“. . . conflict between the Runner community and the corporate entity of Lunar Base Corporation led to actions both sides came to regret. However, those events and the circumstances that arose from them were inevitably to lead to a new sociological dynamic on the moon . . .”
excerpt: “Manned Space: A Study of Sociological Development, Introduction”
I could hear my father calling me to wake up; I must have overslept.
“Wake up, Peter!”
My head was filled with cotton and I ached all over; no way I was going to school today. I rolled over to tell him, and my left knee exploded with pain. When I could think again, there were tears in my eyes, and I was back on the moon. Frans was holding his helmet against mine and yelling my name.
“Okay, Frans, I’m up, just gimme a sec to . . .”
“No, just listen to me, Peter. Your plan worked! Someone heard me on the radio.” Frans was almost boyish in his elation. Despite my own rush of relief, I tried to be cool.
“Damn, I’m glad of that. I’m tired of walking. I’d like to ride a while.” I flopped back on top of the cart, and watched Frans start a Lunar Jewish jig. My sprained knee ached, my muscles burned with fatigue, the inside of my surfacesuit smelled, and I had a headache from the stale breathing mix, but I was as happy as Frans.
Despite my earlier confidence, the odds had not been with us. Frans had guided us to a wide corridor of relatively smooth lunar surface, a hundred-mile wide highway often used by Runners. However, often isn’t always, and Frans guessed we had a 50 percent chance someone would use this path on their run. We had positioned ourselves in the heaviest concentration of old tracks, but our twenty-mile-wide radio range covered perhaps half of the well-used part of the path, which gave us an optimistic 25 percent chance of a rescue.
My radio was off to help conserve the battery, but I figured it wouldn’t be a problem now. Funny, to get air from the fuel cells we took electricity, so to conserve air, we had to conserve power. I switched the radio on.
“. . . so let me tell Pete to get his radio on.” It was Frans’ voice.
“I’m on, Frans, thanks,” I interrupted.
“Peter?”
Strange, it sounded like, “. . . Patty?”
“Peter, I brought your bloody candy bars.” She laughed.
My pains disappeared, and I was suddenly sharply aware of everything around me: the beauty of the lunar vista, the warmth of the still-rising sun, the sea of stars. I could even see the gleam of a satellite arcing overhead.
“Uh, Patty?” I felt extra stupid, too.
“Yes, Patty, ya twit. Who else would trek out here after you?”
I couldn’t think of a good answer; my attention focused on the moving point of light. It seemed bigger. Fear stirred in my gut.
“Peter? Pete? Frans, is Peter okay?”
I waved at Frans and pointed; he looked at me, then into the sky. Something was flying toward us, and on the moon that meant a lander, and a lander meant Lunar Base had found us.
“Okay, mates, if you don’t want to talk to me, I’ll just turn around and . . .”
Frans shut off my radio and leaned in to touch our helmet face-plates again.
“This could be trouble,” he said.
“Trouble? Someone tried to kill us, Frans, and that someone is probably on that lander. We have to do something.”
“Certainly, I agree. Do you have any suggestions?”
“Well, we can’t call the Space Patrol . . . wait. I may have an idea.” My mind was racing, clicking over like no sociology final had ever made it. “All right, listen to this and tell me what you think. We can’t let them catch us both together. It would be too easy for us to have an unfortunate accident that way. And we have to get Patty out of the way, too. And we can’t all take off together; the three of us together would be easy targets if they are armed.”
“Armed, Peter?”
“Guns. If Patty picked us up before the lander gets here, they could change course, shoot a few holes in the rover, and POW, another unfortunate accident.”
“I find the idea of guns on the Moon hard to believe, Pete, but better safe than sorry. Go ahead.”
“Better safe than dead, you mean. Switch your com back on.”
We turned our radios back on in the middle of a blistering string of curses. I looked at Frans’ and we shared embarrassed grins while Patty explored the possible lineage and sexual habits of someone. Probably me. When she paused for breath, Frans jumped in.
“Patty dear?”
