Four years ago, I was invited to submit a short story to a planned young adult anthology exploring the “real” reasons we’d stopped the moon missions. The anthology had been planned, I think, as a way to get a new generation thinking about us resuming manned flights to the moon in the coming years. Unfortunately, the book was sadly axed during the COVID-19 pandemic.
My contribution, “The Lunar Code,” is presented here in four parts for subscribers.
I hope you enjoy.
— Jim
Note: The following is a work of historic fiction. The astronauts named are real people, as are the historic NASA figures from the Apollo missions, as is President Nixon. However, except for the opening scene in the Apollo 14 lunar lander, all dialogue and narrative is imagined. The contemporary characters are wholly imagined, and any resemblance to real people is entirely coincidental.
The Lunar Code
By Jim Trageser
1971
Friday, Feb. 5, 1750 Central Time
Antares Lunar Lander, Fra Mauro Base, The Moon
Alan Shepard was finally drifting off to sleep.
The feeling of gravity after fives days of weightlessness was a blessing. Still, the excitement of simply being on the moon, and the pain of his suit’s helmet ring pressing into his neck, had made falling asleep difficult in the uncomfortable hammock. But 4 hours and 48 minutes exploring the surface of the moon had left him and Ed Mitchell more exhausted than they’d expected, and fatigue was beginning to win out.
A loud bang from somewhere in their fragile lunar lander quickly brought him back fully awake, his heart racing. Apollo 13 had reminded the entire Astronaut Corps just how perilous these lunar missions really were.
“Ed? Did you hear that?”
“Hell, yes, I heard that.”
“What the hell was that?”
“I don’t know.”
Neither man would get back to sleep after that.
Friday, Feb. 5, 1751 Central Time
Mission Control, Houston, Texas
Deke Slayton, chief of the Astronaut Corps, tore off his headset, and looked over at Fred Haise, who was lead astronaut communicator on shift at Mission Control. “What the heck was that noise?”
Haise shrugged, indicating he had no idea.
Slayton turned to Flight Director Glynn Lunney.
“Can we run some tests to try to figure out what that bang was?”
Dr. Alan C. Harter, chief medical officer for the mission, sat quietly at his station listening to the engineers urgently try to isolate the cause of the noise that had just woken the two astronauts on the moon. After a half minute or so, he slipped out and walked to his office to make a telephone call
.
2019
Monday, July 8, 1017 hours
Oval Office, White House, Washington, D.C.
“I’m sorry. I don’t believe I heard you correctly.”
“We can’t go back to the moon, Mr. President.”
A small, barely perceptible furrow briefly crossed the brow of President Nathaniel Garretson — a popular former governor who was famed for being unflappable no matter the situation.
“Now I’m not sure that you heard me correctly, Madame Administrator. When we spoke last week, I was giving you direction, not seeking your advice.”
“Sir ...” NASA Administrator Emily Fontaine pulled a large, well-worn leather satchel from the floor next to her chair and placed it on her lap before glancing at the president’s chief of staff seated next to her in the Oval Office. “This is for your eyes only, Mr. President. Your eyes.”
The president arched his eyebrows.
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