Here's a story called 1982 that I made when I was 12 or something like that. Anyway, enjoy...
1982
I've never really understood the meaning of the word magic until I rode on an spaceship. I'm sure we've all wished to travel to the moon and back. Wished we could let the wind lift us up and take us on a journey through the clouds and into the cold, dark, reaches of outer space. Never before did we think we could fulfill our dreams. But step into the magic of a spaceship and let your dreams take over you. Let it lift you into the sky, clouds, and into a whole new world...
This is exactly how I felt when I had finally got the chance to travel to the moon on a spaceship. Ever since my early childhood, I was fascinated with space. Someday, I had always hoped to visit there. Then one day, an advertisement from Leith Spaceport announced plans to build a new series of spaceships that can travel to the moon and back at only a small fraction of the cost. As I had expected, the cruise was very good and everything went smoothly without any major problems. But i'd better not tell the ending of my story at the beginning.
Hello, my name is Grahall Paglonda and I am a 61-year old ex-superhero. My story begins with me and Liam cycling along Sambo Street, which turned into Balantius Road. We were in Leith, looking for the new breed of spaceships, the Plutera Discovery and the Rell Galaxius. The two ships were to travel to the moon in just 3 days.
After some researching, we finally arrived at the spaceport. Inside, were lots of people, mostly just visitors, here to look at the new museum opened by Plutera. It showcased the last 50 years of space travel and industry, with a life-sized replica of the lunar spacedome being it's major attraction. The shows were very biased though, with most of their models originating from Plutera.
I asked one of the ladies where I could get myself validated. She was very kind and even guided us to our destination. I finally registered myself and gave out my details. They checked me and searched me for any items I was carrying. I left my watch on the counter and gave my laptop to Liam who had some trouble carrying it, finally he sat it down on the floor below him. While leaving, we forgot about it.
We both sat down on the seats and waited for the ship to finish it's routine inspection. Hundreds of people were waiting next to us. The air was hot and uncomfortable. Our faces were bright red and we were sweating a lot. However, Liam looked perfectly okay. He was reading a book called “1984”.
Just then, when I had least expected it, out of the runway came a huge disk-shaped vehicle. I didn't know what it was but it sure looked exciting! I was going to ask Liam (Who knew alot about spaceships.) I shifted over and bended my back to start talking but I was soon startled by loud screams coming from the waiting port.
Everyone was smiling, laughing, and cheering. A strange sense of amazement seemed to devour the entire room. Then, Liam closed his book and joined in with the crowd. Unable to find a reason, I decided to join in too. Then, after the screaming had ceased and everyone grew relaxed again, I asked Liam what everyone was screaming about.
"Huh? You don't know? The spaceship's arrived! You're going to space soon!" He looked at me as though I was turning crazy. So I turned my face to the opposite direction. Through the windows was the huge metallic object. Now that I was closer, I was able to read the fine text printed on it's shiny silver body. "Plutera Discovery," it said.
A sudden burst of excitement ran through me. "Yay! The spaceship has arrived!" I was so happy that I jumped out of my seat and started to sing and dance at the same time." Everyone looked at me. My feelings of happiness and excitement were quickly transformed into embarrassment and humiliation. I slowly sat back down back on my seat and pretended as though nothing had ever happened. Inside, I felt horrible. Throughout the whole wait, everyone stared at me. Even Liam didn't offer much support either. He was too busy reading his own book.
Finally, when I thought I couldn't continue, a strange-looking, asian man welcomed us into the Plutera Discovery. We passed through a small tube and had another item check. Then, we passed through an even smaller tunnel before exiting through the other side.
It was outside. The trees were swaying softly to the wind and the cool breeze gently touched my cheeks. On a closer inspection, the spaceship was enormous. The navy blue shell emitted a strange, yet welcoming bright green glow. The windows were oval-shaped and neatly attached to it's round, bubbly corners. The bottom shell had a huge machine-operated handle that, when opened would show an extremely complex array of quantam mechanics.
