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In a Faraway Land
- Gate Item, USAF Battery Blue, Henson Crater SW Rim, South Pole, Luna
Guardiamarina Alejandro Navarro, Mexican Navy
November 27th, 2062
av didn’t know what to expect a real space suit to feel like, but he never got used to it. Operating the U.S. Air Force’s “Field Security Full-Pressure Suit, Limited Actuation, Type A/P22S-9” felt less like a suit and more like a tin foil balloon filled with vaseline. Each step had a slosh to it as the shin gradually compressed the gel-lined walls into motion. There was a lag and rubberbanding to every motion as the gel queued “actuation assist”. The wearer’s movements were multiplied at the joints to make action more deliberate and squeeze out any dexterity they could out of what was essentially a man-sized spaceship. However, that assist was usually a second late in the older models.
Nav stepped out of the air lock onto the grey regolith alongside Private Schuster or “Shoey”, his partner for the shift. Shoey had just arrived from Infantry Training Battalion the previous month so was new to the patrol depth chart. Nav wasn’t much of an English conversationalist, but even he noticed Shoey’s eyes pinned to the ground in the suit-up room. He was apparently still in the aftermath of a thrashing the senior Lances gave him once they discovered he packed his high school yearbook to the Moon. Shoey spent his 18th birthday sleep deprived at a Recruit Depot, so the Friday night lights were just yesterday for him and Battery Blue was as remote as deployments come. However, some aspects of youth were desirable to the Marine Corps while others were not. At least that’s how the Sergeants justified letting it go to themselves. Boredom and the universal past-time of boys beasting those barely their junior were the more likely culprits.
Nav flicked the radio mounted to his hip. Its cable fed into a flexi-electrical panel embedded over the small of his back, which connected to his Snoopy cap’s microphones and earpieces. He was meant to do a comms check before leaving the suit up area but the scared Private suiting Nav and Shoey up was too rushed to run them through the entire checklist.
“Whippet 1-7, this is Whippet 1-Eh…2-Oboe-1-Nan. Eh… Radio check, over,” Nav said. His enunciation was a bit drawn out and still shaky as he remembered back to the abridged English radio etiquette course some tired old 1/24 Marine gave the 12 of them back at the Detroit armory.
“Whippet 1-2-Oboe-1-Nan, Whippet 1-7. Roger, out,” Staff Sergeant Romano replied. “Whippet Main, this is Whippet 1-7. Red shift is departing for RV Keller. Over.”
“Whippet 1-7, this is Whippet Main. Roger, over. Break. All stations, Whippet Main. Blue to red changeover is in 15 minutes. Over.”
Nav and Shoey joined Romano and Corporal Salamanca out on the dusty courtyard leading out towards the perimeter fence. White walls and steel catwalks towered over them on three sides, while the fourth—straight ahead—faced straight into the black-white horizon. Their well-used white “mobility kits” were stained grey from moon dust. Shoey, as the new guy, hefted the patrol’s long-range radio—a large backpack encased in a white tarp to keep the dust out. Salamanca towed a cart stacked with replacement batteries for the remote sensors that Red shift would come across on their eight hours of walking. Their bulbous helmets were shrouded by mesh bags to break up their silhouettes, although it did nothing for their conspicuous orange visors that caught the sun at every angle. Anything less and their field of vision, especially up close, would be cut from terrible to nil. The suits were a bit more “tactical” than those worn by their civilian counterparts in that they had they could kneel and probably wouldn’t tear anything from a low speed fall, but seeing and moving was still a frustrating affair.
Each of the Marines carried a rifle specially modified to interface with their suit’s gel system to ease the trigger pull. It handled like a hollow plastic toy in lunar gravity. Radiator fins protruded far from the barrel to disperse the heat as best as possible, although the amount of sustained fire they could get out of them was still not stellar. In theory they could take advantage of a barrel-change system when stationary, although the armorer at Battery Blue pinned the barrels in place. The only shots that had ever been fired on the installation were negligent discharges and each patrolman only carried two magazines anyway. Nav though, not yet qualified on the American rifle, only carried a holstered sidearm.
