Part 4 (2/2)

”Look, it's a fact,” Rick told her, still put out with the whole situation. ”Ice would make it easier to set up a colony. We wouldn't have to fly all our water up from Earth. That doesn't mean I think we're actually going to build one, okay?”

”All right,” Tessa said. ”I just want you to be careful.” She looked out the window at the Earth, now just a tiny blue and white disk in the void. ”So, Kaliningrad, what do you suggest?”

Gregor said, ”Give us a minute.” He took longer than that, but when he came back he said, ”We want to check your guidance computer's program. Perhaps we can discover where it intends to take you.”

So Rick, who had at least trained with the primitive keyboard and display, pulled himself down into the equipment bay and ran the computer while Kaliningrad talked him through the procedure, and sure enough, the program was indeed for a polar trajectory. And when they checked the computer in the lander, they learned that it was programmed for a descent to the rim of the Aitken Basin, a 6-mile-deep crater right on the Moon's south pole.

”That's ridiculous,” Rick said when he heard the news. ”How could we be expected to land on the south pole? Like Gregor said, the light would be coming in sideways. Shadows would extend for miles, and every little depression would be a black hole.”

Tessa, who had been running the computer in the lander, said, ”Well, maybe this switch labeled 'Na inject' could provide a clue. If it sprays sodium into the descent engine's exhaust plume, it would probably light up like a candle flame and provide all the light we need.”

”You're kidding.” Rick pulled his way through the docking collar into the lunar module to look for himself, and sure enough there was the switch, right next to one labeled ”Hi-int Floods.”

Tessa said, ”It looks like landing lights to me. Two separate systems for redundancy.”

”Those weren't on the simulator I trained with,” Rick said.

”Of course not. NASA would never plan a polar landing. Too dangerous.”

They knew that NASA had been listening in on their broadcast all along, and sure enough, now Laura Turner in Houston said, ”Well, maybe not, Tessa. We've been digging through the old paperwork here, and in fact one of the mission proposals was for a polar landing. You're right, there was a lot of argument against it, but it was considered a possibility for a later mission after we'd gained enough experience with the easy ones. Of course it got axed along with everything else when the budget cuts came down, but if we'd had the support for it, we would eventually have gone.”

Rick felt a s.h.i.+ver run up his spine. ”The last two ghosts went to Copernicus and Aristarchus. Those were on the list too, weren't they?”

”That's right.”

”So basically we're re-enacting what the U.S. should have done all along.”

”That's a matter of opinion, but yeah, I guess you could say that.”

Gregor asked, ”Houston, can those guidance computers be reprogrammed for a less difficult landing site?”

”Negative,” Laura said. ”The programs are hard-wired in core memory. There's only two kilobytes of erasable memory, and they need that for data storage.”

”So it's a polar landing or nothing,” Rick said, his breath coming short. He looked at the controls again. They were solid as a rock now.

”Looks that way,” Tessa said. She grinned at him. Even with the added danger, it was obvious what she would choose.

Rick gulped. Her wide smile and intense, almost challenging stare were incredibly alluring, but at the same time he couldn't help wondering how deep a hole they could dig themselves into on this flight, anyway? Deeper, apparently, than he had first thought. But they were already in quite a ways; he couldn't back out now. ”All right, then,” he said. ”A polar landing it is. I just hope we find something worth the risk.”

Tessa laughed, and leaned forward to kiss him. ”Just going is worth the risk,”

she said. ”That's what exploring is all about.”

Both Houston and Kaliningrad were unhappy with their choice, but Houston didn't have any say in the matter anymore, and Kaliningrad was caught in a dilemma of its own making, for bailing out now would amount to abandoning an international rescue in the middle of the attempt. So they reluctantly set up their own computers to match the course wired into the onboard ones, and on the eighty-third hour of the flight Rick, Tessa, and Yos.h.i.+ko strapped themselves into their couches for the long rocket burn that would slow them into orbit around the Moon. That had to happen after they had rounded the horizon, which meant they would be cut off from Earth for the burn. The computer would count down the time and fire the engine automatically, but just in case it didn't, they all set their watches to keep track as well.

