Bouncing Off the Moon

by David Gerrold

  "Come on, Charles, I can't do this alone. I need your help." He rolled Bobby onto Douglas, and picked up Douglas by the head. I picked up Douglas by the feet and the two of us began carrying him forward. The inflatable bulged into unmanageable shapes, but we both had our hands pushed into its gloves and we held on to Douglas himself and tried to keep the bulges from dragging and scraping along the sides. We bounced through the tube as fast as we could manage. I could feel my heart pounding so hard I couldn't hear anything else.

  Mickey led the way, I followed. I couldn't see past him very well, so I couldn't see if the tube sloped up or down, right or left, so I was constantly bumping and jerking, trying to keep up. Bobby and Douglas were still coughing, but Bobby was crying, and that was always a good sign. If we could just make it to the end of this tube. How far was it anyway?!

  We had to stop then, while Mickey zipped us through another manual airlock. And then we pushed on again. I didn't know how much longer I could do this—I didn't care that we were in one-sixth gee. This was exhausting, and I was reaching the limits of my endurance. "We've gotta stop soon—" I managed to gasp.

  "You'd better pace yourselves." Douglas coughed. He waved the breathing tube back and forth between himself and Bobby.

  "All right, all right—" Mickey brought us to a halt. We lowered Douglas and Bobby to the deck and the two of us stood there, hands on knees, panting heavily.

  "Aren't we there yet? How far is it?" I asked.

  "We're halfway there. More than halfway. How are you doing, Douglas?" He was already shoving another air tank through the zipper locks. The last one. This was going to be close. "Turn it all the way up. Give yourselves as much pure oxygen as you can. And try not to strike any sparks. Ammonia is flammable, you know."

  "If I turn it all the way up, the inflatable will fill the tube. We'll use the breathing mask. We'll be fine."

  "Douglas, look at your bubble suit. The plastic is supposed to change color around a rip or a puncture. Red or yellow, I think. If you can find the hole, there's emergency tape right there. Just pull off a strip and press it to the leak. Can you find it? Look around your feet. Turn over, maybe it's behind you. Charles and I will look. Do you see anything, Charles—?"

  "I'm still looking. It's hard to see through all these layers—"

  "Douglas?"

  "I don't see anything either."

  "Damn! Maybe it's in the foot pads or the gloves or someplace it doesn't show. All right—" He glanced up the length of the tube. "It's doable. You ready, Chigger?"

  "No," but I picked up Douglas by the feet anyway.

  This time, we held our panic in check. We moved fast, but we weren't running anymore. We were tired, but we weren't exhausting ourselves. And then, just to make it worse, we started up a long uphill slope. I could see the ceiling of the tube arcing away.

  "Gohvno!"

  It hurt, I ached, and I was beginning to imagine I could smell the ammonia piss-smell myself. It was enough to make my eyes water. I coughed.

  "Not you too!" Mickey said.

  "Keep going!" I shouted.

  And finally, the tube crested the hill. We passed through another manual airlock and started down the last long slope to Gagarin. And yes, I really could smell ammonia now. My suit had a leak too. But I could make it. I was certain of it. All we had to do was get to the bottom of this hill, that's all. Okay, the bottom of this hill then. If I could just hold my breath a little bit longer and not start coughing again—

  —the pain in my eyes and nose and chest was impossible, and somebody was trying to force a breathing tube in my mouth. I was trying to hack out my guts and somebody was telling me to inhale. And all I wanted to do was just get Douglas and Bobby to the other end of the pipeline. And then I finished retching and the tube was shoved into my mouth, and then the next thing I knew, somebody was sitting on me and somebody else was carrying me and we were bouncing down the birth canal of hell pushing into the light, and—and then we were in an airlock or just outside of it and somebody was stripping me out of my bubble suit and turning me on my back and standing on my stomach. Oh, flaming God, even CPR was different on the moon—

  ZOMBIES

  I was on my side. I was in the inflatable. Stinky was sitting next to me, rocking and hugging the monkey and crying. Douglas and Mickey were outside of the inflatable—leaning over me—how had that happened? They were both in bubble suits. Douglas's had a strip of tape on it. I noticed that immediately. My eyes and lungs still burned, there was blood dripping from my nose, but the piss-smell of ammonia was more memory than real.

