Crater Trueblood and the Lunar Rescue Company

by Homer Hickam

  “Where?”

  The South Atlantic three hundred miles off Africa.

  “They’re going to take a pounding down there,” Captain Valence said. “Shall we keep following?”

  Crater nodded. “We need to get as close as we can to record what happens but keep track of our fuel. We’ll want to get back to the moon.”

  Maria said sadly, “Poor Earth. Poor, poor Earth.”

  “That chunk will break up when it hits the atmosphere,” Crater said. “It’s going to cause a lot of damage, but at least it isn’t going to destroy the planet.”

  Many hours later, after a thorough search of the area where the fuser taxi might be, and finding nothing, the warpod moved closer to Earth, its warpod cameras recording, while the people aboard watched silently from the bridge.

  The Earth facing the warpod was dark. Fiery flashes of light streaked across it, then more flashes as the surface was struck with hundreds of impacts. It seemed as through the bombardment would never stop.

  The warpod moved until it could see the Earth in sunlight. The atmosphere seemed washed out, the continents fuzzy. “Dust, ash, and water vapor are filling the air,” Crater mused. He zoomed a camera in to look closer. “There are volcanoes in Central America that are smoking. Likely there are earthquakes causing the plates to shift, putting pressure on them.”

  Everyone on the warpod gasped when they saw another flash of light, this one above North America. “What’s that?” Captain Valence gasped.

  Crater studied the rising smoke. “I think it was a nuclear weapon. There’s another one!”

  “Oh, please, God, no,” Maria prayed.

  More flashes occurred. Captain Valence appraised the situation. “A general nuclear exchange,” he said.

  They continued to watch until Crater said, “I think we’d better be getting home, Captain.”

  “Yes,” he said. “To your home, anyway. Will there be a place there for me and my crew?”

  “If I have anything to say about it, Captain,” Petro said, “you’ll be welcome.”

  “I think we will all get behind that,” Maria said. “We’re all in this together now.”

  “Call the L5 station,” Crater said. “Tell Crescent to evacuate aboard Captain Philippe’s warpod and land at Armstrong City. We’ll meet them there.”

  Captain Valence made the necessary adjustments, and the warpod made a long turn, lit its jets, and set a course for the moon to discover what the future might hold for a remnant of humanity that now called the little gray planetoid their only home.

  FIFTY-EIGHT

  THREE YEARS LATER . . .

  The great bell in the tower of the new Cleomedes cathedral tolled slowly and mournfully to mark the third anniversary of the end of the world, at least as it had been known. Engraved on the bell, made of an alloy of tin, copper, and iron mined from the lunar wayback, was this inscription:

  Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.

  2 Peter 3:13 KJV

  The Earth was still there, hanging in the lunar sky, a magnificent jewel pressed against the vast darkness of space, but lovely as it was, its colors were faded as if a veil had been drawn across the planet. In fact it had, the veil made of fine dust and ash from still-spewing volcanoes and the rubble thrown up by nuclear blasts. The Earth also seemed far whiter, vast areas in both the northern and southern hemispheres covered with fresh ice and snow.

  There was still no commerce with the Earth. Before the asteroid strike, scramjet/rocket hybrids were used to reach orbit and then rendezvous with the Cyclers. Now dust and ash in the atmosphere made scramjet engines unsafe to operate, so they were all grounded. Only fully rocket-propelled craft could make it to space from the Earth, but there were only a few of them, none of them designed to carry people and not enough of them to carry significant cargo. The factories that had built them were all shut down, the economies of the nations in shambles where they were located. Starvation was also a worry for every nation, the crop yields shrunk by the reduced sunlight reaching the surface through the dust haze.

  The people of the moon could communicate with the home planet through individuals on Earth transmitting on old-style radios. These radio operators told them that Earthian scientists were predicting that the air would be washed clean by the great storms that had erupted planet-wide, producing torrential rains and vast floods. It was as if the planet knew it had been damaged and was doing all that it could to cleanse itself. The air, these scientists said, should be clean enough for scramjet operations within twenty years.

