Dark Side of the Moon Read online

  DARK SIDE

  OF THE

  MOON

  An OPSIG Team Black Novel

  Alan Jacobson

  For the astronauts, engineers, and scientists who pioneered manned space travel, to those who gave their lives, and to those who risked them to reach beyond our limits and expand our horizons.

  Author’s Note

  When the idea for Dark Side of the Moon came to me, I had the ridiculous thought that my research load for this novel would be lighter than normal because I would not have to travel to locations all over the world. My most significant setting was going to be otherworldly—literally. However, I realized I needed to get my characters to the Moon, and as I would soon learn, I knew what the average person knows about this—at best not much and at worst a lot less than I needed to know.

  Moreover, I had no intention of writing science fiction—not because I don’t enjoy it (I grew up on Star Trek), but because that is not my genre, it’s not what my readers expect, and that’s not the world in which my characters live. That meant I needed to make this story believable and grounded in reality while using technology and methodology that currently exist. And that meant I needed to work with engineers and scientists far outside my usual realm of research contacts.

  It was an enormous undertaking. But I learned a hell of a lot, and I truly appreciate the time and effort these experts gave me—both anonymous and named—in helping me understand how it all works. They enabled me to tell the story that I got so excited about when it first leaped into my thoughts.

  My readers know that I always strive to show them new perspectives, using fresh ideas, in an effort to take them behind the scenes to places they wouldn’t ordinarily be able to go—in this case, where few have gone before.

  One important note: I revisit events that occurred during the Apollo 17 Moon landing in 1972. Some of the dialogue is real, taken from mission transcripts, though I summarized some of the exchanges because actual conversations are often boring—and make for poor reading. However, I depicted one event that did not actually occur and thus the dialogue spoken by the astronauts regarding it is fictional—meaning Gene Cernan and Jack Schmitt did not really say and do all these things. (If it smells like a legal disclaimer and sounds like a legal disclaimer …)

  I trust you’ll enjoy the journey and hope it’ll give you a few things to think about.

  “The eyes of the world now look into space, to the Moon and to the planets beyond, and we have vowed that we shall not see it governed by a hostile flag of conquest, but by a banner of freedom and peace. We have vowed that we shall not see space filled with weapons of mass destruction, but with instruments of knowledge and understanding.”

  —President John F. Kennedy

  September 12, 1962

  “Space appears to be the great wave of the future, and certainly military uses would be found for it. The Russians, with their lead, had probably already learned to put bombs up there, and … we should have our men—if not bombs—up there too… . Space was the new high ground, and the Air Force had best prepare to occupy it.”

  —Michael Collins

  Gemini 10 and Apollo 11 astronaut, Carrying the Fire, 1974

  “China and Russia … have hacked into every agency in the federal government including the Pentagon … the espionage, the stealing of military secrets, satellite technology, rocket technology out of NASA, it’s prevalent. It’s everywhere.”

  —Rep. Michael McCaul

  Chairman, House Homeland Security Subcommittee on

  Oversight, Investigations, and Management

  “Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet.”

  —Gen. James Mattis, Usmc

  Apollo 17 Landing Site

  Taurus-Littrow Valley

  Mare Serenitatis

  The Moon

  December 13, 1972

  Houston, we’re getting some unusual radiation readings here.”

  “Say again? Where are you and what kind of readings are you getting?”

  Apollo 17 commander Gene Cernan kept his gaze fixed on the Geiger counter. “We’re on the southeast side of Bear Mountain and—”

  “You’re supposed to be on your way back to base,” said flight director Denny Driscoll.

  “Uh, this is Jack,” geologist Harrison “Jack” Schmitt said. “This could be an important find. I think we should stretch our safety margin and stay out here a bit longer to—”

  “Negative, Seventeen. You two told us ten minutes ago you were drop-dead exhausted from three days of climbing and digging—not to mention hauling Moon rocks for six hours today. You said your hands were tired and chafed raw from wearing those gloves and you were returning to Challenger.”

  “This is a once in a lifetime opportunity,” Schmitt said. “Who knows when we’ll get back here?”

  In fact, they all knew it was going to be awhile—a long while. President Kennedy’s very public challenge for Americans to land on the Moon before the Soviets had been accomplished—and on time. With budgets strained and the public’s enthusiasm for the space program waning, Apollo 18, 19, and 20 were canceled. The writing was in NASA’s budget—and as good as etched in the basalt of Moon rock: the agency was turning its attention to Skylab and something else they had been discussing: a low Earth orbit space shuttle.

  There was a long moment of silence. Cernan figured Driscoll and his mission control specialists were discussing, if not debating, the timing of all they had left to do before liftoff.

  Then: “Uh, Seventeen, what readings are you getting?”

  Cernan looked to Schmitt. As the only scientist to walk the Moon’s surface, this was his argument to make.

  “Exceptionally high CPM on the Geiger. Everything here, so far, is the tan-gray subfloor gabbro that I’ve seen. But the rover’s shadow is making it impossible to see. I think the rock I’m getting the radiation reading from is darker, slicker, graphite-colored.”

  “Apollo 14 found uranium and thorium.”

