172 Hours on the Moon Page 18

  “Devereux, what’s going on?”

  It took a few seconds before he responded. “I think I ran over something.”

  “Stay where you are, I’m coming back.”

  “Okay.”

  Nadolski made a wide left turn and discovered the other LRV well over three hundred feet behind him. When he got back there he saw right away what the problem was. Antoine had hit a large rock with his left front wheel and broken the axle. The wheel was lying down flat in the gray dust.

  “I’m really sorry about this. Really. I don’t know what happened.”

  Nadolski looked at the damage. He couldn’t do anything about it out here.

  “What do we do now?” Antoine asked desperately, walking around the rover to pick up the loose wheel.

  Old equipment, Nadolski thought. Everything on this whole expedition is so goddamn antiquated.

  “It’s not a crisis,” Nadolski announced. “Both of the rovers were built to hold an extra thousand pounds of weight, so you can ride with me on mine. This was exactly what I was afraid —”

  He didn’t get to complete his sentence. Something in the dust caught his eye. He dropped down onto his knees and he felt a cold sweat trickling down his back inside the suit. Now it made sense.

  “Devereux!”

  Antoine let go of the wheel and returned to Nadolski as quickly as he could, but the enormous suit made his movements sluggish. Combined with the low gravity, he had difficulty keeping his balance.

  “Do you see these tracks?” Nadolski asked. Antoine nodded. “Good. I’m just asking to make absolutely sure. It’s been a long time since any of us has slept properly. And next I’ll ask: Do you see these wheel tracks?” Nadolski pointed to another pattern running parallel to the first set.

  Again Antoine said yes.

  “These are the tracks we’ve been following since we turned around,” Nadolski explained.

  “And your point is …?” Antoine asked.

  Nadolski looked at him. It was easy to see that he was worried, as if he already knew he was about to receive bad news.

  “These aren’t our tracks.”

  “What … do you mean? I don’t understand. They’re exactly the same, aren’t they?” Antoine asked.

  “No. Look at them carefully,” Nadolski said. “This is one of our tracks, you see? And then look at the other one. You see that stripe in the middle? None of our vehicles makes that pattern.”

  “Maybe it’s from another lunar mission?” Antoine volunteered. “Like when they installed the power station, for example.”

  Nadolski raised his hand to him. “No, Antoine. According to Coleman it was set up remotely without any astronauts on the ground. NASA has never been here. And neither have we, wherever we are. These tracks didn’t exist an hour ago.”

  “What are you trying to say?” Antoine asked, his voice shaking.

  “I’m trying to say I think we’re in danger.”

  Just a few seconds later they spotted two figures about a thousand feet away. They were walking toward them, slowly, but undeniably, closer and closer.

  Neither of them was wearing a spacesuit or helmet.

  They didn’t struggle against the moon’s low gravity.

  They were walking as naturally as if they were walking on Earth. And they were coming this way.

  There was nowhere to hide. It was impossible to run.

  The last thing that Antoine noticed was that one of them looked like Nadolski.

  And that the other one looked exactly like him.

  Then everything went white and noisy, and Antoine Devereux felt himself losing consciousness.

  Coleman drank his coffee and drummed the fingers of his other hand on the table. They should have been back a long time ago. He had already given them twice as long as he figured they needed, but he still hadn’t seen them or heard from them. He had called them repeatedly over the intercom in one of the helmets, but as long as they were more than a mile or so away, they wouldn’t hear him anyway.

  Something must have gone wrong. Their attempt to get the power station operating must have failed. Could it be … no …

  Coleman’s throat tightened and his mind went black, as if someone had filled it with warm, viscous tar. He had to forcibly pull himself together to breathe normally. He hadn’t felt like this in fifty years, since he was nine years old.

