by Ben Bova
At last Joanna stepped through, looking years older than the last time Doug had seen her, but still regally splendid in a Yuletide green dress that glittered in the light from the ceiling panels.
“Welcome to Moonbase,” Doug said ritually, then embraced his mother.
She was tired, he could see, dark rings circled her eyes. But he urged her, “Come on, we don’t have a minute to lose.”
“My things…”
“The ground crew will take care of them. I briefed them myself. They know what to do.”
She nodded, just a trifle hesitant, but let Doug take her by the wrist and lead her out to the tunnel that ran back to the main section of the base. He helped her up into the old standby tractor, then climbed into the driver’s seat and started its electric motors.
“I hope we’re not too late,” Joanna said.
“We’re shaving it close.”
As they drove through the long, straight, featureless tunnel, the wide-spaced overhead lights casting shadows across their faces like the phases of the Moon, Joanna told her son about the negotiations with Yamagata.
“We’ve got to be able to continue manufacturing Clipper-ships,” Doug said. “That’s the important thing. That’s Moon-base’s economic lifeblood.”
“Seigo’s agreed to that,” Joanna said. “He’s all in favor of it, now that Faure’s stepping down from the U.N. We’re even talking about manufacturing automobiles.”
“With nanomachines?”
“In Japan.”
“Wow! Things really have changed!”
“In fact,” Joanna continued, “it turns out that one of the major reasons why he wanted control of Moonbase was your nanotechnology capability.”
Doug shot her a puzzled frown. “But I thought—”
Joanna silenced him with an upraised hand. “Seigo has a genetic predisposition to cancer. He wants to be able to come up here and have nanotherapy to remove any tumors he may develop.”
“That’s why he wanted Moonbase?”
She nodded. “That’s his real reason. He was willing to go along with Faure to gain control of Moonbase, as long as he could have nanotherapy in secret.”
“And he killed Zimmerman in the process.”
“Kris Cardenas is still here.”
Anger simmering in his guts, Doug grumbled, “Why should we let Kris help him? He killed Zimmerman! He might even have been involved in Lev’s murder.”
Joanna seemed strangely unperturbed. “Don’t leap to conclusions, Doug. Seigo’s not the devil incarnate. Have some Christmas charity.”
He stared at her as the lights flashed by. “What’s going on between you two?”
“Nothing,” she said quickly. “Except -I think we’ve learned to respect each other. And he had nothing to do with Lev’s death. That was strictly the New Morality’s doing.”
“You’re sure?”
“My security people found that the corporation is honeycombed with New Morality zealots. That’s why I’ve decided to live up here permanently.”
“Can’t you do anything about them? Back Earthside, I mean.”
Joanna said matter-of-factly, “There are too many of them, Doug. As long as we can operate here on the Moon and use nanotechnology, let them stew in their own juices for a generation or two. They’ll get what they deserve.”
“You sound like Jinny Anson,” he said. “If she had her way, we wouldn’t have any contact with Earth at all.”
“That wouldn’t be so bad, at that.”
Doug suddenly saw the full Earth in his mind’s eye, hanging in the dark lunar sky, shining bright and beautiful.
“We can’t let them strangle themselves,” he murmured.
“Doug, there’s more than ten billion people on Earth,” Joanna said. “We can’t save them.”
“Yes we can,” he insisted. “We can try, at least.”
She shook her head. “I thought you wanted to look outward and push the frontier.”
“That’s the best way to help them. Create new knowledge, new wealth. Keep the safety valve open for anyone who wants to use it.”
Joanna took a deep breath. “You almost sound religious.”
He broke into grin. “Well, it is Christmas—almost.”
She had no reply and they rode to the end of the tunnel in silence. As they got down from the tractor, Doug said, “I hope the medical team got there in time.”
He had to slow his pace to accommodate his mother, a little wobbly in the low gravity despite the weighted boots she wore. As they approached the infirmary Doug saw that a small crowd had gathered outside: Anson, Falcone, even Zoltan Kadar was out there, waiting.
Doug pushed through them and into the infirmary’s observation room, Joanna right behind him.
Nick O’Malley was just stepping through the door from inside the infirmary, stripping off a surgical mask. His face was sweaty, pale.
