Luna

by Garon Whited

  Kathy kept her eyes fixed on the radar screen. “What happened?” she asked, softly.

  “I had them fix him up. I missed my nephew’s graduation, but I got a dog out of it. Funny way to get adopted, but it worked. Ford was with me for four more years after that.”

  “You named him Ford?” she asked.

  “Well, that’s what I was driving when I hit him.”

  Kathy burst out laughing and tears trickled from her eyes. “Are you serious?”

  “Yep. I have a photo of him in my wallet.”

  She nodded. “I can see you doing exactly that, Max. Sometimes you can be such a softie. What did your nephew have to say? About missing his graduation.”

  “I told him what happened and his first question was, ‘Did the dog live?’ I told him yes, and he said, ‘Okay, I forgive you.’”

  “I’m glad.”

  “So am I. It’s hard to go through life knowing someone thinks you’ve wronged them.”

  Kathy was silent.

  “Kathy?”

  “You’re a good man, Max,” she said, softly. “A very good person, indeed. So much better than I. I’m glad you’re here.”

  “So you’ve said. Not that I mind hearing it, you understand.”

  “You give me hope that humanity is worth saving.”

  “Fair enough. You keep reminding me of why I want to save humanity.”

  She turned to look at me for a moment. “I what?”

  “You keep making me want to produce more humans,” I explained, waggling my eyebrows and leering comically. She blushed and turned back to her monitors.

  “Max, you are an utter rogue. I will never understand how I failed to notice while we were training for this mission.”

  “Easy,” I countered. “We were a lot more formal then. It’s hard to be a rogue when there’s a lot of yes-sir, no-sir, as-you-say-sir going on. I had to hold it all in until I was off duty. We’re a little more informal up here.”

  “True.”

  “Can I ask a question? It may be a personal one.”

  “You can ask me anything, Max. I may choose not to answer.”

  “Works,” I agreed. “What did you mean when you said I was so much better than you?”

  She was silent for so long I thought she wasn’t going to answer.

  “I’ll tell you, Max,” she whispered, “later. Not now.”

  “It’s not that important,” I answered.

  “Yes, it is. I see that it is. I should tell you. I will. But… later. Please?”

  “Don’t tell me at all if you don’t feel like it. I was just curious. I don’t need to know.”

  “Yes, you do,” she protested.

  “Nope,” I replied, cheerfully. “I know everything I need to know about you.”

  That drew a look of disbelief. “I doubt that very much.”

  “You’re smart, you’re helpful, you hate lemon chicken, you fly like a hummingbird on speed, you’re the most improbably healthy person I’ve ever met, you drink vodka by the quart without falling down, you can’t hold whiskey worth a damn—” I referred to a New Year’s party we had all attended; she blushed—“and you know how to keep your teeth together around a secret.”

  “That’s all?” she asked, blushing.

  “That’s just a start. You keep your word, you understand responsibility better than I do, and you have a black belt in some sort of kung fu. Oh,” I added, “you’re also beautiful. But anybody can see that.”

  She kept blushing. I rather liked it.

  “See?” I said. “I know you. All that matters, anyway. If you’ve got something else I need to know, you can tell me—but don’t think it’ll change my opinion.” I got up and stood behind her chair, kissed the top of her head. “Now I’m off to destruction-test the latrine; I don’t think the chicken agrees with me.”

  “Are you sure it was the chicken?” she asked, trying to avoid the flood of compliments I’d just swamped her with.

  “No. See, everything in a quickie ration…”

  * * *

  My next order of business was actually a shower. Spend four hot hours in a space suit—or even just a hot car—and it starts to be important. Add a lot of jumping around and some nerve-wracking moments trying to set things up to avoid the risk of being shot by a nuke… well, I was looking forward to a shower. Anybody near me was probably of the same opinion.

  Somewhere around the rinse cycle, I realized that I was thinking about my nephew and Ford. And that they were dead.

  I have a good memory. Some would say it’s an exceptional memory. My memory showed me a roll call of everyone I’d ever known and loved. They were my lovers and my friends, my enemies and my adversaries, my companions and my competition. They were the people that helped make me who I am.