  It had been a Saturday in July, he remembered. His mother had given him permission to visit a friend who lived on East Sixty-Fifth Street, even though he was too little to be wandering around New York City on his own. She’d given him cab fare and asked the doorman to help him get a cab. But he decided to walk instead and use the money for something else. Candy, maybe. He decided to go through Central Park, maybe stop by the zoo to see if there were any new animals. But on his way through the park, a figure suddenly crawled out of the bushes and grabbed him. Coleman was pulled behind a tree, and the next thing he remembered was the man holding a revolver to his head. Coleman tried giving him the cab fare from his pocket, but the man just laughed at him and cocked the gun.

  “How old are you going to be when you die?” the man asked. Coleman didn’t answer, just felt the revolver chafing into his temple and the urine running down his pants leg.

  “You’re not going to get any older than this, you know,” the man said and fired.

  Coleman heard the gun click and knew the chamber was empty.

  “Do you feel this?” The man pushed the gun harder against his head.

  Coleman was sure it would puncture his skull. “I feel it,” he whispered.

  “This revolver holds six bullets. But there’s only one loaded in it. How long do you think you’ll live?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I want you to count with me. All right?”

  Coleman didn’t respond.

  “We already had number one, right?”

  The man fired again. Again, the gun just made a clicking sound.

  “Two.”

  Click.

  “Three.”

  Click.

  “Four.”

  Click.

  “Five. Now’s when it happens, you know.”

  That was when he felt it. The same feeling he had now, standing in a corridor in DARLAH 2. The feeling that there was no hope. And that all the goodness in the world couldn’t save him from the evil standing right next to him.

  There never was a sixth try. The man held the gun against his head for a long time, before suddenly lowering it and going on his way. Coleman sank into the grass, and the next thing he remembered was a young woman’s face, her asking him if he was okay. She walked him home to his apartment, and his mom served her coffee. Coleman could still remember it, how the scent of coffee spread through the apartment and slowly made the world normal again.

  He stopped in the dark corridor, not sure where he was actually going. From somewhere far away he heard footsteps, shoes running over the metal floor. That must be the two girls, he thought. What are they up to? They should be resting. Without another thought he turned around and headed back to the kitchen in module two. Caitlin was still sitting at the big, round table.

  “I’m going to go out there to look for them,” Coleman said. She looked at him with concern. “Coleman, what are you saying?”

  “It’s been more than four hours,” he said. “They should have been back ages ago. I’m afraid their attempt may have failed.”

  “They took both of the LRVs, Coleman.”

  “I’ll walk. Keep an eye on the girls,” he said, and then turned and left the room.

  Coleman walked quickly to the equipment room, took down a suit, and pulled it on. He picked up an oxygen tank and attached it to his back before stepping into the decompression chamber.

  This time it was his turn.

  Coleman opened the metal box next to the hatch and typed a code on the keypad. It was a code only he knew. A green light appeared next to the keypad and he heard the little motor start humming. He d
epressed the button on the wall, and the hatch door lowered shut behind him. Good, at least something still works, he thought. Then he flipped one of the other switches on the wall, and the air was quickly sucked out of the chamber. The hatch to the surface opened and he stepped out.

  SHOE

  Mia was dizzy when she woke up. How long had she been asleep? She didn’t know. Somewhere in the back of her head she heard music. Someone was singing. It took a few seconds before she realized she was still wearing her earbuds. Mia calmly sat up in bed and picked up her iPod. It was the Talking Heads. The song was called “(Nothing but) Flowers,” and she knew it practically by heart. It was about a postapocalyptic world. The person in the song was ambling around in an open landscape, missing everything that didn’t exist anymore: 7-Elevens, cherry pies, chocolate chip cookies, shopping malls, and real estate. She could picture the guy staggering around on an overgrown planet where the grass was three feet tall. “If this is paradise, I wish I had a lawn mower.” She imagined his desperate search for signs of something he could recognize. “This was a Pizza Hut, now it’s all covered with daisies.”

  The moon was far worse, she thought, because nothing grew here. What if she had to spend a whole year here? Would that even be possible?

