by Duncan Long
As we rose, Nikki guided the van toward the rocket field and kept the cloud of vapor the rocket was riding on between us and the radar installation of the port. “Fantastic,” she laughed.
“Want to follow the rocket a ways?”
“Sure,” I said hoping my voice didn’t betray my sheer terror.
We hurtled upward.
After a bit, though, I started to get into the spirit of things. The only sound was the wash of the air past the van. We were still alive. Nikki really did know what she was doing. We were still alive. The van had stayed together. We were still alive.
It was fantastic.
“Will we remain hidden?” I asked after a bit.
“Should. Sometimes the radar here in Denver has ghosts anyway. They won’t think much of it as long as we’re matching speed with the rocket. That isn’t hard.” She whispered something to the computer and we speeded up a bit more. “Unbelievable,” she said.
We arched upward with the rocket, following its plumed path toward the south. The sky above us turned jet black and the stars became sharp points of light; we saw a second sunset which looked almost like a rainbow framing over the mountains to the West of us. It became more than a little hard to breathe.
“I’d like to race the rocket, but we’d only have space to inhale at the top of its path,” she explained. Her voice sounded thin because of the lack of air in the van. “They leave the atmosphere at the top of their ballistic arch.”
Fortunately when the rocket’s booster dropped on parachutes, we followed it down, falling back into nighttime, dropping in free fall until the wind caught the chutes of the booster so that we could slow our descent. My stomach again felt as if it had made a left turn while the rest of us traveled to the right. Once the free fall had ended, I settled down and enjoyed—as much as possible—the sight of the ocean racing up to meet us. “We ought to get an altimeter so we can keep from smashing into the ground,” Nikki said.
Very reassuring, I thought, closing my eyes and gritting my teeth until we finally stopped our fall. The wind whipped the chutes down into the Gulf of Mexico; we hovered over the water just off-shore from Texas.
I opened my eyes and watched the twinkling lights from the shore as they danced in the ocean in front of us. “Won’t the radar pick us up?” I asked.
“Yeah. But they won’t recognize us as a moving thing. We’ll be part of the waves at this height.”
The moon rose so we could see the water clearly in its yellow glow. Nikki pushed the van’s accelerator pedal and we hurtled toward the shore, then slowed, skimmed over the beach for several hundred meters, hopped a weedy hedge, and parked under a tall, gnarled palm tree.
After sitting for a few minutes looking out over the ocean, we climbed from the van, kicked off our shoes, and walked hand-in-hand in the gentle surf of the Gulf. The moon rose higher and lit the white sand of the beach as a cool, gentle breeze blew in from the sea. Almost an hour later we were again in the van. I fell asleep almost instantly in the reclining seat that was beginning to seem like home. (And, no, there were no romantic going ons… Nikki and I were on a strictly brother/sister relationship. Despite my tries at incest.) I don’t think Nikki slept any that night. She and the two computers whispered and plotted and made lists of things they would be needing for a project that would have had me wide awake had I known what kind of scheme the three of them were hatching.
Chapter 8
The morning sun woke me. In the distance, sea gulls were squawking while the waves added a low hissing rise and fall to the din of the birds.
I sat up and inspected the bright, white sand that stretched into the deep blue green of the ocean, sprinkled with splotches of turquoise that were the shallows. Waves formed in the deep water and chased themselves to the shore where they sputtered their energy in a roll of hissing, white foam, only to be dragged back from the sand and swallowed up by the next incoming wave.
Directly in front of me Nikki abruptly rose up out of the water like some ancient goddess, rivulets of water streaming down her firm, dark arms and thighs as she wadded ashore. A pink T-shirt clung tightly to her body in a way that might have been obscene on almost any woman but Nikki. Somehow, her demeanor always made her seem innocent—even though her speech and dress often argued otherwise. I pulled my tongue back into my mouth.
After she had dried off and wrapped a towel around her curves, my next task was pushing my eyes back into their sockets. Then we had a picnic lunch in the shade of the palm trees around our van.
After a polite amount of small talk, Nikki eased into telling me what she and my computers had been discussing the night before, “Phil” she said around a huge bit of reconstituted dinosteak,
“did you ever want to travel into space? Maybe even explore space?”
“Sure. And be a cowboy, and a fireman, and a policeman. Instead, I got a nice calm job where everyone’s trying to kill me.”
“No really.”
“Sure, I’ve always wanted to travel into space. Yeah. I even tried to save up money to buy a trip once. And I enjoyed last night’s ride—except for not being able to breathe. Why?”
Silence. Nikki seemed to be studying her sandwich.
If I had had any sense, I would have gotten up and run away right there. And maybe drowned myself for good measure. But Nikki is like a flame to a moth. Rather than fleeing, I fluttered closer and proceeded to get singed.
“I was thinking,” she munched,” that we could take that van into space if we—”
“Woe, there. You must be kidding.”
“No, really.”
“Nikki, there’s no way that—”
“Now listen. You’ve got the power from the flywheel generator to run all kinds of life-support equipment. The van can accelerate with a constant speed… It doesn’t need fuel… And the computers can be programmed—in fact are…I took the liberty last night—for Earth orbit. All we need is a couple of suits and some gear. We could—”
“That’s crazy. Too dangerous,” I popped open a can of pop and toyed with the idea of hiding inside it.
