back, howling like a wolf, her cheeks flushed. Long lashes, the subtle allurement of the stranger, her broad shape, and her long nose designed to survive the glacier winters belied a nimbleness, deadly and beautiful. She was addictive-another of the other characteristics to survive the glacier flows. Haughty beauty and dangerous skills bred from untold generations of survivors.

The pink shell at her throat and the beautifully curved lines of the fertile woman represented the sweet pleasure of the rhythmical dance near the fire, which they both knew well.

Marcus, bleeding, panting at the escape from death, felt himself growing excited.

She laughed, mischievous satisfaction at the look in the eye of her hunter. Rut. Bull elk, or mammoth, the look in Marcus's eyes was the same, always, forever—the imperative for children.

Unabashed at her powers of both sling and dominance over the fallen woman, Eileen flung her braids in the way that never failed to capture.

A feral growl escaped her lips.

Marcus looked at Ophelia's crumpled form and yelled in alarm.

Borderland of insanity, Marcus carried Ophelia into the cave and laid her on furs; her head was already swelling at the sling stone impact site. Ophelia's head was dented, and the skull pushed onto the brain; death was calling.

Marcus shoved spiderweb and elm bark into his wounds and wrapped them tight, ignoring Eileen, who licked at the fresh wounds. His hands were shaking from pain and the knowledge of what must be done to save Ophelia's life.

"I will have to remove the dented bone."

Marcus pushed the blond woman away to locate a chunk of flint boulder and expertly struck off a flake with an antler billet. He tested the flint on his hand, and the razor-sharp shard drew blood.

Eileen watched from her furs, quiet as a lioness, angry at his rejection of her offer of licking his wounds, waiting to claim Marcus—her hunter.

Marcus hovered over the unconscious Ophelia; he had seen the operation often enough, especially since his clan had moved near the honey-hair-colored people of the horse eaters and their slings.

Cut the scalp and peel it back from the wound, incise along the outer edge of the dented bone as if carving, remove the bone, and set the scalp back in place.

"Ophelia, I am sorry," said Marcus. His hands shook from wounds, and blood splashed on Ophelia's head even before making the first cut.

Eileen grabbed his shaking hands and speaking in the alien accent of the horse eaters, said, "Let me save her. My hands do not shake."

Eileen, the huntress, who studied the animals to learn their habits in order to kill them, had seen another way to make the tall hunter obligated to her.

She took the sharp flint chip from his shaking hands.

"I have done this before," and made two expert x-shape cuts over the impact.

They were all hunters, and the skinning of animals was second nature.

Eileen pulled Ophelia's hair tight, stretching the four scalp flaps out of the way, and tied the hair behind her head.

"It does not matter if this hurts. If she lives, her head will ache for a moon cycle."

Two of every three operations to remove the head swelling bone survived. However, that meant one of every three failed. Marcus was not alarmed. It was what it was. You lived, or you did not. The destruction of Ophelia's beauty could not be helped; that was the cost of sharing land with the brown or white bears or their cursed offspring.

As a consolation, Eileen offered words of comfort, "If Ophelia does not survive, I will remove the skin and hair from her head. Anytime you long to rut with the departed Ophelia, I can don her face-skin and hair and make the same noises you like."

Eileen had indeed studied all animals.

Marcus considered the offer. On cold winter nights, hugging the fire for warmth, there could be no finer way to celebrate the loss of a loved one.

The horse eaters had some unique customs to survive the glacier lands.

A knot in his throat indicated Eileen's offer would be more than acceptable.

"Let's see if we can save her," said Marcus.

"Of course, and I will make her a pendant from her skull bone." Whether she lives or not.

Eileen worked at the skull until the dented bone was getting wobbly. Pink fluid leaked from the incised area.

"I will need an awl. And get me more sharp flint."

When the bone was free of the skull and the pressure released, she would give a few extra cuts into the pink matter—revenge of sorts.

"Bitch," she hissed. "You left me in that space shuttle to burn."

Other tails of the Space Center:

Vampires of Kennedy Space Center

Demons of Kennedy Space Center

Demons of Kennedy Space Center, corpus callosotomy

Ghosts of Kennedy Space Center

Dreams of Kennedy Space Center

Aliens of Kennedy Space Center

Director of Kennedy Space Center

Hitchhikers of Kennedy Space Center

Witches of Kennedy Space Center

Cave Bears of Kennedy Space Center

Chimeras of Kennedy Space Center

Gods of Kennedy Space Center and the Nile

Dinosaurs of Kennedy Space Center

Kayakers of Kennedy Space Center

Shadows of Kennedy Space Center

Virus of Kennedy Space Center

Gate Jumpers of Kennedy Space Center

Allies of Kennedy Space Center (Pt 2 of Gate Jumpers

Savants of Kennedy Space Center

Gene Splicers of Kennedy Space Center

State Security of Kennedy Space Center

Rescuers of Kennedy Space Center

Remembering Kennedy Space Center

Return HOME from Cave Bears of Kennedy Space Center

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Author Bruce Ryba at Kennedy Space Center Launch Pad 39B & Artemis 1. "We are going to the Moon!"

Author's discussion (that's me) on You Tube of a book review on Amazon

For the video versions of information, please check out my YouTube Channel (Turkeys, Flintknapping, dive stories etc.)

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