by Marty Steere
On the ground ahead of them, a softball-sized rock caught the light of the sun as they approached in such a way as to reflect what appeared to Cartwright to be almost a deep blue, an interesting contrast to the washed out beige of the surrounding environment. Pointing, he said to Gale, “I think we should grab that one.”
Gale seemed to hesitate. Then he nodded. Reaching down and using the claws on the end of the aluminum pole in his right hand, he retrieved the sample. When Gale had safely deposited it into one of the bags they were carrying, Cartwright started them up again, and they slowly made their way around a large rock outcropping.
When he saw the object, Cartwright was so startled he actually lost his grip on the steering control. He immediately lunged for the control, pulled back and stopped the forward progress of the rover. He stared, flabbergasted, for a moment. Finally, not knowing what else to say, he blurted, “That shouldn’t be here.”
9
Krantz heard the door behind him burst open, and, when he glanced back, Adam Huffman stormed in.
“Stand by,” Krantz said into his microphone. He flipped the switch on the control box clipped to his belt, muting the line, and turned to face the NASA deputy administrator.
“What’s the status?” Huffman asked.
“We’ve had first contact, and we’ve effected the switchover.”
“So soon,” Huffman said.
It was a superfluous comment. Krantz merely nodded.
“What was the contact?” Huffman demanded.
Krantz turned his head and nodded toward one of the large television monitors mounted on brackets hanging from the ceiling. Across the lower half of the screen was a bright lunar surface dotted with rocks and boulders of various sizes. The area above the horizon was pitch black. On the ground in the center of the lunar landscape was an object. With its sharp geometric features, it looked completely out of place.
“Zoom in, again,” Krantz commanded.
As the lens of the camera mounted on the front of the lunar rover was refocused, the object grew in size until it practically filled the screen. It appeared to be a square metallic box with a narrow antenna attached. Without any point of reference, however, it was impossible to tell how large the thing was.
“What is it?” Huffman asked.
Krantz shook his head. “We’re not sure. Most likely some sort of motion detector.”
“This far out?”
Again, Krantz shook his head. “We may be closer than we thought. In any event, it appears they’re expecting us.”
Suddenly, there was movement on the television screen, and the object was obscured. The man working the remote controls adjusted the focus of the camera, and the image drew back out. As it did, Krantz realized that what he had seen was the back of either Cartwright or Gale moving away from the rover. As he watched, the two astronauts took bounding steps toward the object. When they reached the thing, Krantz was finally able to judge its size. It appeared the base was approximately a foot square, and the antenna extended upward about two feet.
“Did we cut away in time?” Huffman asked.
“Yes,” Krantz replied. “Cartwright said something about it just before the switchover, but it never appeared on the screen. And what he said was pretty vague. Could have been referring to just about anything.”
“What exactly did he say?”
Krantz turned to one of the men sitting in the row in front of him. “Give me play back on the audio. Start at twenty seconds before switchover.” After a moment, the slightly metallic voice of Bob Cartwright filled the room.
“I think we should grab that one.” There were several seconds of silence. When Cartwright again spoke, there was an edge to his voice. “That shouldn’t be here.”
After a moment, Huffman nodded slowly. “Ok. It is what it is. What have you told them?”
“I’ve stuck to the script,” Krantz said. “Said we had a communications glitch and we’ve switched over to backup.”
“What are they saying?”
“Nothing.” Krantz consulted the panel on the front wall. “At least nothing we can hear. They’ve gone to Comm 2.” The astronauts had engaged the personal intercom option on their communications system. In that mode, they could talk to one another, and, while they could hear transmissions from ground control, until either of them activated a cable-mounted switch attached to the front of his suit, their voices would not be heard back on Earth.
Of course, even when they did that, nothing would be heard in Mission Control. From the moment Krantz had hit the override switch, the only contact the men on the moon would have with Earth would be with the small cadre of men who had been assembled in this former storage room in the basement of the headquarters building at the Johnson Space Center.
“Ok,” Huffman said. “The shit’s hitting the fan upstairs. I’ve got to make an appearance. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
Krantz nodded. As Huffman made his way to the door, Krantz returned his attention to the television monitor.
#
Bob Cartwright’s mind was a jumble of thoughts as he stood considering the thing. He glanced over at Gale. A distorted image of Cartwright’s own helmeted figure stared back at him in the reflection of the man’s visor. After a long moment, he looked back down.
The mere fact that a man-made object sat here in a place it had no business being was extraordinary. But, given time, Cartwright could have conjured a series of explanations for it. Off the top of his head, he figured, it could have been a piece of one of the lunar modules that was allowed to crash back onto the surface of the moon after a prior Apollo mission. Of course, it didn’t look like any part he recognized. But at least that offered a marginally reasonable explanation.
There was no way, however, he could rationalize the footprints surrounding the thing.
And, as if that weren’t sufficiently disconcerting, a small red light on the base glowed, apparently indicating that, whatever it was, it was active.
The two astronauts had switched over to the personal intercom, so he didn’t need to worry about the sensibilities of the television audience back home. “What in the hell do you suppose this is?” he asked.
