The Long Way Around

Illustrated by Vincent Di Fate

During the descent, the First Lunar Outpost resembled toys set out on the sand. In a rough straight line were the FLO Center, the Oxygen Furnace Complex about five kilometers distant, and the Silent Earth Radio Telescope some twenty-five kilometers further.

Standing now at the open hatch of the lander, Adrian gazed out. Low in the sky, its lower limb kissing the horizon, the bright disk of the full Earth cast a blue-gray luminance onto the nighttime lunar landscape. He rested his gaze on the Oxygen Furnace, his responsibility now, but then looked upward as a light in the sky caught his attention. The exhaust of the deceleration rocket.

Suspended from the supply rocket by a hundred meters of unmeltable ceramic fiber, hung a huge container delineated by blinking red beacons.

“Sort of pretty, isn’t it?” came Victor’s voice from the radio speaker in Adrian’s helmet, sounding tinny and distant even though he stood just behind Adrian with their helmets almost touching.

“Welcome to Mare Smythii,” came another voice. “Home of the one and only First Lunar Outpost.”

Adrian looked down from the hatch and saw a spacesuited figure in an open vehicle with bulbous wheels and an attached utility trailer. The figure waved.

“That is our mayor,” said Victor, “Ralph Bernard.”

“Mayor of a thriving metropolis of ten,” came Ralph’s voice, resonant even over the little speaker, “yourselves included.”

Adrian waved back, then clambered down the metal ladder to the surface. Victor followed.

Ralph indicated the person sitting next to him in the front seat of the moon buggy. “This is Dr. Kimberly Wells. She’s our botanist.”

“A botanist on the Moon?” said Adrian with a chuckle.

“Oh, I run an occasional low-gravitation seed experiment,” she said, “but mainly I’m in charge of the hydroponic vegetable farm. I’m also the town’s medical staff.”

Ralph placed a hand on the control stick. “Sorry to have to put you guys to work so soon, but …” He gestured toward the falling drop-container. “We have to bring in the mail while we can still find it. Damn inconvenient, not being allowed radio beacons.” He pointed to the rear set of seats. “Hop in.” He made a sound half way between a laugh and a grunt. “As an Australian, hopping should be second nature to you.”

Adrian gave a wan smile. As he and Victor swung into the rear seats, he said, “I gather you’re not completely wild about the Lunaroo idea.”

“As usual,” said Ralph as he pushed the stick and the buggy lurched forward, “it’s another case of politics triumphing over engineering.”

“Why don’t we defer politics for awhile?” Kimberly broke in. She moved her body slightly, as if to look over her shoulder. In a spacesuit, it was an impossible gesture. “Your first time on the Moon, Dr. Clarke, isn’t it?”

“It is. But ever since I was a kid in Melbourne, I’ve looked at it a lot.” Adrian pointed at the Earth. “With a good imagination, you can just make out Melbourne.” He paused. “Pretty place … Earth, I mean. Nice to see it shining down on us.”

“It doesn’t always,” said Kimberly. “Lunar libration keeps it below the horizon much of the time.”

“That’s actually why the Silent Earth Radio Telescope was built here on Smythii,” said Victor. “When the Earth is below the horizon, the telescope is shielded from its radio interference. And at night, this is the most radio-quiet place in the solar system.”

“I have been prepped for this trip, you know,” said Adrian.

“SERT’s a damned nuisance,” said Ralph. “Only low-power radio equipment is allowed on the base.” He gave a short grunt. “Which is why we have to chase after the drop-container at night, using only its light beacons. A right damned nuisance.”

Adrian, thinking that the mayor had probably been on the Moon too long, didn’t talk until they’d reached the drop-container. Nobody talked.

With their helmet lights providing illumination, the four set to work disassembling the container. When they’d gotten the front panel off, Ralph peered inside.

“My god!” Ralph, even in a spacesuit, visibly stiffened. “That is Australia’s contribution to the space program? It looks like the kangaroo from hell wearing snowshoes.”

