The Moon Talker - Chapter 20

Not Her, Not Her

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With both arms outstretched, I hug the largest of the giant sequoia trees and breathe in the earthen scent of the bark, as the light rain drips onto us through the canopy.

Mindful of all the freshened smells and sounds of this mini forest within the Moon, I focus on my breathing and try to open my mind. The Mala necklace orbits around my neck, mantra-by-mantra, one bead at a time.

“Hear me, Moon, I am here.”

But The Moon is not there. Maybe I have to be touching its own rock, not transplanted organic Earth matter. Yet I’m no longer stressed about it, but am connected to home instead, and at peace with my newfound purpose in life.

“Where is she?” whispers Yang. “It’s two-fifteen.”

“She’s not coming,” I say. “She knows it’s too risky to meet in person.”

Sköld is not as bullish and reckless as she seems.

“There’s no CCTV in the Garden Zone,” says Yang.

“There is at every entrance and exit point, and we can’t rule out that we haven’t been followed.”

His agitated footsteps pace back-and-forth. “So what do we do? Is there some hidden message to decipher? A secret trail to follow?”

My new guru needs his meditation beads back, it seems. As for what happens next, only Sköld knows. She’s testing our commitment, and to pass, Yang and I have to appear unperturbed. Just two friends released from prison, exploring their new surroundings and freedom.

“No,” I say. “Unless you see anything out of the ordinary, let’s go home and wait for the next message.”

We head back down to our own level. The pace starts off slow and soon gets slower as I fight to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Cramp sets into my left leg, and pins and needles surge through both feet. I pushed my body too far today and will suffer even worse in the morning.

Back at the apartment, Yang guides me to my bedroom. After twenty long, clumsy minutes of getting orientated and ready for bed, I finally settle down. This amazing bed is soft and welcoming, and I snuggle into the faux-feather bedding and fall into a deep, dreamless sleep.

“BUZZZZZZZZ,” a screeching monotone alarm blasts out without warning.

“What the hell, jailer?!” I cry, sitting bolt upright and breathing hard, before remembering where I am. “Yang?”

He bounds into the room. “You okay?”

All he gets is a shrug in return.

“Homebot!” shouts Yang. “What on Earth are you playing at?!”

“Homebot sends its apologies, for being so easy to hack,” says an all too familiar Swedish accent.

“Yes, thank you, Sköld,” says a more welcome Scandinavian voice, Mäkinen. “Excuse the rude awakening — we only have a brief window in which to get your immediate and full attention.”

Yang sits down on the bed beside me and holds my cold, sweaty hand.

“Sköld has created a secret virtual private network amongst our homebots,” says Mäkinen. “Video and footage and audio of us asleep is looping now, but the Lunar Colony InfoSec bots scan the network every fifteen minutes for anomalies. So we have only thirteen minutes to talk before Sköld must shut down the VPN and this conference call. So let’s keep conversation concise and on point.

“Harper, Dr Yang, it’s good to see and hear you both. Please accept my apologies for your wild-goose chase to the forest. We had to see, firstly if you would come, and secondly if you were being followed.”

“Flight Director,” I say, still breathless, “the caution is appreciated, the choice of alarm sound less so! Who is we, exactly?”

“The rebellion.”

“Against my father’s rule?”

“Yes. We are few, as it stands. On the call we also have Maria Méndez, who we all know and are eternally grateful to for our release.”

My mouth gapes open. “That’s it?!”

“Yes,” says Mäkinen in a terse tone. “Now, since President Gold’s coup of the colony and the illegal formation of its republic; human and workers’ rights violations have become a daily occurrence, and the colonists live in constant fear of police brutality and the whims of its selfish dictator. Economically too, export income is down 500% because of soaring inflation. It is a vicious circle that we must break.

“The colonists were, in the vast majority, already aligned towards a separation from Earth, and an independence referendum was in the planning well before ourselves or your father ever touched down. With the right leadership, and both of you on board, we can unite the many against the few, and overthrow President Gold and his Northern Alliance cronies. We can create a new self-governed democracy.”

Whilst his words stir something in the pit of my stomach, Yang and I have our own mission now. “What about the ACDs, and the Permacloud?”

“Our true purpose holds firm, for me at least. But the mission we set out to achieve all those months ago has failed, for now. We cannot be successful in this environment. We must first free the colony from your father’s idiotic tyranny. Then we can retake the other Orion-X, recover your mining equipment, and resume our mission.”

“The lithium is out of bounds.”

“The lithium is the mission. We have all heard about this underground Moon god that you speak with, but you are free now — there’s no need to persist with such fantasies.”

“She means what she says, every word,” says Yang. “Just earlier this evening—”

My elbow gives him a subtle nudge in the ribs.

“… I was saying to Harper how we should not rule out any theory unless there has been a conclusive scientific study into it,” says Yang. “Let’s be open-minded, and respectful of everyone’s beliefs.”

“Very well,” says Mäkinen. “The mining matter is a moot point for now, anyway.”

But this issue can’t be kicked down the road. “Mining the lithium is off the table, or this conversation is finished.”

“Harper,” says Méndez, “I represent the farming unions here. With respect, that lithium is essential for your own inventions, these ACDs, to get rid of the Permacloud surrounding Earth, correct? And the Colony will make great use of the remainder. All that extra energy storage would increase our range, capacity and yields tenfold.”

