The Methuselan Circuit

by Anderson, Christopher L.

  Alexander was giddy with glee as he soared ahead of the cursing Khandar. The roar of his classmates sent a thrill down his spine. His excitement was short lived, however. As he crested the top of the crater rim a pocked and pitted area of folds and cracks came into view—finding the ball was going to be tough, but his immediate concern was landing. This was not the smooth lunar plain they landed on but a narrow band of debris and shock rings from the formation of the crater. Alexander sighted a landing area and prepared for the impact. He struck it with both feet, not trying to stop, only to control his landing and launch himself toward another suitable landing area. His landing was good, and he bounded back up, but he soon discovered that he had virtually no time to scan the terrain for the ball before he had to think about landing again. Another landing, this time slightly off balance, so his bounce sent him off to the right and away from the center of his search area. It also made Alexander lean too far to the right. He used his jets to try and right himself, but all they did was stop his lean, there wasn’t enough time to correct it. Alexander was going to crash hard into a rocky area; this was going to hurt. Bam! Something hit him in mid air. It was Khandar. Now instead of Alexander crashing into the ground they both hit, bouncing, skidding and spinning out of control.

  When Alexander finally regained his balanced he started off again, and Khandar was right with him. He ran into the Golkos, checking him with his right shoulder, shoving into the Golkos cadet’s ribs. Khandar responded by grabbing at Alexander’s helmet. The result was both of them careening drunkenly along the terrain, falling, clutching and running into each other as they looked for the missing ball.

  “What are you cadets doing, we don’t have all day!” Centurion Fjallheim radioed them.

  “Yes sir!” They responded, as if they were working together.

  Alexander bounded up and over Khandar, looking wildly around for any hint of the white ball. Where was it? It should show up clearly against the gray-brown terrain. It didn’t. Down he came, and there was Khandar waiting for him. Alexander braced himself and sure enough, the Golkos sent him sliding in the lunar soil. Alexander used his momentum to leap back into the black sky, avoiding Khandar’s shove. It was the Golkos boy who stumbled, falling over a waist high boulder and spinning onto his back. That gave Alexander a moment to scan the area. He took a quick look around—nothing—when he landed he bounded into the vacuum, jumping as hard and as high as he could. Alexander figured he must be thirty meters above the surface, but it gave him a perfect vantage point. He turned slowly as he rose and continued to turn as he came down, scanning the terrain as carefully as he could—nothing. Khandar was skipping toward him though, trying to cut him off. Alexander landed like a pogo stick, rocketing back into the sky before Khandar could stop him. Again he looked, but he saw nothing on the way up. He stopped, hung in the sky for a second and started back down. Khandar was coming up at him.

  “Why don’t we just cooperate and find the ball; we’ll never get it like this!” he snapped angrily, narrowly avoiding the Golkos swiping at him.

  “Work with you—never!”

  Alexander couldn’t understand such hatred, but he couldn’t change Khandar’s feelings. All he could do was to find the ball as quickly as he could. He landed and bounded right back up, jumping slightly off to the side so that the Golkos wouldn’t hit him on the way down. Khandar did miss him, but when he landed he jumped off in another direction. Had he found the ball? “Computer plot Khandar’s course!”

  A green line sprang from Khandar westward. “Cadet Khandar’s course is projected. He is seventy-three meters from the Lugby ball.”

  “You knew where it was?” Alexander asked in surprise.

  “I have scanners operating in visual through infra-red wavelengths as well as radar,” the computer informed him matter of factly.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” Alexander exclaimed, frantically firing his jets. As hard as he tried, they gained him little. All of his momentum was going up. It took an endless amount of time for Alexander to fall back to the lunar surface, and then he had to get himself going after Khandar. By the time Alexander was moving forward the Golkos boy was almost at the ball. Alexander had one choice left. If he missed, he lost; there would be no catching Khandar.

  He bounded ahead as fast as he could, trying to gauge his jumps so that he wouldn’t have to slow down. That’s what Khandar was doing right now, and Alexander could see he was having trouble. In micro-gravity he could maintain a blistering pace effortlessly, but turning, or stopping as Khandar was attempting to do, took planning. The Golkos cadet was trying to skid to a stop, but his momentum carried him through past the ball. He reached for it as he went past, but his foot caught a rock and sent him flying. He caught a piece of the ball and it bounced away as if someone kicked it.

  As Khandar kicked up a cloud of lunar dust, Alexander tried to alter his course. It was tricky business. The only way to do it was to land on both feet, steadying himself with his left foot on landing and then stomping hard with his right foot, pushing off in the direction he wanted to go. At full speed it changed his direction by about thirty degrees, meaning it would take him six hops to turn completely around. Cutting to his left, Alexander guessed he’d get to the ball in a bit over two, almost three hops. That meant he had to calculate his turn and cutting his hops all by the seat of his pants—it was a lot to ask. Khandar was moving like he was underwater, but at least he was making his way to the ball. He’d still get there before Alexander did but not by much.