  We were still in the tube. Douglas waved at me. I waved back. He grinned; I wasn't sure what was happening. He picked up my feet, Mickey picked up my head; Bobby lay down on top of me, he didn't weigh enough to matter—and we were heading down the tube again. This time, I was the cargo. How had I gotten inside the inflatable? How had Douglas ended up outside again?

  It hurt too much to wonder about it. I concentrated on breathing. One desperate gulp at a time. My throat felt scorched. My nose still dripped. I wiped at it futilely. My arms were too weak to move. Stinky waved a breathing tube at me.

  I must have passed in and out of consciousness, because the next thing I knew, Douglas and Mickey were passing me through a hatch, and we were out of the tube inside another cargo-pod-shaped place. And then they were unzipping everything and pulling Stinky out and then me and I was full of questions, but I couldn't ask them because Mickey had a medikit and was wiping my face and shining a light in my eyes, telling me to watch his finger, asking me if I could talk.

  I croaked something in response that sounded like "Kwaaact whaccked?" but really meant "What happened?"

  "Your suit tore. We pushed you into the inflatable. I was going to go for help, but Bobby found the hole in your suit and Douglas patched it. He put it on himself and the two of us carried you out. You should have said something—"

  "Waack tdiict!"

  "Don't talk," Mickey ordered. "Breathe this. It's going to smell funny—" He sprayed something into my throat. It was wet and cold, but in a few seconds, my throat stopped trying to climb out of my neck, and the pain subsided into a dull ache. That left only my lungs screaming for relief. Mickey pressed something cold and hissy against my arm.

  It didn't make the throbbing in my chest go away, it made me go away. I was still awake, I could even feel stuff, I just didn't care anymore. I saw Mickey turn to Bobby next and start making the same tests. Bobby was in better shape than me. So was Douglas. But he sedated them too. Douglas sat down cross-legged next to me, with a stupid look on his face. We must have looked like three happy zombies—

  And then there were some other people around us and Mickey stood up and started showing them his documents. "My name is Michael Gordon Partridge. I'm a licensed bounty hunter from the Line, and these people are my prisoners. Here's a copy of the warrant. Here's my license and my ID. They need immediate medical attention, and I need to arrange fast transport to Armstrong."

  I saw Douglas look up, blinking in confusion. "Huh—?" I wasn't sure what happened next. That's when I started passing in and out of consciousness.

  The next thing I knew, the room was vibrating loudly. And I was strapped down so I couldn't move. I couldn't see either. I turned my head and something wet fell away from my eyes. Douglas was lying on another cot across from me. I didn't see Stinky or the monkey, but there was another cot above me. Maybe he was on that. There was a signal I could whistle—

  —but there was an oxygen mask over my face. And then someone came and put the wet pad over my eyes again. Mickey's voice. "You're going to be all right, Charles. You took a few bad gulps, but there isn't going to be any permanent damage. Douglas and Bobby are all right. So is the monkey. Everybody's here. All you have to do is relax and rest and let us get you to the hospital at Armstrong Station. We'll be there in another two hours." He leaned in close to put his lips next to my ear. "Everything is going to be all right, I promise."


  I couldn't speak. I didn't try. I didn't care. I didn't have any feelings left. Later on, I might have feelings again. But if they were going to hurt, I didn't want them. I'd had enough of feelings, thankewvery-muchnext. But I wanted him to go away. I knew he wasn't good for us anymore, even if I couldn't remember why. I tried to tell him that. I struggled against the restraints and twisted my head back and forth, trying to shake the air mask loose, so I could speak, but that didn't accomplish anything, and a minute later I felt something cold on my arm and I went away again.

  This time when I came to, the room was silent and dark and I was all alone. I was still in a cargo pod. We'd spent our entire time on Luna going from one used cargo pod to another, missing sleep, missing meals, trying to breathe everything from vacuum to ammonia—

  At least the air smelled clean and wet here. It smelled like flowers. Hawaiian flowers. Plumeria, I think that's what they were called. That was nice. What was even nicer was that I could smell them at all.

