Moonlore

I didn’t want to go. I was scared. More than scared, I was terrified. Terrified because not a single person ever came back. There were no messages or contact from the ones that went before me. I had no idea what to expect, except that I would never see my family or friends again, and I would presumably be alone for the duration of whatever life I had left.

It didn’t matter that I didn’t want to do this or that my fear overtook every other instinct. I was still strapped into this stupid rocket, hurtling towards the moon, with no way to be saved, and no way to get home. Once you landed, the rocket deployed you into the vast emptiness of the crater filled rock and returned home. I had tried to hide, to avoid this fate, but, of course, they had found me.

On the first of the year, at the ending of the moonlight festival, the finale celebration was to announce the ‘lucky’ citizens name that had been chosen. You then had half a year to make arrangements and make peace with the fact of going. On the 1st of July, that person was shoved into the rocket and sent off in another celebration. Of course, the only ones allowed to attend those nights of fun were those that held a certain amount of financial status; those that considered themselves, collectively, a ruling world government. The majority of the world watched through the lens of a television, never caring about the carnival or the music and food; just watching and praying their name was never called, but knowing any year could be the year it was over for them.

My name was uttered in a overly sugared squeal, like the overweight and much too heavily made up women had never been happier to speak someone’s name, as she read from a silver sheet of paper that had been presented like an award.

“Nathan Selpor!”

  Parties being held in honor of the festival were more for the moment that someone learned they would leave, so they could start the process of saying goodbye, and my party was no different.

My plummeting, sinking heart prevented me from doing much more than looking at my family and friends gathered around me, their faces of shock jump starting the fear that had stayed with me since that first moment. 

“Hey guys, don’t worry, I’ll find a way out of it.” My first instinct was to protect all the people that I loved and cared about from the hurt this was going to cause them.

My mom was the first to start crying and others followed as the group of announcers let out sounds of joy and congratulations. Like it was something to be honored, something to be revered, when you were chosen. 

Only my longest and best friend, Corleen, spoke the truth while remaining calm. “Nate, you know there’s no way out. You know they can track you, even if you found a place to hide. Your name was called and that means you’re going. How many people have you ever heard about not wanting to go and got out of going?” 

I knew it was true, but I couldn’t think clearly. No one had ever gotten out of it. No one. Corleen was right that they would track me. Every new birth resulted in the infant digesting a dissolvable blue liquid that absorbs into their blood stream. It mingles with their blood and creates a unique identifier for each person. After a short waiting period, a blood sample was taken. This blood sample was added to the ever growing pile of unwilling contestants once that child turned 20. Once the blood was taken, the government could track that person just by following the signal given off by the blue liquid.

Knowing all of that didn’t stop me. I said my goodbyes and headed out a month before take off. Either way things went, I would never see my family again. I thought the safest place to go might be to a uninhabited island, but then I thought there probably weren’t any islands like that and I would be alone anyway. The densely populated place that I chose, was so packed with people that I was hoping I could blend in with them and their surroundings.

None of it mattered. When the sirens started honking a week before the first of July, alerting me that I was being requested to present myself to the take off pad, I saw the uniforms of the enforcers already in the area. Waiting to arrest me if I didn’t go voluntarily. 

I didn’t. 20 men marched into the closet sized bunker I had found, sweeping the debris and garbage from the floor out of their way with their steel-toed black boots. I hunched my back up against the hard coldness of the wooden wall, doing my best impression of a chameleon and using all my strength to wish they wouldn’t see me. No less than 10 strong fists lifted me into the air and away from the city. I did my best to put up a fight, but I eventually felt the sleepy effects of some kind of tranquilizer and woke up where I was now. Strapped into the seat and not knowing what to do.

I wondered vaguely what was waiting for me and if it meant anything at all. I mean, no one even remembered why we started sending people once a year to the moon; we just kept up the tradition. Of course, there were theories floating around, but nobody knew for sure. 

Maybe there was once a monster and we banished it to the moon and to keep it from coming back, it demanded one human sacrifice a year.

Maybe there was some kind of battleground up there and people had to fight to the death for the right to be called king. They would be king until the next year’s ship landed with another new potential opponent.

