Dark Star Rising Second Edition (Pebbles in The Sky) (31 page)

He motioned the TV off and sauntered back into the kitchen to find something sweet for dessert.  Jessica just sat on the sofa staring at the blank TV monitor with a worried look on her face.

…

“I hope someone strings that asshole Greco up,” said the President.  “Turn that crap off Marius.  The only person I dislike more than Benjamin Greco at the moment is that bitch Marla Albright.  She set him up just like she has set up so many other people she has interviewed, including me.”

Marius switched the TV off.  “Mr. President, as your Chief of Staff I would have to consider that interview as a win for you and the country as a whole.  He just admitted that the whole birth control scheme was dreamed up and carried out by him and his rich cronies.  He did not implicate the United States at all. Maybe this will get the rest of the world off our backs.  And in all fairness, he probably did do a good thing for the world as a whole and saved a lot of suffering.  If not for Miss Albright blind-siding him about the cloned dead boy at the end, many people would have thought him a hero.  Her bringing up the point that while he was stopping billions of women from having children he was having his own dead son cloned is probably not going to go over very well.”

“Maybe,” reflected President Bailey thoughtfully.  “I was not aware of the cloning thing before.  Have someone look into that.  Contact the Driskalls down at the DNA Ark and see if that is true.  If so, I want some information about how they did it and how practical the procedure may be.”

Marius looked at the President in surprise.  “Do you want to make some clones of your ex-wife Mr. President?”

The President snorted. “No thanks, one of that woman is enough for anyone.  However, remember in the news last month how the Russian President lost both his wife and daughter to an Iranian terrorist attack? Maybe we can mend some fences with them if we offered a way he could get his infant daughter back.  Get me that information.  We may be able to use this. We will see how this shakes out,” the President said thoughtfully.

Chapter 35

May 1
st
, 2031

Farside Base, Earth’s Moon

Colonel Abraham Allan watched from the bunker as the huge lunar lander slowly dropped toward the landing field. The field was almost a kilometer away from the base as it would not have been prudent to have that hot
engine exhaust come anywhere near the base  and its one hundred and thirty inhabitants.  Colonel Allan was the commander of Farside Base, the second base being built on the moon. 
Schackleton Bas
e
, the first bas
e
that had been built
,
wa
s
located at the lunar South Pole.  The main purpose of the southern polar base was to mine and process the water ice found in the deep craters there that were never exposed to the sun’s unrelenting heat.  That water was what made the human presence of the United States Space Force on the moon possible.  Rather than shipping water, oxygen and rocket fuel up from the gravity well of the Earth to the space and lunar stations, it could be done vastly cheaper from the lunar south pole.

Farside Base had a totally different purpose.  A huge phased-array for a space based radar system was being built here.  Its purpose was to constantly search the solar system for asteroids, comets, or large meteors that could be a threat to Earth.  After the detection and tracking of such objects, Space Force could then determine what threat the object was and what means was needed to alleviate it.  It was also hoped that asteroids containing large amounts of valuable metals and volatiles could be identified so that they could be captured and brought into a lunar orbit where they could be mined and processed at Lunar One, the space station in orbit around the moon.  A great deal of expense could be saved by mining the resource rich asteroids in orbit without the materials ever having to be hauled to and from the surface of the moon.

The large nuclear powered lander easing itself down to the surface contained the first elements of that radar system.  The lander itself would never have flown in Earth’s, or any other planet’s atmosphere.  It was basically a large Nuclear/Thermal Propulsion system with an open steel girder frame and a crew cabin at the very top.  Various arrangements of cargo pods, tanks, and containers could be fastened to its frame for transport down to the lunar surface or back into lunar orbit.  The intensely hot, slightly radioactive hydrogen gas being exhausted from its engine nozzles was all but invisible except where it came into contact with the regolith of the landing field. There it stirred up a strange looking dust cloud that quickly settled back down onto the surface.  Since there was no wind or air to keep it suspended, the fine regolith powder would settle back down and coat everything below it with a fine layer of dust.

“Farside base, this is Lander Three.  We are down and shutting down engines,” came over his suits radio system.

“Roger Lander Three,” came the reply from the flight control center of Farside Base.   “Good to see you guys again.  Let’s let things cool down for about four hours and we’ll roll out the welcome mat for you.”

Colonel Allan made it a habit to observe every takeoff and landing in person.  Although his base personnel were well trained and had practiced flight operations until they could do it in their sleep, no one took chances on the moon.  The moon was a harsh mistress and six men had died so far due to accidents while constructing the base.  He knew that his ground crew would wait the mandatory four hours for the ground beneath the lander to cool and for the short-lived radioisotopes that had been formed by the few stray neutrons from the lander’s exhaust to decay away to safe levels.  They would then do a quick radiation survey and roll the cargo carriers and cranes up to the lander and get the cargo pods detached and on their way back to Farside Base.

He waved his space suited arm at his driver, Sergeant Mays.  “Let’s get back to base Sergeant, I want to be there when the crew disembarks and arrives.  The pilot is an old friend of mine.”  They left the observation bunker and climbed back into the six wheeled moon buggy.  The Sergeant pulled back onto the road of compressed regolith and sped up to the buggy’s top speed of forty kilometers per hour for the quick sprint back to the base.

