Kemlo and the Craters of the Moon

Book 0: Kemlo

by E.C. Eliott

Genres: Science Fiction; Alien Contact; Post-Apocalyptic sci-fi

Synopsis

Were they the first men on the moon - or not? If they were not, then what had raised those magnificent buildings, apparently a deserted city, that Kemlo and his friends found standing beneath the cratered crust?

Release date: June 29, 2016

Publisher: Gateway

Print pages: 110

Sample

‘WILL you remember all that?’ Kerowski asked in a despairing voice.

‘I hope so.’ Kemlo grinned. ‘Most of it, anyway.’

‘We’ve got some funny words in this language.’

‘Why?’

‘Because we’ve just completed two days of what they call a briefing. Yet “brief” means something short—a sort of summing up in a few words of what would otherwise be a long story.’ Kerowski sounded troubled over what was apparently only a small matter. But Kemlo did not laugh at his friend because Kerowski had a very great love of words, and could quote whole chunks of Shakespeare and other famous writers.

‘When you consider how long it has taken to prepare for this expedition to the moon, and how much detail there is in the whole organisation of it, two days seems quite a brief time to me.’

‘True enough,’ Kerowski admitted as the two boys entered the refreshment bay. ‘It’s thirsty work listening to a briefing.’

Both boys climbed on the high stools close to the counter and ordered a large fruit drink each. They were halfway through the drinks when a hand slapped Kerowski on the shoulder, making him splutter over his drink.

‘I shall very probably flatten whoever did that,’ he said threateningly.

‘Hello, Kartin.’ Kemlo greeted the boy who had joined them. ‘How’s Krillie?’

‘He won’t be up for about another week,’ said Kartin. ‘Says he could get up today if the doctor wasn’t such a fusser.’

Kemlo laughed. ‘Krillie just naturally knows more than any doctor,’ he said, referring to his young friend who was recovering from a rather severe bout of tonsillitis. ‘I’m sorry I wasn’t allowed to visit him though.’

‘You want a fruit drink, scrounger?’ Kerowski asked Kartin, who grinned as he nodded in reply.

‘I could go another one,’ said Kemlo, throwing the empty plastic beaker into the waste chute. ‘I’ll pay for them, Kerowski. I know it will break your heart if you do.’

‘That’s libel,’ Kerowski declared. ‘It won’t break my heart at all—it will just make me very unhappy.’

The three boys took their fruit drinks to one of the tables at the side of the refreshment bay and sat down. Kerowski stretched his long legs and yawned mightily.

‘Wish I were Krillie,’ he said. ‘I think I could sleep for a week. It’s all that concentration on the briefing.’

‘I wish I’d had it to do,’ said Kartin. Then he shrugged as he added: ‘Still, we all had our chance to win a place in the expedition. You two just happened to be better than any of the rest of us.’

‘You came very close,’ said Kemlo. ‘I don’t know how I got the marks I did. That exam paper on geophysics just about had me floored.’

‘Rocket engineering and electronics gave me the most trouble,’ said Kerowski.

‘But you did well in latent languages,’ said Kemlo.

‘That’s because Kerowski’s big head is full of languages,’ said Kartin. ‘They ought to take him along anyway, in case they find any messages or meet any people whose language needs interpreting.’

‘Go ahead and sneer,’ said Kerowski casually. ‘You’d look funny if there were no language and no words to speak.’ Then he leaned forward and rested his elbows on the table as he said more seriously: ‘I wonder if there is a universal language for the outer worlds?’

‘How can there be, unless they are all inhabited?’ Kemlo asked.

‘Well, that’s what we don’t know,’ Kartin replied. ‘But there’s really no universal language on Earth, is there? When you think of all the minor planets and galaxies, apart from the Moon, Mars, Saturn, Jupiter or Venus—even if all those were inhabited by some form of creatures like ourselves, that is to say, human beings, there still wouldn’t be any need for a universal language because only Earth-men can travel from one planet to another.’

‘You mean only Earth-men hope they can,’ said Kerowski. ‘We’ve lived up here in the sky on Satellite Belt K all our lives. We were born here. We’re what the Earth-people call the children of space, and yet apart from an odd visit to a breakaway planet and that expedition to Deimos, what do we know of the outer worlds?’

‘But Earth-men have come a long way, even in a century,’ said Kemlo. ‘We have a number of these Satellite Belts moored in the sky and used as space stations for rocket ships and research craft of all sorts, but no-one’s really ever heard of or seen anything from another planet beside Earth.’

‘That’s where we make a mistake,’ said Kerowski. ‘Why does life on another planet have to be the same as ours? There could be little green men with eyes on the tops of their heads and a row of push buttons for a face. It seems to me that all space scientists link everything with what happens on Earth. Mars is millions of years older than Earth. You read back into the history of Earth and you’ll find that millions of years ago it was a pretty poor planet with only funny-looking animals living on it. If Mars is millions of years older, how much more have they progressed?’ He glared defiantly at his friends as he said: ‘For all our cleverness, we just don’t know.’

‘Kerowski, the super scientist,’ said Kartin with a laugh. ‘He knows more than all the brain bonces put together.’

Kerowski ignored the sarcasm.

‘I wish I knew a quarter as much. And I wish some of these scientists could give straight answers to questions.’

‘But they do, don’t they?’ said Kartin.

Kerowski shrugged. ‘They’ll give a sort of answer,’ he replied grudgingly. ‘But they always put in a lot of ifs and buts.’

