Worlds

15. Black Gold on the Moon

O’Hara:

I’m sure Dan has written you about this, but maybe not in much detail. He’s probably the busiest person in the section right now, and loving it.

You know the polar-orbiting Lunar Prospector satellite? Probably not; it hasn’t done anything new in half a century. It was built to analyze absorption spectra from the lunar surface, to draw a map of mineral deposits on the Moon. One thing we looked for, hoping against hope, was a carbonaceous-chondritic “infall”; a CC meteorite remnant that we could mine for carbon, nitrogen, and hydrogen.

We didn’t really expect to find one, because the temperature of the explosion when a meteorite hits the Moon is enough to decompose a CC rock. All of the precious stuff evaporates into space.

Well, they decided it was time to refurbish the Prospector, since we have much more delicate sensing and analysis tools now. Technically, it belongs to Devon’s World, but since it was no longer functioning, we claimed it as salvage. That was fine with them, of course, since if we found anything, we’d have to use their mining and launch facilities, at standard royalty.

The Prospector found an anomaly that seemed worth investigating. It turned out to be a strip of CC gravel, about two kilometers wide by two hundred long. It was evidently the result of a low-velocity impact of a large CC meteorite that hit the surface tangentially, a glancing blow that shattered it into millions of pieces. Most of the chunks are on the order of a centimeter wide (mostly buried in the dust), though there are a few boulders a meter or so wide scattered around.

All we have to do is rake the stuff up and haul it to the mass drivers. There’s more than ten thousand tonnes of it, easily accessible.

What this means is that we can scale up our CC decomposition factories a thousandfold, and have them running smoothly long before Deucalion comes in.

It doesn’t mean independence from Earth; ten thousand tonnes holds about 250 tonnes of carbon and 1300 tonnes of water, and only about thirty tonnes of nitrogen. (Some people think there might be many similar gravel fields, though.) The main thing is that we’ll be able to run the factories at the same rate of materials flow as we’ll need when we start dismantling the asteroid.

It is exciting, even for an old mudballer like me. Everybody in New New is galvanized, understandably. Lots of smiles and spontaneous laughter. You should have seen the chaos in the Light Head the day they made the announcement. I had to take my Guinness and go home (thanks for telling me about the River Liffey; it makes my stout taste flatter).

I’m glad you decided to drop that language course. The only person around here who has any dialect, to my ear, is Dan, and you seem to understand him pretty well. Are you going to replace it with anything, or just take a lighter load?

Well, tomorrow we go out and vote. Big surprise: it looks as if I’ll be on the Privy Council, as Representative-at-large from External Systems. As you probably know, there’s a technicality that requires two candidates for Rep-at-large. Eugene Knight has agreed to be my “stalking horse.” The sole item in his platform is that he proposes to replace all the air in New New with hydrogen cyanide, as an experiment in terminal ecology. Well, he gets my vote.

Seriously, the Privy Council isn’t too bad, but I’m already on the Import-Export Board, so there’s two days a week out the lock. I almost hope that Goodman doesn’t win Coordinator-elect. He wants me to be in his cabinet. When would I ever get any work done?

You’ve been gone over a month and Dan tells me you haven’t picked up any of those degenerate Earth boys yet (see, no secrets). What’s wrong with our little butterfly? Gravity got your hormones?

Privately, listen to Uncle Ogelby, I think it would help Dan’s peace of mind if you told him you were getting your ashes hauled (bet you’ve never heard that one), even if you aren’t. Although I doubt that he’s said anything to you, I know he’s afraid you’re going to work yourself into a pressure situation and suddenly fall for some groundhog because he presents a metaphorical shoulder at the right time. Don’t tell me you’ve never done it before, daughter. Remember the parade that followed Charlie?

Maybe I’m talking out of turn, but I don’t think so. Dan treats you too gently. As a lover should, I suppose.

I better transmit this before I lose my nerve. Feel free to write back that my advising you about sex is like you advising me about crystalline lamination. Love—

John