LunaDome: A Novel

by Olin, a. Paul

  And let them believe it, eh? Everyone needed at least a shimmer of hope.

  Beyond the doors was a large auditorium with a small group of about ten to twelve people. A large screen was stretching out beyond them, showing a rotating aerial view of Earth’s only satellite in all of its white and grey splendor.

  Mickey found a likely viewing area for us. We folded out our plush seats, and sat down to watch the show. Or whatever we were doing. Crass took off his backpack and sat it between his legs on the concrete floor. The lights began to dim and he tried making a head count in the dark as the Moon came into view again on the screen, this time zooming in on a highlighted area marked as Mare Tranquilitatis, translated for us Americans in parentheses (Sea of Tranquility).

  He counted nine plus Mickey and himself. The rocket had more room than he originally thought it did.

  Crass fumbled around in the front pocket of the bookbag searching for his hidden treats, found them, passed one off to Mickey, who was all smiles, and then he took one for himself. One bite and his eyes started to haze over, the screen becoming a murky disaster of color and gurgled sound.

  Ten ton bricks were resting on top of his eyelids, weighing them down with great force. He fought off sleep twice and then lost the battle on the third attempt.

  Mickey woke up Crass with a few soft nudges in the delicate ribcage area.

  “Dude, you’ve been out for the last two hours,” he said, taking a passive look at his wristwatch. “And you missed one hell of a movie. Did you know they’re already testing out habitats for Mars and Titan?”

  Crass rubbed his eyes. “Who is they?”

  “NASA, China, India, private citizens with loads of money. Whoever has the means, dear boy. This is a race into the Solar System, the fucking Gold Rush all over again!”

  “I thought we already made that point.” Crass said, giving out a wide yawn.

  Mickey had a puzzled look on his face. “What?”

  “Nevermind,” Crass said. “Hey. When are we leaving this place?”

  The screen on the wall was clearing up as the credits rolled over it in hyperspeed. He couldn’t catch a name to save his life, though he did try.

  Mickey looked to be contemplating the question far too long, analyzing something in an overdramatic fashion.

  “They haven’t said yet,” he replied, finally. “And nobody has asked for my or your ticket yet, which means I’m still in the clear being here and all.”

  “Don’t give up hope, Mickey. There may be a few seats left if you really want to go up there.” Crass said, pointing his finger towards the ceiling of the auditorium.

  “You may be right, Crass buddy. What I can’t figure out is what the hell we’re going to do up there?” he asked, also pointing his finger upward, aiming it at the lights as they started to brighten and the screen died in a haze of white discolorment.

  “There’s the LunaDome and space. That’s all I know really.” Crass glanced around the place, observing the crowd again.

  Long maroon drapes hung from the ceilings and against the walls in billowed sheets, lining the ambient décor. Crass closed his eyes, hearing the sounds around him slowly start to drift away, and the warm tunnel of light began edging closer and closer…he could almost feel the warming heat on his skin, running, and engulfing his arm, working higher towards his face.

  Mickey broke the silence and Crass snapped back to reality. He realized he was sitting in a plush seat in an auditorium off the coast of Florida. Innsmouth was the name of the place. Damnit was he was tired. And he was going to the…to the?

  “What’d you say?” Crass asked, rubbing his eyes again and looking over at Mickey.

  “I was verbally wondering how much regolith would go for on eBay or Amazon. If we could somehow attain enough and get i—”

  Crass interrupted him. “Hold on a minute. What the hell is regoliff?”

  “It’s rega-LITH, genius. And since you were getting your beauty rest, I’ll fill go ahead and fill you in. Regolith is alias for lunar dust or debris. It’s kind of like the topsoil of the Moon, I guess you could say.”

  There was an infectious glint spreading over Mickey’s face and lighting up his entire demeanor and attitude. Crass momentarily thought he saw the presence of dollar signs dancing in his pupils like a Vegas showgirl. He blinked twice, noticing they’d returned back to normal. Regular, accustomed to expect, eyeballs with color and big black pupils like raisins.