The Plutera Discovery was a very large cruise ship. Made of carbonic nanotubes, the ship's surface was 40 times stonger than most other ships. The tubes were specially designed in a geometric pattern to lower the amount of conductivity and reduce static to prevent the hydrogen from exploding. Previously, all ships were made of graphite fibres, Spectra 1000, artificial diamonds, and other various configurations of ionized carbon molecules. As a result of this, the ships were heavy and easily breakable. The new carbonic nanotubes are able to withstand meteor blasts and space debris. However, meteorites aren't the only hazard. Space is filled with radiation, too. Spaceships in low-earth orbit are substantially protected by our planet's magnetic field. The basic rule for working out this relation is...
299,792,000M/PS = c
Wavelength = lambda
Frequency = nu
Relation: c = lambda x nu
The sky was dark and cloudy today. However, not a single drop of rain had passed the stratosphere, leaving the ground dry and bristlly. When asked, the ship's astrometeorologist told me that everything was going to be alright. She explained that these weather conditions were very normal and seemingly harmless.
The people were seperated into two groups, spectators and passengers. From the spectator's view, they could see the space ship next to them. It's image reflected in the mirrors that covered the transient, serrated surface of the launching pad's floor. It's grey metal flukes lifted and fell slightly with the windy swell.
Once organized, I gave my ticket to the ticket man. A few metres below, I could see Liam. He was looking directly at me. I smiled. He responded by waving back.
Before stepping into the spaceship, I felt nervous. I was afraid of her strange new surroundings. The very fact that I was going to exit the Earth and venture into an unknown territory felt worrisome. But I knew that I had to go. I couldn't turn back now. Everyone would be disappointed in me. The ship's door was open and a faint green glow stretched across the gap. The ticket man reached out towards it, and the light faded. He gestured at me to go ahead. “She's as ready as she'll ever be,” I said to myself. And so I bravely stepped in. The other passengers followed behind. The air brightened again behind them.
I looked inside the spaceship. The walls were a translucent shade of white and the chairs were spherical and gently bulged into the shiny, silver floors. The pods were organized into bunches of two, with large, transparent hemispheres attached in-between. Small shapes were carved into the walls, indicating an unmistakable sense of nautical poesy.
I found my seat and sat on it. A strange metallic shell emerged out of the shiny white roof. It's metallic plates covered me tightly then quickly relaxed. The air-cushions inside the cocoon inflated to fill the gaps and a small monitor kept the inside of the cocoon at constant room temperature, slightly flunctuating in the lower 20^C's.
After a while, a small slit opened up above me and out came a thin piece of translucent plastic. It displayed the words "Multi-Purpose Automated Personal Computer" After a five-second loading, it presented me with a few options. They included, watching television, surfing the intranet, listening to music, playing games, watching movies, and gaining access to the external cameras. Despite it's impressive features, I chose to use the cameras instead. The screen turned black and flickered. Then, it showed a clear, live, 3-D image of the entire space station. I closely zoomed into a small crowd of people standing near the space ship and found Liam sitting on a wooden bench. His parents were sitting beside him, they were all eating ham sandwiches bought from the sandwich shop down the road. When Liam had finished eating, he looked up at the space ship again. His eyes were directly facing the camera.
After a while, my chair started talking, "Departure will initiate in 5 minutes. An inspection is currently under process." Just then, two small cameras protuded through the walls and started inspecting us. Seconds later, they swivelled back into their original locations and disappeared. Just to be safe, I shut down my MPAPC and slid it back into the roof.
"10... 9... 8... 7... 6... 5... 4... 3... 2... 1... Blast Off!" The ship made a huge noise as the hydrogen started exploding and igniting with the flames. A frightening rumble shuttled from the rear end of the spaceship and our metal cocoons shook.
Then, we heard a loud clicking noise coming from the base of the spaceship. The ship stopped shaking and rose from the ground. Second after second, I watched the spaceport slowly melt away as we gained altitude. A movie started but I was too curious to pay any attention. Overhead, the sky was darkening. The deep, rich green of late afternoon was giving way to the black of night.
