Southern Cross by Windstar

Emily spread her hands and her grin widened a bit. She hated most diplomatic games with a
passion. The President had been a refreshing change from most of those games.
"Yes we did Blake. Let me try that again, what can I do for you?"
The President laughed and shook his head, leaning back in his own chair. Which, Julie noted,
appeared to be in the Oval Office.
"Keep your day job Emily."
The smile died as he fiddled with a pen, twirling it absently between his fingers.
"You've got some worried Republicans and Democrats down here Emily. We've been going over
these specs your people sent over regarding this planetary shield thing. I have to tell you Emily,
this is not going to go over well with a lot of people."
Emily knew exactly what part of it was not going to go over well and she sighed. This was not an
unforeseen problem, but she had hoped that most of it would be shunted off to her brother to deal
with.
"Blake, we need that shield. It's that simple. One missile gets through with a viral payload, and
the same thing that happened to Tiri Prime could happen here. I don't need to tell you how fond
the Bak'ra are of using viruses, do I?"
"Emily, it's not that and you know it. No one here has anything against putting up the planetary
shield itself, well, just some fringe groups. What's got people riled up is what's going to happen
when you get those stations finished and put it up."
Emily could feel a headache coming on and resisted the impulse to snarl at the President. Not
because he was president, but she genuinely liked the man.
"As soon as the Orbital Defense Forts are operation we have to test the Planetary Shield, Blake.
There is no way around what is going to happen when we do. That shield is going to shred
anything that is in low Earth orbit when we activate it."
"Emily, I know you know how many satellites we're talking about here. I don't think you know
just how much we depend on some of those though. Is there anyway we can get you to raise the
shield or lower it maybe?"
Emily was already shaking her head before he had finished speaking. A part of her absently
noted that a shuttle had received permission to dock with North Star.
"I had Blake and his people go over it again. There is no way to get a solid shield if we expand it
much more, and if we go lower we'll be building the Forts too deep in the planet's atmosphere.
I'm sorry Mr. President, there is no way around this one."