Or maybe, and this was my personal favorite, the government just wanted to remind everyone that they had the capability to force people into an exile of solitude and the general population had better stay in line or they would be next. No reason at all except more power for the already powerful. I just so happened to be called on this year as the reminder.

It made me sick just thinking about it. It made me wish there was some monster; something tangible to fight with. At least I would be able to die fighting for something. At least try, do my best, to make a difference.

My breath became uneven as the enormity of the space rock loomed in front of me. Any minute I would land and be forced out. Well if I was going I wasn’t going with nothing. I was still strapped to the seat and I figured it would roll out with me in place once I landed. Maybe the restraints that were wrapped around my chest and cutting into my skin would at last let me go. 

The minutes passed quickly, too quickly and it felt like my heartbeat was a timekeeper for those minutes. Hardened metal surrounded me and I grabbed at anything I could. Sleek and smooth, wherever I tried, the metal was bolted and soldered together.

A red flashing warning light accompanied by a wretched computer voice, insisted that landing would take place in 5 minutes.

5 minutes.

Sweat pouring down my forehead, blood dripping from my hands, I groped around to find any piece of the ship that would come loose. The chair pulled free from the floor easily, and I knew that I had been right before. The chair was meant to exit the ship with me attached to it. I kicked around until I rolled myself up against the small control panel. 

4 minutes.

The soft gel of the buttons I smashed were such a contrast to the hardness of my breathing. The sweat had moved down to soak through my shirt and I could hear myself taking large gasps of air. 

3 minutes. 

The chair, pre-programmed to move into a position near the only door, started rolling in that direction. I could no longer see the moon in front of me as the rocket made it’s descent.

2 minutes. 

I hadn’t found anything to bring with me so I could fight off a potential attack. I didn’t know what was on the other side of the door. I had absolutely nothing and no one. Salty tears mixed with the salt of the sweat already on my face and the broken breathing suddenly turned to sobbing. 

1 minute.

My life, my family, all the things I had loved and wanted filtered through my mind. This was the end and I was never going to get any of that. I felt cheated in a way that I couldn’t explain. It’s not like I had to die. It’s not like I had some been in some accident and couldn’t be saved. No. This was forced on me, without my consent, and it made it so much worse.

A countdown started in that same eerie, disembodied voice. Uncaring and final. 

10. 

9.

8.

7.

6.

5.

4.

3.

2.

1.

A light covering of gray smoke and a deafening hissing filled the tiny cabin as the door hinged open. My scream was cut away as I buckled down for the unknown. If I had to ram myself into a fire breathing dragon to try and survive, that’s what I was getting ready for. If there was just a void of nothing and I sat there with no food or water, I would do so, unmoving, dragging it out for as long as I could muster. 

The creeping light was too bright, too foreign. My chair silently rolled forward into that light and I was blinded. It was too much. It didn’t belong to the grayness of the moon. Colorless powdered dust rained down on me as the rocket that had carried me here immediately headed back to Earth. There was no point looking up as it departed. My eyes were just starting to adjust and my surroundings looked vague and distant, even the weird shapes closest to me. I didn’t really care anyway. I was here, and I couldn’t be sure that meant I was going to live for much longer.

It was now obvious that something was here. If I was alone, there wouldn’t be any bright lights or loud, unnatural sounds. Maybe they wanted me without my senses so I couldn’t react properly. I wasn’t quite sure this was right because my eyes were adjusting more and more to the brightness around me. I could just make out the ground in which I still sat, captive to my chair.

The tension around my chest and legs lessened, and I felt a cool breeze of warmth flow through the suit I had traveled here in. The straps holding me in place disengaged and for the first time in hours, I was able to stand and walk freely. 

I tried it, inching my way ever so slowly out of my one man prison. Tiredness and fear finally took over my entire body, and with shaky legs and heavy eyes I fell, passed out before my head hit the solidness of the ground.

It could’ve been hours or days or weeks that I laid like that, how would I ever know? Groggily, I sat up, the fear returning at once. I wasn’t on the ground where I had fallen. I wasn’t outside at all. 

Frantically, I looked around to figure out how I got in here. Who put me here and where were they now?