  “This is not that.” Schmitt carefully leaned forward, his left hand keeping the heavy pressure suit from tipping him over as he tried to get a better look through his glass helmet visor. “This is … different. And I’m starting to think that maybe the gray, relatively nonvesicular subfloor may be the deeper fraction.”

  “Boy,” Cernan said, glancing around beyond them to his left and right, “these rock fields are something else.”

  “Dandy,” Driscoll said. “That’s terrific, Seventeen. And I’m glad you’re enjoying the view, Geno. But we’re short on time so tell me about those radiation readings. Can you explain what you’re getting, Jack?”

  “I can’t, Houston. I—I um, I don’t know what to make of it.”

  “I’m gonna get a picture,” Cernan said as he maneuvered the Hasselblad camera into position and snapped off several exposures. “Got it, I think.”

  “Seventeen, Houston. We want you to collect a small, representative rock sample, record its location, and lock it away in the lead-lined box when you get back to the LM,” he said, pronouncing it “lem” and referring to the lunar module. “We’ll analyze it back here.”

  “But—”

  “You’ve had twenty-two hours of EVAs the past three days,” Driscoll said, using the acronym for extravehicular activities. “But time’s up. You need to park the rover and get your weight balanced for liftoff. Full checklist ahead of you. Go directly back to Challenger and get to it. Houston out.”

  Schmitt sighed, the moisture causing a slight fogging of his helmet visor. “A geologist’s dream. And I—”


  “You’ve lived the dream, Jack. The only scientist in human history to land on another planetary body. Get your hammer out. Let’s chisel off a piece, take a core sample directly below it, and head back.”

  After securing the specimens, they got back in the rover and drove toward the Challenger. Upon arriving, they off-loaded the cases of rocks they had collected, taking care to use the radiation shielded container as directed. They weighed each box and placed them in precise locations to ensure that the ascent stage—which would deliver them into orbit to rendezvous with the command service module—was properly balanced. Every ounce had to be accounted for so they could be certain the engines had enough thrust to lift them off the surface.

  “You good with this?” Cernan asked. “I need to go park the rover.”

  “Yeah,” Schmitt said. “I’ve got some cleaning to do. This Moon dust is like cat hair—it’s everywhere.”

  Cernan drove the LRV, or lunar roving vehicle, several hundred feet from the lunar module and turned in a circle, orienting the front so that it faced the spacecraft. He checked the movie camera mount to be certain it was framing the shot properly. Mission control wanted to film the liftoff, and this distance would give them a good view and enough perspective relative to the surface—as well as a safety margin to prevent the equipment from being incinerated by the rocket engine’s burn.

  Cernan climbed out of the rover and stood there a moment, pondering the fact that they had stayed on the Moon longer, and traveled farther, than any other crew had.

  He knelt beside the rover and, scraping the stiff right index finger of his glove against the lunar soil, carved the initials TDC, after his daughter. He chuckled, knowing that with the Apollo program now ending, his inscription would remain undisturbed for many decades to come … perhaps for eternity.

  He hopped and bounced back to Challenger—the lunar module’s call sign—marveling at what he and Schmitt, and the hundreds of engineers at NASA and its contractors, had accomplished.

  Upon reaching Challenger, he grabbed the handles to hoist himself up the ladder. This moment had haunted him for weeks. He had wanted to prepare remarks to read but he never had the time to formalize something. Just as Neil Armstrong’s words of mankind’s first steps on the lunar surface had become famous, the last man making his final boot prints on the Moon might likewise be remembered.

  He had jotted down some notes on his sleeve over the past three days, but now, as he stood there, found that he did not need them. Instead, he spoke from the heart.

  “As we leave the Moon and Taurus-Littrow, we leave as we came, and God willing, as we shall return, with peace and hope for all mankind. As I take these last steps from the surface for some time to come, I’d just like to record that America’s challenge of today has forged man’s destiny of tomorrow. Godspeed the crew of Apollo 17.”

  He lifted his left foot from the soil and climbed aboard Challenger.

  AFTER ASCENDING THE TEN STEPS into the lunar module, Cernan was informed that they were over their weight limit by 210 pounds. They had anticipated this would be the case, and like some of the Apollo missions before them, they pulled out a fish scale and began weighing items they no longer needed.

  Out the door went a bevy of expensive equipment: lab instruments, pouches of uneaten food, unneeded pairs of extravehicular activity/EVA gloves, two PLSS primary life support system backpacks, a Leica camera, and, last, the handheld scale.

  They finished going through their written checklists and reported in to Denny Driscoll in Houston.

  “We’re just about on schedule,” Cernan said.

  “Roger, Geno. All systems are go.”

  “I’m gonna miss this place,” Schmitt said. He sat back in his couch. “Someday, some way, mankind has to find its way back here.”

  “Roger that,” Driscoll said. “Someday, some way, I’m sure we will.”

  1

  Nasa

  Neutral Buoyancy Lab

  Underwater Training Facility

  Houston, Texas

  Present Day

  The two former Navy SEALs broke through the surface of the 40-foot deep, 200- by 100-foot 6-million-gallon pool that NASA used for training astronauts. Although neutral buoyancy diving did not perfectly duplicate the effects of a zero gravity environment, it provided the best way to simulate weightlessness for EVAs, or extravehicular activities, in space or on a planetary surface.