  It turned out that Khandar was in such a hurry with Alexander bearing down on him that he fumbled the ball trying to pick it up. When he regained it, the Golkos cadet looked up to see Alexander flying at him at break neck speed. His pupil-less eyes brightened from their normal green to a furiously bright yellow. Alexander tackled Khandar like a football safety hitting a receiver right after he’s made a catch. They tumbled to the dusty ground, each grappling after the ball, turning, twisting and kicking. The ground disappeared. Alexander fell into blackness, still fighting for the ball. His lights automatically went on, but all he could see was Khandar’s face, eyes blazing, mouth snarling, his yellow fangs chomping in fury. Then they landed.

  They didn’t hit as hard as Alexander expected. Actually, they landed in something that yielded to their weight and then sprang back. At the same time it grabbed at them, so they didn’t fly back up, but rather quivered to a halt like they’d landed on a mattress. Alexander still clung to the ball, as did Khandar. His lights still illumined the Golkos’s face, but much to his surprise, there was another face pressed up against his helmet. It was a gray hollow face with deep sockets where its eyes should be and a mouth opened round as if in mid howl. The face was exactly between them. Alexander stared at it. Khandar stared at it. It was the face of a corpse.

  They screamed together.

  CHAPTER 18: Interrogation

  The Lugby ball was forgotten. Alexander tried to get away from the corpse, and Khandar was equally as eager. It wasn’t easy though. They’d landed in a thick matt of stellar brambles. The brambles could be found growing on distant asteroids. They could survive in the harsh temperatures and vacuums of airless worlds. The reason to have them was that they grew deep roots searching for the ice that they needed to survive. Much like any other plant they used sunlight. However, the unique thing about the bramble was that it didn't depend on carbon dioxide, but instead used solar energy to help it consume the hydrogen in the ice for food and excreting Oxygen. Brought by Terrans to the Moon, the stellar brambles grew fast and spread fast. Along with the half-score other species of vacuum adapted plants they started the decades long process of terraforming.

  Alexander and Khandar got free of the brambles, staring at not one but three corpses caught in the stellar plants. Two of the corpses were obviously Terrans. One was a male, the one they’d fallen on, and the other was a female. The third corpse was a saurian, a Seer’koh. Alexander gasped, “I know who they are!”

  T
he Golkos glared at him, but then the urgent voice of Centurion Fjallheim came over their helmets. “Cadet Wolfe, Cadet Khandar report! What the devil is going on?”

  “Sir, we’ve landed in a crack and discovered three corpses,” Alexander exclaimed. He was about to elaborate when Khandar drew his finger across his throat, meaning for Alexander to cut his transmission. The request mystified Alexander, there was no hiding their grim discovery, but the expression on Khandar’s face was in earnest and it had nothing to do with their feud. Alexander cut his comlink.

  Khandar leaned forward, touching his helmet against Alexander’s. The Golkos cut his own comlink and began talking. His voice was weak and had a buzz in it, but Alexander could understand him. “The helmet will transmit the sound waves of our voices by vibration, that way no one else can hear us,” he explained. In response to Alexander’s expression he went on, his brows knit in consternation. “On Golkos the first rule in survival is to hide your secrets! These corpses didn’t get here by accident; someone hid them here!”

  “What does that have to do with us,” Alexander asked. “We can’t be blamed for finding them. We were just looking for the Lugby ball.”

  “You said you knew these people,” Khandar corrected him. “That involves you, and since I was with you, that involves me. The people who did this will connect the dots just as quickly as the people who will investigate this—we are the common link!”

  “There’s no way we’re connected to this,” Alexander retorted.

  The Golkos sneered ferociously, “What are the chances that the only cadet in the Academy who knows who these three people are then discovers them hidden in a crack on the surface of Luna?”

  Alexander felt his stomach knot up. “I see your point.”

  “Who are these people?”

  Alexander explained the incident with the Methuselan Circuit. As soon as he mentioned that Khandar turned bright red. He stopped Alexander. “There’s more to this than either of us knows,” he said harshly, “but we can’t trust anyone—even Centurion Fjallheim, maybe even especially him!”

  “What are you saying?”

  “Why did he send you and me out here out of all the cadets?” His luminous eyes narrowed, and he pointed at the corpses. “You know who these three are and can tie them to some nefarious plans for the Methuselan Circuit, and I,” he paused, “I am the only person in this part of the galaxy that knows how to destroy it!”

  “How could Centurion Fjallheim get us here,” Alexander mused.

  “I don’t know, that part of it doesn’t make any sense,” Khandar admitted.

  “Unless,” Alexander headed over the brambles, crawling over the stiff, bloodless corpses to retrieve the Lugby ball. He got it and took it over to one of the sharper rocks in the pit. Without explaining what he was doing to the Golkos he jumped up and came down hard on the point of the stone, using the Lugby ball as a cushion. The ball burst. Alexander brought the limp synthi-leather casing back to Khandar. The Golkos looked on as Alexander ripped the seam open farther and shook the casing. A small silver bead the size of a small marble fell out and into his waiting glove.

  Khandar touched helmets. “What is it?”