“Frans?” She responded instantly. “Is everything all right? You stopped transmitting, Peter stopped talking and . . . what happened? What do YOU want?”
“Uh, we had a change of plans,” I answered, a little confused by that last part. “Patty, I need you to stop where you are, one of us is going to come to you. Something has come up, something we’ll explain when we get time. Frans, how long until the lander is here?”
“If we can see it, we probably only have a couple of more minutes.”
“Lander? Hold on. There’s a lander? Why?” Patty sounded confused.
“Yes, a lander is almost here, and I don’t know why, and we can’t wait. Frans, grab the spare pack and start toward Patty.” Something bothered me about Patty’s answers, but there was no time to stop and figure out what.
“No.” Frans sounded grim.
“Don’t have time, Frans. I have to stay here and get captured, and you have to go to the rover and escape.”
“No. I’m out of medicine. The lander is the fastest way back to the base, and whoever this is can’t afford to kill me or let me die while you are still free and alive.”
“Kill? Die?” Patty was clearly getting worried. “What’s going on?”
”So, you and I are each other’s insurance?” I nodded, ignoring Patty for the moment. Frans nodded back.
“That’s it then. Patty, I’m coming to you, Frans will be the only one talking now; we can’t transmit any more, or the lander might find you, too.”
“But, Peter . . . NO! You sunnufa . . . ” There was a pop as Patty was disconnected.
God, I felt stupid.
“Frans, did you ask Patty how she happened to be Out Here in a rover?”
“No.” He looked bewildered.
“They are with her, too.”
My head whirled as I tried to fit it all together, but I knew we were running out of time. Frans was beginning to get it, I could see. I decided I didn’t have time to actually figure out who or why. I really had to act now, DO something, before that wasn’t an option anymore.
“Frans, we gotta hurry.” We both glanced up at the descending lander.
“I’m . . . at a loss, my young friend”
“Someone has to get away, so the rest of us have a chance.”
“Well,” he said, “if that is our only chance, then we go together.”
“Your heart,” I said. His hand touched the surfacesuit over his chest absently and he nodded.
“Right. And I daresay I’m the better negotiator. Let’s do this.”
Seconds later I was back in the harness. The silence was bothering me; I expected melodramatic threats, crafty negotiations, or warrants for our arrest, anything but silence. No time left to consider that, though. My heart pounded, I was chilled but sweating, and my fear threatened to make me puke. Com off again, we touched helmets. Frans must have noticed my distress.
“Peter, this isn’t a suicide mission. Calm down.” He sounded sure of himself.
“Well, I don’t see much other option here, Frans. Do you?” My voice was far more in control than I felt.
“Do you have your little computer handy?”
“Uh . . . ” I felt quickly through the outer pockets of my surfacesuit. “Yeah, right here.”
“Turn the voice record on, and hold it tight to my helmet.”
Frans started reciting coordinates, locations on the lunar surface. I should have paid attention, but all I could think about was Patty. Surely they wouldn’t risk hurting her if a witness existed. On the other hand, I didn’t really know who it was holding her, and might have a hard time proving anything. Suddenly I didn’t like my idea. Maybe I’d be better off trying some heroic rescue attempt. Before I could totally freak out, Frans spoke to me.
“Those are some of my best spots, Peter. You’ll have to travel from spot to spot. Just shovel the dust into the outhouse, that’ll process out what you need. You might make it home before sunset.” Debris from the lander exhaust blast started to rattle on our helmets. “Go, hurry.”
My panic faded as quickly as it had risen.
“Okay. Good luck, Frans.”
“You too, my boy.”
We shook hands in silence, a moment I felt could be our last. I leaned into the harness as we were pelted by dust and rock. Between the dust and my tears, I didn’t see the lander touch down.