  The nuclear exchange had been caused by automatic systems that thought the incoming asteroid fragments were an attack. The effectiveness of the city-busting strikes had been limited because the dust and the ash had caused the missile targeting systems to go awry. Cities were missed with the nuclear detonations going off over the seas or deserts or mountainous regions. The people, animals, and plants in those areas suffered, but wholesale human slaughter was at least avoided. After the initial exchange, the countries who’d launched them quickly shut the systems down and then went out of business, their leaders hiding from their angry citizenry.

  The Earth was rebuilding, the amateur radiomen reported, but how that reconstruction would turn out, no one knew for certain. The hope was that the people on the moon would hold the seeds of civilization and be prepared to help their poor cousins on Earth when they were able. The radiomen also reported that churches were packed, the cataclysmic events paradoxically bringing out a new sense of wonder and even gratitude toward the Maker of the universe. In some ways, it was said, the people on Earth had never been happier. The challenge to survive had knitted them together like nothing had for centuries.

  The people of the moon were also going through a period of adjustment. Still steadfastly against a central government, the Lunarians operated from city states. In Endless Dust, General Nero and Perpetually Hopeful had laid a test oxygen pipeline from Adolphus Crater into a vast dome that had transformed the small mining town into a pressurized farmland. Lakes and streams of water flowed through the acres, brought up by pumps from a deep well. Instead of biovat food, fresh produce was revolutionizing lunar cuisine. In Moontown and the other mining towns, the scrapes were still being worked. Some Helium-3 was carried up to the Cyclers and then sent down to Earth aboard spacecraft with ablative heat shields designed to land near fusion reactors that were still operable. This was charity from the moon, no payment expected. More of the precious isotope, however, was being stockpiled in anticipation of the atmosphere clearing on Earth and new fusion energy plants clamoring for replenishment.

  All this history was running through Crater Trueblood’s mind as he listened to the tolling of the bell. Crater was the president of the Cleomedes-based Interstellar Transportation Company and was presiding over a memorial ceremony, his employees assembled around the ship the ITC was building to fly into deep space. After the bell finished its final toll, he asked for a prayer from the company reverend, who was the widow of the late sheriff of Moontown:

  “Dear Lord, within our bounty on Luna, please do not let us forget the suffering of our fellow humans on the Earth, nor the suffering of her animals, the destruction of her vegetation, and the pain of her radiated surface and befouled atmosphere. We trust that You will allow Your Earth to heal and Your people of Luna to help when and where we can. Let us recall Paul’s admonition in his letter to the Colossians: ‘For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: and he is before all things, and by him all things consist.’ Let us therefore move ahead with confidence that all is unfolding as it should while recalling those who sacrificed themselves in an attempt to shield the Earth from its woes and to all those who are now seeking a new path and a new prosperity, this time even to the stars themselves.”

 
; The employees of the Interstellar Transportation Company amened the reverend’s prayer and got back to work on the deep-space ship. Crater turned to his wife and the company’s chief financial officer, Maria Medaris Trueblood, who was holding their baby boy, two months old. “He needs his diaper changed,” Maria said and handed the baby to her husband. When Crater looked clueless, she added, “Ask the gillie. It knows how.”

  The gillie stayed in Crater’s shirt pocket, although it said, The baby stinks. After a few beats, it added, But I love the little creature. I will not change its diaper, but I will teach it to read and write. It will be a great author.

  I will teach it its numbers, Maria’s gillie said from her pocket. It will be a theoretical physicist.

  It will need its own gillie, Crater’s gillie said. You should divide.

  I divided last time to give Crescent a new gillie after I went back to Maria. It’s your turn.

  Maria said, “Hush, you two. This is about changing Jack’s diaper, not gillie mitosis, which no one wants to hear about.”

  The baby was named John High Eagle Medaris Trueblood, although he was mostly called “Little Jack.”

  “I’ll show you how to change his diaper,” Absalom the crowhopper volunteered. He held out his thick arms, and Crater gratefully gave up the baby, then followed them both into a bathroom to accomplish the deed.

