No Moon Over Kentucky

This is a flash story and I'd like to thank Randi for her editorial assistance. Any errors are, of course, all mine.

The new lunar Site was ready for occupation. Sally and Greg were the prep team who had been putting the final touches to the Site before the crews arrived at the Site. In previous decades it would have been called a moon base, but such language had long ago been deemed too militaristic. There were even some hardliners (the word extremist had been banned) who objected to the word Site.

Greg was from Boston and Sally originated in Kentucky, and whenever she could see Kentucky over the Earth Monitor (basically a giant widescreen projector telescope) she would sing a song by a group from the Golden Age of Rock, Sparks, called "Moon Over Kentucky."

Such matters as the arrival of the rest of the team (the older word crew had been outlawed as a term many years before) had been put to one side because there was a major development occurring on planet Earth, and Sally and Greg were watching it on the widescreen virtual television in the management center of the Site. The breathless presenter was at the launch of the Project DeCarb, which was the culmination of 20 years of work by the scientists employed by the Greta Thunberg Foundation.

The plan was that 100,000 strategically placed Gas-ion conversion plasma units all over the world would be switched on at the same time and that these would remove "the dangerous free carbon in a gaseous form from our atmosphere and thus reverse the threat of Climate Change."

There had been a number of voices raised in opposition, but these had been shut down using the various pieces of Climate Change Deniers legislation, worldwide.

Sally and Greg watched the proceedings with interest. The studio anchor, an AI simulation said: "We go over live, Peoples (People or Peoples being the preferred identifier pronoun of 90% of the populace), to the launch of this auspicious event which will put to rest the lies and nonsense spouted by the Climate Change Deniers. Please stand by for our co-presenter MSNBC-Fox-ABC-CNN's Amanda Clark, who is live at the scene of this historic event."

Clark began to speak: "And now Peoples of the world, it's my honour and privilege to show you the scene as the 50th President of the United States of America, President Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who is joined by famed green activist and reputed recluse Greta Thunberg, herself, as they both simultaneously press the very symbolic large green button that will send out a radio pulse to all 100,000 gas-ion conversion plasma units all over the world. But first, please listen to our president."

President Ocasio-Cortez chattered on about what a great day it was for the whole of humankind for several minutes. At age 51, she had developed into a consummate political operative.

Greta Thunberg hadn't changed much, in fact some people jokingly claimed that she had developed a secret anti-aging cream in her research institute. She gave a speech which seemed somehow tired and perhaps a little trite. Gone were the days of the firebrand activist, it seemed.

The crowd joined in with the countdown and Amanda Clark's excited breathless delivery was transmitted round the world and to the Lunar Site. "And now, the countdown is over, the big green button, a powerful symbol of our great renewed green new deal, has been pressed and the Project DeCarb gas-ion conversion plasma units, all 100,000 of them, will start removing the deadly poison of CO2 from the atmosphere. It's a great day and..." suddenly there appeared a luminous white cloud that seemed to start from the device, spreading outward at a modest speed.

There was a sudden change in the delivery from Amanda Clark: "Oh... God! My lungs... My lungs! the incredible pain! I can't... breathing... No!" There followed a scream, then the sound of other screams and yells from the thousands of people in the crowd. The signal sputtered and died.

"What the fuck is going on?" said Sally. "I don't know," replied Greg. "Let's look at the Earth monitor."

What they saw shocked them as they saw the strange luminous cloud spreading out all over the world, obliterating everything.

Sally walked over to the communications console and tried to raise Houston, still the home of mission control, although it was no longer called mission or control.

She looked at Greg "They don't answer, Greg. What the fuck do we do?"

Greg shook his head "Fucked if I know. Maybe they'll get in touch with us soon?"

But they didn't.

They checked their stocks, because foodstuffs and potable water had been pre-delivered for the expected 500 inhabitants, there would be enough food and water for the two of them to last for 50 years.

Unfortunately, this was contingent on the water and oxygen generating plants keeping on working, and for the nuclear power plant (installed because solar cells would not always be available to supply power), continuing to run.