I moved quickly for half a minute, then bumped down into a good-sized double crater. The twin ejecta mounds threw a hard, black shadow across the bottom of the crater, mostly hiding the cart. The lander was still bouncing on its landing gear when I peeked back over the crater rim. Frans shuffled toward the lander and waited while two men in Security Division surfacesuits unloaded. I switched my radio back on; I hoped it wouldn’t give me away, but felt I needed to hear what was happening. Frans blustered at the men, but they didn’t say anything, at least not on our channel. They ignored his protests, grabbed him, switched off his com, and dragged him bodily to the lander. Suddenly I noticed my trail; the cart track and my footprints were quite visible in the high relief of the morning sun. The only foot prints for about a thousand miles. Crap.
I was just a hundred yards away from the lander. If I waited in hiding, only the most incompetent search since Stalag 13 would miss that trail. I needed a head start, but they’d be even more incompetent if they didn’t start searching for me right away. I looked around the mare; if I ran, there was no way the men wouldn’t see me. Movement caught my eye. The rover was close, closer than I’d thought, only a mile or so. Well, there went most of my chance of sneaking off. Still, it was my best hope, so I waited and watched.
It was less than ten seconds before incompetence struck.
Both men were re-entering the lander with Frans. It would take a minute or more to cycle the airlock going in, and another minute to cycle back out. Even if they were just checking in for instructions, I had two minutes or more to make my getaway. A quick glance told me the rover was still speeding straight for the lander; with a little luck, whoever was driving wouldn’t see me run for it. I didn’t bother strapping in, just threw the harness over my shoulders, grabbed the handles, and let adrenaline power me out of the crater. I hardly felt my knee as I turned away from the oncoming rover and put everything I had left into a burst of acceleration. Within half a minute, I was running down a slight slope at about twenty miles per hour. My radio fizzed static and popped. NOW what, I thought.
“Peter, this is Patty. Is that you hopping along like some bloody outback kangaroo?”
In a few seconds the wreck was over. Shocked to hear her voice, I had slowed my pace slightly, and the cart’s momentum simply pushed me off my feet. My first reaction was to hold myself up to catch my balance, which pushed the handles down. I might still have recovered, but my injured knee gave then and I fell, my faceplate and the cart handles plowing into the dust. Still, I’d been lucky. If the handles had lifted again, the cart might have rolled over me and dragged me to my death. Instead, the handles dug into the dust and struck a hidden ridge or crack, and physics did the rest. I plowed to a stop in the dust, but the cart spun starward, catapulted over the suddenly lodged handles, flinging loose items in all directions. The cart, or what was left, was still tumbling across the lunar surface when I wiped the dust off my faceplate, struggled to my feet and turned to limp back toward the lander.
“Peter! Are you okay?” The concern in her voice twisted my heart.
“Yeah, I’m all right,” I said with a grim smile, “my stuff is scattered for a mile, but I got lucky. How are you?”
“Never mind me; is Frans okay?”
“They have Frans on the lander. We decided he should surrender. Patty, Frans is out of his heart medicine, has been for more than a week.”
“Well, where in the hell were you going, then?”
“Doesn’t matter now. What do we do about Frans?”
“You don’t worry, Pete, I’ll take care of Frans, you just get back to that lander if you want a ride home.”
“On my way, thanks,” I said with some relief. She didn’t answer, and her voice had seemed sharp. I guess I’d said something to set her off.
I started trotting, favoring my knee. Something was still bothering me, so I decided to risk her wrath further.
“Patty, we thought something had happened to you, like maybe someone attacked you?”
“Something like that, mate,” she said, and laughed. “The big, brave bloke is locked in storage B.”
“Isn’t that the . . . ?”
“Freezer. He’s a lucky bugger; my first thought was to send him vacuum diving. Now please hush, Peter. I need to get busy. You people in the lander, I know you’re hearing me. I’ll be there in thirty seconds. If I don’t see Frans outside when I get there, I’m gonna roll through ya at seventy-five kaypeeaitch, then reverse on the wreckage and play moon rugby with your heads. Com out.”
I broke into a sprint, or as much of a sprint as I could manage. This was not going any way I could have imagined, and I wanted to be at the lander. I had no plan, but if I was close, maybe I could do something to help. I could see the rover barreling straight at the lander, and I’d bet the guys inside could see it too. I knew Patty meant what she said, and I hoped whoever was in the lander believed too.