The Lunaroo did look kangaroolike, despite having a door on one side seemingly lifted from a convertible sports car and an interior like an old open-cockpit aircraft, but where the riders sat abreast. It had a head with two spiky radio antennas where ears might have been expected and headlights for eyes. The tail was articulated and the feet were huge. On the door was stenciled the name “Skippy.”

“We need another vehicle, and they send us this,” said Ralph. “This is crazy.”

“Why?” said Adrian. “With 18 percent Earth-normal gravity and the rough ground, a hopping transport vehicle makes a lot of sense.”

“Crazy,” Ralph repeated, as if to himself, his eyes on the Lunaroo.

“Well,” said Kimberly, “if Canada can have its robot arm, then Australia can have its robot … kangaroo.”

In addition to the Lunaroo, the container held a smaller box. Ralph opened it and his mood brightened. “Frozen meat,” he said, “and a few cylinders of precious nitrogen.” He and Adrian moved the box to the trailer. “Precious nitrogen?” said Adrian. “I’d have thought it was oxygen that was precious.”

“Oxygen is necessary,” said Ralph, “but not necessarily precious. Heating the lunar basalt in the furnace releases all we need. But for nitrogen, we’ve got to rely on Earth.” He laughed. “But why am I telling you all this? You’re the geologist.”

“And I’m also the roo wrangler.” Adrian went to the Lunaroo. While the others finished disassembling the container around it, he untethered the vehicle. He’d trained with one back home, and he looked forward to riding a roo in the lunar gravity it was designed for. He got into the vehicle, strapped himself in, then hopped it off the base of the container. “Hey, this is great!” At low horizontal and vertical throttles he hopped the craft a few times around the buggy and was amazed how high and smooth the Lunaroo moved. “Really great! Spiffy!”

“All right, all right,” said Ralph. “Come on and help us get the panels in the trailer.”

“Yeah, fine.” Adrian pulled back the throttles and the hops became shorter and lower until the metal beast came to a stop. Adrian jumped out. “But afterward, I’d like to inspect the oxygen furnace.”

“After we take care of the container,” said Ralph in a tired voice. “Then you can hop that thing to the FLO. We’ll follow you in the buggy.” He sighed. “After that, you can take the buggy to examine the furnace. Damn! I wish we had that second moon buggy.”

“No worries,” said Adrian as he helped lift a panel, “I’ll use the Skippy here to go to the furnace.”

“Can’t allow it,” said Ralph. “No solo outside work is allowed. It’s a rule that all vehicles must have two or more people in them.” He blew out a breath, sounding like a hurricane in Adrian’s helmet. “All vehicles … all one of them.”

“The Lunaroo is a two-seater, you know.”

“I do know,” said Ralph. “The problem will be getting someone to occupy that second seat.”

“I’ll go,” offered Victor.

When they’d finished loading the trailer, Adrian took Victor for a set of training hops. Kimberly and Ralph watched from the buggy.

Adrian hopped the roo away at low throttles. “Best not to go too fast. The ground is rough here.”

“How does it turn?” Victor asked.

“It swings its tail in mid hop.” Adrian executed a change of direction. “Conservation of angular momentum and all that.” He leaned to the side and the roo banked slightly to that side. “And body English helps.” Adrian sat upright again. “It takes some getting used to, though … like turning on a motorcycle. The thing to remember is, turning is hard, but braking is impossible.”

After a few minutes, Adrian hopped to a stop and called to Ralph. “I think things are good here. We’ll go to the furnace now, if it’s okay with you.”

“All right,” said Ralph. “But careful. Our high-point radio relay is down and the furnace isn’t in line of sight with the base. You won’t be able to reach us by radio … not with your low-power spacesuit radios at any rate.”

“Ah, but the roo radio is a high-power unit,” said Adrian. “We should be able to contact you by crater wall bounce if we get into trouble.”

“Good,” said Ralph. “I’d hoped as much.”