  I couldn't open my eyes. Something moist was taped in place over them. I wondered if I'd been blinded. That was going to be a nuisance. But at least I could I still hear. The music was Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings, which struck some people as plaintive and annoying, or just plain desolate. I always liked it for its thoughtful quality. It was Dad's recording, and I think I knew which one. It was the first time I ever got to see him conduct. He conducted with his eyes closed. At least it looked that way from where I was sitting. He was lost in the music. And his hands were like living creatures—he didn't use a baton; he just stroked the air and the music poured forth. He coaxed the Adagio into life and let it fill the auditorium. I don't think I took a breath for the entire ten minutes. I'd never heard anything like that before in myv'ife. I hadn't known such sounds were possible. And afterward, I kept playing it over and over again, always trying to recapture that same initial wunderstorm …

  I wished I could tell him how much I loved his music. That would be nice. Somebody took my hand in his. It felt like Dad's hand. Large and warm and safely enveloping. I knew it had to be Douglas holding my hand, but it was nice to pretend it was Dad for a while.

  And then Dad spoke. "I was so scared, Chigger. For a while, I thought I was going to lose you. All of you, forever. I didn't get a chance to say any of the stuff I wanted to say. And I was afraid that even if I could say it, you wouldn't want to hear it. And now that I have the chance to tell you, all I really need you to know is how important you are to me and how sorry I am everything got so screwed up. I wish I could have done better. The music—do you remember this? You were always asking to come see me conduct, and I was sure it would bore you to death, but I took you anyway, and you sat there totally entranced and captivated. You were listening to the music as deeply as anyone I've ever seen. I was so happy for you that day—because you'd discovered something all your own. And I was so glad it was something I could give to you. I remember the look in your eyes of total awe and admiration, and how proud I was to be your dad; the person who'd brought that look to your face. I wish I could have made that moment last forever." He kissed my hand and replaced it on the bed, and then he got up and went away, and the dream ended. But it was really a nice dream while it lasted.

  And then I had a dream about Mom too. Her and that Sykes woman. But I didn't remember what they said. And that bothered me for a while—because it didn't seem fair for Dad to have a whole vivid dream and not Mom too. But it was kind of like Mom had stepped out of my life for a while and I guess I wasn't ready to let her back in, not even in my dreams.

  That reminded me of something Douglas said once, about moms. He said that nothing gets in the way of a good fantasy like a mom. That's why most guys try to put Mom aside for a while—while they try to figure out who they are, I guess. It didn't matter anymore. We were all going to jail soon enough. If we weren't there already.

  And then, one morning, I opened my eyes to the smell of hot chocolate, eggs, toast, and strawberry jam. And I sat up in bed and looked around. Except for a slightly sleepy feeling of confusion, I felt better than I had in days. I could even talk. My voice was still dusky-scratchy like my throat was lined with cockleburs and foxtails, but I could actually make understandable words. "Hello? Is anyone there?" I was in a room that was not part of a cargo pod. It actually had a real floor and real walls and a real ceiling. It was spooky. Everything looked soft and gentle and flowery, that's how I knew it was a hospital; it smelled like a hospital too, with the air just a little too fresh and clean.

  "Oh, good, you're up. Right on schedule." The woman wore a purple-gray dress and a thing like a pink apron over it. I guessed it was supposed to be cheery, and it wasn't too hard to look at, but I was never big on industrial cheerfulness before and as good as I felt, I wasn't ready to start now.

  She was just uncovering a tray of food—that was what I'd smelled. She put it across my bed and tied a bib around my neck. "Just in case," she said. "You might still be a little weak."

  "What is this place?"

  "Tranquility Medical Center at Armstrong."

  "How long was I out?"

  "Three days. No, four. It doesn't matter. You're fine now. You'll just have to take it easy for a bit. I'll leave you alone to eat. The shower is through there. There are fresh clothes in the closet. Try not to take too long. You have to be in court in two hours—"

  "Say what?"

  But she was already gone.