“Phil, things aren’t exactly safe here on the ground for us.”
“Right. But what would we gain in space?”
“That’s just it. They’d never think of looking for you on… Oh, say the moon.”
She said that a bit too casually. I felt a cold chill dance up and down my spine. “The moon?” I asked, knowing I didn’t want to hear what was coming.
“I did a little figuring and…” She launched into her sales pitch.
I fought a losing battle from there on.
Of course I had always wanted to go into space. What boy who became a man didn’t. Never mind the deaths that resulted with the collapse of the space elevator, or the fact that no more glamorous sci-fi shows ever graced the 3V broadcasts any more. Most kids of the male persuasion dream of going into space.
It’s just that I had never expected to really do it. And especially not in an old van. But the more Nikki talked, the more enthused I got, perhaps proving that insanity is contagious. But the truth be told, I had toyed with the idea of a space ship propelled by the rods when they’d first been perfected; I just hadn’t expected to be using a van to travel into space rather than a nice sleek conventional space ship.
Nikki explained to me that the time was perfect, too. The world government had, without fanfare, closed the few moon bases that had been put on the moon, and liquidated the surplus gear left over from the space program almost faster than consumers could buy it. In fact all the rocket jocks she’d known had been buying all sorts of hardware and toys, while bemoaning the fact that the space program was all but officially dead. So, Nikki reasoned, we could probably outfit our expedition for just centimes on the dollar.
Slowly she wove her spell the way a spider weaves a web. Before I knew it, I was trapped and we were off in the van to buy some used space suits.
After crashing through the scrub brush for a while, and making low
flights that—I hoped—
were off the radar, we finally located a road that led to a highway. I parked the van at the first electro-charge station (hoping the attendant wouldn’t become too curious as to why the van didn’t need to be charged) and found out we were on Galveston Island. Using an Internet map we bought from the attendant, along with a phone book disc, we finally found the name of a nearby surplus dealer which—we hoped—might lead us to a source of the gear we’d be needing.
Several hours later, and despite the errors on the map, we finally located the surplus store at Hitchcock, west of Galveston.
As we neared it, it became apparent that the store was once a huge old barn. Crates and old freight trucks littered the area around it. A chain-link fence enclosed the cemetery-like area around the barn where—it appeared—all vehicles in the area crawled to when it came time for them to die. With a bit of originality, the owner had painted, in huge amateur-looking letters,
“Space and Military Surplus” over the chipped, red paint of the wooden structure.
We brought the van to a stop in front of the huge eyesore. No other working vehicles were in the customer parking lot. The hot, Texas wind pummeled sand against the side of the van.
“Are you sure we want to go in?” I asked.
“Yes!”
“Assuming we find anything of use, what are we going to pay for things with? I chucked my card outside New Denver.”
“I’ve got some jewelry.”
“That’s not cash”
“These guys like to barter. Anything else we could trade?”
“I hate to drag a needle gun in—might give the owner a heart attack. How about your laser?
Industrial lasers get good prices.”
“Sounds good. I have no attachment to it.”
“It still ought to get us a lot. If we work our trading right. Let’s leave the laser in the van ’til we see if there’s anything here.” I had my doubts.
We got out of the van and sauntered toward the gate. I squinted at Nikki in the bright sunlight. She looked so different with her blond hair and the synthaface.
“What are you smiling at?” Nikki asked. “You look like you know something I should know about.”
“You don’t look like Nikki any more. I was just thinking I liked the way you looked better before you changed your face.”
“Well, I like you better the way you are now. ” She laughed and gave me a shove, then raced ahead of me toward the store.
I chased her to the barn door; both of us were giggling like teenagers as we pulled it open and stepped into the cool darkness of the interior of the building. Once in, we grew quiet.
It was like a museum.
I couldn’t believe what all was there. Spotlights, hung in the ceiling, cut through the gloom with beams that caught the dust particles in the air and bathed equipment on the floor in pools of light. Other piles of machinery sat hidden in the dark and under dust tarps looking like large animals waiting for their prey. The contrast between the highly lit areas and those in darkness made it necessary to study what you were looking at before your mind could make any sense of the jumble.
Large bins holding small parts spread out along one unpainted wall in a haphazard manner while space suits of various designs hung down the back of the mammoth room like a long line of alien soldiers. An ancient space capsule was suspended from the rafters of the barn and slowly turned in the cool breeze of an air conditioning duct that was bolted to the ceiling. In one dusty corner, a convention of space-bots stood frozen as if waiting for a command to get to work.
“Help you folks,” a voice that made us both jump called out of the gloom.
We turned to see a beefy-looking man with black whiskers shuffle into the light. Dressed in dirty white space overalls with a vintage NASA baseball cap, he bumped and dragged on a pair of crutches as he came toward us. One leg seemed to be paralyzed and scraped along behind him as he approached. The twisted member looked out of place on his otherwise perfect, muscular body.
“We need some gear,” I said. “Is any of this operational?” I asked, pointing to a space suit.
