by Bob Goddard
Something related to engineering at Armstrong Base? He ran through all the projects under way and mentally ticked them off one by one. There was still a hell of a lot to do, most of it urgent and all of it important, but nothing there to cause his disquiet.
His mom and dad perhaps? No. Despite the comet threat they were more than capable of looking after themselves and had one of the best shelters in the world to move in to later today. He’d spoken to both of them last night and even his mom, who was never satisfied with her pampered lifestyle, appeared reconciled with living underground for a few days.
His dad had commissioned a private report which predicted the worst effects of Comet Santos would be over in a week or so. He had used it to persuade his wife she would be back home in Santa Barbara before she knew it.
Will prayed that might be true and Thijs Jansen’s gloomy forecast was overly pessimistic. Either way, the Terra Vivos shelter was capable of sustaining its inhabitants for a year if need be, so they should be okay, even if others weren’t so fortunate.
Was it Ginny then? Last night was one of the best vidcalls in weeks. She was back home in Monterey and in good spirits. She’d moved his beloved Harley-Davidson to a secure underground car park and deposited their other valuables in a bank vault. A wise precaution as looting was already being reported. She would join his mom and dad in Santa Barbara this morning for the short flight to the Mojave Desert in his dad’s tiltrotor.
He knew Ginny and his mom didn’t get along too well and hoped they’d manage to be civil to each other for the duration. But Ginny had breezily dismissed his concerns and assured him she would be just fine. She had lots of work to keep her busy and could write her reports in a hole in the ground just as easily as up a tree or back at home.
It was he who needed to take extra care, she said, to keep safe and come on home to her as soon as possible. She’d even had time to answer his questions about how trees manage to transport water from their roots all the way to their leaves – 300 feet up in the case of the sequoias – against the pull of gravity. It was for a crazy idea he was cooking up, he told her, and she’d been delighted that her specialist knowledge might help his work on the Moon.
Then they’d blown each other kisses, promised their love across space and time and Ginny had turned her heart-melting smile on him before the call ended, leaving him feeling elated for once.
No, she would be safe with his mom and dad in the Terra Vivos shelter. It was all under control. He needn’t worry.
And yet he still did.
With a curse he threw off the sheet, rolled on to the floor and knocked out a hundred press-ups, half on one hand, half on the other, before pulling on his jog suit and setting off for his run, hoping it would clear his mind.
As he pounded along the eastern corridor tube he had an eerie feeling that something was following him, hovering over his head and getting closer by the minute. Through the newest farm tube, dodging startled early-shift workers, he couldn’t shake it off. Sprinting as hard as he could up the western corridor tube he felt the presence dogging his steps.
Finally, standing in the shower and looking up into the stinging jets of hot water, he knew what it was.
Comet Santos.
Nineteen hours to impact.
* * * * *
Moon, 2087
Nadia Sokolova tapped her screen to accept the call she’d been expecting all morning. She was surprised he’d held out for so long.
“I want talk.”
“I don’t have time to waste words on you, Mr Lanimovskiy. If you want to work, I’ll see you in half an hour. If not, then I have nothing to say to you.”
“Da, da. I work, I work.”
“Very well. Come to my office in thirty minutes.”
It was 12.10 when Lanimovskiy stepped into Nadia’s office and pulled a face when he saw Tamala sitting there.
“Why she here?” he grunted.
“Why? To stop me from losing my temper and breaking your stupid neck,” said Nadia. “And to record this conversation. Your behaviour here and at work will determine your treatment. All recordings will be forwarded to police when you return to Earth. Maybe, if you show remorse and work hard, you will get a shorter sentence.”
He was silent.
“So. Do you want to work or not?”
“What choice? I am starving,” he slumped his shoulders sullenly.
“Nobody starves in two days. Maybe in fifty or sixty days. For now you feel little bit hungry. If you work and work well, you eat. Don’t work – don’t eat. That is your choice.”
“If agree, you let me eat now?”
“No. You can start work at 14 hours when the afternoon shift starts. At 18 hours, if the report on your work is good, you can eat then. Thirty minutes for supper, then back for four more hours work until the shift ends at 22 hours. Same as everybody else.”
“Suka!”
“Yes, I am the bitch in charge here.” She stared into his eyes until he looked away.
“Da. Okay. I work. Where?”
“For now you will be working in the recycling tube – unit 35 – where we have staff off sick.”
He hissed through his teeth and shook his head in resignation.
“Present yourself to the Section Head there at 13.45 for instruction. That is all. You can go.”
He turned to leave.
“And if you slam my door again you will be mining for ice in Haworth Crater instead.”
The door closed behind him with a gentle click.
“Well!” Tamala breathed a sigh of relief and turned to Nadia with a bright smile. “I think you won that battle of wills, Nadia.”
“Maybe. But have I won the war? We will see.” She was watching him slouching disconsolately away on her screen. “What kind of parents produce a useless oaf like that?”
“His mother and father split up when Andrei was eight,” said Tamala. “I was checking his family background yesterday. It seems his father came into money and control of his company through connections with the president. Then he divorced his wife and got custody of the boy. There’s been a succession of women in the Lanimovskiy household since then, mostly models, celebrities, porn stars. Not ideal mother material.”