As I looked, I took notice of where I was. The room was small, only big enough for the bed I was on and a half-sized nightstand next to it. It was just as bright in the room as it was outside and the walls were an unfortunate, bare, reflective white. On the far side of my bed, which wasn’t as comfy as my own bed, but not as bad as the floor, was a large window that ran the length of the wall, from floor to ceiling. The only break in the window was a small wooden cut-out for a door. The door had some sort of bio-metric lock that looked to scan maybe an eye or finger. I got the feeling I was in some sort of a lab.

As soon as that thought popped into my head, a beeping sound came from the lock and rectangular green lights began to flash above the door frame.   

I cowered into the wall as close as I could. I knew that whoever it was didn’t want to kill me or they would’ve done so when I landed. But even if this was someone that had come before me, even the person from last year, they didn’t seem all that friendly to have thrown me in here, but for all I knew it could be some human eating, moon alien and they were just hadn’t been ready for dinner when they found me. I didn’t want to see, so I covered my face with my hands and peeked through my fingers.

The thing that entered my room was human, that much I was sure of, but it was odd. I removed my hands and stared openly. I couldn’t tell what gender it was or if it even had one. It’s elongated head bounced around like a bobber on a fish line. It’s eyes were unusually small, two little beady raisins, protruding from it’s big head. As it walked toward me, a thing like a clipboard in one of it’s outstretched arms, I saw that while it’s height was of standard proportions, the area of its torso spread out like it had been ironed flat. 

  “Please do not be afraid.” It spoke to me in my own language! “We know you did not choose this, but we can help you understand what is happening. We would like to explain.”

Startling myself, I jumped up to walk over to be near it. To listen to what it had to say. Cautionary thoughts flew through my mind. 

Be careful. This could be a trap. Or a lie. Where are the others. Why does it look so different?

The relief I felt of not having to be alone through whatever this was, over powered any caution I had. 

“What is going on?” I asked, more demanding than I intended to be. “I want to know everything. Who are you? Why are we here? Are the people from the other years here? Can we leave? Who are you?”

“I see your most pressing question is who I am, since you’ve asked it twice.” It said with a small laugh. “I guess that’s as good a place to start as any. My name is Troy. I’ve been here for 30 years.”

Gasping in shock, I couldn’t believe he had once come from Earth. His little eyes held so much sadness that I almost felt bad for him. Until I remembered that I was in the exact same situation as him. I had better learn from him.

He took a deep breath and started the long history of why we were here. “A long time ago, there was a mission to the moon. A mission to see if humans could colonize it. A group of 83 astronauts came up and then got stranded. It was only supposed to be a research mission, but the ship crashed landed and they knew they were trapped.” 

I could feel his eyes on me, watching me. 

“Once they explored the area, they found a group of native beings. These beings were much like us and claimed to once be from Earth. Long before that first research mission, there had been a great war on Earth. Humans were evolving into two separate species. To prevent an extinction of one group, a treaty was agreed upon that whichever of the species could survive it, should reside on the moon. Close enough to home, but still far enough away that they would know peace. After some time, that first mission landed and found them, the natives learned that, back on Earth, their line of species had been all but wiped out, and we were what remained. In the beginning, they asked Earth to send anyone they could find with genes matching the natives, while picking up the original people from the research team. A kind of trade. The blue liquid marks you for what you are, and once someone is able to make the trip, they come. We don’t really know why they never stopped, after the others were gone, but most of us think it’s because our blood, the reason you were picked in the first place, means your different. Too different to belong on Earth. They want me, you, and everyone like us gone, and they won’t stop until we’ve all landed here.”

I didn’t want the rage that filled me. I had known that the world government was vile and disgusting when it came to proceeding with their own greedy, selfish agenda, but how could they think it was alright to banish people here? Because they were different? In that moment, I hated them. I hated that they had this type of power.

I looked around the small, lab like room again. I wasn’t going to do it. I wouldn’t just lie back and be treated like this. I had tried so hard to remain on Earth, and then the rocket. I would find a way back. I would find a way back and make them pay. 

Next year, when the rocket landed with another scared and hopeless person, I’d be waiting. I’d be ready.