  Astronauts who had trained at the Neutral Buoyancy Lab, or NBL, as it was known, and then went on to do EVAs outside the shuttle or International Space Station reported that it was effective in helping them prepare.

  Standing on the edge of the expansive pool were FBI director Douglas Knox and secretary of defense Richard McNamara.

  As the metal platform rose out of the water, two astronauts wearing modified pressure suits with leg weights strapped to their ankles stood rigidly, back to back.

  Harris Welding rotated his head inside the large helmet and waited for the assistant dive operations training officer to help him out of his gear.

  Two training support personnel began removing the breathing apparatus from Welding’s partner, Darren Norris, while another unhooked the tank that supplied nitrox.

  Once their helmets were detached from the suit, Secretary McNamara stepped forward, remaining behind the yellow and black striped safety line at the pool’s edge. “You’re both doing exceptionally well. We want to personally congratulate you on your progress.”

  Welding laughed. “Thank you, sir. But all due respect, the two of you didn’t fly out to Houston just to give us a pat on the back.”

  “No,” Director Knox said. “I know it takes forever to get out of those suits, but meet us in the briefing room in forty-five minutes. We’ve got some classified information to share regarding your mis—”

  “Daddy! Daddy!”

  Three children, two girls and a boy, came running toward Knox and McNamara, with a woman in her late thirties trailing twenty feet behind them.

  “Wesley-Ann and Nicki,” their mother shouted. “Stop. Michael, get your little sister!”

  Knox stuck out his right arm and corralled the children. “Whoa, it’s dangerous by the edge of the p—”

  “Hi Daddy,” the older girl, about seven, said.

  A broad grin spread over Welding’s lips. “Hey sweetie. What are you doing here?”

  “You’re s’posed to eat dinner with us, remember?”

  “Oh. Uh, yeah, sweet pea. But you’re way early.” Welding was still sheathed in his suit and standing rigidly on the platform with a few inches of water from the humongous pool sloshing violently at his boot tops.

  The woman reached Knox and gathered up her kids. “Sorry. They get so excited visiting Harris. He’s been training all over the country for a year and a half, so when he’s right in our backyard we try to spend as much time as possible with him.” She held the three children with her left arm and stuck out her right hand. “Tanya Welding.”

  “Douglas Knox. You have great kids. They’re adorable.”

  “Thank you. Are you— I know your name. But … sorry, I can’t place it.”

  “No apologies necessary.” The corners of Knox’s mouth lifted ever so slightly. “I’m with the FBI. I try to stay out of the news as much as possible. It’s not always possible.”

  “Sir,” Welding said. “Mind if I take a little time with my family?”

  “Absolutely,” Knox said. “Take whatever you need. Just be in the briefing room in forty-five minutes.”

  Dressed in NASA t-shirts and cargo pants, Welding and Norris sat down at the oval table. Joining Knox and McNamara were CIA assistant director Denard Ford and Brig. Gen. Klaus Eisenbach from USSTRATCOM, the United States Strategic Command.

  “The time has come,” Ford said, “to brief you on certain classified aspects of your mission.” He
turned to Eisenbach. “General.”

  Eisenbach’s uniform was heavily decorated. He tugged it into place as he rose and walked over to the tabletop podium.

  “Are Carson and Stroud getting this briefing too?” Welding asked.

  “They are,” Eisenbach said. “But you two are not due back at Vandenberg for a couple of weeks and it couldn’t wait.”

  Welding and Norris shared a look, then leaned forward in their seats.

  “You’ve spent time studying the Apollo missions,” Knox said, “because they served as the basis for how you’ll be approaching your op.”

  Eisenbach picked up the remote control from the table. “The knowledge we gained, the data we collected, the technology we developed, rank among the most important scientific achievements of humankind. But there’s something that came out of Apollo that’s never been publicized or published. Anywhere. Seventeen was the last Apollo, but the first to include a scientist, geologist Jack Schmitt.”

  “If I remember right, they brought back hundreds of pounds of lunar rock,” Norris said.

  “Yes. Including some odd orange, titanium-laced soil from Shorty Crater that contained the radioactive elements thorium and uranium, which are also found on Earth.” Eisenbach clicked the controller, and the screen behind him lit up with a chemical diagram. “But they also found a new element. Like thorium, it’s radioactive. But we believe it goes far beyond thorium’s capabilities.”

  “How so?” Welding asked.

  “We only had a few micrograms to work with so we couldn’t be sure of what we were seeing. We couldn’t produce it in the lab so a lot of our analysis required extrapolation and, more recently, computer modeling. I don’t want to get into molecular physics—I’m not an expert so it’d be a short conversation—but this is one of the heaviest elements to be discovered, at the far reaches of the periodic table. Typically such elements are very unstable and highly radioactive. Elements heavier than uranium aren’t usually found in nature. They’re manufactured, so to speak, in linear accelerators in a laboratory. They only exist for thousandths of a second.”