– Ronald, you said that we were in the Caracas area.

Whitehouse shrugged his shoulders.

Having had a good look at the surroundings, Dybal spent some time inside the capsule, and then climbed out red as a tomato, as if he has spent an hour in a Finnish sauna. But at the same time happy. He gently cradled a small box of a shortwave transmitter in his hands:

– Here you go. It seems to work. Now we can connect with the satellite-based positioning. We will send an emergency call and-and-and-and......

– Well-well… And who is going to show up for your call sign? – Sand cracked on the teeth of Whitehouse. He spat aside.

– What do you mean?

– Well then, no outgoing signals. First let's try to listen to the incoming signal. – Forestalling the hesitant navigator, Whitehouse clicked the tumbler and pressed the 100.00 Hertz button.

The transmitter responded with a bang and a howl of automatic tuning. An alarmed voice could be heard through the ethereal sound; it was mumbling so fast that you could hardly parse a word.

After a while, a few more voices joined in. Sometimes the signal was muffled by the trills of triggered aircraft "friend or foe" identification systems.

– I think they speak Spanish – Said Dybal lifting the transmitter right to his ear:

-Please give permission for military approach…

Go ahead…

Iglesias, cover me…

-Yeah right. They attack our second container with Eichberger and Hoffman… Coal-colored cylinder, about three feet in diameter, open aero braking shield, two parachutes…

They do not respond to inquiries; do not shoot off the signal flares.

– In Spanish? So we are still in the SAU.

These are their patrol fighters. The SAU is neutral.

-Perhaps we could try to enable the emergency calls. – Perked up Mackliff.

Whitehouse shook his head:

– No need to hurry up, John. Yes, the SAU’s are neutral, but now we only have the information that we had before the collision with "Das Rein." But then we were attacked by the Arabs. And who knows, maybe another war broke out.

And when the war starts, you can never vouch for the neutrals’ position.

– Oh, shit! They brought it down them bastards, they brought down the container! – Dybal suddenly shouted, clutching his head.

– Damn it… What could a helpless container, an iron box hanging on the parachutes possibly do to them? Nasty freaks… Ah… – Whitehouse clenched his fists.

At this point, a little moan escaped from Von Conrad’s mouth. Dybal bent over him:

– What is it, Manfred? Do you need something? Water, a painkiller…

Von Conrad was in a very bad state. Despite the fact that his body had no serious injuries, the general condition worsened with each hour.

When the capsule with him Whitehouse, Mackliff and Dybal, released the aero braking shield at the estimated height it started buffing and the heat reached its maximum.

After thirty seconds of falling in the atmosphere at a speed of 1750 miles per hour the titanium seal around the hatch had depressurized, and the temperature inside the container went off scale.

The fireproof fabric of the suits got wrinkled and softened, like cellophane by the fire, and air conditioning systems continued to work by a miracle.

That was the end.

Mackliff gritted his teeth and said that his life was not lived in vain, that he has developed quite a few first-class control systems of various levels, invented a probe accumulation of solar energy reflected from the moon’s surface and had it affirmed by the NASA commission; made a spectrum estimation analyzer of orbital dust; said that he always liked the guys like Whitehouse and Dybal, and if he sometimes was grumbling and angry, it was only for the good cause.