Gale didn’t immediately respond. After several seconds, he said, simply, “Probably a motion detector.”
Given Gale’s usual lack of emotion, some dispassion was to be expected. Still, under the circumstances, the man’s reaction struck Cartwright as completely out of place. Cartwright’s patience, already stretched, was beginning to fray. He again looked at Gale. “Aren’t you even mildly surprised at this?”
There was another pause before Gale replied. “I’m surprised to find it this far out.”
Cartwright took a long moment to process that. “This far out,” he asked, finally, “from what?”
The combination suit and backpack units that the astronauts wore - referred to in the acronym-friendly space program as EMU’s, or extravehicular mobility units - were too bulky to allow detection of anything other than large movements on the part of the wearer. Even so, Cartwright could have sworn that Gale shrugged.
“We’re not alone.”
“Oh, really,” Cartwright said, unable to keep the sarcasm out of his voice. “What was your first clue?”
Gale didn’t respond to that.
A series of choice phrases came to mind, none of which, Cartwright knew, would have played well with the audience back on earth. And, though they weren’t currently broadcasting, some vestige of propriety caused him to bite them back. Instead, he took a deep breath and asked, “Is this just your conclusion, or do you know something I don’t know?”
Gale turned his body to face him. Each of them had lowered the exterior, “gold,” visor on his helmet to cut the sun’s glare, so neither of them could see the expression of the other. It was unnerving. Not that Gale was ever particularly demonstrative, but, without even the slightest of facial clues, it was like dealing with an automaton.
“I know something y
ou don’t know.”
That would have been a perturbing statement had it been offered up on its own. What had just come before blunted some of its impact. Still, it struck a nerve. “Now,” Cartwright said, acidly, “would be a good time to share.”
#
On the television monitor, the moon’s surface rose and fell as the lunar rover bumped its way along the craggy route indicated by the tracks in the regolith. It was, Krantz thought, awfully convenient that the astronauts had been provided a clear trail to follow. Of course, he realized, it could also be a nice way to set up an ambush. In reality, though, there weren’t a whole lot of good options. Inevitably, the encounter was going to be on other than their own turf. No reason he could see not to accept the rolled out welcome mat.
And, in any event, he had confidence in Toran’s ability to anticipate and react.
“Houston,” he heard Bob Cartwright say, “have normal communications been restored yet?”
Krantz spoke into the microphone attached to the stalk extending down from his headset. “Sorry, that’s a negative. A major electrical storm moved through the area. Apparently, it fried the primary telemetry and communications server. Not to worry, though. We have multiple backups and full redundancy.”
There was a long pause. Then Cartwright’s voice came again. “Can you patch in Rick Delahousse for me, please?”
They’d anticipated this.
“No,” Krantz replied. “Sorry again. They’re down completely.”
After a moment, Cartwright asked, “Where are you located?”
Despite himself, Krantz smiled. Bob Cartwright was no fool. He wasn’t going to let them just spoon feed this to him. “Alamogordo,” he said. It was logical. Alamogordo, New Mexico was home to Holloman Air Force Base, where NASA was in the process of developing a training facility for the upcoming space shuttle program. It was far enough away from Houston that Rick Delahousse wouldn’t be expected to just pop in and resume Capcom duties. And, taking no chances, they had confirmed that Cartwright had never been to Holloman, so he would not know whether and to what extent there might be a facility there capable of handling ground control duties.
“Who are you?” Cartwright asked.
Krantz had been ready for this, as well. “My name is Arthur Spelling. I’ll be filling in for Colonel Delahousse until they’re back up and operational in Houston. Shouldn’t take long.”
That was apparently a satisfactory answer, because, after a moment, Cartwright asked, “Are you getting the feed from the video camera?”
“Yes,” Krantz replied. “It’s coming in clear.”
“Ok,” Cartwright said. “We’ve got something at our two o’clock. Turning toward it now.”
On the television monitor, the front of the rover crested a short rise and began a slow turn. From the far right edge of the screen, a new object slowly emerged. As it slid into view, Krantz realized he was looking at a structure that had the vague appearance of an upside-down water trough. It reminded him of the Quonset huts he’d first seen when he’d gone through basic training. Sitting a short distance away, on squat legs that looked remarkably similar to those on the descent stage of the lunar module, was a craft of some kind. This, however, was taller and had a more rounded and symmetrical shape than that of the Concord.
Stenciled in bright red along the fuselage, just below a five-sided star, were the letters “CCCP.”
#
Bob Cartwright halted the rover and sat motionless for a long moment. Even though he’d been somewhat prepared for it by Mason Gale, it was still shocking. Twenty minutes ago, he had considered himself to be the thirteenth man to have set foot on the moon. And all others who had come before him had been Americans. That now was clearly not the case.