“Alright gents, be on the lookout for ghosts and don’t fuck with the wildlife,” Romano said. “And Salamanca, if you flip the cart again we’re shooting you in the knees.”
“Oh please, Staff Sergeant.”
Romano hopped and spun around, lofting a bit in the low gravity, and locked on Nav. The helmet was fixed to the torso of the suit so there was no head turning. Nav couldn’t see anything past the amber glass, but he knew the Staff Sergeant’s stare was behind it.
“It’s the long route again, sir. No tapping out,” Romano said.
“Aye, aye.”
“L-T, you’ll be amazed by how sweaty your legs and dry your eyes can get,” Salamanca chimed in.
“Sally, I’ve been out three times a week for the past 6 months. You’ve been there for a third of them.”
“And yet I’m amazed everytime.”
The four set off with Henson Crater to their backs and the perimeter fence to their left. Every step felt like stepping in gelatin as the gel layer on the soles of their feet redistributed. The muffled crunch of fine powder lightly vibrated suits, like walking on the beach with your ears plugged. It wasn’t so demanding, although they’d be standing for 8 hours and everything below chest level became terribly sweaty inside the skintight body glove.
A red pennant frozen mid-flap gradually came into view. Another four figures, positively caked in grey dust, approached from the other direction, towing their own cart full of drained batteries. They were actually quite about 5 miles away from the main facilities of Battery Blue on Henson’s rim—an elevator and tram brought the perimeter patrols to an annex at the base of the crater to cut down the walk.
“Our relief,” the lead approaching figure said. It was Sergeant Molina from 3rd Platoon, which manned Blue shift in their zone around the crater. “Took you long enough.”
“Yeah well Yates said you guys were late to changeover this morning so couldn’t let you get off easy,” Romano said. “Anything going on?”
“We couldn’t remediate the sensor issue at Item-Five-Able, so you might need to stick around there for a while. But other than that, same old nothing.”
“Alright well, hurry back and link up with Top so they can maybe send out a replacement with White tomorrow. You might be able to catch him in the shop if you get back before 1730.”
“Fat chance, you know it’ll be a month of walking around in circles over there. Top is allergic to actually maintaining past 1200 and First Sarnt will be up our asses over it.”
“I believe the response you’re looking for is, ‘Aye, aye, Staff Sergeant.’” Romano brought his wrist to eye level to check the watch built into his gauntlet. “Now get the fuck out of here. And fill out the goddamn patrol journal correctly this time. Last time it looked like it was filled in by a four year old.”
“Aye-”
The radio squelched. “All stations, this is Whippet Main. Hold position, over.”
“Whippet Main, Whippet 1-7. Wilco, over,” Romano said. He swept his arm down and to the side. “Everyone fan out and heads up.”
“Man I just want to hit the rack-”
Molina hushed abruptly and peered up towards the crater. Everyone else followed. Five interceptor missiles were climbing skyward from Battery Blue, fanning out to the north. No one had ever seen that before.
“Do they do test launches?” Nav asked.
“What the fuck- woah!”
One of the interceptors exploded almost directly overhead. Surely they weren’t actually intercepting something? It must have been some sort of accident and a programmed destruction.
Another interceptor exploded. Just behind it Nav could just make out the glint of something, but it was gone in an instant. Suddenly, something in the crater erupted in a fire ball before rapidly cooling. Another impact immediately followed, but seemed to penetrate the ground because instead of a ball of hot gas it ejected a column of dust into the sky. A Battery Blue interceptor tried launching, but instead of elegantly shooting into the heavens it clumsily veered off, entering a violent spiral and detonating on the side of the crater.
“Whippet Main, this is Whippet 1-7, I’m seeing multiple explosions in the direction of Battery Blue. Please advise.”
Silence.