And line your pockets with battery exports to Earth and Mars, no doubt.

“I witnessed first-hand the pain and suffering you went through in prison,” says Méndez. “But the lunar people need an alternative government that they will trust and vote for. For us, there is only one God, not some Moon spirit you created in despair.”

An awkward silence hangs in the air. Méndez worked so hard to secure my release, but to question my sanity is out of line. Yet I bite my tongue. Yang and I need them to get close to Klingemann’s drill, and it’s now obvious why they need Yang and me — they will build their proposed new government will on the riches of The Moon’s lithium, but they have zero knowledge on how to extract and process it themselves.

“This is pointless,” says Sköld. “We have less than eight minutes left. Just tell them the plan, Mäkinen. Forget the lithium.”

‘You must give Sköld and our unknown companions a chance.’

Okay, Moon, this is their last one.

“She’s right,” says Mäkinen. “Our former mission team is fractured. Us three outcasts are here — the forgotten pariahs. Myself, I am only alive to bio-authenticate the mining machines with Harper. The regime sees Dr Yang, wrongly I feel, as less of a threat. So they give us menial work and access to levels 7, 8 and the Garden Zone only.

“Klingemann, Patel, Lebedev and Nkosi are building their own drilling machine to scupper your equipment, Harper, which as you say, is under control of an external force. That leaves Commander Johnson, who has aligned herself, rather closely, to President Gold.”

A knot tightens in the pit of my stomach at those words, the first sign of an impending panic attack. Adrenaline courses through my veins. My heart pounds. “What do you mean by ‘rather closely’?”

“They are living together,” says Mäkinen, “in the grandest apartment on the top level. Quite the power couple. Commander Johnson is in charge of all military, police and exploratory forces.”

But she can’t stand him? She hates him! Johnson had always been on my side, trying to limit my father’s influence over me, mentoring me through the Moon Drone Programme and this mission. Supporting me as a friend, like a mother even, through the darker periods of my depression.

Johnson should be grieving Capaldi, not sleeping with the enemy. The woman I knew and loved is truly lost.

“Now, through Sköld,” says Mäkinen, “we have contact with one of your former crewmates. I can’t say who, but that person is our insider on the mining team…”

My imagination runs away into wild, dark places, conjuring dark images of my grotesque father, kissing Johnson, and laying her down in a grand four-poster bed. “Not her, not her!”

Crying in sorrow and anger, I daydream about slashing with a dagger, killing them both where they lie. An act of passion. An act of revenge. There’s a combat knife dangling in my hand, its seven-inch blade drenched with their blood. It’s the same jagged-edged blade I had held, and used, all those years ago.

***

Loud noises from downstairs wake me up.

Velcro straps rip open from Mama’s room as she grabs the hockey stick I’m not meant to know about from under her bed. She opens my bedroom door, phone to her ear. “Shhh, stay here.”

She closes the door as slow as she can, but its hinges screech. Shaking, I jump up to help her heave my oak chest of drawers across the doorway. We barricade it with my mattress, a chair and pile on anything else to hand.

“Police? … Maia Gold. That’s M-a-i-a Gold… 105 Kings Court, Haslemere… Someone’s broken in! They’re tearing the place apart… It’s just my daughter and me…”

The stairs creak as the intruder ascends. Mama herds me into the corner and shields me behind her back. She raises the hockey stick aloft in the strike position. Quivering, I peek over her shoulder, transfixed at the door. The intruder shakes and then kicks it in frustration, but still the barricade holds firm.

Then silence. We wait. Suddenly the chest of drawers topples, sending the heaps of paraphernalia flying as the intruder shoulder-barges the door open.

“Back off,” Mama snarls, like a cornered vixen protecting its cub. Still, the masked wolf approaches, clothed in black from head to toe. Semi-silhouetted by a table lamp, only one of our attacker’s ice-cold blue eyes is visible.

He unsheathes a large black dagger. Mama springs up and swings the hockey stick at the intruder with all her might. But with a deft sidestep, he unleashes a vicious kidney punch that disarms and forces her to her knees. He grabs her long brown hair in a fist and jerks her head upwards.

Mama’s wild-eyed stare fixes upon me. “Not her, not her!”

The intruder runs the blade across Mama’s throat and throws her gasping head to the floor.

“No!” I reach out in desperation around me. Only yesterday’s dinner plate comes to hand. Like a discus, I release it with all my strength and fear, crying out in anger. As the intruder turns to me, the edge of the spinning crockery smashes square upon the bridge of his nose.

Calling out in pain, he drops the knife to clutch his face. Blood pours through his fingers. Running towards him, I scoop up the saw-toothed dagger and thrust the full length of the blade into his guts.

He back-hands me with such ferocity that my teenage body leaves the floor, spinning like a tornado, and slams face first into the wall.

“Mama,” I whimper. The sound of sirens fades in, whilst the rest of my world fades to black.

***

Someone’s shaking me. “She’s gone white!” says Yang’s muffled voice. “Harper, Harper! Are you with me? Call Dr Ross!”

Sköld tutts. “Time’s up, losers.”

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Explore short stories and more content from Martin Grace over at Sol Stories.