Adrian watched as the moon buggy started away, then, with Victor navigating, he hopped the roo toward the furnace. As they progressed, Adrian taught Victor the controls. But suddenly, Adrian hopped the Lunaroo to a halt. “I’m an idiot!”

“If you insist,” said Victor. “But why, in particular?”

“It’s a solar furnace,” said Adrian. “I can’t tell much about it at night.” He shrugged—a purely private gesture in a spacesuit. “When’s sunrise?”

“In a couple of hours.” Victor slapped a gloved hand gently against the roo’s control panel. “Tell you what. Why don’t we go to the telescope first? I have a few adjustments to make on the secondary focus. And the focus is not a nice place to be when the sun is up. After that, we can swing over to the furnace.” He paused. “But SERT’s about twenty-five kilometers away. I wouldn’t want to spend forever getting there and back.”

“No worries,” said Adrian. “Skippy here can go a hell of a lot faster than you might think.”

“Okay,” said Victor, pointing. “The scope’s off that way.”

“Hang on.” Adrian started the roo and pushed the throttles forward. “I saw SERT from the lander. It looked huge.”

“It’s seven hundred meters across … the size of its crater.”

“Impressive!” said Adrian.

“Yeah.” With a short pause each time the roo’s feet hit the lunar surface, Victor went on to describe the telescope. “Something like a sheet of aluminized silk is hung from—a hoop around the rim. The material has varying density so it hangs as a true spherical surface. And with no atmosphere it doesn’t move. Even small meteors can pierce the fabric without disfiguring the mirror.”

“Hmm,” said Adrian, to show he was listening.

“Gregorian secondary optics sit near the focus. They correct for the spherical aberration and allow some pointing. Three cables from the rim hold the secondary and the detector array.”

“Very impressive,” said Adrian, impressed most of all by Victor’s bubbly enthusiasm.

“When the Earth’s below the horizon we do radio astronomy, and when it’s above, it does automated SETI observations.” Victor patted a hand on the roo’s door. “Hey, you know, this hopping is okay.”

“Yeah, it is,” said Adrian, distantly, his eyes drawn to the wonders of the lunar landscape. He’d be happy if the trip went on for hours.

At length, Victor snapped forward. “There it is,” he said. “SERT. At eleven o’clock.”

Adrian turned the roo gently toward the nondescript crater. “Could have used some advanced warning. Roos don’t turn on a dime.”

“Stop there,” said Victor, pointing to a hole in the crater wall. “The service entrance.”

As the crater went by on Victor’s left, he leaned out toward it.

“Don’t lean!” Adrian called out. He leaned in the other direction to keep the roo stable.

“Sorry!” Victor pushed sharply against the roo structure, forcing his body upright. But his sideways motion continued until he was leaning against Adrian.

“Bloody hell!” Adrian tried to sit upright, but couldn’t with Victor pressing against him. The roo also leaned. Adrian tried to turn into the direction of lean, but it was too late. The slow-turning Lunaroo banked awkwardly, landing on but one of its snowshoelike feet. Adrian pulled sharply down on the throttles but not quickly enough. The roo began another hop. It went up and came immediately down—horizontally, landing hard on its side, spinning against the SERT crater and throwing up a spray of rocks and fine powder from the regolith.

Adrian suppressed a grunt of pain as Victor fell on him, twisting his leg under the edge of Victor’s life-support module.

Victor released his harness, crawled off onto the surface, and scrambled to his feet. Adrian clutched his knee and let out a moan.

“What’s wrong?” Victor shouted.

“I hope just a seriously sprained knee,” said Adrian through clenched teeth.

“Jeez!” said Victor. “I’d have thought it impossible to injure oneself in this light gravity.”

“Well, mate, it seems I’ve done the impossible.”

“Hold on. I’ll get you out of there.” Victor released Adrian’s harness and pulled him free. “We’ll have to get you back so Kimberly can look at you.”