  Crass went to stand up so he could stretch his legs when he realized both of his feet had lost the essential blood flow and gone completely dead. He was paralyzed in the seat, feeling the warm tingle of life spreading through his feet that felt like the weight of cinder blocks.

  Both double doors opened and our escorts, the Men in Black, were both standing there and talking to the crowd. One was telling the crowd to follow Mr. Jones, the Man in Black #1 (white guy with genial flowing blond hair), to the elevator if they wanted to proceed with the launch.

  Man in Black #2 (black guy with radiant eyes, flaring nose, maybe a temper) was telling the others if they wanted a refund they would need to fill out Form OPT-OUT Schedule 496 and send it off to such and such address, only after having it signed by three witnesses here, and also, it needed to be notarized before being mailed out. And get this, all of it need to be done here tonight, no stinking exceptions to the rules.

  All was well until people found out the only notary public on the island charged eight dollars and ninety-six cents to complete their end of the deal. When Crass’s feet found their intended use again, he was up and out the door right behind Mickey. They brushed past the bickering crowd who were in an uproar, still bitching and moaning about that ridiculous notary public’s fee.

  We made it out and over to the elevator behind Mr. Jones, glancing back down the hall at the open doors of the auditorium. Walking our way was a small group of four or five people. Mr. Jones pushed the down button and we waited for our ride below. The group assembled by the door and spoke in light tones of conversation. You could literally feel the anticipation in the air.

  A bell rang and the doors unhinged into the walls, revealing an enormous cart capable of fitting a John Deere tractor inside. The group filed in, then Mr. Jones, followed by Mickey, who nudged Crass right before stepping on the elevator, tilting his head violently to the right. In the male Homo sapiens body language, this meant he should check out something particularly interesting in the general direction of the head tilt.

  So he did.

  In the hallway, a dark haired girl checked her makeup in a wide mirror hung between two still-life paintings. She was shading in her eyes with a stubby black pencil, and the single most memorable thing about her was her choice in footwear—none.

  Crass looked down the hall, noticing an estranged looking young man in a tweed jacket. He was holding on to a pair of studded high heels, something expensive and not cheap. Think Valentino or Manolo Blahnik, elegant and sexy.

  She put the pencil away in her purse, turned towards the elevator, and began walking slowly toward us, swinging her hips gracefully back and forth. Crass held the door as she stepped on board and to his right, whispering almost inaudibly, “Thank God that’s over.”

  Mr. Jones pushed the button for the 1st floor and the cart started to move down into the belly of the stone mansion. On the way down, all Crass could think about was…

  What kind of perfume is that? Damn, it smells fucking good. Why the hell is she barefooted? She must be from the country I guess, one of those Southern girls you sometimes hear about. I don’t know though, her purse looks expensive. Hold on, is that a Louis Vuitton?

  He thought it was. And he didn’t know why, but he liked that fact.

  V: Bathroom Break

  The elevator stopped and a female with a serene, computerized voice said, “Welcome to the first floor. Please proceed to the waiting area for further instructions.”

  The people filed out in droves behind the fearless, blank-faced leader, M
r. Jones. Mickey and Crass hung close to the back of the crowd while Jonesy went over a few rules and safety tips.

  Crass felt his eyes trying to haze over again (this guy’s voice is so monotone) and he tried mentally highlighting a few key notes from the speaker. He looked to his right, hoping to mention something funny to Mickey and Poof! He’s gone. Vanished like thin goddam air.

  They always tell you not to panic in sticky situations, so Crass did the American thing and casually ignored the problem. He tapped his feet, whistled or whatever, and found the patterns sewn in the brunette’s blue jeans pockets utterly fascinating. Her ass rounded over and sat firmly on her upper thigh.

  Crass traced his eyes up the back of her shirt, thinking he may have spotted Waldo in the patterns of her shirt, a kaleidoscope of colorful imprints, very elegantly sewn with caring hands. Her black hair fell over her shoulders and ran midways down her back.