  I will not share them.

  For a while, I sat down under the hot water and wept. I’d cried in Kathy’s arms—the first time I’ve shed tears since my mother’s funeral, six years ago. I’d cried from loneliness and sadness, to share pain with another human being and so diminish it.

  Under water that fell more slowly than tears, and for the first time in my life, I wept in despair.

  How long I sat in the shower stall and let the water pour over me, I don’t know. It was a long time, because the ghosts of a thousand people paraded by, weeping and gnashing their teeth, pointing fingers and accusing eyes all blaming me. Me. Me! I lived. I survived. I, who had always been the optimist, the competent one, the one who always came through in the crunch. I survived while they died. I didn’t keep my promise that everything would be all right. All my life, I’d spread hope like water on a field of flowers—oh, such delicate flowers!—and the fire swept the fields to black ash in minutes.

  What broke me out of my black abstraction was the opening of the shower stall door.

  “Oh, Maaa-ax…” sang a voice, followed by a shapely foot, calf, and thigh around the edge of the door.

  Of all the things… this was not what I needed. Not even close.

  The voice was Julie. She’d opened my door and come into my quarters. Now she was trying to be seductive. Under other circumstances, I might agree that she was. At just that moment, I was decidedly not in the mood. She had bothered me unceasingly whenever she got the chance, made me feel pressured and awkward whenever she leered at me, had embarrassed me unceasingly, and I didn’t feel like taking one more word of it!

  I came out of the shower, soaking wet, and was suddenly face-to-face with her. I don’t know what my expression was like, but her eyes went wide and she yelped, startled, and tried to back away. She wasn’t naked; she was just down to her underwear. Her jumpsuit was beside my bed, twined with mine in what was probably meant to be a suggestive manner.

  Okay, I’ll admit it: Julie curves just right, and in all the right places. Even hacked and ready to snarl at her, I noticed. It didn’t change anything, but the animal parts of my brain registered the fact. I might regret not taking advantage of her apparent offer, but I didn’t even consider it.

  I took her by the arm, turned her around, and grabbed the back of her neck. I picked her up—easy enough to do in Lunar gravity. I didn’t hurt her, but I most definitely wanted to make my point; there’s nothing that says “I mean business” like picking someone up with one hand. You see it in movies all the time, but here you can actually do it.

  “You listen to me,” I snarled, my mouth close to her ear. “I’m not your private plaything. I’m not some toy. I’m a man, and I have feelings. You will respect that. I respect you as a competent professional—but you have a long way to go to earn any respect as a lady. You want me, earn that first. This is not the way to do it. And I will not take another lewd suggesting with good grace. Bother me again and I will see to it that you pay.” As I spoke, I walked toward the door, carrying her with me. “Signify that you understand.”

  “Max! Max! Please let me explain! Please!”

  I paused before opening the door. I could hold her off the dec
k for a long time; she weighed no more than ten kilos or so on the Moon.

  “Talk fast,” I growled.

  “I knocked! I knocked! I wanted to talk to you about what the Captain said—I wanted to bitch, all right? Then I heard the shower running. I came in anyway—I’m sorry! God, I’m sorry, all right? I heard you in the shower and I couldn’t just leave you. I wanted to help. I want to help! Please, Max! I didn’t know what else to do for you! I just want to help, I swear!”

  I held her there, her feet dangling midair, for over a minute while I thought about it. I decided I believed her, and then put her down. She was flushed and trembling, almost shivering.

  “Get your uniform,” I said. She didn’t argue; she just grabbed it and started climbing into it.

  “Understand me very clearly, Julie. You’re pretty, and I like you. But I don’t like you that way, nor that much. You want to help me? That’s great. I appreciate it. Thank you very much. Don’t try to do it with your body. Appeal to my head, appeal to my heart—don’t ever think you can manage anything without those. Are we clear?”

  She zipped up her jumpsuit and looked meekly at me. “Clear, sir.”

  I realized I was still dripping wet. I stalked over to a towel, grabbed it, wrapped it around me.

