"Keep coming!" cried Alexei from above. "Don't stop!" shouted Douglas and Mickey from below.
I swallowed hard, visualized–was it getting hot in here or was it my imagination? Had I scraped my bubble? Did I hear something hissing? Was I losing air?–visualized again and unclicked, kicked, and climbed. I fumbled again–but this time grabbed the cord anyway, clicked, and hung, braced myself against the wall. I couldn't see. The tears were a torrent. The light was awful. If I could just see–
"Only three more and you are here, dingaling! Keep coming!"
Visualized, unclicked, kicked, grabbed, clicked and pulled–okay, I could do this. Two more times. Took a breath, did it all again on the other side. Once more–except I couldn't see a thing. My goggles were wet, my eyes were flowing. I pulled my hand out of the lower glove and pushed my goggles up, tried to wipe my eyes with my wrist. That was a mistake. My goggles fell off my head and bounced away somewhere below me. I felt them hit the floor of the bubble. Even with my eyes closed, the light was an orange blast. I said some of those words that mom hated so much.
"What just happened?" Douglas demanded.
"He dropped his goggles," Alexei said. "Not to worry. Is easy enough, we do it with eyes closed. Come up, dingaling. You are almost here."
It wasgetting hot in here. It wasn't my imagination. The sweat was dripping from my armpits. If I could just see–I squinted up. The rope was a blurry line. Maybe if I could get the goggles. I pulled my knees up, bringing the floor of the bubble almost up within reach. I reached around, fumbling for the goggles. If I could just find the goggles–my hand scrabbled frantically.
"Charles!" That was Douglas. "Don't stop! Keep climbing!"
"I just want to grab my goggles. I can't see!"
"Forget stupid goggles! You are close enough to do without."
And then I swung around just a little bit and my view widened beyond the bubble to the scenery outside.
I was hanging on the inside wall of a Lunar crater. It was big, round, and deep. The pod had come down on the far side and we'd crossed the rubble‑strewn floor, always keeping to the shadow until we'd finally climbed its steepening slopes–until we'd finally had to pull ourselves up the wall. From this perspective, it looked bigger and deeper than the Barringer Crater in Arizona, only it was painted in hard colors of black and silver and bright.
And I was hanging halfway up the inner wall.
In a bubble of air. Baking in the sun. Surrounded by vacuum and dark. And nothing below me and nothing above me, hanging only by a single arm. My arm was getting tired. And no one anywhere could save me.
I knew the distances weren't the same here on the moon. I knew the gravity wasn't the same. I knew my weight was lighter. But my eyes told me distance and my brain remembered Earth. And my stomach clenched.
"Please, little Dingillian. Put hand back in glove. Reach up. I will pull you, but you will have to kick away from wall. Hokay?"
For a moment, I forgot everything–even the light. I could hear myself thinking– This is a really stupid way to die.And then the other side of my brain argued– No it isn't. This is really dramatic.
And then I got annoyed, and said, "You're both wrong–"
"What's that, dingaling?"
I didn't answer. Somehow I got my hand back into the glove. I ignored the light and heat and unclicked. I kicked away from the wall, swung myself up, grabbed, and clicked, braced against the wall, unclicked, kicked, swung, grabbed, clicked, braced–"Now!"–and kicked straight down, bounced up–and Alexei grabbed my arm and pulled me over the top, pushing me into the shadow of a looming crag.
I flopped down cross‑legged on the broken Lunar rocks and let the tears flood out of me. My eyes were dazzled so badly, I could hardly see.
"Is he all right? Is he all right?"That was Douglas.
"He is fine. He is just shaked and baked a little. Wait–" Alexei hovered over me, checking air and temperature and everything else he could think. He looked all over my bubble for leaks, but the pressure meter said it was fine.
"Can you sit here quietly, Charles? I bring your brother up?"
I managed to nod, and Alexei moved back into the light, and started calling instructions down to Douglas.
I wiped my eyes with my hands, again and again. Suddenly, someone was handing me an alcohol‑wipe. The monkey. The package was already open, but my hand was shaking so bad I couldn't take it. So the monkey reached up and began gently washing my face. I had to laugh at the absurdity of it. When the monkey finished, it held up my missing goggles. It wiped them off carefully and dried them, then made a big show of inspecting them with a harsh monkey squint. Finally, it handed them over, and I managed to get them back on and my poncho adjusted.
"Okay, you," I said. "On my head again." The monkey did it in a single bounce.
I stood up and turned around. Alexei was just swinging Douglas over the edge, pushing him into the shadow next to me. He grabbed my arms. "Are you all right?" His tone was beyond concerned. It was scared.
I nodded. But I still felt jittery. He stood there, watching me, waiting for me to say something, but I was caught in another one of those terrible churning wunderstorms,realizing a thousand things at once. Not just the ordinary stuff about how dangerous adventures were–but the extraordinary stuff about how much I loved my brothers and how lost I'd feel without them–and how much it would hurt them if they lost me. I didn't want to hurt them anymore.
And there were a bunch of other thoughts in that wunderstormtoo–about Mickey and Alexei and the monkey. But I couldn't say any of it right now. I couldn't say anything. It would all have to wait.
SUMMIT
After Mickey pulled himself up, he and Alexei checked me over again. Then they checked Douglas. Then Douglas checked them. It was a little crowded in the shadow of the crag, but it was safe enough for the moment.
Alexei insisted that we each drink some water and take a few bites of high‑energy pack. He wanted us rested before we started down the other side. There was probably a lot that we all wanted to say. I knew that Douglas was angry–he probably wanted to know why Alexei was putting us all in such danger and why Mickey had agreed to this. Mickey should have known better. I could almost hear the argument–it sounded a lot like Mom and Dad.
But Douglas was smart enough not to raise the subject here. We weren't exactly out of danger, and our first priority had to be getting to safety. And after we got to safety, then the argument wouldn't matter anymore, would it?
For a while we sat in silence. Mostly, I was waiting for my eyes to undazzle. All I could see were big purple splotches everywhere. Nobody said anything at all. We just listened to ourselves breathe. We were tired. This wasn't fun anymore. And even though none of us would say so, we were all scared. It was real now–we could die out here.
Alexei had deliberately chosen this landing site because it would be hard to get to. He had chosen this path across the broken Lunar surface because we would be hard to track. We were out of view of any of the Lunosynchronous satellites, and the ones in polar orbit were equally unlikely to spot us.
We were hidden in the shadows, we were masked by the rocks. And even our thermal signatures would be partially lost in the hash of heat and cold. So there wasn't much likelihood of someone finding us. We weren't going to be picked up unless …