The competition to be the first nation to put a man on the moon had been a two-horse race for the better part of a decade. Building on the success it had achieved with the launch of Sputnik, the Soviet Union had taken the early lead, becoming the first country to put a man into orbit and the first to have a man walk in space. The United States, however, had rallied quickly, and, by the end of the 1960s, had claimed the grand prize, successfully landing men on the moon and returning them safely to earth. While that was happening, the Soviet Union had endured a string of high profile and embarrassing failures. By the end of the decade, Moscow had abandoned all efforts to reach the moon.
At least that’s what the world had thought.
The ostensible focus of the Soviet space program had shifted to the establishment of a permanent manned space station. To that end, a series of platforms under the project name Salyut had been put into orbit around the earth. Salyut 4, Cartwright knew, would soon be entering its third year of deployment, and the Soviets had launched Salyut 5 just three months before Apollo 18 had blasted off. A little over a year ago, he knew, a pair of Russian cosmonauts had set a new space endurance record by spending more than two months aboard Salyut 4.
Apparently, however, the Soviets had been doing more than they’d let on.
Though Gale had been his typically taciturn self, Cartwright had been able to extract some basic information from him to help explain the extraordinary sight that now greeted him.
“Those are Russian footprints,” Gale had said as they stood staring down at the object they’d first encountered. “They’ve been here now for about three months.”
After absorbing that bit of information, and not exactly sure what to do with it, Cartwright asked, “Why all the secrecy?”
Gale did not respond to that. Instead, he said, “We received intelligence several months ago indicating the Soviets were moving forward with this. But we didn’t get confirmation of the launch until June. That’s when our mission got the final green light.”
“Who’s ‘we’?”
Gale did not respond to that, either. After a long, uncomfortable silence, Cartwright asked, “Why am I being told this only now?”
“We didn’t want to alarm anyone.”
Resisting the urge to inquire again who “we” were, Cartwright asked, “Why would anyone be alarmed?” After a moment, he added, “And who were you trying not to alarm? Me? That doesn’t make any sense.”
To Cartwright’s growing annoyance, Gale again remained silent. Finally, in a tone that suggested he’d given all the explanation he was going to give, the man said, “It wasn’t my call, Commander.”
That, Cartwright had realized, was probably all he’d get out of Gale. And not for the first time, but with a newfound sense of unease, Cartwright wondered what to make of the man. Obviously, all was not as it appeared. For Cartwright, who liked to be in control, it was exceptionally unnerving.
A movement in the distance caught his attention. To one side of the structure, an opening appeared, and, as he watched, a figure clad in a spacesuit not unlike the one he and Gale were wearing backed out slowly, stood and turned toward them. After a moment, the suited figure raised his right arm and waived it side to side. Then he reached the arm out, turned his palm upwards, and made a clear beckoning gesture.
“Well,” Cartwright said, as much to himself as anyone else, “I don’t know what the protocol is for this, but I’m taking us in.” He eased forward on the controller, and the rover slowly advanced on the structure. At his side, Gale said nothing.
As they approached, Cartwright could make out more of the details of the structure. It looked almost like a large tent, though, instead of canvas, wide strips of a metallic material appeared to be stretched across bowed semi-circular support beams. Based on the size of the suited figure standing next to it, he estimated that the structure was about twenty feet in length and eight feet high along the center line.
When he was no more than ten feet from the thing, Cartwright halted the rover. He undid the strap that held him to his seat and dismounted. Gale did likewise. The figure who had emerged from the structure took a couple of steps to the side and, with a gesture of one gloved hand, indicated that they should enter through the open
hatch.
“Alamogordo,” Cartwright said, “are you seeing this?”
“Affirmative,” came the voice of the man who had taken up Capcom duties after the communications failure in Houston.
“Any suggestions as to how we should proceed?”
There were several seconds of silence before the man responded. “Proceed with caution.”
Oh, great, Cartwright thought. Where did they dig this guy up anyway? He turned to face Gale. “Ok,” he said, “I’m going in. Wait out here until I give you the word.”
“Roger that,” Gale replied.
Cartwright stepped over to the Russian. The man’s outer visor was up, and Cartwright could see his face inside the bulbous helmet. He was clean-shaven, and he had a surprisingly youthful appearance. There was nothing sinister or menacing about his countenance. In fact, as Cartwright watched, the man gave him a toothy smile. Cartwright raised the exterior visor on his own helmet and made what he hoped, given his general sense of unease, was a friendly nod in return.
Again, the man gestured toward the structure. In the center of the end wall was a hatch with a door that had been swung inward. Bending slightly at the waist, Cartwright eased his helmet and the top of his bulky backpack beneath the upper edge of the entryway and awkwardly peered in. The area beyond the opening extended only about six feet inward, where it met another wall with a similar hatch, this one closed. He was startled by what at first appeared to be another suited figure standing to one side. Upon closer inspection, however, he saw that it was just a space suit, complete with attached helmet, hanging from a hook on one of the support members. What he was looking at, he realized, was an air lock, a transitional chamber between livable quarters and the vacuum that was the surface of the moon.
He cautiously eased one foot over the threshold, then stepped through. He straightened and turned slowly, looking back at the suited figure standing outside the hatchway. He could see the man making the same beckoning gesture as before, inviting Gale to join Cartwright.