The slanting sunlight made the dash across the lunar surface almost easy; craters, loose rocks, and dust usually made running harder. Still, my head was down as I watched my path when the lander lock cycled open.
“All right lady, here he is.” I looked up in time to see Frans being dragged from the open lock by one of the kidnapers. I was coming from behind them, and they must not have seen me. I could also see another one of them hiding in the shadowed airlock, secretly observing the oncoming rover. They were going to ambush Patty’s rover; it was time for me to do something. What, I didn’t know, but I was almost there and it would come to me.
Then the guy in the airlock swung out and started shooting a pistol into the cab of the oncoming rover. I saw glass and plastic fly, and a surfacesuited figure jerking . . . and I went a little crazy.
I leapt at the man with the gun, catching him dead-center, and we went skittering across the ground. I was acting in rage, and had no plan, simply the desire to kill him. I rolled to my feet on the first bounce, and was on him before he could recover his balance. Unlike TV, he hadn’t dropped his gun, and didn’t bother fighting back, just turned the gun on me as I uselessly tried to punch him through his surfacesuit.
The gun blasted once, close enough for the muzzle blast to thump my helmet, but the shot missed in the struggle. We fought for a few seconds more then the muzzle touched the middle of my faceplate. I distinctly heard a click as he pulled the trigger, and I was shocked into motionlessness. Desperately, he pulled the trigger again and again; we both realized the gun was empty about the same time. I drew back a bit, and he rolled away, shielding his attempt to reload with his body. His backpack was now to me.
I grabbed the main air feed hose like a suitcase handle, and jerked him to me. The hose and fittings were ‘accident proof’, but not built to survive the kind of abuse I applied. I stood up and shook him violently, until the helmet fitting split. Like any drowning victim, he forgot what he was doing and panicked when the next breath didn’t come. I stepped back and watched, fascinated for a moment by his death struggle; had I just done that?
“Peter, dear, get outta my way!”
My head jerked up, and I saw the rover bearing down on me. Without further thought I grabbed the panicked thug and jumped clear of the rover’s path. I didn’t see the impact; the guy was completely freaking out and we struggled several more seconds. Finally he blacked out, and then I spent the next half a minute sealing the hose fitting with the emergency goop from the surfacesuit emergency kit. I’d ruined the helmet, but he’d live.
When I turned to see the crash, it was already over. The rover had crashed through two of the lander’s legs and spun to a stop a few yards further on. The spacecraft had toppled to the ground, a plume of dust and gas mushrooming around it. My heart was pounding, my hands were shaking, but my vision was very clear. Frans and his captor had leapt clear, but were just standing there, apparently too shaken by events to do more. I limped to the rover, hoping that by some miracle Patty had survived the gunshots and impact, but my guts twisted at what I saw.
The cab was mangled and flattened. I could only see a patch of surfacesuit in the crumpled wreckage. I ignored the sick feeling and hurried as best I could to the main airlock; if I could get inside and open the cabin airlock, I might be able to free her. Before I got there, the outer door popped open and an unsuited figure tumbled out, followed by someone in a surfacesuit. It was Patty. She saw me there, standing dumbfounded; of course she had to laugh.
“Peter, do this chump a favor and help him into a lifeball. I need to check on Frans.” She pulled the activator on the package she was holding and tossed it to me. Reflexively I tried to catch the slowly arcing lifeball, but it deployed into an unwieldy giant pill. By the time I’d quit juggling it she was gracefully bouncing toward Frans and his former captor, a black pistol in her left hand. I turned my attention to the guy asphyxiating in front of me. It was Alan, Coordinator of Security Division Alan, mouthing and flopping like a fish out of water.
“Patty, what . . . ?”
“Had to use his ‘suit to decoy the bugger with the gun, and couldn’t leave him alone in the rover, could I?”
“But, didn’t he have a gun?” It seemed to take forever to get him in the oblong lifeball. I grunted as I struggled with Alan.
“Yup, and he stuck it too close to me, so I took it and twisted his arm for the trouble. Teach him to lie to me about rescuing my friends. Going com off for a bit.”
