Moon For Sale

by Jeff Pollard

  “Bieber's not backing down on his monkey demands,” Missie Schwinghammer, head of Customer Relations, says as she enters a meeting room at SpacEx's Launch Control Facility in Florida. There's a meeting waiting to happen, waiting for Kingsley to arrive.

  “Yeah, of course that was going to happen,” Brittany adds.

  “Which means that we can't sell any of the other seats on his flight,” Missie adds. “Nobody wants to go up with a monkey. Why did K think this was a good idea?”

  “I didn't,” Kingsley says as he enters, surprising Missie. “I thought for sure the monkey would flip out.”

  “Well he didn't,” Missie says. “And Bieber is not backing down. So now we've got a whole flight for just him and his monkey.”

  “We've got an actor and a porn star too,” K says.

  “Assuming the movie happens,” Missie says.

  “It's happening, I made the deal,” K says. “So it's just two empty seats we need to fill.”

  “Which we can't because of the monkey and the studio is trying to lower their contribution again,” Brittany says.

  “We had a deal,” K says.

  “They think something has changed, they threatened to pull the plug and go another way,” Brittany says.

  “What other way?” K asks.

  “I don't know, maybe just special effects,” Brittany says.

  “If it's special effects then it's not the first zero-G porn. Tell 'em if they back out, I'll make the first zero-G porn myself,” K says.

  “No, they said they could find another way,” Missie insists.

  “To orbit?” K asks.

  “I guess,” Missie says.

  “What about passengers for the next crew mission?” K asks. “You know, the one without a space monkey.”

  “Nothing,” Missie says.

  “Nothing?” K asks.

  “Zero-G screwed us,” Missie adds.

  “That was how long ago? Months. People will get over it. That wasn't us.”

  “Well, we've got a decided lack of interest from everyone,” Missie says. “Except for Clooney. I was talking to him yesterday and he said something about looking forward to going to space for the film.”

  “He's not in this,” Brittany says.

  “I know,” Missie replies.

  “Maybe he was talking about Gravity,” K says.

  “No, it was about the future, he was looking forward to going to space, like he was in the movie.”

  “I don't know what that means,” K says.

  “Me neither,” Missie adds.

  “Alright, well I gotta get down to the assembly building, Bigelow is throwing a hissy fit about every detail of the BA330s,” K says. “Get Clooney on the phone for me.”

  “I've been trying all morning,” Missie replies.

  “Fine,” K says testily as he leaves.

  “You tell that asshole to get down here right now!” Bob Bigelow's shouts echo in the horizontal assembly building.

  “He's on his way,” Hannah says for the ninth time.

  “You tell him, he better get his ass-”

  “Stop telling my ass what to do,” K says as he walks up behind Bob.

  “Look at this, look at this!” Bob screams flailing his arms toward the payload.

  “What?” K asks.

  “What do you mean what!? Look at it!”

  “I have no idea what you're flailing at,” K replies calmly.

  “They're touching! They're not supposed to be touching!”

  “Relax Bob, they're not done yet, alright, take a chill pill.”

  “I ain't taking none of your chill pills, I don't want to end up like Gwenyth Paltrow.”

  “You accidentally drug a famous actress one time,” K says to Hannah, before adding, “would you get Clooney on the phone please.”

  “Anything would be better than dealing with this guy,” Hannah mutters and walks off while searching K's contacts for Danny Ocean.

  “I heard that,” Bob says.

  “She knows you heard that,” K adds. “She said that specifically so you would hear it.”

  “You let your people talk to your customers like that?” Bob asks derisively.

  “You do realize that I'm your customer right, not the other way around,” K says. Just then he notices the film producers enter one end of the hangar, with many assistants in tow. K approaches them quickly. “What's this I hear about you threatening to pull the plug? We've got the sets in the rocket already. It's too late.”

  “Whoa, whoa, we're not pulling the plug,” a producer says.

  “Yeah, we're just reducing our offer,” another producer adds.