“And the father,” said Nadia, “he throws money at the boy to cover his guilt. Anything he wants, he can have.”
“Yes, it seems that way. He may be a useless oaf, but it’s not all his own fault, Nadia. That’s not an excuse for his behaviour, but it is an explanation, perhaps? Everybody was talking about him last night after the news about his father. I don’t think he has many friends here.”
“Doesn’t surprise me.”
“I may discuss him with George Niarchos and see if he would like to have a quiet word with Andrei. He would be a more suitable father figure and might be able to help him.”
“Okay. That’s a good idea, Tamala. Now, I have other work to do. Thank you for your help.”
* * * * *
Moon, 2087
“Ah, Lian!” Her mother looked composed, despite the yellow hard-hat perched on her head. “I hope you are feeling better today? Did you see the doctor?”
“Yes, Mother,” she lied. She’d not seen Doc Rozek since the day of her attack.
“And you’re taking some medication? You seem calmer today. That’s good.”
Lian didn’t tell her that she’d stopped taking her mood-meds because they made her feel vague and groggy. Or that her calm appearance was masking a deep well of sorrow.
“Yes, I’m okay now. Are you still working? Shouldn’t you and father be moving into a shelter by now? You know it won’t be safe to stay in your apartment?” Lian shuddered as her nightmare with the crumbling tower block reappeared as a vivid flashback.
“Of course, Lian. You know my company built the Golden Gateway shopping mall complex underneath the city centre? Your father and I have been given a suite in the new Tianfu Moonlight Hotel down there for as long as we need it, courtesy of the owner
s.
“It is five star with pools, tennis courts, even an ice-skating rink. So we will have a luxurious holiday for a couple of days. You needn’t worry about us.”
“I think you will need to shelter for more than two days, Mother. The Chief Astronomer here says the effects of the comet impact could last for months, with a global winter caused by dust.” She waited for her mother’s reply to cross the void.
“He is exaggerating, Lian.” Her mother waved her hand dismissively. “He’s like all these trumped-up experts, trying to make a name for themselves by predicting the end of the World. Our government says we are so far from the impact site we will have the least effects here. Some minor earthquake damage, perhaps, but nothing more.”
“How about all the people who don’t have an underground hotel to go to?” Lian was aghast that her mother seemed oblivious to the human suffering about to befall the world.
“The shopping mall will take 200,000 people, Lian. The rest will find parks to camp in until the earthquake risk has passed. It has all been organised by the authorities. This is not Bangladesh, you know.” She laughed.
“But Mother, even if the people survive, surely most of their homes will be destroyed by earthquakes? It will be a disaster.”
Her mother looked exasperated. “Why do you have to be so negative about everything these days, Lian? Think positively. Who is going to get the reconstruction contracts, eh? This could be the biggest boost for business in years.”
Lian stared at her mother’s happy face beaming in the Chengdu darkness and thought: I don’t know this person. Can she really be my mother?
“Anyway, Lian. I have to go now. You need to call your father. You haven’t spoken to him for a week. He is packing our things in the apartment. Call him right now. We can speak again tomorrow… after this so-called ‘disaster’ is all over. Bye bye.”
A huge blurry finger approached and ended the call.
Lian sat motionless and numb while her mind raced like a lab rat in a maze. Her thoughts ran down narrowing tunnels to one dead-end after another. The minutes ticked by unnoticed.
Somewhere there must be an explanation for all this. Some key to unlock this mysterious and confusing whirlpool that was sucking her down into darkness. If she sat here and thought hard enough, surely she would find the answer…?
Bee-eep! Bee-eep!
Lian jumped as if from an electric shock. Then she realised it was her comm alerting her to an incoming call.
Bee-eep! Bee-eep!
She tapped her screen and a man was talking to her. He seemed familiar, but she felt sure it wasn’t her father. Who could it be? He stopped speaking and stared at her for a few moments.
“Are you alright, Lian?” He spoke with a funny accent. Was she supposed to laugh? She realised he was waiting for an answer.
“Sorry. What was your question again? I was asleep.” She lied to cover her confusion.
“Oh. I am sorry to disturb you. I wanted to know what colour lighting is required for the top two racks of the new farm tube. I have to put in the order with Will Cooper of engineering. Your plan says we are to grow cranberries there and as it is a new crop, I don’t know the best lighting for it.”
“Ah, yes. Just a moment please.” His funny accent sounded Brazilian. It must be Carlos Ferreira. Yes, of course it was! She had spent nearly all day yesterday and half this morning working with him. How could she forget?
“I’m just looking up the file…” she flustered. She knew what she wanted, but couldn’t remember where to look. She searched: Lighting. Plants. And there it was. Of course! She had prepared a spreadsheet detailing every crop’s preferred lighting duration and colour, feeding and irrigation. She had called it Crop Cultivation Optimums.
“I will send you the whole file, Mr Ferreira.”
“Please, call me Carlos, Lian.” He had a puzzled smile. She realised she hadn’t addressed him by his surname since their first meeting, days ago.