“Huh.” Alan was still conscious when I zipped it and popped the O2. He gasped and glared as the lifeball pressurized.
He might as well have been locked in a vault, so I started over to Patty and Frans. They had their helmets together, and I turned to check on my thug instead. He was still unconscious, with a trickle of blood from his nose. He’d certainly sucked too much vacuum, but his breathing seemed fine to me, better than the breathing he’d wanted for me. I looked until I found his pistol then dug the spare clips out of his surfacesuit pockets. He must have been expecting some kind of war; he had nine more clips besides the empty one. My search complete, I drug him toward the rover, my knee throbbing with every step.
“Peter,” Patty called, “are you - oh, never mind, you’re ahead of me, I see. I left the duct tape on the dining table; be a dear and tie him off?”
My answer was somewhere between a grunt of weariness and a groan of pain. The adrenaline must have been wearing off. I was smiling, though. She’d called me ‘dear’ twice already.
Halfway to the rover, my thug started to struggle. I dropped him, stepped back, fumbled the pistol out of my pocket, and pointed it at him. Then I remembered it wasn’t loaded. Cursing, I found a clip, got it shoved in just as the guy stood up. I could see his face, an ordinary face, a face you could see anywhere. He saw me working the slide, trying to cock his gun, and his face changed. His hand snapped out, a gleam of steel suddenly appearing, and he lunged at me. I felt the slide close on the pistol, and a fierce rage rose. The gun bucked, the only sound a faint thump from the recoil in my glove. Icy pain numbed my arm as he slashed at me, but I felt the gun thump again and this time he staggered back, his face twisted and dark.
“Bastard!” I yelled. Thump. He regained his balance and surged toward me again. I stepped coldly into him, burying the pistol in his chest as his knife swung into me. Thump. Thump. He fell limply then, in lunar slow motion. I went to one knee beside him and pressed the muzzle of his pistol to the faceplate of his helmet. All I could think of was that he’d tried to kill Patty. I willed the pistol to shoot, to put a bullet through the ordinary face, but my anger had abandoned me. I could hear Patty calling to me on the com, see her gloved hand on my arm; I trembled with the effort of trying to pull that trigger.
I didn’t actually lose consciousness, but things grew confused and flat. Frans and Patty walked me to the rover and dressed my wounds. The thug had cut my arm badly, as well as a couple of other minor slashes. It was about half an hour before I felt even close to normal.
I sat up in the bunk, putting my head down as a wave of nausea came and went. Patty glanced up from wrapping duct tape around Alan’s ankles. The rest of him was already well taped.
“Hey, Pete, be careful,” she said gently. She ripped the tape off the roll and came to squat beside me. “Maybe you should lie back down?”
“No.” I shook my head, still looking down. “Just let me get my bearings. I’ll be all right. I just had a thought - did you check the lander for crew?”
“The little one was the pilot. Everyone accounted for.”
“Good. How did you find us?” I felt the rover lurch, and realized we were moving.
“Alan. They orbited a lander to listen for you when you were late, but I insisted we take a rover for backup. Alan came with me, to coordinate the rescue, he said.” Her freckles twisted into a frown. “Pete, Ray died. They said it was an accident.”
I couldn’t find any surprise, although I hadn’t considered it consciously.
I nodded. “Patty, I know you know that Frans is your grandfather. Frans knows about you, too; he has all along.”
She sighed and reached out to squeeze my hand.
I cut my eyes sideways at her. “That guy, is he . . . ”
She met my gaze. “Yes. Dead. Thank you, Pete. You saved our lives, all of us.” I didn’t know how to feel about that and turned my face back toward the deck. Patty saw my confusion.
“Peter. Look at me.” She hooked her finger in my shirt pocket. “You didn’t make the decision that someone had to die. He did. You saved lives. You saved your life, you saved Frans, you saved me.” She held my eyes with hers. “Right now you’re tired and hurtin’ and lost some blood. You just remember, Peter Lagger, you are a hero. My hero. Someday, our children’s hero.”
I guess heroes cry.
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