  “The market has evolved,” a third producer adds.

  “Has it,” K says sarcastically.

  “Clooney on the phone for you,” Hannah says.

  “Excuse me, I have to take this,” K says.

  “Why is he talking to Clooney?” a producer asks.

  “George, what's this I hear about you going to space?” K asks.

  “You didn't hear it from me,” George says from his ranch in South Africa.

  “I didn't hear what from you?” K asks.

  “Your studio, they approached me about being in a space movie next summer. They said they thought the project they were doing with you might fall through and that they had a cheaper option next year.”

  “What cheaper option?” K asks.

  “I don't know. But they were just touching base with me to see if I'd be interested in starring in an actual space movie in case the Bieber thing falls through,” Clooney says. “I told them no. I mean, I just did a space movie. Apparently they offered it to Brad next and he said yes.”

  “Shit. That's why he was being so weird on the Vomit Comet,” K says.

  “Damon's pissed they didn't offer it to him,” Clooney adds with a bit of glee in his voice.

  “Thanks George,” K says.

  “You didn't hear it from me,” Clooney says but the line is dead before he finishes.

  “What's this I hear you're working on an alternate movie with Clooney next summer? Where the fuck do you get a cheaper option?” K shouts from halfway across the hangar as he rushes toward the producers.

  “God dammit George, did he call you and snitch on us?”

  “I have business with George, I'm helping him spy on genocidal fuck heads in Africa. Don't call him a snitch, the guy's a god damn hero, you make shitty movies,” K responds angrily. “So where the fuck do you get a cheaper option?”

  “Umm, that might be my bad,” Bob Bigelow says from behind K.

  “What?”

  “I sold a BA330 to ULA. They're launching it on a Delta IV H next May,” Bob says.

  “And they offered us a CST-100 flight to the BA330 for our movie for only 60 million up front and more points on the back end,” a producer says.

  “And we'd take that, but we'd lose Bieber if we pushed it back,” another producer adds.

  “But we're thinking about it.”

  “And you can stop us thinking about it if you lower the up front price and take more points.”

  “Jesus,” K mutters. “Fucking ULA undercutting me again.”

  “So you see our predicament.”

  “How about this,” K says before finalizing his proposal in his head, like a Jeopardy contestant ringing in before they know the answer. “So...how about I spice up my end of the bargain,” K says.

  “Less money, more points.”

  “No,” K says.

  “Then how?”

  “I'll throw myself in,” K says.

  “Meaning what?”

  “I'll be in the movie. I'll go up with Bieber, I'll be in the movie. I have to add some kind of star power right? A movie actually made in space starring Justin Bieber, Kingsley Pretorius, and an actual eccentric Russian gangster billionaire. Who wouldn't see that?”

  “You're not a bankable name in Hollywood.�
��

  “How do you know?” K asks.

  “Maybe if you throw in a seat for another actor.”

  “Pitt?”

  “Would he put up with a monkey?”

  “Clooney,” Kingsley says.

  “Does he like monkeys?”

  “I don't know, but he's had pet pigs, so it's worth a shot,” K says.

  Kingsley's 2014 Edison Achievement Award is a glass cube with a light-bulb nestled inside it. The glass cube sits on a low shelf in the observation room behind the launch control room. Small, greasy fingers find the award and lift away from its home near several other awards.

  “Hey, hey, hey,” Kingsley says as he quickly races toward the display, rescuing his precious award from the hands of little Griffin. The small boy starts crying.

  “You scared him,” Hannah scolds Kingsley as she comforts her son.

  “This is important,” K says.

  “Whatever, it's just a hunk of glass,” Hannah replies.

  “It's not just some random chunk of glass. It's a major award. It's priceless.”

  “How long until the launch,” Caroline tries to say while yawning.

  “What are you yawning for?” K asks. “This is a big launch.”

  “Yeah,” Bob Koke says as he and his brother enter, both holding small pet pigs.