“Of course, Carlos. I’m sorry.” She was making a fool of herself. “There… I’ve sent you the file. You should find everything you need in there.”
“Thank you, Lian. Sorry to have disturbed your rest.”
“Okay. That’s okay. Bye. Bye.” She tapped her screen and he was gone.
Lian dropped her face into her hands in shame. Why had she made such a fool of herself? How could she not remember the person she had spent so much time with lately? Was she going mad?
One thing the call had done was remind her to call her father. She checked the time. It was 14.05. It would be 22.05 in Chengdu. Would her father still be at the apartment? Was it really an hour since she spoke to her mother? Where had all that time gone?
She shook herself to break out of her stupor. In just over eleven hours Comet Santos would end all the speculation and settle the arguments. There wasn’t much time left.
She reached for her screen to call her father.
* * * * *
Moon, 2087
The Governor’s meeting at 18 hours discussed their progress since Tuesday’s switch to three-shift working. Nadia thanked them and told them she had just heard from ISCOM’s Australian office – Darmstadt was now shut down – that a Chilean observatory had discovered auto-recorded footage of Comet Santos from two weeks before. This was when the comet had changed course and it was hoped the recording may help, finally, to explain why. The data was undergoing analysis and they should have an answer by midnight.
“Speaking of data,” she said, “it is time to tell you about a data-gathering exercise I initiated a few days ago.”
She took a deep breath and continued: “Shortly after the start of this comet situation, I realised we might lose our data retrieval and processing service. Almost everything we do here depends on information we download from Earth.
“In the absence of the internet we route all our requests for instructional and reference information through the Darmstadt office. This ceased at midday today when the building was evacuated. We don’t know when the office will be able to resume this service, or whether atmospheric dust will disrupt transmission of data, and if so, for how long.
“So, as a precaution, I asked ISCOM if we could download data we might need in the event of a prolonged interruption of communications. For the past five days my father has been working around the clock to transmit all the information resources we might possibly require in future. As you can imagine this has proved to be a massive task – a race against time – which ended at midday today.”
“What sort of information are we talking about here?” asked Will.
“Every kind,” said Nadia. “All the reference works that Lian might need for crop production, meat production, fish rearing, you name it. Every medical report and journal that Doctor Rozek might need in the future. Every kind of surgical procedure, midwifery and paediatric care…”
“Jesus Christ!” he exploded. “You think we are going to have babies being born up here before we get rescued? Before we even get communications again!”
“Who knows, Will? We all hope that comms will be re-established in a short while and we may return to Earth in due course. But none of that is guaranteed.”
“And how about engineering data,” he asked, “and chemistry, synthetics, electronics – all that?”
“Yes, all of those, Will. Plus how we go about putting satellites into orbit, in case ours don’t survive the comet debris.”
“Jeez. I hadn’t thought of that!” He brushed his hand over his scalp.
“And…” she paused, considering her words carefully, “and how to build rocket engines, in case no-one on Earth is able to come and fetch us.”
“You’re scaring me now, Nadia!” Tamala’s voice was trembling.
“Well, now you know why I haven’t shared this with you before. And why none of you will breathe a word of it to anyone else. It is an insurance policy, that’s all. Just in case the future is not as rosy as we all hope and pray it will be. My responsibility is to e
nsure the welfare of the whole colony, no matter what the future may hold. So I’m taking no chances.”
“Why are you telling us now?” Tamala looked shocked.
“Because you deserved to know why calls to your families have been so restricted, even after the scientists were redeployed and their research data slowed to a trickle.”
“Ah,” said Will, “I wondered about that.”
“It is because ninety per cent of SeleneSat’s capacity has been taken up with the huge data download. We have received 795 Zettabytes of compressed data over the past five days.”
“Jeez! That’s massive!” said Will. “Do we have the capacity to receive that much data?”
“Only just. I have had to use every bit of storage we possess. And now we need to create a bank of servers to handle the data so we can de-compress and access it. That’s the other reason I’m telling you this: we need a bank of servers and I’m hoping you can provide them, Will.”
“Sheesh! I’ll speak to Marina. She seems capable of solving most electronics problems. She’ll want to know why we need such a huge server capacity though…”
“I will have a word with her, Will,” said Nadia.
“Who else knows about this?”
“Our IT specialist. He was sworn to secrecy on Saturday when the downloads started.”
“So your father,” said Tamala, “he’s been working on this since Saturday too?”
“Yes. ISCOM allocated two people to work with him, but he’s been sourcing and sending data non-stop these past five days,” said Nadia. “When he wasn’t monitoring a certain person’s calls and setting up a Spetsnaz mission to save my mother.”
“Jeez,” said Will, “what a hero!”
“Yes,” Nadia smiled for the first time, “it is useful to have a father like this.”
“And it is also very useful,” said Tamala, “to have a Governor with the foresight to protect our future like this. Although I sincerely hope it will be unnecessary.”
“Yes. I hope so too, Tamala. Now, as you heard in my midday broadcast, I have invited everybody to gather in the Lunchbox after 1 hours tomorrow morning, so that nobody has to be alone at the time of the impact.”