“I told you, I’m not going to touch anything I’m not supposed to!” Drue said. Bo remained silent. “Do you even know who I am? Who my dad is? I’m a Lincoln. We are very important on Earth.” As Benny walked by, Drue perked up. “Hey, tell him it’s OK for me to be here!”
Before Benny could answer, Jasmine’s voice rang through the garage. “Yes! Here!”
Benny raised a finger to Drue. “One sec.”
Drue huffed but stayed seated as Benny made his way to the huddle. “Tell me you’ve got some good news,” he said.
“Jasmine thinks she’s figured out where this Bale guy might be hiding out,” Hot Dog said. “So much for Elijah being the smart one.”
“Well, maybe,” Jasmine said. “And I’m sure Elijah could have found him if he’d actually tried to. From everything Pinky and Trevone mentioned, it sounds like a reunion with Dr Bale wasn’t a big priority to him.”
“True,” Pinky said. “I think he’d rather have forgotten the man ever existed.”
“Anyway, I looked at places where it seemed like he’d been camping based on evidence the Pit Crew or Elijah came across while exploring. Which, honestly, is mainly just a few footprints and Space Runner landing marks. Dr Bale and his team did a great job of cleaning up after themselves.”
She pulled on one chrome corner of her HoloTek to extend it and then held it up to Benny, showing him a map of the far side of the Moon with several yellow dots on it.
“I think he was hiding in the Daedalus crater for a while, but given when the footprints were discovered and factoring in the amount of time it would have taken to get to Hot Dog and leave her supplies after she went down, this might be his movement pattern.” She tapped on the screen and blinking lines connected the dots. “Fortunately, he’s heading closer to us.”
“Yeah,” Hot Dog said, pointing to the dot on the left side of the HoloTek. “Turns out there was some kind of energy ping around here right after I got shot down and before you guys found me.”
“It was just before our satellites were destroyed,” Pinky said. “The energy signature was comparable to that of a hyperdrive engine.”
“I’d suggest we search this group of mares,” Jasmine continued, gesturing to a spot on the map. “It’s actually not far from the alien base, relatively speaking, which means it’s possible that’s where he’s headed. Maybe for shelter. He might have seen the storm coming.”
“Uh.” Hot Dog groaned. “Didn’t we kind of leave a big hole leading into the underground tunnels back there? Maybe we should get that fixed.”
Ash McGuyver snapped her gum. “Bo and I will take care of it, no problem.”
“Perfect!” Drue said, springing into the middle of their group. “So, what, we’ll just head out and search the crater. Easy.”
“It’s not that simple.” Jasmine waved two fingers across the map, zooming in. “These mares – if he’s even there – can be almost a hundred kilometres in diameter.”
“Uh, can you talk to me in miles, Jazz?” Benny asked. “Or, better yet, how many Tajs is that?”
“The search area is the size of two or three cities. Big ones.” She shook her head. “Honestly, how has everyone not picked up the metric system yet?”
“Don’t lump me into your science shaming,” Drue said. “My tutors taught me both. This should still be pretty easy, though. It’s a whole lot of nothing out there, right? Plus, don’t we have sensors and stuff like that?”
“Heat sensors, energy sensors, you name it,” Ash said. “But if Bale has a way of messing with those, you kids are on your own.”
“So what are we waiting for?” Drue asked.
“One last thing,” Pinky said, furrowing her eyebrows a bit. “Remember that Dr Bale and Elijah don’t have the greatest history together. And in a way … you are sort of intruding on his territory.”
“Yeah,” Benny said. He looked at Drue. “We’ll be careful.”
Even as Benny spoke, though, Drue was racing towards the Space Runners. “I call whatever goes fastest!”
“You’ll take the laser-armed SRs or you’ll stay here,” Ash yelled after him. She wiped her hands on her coveralls. “That boy’ll be the death of me.”
“Jazz, you’ll navigate us, yeah?” Benny asked as they made their way to the vehicles.
“Sure,” she said, but her cheeks flushed a little. “Just, uh, don’t mind me if I get a little behind. I haven’t had much actual experience flying these things.”
Hot Dog winked at her. “Don’t worry, we’ll take care of you.”
They slid into four of the Space Runners with Mustang-red stripes painted across them. A holographic map appeared on Benny’s windshield, a blinking line cutting across the projected lunar surface.
“Here’s our path,” Jasmine’s voice came through the comms, filling the cabin of Benny’s vehicle. “I suggest a diamond flight pattern so we can keep an eye on the surface and each other.”
“Agreed,” Hot Dog said. “Benny, you take the front, Drue and I will take the sides, and Jasmine can bring up the rear.”
Benny waited for Drue to protest that he should take the lead, but he didn’t say anything.
“All right,” Benny said. “Pinky, open up the auxiliary pressurisation tunnel. Uh, please.”
And then they were off, shooting one by one out of the Grand Dome and into the stillness of the Moon’s imperceptible atmosphere.
“Race you guys to the mare,” Drue said over the comms. His Space Runner shot forward. “Last one there has to tell Ricardo we left.”
“Formation, Drue,” Hot Dog said. “We went over this.”
“Oh. Yeah.” He took his spot at Benny’s right again.
“We’re a good half-hour away from this search zone,” Jasmine said, “but we should keep an eye out for anything odd, just in case.”
Benny laughed a little to himself, thinking what a strange thing this was to hear, considering the fact that they were setting out to hunt for a mysterious doctor hiding on the dark side of the Moon to possibly recruit him in their effort to save the Earth from aliens. All of it was odd. Even the fact that Benny was sitting in a Space Runner. Despite the fact that this car had been in battle earlier that day, the inside was still sleek and clean, the surfaces all polished and the artificial-leather seats buffed. He caught his reflection in the rearview mirror and realised that he was pretty clean, too. At least compared to what he usually looked like in the Drylands, where it was impossible to scrub off all the dust even when they did have enough water to bathe, and his black hair was usually stiff with dried sweat, sprouting out in all directions. When he’d first got to the Taj, he’d felt so out of place. Even in the Space Runner on the way up to the Moon, he’d managed to get dirt everywhere because it had spilled out of his bag.
But now he’d changed. And for some reason that made him miss home even more.
Eventually, they were flying across the far side of the Moon. Benny pressed his face against the passenger window, looking at the