“See if you can get Skippy upright,” said Adrian, massaging his knee with heavy gloved hands, “so we can use its radio.”

“Right.” Victor walked to the downed vehicle and managed to raise it to its feet. “Uh-oh,” he said. “One of the antennas has snapped off.”

“Let’s hope it was the dummy,” said Adrian. “One of the antennas is only for show.” Slowly and accompanied by much pain, he straightened his leg. “See if you can fire it up.”

Victor climbed into the roo and threw a switch. “We have power.”

“Great! Now flip the radio switch to Relay.”

Adrian waited anxiously as Victor’s hand hovered over the roo console, and then found the radio controls.

“Damn it,” said Victor. “No carrier. Nothing.”

“Try your suit radio, then. Command it to High Strength.” Adrian would have tried his, but he knew from experience that Baby, NASA’s speech recognition system, sometimes had trouble with Australian accents—not to mention Australian accents under duress.

“Baby,” came Victor’s voice. “Radio gain high. Set.”

“Set radio gain high. Yes, no,” came a synthesized woman’s voice.

“Yes,” said Victor.

“Radio gain high.”

Adrian winced as, even with the suit’s auto-gain-control in operation, the synthesized voice rang almost painfully loud in Adrian’s helmet.

Victor spent the next quarter hour sending an emergency call, waiting a few seconds for an answer, and then trying again. Finally, he commanded the radio gain back to low and looked over at Adrian. “No dice.”

Adrian nodded to himself. “I’m not too crazy about riding a roo with a busted knee. But there doesn’t seem much choice. Take a spin in her. See if the controls all work.”

Victor hit a few buttons and pushed forward a throttle. The roo started hopping vertically. “So far, so good.” He pushed the other throttle, moved it a few more times, and then said, “Not good. Vertical motion works, forward motion doesn’t.”

“Lean with the hops,” said Adrian. “Try body English.”

Victor tried again. The roo hopped but only progressed forward a few inches per hop. “No good,” he said, switching off the power. He stepped out of the roo. “We have a real problem. We’re stuck here.”

“When they find we’re overdue,” said Adrian, “I imagine they’ll come looking for us.” He gestured, expansively. “Might as well just sit back and enjoy the scenery.”

“But how will they find us?” Victor sounded very serious. “They thought we’d gone to the furnace.”

Adrian shivered as the situation became clear to him. “Eventually they’ll go back to the drop zone and follow the roo tracks.”

“Eventually,” said Victor under his breath.

Adrian didn’t need it spelled out. What was the chance they’d be found before their oxygen ran out? He thought hard for a plan. Focus, Adrian. Focus! Then he noticed the warning light on his heads-up display. “I’m afraid we … I have another problem,” he said, forcing his voice calm.

Victor turned to him. “Tell me.”

“My refrigeration unit. It’s failed.” Adrian examined all the status lights. “Heater’s fine, though. Everything else, okay.” He knew that as long as they were in the lunar night, he’d be just fine—no need for refrigeration. Adrian asked the crucial question. “How long,” he said in a voice made calm by his NASA training, “until sunrise?”

“I don’t know,” said Victor with a heavy voice. “Not long. Half-hour, maybe. But the Sun comes up very slowly on the Moon. As long as you’re in shadow, the Sun can’t get to you.”

“Just as well,” said Adrian with forced cheerfulness. “I’m not really in the mood to work on my tan.” Victor didn’t laugh. He didn’t make any answer. “Victor,” said Adrian after a few seconds, “what’s the matter?”

“The refrigeration unit. We’ve seen them fail before. Temperature sensor failure.”

“So?”

“The problem is that the same failure locks the heater on. The suit temperature keeps going up.”

Adrian fought down a surge of panic. “Baby. Display detail on.”

“Unrecognized command,” came Baby’s voice. “Command must end with query or set.”

Damn! Adrian fought to keep his voice steady. “Baby. Display detail on. Set.”

“Set display detail on. Yes, No.”

