First on the Moon, Jeff Sutton [most read books in the world of all time TXT] 📗

This was the Aztec! The real Aztec! The truth came in a rush. The huge silver ship at Burning Sands, which bore the name Aztec, was merely a fake, a subterfuge, a pawn in the complex game of agents and counter-agents. He knew he was right.

"After you," Gotch said. He indicated the ladder and stepped aside.

Crag started up. He paused at the third platform. The floor of the desert was a sea of darkness. Off in the distance the lights of Alpine Base gleamed, stark against the night. Gotch reached his level and laid a restraining hand on his arm.

Crag turned and waited. The Colonel's massive form was a black shadow interposed between him and the lights of Alpine Base.

"This is the Aztec," he said simply.

"So I guessed. And the silver job at Burning Sands?"

"Drone Able," Gotch explained. "The deception was necessary—a part of the cat and mouse game we've been playing the last couple of decades. We couldn't take a single chance." Crag remained silent. The Colonel turned toward the lights of the Base. He had become quiet, reflective. When he spoke, his voice was soft, almost like a man talking to himself.

"Out there are hundreds of men who have given a large part of their lives to the dream of space flight. Now we are at the eve of making that dream live. If we gain the moon, we gain the planets. That's the destiny of Man. The Aztec is the first step." He turned back and faced Crag.

"This is but one base. There are many others. Beyond them are the factories, laboratories, colleges, scientists and engineers, right down to Joe the Riveter. Every one of them has had a part in the dream. You're another part, Adam, but you happen to have the lead role." He swiveled around and looked silently at the distant lights. The moment was solemn. A slight shiver ran through Crag's body.

"You know and I know that the Aztec is a development from the ICBM's guarding Fortress America. You also know, or have heard, that out in San Diego the first atom-powered spaceship is nearing completion." He looked sharply at Crag.

"I've heard," Crag said noncommittally.

Gotch eyed him steadily. "That's the point. So have others. Our space program is no secret. But we've suspected—feared—that the first stab at deep space would be made before the atom job was completed. Not satellites but deep space rockets. That's why the Aztec was pushed through so fast." He fell silent. Crag waited.

"Well, the worst has happened. The enemy is ready to launch—may have launched this very night. That's how close it is. Fortunately our gamble with the Aztec is paying off. We're ready, too, Adam.

"We're going to get that moon. Get it now!" He reached into a pocket and extracted his pipe, then thought better of lighting it. Crag waited. The Colonel was in a rare introspective mood, a quiet moment in which he mentally tied together and weighed his Nation's prospects in the frightening days ahead. Finally he spoke:

"We put a rocket around the moon, Adam." He smiled faintly, noting Crag's involuntary start of surprise. "Naturally it was fully instrumented. There's uranium there—one big load located in the most inaccessible spot imaginable."

"Arzachel," Crag said simply.

"The south side of Arzachel, to be exact. That's why we didn't pick a soft touch like Mare Imbrium, in case you've wondered."

"I've wondered."

"Adam," the Colonel hesitated a long moment, "does the name Pickering mean anything to you?"

"Ken Pickering who—"

"What have you heard?" snapped Gotch. His eyes became sharp drills.

Crag spoke slowly: "Nothing ... for a long time. He just seemed to drop out of sight after he broke the altitude record in the X-34." He looked up questioningly.

"Frankly, I've always wondered why he hadn't been selected for this job. I thought he was a better pilot than I am," he added almost humbly.

Gotch said bluntly: "You're right. He is better." He smiled tolerantly. "We picked our men for particular jobs," he said finally. "Pickering ... we hope ... will be in orbit before the Aztec blasts off."

"Satelloid?"

"The first true satelloid," the Colonel agreed. "One that can ride the fringes of space around the earth. A satelloid with fantastic altitude and speed. I'm telling you this because he'll be a link in Step One, a communication and observation link. He won't be up long, of course, but long enough—we hope."

Silence fell between them. Crag looked past the Colonel's shoulder. All at once the lights of Alpine Base seemed warm and near, almost personal. Gotch lifted his eyes skyward, symbolic of his dreams. The light of distant stars reflected off his brow.

"We don't know whether the Aztec can make it," he said humbly. "We don't know whether our space-lift system will work, whether the drones can be monitored down to such a precise point on the moon, or the dangers of meteorite bombardment. We don't know whether our safeguards for human life are adequate. We don't know whether the opposition can stop us....

"We don't know lots of things, Adam. All we know is that we need the moon. It's a matter of survival of Western Man, his culture, his way of life, his political integrity. We need the moon to conquer the planets ... and some day the stars."

His voice became a harsh clang.

"So does the enemy. That's why we have to establish a proprietory ownership, a claim that the U.N. will recognize. The little nations represent the balance of power, Adam. But they sway with the political winds. They are the reeds of power politics ... swaying between the Sputniks and Explorers, riding with the ebb and flow of power ... always trying to anticipate the ultimate winner. Right now they're watching to see where that power lies. The nation that wins the moon will tilt the balance in its favor. At a critical time, I might add. That's why we have to protect ourselves every inch of the way."

He tapped his cold pipe moodily against his hand. "We won't be here to see the end results, of course. That won't be in our time. But we're the starters. The Aztec is the pioneer ship. And in the future our economy can use that load of uranium up there."

He smiled faintly at Crag. "When you step through the hatch you've left earth, perhaps for all time. That's your part in the plan. Step One is your baby and I have confidence in you." He gripped Crag's arm warmly. It was the closest he had ever come to showing his feelings toward the man he was sending into space.

