Rose could not see the lunar surface. His command module was five hundred miles away from the landing zone now and heading for the terminator which would bring it back within line of sight of Earth. In fifteen minutes he’d be within communications range of NASA. Line of sight with the landed Odyssey module would continue for a further eight minutes before Chris Aldridge and Jimmy Coleman would become the most isolated men in history. They wouldn’t be able to talk to another living soul until Rose returned around the other side of the moon – a full ninety minutes later.
“Ahh, Odyssey, I’ll be leaving you guys alone for a while. Just wondering if you opened your… ah… sealed orders?” he knew of course that they had, “Wondering if you had any thoughts about what we’re dealing with.”
There was a crackle of static. The first real audible crackle of static Rose had heard since he’d stared using the radio. They were getting further apart, he reminded himself. Soon the radio would be dead altogether and Odyssey would be on its own.
“Just hoping that we don’t end up in the same shape as the Freedom probe, Mike,” Coleman voice quavered slightly, a jovial statement that got caught in his throat.
“Roger that, Odyssey,” Rose said thoughtfully, “You guys aren’t hurtling towards the anomaly at two hundred miles an hour, so I’d figure that’s going to help somewhat.”
There was genuine, stress relieving, laughter. Rose could hear Aldridge’s voice in the background but the radio didn’t quite pick it up. The lunar module was spacious compared to the mercury capsule Chris Aldridge had orbited the Earth in eight years ago, but preparing for the moonwalk was slow and difficult. Coleman had to pressurise his suit too, even though he’d be staying behind to monitor the mission commander as he made the trek alone to the anomaly.
Twenty minutes passed before Aldridge set foot on the surface of the moon. He remembered Neil Armstrong’s first steps and the infamous fluffed lines that had become so famous. He had been thinking, during sleepless nights, of what his own first words would be on stepping onto the lunar surface – even though nobody back on Earth would ever know what they were.
“I’m about to start what might be a man’s greatest journey,” he said, after a long pause.
There was laughter on the suit radio.
“You realise I’m the only one who can hear you?” Coleman said, “But, thanks. That was beautiful.”
Aldridge shook his head inside the helmet slowly, smiling broadly.
“Thought I had to say something. Who knows what I’m about to meet out here.”
“I roger that,” Coleman said, “But you better get moving. Suit’s got four hours life support and that walk will talk you over an hour each way. At best you’re going to have under an hour to investigate what you find out there.”
“Odyssey, Dutch Girl,” Rose interjected, “I confirm your EVA and am relaying to Houston. I’ll be losing you in a few minutes, guys. Good luck, Chris.”
”Thanks. I’m already on my way. Surface is smooth. Feels… powdery – just like Neil said. Movement in the suit is good. Radio loud and clear. Instrument package feels… heavy, but it’s not uncomfortable.”
”We were worried about that,” Rose replied, remembering the heavy metal case that contained the special instruments, “Thank the stars for the low gravity.”
”Affirmative to that.”
Just like that, Rose moved out of communications range. Chris Aldridge was walking faster, gaining more confidence with each step. The surface of the moon looked like a barren rock field completely covered with a thin layer of grey white powdery dust. Each step in the environment suit was difficult, but with the low gravity he could cover more ground with each step. The alien object was less than a mile away. He would reach it in maybe an hour.
1976 – Nevada, USA.
“You shouldn’t have stolen this car,” Matt said, looking over his shoulder, “It’s too slow, and we stand out like a sore thumb.”
She felt embarrassed and a little ashamed. He was always so clever. He always knew better and she needed to listen to him more often. She made an apologetic expression that belonged to a much younger person. She looked in the rear view mirror. The cars behind her were closing in. She looked into Matt’s narrowed, blue grey eyes and smiled nervously.
“Everything’s going to be alright,” she said, still smiling.
She watched him shift nervously in the red and black chequered bucket seat. He looked more afraid than she'd seen in a long time. It made her feel very afraid to see him look this way. Her stomach was closing into a very tight and very cold ball.