  “All right. You wanted to gripe. Have at it.” I sat down on my bunk to listen.

  She stiffened into a more military posture. “With respect, sir, I no longer feel the need.”

  “No longer feel the need, or no longer want to complain to Mister Sympathetic Ear, now that he’s turned into a ramrod-straight bastard?” I asked.

  She said nothing.

  “If you want to have a gripe session, I’m agreeable. I’ll listen to any unofficial bitch-whine-and-moan you want to make; I mutter that stuff under my breath all the time and it’s good to let it out. But start over again another time. Okay?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  I realized I was wearing my Serious Face. I grinned on purpose.

  “And you can still call me ‘Max’ when we’re not on duty. That is, if we’re still friends.”

  She looked at me for a long minute.

  “Are… are we still friends, Max?”

  “I think so. But it takes two, you know. You tell me.”

  “We’re friends, Max,” she said, smiling just a little. “I’d like to be… well, more. But I’ll take friends.”

  I gave her a chuckle I didn’t feel and laid out some clothes. “I understand. And I’m sorry.”

  “Not half as sorry as I am.”

  “Maybe. But there’s always hope you can be a really good friend, someday.”

  She eyed me speculatively. “As in, ‘friend with benefits’?”

  “Maybe. Talk to Anne about our racial genetic future. There’s a human race to repopulate.”

  “Then there’s hope, I guess. I’ll work on it. Any hints on what to work on?”

  “Be yourself,” I answered. “Don’t pressure me, though. Take your time. Don’t suck up, don’t get pushy, and try to understand that I’m doing the best I can.”

  “I will. And Max?”

  I stood up, preparatory to kicking her out and getting dressed. “What?”

  “If I asked you, very nicely, to pick me up like that again someday… would you hate the idea?”

  “Why?”

  She lowered her eyes. “I… I like a man who, um… can… take charge?”

  “In the bedroom?”

  She nodded.

  “I guess I wouldn’t mind,” I admitted. “It’s not something I’d go for regularly, you understand. But I could do that. Someday. Maybe. But like I said, don’t push me.”

  She nodded again. “I’ll work on it,” she repeated.

  “Okay. Now beat it, please; I’m tired.”

  She didn’t ask if I wanted company. She even shut the door behind her. I dried off, feeling exhausted, and crawled into bed.

  * * *

  I woke up when a warm body slid into bed with me. My fists balled. The feeling of frustration and outright rage at Julie made me want to slug her. I rolled over in the darkness and snapped at her.

  “Julie! No! I told you—”

  Fingers pressed to my lips and Kathy’s voice said, “Max. Hush. Julie told me what happened. Go to sleep, Max.”

  “Kathy…?” I asked, confused. “What are you doing here?”

  “Julie told me you needed someone and it wasn’t her. I’m not good at this sort of thing, but I’ll try.”

  “So she told you?”

  “Well, it was either me or Anne. Who did you think she was going to tell? Now just hold me and go to sleep. Please.”

  I’m not a complete idiot. I did.

  Chapter Five

  “The absence of alternatives clears the mind marvelously.”

  —Henry Kissinger (1923-)

  Six days can be a relaxing vacation—or a never-ending torture. Funny how that works. Time seems so different up here. There’s no day or night, just lights up or lights down. We keep to the twenty-four-hour clock out of habit, and because it fits the rhythms of our bodies. A lunar “day”—sunrise to sunrise—is really about twenty-nine-and-a-half days. I guess we could call it a month, or invent a new unit—maybe a “lunar.” But some things are best measured by waking and sleeping. So, six days have gone by.

  Kathy helped me a lot. Everybody knows what happened, even though they don’t say anything. Anne smiles at us whenever we’re together, which is often. Julie nods at us, a sort of acknowledgement, and has remained friendly and polite. She’s a nice person, she really is, and I do like her. I guess she really does care about me, too; she went and got Kathy, after all. That says a lot about her character. The Captain doesn’t seem to have an opinion on Kathy and I; he just looks at me and I know he knows. He doesn’t say or do anything to indicate whether he approves or not.