  “This launch represents two of his last three chances to get one of these niner things back.”

  “So when they crash, he'll be left with just one more chance,” Bob says as they find seats along the back wall.

  “Which he'll screw up, and then he'll be out and this whole reusability thing will be dead.”

  “It's pretty exciting.”

  “I'm excited to watch,” Bill Koke says.

  “We got popcorn in here?” Bob asks.

  “No. We don't have popcorn,” K replies.

  “I have some gummy bears,” Hannah offers, reaching for her massive mom-purse. Griffin discovers there are small pigs at the back of the room and races to pet them.

  “My son likes pigs,” K says as he sits next to Caroline in the front row. “Which gives me an idea,” he says as he turns in his seat. “Hey Billy-Bob, you guys wouldn't be interested in going into space would you?”

  “Why?”

  “Yeah, why?”

  “Because space,” Kingsley says. “What do you mean why?”

  “We ain't bailing you out.”

  “It won't help me with reusability,” K says.

  “What's the catch?”

  “There will be a monkey on board,” K replies.

  “I ain't hanging around space with no monkey,” Bob says.

  “I mean, it can't be much worse than carrying a pig with you everywhere you go,” K replies.

  “Pigs are cute,” Bob replies.

  “Besides we're talking about a zero-G monkey,” Bill adds.

  “Zero-G monkeys are still cleaner than one-G pigs,” K replies. “Monkeys and humans are close cousins, just think of it as a toddler. Probably won't be any dirtier than if we launched that little hell raiser up there,” K says, pointing to Griffin.

  “Hey!” Hannah takes offense.

  “I'm just saying, zero-G potty training is probably easier with an adult Capuchin than with this kid,” K replies.

  “You know that doesn't make what you said sound any less offensive right?” Caroline asks.

  “I ain't cousins with no monkeys,” Bob Koke says.

  “I mean, like a millionth cousin thirty-seven times removed, something like that,” K says.

  “Humans aren't animals,” Bill Koke replies.

  “Right,” K says, “how could I forget, Billy-Bob doesn't believe in 'evilution,'” K says.

  “Hey Kingsley, I've always wondered, what do you say when someone sneezes? Surely you don't say god bless you,” Bob says. Just then, Bill Koke fake sneezes exaggeratedly.

  K replies quickly, “Shut your god damn mouth heathen.”

  “So how about it?” Caroline tries to change the subject. “You guys wanna go to space with a monkey?”

  “Not no-”

  “But hell no.”

  “It won't be that bad,” Hannah offers as she holds Griffin and lets him pet a pig, “Kingsley's going, so you know it can't be that dirty.”

  “I'm sorry what?” Caroline asks.

  “What?” Hannah asks.

  “Kingsley's going where with the what now?” Caroline asks.

  “I'm going up with Bieber and Jayna J. Jaymeson, or whatever, something like that.”

  “You're going back up to space in a couple months?” Caroline asks.

  “You didn't know?” Hannah asks.

  “Hey, it's not like it's been a long time coming,” K tries to defuse this bomb before it goes off. “I just got in on it this week. I had to offer myself to keep the movie producers happy, give them a little more star-power for the movie, otherwise they would have pulled out.”

  “So the producers said you either go to space or they pull the plug?” Caroline asks.

  “I mean...no, they didn't put it quite like that,” K says.

  “So it was your brilliant idea,” Caroline says.

  “It was my light-bulb moment that saved all our asses by coming up with a plan on the spot.”

  “So this isn't you trying to go on one last hurrah to the sky before your life ends and you become a dad,” Caroline says. “Definitely not some kind of mid-life crisis.”

  “Right,” Kingsley says.

  “Just a business decision,” Caroline says sarcastically.

  “Exactly,” K says seriously.

  “Just you conducting business with a porn star and a gangster,” Caroline says.

  “And a Capuchin,” Hannah adds helpfully. The Kokes laugh amongst themselves as Kingsley races into the doghouse with Caroline.

