Angry Moon

Chapter 35b

     “Everyone ready?” asked Benny as Paul took his place in the co-pilot’s chair. Behind them, Eddie and Susan were already strapped in. Eddie looked excited and was staring out of the small porthole beside him at the glorious, curving globe of the Earth. They were over the Pacific ocean at the moment, and a huge, cyclonic storm system was on its way towards the coast of Indonesia. Someone was having a bad day.

     Susan, in contrast, looked stressed and unhappy and just stared ahead at the back of Benny's head. Eddie had gathered, while talking to the others, that she was totally fed up with space and wanted nothing more than to go home. She had the lockbox containing the alien mass dampener latched to the bulkhead beside her, and whenever she looked at it, it was with pure loathing. If not for the responsibility her countrymen had given her over it, she’d still be on the space station, it was true, but at least she wouldn't be getting any further from the Earth.

     Eddie reached out a hand and touched her lightly on the arm. “You okay?” he asked. She pulled her arm out of his grasp and said nothing.

     Paul strapped himself in. “You okay back there?” he asked.

     Eddie looked across at Susan again. They were still docked at the space station. It would only take a moment for Susan to get out and for one of the Chinese engineers to replace her. For a moment he thought about suggesting it, but then Susan turned her head to smile at him. “We're okay,” she said.”

     “Okay then,” said Paul. “Benny, as soon as we cast off, you become the commander. You okay with that?”

     “Understood,” the Swede replied. “Ready to cast off.”

     “Then cast off when you're ready, Commander.”

     Benny touched some of the controls in front of him. “You there, Canberra?”

     “Where else would I be?” said a familiar voice.

     “George! That you? You're going to be our man on the ground?”

     “Yeah, I drew the short straw. We show you’re all ready, Pluvier.”

     “I'm green across the board, too,” replied Benny. “I see no reason to hang around. You okay with that, George?”

     “Cast off when ready, Pluvier.”

     “Roger that. Preparing to unlock.” He touched a couple of controls. “Unlocking bolts and latches.” Through the cockpit window, they saw the space station begin to slowly recede as the spring loaded arms pushed them gently away. “We are undocked and floating free in space. One metre from the docking port. Two metres. Three metres.”

     Eddie felt a thrill in his stomach as various parts of the space station drifted slowly past the porthole beside him. He looked forward, through the cockpit window, and saw Jayesh and the two Chinese engineers waving to them through a window in the Rotterdam module. He waved back.

     “Ten metres from docking port,” said Benny. “Closing nose covers.” The two halves of the shuttle's nose slowly closed, covering the airlock. Normally it would have left the shuttle looking smooth and sleek, but the nose would be taking some of the worst punishment when they landed on the moon and so they'd added plates of thick steel armour to it. It left the shuttle looking as if it had some kind of malign tumour on its nose, but there'd been no time to make it prettier. Eddie didn't mind so long as it increased his chances if getting home alive.

     “Commencing yaw manoeuvre,” said Benny.

     Eddie felt a slight sideways acceleration as the shuttle's nose slipped to the right, the spacecraft rotating about a vertical axis. The docking port disappeared from view and the space station's huge solar panels came into view in front of them.