“Everything is going to be alright,” she repeated, taking her eyes off the rear view mirror for a moment, “I really promise.”
“I know you do,” Silverman's voice was hoarse, “But I'm not so sure if...”
The dirty black Chevelle smashed into the TR7 without warning. It struck the door beside the startled, anguished passenger. The window on Matt Silverman’s left smashed and small fragments of safety glass flew all-round the inside of the small car. Carol Hayes almost lost control and, at ninety eight miles per hour, the car’s tail end started to come out. She looked at Matt instinctively. He caught her eye and she could see that he was in pain.
”I’m losing it,” Carol said, twisting her cute expression in an apologetic grimace “Sorry, sweetie. Hold on tight.”
The TR7 swerved off the road, kicking up dust as the brand new rubber tyres bit into the crumbling earth. She worried, for a moment, that the car would roll over. But it didn't. It bounced a few times, spinning round to the right, then slowed considerably. Carol continued to push the brake pedal into the floor as the car started to come to a halt. The pursuers were quick to react, braking sharply and following the little flame coloured sports car as it left the road. Carol’s mind raced. She pushed the gearstick into third and then second as she struggled to control the spin. But everything she’d learned about driving hadn’t prepared her for what this car was doing. There were no computers or automatic systems to correct the mistakes she was making.
The Mustang was closer to the TR7 than the older Chevelle, which had stayed back for some reason. The Mustang rammed the TR7 hard from behind and Carol cried out reflexively. She released the clutch and the TR7, rolling backwards, jerked into second gear. The engine stalled instantly and the gears made a loud crunching sound, the short gearstick jerking out of her fragile looking hand. She moved her hand to the ignition, but removed it just as quickly. She knew that there wasn’t time to start the primitive combustion engine again.
The three men were out of the Plymouth and running even before the TR7 had stopped moving. Both men wore loose fitting blue jeans with matching bleached shirts. Carol struggled with her safety belt as she watched the men sprint towards the tiny sports coupe. The men were drawing weapons from black leather holsters clearly visible on their hips. Each man’s gaunt expressions looked identical. Stone faces, mouths turned down at the corners. Cold, colourless eyes hidden behind thick-rimmed black sunglasses. Carol Hayes saw the men rushing towards her but she was distracted by her husband. He looked like he was in pain and was coughing, quietly, and wincing with each movement. Then, to her shock, he was being dragged from the car by two of the three men. She watched it happen with the strange, detached sensation of a daydreamer. Her husband’s cries of anguish brought her back to the horrible reality of what was happening.
She kicked open the TR7’s door and jumped out. The Mustang crashed into the door, missing her by inches. The heavy car pinned the buckled door shut as Carol rolled onto the wedge shaped hood before sliding gracefully down onto the ground.
The Mustang’s doors opened and hands reached for her. She recoiled from the grabbing hands and searched for Matt, her heart racing. He was calling out to her, his voice shrill and afraid. She got to her feet nimbly and found herself staring into the barrel of a gun. One of the two men from the Mustang had a snub nosed revolver pointed right at her face.
”Okay,
Miss. Just take it easy,” the agent’s voice was calm. She did not recognise the man from the base, “We just want to ask you some questions.”
”Get your fucking hands off me!” she heard Matt shouted, “Carol! Help!”
It was her husband’s cry of pain that animated her. She turned away from the shiny, silver handgun and watched her husband collapse to his knees. He had been punched in the lower back by the agent on his right. She moved her hands in a lightning-fast blur of motion. Suddenly the silver barrel wasn’t in front of her face anymore; it was between the palms of her slender hands and then, a fraction of a second later, twisting in agent Chalmers’ hand and falling apart as it span through the air in pieces. She felt firm hands grabbing at her from behind – the second agent from the Mustang. But she was already aiming a firm kick into the groin of the agent in front of her as she dodged down and beyond the reaching fingertips of the man behind her. There was a loud gasp of pain as her foot flattened Chalmers’ testicles. He fell back, clutching at his crotch and exhaling with a loud groan. She stepped forward, landing a powerful thrusting kick into his abdomen just above his brass belt buckle.