“Yes.” Linear meters and a digital clock now joined the status lights. Adrian stared at the temperature meter. The value crept higher even as he watched. “It is getting a trifle warm, actually.”

“Try your radio,” said Victor in a voice saying it was useless. “Use high gain. I’ll try mine as well. Maybe someone is in earshot.”

“Not likely,” said Adrian.

Victor swiveled around toward the crater wall. “Let’s hide out under the telescope. Aluminized film. It’ll reflect most of the heat back into space.”

“But not the internal heat from my suit.”

“No,” said Victor in a barely audible voice. “But it’ll buy you some time.” He helped Adrian to his feet. “Think you can walk?”

“Depends on what you consider walking.” Adrian forced a laugh. “Under the telescope. Like cats under a hot tin roof.”

“Come on,” said Victor, offering his shoulder as a handhold. “It’s just a few meters to the entrance.”

“If they couldn’t hear us before,” grunted Adrian as he hobbled, “they’ll never be able to pick up radio signals from in there.”

“There’s something to be said for dying later rather than sooner,” said Victor. “Anyway, I’m sure they’ll come looking for us.”

“The Moon’s a big place. They’ll never find us in time. Our oxygen will just run out. It’s fry or asphyxiate.”

Victor turned on his helmet light as they passed through the entrance.

Inside, Adrian sat with his back against the crater wall, He could see a dim bluish patch of light on the ground stretching out from the entrance—the light from Earth. Earthlight. I can’t die here, so far from home. I need a plan. Focus, Adrian! He checked his temperature display: 38 degrees Celsius.

Victor, standing, looked out the entrance. “I think,” he said without turning around. “I think our best shot is for me to try to jog back to the outpost for help.”

“That’s twenty-five kilometers away.”

“Give or take,” said Victor, “but I should be in line-of-sight radio range in, I don’t know, around twenty.”

“Well, if you think you can make it …”

Victor stood at the entrance in silence. Then Adrian heard a sigh. “No,” said Victor, softly. “I’d never make it. No way the suit and the refrigeration module could survive a twenty-five kilometer run into the sun … not to mention me surviving it.” He turned away from the entrance and then just stood like a statue.

Idly, Adrian looked up at the underside of the huge bowl of the telescope, its bottom three meters or so above the ground. “Formidable!”

“The telescope?” Victor also looked up at SERT. “On Earth now,” he said, in a wistful voice, “thousands of people, amateur astronomers, are at their computers analyzing the multi-channel radio signals from this beast.”

“Not in real-time, of course,” said Adrian, seeking intellectual refuge from his problems.

“Yes. In real-time.” Victor spoke with the pride of one of SERT’s developers. “When the libration moves Earth above the horizon, the signals are multiplexed and modulated onto a laser beamed at Earth.”

“Interesting.” An insistent inner voice pulled Adrian back. He couldn’t waste what little time he had in idle chatter. Focus, Adrian—39 degrees!

“Wait a minute!” said Adrian, aloud. “Focus!”

“Excuse me?”

Adrian tried to jump to his feet, but couldn’t. “Victor,” he said, excitedly, “do you think Skippy could fit through the crater entrance?”

“What? Why?”

“Well, I think it will fit through.” Adrian tried to flex his knee, but it had grown stiff. “Look, I’d do it myself, but I can’t walk. Please, Victor, see if you can glide it in. And quickly, before the Sun comes up.”

“Why?” said Victor again, louder this time.

“I have an idea. We need to hurry. I’ll explain it as we prepare the roo.”

Victor stood staring at Adrian.

“Please!”

“Okay. Okay.” Victor strode though the entrance. A few seconds later, Adrian heard grunts of exertion. Soon after, he felt a vibration through his spacesuit. Skippy hitting the ground. And a minute after that, Adrian saw the head of the Lunaroo slide in through the crater entrance. Adrian crawled to the roo. Then, while Victor pushed, Adrian pulled. When the Lunaroo had cleared the entrance, Victor stepped back in through the crater opening. “Okay,” he said, “What’s this big idea of yours?” He paused. “The leading edge of the Sun is visible now,” he added, softly.

