“It’s more than just desolate. It’s oppressive. Something about it just exudes a feeling of…” He gestured loosely with his hand. “Of menace,” he concluded. “I can’t imagine who, or what, would voluntarily choose that place as a home.”
“Eh?” Monty mumbled. “Yeah, I was just writing.” He squinted at the page of hardcopy produced by the typewriter before tearing it from the machine and crumpling it up. “Writing drivel,” he concluded.
He tossed the discarded manuscript toward his wastebasket, but missed. The ball of paper bounced off the edge of the basket and rolled, stopping precisely between the toes of Rosemary’s white boots. She picked it up, unbunched it, and glanced over the page.
“Two of the other moon expedition members have come to the medical bay since you returned,” the medic explained. “Complaining of headaches, dizziness. We think the weird lighting might have something to do with it.” She bit her lower lip self-consciously, folding the paper in half and placing it in the wastebasket.
Lamont leaned back in his chair and rubbed his eyes. “I find myself unable to describe it adequately,” he admitted. “It’s more than just desolate. It’s oppressive. Something about it just exudes a feeling of…” He gestured loosely with his hand. “Of menace,” he concluded. “I can’t imagine who, or what, would voluntarily choose that place as a home.”
“The tower is miles high,” Rosemary reminded him, sitting on the edge of his desk and folding her arms. “Maybe the idea was to get as far away from the surface of the moon as possible without leaving it.”
Lamont nodded thoughtfully. “So they could keep its resources in reach.”
“Right,” Rosemary said. “The moon is a cornucopia of minerals, and it’s got loads of oxygen just sitting there. Whoever built the tower breathed oxygen just like us, unless it somehow changed itself to suit us. Which would be a disturbing thought.”
“Agreed,” Lamont said. “It’s about time we started getting some answers, isn’t it?”
“That’s why I’m here,” Rosemary smiled. “To tell you we’re going back in…” She checked her wrist chronometer. “Four hours.”
“We?” Lamont repeated. “Do you mean that Faust is letting you go back?”
Rosemary brushed idly at the hem of her uniform tunic. “He wanted to keep an eye on me for a while. But he’s got to admit that I’m right as rain now. I’m going back, and this time I’m taking a full mobile lab with me.”