  “Well, while you're up there on your bachelor party, getting all that partying out of your system before your entire life screeches to a halt thanks to my uterus, just see if you can spend a little bit of your time thinking about girl names.”

  “It's a girl?” K asks. Caroline nods and stares straight forward, chin-up.

  “You should name her Wendy,” Hannah says with a snicker. K shoots her a pissed-off look.

  “Hey look, a rocket is launching,” Caroline says as the countdown nears zero and the Eagle Heavy blasts into the sky a few miles away. The tall, sleek, white rocket rises silently into the air for several seconds before the rumble reaches the building.

  The first two minutes of the launch are rather uneventful. The twin Eagle 9 boosters are set to pull away from the core Eagle 9 at T+2:05. As the clock nears two minutes, many asses are on the edges of seats.

  “Come on baby,” Kingsley says quietly, rooting for the booster Eagle 9s to successfully separate, perform a turn-around burn, and come back for landing at a pair of concrete pads back by the launch site.

  “Come on baby,” the Kokes both quietly root on the rockets too, except they're hoping for a rather different result.

  At T+2:06, the separation occurs at an altitude of 35 kilometers, 25 kilometers down-range, and at a velocity of 1.1 km/s or about 2500 mph. On the screens in the control room, they can see the boosters power down, only the exhaust plume of the core remains, followed by a burst of white vapor coming off the boosters as they begin to peel away. The cold-reaction-jets fire in bursts, and the boosters halt as soon as they complete a half-rotation. The engines are now pointed forward and the rockets will continue up to an altitude of about 40 km. Before they reach their apogee, the center engine on each booster turns on, burning back to launch site. The flight computers try to give the nearly empty rockets the velocity needed to put them on course for their respective landing pads some 40 km below and 30 km away.

  “Come on babies,” Kingsley roots them on, standing up now, trying to read the panels in the control room below him, but settling for watching his team's reactions. />
  “Come on,” the Kokes root on failure a little louder, standing up too. Kingsley and the Kokes enter a rooting competition, trying to will the rockets with their voices toward their desired outcomes.

  “What's with men and rooting?” Caroline asks Hannah quietly. “Do they think the rockets can hear them?”

  A large display shows the trajectory lines of the rockets as parabolas. As the rockets halt their down-range progress, the parabolas become simply vertical lines for a brief instant, then the parabolas stretch back in the opposite direction until the ends of the lines reach some distance beyond the landing pads, at which point the rockets cut off. The trajectory lines are based on their position and velocity, but don't factor in air-resistance. The rockets spin back around. They are visible in separate tracking camera views, quite small and in the distance. They once again halt their spins, presenting the engines into the wind. The trajectory lines shrink slightly as air-resistance slows the rockets.

  Another projection screen shows the core of the Heavy continuing to burn toward orbit. The core Eagle 9 will continue to burn past the four-minute-mark, above 130 km in altitude and more than 300 km downrange. If the Heavy core were to attempt a return-burn, it would need quite a hefty burn to halt its downrange velocity and then give it the speed needed to come down back at the pad some 300 km away. Such a maneuver would require a lot of propellant remaining in the tanks which would significantly eat into the payload.

  The core of the heavy runs out of fuel, shutting off and breaking away from the upper stage which quickly lights and continues towards orbit, a separation event that occurs at a velocity of more than 3 km/s or about 6600 mph. But Kingsley will only allow himself quick glimpses at the heavy core and ignition of the second stage, otherwise he might jinx the booster rockets which are falling through 20,000 feet and about to power up for landing.

  A bright green flash coming from the center engines show the TEA-TEB (Triethylaluminum and Triethylborane) pyrophoric igniters have been released into the combustion chambers, providing an intense reaction that should act as a spark to ignite the propellants. Getting the rockets to ignite into the face of the wind has been one of the toughest engineering challenges. The bright green flash is quickly accompanied by a glow and a trail of exhaust surrounding the cylindrical rockets. Both engines have lit.