“Lift the roo upright,” said Adrian, trying to keep fear out of his voice.

“Sure. Why not?” Victor bent to the task.

“My idea,” said Adrian, “is to use Skippy to send an SOS.”

Victor stopped mid lift and, through Victor’s helmet, Adrian saw the man mouth “what?”

“The roo can still hop,” said Adrian. “So I propose moving it to right below the SERT bowl. We’ll have Skippy hop, and when it gets to the bottom of the bowl, we can grab the aluminized fabric and pull it. That will deform the mirror. As the roo goes down, we let go of the fabric and the scope will return to focus.”

Adrian could see Victor staring at him as if he were out of his mind.

“Please finish raising the roo,” said Adrian.

Without answering, Victor heaved the Lunaroo onto its feet.

“The people on Earth doing real-time observing should see a signal dropout,” Adrian went on. “If we time it right, we should be able to send an SOS in Morse code.”

“That’s your idea?”

“Yeah,” said Adrian.

“It’s crazy.”

“Your point?” Forty degrees.

“Do people even know Morse Code anymore?” said Victor.

“They’ll know SOS. Look. We … I don’t have much time. Let’s center the roo and do it.”

Victor shoved the roo directly under the low point of the bowl, paused, and then said. “It feels like … sacrilege. I mean an astronomer purposefully degrading the performance of a telescope mirror. And actually, I don’t know Morse code”

“Just help me into the roo. I’ll do it.”

“It makes more sense for me to do it,” said Victor. “Teach me SOS.”

“No. I’ll do it.” Adrian struggled to his feet. Using Victor as a support, he limped to the Lunaroo and got in. He fastened his harness, turned on the power, and switched on the lights. In the bright illumination reflecting off the bowl, Adrian felt as if he were in a gigantic inverted planetarium. “Okay,” he said, his hand on the vertical throttle. “Here we go.” The roo hopped and Adrian’s knee throbbed with pain.

After fifteen minutes of SOS sending, Adrian gave it up. The temperature in his suit was going up fast, and the exertion of pulling against seven hundred meters of fabric had increased his oxygen use enormously. And the pain had become excruciating. Adrian hobbled to his place against the crater wall and collapsed to a sitting position with one leg folded, the other out straight. He tried to breathe sparingly, pretending he was just loafing during a camping trip in the outback.

“So we wait,” said Victor, also resting against the crater wall.

“And hope,” said Adrian, quietly. He glanced at Victor’s helmet. “Aren’t you going to turn on your display meters?”

“I’d rather not know.”

Over the next forty-five minutes, their conversation slowed to the occasional question of how the other was holding out. Eventually, talk stopped altogether.

Adrian’s heads-up helmet display, meanwhile, relentlessly revealed how many minutes of oxygen he had left and how high the temperature had reached in his suit. He wondered which would kill him first. He knew when his asphyxiation death would happen. Judging when he’d die from heat was harder. The display indicated a grim race that he couldn’t help watching. He read the numbers through sweat-blurred eyes.

Finally, Adrian knew it would be the oxygen—and in just a few minutes. He wondered if he should say good-bye to Victor, but he decided against it. It would take effort and what was the use? In the final analysis, everyone dies alone.

Suddenly the crater went dark. Adrian started, then saw that something had blocked the sunlight coming through the entrance. Forty-four degrees.

“Are they in there?” came Kimberly’s bell-like voice.

Adrian almost cried. “Oxygen,” he heard Victor gasp.

“Kim”—it was Ralph’s voice—”bring in two oxygen cylinders. Fast!”

“Acknowledged.”

Adrian closed his eyes. A moment later, Adrian felt hands on him, twisting him around to get to the emergency oxygen snap-valve. And a few seconds later, Adrian smelled the sweet aroma of fresh oxygen. He breathed heavily. The mayor was wrong. Oxygen is precious. As he breathed, he heard Victor say, “Nice to see you guys. You know, it’s amazing what a little oxygen can do for one’s spirits.”