  I’ve been spending more time with Kathy because I can. We all have a little free time, now that we’ve done the initial checks. Everything is working, everything is sorted out, and now we have nothing pressing to do. Oh, we stand safety watches, of course—Julie still has a lot of those left for sassing the Captain. But what do you do on the Moon when there’s no Internet and no email? We have a heck of a dish, but nothing is on the TV or radio except static.

  Speaking of radio, we still have the transceiver blasting away with our warning. Nobody’s managed to radio back, and the laser communicator lens aimed at Earth hasn’t picked up anything. Maybe someone is still alive on a station, somewhere, but they don’t seem to be able to say much. Radar says that everything in low Earth orbit is purely ballistic; it’s possible their signals are just too faint for us to hear.

  Three hundred and eighty thousand kilometers is a long way.

  The good news is that whatever blew away Provo doesn’t seem to care about our orbital signals. Wouldn’t it be just too ironic if it weren’t a missile? The first sizable meteor to hit ground since Tunguska, and it smacks into the only radio source on the planet. The odds against it are astronomical—no pun intended—but I wouldn’t put it past the Universe to play that kind of joke. If so, I have issues with the Universe and its sense of humor. We need a complaint department.

  The good news for keeping from going cabin-crazy is that we have a lot of games, recreational equipment, and a movie theater. One wall of lunar concrete, polished smooth, makes a great screen for the LED projector. And, much to our everlasting delight, the base library includes recreational materials. Why shouldn’t it? It’s just data; there’s no cost to lift that into orbit. There are classics, horrors, dramas, comedies, mysteries—you name it. Julie even found a few digital movies that probably weren’t on NASA’s approved list. Doubtless, there were some techie geeks giggling into their pocket protectors at that. Bless them.

  Give a techie a lot of bandwidth and a place to put it, and porn will get uploaded. It seems to be a law of nature. Almost like gravity.

  Aside from that, we have to exercise a lot. The eq
uipment is all pneumatic, and a good thing, too! If we had to use free weights, we’d be tossing around massive pieces of lunar rock. I used to bench press a little over a hundred and twenty kilos, Earthside. Here, I’d have to load up over seven hundred kilograms of weight to get the same effect. That would not only look silly, it would be impractical. Thus, we have air-pressure pistons that simulate weight. When we turn the dial to a given resistance, that’s the Earthside weight we’re pushing.

  There isn’t much to be done about running on the treadmill, though. It’s hard to jog in this gravity. Or, rather, it’s entirely too easy. You don’t run; you dance. It’s graceful—when you do it right—and it’s easy. The good thing is when you trip on the treadmill, it doesn’t hurt anything but your pride.

  I will admit, though, that Julie impresses me immensely as a gymnast. Kathy and Anne both had some gymnastic training, but Julie was on her gymnastics teams all through school. Now that she’s adapted to the low gravity, the things she can do! One-handed handstands, multiple mid-air somersaults… the flips and spins are things no earthly gymnast could ever do. She jumps higher than I do!

  Captain Carl also exercises—and he sweats, so now I’m fairly sure he’s not a robot; maybe he’s just an alien. In fact, he asked me to make some sporting equipment for him. He fenced on a team when he went to the Academy, it seems, and he’s decided that we should all learn how. I think that’s so he can have someone to fence with; it’s a poor solo sport. I don’t think we’re much of a challenge. He kicks butt all over the gym. Someday, I hope to score on him. No, I take that back; someday I hope to see someone score on him. Even Kathy can’t touch him, and her reflexes are faster than a frightened cat’s.

  I think he’d have enjoyed captaining a wooden ship and boarding enemy vessels with a pistol in one hand and a saber in the other. But just try to get him to admit that!

  Off-duty, we also have an ongoing project of Thinking Ahead; we’re never bored. I keep thinking about Kathy and the Luna; Kathy loves to fly and the Luna is meant to. But how to refit the Luna to use fuel we can make here? Her usual go-juice involves a lot of hydrogen, and our supply of that is sharply limited.