“600KM/PH... 1,000KM/PH... 1,800KM/PH...” The ship's speed was quickly increasing. I felt the g-forces slowly impact me onto my metal cocoon. My skin started to stretch back into my neck, my hands were pinned down into the air cushions behind me. My eyes were unable to open.
“Bhrrr...!” The sonicboom was coming closer. I heard the spaceship rip out of the layers of sound. The intensified shock waves that were forcefully compacted into the nose of the spaceship burst open and nullified the entire ship. A jet of water vapour circled the ship then disappeared. The cocoons shook again, causing everyone to scream and panic. The computer realized this and told everyone to be quiet. Finally, the screams subsided as the ship gained it's control back. This time, the ride seemed to have now gotten smoother as SB-10, a lubricant, was sprayed onto the ship's body, lowering the amout of friction and air resistance from the Earth's atmosphere.
Outside the window, I saw the different layers of the Earth's atmosphere fall past me. At the arrival of the ionosphere, the sky turned darker and darker as the free electrons were slowly captured by the nearby positive ions. Faint whisps of green and blue slowly disintegrated then reformed again. Tiny clouds of plasma were also seen.
After the ship had passed the exosphere, I decided the re-open the window. The view outside was stunning. Everything looked different now. The Earth was no longer a flat plane. Instead, the curvature of the Earth looked very imminent. The sky, clouds, oceans, and countries merged together to form a beautiful blue ball that seemed near enough to feel and touch. Although several hours had already passed, it seemed to me like a very short time.
For breakfast, we were given a strange, yellow, bitter-tasting paste that was squeezed out of two rubber pumps located on the bottom-corners of the centre console. Lunch was served in exactly the same way, and so was dinner too. Between these times, all we did was sit inside our pods to look outside the windows. The lights were turned off at exactly 12:00PM and turned back on six hours later. The voyage to the moon was pretty boring and uncomfortable. The forceful extraction of human waste products was painful, disquisting, and horribly disturbing. Suction pads were used to complete this job and they were frequently clogged, stuck, jammed up, and unremovable. The voyage took three days. During that time, I felt terribly sick.
Finally, after the voyage was over, we were evacuated from the spaceship and sent down into small lifts that automatically descended into the Lunar Spacedome. Whilst entering the lifts, I craned my head back to catch the last glimpse of the Plutera Discovery and thought about all the things that had made this ship a legend during the Lunar Revolution. Alive was only a tiny figment of her former glory, the speed no ship of her class had ever equaled.
Exiting the ship was a truly unique experience. For the first time ever, my body felt weightless. Walking on the moon felt very similar to wading across water. Air pumps were attached to our mouths for inhalation. During this time, almost 50 different layers of protective fibres had to be worn. These fibres prevented cosmic radiation, frostbite, heat, and lunar disintegration. Although Earth had a very high gravitational pull of 9.80m/ps/ps, due to the moon's low mass, the moon also has an extremely weak pull. This wonderful, floating-in-the-air feeling gradually dimished as we entered the spacedome. The spacedome slowly rotated and thus, artifical gravity (5.50m/ps/ps) was produced. Here is an easy formula for working out these results...
Escape Velocity = ev
Release Height = r
Earth: ev = 9.80m/ps/ps = 9.80m/ps x r
Moon: ev = 1.60m/ps/ps = 1.60m/ps x r
Example 1: r = 3.00m
Earth: 9.80m/ps x 3.00m = 29.40m/ps
Moon: 1.60m/ps x 3.00m = 4.80m/ps
Example 2: r = 7.12m
Earth: 9.80m/ps x 7.12m = 69.776m/ps
Moon: 1.60m/ps x 7.12m = 11.392m/ps
To me, the Lunar Spacedome seemed like a bubble stuck in tar. All around the hemisphere of the glass, the surface of the moon gave off a dull, lambient shine. The liquid quality of the reflected sunlight enhanced the feeling of being inside a crystal ball that was trapped in mire, unable to escape into the cleanliness of outer space.