  The music suddenly stopped.

  She looked down at her player. The words low battery appeared for a few seconds before the player went dead. She had been expecting that to happen. She was prepared for it, but it still hurt. From now on there would be no music in her world.

  She quickly grabbed a pen and some paper to write down the lyrics in her notebook. That way at least she could keep the song alive a little longer. But the thought was interrupted by another one: They must be back now. Antoine and Nadolski must be back from DARLAH 1.

  That got her out of her bed and into her clothes quickly. On impulse, she walked over to the little porthole window and looked out, perhaps hoping to see some sign of the two returning. But there was nothing to see. Nothing at all. Dead, gray surface as far as the eye could see.

  But then, something else.

  At first she thought it must be her sleep-deprived brain playing tricks on her. But she pushed her face right up against the glass and stared hard at what she thought she saw. …

  Footprints.

  There were obvious footprints out there.

  But that wasn’t all.

  The footprints were so clear, she could recognize the distinctive pattern.

  Paratrooper boots, she thought, astonished. The same as mine.

  “Midori? Midori!” Mia tugged at her roommate, fast asleep in her bunk. “Wake up!”

  Midori slowly opened her eyes and looked confused. “What is it now?”

  “There’s someone here!”

  Midori yawned and rubbed her eyes. “What do you mean? Are they back? Have we been rescued?”

  “No, there’s someone out there!” Mia pointed to the window. Seconds later Midori was on her feet next to Mia, staring down at the moondust. She saw them, too.

  Vividly clear footprints in the dust.

  They ran through the corridors.

  They ran past the computer room, through the hatches into module one, and didn’t stop until they found Caitlin in the communications room. She was sitting down, hunched over the radio transmitters, trying to get them working. Breathlessly they told her what they had discovered outside their bedroom window and waited for her reaction. She raised her head and looked at them dully.

  “Oh. Yes, I saw that,” she said, and went back to the radios.

  “What do you mean, ‘I saw that’!” Mia shouted frantically. “What the hell is going on?”

  Caitlin looked at her blankly and shrugged. She said, “I saw that when I walked you guys back to your room.”

  “But …” Midori began. “What does that mean? What are we going to do?”

  “There’s nothing to be done, really. Not anymore.”

  Mia was furious. “Caitlin, what’s wrong with you? There’s someone out there, don’t you get it? The hatch that got closed from the outside, Wilson and Stanton who couldn’t get out. The lunar lander that was sabotaged.”

  “And Nadolski and Antoine, who never came back,” Caitlin added in a somber voice.

  Mia felt her heart sink like a sharp object scraping her up on the inside. “They didn’t … come back?”

  “No.”

  “But … have you tried to contact them?”

  “Their intercom is way out of range. Coleman went out to find them.”

  “Thank God,” Midori said with a hopeful sigh of relief.

  But Mia looked around and then slowly asked, “How long ago was that, Caitlin?”

  Caitlin’s eyes seemed blurry.

  “I don’t know … many hours ago, I’d guess.” It was as if Caitlin were in a trance. She didn’t seem alarmed, or hopeful, or sad, or anxious. “I’m afraid it’s too late to do anything for our dear Coleman. He was a great guy.”

  Mia grabbed Caitlin by the shoulders and shook her. “What the hell happened here? Why are you acting like Coleman is dead? And Nadolski and Antoine?”

  “There’s no reason to assume they’re alive. Every person who has left this base has not returned. I’m so sorry, girls. I think it’s just the three of us here now. We’ll have to be brave, together.”

  The girls stared at Caitlin, dumbfounded. Was this woman on drugs? She suddenly changed topics and smiled. “Do you guys want anything while we’re waiting?”

  “While we’re waiting for what?” Mia asked, almost hysterical now.