Sensing movement behind, she spun round. Both her arms crashed hard against her second attacker’s neck and collar. He cried in pain as his collarbone broke under the force of her supported forearm strike. He fell forwards onto his left shoulder, unconscious before he hit the ground.
Matt was struggling with the two agents who were holding him. He couldn’t get free. She was confused. It didn't look like he was trying all that hard. He was much stronger than this. She winced as one of the men kicked him in the back of the knee. She felt overwhelmed by rage and fear all at once. She wanted to run at the man who had struck her husband. But she realised that the last agent – an older man in his fifties – was suddenly aiming a long barrelled, automatic pistol towards her. Even as she registered the matt black handgun she realised that it was firing. Her mind raced. She wasn’t sure that her body could move fast enough, but she tried anyway. Her left arm crossed her body at lightning speed as her hand flattened and tightened into a hard knife’s edge. She could barely believe it when her chopping hand struck the bullet and deflected it to the road surface. It kicked up gravel with a spitting sound.
”Son of a bitch,” the older man muttered. He prepared to fire a second time, but Carol Hayes was vaulting over the TR7’s smooth orange hood like an Olympic athlete, blood dripping from her hand just above the wrist. The gun in Sullivan’s hand bucked as a second bullet exploded out of it, fire licking from the pistol’s barrel.
Carol raced towards her attacker in a blur of motion. The bullet whizzed past her left ear, meeting her halfway as she charged agent Sullivan. He didn't have time to fire a second shot. She was on top of him in a third of a second, kicking the gun from his hand and slamming both hands against his chest. Sullivan fell backwards and slammed hard into the ground, the consciousness knocked out of him as the back of his head thudded against the dirt. The wood gripped automatic pistol clattered onto the gravel at the side of the road, falling out of reach of his spasming fingers.
She didn't look back at Sullivan. It only vaguely and fleetingly occurred to her that she might have badly injured him. She'd think about that later, just like Matt had taught her long ago. She continued towards Matt, running faster than any athlete on Earth had ever ran. Twenty eight miles per hour. Covering the distance between them fast, but not fast enough. Matt was still four metres away. One of the agents holding him reached for a weapon holstered under his left armpit. Matt’s head was bowed and blood was streaming from his nose or mouth. Time was moving slowly again. Her thoughts were racing. She was running at thirty two miles per hour, but the agent had the time he needed to squeeze the trigger on his snub nosed Smith and Wesson revolver. Carol knew that her arms were in the wrong position to deflect this bullet. She knew that there were limits to her speed. She twisted her body in the air cat-like as she jumped at the shooter. Agent Maxwell’s bullet grazed a good half centimetre of skin from her right breast. She felt a sudden, searing, heat and then, almost simultaneously, an icy chill. In the next instant she was right on top of Maxwell, punching his face four times before he even knew what was happening. Three more shots flared out of the silver pistol in frantic, rapid succession. The stray bullets smashed into the Mustang's rear window, which exploded in a shower of crystalline fragments. Maxwell put up a good fight. He was a strong, formidable fighter, but Carol was much, much faster. She pushed him backwards and pounded him in the face repeatedly with her tiny balled up hands, her legs locked around his waist. She landed five hard blows in the space of a half second as they struggled on the ground together. Carol managed to use her speed and agility to stay on top of the stronger man, avoiding his continued attempts to grab hold of her. He struck out furiously towards Carol's chin, but she ducked to the right and away from his attack with ease. Her tiny, bony fists moved in a blur. She was holding back with her punches because she knew that the full force of her punches could snap the agent’s neck or smash the muscles of his face. Instead she rapidly struck at each eye before landing a third punch directly on his nose. Maxwell was reaching out to strike again when she knocked him out cold with a carefully measured hammer blow to the side of his temple. She leapt off his body, kicking him away from her.
Matt was almost within reach. The last standing agent was holding him up, still trying to drag her husband away. There was so much blood on the lower part of his face. His eyes were closed. She felt cold and afraid. Her eyes blazed in anger as she moved carefully forwards.