In the near distance, the rocks themselves looked strange. Unusual minerals formed in the heat and under constant bombardment of particles from the solar wind. I was puzzled without quite knowing why, at powders with odd crystal shapes. And there were puddles as well. I sheilded myself away from thinking about those, abruptly ending my concentration. And something else near the horizon demended attention.
The Sun. It as very dim, cut down by the powerful protective screens. But the whitish yellow ball seemed like a golden dandelion near enough to feel and touch, resembling the faded colours of an incandescent coin. Dark sunspots ran in clusters, fanning north-and south-eastward, seperated far away from the burning equator. The surface had a fineness of texture that just escaped focus. Looking directly at the Sun bought a strange sense of detachment withn me. Dimmed, but not reddish, it's light bathed those inside the dome in an energetic glow. Streamers of sunshine seemed to carass my forehead.
Beneath the dome, various machines stood on a fused plate of hafnium carbide (HfC), the most refractory binary compound known to man. I craned my head back to look at the huge pylon that filled the centre of the chamber and protuded from the top of the protective screens, into the hot lunar sunshine. At it's tip were the lasers, masers, and phasers which kept the Lunar spacedome in touch with planet Earth, and via a net of satellites, orbiting hundreds of kilometres above the surface of the planet, followed the cruisers down the violent maelstrom of the solar system. The lasers, masers, and phasers were busy now. One colourful pattern after another flew at light-speed to the computers at home. It was tempting to imagine riding that beam back to Earth, to blue skies and waters.
The optical communicator was a small machine attached to the laser optics of the supercomputer system. The microphone was esentially a large mouthpiece against which a human user could press his mouth onto and speak. The optical input did the rest. Using this, the passengers living in the spacedome had the chance to talk to their friends and family back on Planet Earth.
The lasers emitted highly amplified, coherent radiation. The lasers on the Discovery used atoms that disintergrated in a cycled energy rate that, as they decay to a lower energy level, stimulate others to decay, resulting in a beam of emitted photons, electromagnetic waves, and free neutrons.
The phasers were installed as a security measure, they are used to amplify the laser's photon emission to a frequency and wavelength considered to be be clearly viewable withn the electromagnetic spectrum. The masers were developed just like the lasers except they were only capable of emitting microwave waves...
lambda = 1mm – 10cm.
Inside this artificially created world, there was no sun in the sky of course... Overlapping cones of light rays coming down from those artificial “suns”, created an ambience which was virtually indistinguishable from that of natural sunshine experienced on Earth.
Just then, a strange silver machine was waiting patiently behind me. The machine constantly emitted high-pitched beeping noises as an attempt to gain my attention. I pressed the buttons located on the little machine's head. Finally, the machine responded by taking me to my cabin.
I saw the bright Earth behind me. With it's three lights glowing in their contrasting colours in the distance. It looked veiled and mysterious. The whole scene appeared to be shrouded in a wispy cloud of interstellar gas and dust that was backlit by the three globes, causing it to glow in a myriad of subtle shades and colours. Besides that, it's oceans sparkled with the sun's radiant sunshine. But however, from such a distance, a few important features were invisible to the naked eye, and always lost somewhere within the overwhelming briliance of the Sun's own fiery glow. From the Lunar Spacedome, looking directly overhead at the dark sky, I saw an aerial view of the Milky Way Galaxy across to the spacedome’s opposite side. The scene resembled a view looking down from a jumbo jet here on Earth, that was climbing toward a thirty seven thousand feet cruising altitude above a city, shortly after take-off. Only here, that aerial view was inverted, and placed in the “sky” of this exotic world. The vast array of Earth's land and water could be seen glinting miles overhead, with Leith itself meandering like a snake through the centre of the idyllic country.
The door to my cabin was white, with silver bars running through the shiny, polished sides. I opened the door and looked inside my cabin. All the furniture inside was tightly bolted onto the white, shiny floors. Worn out and heavily tired from my recent voyage, I decided to crawl into my sleeping chamber to go to sleep.