  Crescent smiled after the trio—man, crowhopper, and baby. She and Maria looked at one another, then over to the little girl who was playing with toys on the rug. Her name was Minerva and she was wearing the elastic suit that all children on the moon wore, which was designed to stress their muscles and bones and assure Earth-like development. “She’s beautiful,” Maria said, filling the awkward silence.

  Crescent admired her own child. “Smart as paint too.”

  Maria smiled. “That’s what the Colonel used to say about Crater.”

  “I know. Crater told me. The seedling doesn’t fall far from the tree. And you’re right. She’s perfect. I was a little afraid . . .”

  She left her fear unsaid, but Maria understood. “At least what Truvia said about that was true. Your eggs were the same as if they hadn’t . . .”

  Crescent finished Maria’s sentence. “. . . manipulated mine in the petri dish to make me this way. Yes, I’m ugly but I’m the mother of a beautiful child.”

  Although Maria and Crescent were capable of admiring their children, the two women were not friends. Although she kept it buried in her heart, Maria resented what Crescent had done when she’d taken from Crater what she needed to fashion the child they now watched playing. Yes, Minerva was a perfect child—that could not be denied—but the child was a constant reminder to her of Crescent’s breathtaking deceit.

  Crescent sensed Maria’s thoughts and agreed with them to an extent. It had been desperation that had led her to steal Crater’s DNA, but it hadn’t been right. Both women knew there was a long-delayed and probably painful conversation they needed to have. Since she found herself alone with Maria, a rare event, Crescent thought maybe now was the day to have it.

  Before Crescent could speak up, Petro swung by. He was the ITC’s chief of design and was forever busy on the puter drawing boards. There were as yet no markets for interstellar ships, but when the Earth got up and running, the ITC intended to be ready to provide one. The hope was that the people back on the world would be so tired of being cooped up on their planet that they would burst forth and carry themselves to the far reaches of the solar system and maybe even the galaxy. The ship that was being constructed was the first design, one that Crater and Petro intended to take on a test drive to Titan, an interesting moon that orbited Saturn.

  “What are you ladies up to?” Petro asked.

  “We’re planning your wedding,” Maria replied without hesitation.

  “But first we need to find you a wife,” Crescent added.

  Petro laughed. “Don’t waste your time. The two best gals on the moon are already taken.”

  “Riley’s still around,” Maria pointed out. “You ever think about her?”

  “Aw, she and Tiger are an item. Wouldn’t surprise me if they got hitched too. All this stuff about needing to have a baby boom on the moon to keep humanity going. Well, I don’t intend to join in. I’ll be around to teach the kids how to play cards and that other important uncle kind of stuff.”

  “You can teach Minerva to play poker, Petro,” Crescent said, “but if I catch you showing her how to cheat, I’ll demonstrate some crowhopper martial arts, starting with the Siberian stranglehold.”

  Petro’s near-perpetual grin faded as he realized Crescent was serious. “I’ll keep that in mind,” he said and walked over to Minerva. The little golden-haired girl squealed at the sight of him and raced to throw herself into his arms.

  “She loves Petro,” Crescent said.

  Maria laughed. “Well, maybe she’ll marry somebody like him when she grows up!”

  “Heaven forbid! Absalom would not be pleased at that prospect!” Crescent paused, then said, “My husband is a most excellent husband.”

  “As is mine,” Maria replied, then lowered her voice so only Crescent could hear. “We need to have a conversation, one long put off, about Minerva.”

  Crescent lifted her chin. “Yes, I was just thinking the same thing.”

  Maria began tentatively. “She’s so beautiful, but I think . . . I know you owe me an explanation.”

  “No, Maria,” Crescent replied, “I don’t. You were out of the picture at the time. I only owed an explanation to Crater, and I’ve done my best to explain to him what I did. He has forgiven me for my great sin. Your forgiveness I don’t need.”