…

About five hours later Colonel Allan was waiting inside the egress storage room as the airlock cycled from outside the base.  The stations inhabitants jokingly referred to the room as the “coat closet,” as it was the major entry and exit point for the base onto the lunar surface.  Except for the airlock building and the assorted storage tanks and vehicle garages, the majority of the base was about twenty five meters underground so that it was protected from cosmic radiation and small meteorites by the regolith and lunar rock above them.  He saw from the status display screen that the men entering from outside the base were clear of the airlock and into the de-contamination room.  They were presently being sprayed down with high pressure air and that air was being filtered to remove all the moon dust off of their suits.  They would then be sprayed down with water and then high pressure air again to dry the suits.  Every precaution was taken to keep the dust out of the base.  The regolith could work its way into any mechanical joint and ruin bearings in no time, as well as being a major atmospheric contaminate that could irritate the eyes and lungs.

Finally,
two men stepped from the decontamination chamber and walked over to the suit racks.  Two technicians were on hand to help them remove their space suits.  After they were free of the cumbersome suits, Colonel Allan walked over and greeted them.

“Colonel Mike Pierce, damn it’s good to see you again,” he said as he shook his hand.  “Major Jenkins, I knew that had to be you driving that pig, Mike would have missed the whole landing field,” he grinned as Hank gave him a somewhat floppy salute.

“Colonel, if Colonel Pierce had been driving, we would have missed the whole moon,” he joked.  Hank looked around, “Wow, they have improved the place since I was down last.  There used to only be room in here for about two people.”

“Wait until you see how the rest of the place is changed,” Colonel Allan said proudly.  “We are up to almost eighty thousand square feet of pressurized space now.  In another year, who knows?”

“Well, we brought down the first parts of the phased array for you.  That stuff ought to keep you guys busy for a while so you don’t get bored,” said Mike.

Colonel Allan motioned for them to follow him.  “You guys come on down to the cafeteria.  We can get you some hot chow.  There might even be some fresh lettuce and stuff you can make a salad with.  We have two of the underground greenhouses up and running now.  The salad stuff is not too bad.  It is a hell of a lot better than freeze dried rations.”  They walked down the corridor until they came to the cafeteria.   The three of them made a salad and scored some fresh bread from the kitchen and took a seat over in
one corner.  It was not meal time yet, so they pretty much had the cafeteria to themselves except for a foursome playing cards over in another corner.

“So, I have been trying to keep up with Space Forces
two hottest pilots,” said Colonel Allan.  That was pretty nice work out there trying out the thruster modules on that asteroid.  I am not sure if I would have had the balls to ride one of those things down until it hit the asteroid.”

Mike laughed. “Actually
, neither one of us did.  It was that crazy ass engineer that was with us that did it. And believe me; after he did it three times, he had no balls left either.  He said it about tore them off the first time as he had his legs wrapped around a grab bar when it hit the asteroid.  He has already designed a seat to be put on all future models in case it had to be done manually again.”

“He sings soprano real pretty like now,” joked Hank.

“It looks like you have been real busy here also,” Mike said as he gestured at the new cafeteria.

Abe nodded proudly.  “In one year, we have increased our pressurized space by over fifty thousand square feet.  We hope to double what we have now in another two years or so.  Most of the new space is greenhouses and lab space.  The new radar control center and its computers will take the rest.  Since we perfected molding the regolith into high stress concrete, we call it Regocrete; by the way, the underground construction has really taken off.  We have two nuclear reactors on the surface about two kilometers away and a large solar panel array that can provide backup power if we happen to be facing the sun.  If we have to take both the reactors down for maintenance or repairs, we have to make sure we are in the right orbital position to get the sunlight.  Since we only have sufficient sunlight for about two weeks a month or so, any maintenance on the power plants has to be well planned out.”

“Back to you two though; rumor mill has it that you have been chosen as the flight crew for the Phobos mission.  That will be a long flight, what about forty two days one way?”

Mike cleared his throat and looked at Hank.  “Space Force has not announced the flight crew yet.  The ship is almost ready to go and most of the specialists and engineers have been chosen.  We asked for it, but some of the other flight teams are griping that we get all the good missions, so we may not be chosen to go.”

“That’s bullshit,” said Abe.  If you are planning on sending a ship with twenty crewmen fifty million miles away, it seems to me you want to send your most experienced crew.  Nobody has been to Mars or to its moons before.  If the shit hits the fan and something bad happens, it will take the best we have to get the ship and crew back in one piece.”

“Sometimes Space Force does not…whoa…..who is that?” whispered Hank.  Abe and Mike turned to see who Hank was referring
to.  A very tall, long legged, blond woman was going through the cafeteria salad line.

“That my friends, is Lieutenant Kristy Nichols.  She may look hot as fire, but she is cold as ice.  Don’t even think about it Hank, you’ll be wasting your time,” Abe said.

“A man’s got to try,” said Hank as he stood.  “I don’t see a wedding band on her finger.”

Hank went through the cafeteria line again for a sandwich and then went and sat down
beside the Lieutenant.

Abe laughed and said “he’ll be back with his tail between his legs in about five minutes.”

“I did not know you had females here at the base, Abe,” said Mike.

“Actually, we have seventeen at the moment.  And every one of them is an expert at what they do.  I think they try that much harder to prove they are as good as the guys.  Hey, I heard that the Phobos mission has four females on its crew also, is that true?”

“Supposedly,” said Mike, “I have not seen the full crew roster yet.  Hey, you were right.  Here comes Hank back.”

Hank came back to their table and
sat down.  Abe laughed at him. “Shot down before you even made it into low orbit eh?”

“You did not tell me she is a certified flight engineer, nor did you tell me she is attracted to other women and not men,” accused Hank.