by TS Paul
“That’s not quite what he said but … I’m an idiot. Thanks, Maxim!” Ron smiled, realizing that he could just call the girls.
“Potato, potahto is all the same. Hold on...big crater! Yaaahooo!” The large boy let out an ear-piercing howl as the rover went off the edge of the large crater.
Half a mile to the west the girls were flying along. Rota-Ree had some speed to her.
“That’s pretty.” Tina pointed to a rock formation on their left.
“It looks like a dragon. We should get a picture, if anything, to show Team Charlie. They keep lording it up about space walking.”
“That sounds good Yana. We should do that. Remind me on the way back.” Tina heard a faint scratching in her helmet.
“Did you hear that?”
Yana slowed the rover down and concentrated on the faint scratching only to be almost flattened by Maxim’s howl!
CHAPTER TEN
“What did you idiots do to this thing?” Yana was walking around Wheelie shaking her head. The front end was smashed in along with the upper roll bars. It was a miracle the boys survived the crash.
“We drove off edge up there.” Maxim pointed up to the edge of the large crater they were standing in.
Ron looked up too. “Yeah, Maxim let out a howl and over we went! If my boots weren’t locked to the deck, I might have died. Is it wrong to want to go again?”
Laughing, Maxim clapped Ron on his shoulder. “Nyet! We can find more, less dangerous things to do. Come. We fix.”
“We fix. We fix. Is that all you have to say?” Nestor crawled out from under the rover. Grabbing his cousin’s hand, he hauled himself to his feet.
“Is fixed?”
“Of course. Only a bent axle. We should be OK now. The body needs work but is driveable.”
“Good.” Maxim saw the looks on the girl’s faces. “Nestor is the family mechanic. Can fix anything mechanical. Where would you like to go?”
“Yana was taking me to see the Apollo 11 site, but I’m not so sure now.” Tina pulled out her tablet.
“Tina, we are here.” Ron stepped over and showed her his map. “Apollo 11 is way over there.” He pointed.
“What is here?” Yana looked over Tina’s shoulder.
“That is Palus Somni.” Ron checked his own tablet. “It’s right on the edge of the area they told us to stay out of.”
“Why is it brown rather than gray?” Yana peered closer at the tablet.
“Not sure. My tablet doesn’t have that information. The name means ‘Marsh of Sleep.’ It does have more of an albedo than the surrounding area. That might be the magnetic soil Bobcat mentioned.”
“Ron, what is this ‘albedo’ you speak of?” Maxim had his tablet out too.
“In the simplest terms, it means a reflective surface. Many conspiracy groups think the shiny parts of the moon contain alien bases or ships. From Earth, all they can see is the reflection. If NASA has found anything, they didn’t tell anyone.”
“We should go look.” The whole group turned to stare at Tina.
“I thought it was against the rules?” Yana grinned at her friend.
“They said it was off-limits because of weird electromagnetism. We could just go to the edge. Just to look.”
Maxim gave Ron a push. “Well?”
“It’s pretty far. These things go way faster than Bobcat told us. Let me check the battery charges.” He stepped over to the pink rover first.
Yana watched as Ron checked the battery and then deployed the solar panel. He came back and had to crawl under his beat up rover.
“I deployed your panels. We have enough juice to get us there, but we might not have enough to get back. It does get dark here. We might have to call them to save us.”
“Still big adventure and way worth it. What do you say Yana?” Maxim stared at his competition.
“Only if your buggy runs. If not, we will abort and give them a call. Understood?”
“Understood. It’ll run. Nestor is a master fixer.” Maxim and his cousin climbed into the rover.
“Hey, what about me?” Ron stared up at his friends.
“You ride with girls this time Ron. The rover is too dangerous now.” Maxim turned the key, and they could all hear the whine of the electric motor.
“It will start.” Nester motioned with his chin for Maxim to give it some ‘gas.’
The rover lurched forward very shakily. Up in the cockpit, the boys were bouncing around more than usual, but mostly safe.
“Boys!” Yana said, “Ron, hop on in.” They all climbed into Rota-Ree and took off after the monster truck version of a moon rover.
With a goal now in mind, the two rovers started to make better time than before. The Wheelie vehicle was a tiny bit slower than the girl’s rover due to the crash. Nestor’s quick fix wasn’t perfect.
