“You’re going to get banned from the entire Taj,” Hot Dog said. “And we’re not going to war with the Alpha Maraudi. We’re …” She trailed off, biting her lower lip.
Drue looked back and forth between Hot Dog and Benny. “Really? Because I bet the aliens are pretty mad that we schooled them this morning. Maybe we should go on the offensive. Though we’d probably need more than lasers if we wanted to take down that big mother ship.” His eyes lit up. “I bet Elijah has all kinds of prototypes for crazy stuff in his files that we could use. Pinky, what have you got for us? Show me the biggest, most ridiculous thing he was working on. Where are all the killer robots like the ones we fought in the video-game room?”
The AI clasped her hands together on the holodesk. “Let’s put a pin in that.”
“We’re not going to attack anyone,” Benny said. “That would make us just as bad as they are. Besides, I told you guys, they’re kind of not what we expected. They’re … more like a space caravan.”
Trying to wrap his head round the idea of extraterrestrial life coming for Earth was one thing, but the realisation that the Alpha Maraudi weren’t really some evil alien race was another, more difficult notion to process. They were just trying to find a new home. Doing everything they could to survive. In a way, Benny understood where they were coming from, and he didn’t want to have to fight them.
That was the real problem, the thing sitting like a heavy lug nut in the pit of Benny’s stomach: what were they supposed to do now? The day before, the stakes had been terrifying, sure, but their goals had been so simple: stop the asteroid storm, keep Earth safe, protect humanity. Now there were so many variables.
And despite his insistence that he wasn’t the leader of the Moon Platoon, it felt like everyone kept looking to him for answers.
“Benny’s right,” Hot Dog said, taking a seat. “I just wish they’d find another place to set up camp.”
“This is like game theory,” Jasmine said, scrunching her eyebrows together. “Another species needs Earth to survive, but so do we. Normally I’d be into a logic problem like this, but it turns out this kind of thing isn’t nearly as fun in real life.”
“So …” Drue said, “we’re taking ‘blowing up the aliens who tried to kill all humanity’ off the holodesk?”
“Pinky, if he gets within a metre of a laser, let me know,” Trevone said.
“What about this guy on the dark side of the Moon?” Benny asked, turning his attention to the Pit Crew member. “Could he help? Any idea how we find him?”
As if the shock of everything that had happened during their battle in space hadn’t been enough, Trevone and Pinky had unexpected news when Benny had arrived back at the resort: the residents of the Taj weren’t alone on the Moon.
“Dr Austin Bale,” Trevone said. He tapped on the desk in front of him and a hologram of a man appeared above it. He was maybe fifty years old in the image, with thick wire-rimmed glasses and a shock of black streaked across the front of his otherwise silver hair. “No clue. He’s spent years avoiding all Elijah’s sensors and expeditions. We have no idea what he’s been up to.”
“How do we know he’s even alive out there, then?”
“Well, for one thing, he was probably the person who left supplies for Hot Dog when she crashed her Space Runner.”
“I didn’t crash,” Hot Dog said. “I was shot down. Big difference.” She leaned back in her seat and clicked her tongue. “I knew I wasn’t crazy to think someone left me stuff. I can’t believe Elijah tried to tell me I was confused.”
“Remind me why we should care about this guy again?” Drue asked. “Let’s imagine that I wasn’t listening too carefully earlier. We had just got back from blowing up a bunch of asteroids.”
“Dr Bale was Elijah’s right-hand man when he began the construction of the Lunar Taj and in-depth exploration of the Moon,” Trevone said. “A renowned astrophysicist and engineer. He was with Elijah when he first discovered the base on the dark side of the Moon.”
“Yeah, yeah, Elijah told us that part,” Drue said. “He wanted to warn Earth about the aliens, but Elijah didn’t want him to. So what’s he doing on the Moon? Why stay up here?”
“Well, things are a bit more complicated than Elijah may have let on,” Trevone continued. “Dr Bale did go back to Earth to warn people about everything he’d seen. He even took a bunch of artefacts from the Maraudi base with him.”
“You mean, he stole them from the Taj,” Pinky corrected. She drummed her holographic fingers on the desk silently.
“Right. But each time he tried to convince them that an extraterrestrial threat was out there some official would call Elijah, who assured them that nothing was out of the ordinary. He, uh …” Trevone paused for a moment. “He told everyone that being on the Moon had caused Dr Bale to lose his mind.”
“Yikes,” Hot Dog said.
“The messages Dr Bale sent to Elijah around this time were … intense,” Pinky said. “So much so that at my recommendation we beefed up security around the Taj. And you wouldn’t believe how much money Elijah spent keeping the man’s comments out of the media.” She shook her head. “I didn’t exist as an AI back then. I was just a human, and I trusted Elijah. I mean, Dr Bale did sound crazy, and he was definitely angry.” She took a deep breath. “Neither of them acted like they should have. And while I don’t love the idea of reaching out to someone potentially unstable, it’s true: he could be helpful.”
“Hopefully,” Trevone continued. “In the end, he came back to the Moon along with a few research assistants who were convinced he was telling the truth. As far as we know, they’ve been living on the dark side ever since. He’s masking his presence somehow, but we find evidence of old campsites every so often.”
“Maybe he’s using some of that alien tech to hide,” Drue said. “Maybe he knows more about these ETs.”
“Eesh,” Hot Dog said. “A few days on the dark side is one thing, but how can someone live out there for years? It doesn’t even seem possible.”
Trevone shrugged. “The man’s a genius. Or so I’m told. I’ve never met him.”
“I have,” Pinky said. “Or, at least, the real me has. And, yes, he is incredibly intelligent. Apart from Elijah, he’s likely to be the only person on Earth capable of surviving out there for so long.”
“But what’s he been doing?” Benny asked, more to himself than the rest of the room.
“That’s the trillion-dollar question,” Trevone said.
“Whatever it is,” Jasmine cut in, “he’s in danger. Scouts from that alien mother ship broke rank in the middle of the asteroid fight. We lost track of them, but they were headed in the general direction of the Moon. If they wanted to hide out, the dark side would be the perfect place.”
“Do we really need his help?” Hot Dog asked. “I mean, we’ve kind of been doing pretty good on our own.”
Benny thought about this for a moment, memories of the last few days flashing through his head – the asteroids, the mother ship, Commander Tull. Finally, he nodded. “We need all the help we can get. We just have to figure out where he is.”
“We could fly out to the dark side to try to spot him visually,” Trevone said. “But I have the feeling he’s the kind of person who finds you, not the other way round.”
Benny