“No kidding,” said Ralph.

“Wait,” said Victor. “Adrian. His suit’s cooling system failed. Heater’s on full.”

“Kimberly,” Ralph shouted. “Watch him while I get the nitrogen.”

Adrian saw a spacesuited figure dart through the opening and dart back just seconds later.

“We’ll roll you over,” said Ralph. “This won’t hurt a bit.”

Adrian felt himself eased over onto his stomach and felt activity at his life-support module.

“Damn it all,” said Ralph under his breath. “I really hate to lose the nitrogen. But there’s no help for it.”

“What’s going on?” said Adrian in a shallow whisper.

“I’m going to vent your air, rather than recirculate it. Hot air out, cool air in. And expansion cooling of the gas.” Adrian heard the clunk of metal on metal. “In the old days,” Ralph went on, “suits used only oxygen and we couldn’t do this.”

Suddenly, Adrian felt a thermal gradient, a cooling starting at his back and slowly spreading over his entire body. He looked at the temperature read-out and realized “cooling” was a relative concept. The temperature stood at 42 degrees Celsius, high even by outback standards.

“Victor,” came Ralph’s voice. “Think you can make it to the buggy on your own?”

“Sure.”

“Think you’re up to driving?”

“Piece of cake.”

“We’ll have to help Adrian to the buggy,” said Ralph.

“He has a bashed-up knee,” said Victor.

“Fine,” said Ralph. “Just fine.” He turned to Adrian. “While we’re riding back, Dr. Clarke, read out the temperature every ten seconds or so. That’ll tell me how much to vent versus recirculate. You sit in the front seat. I’ll be behind, controlling the oxygen and nitrogen valves.”

“You’ve done this before,” said Adrian, with forced lightness.

Ralph chuckled. “Once or twice.” He turned away, a move of habit rather than necessity. “Kimberly,” he said. “In the buggy, see if you can keep Dr. Clarke—”

“Call me Adrian.”

“Keep Adrian in the shadow of your suit. You too, Victor … if you can do that and drive at the same time.”

“Understood,” said Victor.

“Acknowledged,” said Kimberly.

“Okay, Adrian,” said Ralph, “start reciting temperatures.” He and Kimberly half-carried Adrian to the buggy and helped him in.

“Forty-one point five,” said Adrian. “By the way, how did you manage to find us?”

Victor started the buggy and headed toward the FLO.

“An observer on Earth detected a SETI signal,” said Ralph. “Seems that the aliens were sending an SOS. The guy thought he’d gone nuts. Fortunately, instead of calling a psychiatrist, he called NASA. Then a whole lot of other people called. It’s good the Earth was visible. And apparently, NASA can respond pretty quickly at times.”

“Yeah, really,” said Adrian.

“Sort of a long way around,” said Kimberly. “Good the libration was in our favor.”

“And it’s good we had Skippy,” said Victor.

“Skippy?” said Ralph under his breath. “Oh, dear.”

“Thirty-nine point five,” said Adrian. Then, in sudden euphoria, he started singing, “Good, good, good librations.”

“Damn,” said Ralph. “Too rich an oxygen mixture.”

Adrian gawked like a tourist at the landscape. “Thirty-eight point five.” Looking away at the Earth, he launched into a half-hummed rendition of “Advance Australia Fair.” “Australians all let us rejoice, for … what the hell comes next?” Then the euphoria wore off and he shut up.

“Adrian,” said Kimberly with a smile in her voice, “after all that has happened on your very first day on the Moon, you’d probably really like to be back on Earth right now, wouldn’t you?”

Gazing out at the lunar landscape, Adrian felt a strange affection for this outpost of Earth, this precious stone, this stark, beautiful but unforgiving world.

“Want to be back on Earth?” he said. “Thirty-seven point five. No. Of course not. Why would you say that?”