Nestor nudged his cousin, “Maxim, you were too harsh with Ron.”
“He scared me when we landed in the crater. I thought for sure he was dead. I was looking for his body when he tapped me on the arm. I must have jumped a foot. He is a good friend, I will apologize later.”
“You do that. This is fun.” Nestor was watching the craters and rocks on the surface. For all his nonchalance this was really cool. They were on the Moon!
—
“I’m tempted just to leave all this stuff and have Jean destroy it from orbit.” Bobcat was under one of the computer consoles trying to unhook the system.
He heard William from above, “Why do that? You said it yourself, this equipment is important.”
“I know that, but they made this stuff so close to the wall I can’t quite reach it!” His arm was up into the middle of the wires and cables.
“Move your arm.”
There was a muffled grunt. “What did you say?”
“Bobcat move your arm!”
He pulled his arm back and asked. “Why?” A large machete came swinging along the wall just missing his head.
“AAaiiee!” Bobcat yelled, and scooted out of the tiny space. “You just missed hitting me!”
“I was careful.” William checked the blade before putting it away.
“Where did you get that thing and why is it up here on the moon?” Bobcat checked his hair and top of his head with his fingers.
“I don’t go anywhere without it. Ever since those guys shot me, I try to stay armed.” He patted the large blade again.
“With that? From what? Rogue asteroids? You are crazy, man.”
“We can re-wire this stuff later, and besides, it saves a bunch of time.” William started packing up the now, disconnected, equipment.
“This might be easier with those kids helping. Have you been watching them?” Bobcat placed the chopped up wire into one of the recycling bags.
“Me? I thought you were doing that,” William closed the box.
Bobcat scratched his chin, “No. I thought we agreed, you would keep an eye on them. Maybe it was Marcus.”
“Maybe it was Marcus, what?” Marcus stepped over some of the equipment and began peeking into the equipment bays.
“Keeping an eye on the kids. You’ve been tracking them, right?” Bobcat stopped what he was doing and stared at the older scientist.
“No. Was I supposed to? I left that up to you two since you turned them loose.”
“Guys, if I didn’t watch them and you didn’t watch them? Where are they now?” William had his tablet out and was staring at it.
“OK, I’ll play. Where are they?” Bobcat looked over at his best friend.
William mumbled, “That was rhetorical. I think that teacher lady is right. We should call you Bozo. They aren’t showing up on my map.” He held up the tablet and turned it around for Bobcat to see.
“What? Please don’t tell me we lost them.” Bobcat reached for the tablet and stared at it.
Looking at his own Marcus began to make faces at it. “I know where they were.”
“Where?” Bobcat asked.
“They went toward the Sea of Tr
anquility. It looks like the girls got ahead of the boys somehow and they went through this section here to catch up.” Marcus pointed at the map.
“Ouch! That is a huge drop-off! Are they dead? Please tell me they aren’t dead? The Queen is going to kill me! Cheryl Lynn will kill me, and John is definitely going to kill me, probably twice. Have you seen him lately? I think he has grown to extra-large-and-deadly. It will be chiseled on my gravestone I am the only member of Team BMW to be killed,” he started counting on his fingers, “Four times!” Bobcat held his head and began to moan.
“Not dead. See they started moving again. They were headed toward the Marsh of Sleep, that’s right on the edge of where we told them not to go.” Marcus tried to zoom in closer. Bobcat let go of his head and stepped over to look.
William shrugged, “Of course. Tell them not to go, and they do anyway. They should still be on the map. We’ve flown over that area before without harm. It is a bit shaky but doable.” Bobcat’s breathing had slowed down, but he was still trying not to hyperventilate.
“That’s in a pod. Who knows what it’s like on the ground. We need to look for them.” William stared at his friends.
“We can use the E. I. satellite system to look for them. If we ask ADAM or Meredith to help, we should find them pretty quick.” Marcus pulled his tablet back from Bobcat and began to type.
“Marcus, what are you doing?” Bobcat gave him a funny look.
“Sending a message up to the Meredith Reynolds asking for ADAM or TOM to take a look.” He began to type faster. Suddenly his tablet was snatched out of his hands.
Marcus looked up confused, “Why did you do that? I was almost finished.”
“Dude, we can’t ask for help! We have to do it, just us. If they find out about it, up there...We will never live it down. We will be the ones that lost five kids on their first field trip! We have to find them ourselves.”