“I hope I never have to go through that again,” he said, his voice shaking.
Kris Cardenas and her husband Pete, the neurosurgeon, came out right behind O’Malley.
“Your Earthside team was too late,” Kris said, smiling broadly.
As O’Malley sank into one of the chairs along the far wall, Pete Cardenas announced, “It’s a six-pound, five-ounce baby girl.”
“Mother and daughter are both fine,” Kris added. “Natural childbirth without the obstetrics team you brought in from Earthside.”
“The first baby born on the Moon,” Joanna said, sitting in the chair next to O’Malley.
“Congratulations, Daddy,” Kris said to him.
Doug held out his hand and O’Malley took it in a limp, weary grip. “Never again,” he muttered.
“Look!”
Turning to the observation window, Doug saw Edith holding a conglomeration of blankets in her arms with a tiny, red, squirming bald baby in the middle of it.
“I got the whole thing on camera,” Edith said through the window. “She’ll be on Global News in a few hours.”
O’Malley brightened a bit and pushed himself to his feet. “She’s kinda beautiful, isn’t she?”
“Even in the midst of life, we are in the midst of death,” intoned Robert Wicksen. Doug had been surprised when Wix had volunteered to preside at Lev Brudnoy’s burial service. The physicist was also a lay minister, he had revealed.
Now they put Lev’s remains into the soil of the farm he had lovingly tended over the years.
“Ashes to ashes,” Wicksen murmured. “Dust to dust.” Doug stood at his mother’s side. Joanna sobbed quietly as Lev was lowered into the ground where he had planted the Moon’s first flowers.
Hours later, after dinner, Edith and Doug joined practically everyone else in Moonbase in decorating the three-meter-tall aluminum tree that had been erected in the middle of The Cave. There was plenty of rocket juice going around, and God knows what else. The party went from festive to raucous as the hours wore on.
Long after midnight, Doug walked beside Edith as they headed for their quarters. The alcohol he had consumed was quickly and efficiently broken down by the nanomachines inside him. Doug regretted that he couldn’t get drunk even when he wanted to.
Edith seemed quite sober, as well. The gashes on her face were completely healed, not even the slightest trace of a scar, thanks to the nanotherapy Kris Cardenas had supervised.
“You’re pretty quiet,” Edith said.
“Yes, I guess so.”
“Post-partum blues?” she kidded.
He looked at her: smiling blonde Texas cheerleader. “Pre-partum blues,” he replied.
“Pre… I don’t get it.”
“Claire’s had her baby. You’ve got your Christmas story. The nanomachines have been cleaned out of you. There’s not much reason for you to stay here now, is there?”
Edith’s face went serious. “You know about the offer Global made me.”
“Jinny told me about it. Managing editor of the entire news department and your own prime-time show every
week.”
“I don’t want to be managing editor,” Edith said. “That’s more headache than anything else.”
“But prime time…”
“Yep. That’s the real plum.”
Doug knew that the LTV sitting at the rocket port would have space for her to return Earthside.
“I’ve talked it over with Jinny and Kris,” Edith went on. “We’ll have to haul in some new equipment from Earthside, but the studio oughtta be able to handle it.”
He stopped in the middle of the corridor. “You mean you’ll do your show from here? From Moonbase?”
“Sure,” Edith answered. “You didn’t think you were going to get rid of me, did you?”
He grabbed her and kissed her mightily. Two Lunatics passing by muttered something about mistletoe.
As they lay in bed in the darkness, warm and pleasantly tired, Doug whispered to Edith, “By the way, Merry Christmas.”
“And to you, sweetheart.”
“We’ve got a new year coming in a week. A new era, really.”
“Hey, now that you’re an independent nation, what’re y’all gonna call yourselves? You can’t call a whole nation Moonbase.”
“No,” Doug said. “We’re going to call ourselves Selene.”
“Selene?”
“A Greek moon goddess, from ancient time.”
“Selene,” Edith repeated. “Sounds neat. Where’d you find it?”
“I read it in a book, when I was a kid.”
“I like it.”
“Good. Now get some sleep. Big day tomorrow.”
“Lots of big days coming up,” said Edith.
“Yes,” Doug agreed. “Lots of really big days.”
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Document creation date: 06.03.2011
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