  He looked around the place again and didn’t see Mickey anywhere around, although he knew for a solid fact that he’d stepped off the elevator with him. To the left and right of the elevator’s metal casing were small wooden benches and above them both hung large picture frames.

  On the left was a snapshot of the American flag being planted on the Moon’s surface—from the Apollo 11 mission. A small light above lit it up immensely, almost to the point where you had to squint your eyes just to focus on it.

  The right side was an artist’s rendition of a working habitat, this planet looking to be more reddish, and below it a small bronze plaque was glistening, absolutely glowing under the lights. It read:

  Habitable Life ON MARS

  Coming 2040

  Damn, he thought. Someone had big plans for the Red Planet. They’d like to move up there and create a permanent residence, sort of kinda like the English pilgrims done in Jamestown or Plymouth Rock.

  Far out, he thought.

  The wooden bench was empty, but to the right and slightly out of view was a door with the words RESTROOM on it. It took Crass awhile to see it, but when he did he felt relief, as he hoped Mickey was doing, in the restroom, and not slipped off into the next fucking time zone somewhere.

  He pushed the door inwards, walking through a hallway with dimly lit wall sconces throwing ambient light against the stone floor. Rounding the corner, he saw several jet black stalls and Mickey washing his hands in a giant water bowl sitting on top of the ebony vanity. His reflection looked up and at me from the mirror.

  Crass was going to ask a question when he lost all train of thought. Something alien entered his nose and his mouth started to salivate, drool running down the inside of his cheek and collecting around his teeth.

  “Oh my GOD!” he exclaimed, sniffing out the pleasant tones in the air. “What is that?”

  They’d put another wooden bench against the left wall, and above it hung a familiar painting, one he remembered studying back in college, on one of those days when he actually showed up to class. If memory served him correctly, it was Van Gogh’s Starry Night Over the Rhone, but in the case it didn’t (it’s been known to happen), then he was almost certain it was one of his others—Café Terrace at Night.

  The painting looked undecided itself, and swirled around by invisible brushstrokes, changing quite literally before his eyes. Mickey didn’t appear to notice or even care about what was taking place before him.

  “These toilets in here man,” he started. “They’ve been engineered to chemically analyze your shit and tell a computer what your last meal was. It sends this information over to the air ducts whose job it is to reproduce the original smell of that meal.” He wiped his hands off on his pants and straightened up his leather flight jacket.

  “How do you know this stuff?” Crass asked, easing back to relax on the wall below the temperamental, mind warping, oil painting taking place up there.

  Mickey reached in his jacket by his breast pocket, pulled out a three by five-inch manual, and tossed it in his lap.

  “It was written by the owner of this fine estate,” he said with a quick smile. “He talks about all of the swell amenities built into it, some one-thousand, one-hundred and twenty-seven updates for modern living that would make Martha Stewart cream her jeans.”

  Crass opened it up and flipped through the pages like it was a Gideon’s Bible from a decrepit hotel room. Not one picture in it and an unrelenting love for the word lugubrious.

  “We’ve brought civilization to the Moon, renovating the lugubrious terrain extensively.”

  He felt quite lugubrious just reading over the damn thing.

  “Innsmouth Island, once a lugubrious and abandoned military fort, was transformed…”

  Crass gave the flimsy manual back to Mickey and focused on the smell in the air. What was it? he wondered. Hints of charcoal? Something sharp and irritating, cracked black peppercorns? And that final twang that went with every little bite, savoring the tender meat—

  “Did you have a steak dinner?” Crass asked Mickey, quickly and with a pertinence that suggested he might be entertaining his fantasy of being on a game show.

  Mickey gazed back at him, his expression as placid as a puddle of rain under an umbrella. “Is that what you’re picking up?” he asked, walking off to inspect the vent in the ceiling.

  Sniffing the air, Crass reaffirmed his vote. If there was anyone who knew the smell of a steak dinner, it was him. And of course that sounded cocky and pompous, but just hear him out for a moment. His downstairs’ neighbors, a nice 21st century modern couple, had went out and purchased one of those ceramic green eggs that secrete all flavors and smells out the top.