"Come on, let's go."

Crag started upward. Gotch followed more slowly, climbing like a man bearing a heavy weight.

The Aztec's crew, Max Prochaska, Gordon Nagel and Martin Larkwell, came aboard the rocket in the last hour before take-off. Gotch escorted them up the ladder and introduced them to their new Commander.

Prochaska acknowledged the introduction with a cheerful smile.

"Glad to know you, Skipper." His thin warm face said he was glad to be there.

Gordon Nagel gave a perfunctory handshake, taking in the space cabin with quick ferret-like head movements.

Martin Larkwell smiled genially, pumping Crag's hand. "I've been looking forward to this."

Crag said dryly. "We all have." He acknowledged the introductions with the distinct feeling that he already knew each member of his crew. It was the odd feeling of meeting old acquaintances after long years of separation. As part of his indoctrination he had studied the personnel records of the men he might be so dependent on. Now, seeing them in the flesh, was merely an act of giving life to those selfsame records. He studied them with casual eyes while Gotch rambled toward an awkward farewell.

Max Prochaska, his electronics chief, was a slender man with sparse brown hair, a thin acquiline nose and pointed jaw. His pale blue eyes, thin lips and alabaster skin gave him a delicate look—one belied by his record. His chief asset—if one was to believe the record—was that he was a genius in electronics.

Gordon Nagel, too, was, thin-faced and pallid skinned. His black hair, normally long and wavy, had been close-cropped. His eyes were small, shifting, agate-black, giving Crag the feeling that he was uneasy—an impression he was to hold. His record had described him as nervous in manner but his psychograph was smooth. He was an expert in oxygen systems.

Martin Larkwell, the mechanical maintenance and construction boss, in many ways appeared the antithesis of his two companions. He was moon-faced, dark, with short brown hair and a deceptively sleepy look. His round body was well-muscled, his hands big and square. Crag thought of a sleek drowsy cat, until he saw his eyes. They were sparkling brown pools, glittering, moving with some strange inner fire. They were the eyes of a dreamer ... or a fanatic, he thought. In the cabin's soft light they glowed, flickered. No, there was nothing sleepy about him, he decided.

All of the men were short, light, in their early thirties. In contrast Crag, at 5' 10" and 165 pounds, seemed a veritable giant. A small physique, he knew, was almost an essential in space, where every ounce was bought at tremendous added weight in fuel. His own weight had been a serious strike against him.

Colonel Gotch made one final trip to the space cabin. This time he brought the Moon Code Manual (stamped TOP SECRET), the crew personnel records (Crag wondered why) and a newly printed pamphlet titled "Moon Survival." Crag grinned when he saw it.

"Does it tell us how to get there, too?"

"We'll write that chapter later," Gotch grunted. He shook each man's hand and gruffly wished them luck before turning abruptly toward the hatch. He started down the ladder. A moment later his head reappeared.

He looked sharply at Crag and said, "By the way, that twosome at the Blue Door got it last night."

"You mean...?"

"Burp gun. No finesse. Just sheer desperation. Well, I just wanted to let you know we weren't altogether crazy."

"I didn't think you were."

The Colonel's lips wrinkled in a curious smile. "No?" He looked at Crag for a long moment. "Good luck." His head disappeared from view and Crag heard his footsteps descending the ladder.

Then they were alone, four men alone. Crag turned toward his companions.

The great red sun was just breaking over the desert horizon when Crag got his last good look at earth. Its rays slanted upward, shadows fled from the sage; the obsidian sky with its strewn diamonds became slate gray and, in moments, a pale washed blue. Daybreak over the desert became a thunder of light. Tiny ants had removed the last of the metal framework encompassing the rocket. Other ants were visible making last minute cheeks.

He returned his attention to the space cabin. Despite long months of training in the cabin simulator—an exact replica of the Aztec quarters—he was appalled at the lack of outside vision. One narrow rectangular quartz window above the control panel, a circular port on each side bulkhead and one on the floor—he had to look between his knees to see through it when seated at the controls—provided the sole visual access to the outside world. A single large radarscope, a radar altimeter and other electronic equipment provided analogs of the outside world; the reconstruction of the exterior environment painted on the scopes by electromagnetic impulses.

The cabin was little more than a long flat-floored cylinder with most of the instrumentation in the nose section. With the rocket in launch position, what normally was the rear wall formed the floor. The seats had been swiveled out to operational position.

Now they were seated, strapped down, waiting. It was, Crag thought, like sitting in a large automobile which had been balanced on its rear bumper. During launch and climb their backs would be horizontal to the earth's surface.

He was thankful they were not required to wear their heavy pressure suits until well into the moon's gravisphere. Normally pressure suits and helmets were the order of the day. He was used to stratospheric flight where heavy pressure suits and helmets were standard equipment; gear to protect the fragile human form until the lower oxygen-rich regions of the air ocean could be reached in event of trouble. But the Aztec was an all-or-nothing affair. There were no escape provisions, no ejection seats, for ejection would be impossible at the rocket's speeds during its critical climb through the atmosphere. Either everything went according to the book or ... or else, he concluded grimly. But it had one good aspect. Aside from the heavy safety harnessing, he would be free of the intolerably clumsy suit until moonfall. If anything went wrong, well ...

He bit the thought off, feeling the tension building inside him. He had never considered himself the hero type. He had prided himself that his ability to handle hot planes was a reflection of his competence rather than courage. Courage,