As excited as I was, I slept peacefully, looking forward to the next exciting day.
1982
I've never really understood the meaning of the word magic until I rode on an spaceship. I'm sure we've all wished to travel to the moon and back. Wished we could let the wind lift us up and take us on a journey through the clouds and into the cold, dark, reaches of outer space. Never before did we think we could fulfill our dreams. But step into the magic of a spaceship and let your dreams take over you. Let it lift you into the sky, clouds, and into a whole new world...
This is exactly how I felt when I had finally got the chance to travel to the moon on a spaceship. Ever since my early childhood, I was fascinated with space. Someday, I had always hoped to visit there. Then one day, an advertisement from Leith Spaceport announced plans to build a new series of spaceships that can travel to the moon and back at only a small fraction of the cost. As I had expected, the cruise was very good and everything went smoothly without any major problems. But i'd better not tell the ending of my story at the beginning.
Hello, my name is Grahall Paglonda and I am a 61-year old ex-superhero. My story begins with me and Liam cycling along Sambo Street, which turned into Balantius Road. We were in Leith, looking for the new breed of spaceships, the Plutera Discovery and the Rell Galaxius. The two ships were to travel to the moon in just 3 days.
After some researching, we finally arrived at the spaceport. Inside, were lots of people, mostly just visitors, here to look at the new museum opened by Plutera. It showcased the last 50 years of space travel and industry, with a life-sized replica of the lunar spacedome being it's major attraction. The shows were very biased though, with most of their models originating from Plutera.
I asked one of the ladies where I could get myself validated. She was very kind and even guided us to our destination. I finally registered myself and gave out my details. They checked me and searched me for any items I was carrying. I left my watch on the counter and gave my laptop to Liam who had some trouble carrying it, finally he sat it down on the floor below him. While leaving, we forgot about it.
We both sat down on the seats and waited for the ship to finish it's routine inspection. Hundreds of people were waiting next to us. The air was hot and uncomfortable. Our faces were bright red and we were sweating a lot. However, Liam looked perfectly okay. He was reading a book called “1984”.
Just then, when I had least expected it, out of the runway came a huge disk-shaped vehicle. I didn't know what it was but it sure looked exciting! I was going to ask Liam (Who knew alot about spaceships.) I shifted over and bended my back to start talking but I was soon startled by loud screams coming from the waiting port.
Everyone was smiling, laughing, and cheering. A strange sense of amazement seemed to devour the entire room. Then, Liam closed his book and joined in with the crowd. Unable to find a reason, I decided to join in too. Then, after the screaming had ceased and everyone grew relaxed again, I asked Liam what everyone was screaming about.
"Huh? You don't know? The spaceship's arrived! You're going to space soon!" He looked at me as though I was turning crazy. So I turned my face to the opposite direction. Through the windows was the huge metallic object. Now that I was closer, I was able to read the fine text printed on it's shiny silver body. "Plutera Discovery," it said.
A sudden burst of excitement ran through me. "Yay! The spaceship has arrived!" I was so happy that I jumped out of my seat and started to sing and dance at the same time." Everyone looked at me. My feelings of happiness and excitement were quickly transformed into embarrassment and humiliation. I slowly sat back down back on my seat and pretended as though nothing had ever happened. Inside, I felt horrible. Throughout the whole wait, everyone stared at me. Even Liam didn't offer much support either. He was too busy reading his own book.
Finally, when I thought I couldn't continue, a strange-looking, asian man welcomed us into the Plutera Discovery. We passed through a small tube and had another item check. Then, we passed through an even smaller tunnel before exiting through the other side.
It was outside. The trees were swaying softly to the wind and the cool breeze gently touched my cheeks. On a closer inspection, the spaceship was enormous. The navy blue shell emitted a strange, yet welcoming bright green glow. The windows were oval-shaped and neatly attached to it's round, bubbly corners. The bottom shell had a huge machine-operated handle that, when opened would show an extremely complex array of quantam mechanics.
