After eighty years, humanity has returned to the Lunar surface again. At last we can begin digging under the regolith. Yet the first expedition runs into a little wrinkle when they excavate whale bones… -- Deathshead419
They thought they had thought of everything. Radiation shielding. Special equipment to snare that and the moon's static electricity and turn it into power. As well as the good, old-fashioned solar panels. Their habitat was proof against meteors big and small. Self-healing, or so the boffins claimed.
Eighty years ago, the peak of technology put two men on this desolate planet to explore. They only had supplies for a handful of hours, and some of their technology was literally sewn together. Not just the space suits.
They claimed the moon for all mankind.
Now, Humanity came to mine the moon for the greater good of some multitrillionaire who wanted to make his holdings increase. They could afford to spend billions of dollars on a vanity project, hoovering up moon dust to sell on Earth as an all-purpose abrasive. Collecting anything larger for later mineral analysis in case there was something valuable in there. Or, if all else failed, coating them in gold and giving them out to egotistical muckety-mucks as some form of bribe.
This time, they had enough to stay there for as long as necessary. They could grow their own food, recycle all their water, and only need a few top-ups from Earth Base once a month.
Theoretically.
Earl doubted that their lord and master CEO would give them emergency supplies until it threatened their lives. If the expendable thralls perished, there would be no more profits for their overlord. And there would be a mess for the next crew to clean up.
Add the bad press of corpse re-use on the moon and he would recapitulate damn fast.
That was all the assurance he had that their boss would actually help them. They set up on the far side of the moon because people would complain if the moon changed. Vacuuming up enough dust to put the habitat on lunar bedrock, because nothing could be wasted.
Corporate could have the budget for return freight rockets. They could spring for a lunar satellite to keep communications going. They didn't want to spend much on the human resources working to get the stuff.
Until Earl and Jay uncovered bones.
Whale bones.
Ten times the size of a regular whale. It was way too big to fit in the return pods. About all they could do was ship off the spine and flipper bones.
The boss was way more interested in their finds after that.
[Photo by Chinh Le Duc on Unsplash]
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