Slowly, over the weeks, things began changing between Greg and Sally. They each had their own rooms that had been kitted out to make them feel at home. But their real homes had been damaged or destroyed. They didn't know which. They tried using the Lunar Earth Satellite System, launched to ensure continuous communications between Earth and the expected crew, calling everyone they knew. But they had been unable to get any calls through. The Earth was now covered with a mysterious swirling luminescent cloud. Through the telescope they could see eddies and odd gaps in the cloud. They realised that life on Earth, had there been any survivors, would be hellishly cold, maybe even -50c or worse.

Sally cried for her lost family and friends, but Greg became sullen and uncommunicative. It came to a head after four weeks. One evening he barged his way into her room. It was obvious he'd become drunk (how? No alcohol was allowed on the Moon).She realised that he was going to assault her. He pushed her back onto the bed and despite her protestations, he was not listening to her and intended to rape her. She felt his hands gripping her throat, fearing for her life she reached to the bedside table, grabbed the table lamp that was there and smashed it down on his head.

He cursed, leapt from the bed and began screaming and yelling unintelligibly. She knew he would kill her; she knew it was him or her and she used her martial arts skills that she had been taught at the Air Force Academy.

She made a fake attack toward his eyes and as he defended against that she used a Karate chop to his neck, snapping it.

As he lay twitching on the floor, she vomited into the wash basin in the room. She wondered how the recycling system would cope with that?

She dragged his corpse from her room and left it in his own room. She moved her gear to one of the other rooms, which she claimed as her own.

The next day she suited up, took his corpse with her through the airlock and dragged it out onto the surface of the moon. She placed it in one of the four Lunar Jeeps and set the controls to start after she had closed the doors. She didn't care where Greg went or how far.

Later that day she remembered that the Site had an amateur radio setup which would be capable of communicating with Radio Amateurs on the Earth using the 144 Mhz Band 2 Radio Amatuer Radio Frequencies. Radio hams (as they were affectionately known) had been using the moon to reflect radio signals to and from the Moon to Earth as far back as the 1960s, so a linkup between the Moon and the Earth was a possibility.

Sally entered the radio room and had started transmitting using the agreed procedures: "CQ Earth. CQ Earth. This is Lunar Site Amateur Radio Station Moon1 calling CQ, CQ, CQ. Come in please, over?"

She repeated this hour after day after day to take her mind off the fact that her only companion had tried to rape and murder her and that his corpse was, even now, trundling about on the lunar surface in a Moon Jeep.

Eventually, much to her shock, she had a reply to one of her CQs: A thin voice came out of the loudspeakers on the communications console. "Oh, God! At last! I've been trying for ages to get someone! Where are you? Are you really on the Moon? Over."

"Hello, yes, I'm really on the Moon. I am part of the prep team for the Lunar Site. Where are you? Over."

"I'm on the Isle of Skye, off the coast of Scotland. Over."

"How are things on Earth? Over.

"They are dreadful. My Mom and Dad went to the mainland on the day of the event. I think they're dead. Over"

"I'm sorry to hear that, what's your name? Over"

"Simon. What's your name? Over"

"I'm Sally. Are you by yourself, Simon? Over"

"Yes, Sally, I'm an only child. The weather is really weird. I was watching the switch on, then it all went wrong. The machines started pumping out a weird gassy stuff and everything went off, the power and the phones and the Internet. The weather has gone very, very cold and it's dark all the time, except sometimes there's a break in the funny clouds. During the breaks in the clouds I have been transmitting with my Dad's Amateur radio rig. I got someone on the other side of Skye, but I haven't heard from him in over a week. I think he's dead. Over"

"What are you doing for fuel? Over"

"We have a generator for emergency use, the solar array on our cottage is useless, it's not giving any power. I'm running low on food. I'm scared! It's so cold outside and I'm running out of fuel for the generator and wood for our wood burner! Over."

Sally tried to comfort him, but eventually the signal faded out to nothing as the cloud swirled and obliterated the signal, or the poor boy had run out of power.

She began sobbing. She realised that their communication, brief though it was, might well have been the last communication between the last two members of the human race.

Meanwhile, Greg was participating in the longest ever ride of his life (or his death) as the AI driver of the Lunar Jeep made the best sense of its last instruction to "just drive, damn it!"

Later that day Sally found where Greg had set up his secret brewery and the small pot still he'd made, so the day wasn't a total bust, she reasoned.

Later that evening, looking at the Earth and feeling ever so slightly buzzed from the hootch, she began singing her own, somewhat twisted version of the Sparks song: "No Moon. over Kentucky."