Luke Marusiak: Lifeboat Moon

She shook her head to clear it. Finally, the atmospheric pressure light came on. Sally opened the hangar’s inner hatch door — a much easier task than the lunar chute hatch had been — and bounded through with her charge. Chuck, goddamn him anyway, hadn’t moved from his relaxed position in the control room. She slammed the hatch door shut, latched it, and attended to Mark.

Sally found the release hook in front of his helmet, pulled out the locking pin, ignored the space suit alarm, and ripped her friend’s space suit helmet off. She thought she heard him gasp. “Mark? Can you hear me?”

Mark opened his eyes to slits, got a glimpse of his surroundings, and closed them shut. He needed all his mental energy to breathe. His oxygen-deprivation training kicked in and he resisted panting. He sucked air through his gaping mouth in long deep breaths and exhaled through his nose. The air was heavy with oxygen. There were the acrid smells one never got used to, there was the near freezing temperature, but the air, thank God in heaven above, was rich with oxygen. He could sense it. This is 30% oxygen, not the 25% in the habitation modules. I can feel it thick in my lungs. He breathed using the oxygen-deprivation protocol he’d drilled on so often. In… slow… deep… out through the nose… controlled exhale.

He sat like that for several minutes eyes closed, hoping all his faculties would return. His brief glimpse was enough to let him know he was in the hangar just inside the load lock hatch door. And he knew another precious thing. Sally was there. Sally was there and she saved him.

Whatever happened to strand him out in the unforgiving vacuum, she saved him. He chanced opening his eyes on a large inhale and saw Sally, through a clearing fog of consciousness, staring at him with wide eyes and ridges of concern etched on her forehead. He forced a smile. “What took you so long?”

“That was my fault,” a familiar voice, not Sally’s, answered. “Sorry man.”

Mark turned his head and through his clearing haze saw Chuck. “What?”

“I got up for a minute and was talking to Chuck,” Sally said. “I lost track of the time.”

Mark frowned. What the hell? I should’ve had more air. He unbuckled his locking ring and Sally pulled the top half of his spacesuit off his head. He gingerly stood and extracted himself from the bottom half of his suit. He gave Sally a puzzled glance.

She didn’t meet his gaze. “I’ll get these processed. I need my suit done as well.” She took Mark’s suit, grabbed his helmet, and bounded toward the equipment room.

Mark’s alertness returned. “The oxygen plant’s doing fine in case anyone wants to know.” His anger flared. “That stuff doesn’t take care of itself.” He looked toward Sally but she’d already moved through the equipment hatch. He turned to Chuck who still leaned against the control panel. “What’s the smirk for?”

“I guess you’ll be around a few more days,” Chuck replied.

Mark bounded from the hangar to the control panel in one large move. He caught himself on a ceiling rail placed there for just that purpose and dropped in front of Chuck. “I’ve had enough of your fatalistic bullshit.”

“You didn’t need to go out there sport.”

“Making sure our pod’s oxygen reactor has adequate power is one of the most important things I do.”

“Blah, blah, blah… who cares? We’re all going to die anyway. I was doing you a favor and Sally screwed it up.

“You left me out there on purpose ?” Mark’s wrath rose and he could feel his newly oxygenated red blood cells burn his cheeks. “Are you serious?”

“Yes, I tried to get Sally to leave you out there on purpose.” Chuck shouted. “Then we can end this ridiculous charade.”

Mark lost control. He balled a fist at waist level and drove a powerful uppercut into Chuck’s chin. He felt and heard satisfying bone cracks as his fist made contact. Like in the old cartoons, the force lifted Chuck completely off his feet. He flew back, was stopped abruptly by a wall, and then fell forward crumpled on the deck. Blood pooled from his disfigured jaw.

“What did you do?” Sally asked, appearing beside Mark.

“The son of a bitch tried to kill me.”

Chuck tried to open his mouth and, in a panic, realized it was welded together. He reached up and discovered he had on a virtual reality — VR visor with noise cancelling earbuds. He ripped his VR headset off and tried again to open his mouth. Instead, his lips peeled back revealing teeth surgically wired together.

A nurse appeared at his side. “Don’t try to open your mouth. We’ve wired it shut.”

Chuck wanted to say ‘Why?’ but what came out of his clenched teeth was, “Eeeiiii?”

The nurse understood. “You’ve got a broken jaw. It’ll take six weeks to heal.”

“Urrrgex eeeks?” Chuck was aghast. That no good bastard.

“Someone is here to see you,” the nurse said.

Chuck looked at the hatchway and sat bolt upright. Standing in the med-bay’s hatch was none other than the person responsible for his broken jaw. He peeled his lips back from his teeth and forced a clenched mouth intelligible word. “Maarrk.”

Mark shook his head and walked to the side of Chuck’s bed. He turned to the nurse and read the name stitched to her uniform. “Carol, can you give us a minute?”

“I’ve got twenty patients with the flu so I’ll be gone for a while.” She pulled a mask over her mouth and nose and turned to Chuck. “You’re the only one with broken bones. Be more careful next time you go drinking.” She bounded out the hatch with a light jump.

“Thas the story? I was drinking?” Chuck realized by pretending he was a ventriloquist, his speech was more or less legible.

“That’s the story Ace,” Mark answered. He glared at Chuck. “You rigged my tank. I went out thinking I had more air. You damn near got me killed.”

“We’re all gonna die.” Chuck replied through clenched teeth. “The earth’s gone.”

“We don’t know that. No one’s giving up.”

Chuck shook his head.

“Listen.” Mark leaned close. “If I catch you pulling a stunt like that on anyone, I will kill you.” With that pronouncement Mark arose and exited the med-bay.

Chuck felt tears well and, not wanting anyone to see, put his VR headset on. He closed his eyes and muted the sound. This is all wrong, he thought. Nothing was as promised two years ago. Nothing’s right. He sighed. I wish I was down there when it happened.

For all the things people thought would end the earth’s future; few had an inkling of what would be its demise. The most surprising thing was that it wasn’t humanity’s folly. It wasn’t climate change, nuclear war, or meltdowns. It wasn’t a meteor strike or a super volcano eruption. No, it was a bizarre celestial anomaly that, even now, was uncertain in effect.

Chuck started as his VR headset was shook. He removed it and stared into the big brown eyes of Sally Ride Henderson. He forgot for a moment that his teeth were wired shut and grunted out, “Eeehh.”

“Hey yourself,” Sally replied. “What were you thinking?”

He exhaled in frustration.

“Mark knows you adjusted the offset for his air.”

“He waas here.” Chuck still worked talking through his wired-shut jaw.

“I’ll bet that went well. You wanted to kill him?”

“We’re all dead anyway. Juust a matter of time.”

Sally frowned. “Chuck!”

“I wasn’t trying to kill him.” He was getting his annunciation down. “I wanted everybody to know how fragile we are. Big Mark needed to stop playing the hero.”