Moon Wreck: First Contact by Raymond L. Weil Page A

those before they had exited the lander. “But that still leaves the question of what we do about food and water? Even on emergency rations, we only have enough for about three weeks.”
    “Can we get the rover out?’ asked Jason walking over to stare at the bottom of the lander and the compartment that held the lunar rover. He had a plan that he had been considering. Somehow, he had to find a way to get them off the moon and back to Earth.
    “I don’t see why not,” replied Greg coming to stand next to Jason and staring up at the rover’s shielded compartment. “It’s light enough in the moon’s gravity that we should be able to position it properly if there’s a problem. I don’t see any obvious damage to the rover compartment. Why do you want to get the rover out? It’s sort of pointless. I mean, why do any exploration? We can’t get back to Earth!”
    Jason turned to face Greg. He knew Greg was worried about his wife and son. “Something is causing that interference that screwed up our landing. It’s still preventing any radio signals from getting out. Don’t forget that the rover has a radio that is capable of reaching our orbiting command module. We just need to find what is causing that interference and shut it down.”
    “You think it’s artificial?’ Greg asked in surprise his eyes growing wide. This was something he hadn’t considered. “How can that be possible? We would know if there had been another mission heading for the moon. You can’t keep something like that a secret.”
    “The interference has to be artificial,” responded Jason looking off toward the south. “It didn’t start until we began our descent. To me that’s too big of a coincidence. I don’t think it was a manned mission. As you said, something like that couldn’t be kept a secret.”
    “You think another country snuck a probe up here hoping to screw up our landing so our company couldn’t get the space contract?” Greg asked with doubt in his voice. He just didn’t see how it could have been done in secret.
    He knew that a smaller rocket would have been harder to detect, but it still would have been difficult to land a probe on the moon without it being noticed. Not only that, but they had kept their landing site a secret until the day of the launch.
    “What else,” Jason replied with growing conviction in his voice. “This exploration contract for the moon and Mars is worth potentially hundreds of billions of dollars. There are even companies in our own country that would like to see us fail.”
    “It would have cost a hell of a lot of money to get a probe to the moon just to sabotage us,” Greg replied doubtfully. “But I can see how the space contract would have made it tempting. With our failure, there are several other companies that will be jumping in to get their share.” Greg was silent for a moment as he mulled everything over.
    “So, do we get the rover out and go looking for the source of the interference?” Jason asked once more. While Jason wasn’t married, he still had a brother and sister he would like to get back to Earth so see. He also knew that Greg wanted desperately to get back to his family.
    “I guess it’s better than sitting around here waiting for our air to give out,” Greg replied after thinking about it for several moments.
    “If we can shut down the interference, we can contact Mission Control from the rover. There is a good possibility our company could send a supply drone to the moon. It would allow us to replenish our supplies and survive until our people down on Earth figure something out.”
    “They could even send us something to set the lander back up,” Greg spoke with some excitement flowing into his voice. “If we can set the lander back up, we can go home!”
    “Perhaps,” replied Jason looking up into the star-studded sky. The Earth was plainly visible above the distant lunar horizon. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. We still have a lot to do and