Selene Crater, Luna’s South Pole: a View of Earth
Human Resources and Dewey walked in on us as we were in the server complex sketching inputs, outputs, and logic flows of what we dubbed the GreatestGameinHistory.
“Get that boy out of here,” shouted Dewey.
“Violation of security protocols,” said Human Resources.
Joe replied, “We’re now under martial law, working under authorization from Vastag.”
“What the…,” said Human Resources.
“Very funny,” said Dewey. “Get that boy out of here.”
“Tell that to Vastag when he gets here. He’s now ambassador to us from the Cislunar Space Nation, which just declared its independence. Plus which, we six are now the most hated humans in the Universe. We’re focusing on how to change that or at least stay alive.”
Human Resources pulled Dewey aside. After animated whispering, he said, “Counsel has advised me that this is a force majeure situation. Acts of war Earthside compel us to ignore certain company procedures. Also, as team building is more important now than ever, counsel has advised me to invite y’all on a ride to our crater rim where you can see Earth.
Joe added, “Its phase right now should show North America with its east half in sunlight. South America is entirely sunlit. We can view it through fused quartz windows with no intervening electronics, meaning no deep fake stuff.”
Eric and Grey said they preferred to focus on building the GreatestGameinHistory. I jumped at the opportunity.
Half an hour later the rest of us were viewing Earth. On the dark side, we saw auroras dancing in slow motion from both poles to the mid-latitudes.
Joe said, “Those extraordinary auroras are evidence of high-altitude nuclear attacks. The US Starfish and Russian Project K high-altitude nuclear detonations of the 1950s caused similar effects. These detonations also would have bricked low Earth satellites. Perhaps geostationary ones, too. And most computing devices below them. No wonder we’ve been hearing so little from Earth.”
It was hard to tell what else was going on. The daylight portion was swathed in what could have been clouds, smoke, or combinations of them. On the dark side of North America, we saw indications of massive forest fires, judging from the orange glow under some regions of an unbroken cloud deck. We saw clumps of incessant lightning in many areas.
Joe activated the onboard telescope and tracked its focus along the western edge of Earth. He clicked several freeze frames so we could observe fast-action electrical phenomena.
“Those colors you see reaching above the cloud deck into space are lightning manifesting itself as red sprites and blue jets. Those halo things at the edge of space are called elves. All these are evidence of exceptionally violent thunderstorms.”
“So we can’t go home any time soon,” said Human Services.
“I promise to never again eat crackers in bed,” said Dewey.
He and Human Services were holding hands.
Continued —>
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