  IN COURT

  Judge Cavanaugh was the largest human being I had ever seen. He looked like the Hindenburg. He was huge and round, and when he entered the room, it took a while for all of him to arrive at the same place. He moved like a human bubble suit, with all of his blubbery mass flubbering and bouncing around like an animated caricature of a fat man. In Lunar low gee, he didn't lumber, he floated. He took his seat at the bench, and all the various parts of him arrived one after the other, settling into place like latecomers at a concert.

  Judge Cavanaugh took roll, made sure all his separate body sections had sorted themselves out, looked out over the room, looked to the display in front of him, rubbed his nose, and waved a go-ahead gesture at the clerk, a skinny black woman. "Case number 40032, in the matter of Douglas, Charles, and Robert Dingillian, custody of, blah blah blah."

  Custody? Again?

  Judge Cavanaugh was scanning through his notes. He finally found the page he was looking for and looked out at us again. He cleared his throat. "Most court cases are a two-body problem. A plaintiff and a defendant. Those are relatively simple to resolve. You listen to the facts, you look for a balance. Somehow you find a Lagrange point."

  He looked out over the room. "But just as the laws of physics start to get complex and unmanageable when you introduce a third body to the problem, so do the laws of human beings become complex and unmanageable when there are three participants orbiting around a claim.

  We have here, a seven-body problem. Or a twelve-body problem. Or more. I've lost count of the number of litigants who have stepped forward to lodge a claim or file a brief as a friend of the court. I know that most of you recognize that you do not have a hope in hell of winning your claim, but it hasn't stopped you from adding bodies to the problem in the hope of making it so unmanageable that it can never be resolved. I applaud your various successes in making this case a colossal nightmare. I promise to reward each and every one of you appropriately."

  He smiled. For some reason, it didn't look friendly.

  "Let me explain something to those of you who've just arrived here in the last few days. I know a lot of you are suddenly out of work and vaguely troubled by the fact that we don't have ambulances to chase here on Luna. And, of course, as we all know, there's nothing as dangerous as an unemployed lawyer—unless it's one who is employed. But for the record, I want to explain to you how things work here in this courtroom, and on most of Luna.

  "This is a small town. There are only three million of us. And we're spread across a landmass equal to that of Earth. So we're sp
read pretty thin. We've only got a few major settlements. The largest still has less than a hundred thousand folks. So we run our courts with a lot less formality than you might be used to back home. That doesn't mean we take our lawyering any less seriously. It just means that we don't bother with wigs and robes and funny hats. They make us look silly and we start giggling—and that's a little disconcerting when we're sentencing someone to the nearest airlock because he refused to pay his air tax. And yes, I'm not joking.

  "So we're just going to cut through a lot of the crap that you guys love so much and see if we can sort things out without using up too much oxygen. Those of you who are representing clients with money, this probably doesn't worry you—but take my word for it, it doesn't matter how much money your clients have back on Earth or on the Line. It can't buy more oxygen if there isn't any left. We want you to represent your client's claims fairly, we want to hear the facts. We do not want a lot of extraneous noise. Nothing pisses off this court more than a low signal-to-noise ratio. I assume I'm making myself perfectly clear? Thank you."

  He paused to note something on the pad in front of him, then said, "So, let's get to it. This hearing is projected to cost the Lunar Authority fifty thousand water-dollars. Therefore, the court chooses to exercise local privilege and will assess a nonrefundable processing fee of five thousand liters of water or ten thousand liters of nitrogen on all claimants in this matter to cover the judicial expenses. Anyone choosing to withdraw his or her claim, please see the court clerk now—"

  Several people I didn't recognize bounced up out of their seats and over to the clerk at the side of the room. I was sitting in a wheelchair with a mask on my face, concentrating on one breath at a time. I'd been wheeled in at the last minute and I hadn't really gotten a good look at anything; besides, my vision was still too blurry to make out details. And strapped in as I was, I couldn't even turn around to see how many people were in the room or who else was here. Next to me, the shape that looked like Douglas was grim. The shape that looked like Bobby was sitting quietly on his lap. I didn't see anything shaped like a monkey.