  “Well, the emergency backup power will eventually run out, and the oxygen generator will shut off. After that the oxygen will disappear over a couple of hours. Maybe we should fix ourselves a meal. Or we could tell each other stories. I don’t know.” It was as if Caitlin had shut down all her emotions and was just coasting along in a dreamworld.

  “You have totally lost your mind, Caitlin!” Mia wailed.

  Caitlin ignored her cries. “Mia, tell me, do you still have any battery power left in your player?”

  “No!”

  “Okay. We’ll have to get by without music, then. Of course, we could always sing. …”

  “You’re responsible for us, don’t you get that!” Midori screamed. “You have an obligation to do everything you possibly can!”

  Caitlin’s response was apathetic and quiet. “There’s nothing to do.”

  “So you’ve already given up, is that what you’re saying?” Midori cried.

  Caitlin fixed her eyes on Midori, and that scared her. “Yes. Haven’t you?” came Caitlin’s mumbled response.

  Midori punched her in the shoulder, desperate. “It’s not fair! It’s just not fair!”

  Caitlin stood up and grabbed Midori’s arm, pushed it away, and hissed, “Well, what a shame. Poor you. Maybe you should’ve stayed home!”

  Deflated, the two girls left the communications room. Mia insisted they should stop by the infirmary, although she wasn’t really sure what she was looking for. But she had a theory, and after a few minutes of hunting it was confirmed: Several of the boxes of pills Coleman had shown them in the medicine chest were empty. Caitlin. Caitlin has been here. She’s started numbing herself to help her get through it.

  Mia examined the boxes. There were some pretty strong pills and morphine for severe pain. She showed them to Midori, who just shook her head without saying anything. After all, there really wasn’t anything they could do for Caitlin, aside from leaving her in peace with her own indifference. Not at the moment anyway. But did that mean Caitlin was right? That there wasn’t much they could do for themselves aside from wait? Wait for the electricity to go out? For the oxygen to disappear from the rooms and corridors? For all of them to suffocate and die?

  They scarcely talked as they walked back toward the kitchen. They had a plan, but it wasn’t a long conversation — just a few sentences from one of them, a couple of nods from the other.

  As soon as they fe
lt it getting hard to breathe, they would head to the equipment room. Then they would put on spacesuits and go out onto the surface.

  They would find a suitable spot, maybe a hill, a place with a view of all of space. And there they would sit with their arms around each other until the oxygen ran out and the carbon monoxide poisoning sent them comfortably and quietly to their deaths.

  CAITLIN

  All she wanted was to sleep. She wanted to sleep and wake up somewhere totally different. Anywhere would be fine with her. Even if it was the middle of the desert somewhere in Mexico, without food or water, with a psychopathic mass murderer on her heels. Even if she had to crawl to safety on bloody knees through the wasteland, surrounded by snakes and coyotes. Anything would be better than sitting shut up in here with no possibilities.

  The only thing Caitlin had to look forward to as she sat, half slumped over the desk in the communications room, was that the pills would let her avoid the worst of the fear.

  After Coleman had left the base in his hopeless attempt to find Nadolski and Antoine, she had paced through DARLAH’s corridors to keep her anxieties at bay. She ended up in the infirmary without thinking about it, and the large medicine chest with the bloodred cross on it had practically smiled at her, as if it were trying to say, It’s just fine; you don’t need to be feeling this way. She opened it and found everything from penicillin to adrenaline injectors, morphine, Valium, and a bunch of other analgesics and anesthetics, along with the usual first-aid equipment.

  The room she was in was relatively large. The infirmary was part of module four and designed to accommodate several patients at the same time. In the middle of the room there were four tables, which were meant to serve both as hospital beds and autopsy tables. The walls were covered with cabinets that followed the almost oval shape of the room. It almost seemed to have been taken right out of an old sci-fi movie. Where she found herself in the role of scream queen right before the decisive scene.

  What was all of this for? All the surgical blades, the microscopes, the plastic lab coats, the rubber boots? The drill, the hammer, and that awful set of rib shears?