The Plutera Discovery was a very large cruise ship. Made of carbonic nanotubes, the ship's surface was 40 times stonger than most other ships. The tubes were specially designed in a geometric pattern to lower the amount of conductivity and reduce static to prevent the hydrogen from exploding. Previously, all ships were made of graphite fibres, Spectra 1000, artificial diamonds, and other various configurations of ionized carbon molecules. As a result of this, the ships were heavy and easily breakable. The new carbonic nanotubes are able to withstand meteor blasts and space debris. However, meteorites aren't the only hazard. Space is filled with radiation, too. Spaceships in low-earth orbit are substantially protected by our planet's magnetic field. The basic rule for working out this relation is...
299,792,000M/PS = c
Wavelength = lambda
Frequency = nu
Relation: c = lambda x nu
The sky was dark and cloudy today. However, not a single drop of rain had passed the stratosphere, leaving the ground dry and bristlly. When asked, the ship's astrometeorologist told me that everything was going to be alright. She explained that these weather conditions were very normal and seemingly harmless.
The people were seperated into two groups, spectators and passengers. From the spectator's view, they could see the space ship next to them. It's image reflected in the mirrors that covered the transient, serrated surface of the launching pad's floor. It's grey metal flukes lifted and fell slightly with the windy swell.
Once organized, I gave my ticket to the ticket man. A few metres below, I could see Liam. He was looking directly at me. I smiled. He responded by waving back.
Before stepping into the spaceship, I felt nervous. I was afraid of her strange new surroundings. The very fact that I was going to exit the Earth and venture into an unknown territory felt worrisome. But I knew that I had to go. I couldn't turn back now. Everyone would be disappointed in me. The ship's door was open and a faint green glow stretched across the gap. The ticket man reached out towards it, and the light faded. He gestured at me to go ahead. “She's as ready as she'll ever be,” I said to myself. And so I bravely stepped in. The other passengers followed behind. The air brightened again behind them.
I looked inside the spaceship. The walls were a translucent shade of white and the chairs were spherical and gently bulged into the shiny, silver floors. The pods were organized into bunches of two, with large, transparent hemispheres attached in-between. Small shapes were carved into the walls, indicating an unmistakable sense of nautical poesy.
I found my seat and sat on it. A strange metallic shell emerged out of the shiny white roof. It's metallic plates covered me tightly then quickly relaxed. The air-cushions inside the cocoon inflated to fill the gaps and a small monitor kept the inside of the cocoon at constant room temperature, slightly flunctuating in the lower 20^C's.
After a while, a small slit opened up above me and out came a thin piece of translucent plastic. It displayed the words "Multi-Purpose Automated Personal Computer" After a five-second loading, it presented me with a few options. They included, watching television, surfing the intranet, listening to music, playing games, watching movies, and gaining access to the external cameras. Despite it's impressive features, I chose to use the cameras instead. The screen turned black and flickered. Then, it showed a clear, live, 3-D image of the entire space station. I closely zoomed into a small crowd of people standing near the space ship and found Liam sitting on a wooden bench. His parents were sitting beside him, they were all eating ham sandwiches bought from the sandwich shop down the road. When Liam had finished eating, he looked up at the space ship again. His eyes were directly facing the camera.
After a while, my chair started talking, "Departure will initiate in 5 minutes. An inspection is currently under process." Just then, two small cameras protuded through the walls and started inspecting us. Seconds later, they swivelled back into their original locations and disappeared. Just to be safe, I shut down my MPAPC and slid it back into the roof.
"10... 9... 8... 7... 6... 5... 4... 3... 2... 1... Blast Off!" The ship made a huge noise as the hydrogen started exploding and igniting with the flames. A frightening rumble shuttled from the rear end of the spaceship and our metal cocoons shook.
Then, we heard a loud clicking noise coming from the base of the spaceship. The ship stopped shaking and rose from the ground. Second after second, I watched the spaceport slowly melt away as we gained altitude. A movie started but I was too curious to pay any attention. Overhead, the sky was darkening. The deep, rich green of late afternoon was giving way to the black of night.
