Carl Frederick: The Long Way Around

“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?”