“Most isn’t. Some is. All looks good, though. Unless you’re needing it for a project of some sort, you can save a bundle by buying things that are just lookers.” He laughed. “Guess I’m talking myself out of some money, here.”
“We need equipment that’s functional. For…experimental work,” I said, trying to be as vague as possible. Not that he would believe that we were about to fly to the moon in a van. I just didn’t want to tell the truth and have him call the loony bin.
Nikki pulled her list out of the hip pocket of her green coveralls and handed it to him, “We’re interested in these. Do you have any of this stuff.”
He took the list, pushed back his cap, and read as he balanced his weight on his crutches. I walked away from him to inspect some of the space suits more closely, wondering where I had seen his face before? The bum leg suddenly jarred a memory: A supply ship that had fallen into the moon. One man rescued the survivors in a heroic effort that cost him the use of his leg and later his career. The black beard and athletic frame… There was no doubt in my mind. Jake Jozek.
“Big Jake.”
Or was it. I walked back to Nikki’s side.
He gave us an odd look.” I think I’ve got most of this. You folks planning on going to Mars or something?”
Obviously he knew his business. Neither Nikki nor I knew what to say.
He went on, “You know, I’ve been in space. Even on the moon once. You folks have something pretty specific in mind. It’s none of my business but—”
“Big Jake Jozek?” I asked, desperately trying to change the subject.
“Yeah,” he laughed. “Didn’t know anyone still remembered. Anyway… I think we can work something out, here. Come on back to where I keep the good stuff.”
We followed him as he scraped and dragged himself across the concrete floor toward a small door at the back of the barn. “Didn’t know anyone still remembered me,” he said. “They just brought me back, pinned a medal on me, and that was that. Now, they’re dismantling everything.
We should be going to the planets… Instead the fools are abandoning the Moon. Just when Earth needs other resources, they’re quitting.” He turned and smiled, “Please ignore the rantings of an old fanatic.”
. I tried to smile reassuringly so he wouldn’t jack up his prices. Nikki said nothing He paused before the door, took out a magnetic key, unlocked the padlock, and pushed the door open. The hinges gave a high-pitched squeak that ended in a moan. He reached into the darkness and flipped on a light.
The door opened into another huge room filled with more equipment. Unlike the room we had seen, the equipment in this room looked spotless, obviously arranged in an orderly fashion.
Several bots glided about with dust rags as if to demonstrate how carefully the equipment was being cared for.
“This is my good stuff. No one but the folks that deliver and unload the gear I buy even know it’s back here. Been saving it for the time when I can buy a rocket—if and when one becomes available—and make my own way back into space. Earth’s not home anymore. Not with this bum leg. It holds me back. It doesn’t matter in space.”
“What kind of prices are we looking at for the gear we need,” I asked.
He laughed. “The stuffs not for sale. Woe there. Don’t give me those long faces… I do have a proposition to make to you.” He paused a moment and turned to stand directly in front of us. ” I can see from your equipment list that you have something special in mind. You get me back into space and I’ll make it worth your while. Get me to the Moon with enough gear to get set up in an abandoned base, and I’ll supply you with what you need for free.”
Nikki and I stood still, not wanting to betray ourselves. Was this guy on the level?
“Uh. Just a minute. We need to have a conference here,” I pulled Nikki over to one of the spotless corners of the ro
om as a bot scurried out of our way.
“I don’t know about this,” I whispered.. “We should probably get out of here. This guy might not be on the level and he’s already guessed what we were planning.”
“He wouldn’t have admitted knowing what we were planning if he were just going to turn us in. I think he’s serious.”
“But there’s no way we can mount an expedition for all three of us to the Moon. And how do you know that he won’t turn us in?”
“Why would he turn us in?”
I paused. “That is a point. He did get booted out of space. Probably has some real grudges, too…”
“Why not trust him? I bet he’s serious about getting back into space.”
“OK. That’s probably right. But I’m not sure if we have enough lifting power to carry all we need. Let alone another—”
“If we accelerate constantly, the trip could be short and—”
“Can you really lift the three of us and some gear?”
“Sure. Well, almost sure that we can do it. I did the calculations last night for two of us. But I think we could squeeze in three. And I’m sure we can trust him. We could use a little help from someone that knows what’s on the Moon.”
“Well… I doubt that we’ll find anyone else with this much good equipment. OK. But let’s not let him know too much at first.”
Having said that, I spilled my guts. More or less. We didn’t tell him HOW we were getting to the moon. Not at first; I didn’t want to scare him off. But I did admit that we were going. “But our first trip will be without you until we get the hang of things,” I finished up.
He was equally forthcoming. “No way. If you have enough lift to get the gear you’re needing into space, you can take one more hand on board. Either I go or you look somewhere else for your gear. And I can promise you, you aren’t going to find anyone else with this quality of equipment.”
I bit my lip. He was like the kid that owned the bat and gloves and ball; he was the only game in town.
“I tell you what,” I countered. “Let me show you what we’ll be traveling in and you’ll probably want to wait for the second round trip. But you can’t tell anyone what you’ve seen. It can be hazardous to your health.”