”What did you do to my husband?” her voice, normally light and musical, growled with slow and deliberate menace.
Agent Mark Wakeman hesitated for a full two seconds before he released Silverman. Matt fell straight to the ground like a sack of potatoes, his face slamming into the dirt and his arms still twisted behind his back. He made no move to protect himself. His body appeared lifeless. She felt intense, sudden, almost uncontrollable fear. Wakeman started to reach for his sidearm, but it slipped from his fingers as he fumbled at the holster. Carol paused for a moment. She stared into Wakeman's eyes, recognising a mixture of fear and surprise. He opened his mouth to speak, but he didn't get the chance to make a sound. The knife edge of her right hand chopped into his neck, cracking his jaw and knocking him unconscious. Absently, it occurred to her that she’d used too much force. A little more and she’d have killed the man. He toppled away from her as she turned to her husband.
She wasn’t sure that Matt was breathing. She touched her hands to his neck and spine, checking for injury there. Finding none, she rolled him onto his side. She touched her fingers to the side of his neck gently, searching for a pulse. He didn’t seem to have one.
”Oh Matt!” she cried, “It’s all my fault! I’m so sorry!”
The automatic pistol in agent Sullivan’s hand discharged. The old man could barely see his target and he could barely hold his gun steady, but he was an expert marksman and his bullet was on target. Carol Hayes moved swiftly enough to jerk her head a half inch to the right. Her eyes moved in their sockets as she saw the muzzle flare from Sullivan’s big revolver. She saw the bullet coming and she calculated, within eight hundredths of a second, that there was no way she could avoid it.
There was nothing she could do. She couldn’t move her body fast enough to avoid the bullet. It was going to hit somewhere between her shoulder and the middle of her back. No matter how she twisted or moved, the bullet would penetrate her spine, blow out a third of her heart and tear out through her chest. She started to twist away from the bullet, time slowing down again to a crawl again in her mind. This bullet was coming to kill her. She had promised Matt that everything was going to be alright, and she had been wrong. Her mind raced in terror, her consciousness rattling around in her head like a frightened bird trapped in a cage. The bullet was coming closer. Coming to tear into her body, and her life. With a sudden terror, she realised that her this was going to
be the end of everything.
1976 – The Dark Side of the Moon.
Aldridge had lost contact with the lunar module. For five minutes he’d managed to speak to the orbiting command module, but now he was alone again. All he had for companionship was the sound of his own breath and the occasional popping sound from the metal case as the equipment there homed in on its target.
The instrument package seemed heavier than he remembered it being during the rushed training for this mission. With the moon’s reduced gravity he’d expected to find carrying the equipment easier, but the walk had been exhausting.
He glanced at the oversized chronometer fixed to the outside of his spacesuit. He’d been walking for two hours. He’d used up a third of the environment suit’s oxygen, which was as he’d expected. Nothing abnormal about that. Abnormal. He thought about that word for a moment and laughed to himself in his helmet, in his suit, in his isolation. Everything about this mission was abnormal. Everything was backwards, upside down.
Another ten metres. He was getting tired. The instrument package was definitely heavier than it should have been. The moon’s gravity should have been making this easier, but it wasn’t.
There was no Earth, No ball of blue in the sky. Just the stars and the sun. The dark sky. Outer space - and the mysterious anomaly. For the first time in his adult life, Aldridge felt a sense of... loneliness. He bounded over a pockmarked ridge and, suddenly, it was there. A distant shape in the distance. Silver grey metal and about twenty times larger than the lunar module. An obvious artificial structure. It appeared like a huge, metallic, chubby crayon. Where the fat cylindrical body started to taper down to a point there were three thin black lines. But more surprising than that was the distinct letter “B” that was painted or etched on the side of the strange craft’s body. And the long, shiny body twinkled and sparkled in places. He knew, instinctively, that he was looking at a crashed spacecraft that had not come from earth.
Beyond the Starport Adventure (Bullet Book 1) Page 2