‘Because they can only answer most questions from theory,’ Kemlo pointed out. ‘Like this expedition to the craters of the moon—they’ve gone as far as they can by observation and with instruments. We’ve got to land there before the theories can be proved correct.’

‘That reminds me.’ Kartin took a pad of plastic writing sheets from his pocket. ‘Krillie was so upset at not being able to ask Kemlo for details to put in his diary that I promised I’d take some notes for him.’

‘Poor Krillie!’ Kemlo laughed softly. ‘He really loves that diary of his.’

‘It’s good for a kid though,’ said Kerowski. ‘Krillie is about the only one in his class who has kept his interest in this diary-writing idea. He must feel a bit lost without Kemlo to tell him things. What does he want to know?’

‘Everything, as usual.’ Kartin smiled. ‘But I promised I’d write down the main points as you told them to me as soon as the briefing was over. Would you do that? Krillie’s feeling rather sorry for himself shut up in the hospital section.’

‘I don’t see why we shouldn’t,’ Kemlo replied, ‘and by going over some of the details we’ll refresh our memories.’

Kerowski nodded. ‘It might help,’ he agreed. ‘Use shorthand, Kartin. You’re a shorthand expert, and you can rewrite it later.’

‘All right,’ said Kartin. ‘I’d better start at the beginning, hadn’t I?’

‘It’s a good idea as a rule,’ Kerowski grunted impatiently.

‘Kartin began to write the word symbols and spoke aloud as he wrote.

‘“The Satellite Belts are space stations moored in the sky just over a thousand miles from Earth.”’

‘Old stuff,’ said Kerowski.

‘Pipe down,’ said Kemlo. ‘Krillie always gives that sort of information at the beginning of every new section of his diary.’

‘“Each Belt is known by a letter of the alphabet,”’ Kartin continued, ‘“and all children born on them have names beginning with the Belt letter. All our names begin with the letter K. The Satellite Belts are so wonderfully designed that they are like small towns. They have large air-conditioned sections for Earth-born men, women and children, and open sections for children like us who can live without space suits.”’

‘Oh, polish it off, Kartin!’ Kerowski grumbled. ‘Krillie can copy that from other sections of his diary.’

‘I suppose we needn’t put much more,’ Kartin agreed. ‘These diaries are made into books and sent down for the Earth-children to read. At one time or another, Krillie’s recorded practically everything about the Satellite Belts and the way we live, so those kids will just have to read some of the previous adventures. No sense in boring them with repetition.’ He poised the slim micropencil above the pad and glanced at Kemlo. ‘Let’s get it down as briefly as we can, and leave Krillie to fill in more details. Where shall we start?’

‘Start by saying that this expedition to the moon is the first attempt at a physical landing,’ Kemlo replied thoughtfully, trying to choose his words in order to put everything simply and clearly, although he knew the subject was so vast that it would be difficult to pick out what information was most important. There have been many research ships sent over the intended landing area of the moon, and from all the information collected by instruments, this expedition has been made ready. The landing area on the moon is known as Sinus Roris. This is a flat surface north of the mountainous area outlining Mare Imbrium.’

‘You’re going ahead of yourself,’ said Kerowski. ‘Krillie will have to record how many ships are going, and why some of us boys are going with them.’

‘All right,’ said Kemlo. ‘Put it like this, Kartin. Satellite Belt K is the senior of the Satellite Belts, and slightly larger than the others. For this reason, two boys have been chosen from K and one from each of three other Belts which are most suitable as take-off stations to the moon. For months the senior technical grade boys have had to sit for a number of exams. On Satellite Belt K the two boys who came out top in those exams had the opportunity to travel in, the rocket flagship of the Moon Expedition. The same sort of exams were held on Belts S, M and T. One boy from each of these Belts will join the ship calling at his space station.’

‘That explains why the boys will be included,’ said Kartin. ‘Now what about the ships?’

‘I don’t think we need to explain the ships in detail,’ Kemlo replied. ‘Krillie can find that out for himself. There will be four rocket ships under the command of Captain Kimball Young, who is known as Captain Kim. There will be a crew of twenty-five in each ship. There’s a fifth ship with a crew of six men. This is the cargo ship which will be left on the moon. The crew of this ship will join the other ships for the return flight.’

As Kemlo hesitated, Kerowski took up the story.

‘The expedition has to be timed almost to an hour,’ he said. ‘There are certain definite times when the landing area conditions on the moon are suitable. The expedition will not stay longer than six weeks. The total time after leaving this Satellite Belt should be about fifty-two days.’

‘I think Krillie can get all the timing details himself,’ said Kemlo.

‘How about take-off and flight?’ Kartin suggested.

‘The rocket ships designed as moonships——’ Kemlo began.

‘We’d better call them moonships from now on, hadn’t we?’ Kartin interrupted.

‘Yes, it might be as well,’ Kemlo agreed. ‘But they’re not like the sleek-looking space ships we’re used to seeing. The flagship is due to arrive tomorrow. We’ve been studying the model, and you never saw anything looking less like a space ship. It’s built first as a great skeleton of girders and bracing bars and retractable legs, with a huge centre shock-absorber landing leg. On top is a large sphere with radar and other equipment sticking out all over, and fastened within the girder framework are long cylinders called the personnel spheres. These are divided into sections and air-conditioned for the crew to live in them.

‘In the centre is another sphere which is split up into two sections containing a power unit for working refrigeration and air-conditioning, and stores and food supplies for at least four. . .