“600KM/PH... 1,000KM/PH... 1,800KM/PH...” The ship's speed was quickly increasing. I felt the g-forces slowly impact me onto my metal cocoon. My skin started to stretch back into my neck, my hands were pinned down into the air cushions behind me. My eyes were unable to open.
“Bhrrr...!” The sonicboom was coming closer. I heard the spaceship rip out of the layers of sound. The intensified shock waves that were forcefully compacted into the nose of the spaceship burst open and nullified the entire ship. A jet of water vapour circled the ship then disappeared. The cocoons shook again, causing everyone to scream and panic. The computer realized this and told everyone to be quiet. Finally, the screams subsided as the ship gained it's control back. This time, the ride seemed to have now gotten smoother as SB-10, a lubricant, was sprayed onto the ship's body, lowering the amout of friction and air resistance from the Earth's atmosphere.
Outside the window, I saw the different layers of the Earth's atmosphere fall past me. At the arrival of the ionosphere, the sky turned darker and darker as the free electrons were slowly captured by the nearby positive ions. Faint whisps of green and blue slowly disintegrated then reformed again. Tiny clouds of plasma were also seen.
After the ship had passed the exosphere, I decided the re-open the window. The view outside was stunning. Everything looked different now. The Earth was no longer a flat plane. Instead, the curvature of the Earth looked very imminent. The sky, clouds, oceans, and countries merged together to form a beautiful blue ball that seemed near enough to feel and touch. Although several hours had already passed, it seemed to me like a very short time.
For breakfast, we were given a strange, yellow, bitter-tasting paste that was squeezed out of two rubber pumps located on the bottom-corners of the centre console. Lunch was served in exactly the same way, and so was dinner too. Between these times, all we did was sit inside our pods to look outside the windows. The lights were turned off at exactly 12:00PM and turned back on six hours later. The voyage to the moon was pretty boring and uncomfortable. The forceful extraction of human waste products was painful, disquisting, and horribly disturbing. Suction pads were used to complete this job and they were frequently clogged, stuck, jammed up, and unremovable. The voyage took three days. During that time, I felt terribly sick.
Finally, after the voyage was over, we were evacuated from the spaceship and sent down into small lifts that automatically descended into the Lunar Spacedome. Whilst entering the lifts, I craned my head back to catch the last glimpse of the Plutera Discovery and thought about all the things that had made this ship a legend during the Lunar Revolution. Alive was only a tiny figment of her former glory, the speed no ship of her class had ever equaled.
Exiting the ship was a truly unique experience. For the first time ever, my body felt weightless. Walking on the moon felt very similar to wading across water. Air pumps were attached to our mouths for inhalation. During this time, almost 50 different layers of protective fibres had to be worn. These fibres prevented cosmic radiation, frostbite, heat, and lunar disintegration. Although Earth had a very high gravitational pull of 9.80m/ps/ps, due to the moon's low mass, the moon also has an extremely weak pull. This wonderful, floating-in-the-air feeling gradually dimished as we entered the spacedome. The spacedome slowly rotated and thus, artifical gravity (5.50m/ps/ps) was produced. Here is an easy formula for working out these results...
Escape Velocity = ev
Release Height = r
Earth: ev = 9.80m/ps/ps = 9.80m/ps x r
Moon: ev = 1.60m/ps/ps = 1.60m/ps x r
Example 1: r = 3.00m
Earth: 9.80m/ps x 3.00m = 29.40m/ps
Moon: 1.60m/ps x 3.00m = 4.80m/ps
Example 2: r = 7.12m
Earth: 9.80m/ps x 7.12m = 69.776m/ps
Moon: 1.60m/ps x 7.12m = 11.392m/ps
To me, the Lunar Spacedome seemed like a bubble stuck in tar. All around the hemisphere of the glass, the surface of the moon gave off a dull, lambient shine. The liquid quality of the reflected sunlight enhanced the feeling of being inside a crystal ball that was trapped in mire, unable to escape into the cleanliness of outer space.