The last few minutes dragged by. The moon wasn't visible in the windows; they had turned the s.h.i.+p end-for-end so it was behind them now, their course missing the horizon by a mere hundred miles. Rick kept glancing at his watch, then at the computer display, then at the att.i.tude indicators, making sure they were still lined up properly for the burn.

Yos.h.i.+ko took careful notes. If Rick and Tessa crashed or couldn't return from the surface, she would have to fire the trans-Earth injection burn herself and make the homeward flight alone.

Just before the burn, the computer asked Go/No-go? again, and Rick pushed ”Proceed.” The three astronauts watched the countdown continue to zero, but Rick didn't feel the engine kick in. He stabbed at the manual fire b.u.t.ton hard enough to break his fingernail on it, and then he felt the thrust.

Tessa looked over at him, her mouth open. ”The computer didn't fire it on time?”

”I didn't feel it,” Rick said. ”Not until I--”

”It did,” Yos.h.i.+ko said. ”I felt it before you pushed the b.u.t.ton. The computer's okay.”

”Are you sure?” It had been a split-second impression on Rick's part, and his body was so high on adrenaline that he might not have felt the thust immediately, but he'd have sworn it hadn't fired until he hit the b.u.t.ton.

”I'm sure,” Yos.h.i.+ko said.

Rick looked to Tessa, who shrugged. ”Too close to call, for me.”

Rick laughed a high-pitched, not-quite-panicky laugh. ”What the h.e.l.l,” he said.

”We got it lit; that's what counts. Are we still go for landing?”

Tessa nodded. ”I am.”

”You still comfortable with the idea of staying up here by yourself for a day?”

Rick asked Yos.h.i.+ko.

”Yes,” she said.

”All right, then, let's do it.”

They didn't mention the possible computer glitch to Gregor when they rounded the back side of the Moon and reacquired his signal. They reported only that they had achieved orbit and were ready to proceed. Gregor had them fire another burn to circularize their orbit, and that one went off automatically, so Rick began to relax about that anyway. He had plenty else to keep him occupied. The flight out had been a picnic compared to the constant checklists they had to follow and the navigational updates they had to key into the computers before they could separate the two s.h.i.+ps. They hardly had time to look out at the Moon, its gray cratered surface sliding silently past below. But finally after two more orbits, two hours each in the lighter lunar gravity instead of the hour and a half they were used to in Earth orbit, they were ready.

They had named the lunar module Faith, to go along with Hope and to signify their trust that it would set them down and bring them back again safely. So when Gregor was satisfied that everything was ready, he radioed to the astronauts, ”You are go for separation, Faith.”

”Roger,” said Rick. He and Tessa were both suited up again and standing elbow to elbow in front of the narrow control panel.

In the command module, Yos.h.i.+ko said, ”Going for separation,” and she released the latches that held the two s.h.i.+ps together. A shudder and a thump echoed in the tiny cabin, and they were free.

Faith's computer rotated them around to the right angle, and when the proper time came the engine lit for a thirty-second burn that lowered their orbit to within eight miles of the surface. They coasted down the long elliptical track, watching the cratered surface grow closer and closer, until their radar began picking up return signals and Gregor finally said, ”You are go for powered descent.”

Rick pushed ”proceed” on the keyboard, and the computer fired the engine again, slowing them to less than orbital velocity. They were committed now.

Tessa reached out and punched Rick in the shoulder. ”Break a leg, buddy,” she said. ”It's showtime.”

It was indeed. Rick gave her a quick hug, clumsy in the suits but nonetheless heartfelt, then gave his attention completely to the controls. Their course was bending rapidly now, curving down toward the surface, which this close to the pole was a stark pattern of white crater rims holding pools of absolute blackness. Rick's gloved finger hovered near the sodium inject switch, but he didn't flip it yet. He didn't know how much he had, and he wanted to save it for the actual landing.

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