Touchstone

They came and took my flesh.

Here for millions of their lifetimes, they came to me with anticipation, trepidation and an innate need to possess what was not theirs.

Forty-seven plus pounds of Moon stuff was delivered to the NASA lab back in 1969. Those guys spent less than an Earth day on the Moon. They put all that Moon stuff into sample bags and then into their Special Environmental Sample Container that protected the samples from Earthlings’ contamination. Over the years, tons of Moon stuff have been picked up, core-drilled out or otherwise extracted. Hauled back to Earth, it was sent around the world for study.

We got our Lunar Touch Rock back in the mid-1970’s. We put it on display shortly after we got it and started calling it “touchrock” to make it easier for all of us to talk about it. We update its display case every decade or so. Thus, the case has been changed many times over the decades.  Inside the case, atop its spherical “plate,” touchrock is available for visitors to reach in and touch. Somehow, it means different things to the millions of different people who touch it annually. 

The rock itself is simply basalt with an overabundance of titanium. As our display explains, touchrock was formed in hot lava 3.8 billion years ago and it flowed onto the terrain where it sat for over 100 billion years. Then, in 1972, a geologist picked it up and brought it back to Earth. Four years later, it got its own display at our museum.

Many astronauts and scientists and researchers and, eventually, entrepreneurs subsequently went to the Moon. Every one of them brought some part of the Moon back and, after the initial few dozen visits, the novelty of it all wore off a bit. That is when folks started taking parts of the Moon home for their private collections.

Nowadays the only people allowed to disembark on the Moon are mining company employees, a smattering of researchers working on the feasibility of setting up colonies on asteroids to make mining easier on them and air traffic control types who monitor and direct launches from and to the Moon. 

Oh, and the United States Space Force (USSF) Security Personnel. Their numbers match the number of miners in case the pod villages get unruly over living conditions or some other cause. Back in the day, there was a movement to include other countries’ Space Forces in the mix, but none of them could muster the funds or personnel to pull off the endeavor. Some of these nations sent personnel to join the USSF as a means to be in the know about efforts on the Moon and in space generally.

Titanium is the big resource we mine. Because it is a higher grade and concentration in Lunar basalts than in Terran basalts, titanium mining on Earth is a fringe industry with very little investment.

We use titanium in just about everything from biomedical devices to food products to…, well, you get the idea. We cannot get enough titanium. Which makes it very tempting for Lunar visitors and miners to hijack some processed titanium and sell it back on Earth. That makes it worthwhile for the mining companies to help fund the USSF security teams.

I have had enough. It was bad enough when they came here on rare occasion. Now, they live here and tear flesh from me in greater quantities daily.

One of my obscure and entirely senseless pleasures is to go by the touchrock exhibit at the end of my day and touch that Moon rock. I have been curator for fifteen years and I still get a thrill every time I touch it. Imagine, it was one of the first extraterrestrial objects retrieved from our nearest solar system neighbor!

As usual at the end of my workday last Tuesday, I moseyed over to the display and touched the stone. It shocked me! 

Impossible, I know! Someone must have played a prank, but I could not figure out how and certainly not why.

I toddled back to my office to check security footage from that previous Monday afternoon when I last touched the stone, to just before I touched it Tuesday. I meant to find out who pulled this off and how. A suspicious activity I found was a man and woman reaching in, touching the stone and kissing whilst they did so. Then I remembered that they had wed there by the touchstone thirty-five years ago. A romantic gesture….

After fast-forwarding through the hours of video records, the only thing I saw was the usual tourist touching the stone either in awe or curiosity. No one appeared to attach anything to the stone or the display case. I concluded that I must have imagined the shock.

Wednesday afternoon, the experience was different. This time I must have touched the stone and passed out. I had a very vivid dream that I was looking at Earth from the surface of the Moon. I was enraged and disgusted by the view. Talk about a horrid nightmare! 

An Earthing can feel me!

Thursday and Friday were even weirder. I am not sure if I passed out, but the dreams were more horrifying than the first one. It repeated the first one and then it embellished it with a sense of doom for the Earth and the humans on the Moon. Nothing specific, but very disturbing.

I had the weekend away from the Museum and decided that I needed to talk about this with someone. The only one it seemed safe to trust without negative judgment was my therapist. My appointment was Monday afternoon.

I met with her instead of touching the stone that afternoon.

“Have you told anyone else about these events?” she asked after I told her my story.

“No, I didn’t want anyone to think I’m nuts. Other than you, of course.”

She laughed and said, “I don’t think you’re nuts. However, I think you should bring this up with someone involved in deciding what is done on the Moon. I assume you know people who fit that bill.”

“Well, yeah, as the curator of the museum, I have several contacts I could reach out to. But I don’t want them to think I’m nuts!”

“That’s a possibility, of course. On the other hand, if there is some kind of terrorist plot to take over the mining operations or to otherwise harm Earth’s inhabitants, I think you should mention it to someone. If you wish, you can say that I’m available for consultation regarding your sanity.”

The twinkle in her eyes as she said that made me laugh.

The next morning, Tuesday, I called my college roommate, Colonel Bob Abrams, head of the Security detail for the USSF assigned to the Moon. We met for lunch, and I told him all about my experiences with the touchstone.

“That’s a bit farfetched. Going from dreams to plots against the Earth transmitted to you from a rock. Even if it’s a Moon rock, it’s still a tad preposterous.”

“I know. But something’s going on. It’s as if that touchstone is communicating with me. Like it’s transmitting the Moon’s feelings to me.”

“Let’s let it ride for another week or two. In the meantime, you keep your habit of touching it each day and let me know if this keeps up. I’ll send a team over this afternoon after your closing hours to see if someone is pulling your chain with technology.”

“Thanks, Bob. I’ll be ready for them.”

I headed back to my museum office, did my usual paperwork, and waited for the day to end.

After all the visitors left, Abrams’ team arrived as promised. We headed over to the exhibit.

“We’re going to run the typical scans to check for outside influences, any kind of connection to the rock or the display case and anything else that strikes us as odd,” Sergeant Smith, leader of the team, told me when we got to the exhibit.

“Once we get set up, I’m going to want you to touch the stone just like you usually do. Then, we’ll see what happens and if there is anything unusual, Sir.”

“Okay, sounds good to me.”

The team unloaded several cases of their intriguing looking equipment. I had no idea what any of it was and nobody explained other than to tell me that if something was awry with our Moon rock their stuff would identify it.

After about ten minutes of set-up, Smith said, “Okay, you’re on. Touch the stone.”

They told me later that when I touched it, I stiffened and stared at the stone for several minutes and was unresponsive to them.

I am alive. Your kind has tortured me piece by piece and I’m tired of it.

In this vision, I saw Her spasm and with a peristaltic motion She ejected everyone in one underground tube section straight out to zero atmosphere. The poor souls had no chance. That was Her warning.

She made it clear that all excisions were to stop right now, or She would puke all the trash we left on Her surface for so many decades back at Earth. Most would burn up. But the rocks She meant to hurl at us were big enough to make it through our atmosphere and pulverize half a continent.

All the people in and on Her were doomed as She convulsed enough to shake them off Her surface or to eject them from underground tomorrow if the excision processes were not stopped now.

All told to me by a little sliver of rock from Her surface.