  He was guessing that in order to justify their actions, they’d moved their entire kitchen from inside to out, and their drastic alteration has indefinitely changed the whole atmosphere and boundaries of his penthouse condo. One step outside and the smell of grilled shish-kabobs slaps you straight in the teeth. Grilled shrimp, grilled salmon, grilled asparagus, grilled grape leaves (WTF?), grilled meat loaf, grilled bread, grill whatever you can find in the kitchen pantry. They’d gone grill fucking happy with it.

  “I’d know that smell if I was blindfolded,” Crass said. He was watching Mickey change the air flow on the vent when he heard the heavy thud of the bathroom door and soft footsteps coming from around the corner.

  He braced both arms on the front lip of the bench, gripping it tight, and locking his elbows in place so he could lean forward and get a better look at the unexpected guest. She turned the corner, stopping to stare at Mickey with a look Crass could only describe as slightly indignant, possibly only a little pissed off at not getting something she’d wanted earlier in the day.

  “What are you doing?” she asked, looking at Mickey and pulling something shiny and metallic from the red purse with leopard print jacquard curling around the corners.

  Mickey was so caught up in his technology obsession he hadn’t heard the stranger come in. He looked at Crass and kind of shrugged his shoulders, the folds of leather bunching up around the neck and making that iconic leather sound that’s so fucking hard to reproduce with words.

  “When did she get here?” he asked Crass.

  Both of them were now looking at him like he’d invited the devil to sit down right beside him on the bench.

  “About thirty seconds ago when you were fiddling with the air conditioning vent,” Crass said.

  “It’s not an air conditioning vent,” Mickey said matter-of-factly. “I know it looks like one to the untrained eye, but I’ve been in upscale bathrooms before and learned a thing or two.”

  “Uh-huh. Like what?” the dark-headed girl asked, pulling a cigarette out of the metal case and placing it between her lips. She slipped the case back in her exotic purse and asked Mickey if he had a light. He said no, and she began walking towards Crass, her bare feet now encased in teal green surgical booties wore around hospital surgery wards.

  “Have a lighter?” she asked, pushing her breasts and hips forward, as if pulled by an invisible string attach
ed to his wildly beating heart.

  “Yes…I mean no. I don’t smoke.”

  “Ugghhh,” she muttered under her breath, and sat down next to him on the bench, crossing her left leg over the right and bobbing her inflated green foot in 4/4 time.

  She dug her free hand through the bottom of her purse, amidst a pile of cosmetics and other indistinguishable items. Something small and wrapped in aluminum foil fell out on her lap, slid off and hit the jagged stone floor. Crass reached down and picked it up, turning it over to inspect the bright yellow sticker pasted there.

  “It’s a moon pie. Brett wanted to stop in Mobile for the Mardi Gras parades. I tried telling him it was for a bunch inebriated seagulls looking for a handout, but no we just had to stop in,” she said, holding a lighter in her hand. Crass handed the shiny marshmallow treat back to her.

  “Have you ever ate one?” she asked.

  “Yeah, I like the vanilla alright, but that’s the chocolate flavor.”

  “I wasn’t asking if you wanted a bite,” she replied, shoving the foiled wrapper back in her small purse and zipping it quicker than greased lightning.

  She scratched the lighter’s wheel and set fire to her cigarette. A cloud of smoke swirled around his face and up towards the painting and the ceiling. He felt tension on the rise. He traveled to the upstairs library in his imagination, looking for anything that might help to change the subject and possibly bring an atmosphere of serenity to the table.

  “What’s your name? I’m Crass and the handsome guy over there is Mickey.”

  “Eva,” she said, bringing the cigarette to her lips. She puffed it twice, and exhaled slowly through her nose.

  “Where are your shoes at?” Mickey asked. “Wait a sec; please don’t tell me you follow that Japanese tradition of taking your shoes off at the door.” He had his hand up high on the ceiling vent.