“Marcus, Bobcat is right. I can’t believe it either, but the Queen won’t be very happy with us if we lose them. We can use the pod to carry the last rover. We can trace where they went and then follow their tracks. They are kids.”
William looked at his two friends, “How hard can it be?”
—
“Whoa! Look out for that boulder!” The Marsh of Sleep was a bust. The soil was just a brown rust color that looked to be the result of a meteor impact. Ron was taking samples when they saw the gleam.
Twenty minutes earlier…
“So it’s just one big impact crater?” Tina stood in the middle of what resembled a brown field of rocks.
“The different colored stones is what makes the color show up from space. The meteor must have been massive to cause this much debris.” Ron picked up rocks here and there adding them to his bag.
“So where to now?” Yana casually looked all around her.
Nestor pointed toward the east. “What is that? It appears to be moving.”
“A spacecraft or probe of some kind? It could be Marcus and Bobcat looking for us.” Maxim dug in the rover for something to see better with.
“Let’s go check it out. It’s just over there.” Ron pointed. “It might be wreckage or something we can haul back.”
“He’s got a point.” Tina agreed. “If we find wreckage, they won’t yell so much about us going out-of-bounds.”
“Tina, you rule breaker you. Come on boys, let's go find the whatever-it-is.” Yana waved them to the rovers.
“Sure. Why not. We are overdue anyway.” Maxim climbed behind the wheel again.
The gleam in the distance suddenly disappeared.
“Hey, it’s gone! Maybe it was a probe.” Ron strained his eyes to see.
“Let’s go anyway.” The two rovers continued east.
—
“I’m starting to hate these kids.” William stared at the hole dug out of the regolith where a rover obviously crashed.
Bobcat punched his friend in the arm. “Don’t hate the kids.”
Rubbing his shoulder William replied. “I don’t really hate them. They just make me look bad. That fall should have destroyed that rover. But somehow they fixed it and continued on. They could take my job, that’s all.”
“They went east like on the map.” Marcus pointed toward the tracks. “The larger rover is driving a little shaky.”
“OK, now I don’t feel so bad. They aren’t perfect. Are you sure they are headed to the Marsh of Sleep?”
Marcus nodded. “That is where the computer lost them. The EM field is much stronger than it was last year. I will have to check the older readings.” He began to type on his tablet.
“Um, Marcus, what are you doing?”
Marcus looked up noticing his two friends stared at him. “Uh, I was checking last year's findings and comparing them. I was about to have ADAM… Oh. Sorry. I forgot.”
Bobcat waved his hands in the air and shook his head. “Just kill me already Marcus. Thanks, buddy.”
Their Pod swooped over the brown colored area known as the Marsh of Sleep by those on Earth. Not a kid in sight.
“OK, now what?” Bobcat looked to William.
“We drop the LRV and search for them. We can lock the pod’s position down, it will stay here for us.” He carefully set the Pod down on the brown soil.
“Have either of you driven one of these rovers?” Marcus climbed into the rear of the vehicle.
“I have, but only to move it. This one is Dr. Crankinstein according to the artwork on the back.” The rover was painted like it belonged to the Munsters.
“Are the other two decorated like this?” Marcus examined the skulls and spiders decorating the rear area.
“Not quite. Those engineers we sent here were a bit on the odd side. I think this one was painted by a goth or something.” The steering wheel was off of a race car. Both it and the gear stick were skull shaped.
“I like it. Remind me to track this guy down. He can decorate my car for me.” William smiled.
“What car? The one back in Florida that the State confiscated? That car?”
“They confiscated his car? Where was I when this happened?” Marcus looked at William.
“It was around the same time they got BA’s house in Smugglers Cove. They called it eminent domain, but you know they were looking for tech or clues about TQB. I’m going to miss my car the most. It was sweet!”
William’s face took on a darker look. “A buddy of mine in the police force told me they stripped it down and used saws to cut it apart. Haven’t they ever seen a lift kit before? Idiots.”
“I’m not up on my cars but what did you have?” Marcus knew guys liked to talk about cars.
“It was a 1968 Road Runner my dad left me. All original. I jacked it up in the back. Added chromed bumpers, wheels, and custom tailpipes. That car was my baby.” He looked away for a moment.