Paul Gillebaard - USSR Hoax

Tom chuckled at the little girl’s problem. He wondered if her eight-year-old brother was also playing. “Is David looking for him too?”

“No, he won’t play with us, and he won’t help me find Peter.”

Tom had to decide whether he should give up his son’s hiding place. Instead, he decided to give Ashley a little help. “Your daddy is in the kitchen. Tell you what, go in there and tell your daddy you saw big black spiders under the sink today.”

“I hate spiders.”

“Me too. So tell your dad and I bet you Peter will show up.”

The girl straightened her cute, yellow sunflower dress. “Okay.”

Tom walked back to the table as the girl left.

“Is Peter your boy?”

Tom smiled as he turned to Dusty. “He is.”

“Sounds like he’s already making the girls cry.”

“Yeah, but Ashley is going to set him straight.”

THAT’S ONE SMALL step for man, one giant leap for mankind.

Those historic words kept repeating in Tom’s head as he lay on the partially reclined lounge chair in his empty backyard, mesmerized by the gleaming crescent moon floating high in the black night sky. The yard was dead quiet except for the occasional cricket chirp. Tom kept shaking his head in amazement. He still couldn’t believe men he knew were on the moon, probably sitting in the LM at that moment excitedly discussing their recent walk on the lunar surface. Those lucky sons of guns. Their feat was making it more plausible Tom would be doing the same soon, once he successfully plundered a small sample of their precious cargo from the LRL building after their return.

The sliding glass door opened, breaking Tom’s concentration.

“What are you doing out here, honey? It’s after 2:00 a.m.”

Tom watched his wife cross the patio barefoot in a long blue nightgown, her arms crossed tightly against her body. He was surprised she was up after she’d kissed him goodnight over an hour ago and headed off to bed. She had had a busy day supporting one of the Apollo 11 astronauts’ wives at her packed home a few streets over. Anne even took the lead in dealing with the press, making sure they kept their distance. Tom had been at mission control observing the flight before eventually joining Anne at the gathering. By the time Tom got there the place had a party atmosphere, celebrating the successful landing and EVA. The two stayed late to help clean up. By the time they got back home, Anne was exhausted.

Tom answered in a lively voice. “It’s tough to go to sleep knowing two men we know are on the surface of the moon. I just can’t believe we beat Kennedy’s deadline, and the world got to see it live on television.”

“Yes, it’s definitely an amazing feat. But like them, you need to get some sleep.”

Tom opened his legs so his wife could sit between them. “I will.” He patted the seat in front of him. “But first come join me.”

Tilting her head slightly, Anne seemed to be considering the offer. Tom patted the area again before she finally consented and walked over. She positioned herself on the lounge and slid back tightly against his chest. She put her head back on his shoulder as she looked skyward.

Wrapping his arms snugly around her, Tom looked back up at the moon. His voice was still full of excitement. “I betcha they’re having a hell of a time trying to get to sleep. Could you imagine looking out your widow and seeing a vast, untouched, alien wasteland surrounding you, beckoning you to come back out? It must be like some dream. How can anyone sleep with that outside?”

Anne answered casually, “That’s why they have sleeping pills. They’ve hardly slept over the last few days, and they have another busy day tomorrow.”

“They’ll be lucky if they get an hour’s worth tonight. I know when I’m up there, I’ll probably be too wired and excited to sleep.”

When Anne turned around, Tom was surprised to see that her eyes were filled with joy. “That’s the first time over the last year you’ve talked about being on the moon.” She gave him a hard slap on the chest. “Good for you. I’m glad you’re talking like that. I’ve always said you’ll be up there someday. Besides, there are no blondes there to tempt you.”

Tom laughed at the joke, a sign his wife had accepted his side of the story. “Hey, there’s only been one moonwalk. So you never know. There could still be a lady or two somewhere on the moon.”

Anne smiled, settling her head back on his shoulder.

Tom hugged his wife a little tighter. He wished he could open up on what his chances were to fly to the moon, but he couldn’t.

WHEN VIKTOR ENTERED the hazy conference room, he saw the same man from previous meetings that he suspected was a KGB agent. The man sat patiently alone smoking a cigarette at the middle of the long wooden table. He signaled for Viktor to close the door, which he did before taking a seat across from the man. The agent appeared agitated, which Viktor assumed was due to the Americans officially winning the space race. Ever since the moonwalkers returned safely back to Earth two weeks ago, the morale around Star City had been at an all-time low. The demoralizing defeat was tough for any Soviet to swallow.

With the N1 rocket blowing up on the pad earlier that month, Viktor wondered if flying to the moon was a lost dream. “You wanted to see me?”

The man took one last deep drag off his cigarette before smashing the butt hard into the ashtray. He opened a file in front of him before slowly blowing out the smoke in Viktor’s direction, eyeing him the whole time. “Can you believe there is an American flag, right now, on the moon?”

Ignoring the smoke, Viktor tried to stay positive. He shook his head. “It’s a shock, but the Americans did sign the moon treaty. At least that flag doesn’t symbolize the moon is now their territory.”

An edge of frustration tinged the agent’s voice. “What that flag symbolizes is the United States will probably be the lone superpower of the world someday soon.”

Surprised by the statement, Viktor still felt his country would continue to be a superpower and a leader in space. “We accomplished many amazing feats in space, beating the Americans many times. Being the first to the moon shouldn’t erase all of those achievements. Besides, we could still be the first to Mars.”

Not listening, the agent looked right past Viktor with a blank stare. “Too bad we didn’t blow up their spacecraft.”

Viktor raised an eyebrow at that comment, wondering what the man meant. “Excuse me?”

The agent stayed in his trance. He seemed to drop his guard as he spoke in sadness. “The general secretary instructed us to do whatever we could to prevent the Americans from succeeding. We fired off a Luna spacecraft that had a laser weapon on board to chase down the Apollo 11 spacecraft. The plan was to destroy the Command Module while the astronauts were on the moon, basically leaving them to die. Such devastation would definitely have snatched victory from the Americans’ hands, essentially shutting down their space program. We would have soon been victors of the Cold War. But instead, the Luna spacecraft failed, crashing into the moon.”

Viktor sat stunned hearing about the secret plan. All the cosmonauts knew of the Luna 15 mission, figuring it was sent to retrieve lunar samples robotically. This was the first he had heard a weapon was onboard. He assumed the agent felt comfortable opening up since Viktor worked on the laser project when he first joined the program. At the time, he had no idea what its intended purpose was. Hearing the purpose was to try to assassinate American astronauts greatly disturbed him. As much as he wanted his country to win the space race, killing innocent spacemen purely for political reasons strayed way beyond what he thought was right. Those men were explorers just like him, trying to expand the reach of all mankind into the cosmos. A part of Viktor was glad the Luna mission had failed, even if it meant losing out on his own moon flight. He tried to keep a steady face as he responded firmly, “I believe they landed for all mankind, just as the astronaut stated.”