Victor Kendall (character)

"Astronaut Victor Kendall" is a fictional character in the novel ""'Ice by Shane Johnson.

Character introduction

Victor Kendall is an Apollo astronaut who suffers a trauma no Apollo astronaut ever had to face: leaving his friends behind to die in space.

Explanation of the character's name

None known.

Character sketch

Motivation(s)

Service to his country and trying to save the lives of his friends.

Goal(s)

* To give his friends every chance he can give them to make rendezvous with him. And when that fails:
* To be at peace with his returning home when his friends didn't, even though his commander peremptorily ordered him home.

Conflict(s)

* With nature, in the form of the harsh cold of space that is about to claim the lives of his friends.
* With the NASA brass, who, he firmly believes, now think he's terminally depressed.

Minor irritation(s)

This character has nothing minor to trouble him, as his sense of survivor guilt trumps everything.

Epiphany

His friends did not die after all--and from the moment he gets the word, he can at last gaze upon the Moon without feeling a crushing self-reproach.

Biographical summary

Prior story

Victor Kendall is an Apollo astronaut. The novel gives no details of any of his previous flight assignments.

Actions in "Ice"

The disastrous turn in his mission

Victor Kendall serves as the Apollo CSM pilot on "Apollo 19", a mission to the Lunar south pole. He shares in the joy that his friends, Mission Commander Gary Lucas and LM Pilot Charlie Shepherd, feel when they discover semi-precious gemstones in their landing zone--gemstones that might contribute to a debate on the continuation of Project Apollo, now slated to close down after this mission.

His elation turns to horror when his friends cannot lift off--because their LM ascent engine has failed to fire.

He spends the next several hours staring at the switch that he will throw to place him into trans-Earth injection--a switch that, when he throws with only himself on board, will effectively doom his friends to a slow death by suffocation and/or freezing. He insists to his friends that he has room aboard his CSM for two, and can stretch his consumables--until Lucas peremptorily orders him to go home, saying that he and Shepherd will abandon their LM, strike out on their own--and make no further attempt to take off.

Kendall bids his friends a tearful good-bye, and then follows through with Mission Control to inject himself into a homeward transit--silently weeping during every waking hour.

Back on earth

From the day he returns to earth, he can no longer look at the Moon without reproaching himself for abandoning his friends to die in space. His wife offers him as much comfort as she can, finally expressing it in terms of her need for him to make some semblance of a normal married couple's life with her. To add to his humiliation, Astronaut Bruce Cortney, the Capsule Communicator for "Apollo 19", calls him to tell him that he, Bruce, has been picked as Mission Commander for a reinstated "Apollo 20," reinstated after an inexplicable signal began transmittin from the original "Apollo 19" landing zone. Kendall entertains no notion that the signal could have anything to do with his friends; he firmly believes that they are dead, since their oxygen should have run out long ago--and indeed the mission of "Apollo 20" is not rescue, but recovery. Kendall is further informed that NASA has taken him off active flight status, and he'll be lucky to be Bruce's Capsule Communicator.

This is indeed the assignment he draws. He carries it out as required, though he still cannot shake his feelings of self-reproach. Then "Apollo 20" transmits a message declaring a radio malfunction--which is actually a pre-arranged code for the transmission of details that might prove unsettling to the American public. But the details, given in a data dump, tell a shockingly different story--and Kendall finds himself conversing with his old friends, whom Bruce and his partner James Irwin have found alive after all!

His last act as depicted in this novel is to drive personally to the home of Carol Shepherd, Charlie's wife, and inform her and Diane Lucas (Gary's wife) that their husbands are indeed alive, and that they need to fly to Hawaii to meet their recovery ship.

Relationship with other characters in "Ice"

* Astronaut Gary Lucas, his Mission Commander
* Astronaut Charlie Shepherd, LM Pilot on his mission.
* Astronaut Bruce Cortney, his Capsule Communicator, afterwards Mission Commander of "Apollo 20"
* Katie Kendall, his wife.

Major themes

Redemption, and especially the need in every man to forgive himself for past mistakes, especially when those mistakes are beyond one's control.

Literary significance & criticism

This character has not been known long enough to generate a significant body of criticism.

Allusions/references from other works

This character is not referred to in any other work by author Shane Johnson or any other author.

Film or TV portraits

This character has not been portrayed in any work of film or television show.

ources, references, external links, quotations

See "Ice"