  Maria felt her face getting warm. Long-repressed anger was bubbling up. “Listen, Crescent—”

  “No, you listen,” Crescent interrupted. “I said I don’t owe you an explanation, but I’m going to give you one anyway. Will you hear it?”

  When Maria didn’t answer, Crescent looked off into the distance as if looking back in time. “I love Crater. I have always loved him, even when I was so angry with him I could scarcely stand it. But it wasn’t only because I wanted a part of him that I decided to have his child. It was because of you.”

  “Me?”

  “Yes, because he loved you the way I loved him, and I knew how much that hurt. Every day I was with him, I saw how much not having you was tearing him up inside. He was always angry; his joy in life was nearly lost. At that time it was my judgment that you and Crater would never be together, and since I thought I was going to die as per the genetic specifications of the Phoenix Legion, I decided to have his child. I was too frightened to ask his permission. No, that’s wrong. I didn’t ask him because I knew he wouldn’t agree, but I didn’t care. I confess there was another reason I did what I did, and there was nothing altruistic about it. I decided to give myself a gift, a gift like none other. Hear me, Maria. I was deliberately born ugly and trained to be evil. Nothing about my life was ever supposed to be soft and good. Yet when I asked the doctor who’d treated his broken leg and had his tissue in her office what were the possibilities, her answer nearly made my decision for me. I would have Crater’s child and grab a small scrap of joy from my miserable life. Of course, I also hoped Crater would transfer the love he had for you to our child and thus save himself.”

  Maria considered Crescent’s words, and her confession. “It might have worked,” she concluded. “Both Minerva and Little Jack are his special joy. I’ve never known him to be so happy. He’s the old Crater, almost the way he was when I first met him so many years ago at that stupid fastbug race. But how did you do it, how did you convince the doctor to let you have his child?”

  “Perpetually Hopeful arranged everything in Cleomedes, to take his cells and the artificial insemination.”

  “General Nero’s wife helped you?”

  “She’s inordinately fond of Crater too. She and I had many talks about him. In fact, I think she’s the one who first proposed that I ha
ve his child. She also thought it might make him happy. It’s amazing what gold will do even for physicians, especially ones who owe their livelihood to the Neros.”

  Maria tried to digest everything Crescent had said. “But what you did . . . it’s still unforgivable.” She paused. “Isn’t it?”

  “Yes, but for some strange reason, it worked out in the end. I don’t understand it, but oftentimes when you look back, even bad things seem to be for a reason, to make things fit the way they should.”

  “I can’t really forgive you yet,” Maria said as her anger subsided. “But I think I can accept what you’ve done.”

  “Just as I won’t forgive you for what you did to Crater over the years,” Crescent replied defiantly. “But I accept that you make him happy now.”

  Maria looked Crescent in the eye. “Fair enough,” she said.

  “Fair enough, indeed,” Crescent replied.

  Absalom came out of the bathroom first, followed by Crater holding Little Jack, now freshly diapered. Petro picked up Minerva and carried her, laughing, over to her mom. “She says she wants to go for a ride.”

  Crescent took the little girl. “Where do you want to go, Minerva?”

  Minerva pointed straight up. “There!” she said.

  “Well, I understood that!” Absalom said.

  Crater swung Little Jack in his arms. The baby was giggling. “I think I’ve got a future fuser captain here.”

  “Maybe he’ll go out to the stars,” Maria said. “Maybe they both will, there to make a new world.”

  “Maybe that’s why we’re here on the moon,” Crater said. “We’re the cradle of a new civilization that looks forever outward. We’ve carved out a life on this frontier, and now we’ll keep on going.”

  Petro looked doubtful. “Boy, Crater, don’t turn into a philosopher. You’re but an engineer. If there’s philosophizin’ that needs to be done, I’ll do it.”

  “And what philosophy would that be, Petro?” Maria asked, her voice suddenly merry. She felt strangely relieved now that she and Crescent had managed to have the talk they’d both put off for so long. Now that it was done, although the air wasn’t completely clear between them, there seemed to be a path forward.