In the near distance, the rocks themselves looked strange. Unusual minerals formed in the heat and under constant bombardment of particles from the solar wind. I was puzzled without quite knowing why, at powders with odd crystal shapes. And there were puddles as well. I sheilded myself away from thinking about those, abruptly ending my concentration. And something else near the horizon demended attention.
The Sun. It as very dim, cut down by the powerful protective screens. But the whitish yellow ball seemed like a golden dandelion near enough to feel and touch, resembling the faded colours of an incandescent coin. Dark sunspots ran in clusters, fanning north-and south-eastward, seperated far away from the burning equator. The surface had a fineness of texture that just escaped focus. Looking directly at the Sun bought a strange sense of detachment withn me. Dimmed, but not reddish, it's light bathed those inside the dome in an energetic glow. Streamers of sunshine seemed to carass my forehead.
Beneath the dome, various machines stood on a fused plate of hafnium carbide (HfC), the most refractory binary compound known to man. I craned my head back to look at the huge pylon that filled the centre of the chamber and protuded from the top of the protective screens, into the hot lunar sunshine. At it's tip were the lasers, masers, and phasers which kept the Lunar spacedome in touch with planet Earth, and via a net of satellites, orbiting hundreds of kilometres above the surface of the planet, followed the cruisers down the violent maelstrom of the solar system. The lasers, masers, and phasers were busy now. One colourful pattern after another flew at light-speed to the computers at home. It was tempting to imagine riding that beam back to Earth, to blue skies and waters.
The optical communicator was a small machine attached to the laser optics of the supercomputer system. The microphone was esentially a large mouthpiece against which a human user could press his mouth onto and speak. The optical input did the rest. Using this, the passengers living in the spacedome had the chance to talk to their friends and family back on Planet Earth.
The lasers emitted highly amplified, coherent radiation. The lasers on the Discovery used atoms that disintergrated in a cycled energy rate that, as they decay to a lower energy level, stimulate others to decay, resulting in a beam of emitted photons, electromagnetic waves, and free neutrons.
The phasers were installed as a security measure, they are used to amplify the laser's photon emission to a frequency and wavelength considered to be be clearly viewable withn the electromagnetic spectrum. The masers were developed just like the lasers except they were only capable of emitting microwave waves...
lambda = 1mm – 10cm.
Inside this artificially created world, there was no sun in the sky of course... Overlapping cones of light rays coming down from those artificial “suns”, created an ambience which was virtually indistinguishable from that of natural sunshine experienced on Earth.
Just then, a strange silver machine was waiting patiently behind me. The machine constantly emitted high-pitched beeping noises as an attempt to gain my attention. I pressed the buttons located on the little machine's head. Finally, the machine responded by taking me to my cabin.
I saw the bright Earth behind me. With it's three lights glowing in their contrasting colours in the distance. It looked veiled and mysterious. The whole scene appeared to be shrouded in a wispy cloud of interstellar gas and dust that was backlit by the three globes, causing it to glow in a myriad of subtle shades and colours. Besides that, it's oceans sparkled with the sun's radiant sunshine. But however, from such a distance, a few important features were invisible to the naked eye, and always lost somewhere within the overwhelming briliance of the Sun's own fiery glow. From the Lunar Spacedome, looking directly overhead at the dark sky, I saw an aerial view of the Milky Way Galaxy across to the spacedome’s opposite side. The scene resembled a view looking down from a jumbo jet here on Earth, that was climbing toward a thirty seven thousand feet cruising altitude above a city, shortly after take-off. Only here, that aerial view was inverted, and placed in the “sky” of this exotic world. The vast array of Earth's land and water could be seen glinting miles overhead, with Leith itself meandering like a snake through the centre of the idyllic country.
The door to my cabin was white, with silver bars running through the shiny, polished sides. I opened the door and looked inside my cabin. All the furniture inside was tightly bolted onto the white, shiny floors. Worn out and heavily tired from my recent voyage, I decided to crawl into my sleeping chamber to go to sleep.
As excited as I was, I slept peacefully, looking forward to the next exciting day.