  “It’s called a glede,” Alexander explained with a frown. “My dad used them as a game, fooling us kids by hiding them in hats, toys you know whatever. The glede can fly and carrying a thousand times its own weight. Dad would use remote control make your hat fly off your head or a baseball fly like it had a mind of its own—someone controlled the Lugby ball to this place. You’re right. Someone knows I know them, and they know you know about the Methuselan Circuit.”

  “They have to be Spooks,” Khandar said harshly. He glared at Alexander. “Is your dad behind this?”

  Alexander was about to retort when the voice of Centurion Fjallheim blasted over their helmet speakers and the interior of the pit was illuminated by harsh white light. “Cadets, what the devil are you doing, sharing Communion?” They looked up to see the Centurion’s helmet silhouetted against the starry sky twenty meters above them. A dozen or so legionaries rimmed the fissure. The lights centered on the corpses, and Fjallheim said, “That’s not normal. I hope you boys didn’t touch anything.”

  “We fell on them!” Alexander exclaimed.

  “Why did you do that,” Fjallheim asked. “The forensics teams won’t be happy with a couple of cadets messing up their crime scene. Each of you can take two demerits for not controlling your falls and two more for not bringing back the Lugby ball.”

  “But sir!” they exclaimed together.

  “You want a few more for making a Legionary Centurion scour the lunar hills for two lost cadets—I didn’t think so! Now stay put, we’ll get a rope down to you. There’s no use trying to get out of there yourselves, you’ll probably fall back down on those bodies and I have enough paperwork to fill out!”

  Two of the legionaries pointed their wrist grapplers down into the fissure and fired. Slim cables snaked down to the bottom. Alexander followed their instructions by making a loop out of the end and wrapping the cable around itself four feet above the loop. His foot went in the loop and his hand clamped down on the wound cable. It took only a few seconds of the burly legionaries to haul Alexander and Khandar up.

  The gruesome discovery interrupted the Lugby match, and Alexander found himself being escorted by two legionaries to the nearby lunar base for debriefing. Khandar had his own escort and followed behind, complaining, “Nice job Terran; because of you our entire trip here is ruined.”

  “That will be enough cadets!” growled one of the legionaries, giving Khandar a prod with his armored glove. He was probably not happy about Khandar’s comment, being a Terran himself. “There’s to be no talking between you two; they don’t want you coordinating stories.”

  Alexander had often dreamed of walking across the Moon, but today wasn’t the experience he anticipated. Still, there was no escaping the desolate beauty of the place. Luna wasn’t all gray. It was full of browns, rusty streaks, black pock-marked rocks and almost white ejecta that reminded him of snow. Many of the hollows and crevasses hosted patches of lunar brambles and white flowering cosmic starbursts. Long gone were the heady years after the Galactic Wars when Terra and her empire expanded into the cosmos. Alexander Galaxus, after whom Alexander was named, set out on a program to forever settle Terrans on hundreds of planets. He also enlisted Galactic technology to terraform candidate worlds in the Terran solar system, primarily Venus, Mars and eventually Luna, Europa and Titan. Venus and Mars were relatively easy and now had growing populations. Unfortunately, Luna was a much more ambitious project and work stopped when the Methuselan War commenced, followed closely by the Caliphate Wars. With the loss of Alexander Galaxus and the destruction of much of the Terran and Galactic infrastructure nothing more happened except having a few tons of Airless Vepres freighted in from some of the outlying systems. The plants took hold quickly and after a decade spread all around Luna, drawing ice toward the surface and starting to form a very thin atmosphere in the craters and valleys. It would take another fifty years before any appreciable atmosphere would form, but Terra simply didn’t have the resources to accelerate the process—it would have to do. Besides, after the carnage of the Caliphate Wars population was much less of a problem.

  The legionaries marched Alexander to the closest airlock. It was a relatively large chamber and could easily take in a full century of legionaries or a number of Zanks or excursion vehicles. They entered the main chamber and then the legionaries led him into an ante-chamber. This was much smaller and didn’t necessitate pressurizing the entire airlock. The door sealed behind them. There was a hiss and Alexander felt the pressure grow outside his suit. A green light went on.

  “All right cadets, you can take your helmets off now,” one of the legionaries told them. The troopers took their helmets off as well. They were both male Terrans like most of the legionaries. The airlock door opened, and they were marched down a long aluminum corridor. Every int
ersection they passed carried a letter and number designation on the ceiling of the junction, visible in all directions on a lighted placard. Alexander tried to keep track of where they had been, but he got lost after three of them—they all looked the same. The legionary obviously knew where he was going, though, and in five minutes Alexander was ushered into a windowless room. Khandar went on to another room.

  “There’s a regeneration dispenser in the corner, cadet,” the legionary told him. “Grab yourself a drink and a snack; someone will be with you in a moment.” He closed the door. Alexander found himself alone, waiting to be interrogated.

  “What have I got myself into,” he whispered. “Dad’s not going to be happy.” He got a drink—milk, and a snack—a fruit bar. Settling into a chair, Alexander tried not to be nervous. There was no reason to be, he reminded himself. After all, he didn’t kill those three people. He didn’t have anything to hide—he stopped himself. Did he have something to hide? He remembered Khandar’s warning. Alexander saw these very same people with Professor Strauss and the Methuselan Circuit. Wasn’t that something to hide?