#Clavius Base

[pedroam-bang]

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

[cluedoenthusiast]

“Cute new places keep on popping up around Clavius, it's all getting gentrified”

Clavius is a lunar crater located in the southern hemisphere of the Moon. In "2001: A Space Odyssey," (One of Alex’s favourite films) Clavius Base is a fictional lunar outpost where significant events occur in the storyline.

Tranquility base

[commbowman]

“Guess what?”

——

Heywood talking to Dave at Clavius base before the Discovery mission.

“What?” He asked, his brows raise in a polite if not try hard interest. Bowman had his hands buried in his suit pockets, not yet restricted when it came to clothing. He dressed nice but not in a way to show himself off, there was an air of modesty to it despite his casualness.

[hellsitesonlybookclub]

Tongues of the Moon, Philip Jose Farmer

The Argentinean straightened up from his weary slump and summoned all the strength left in his bleeding body. He spoke in Russian so all would understand.

"We told you pigs we would take the whole world with us before we'd bend our necks to the Communist yoke!" he shouted.

At that moment, his gaunt high-cheekboned face with its long upper lip, thin lipline mustache, and fanatical blue eyes made him resemble the dictator of his country, Félipé Howards, El Macho (The Sledgehammer).

Panchurin ordered two soldiers and the doctor to take him to the jail. "I would like to kill the beast now," he said. "But he may have valuable information. Make sure he lives ... for the time being."

Then, Panchurin looked upwards again to Earth, hanging only a little distance above the horizon. The others also stared.

Earth, dark now, except for steady glares here and there, forest fires and cities, probably, which would burn for days. Perhaps weeks. Then, when the fires died out, the embers cooled, no more fire. No more vegetation, no more animals, no more human beings. Not for centuries.

Suddenly, Panchurin's face crumpled, tears flowed, and he began sobbing loudly, rackingly.

The others could not withstand this show of grief. They understood now. The shock had worn off enough to allow sorrow to have its way. Grief ran through them like fire through the forests of their native homes.

Broward, also weeping, looked at Scone and could not understand. Scone, alone among the men and women under the dome and the Earth, was not crying. His face was as impassive as the slope of a Moon mountain.

Scone did not wait for Panchurin to master himself, to think clearly. He said, "I request permission to return to Clavius, sir."

Panchurin could not speak; he could only nod his head.

"Do you know what the situation is at Clavius?" said Scone relentlessly.

Panchurin managed a few words. "Some missiles ... Axis base ... came close ... but no damage ... intercepted."

Scone saluted, turned, and beckoned to Broward and Nashdoi. They followed him to the exit to the field. Here Scone made sure that the air-retaining and gamma-ray and sun-deflecting force field outside the dome was on. Then the North Americans stepped outside onto the field without their spacesuits. They had done this so many times they no longer felt the fear and helplessness first experienced upon venturing from the protecting walls into what seemed empty space. They entered their craft, and Scone took over the controls.

After identifying himself to the control tower, Scone lifted the dish and brought it to the very edge of the force field. He put the controls on automatic, the field disappeared for the two seconds necessary for the craft to pass the boundary, and the dish, impelled by its own power and by the push of escaping air, shot forward.

Behind them, the faint flicker indicating the presence of the field returned. And the escaped air formed brief and bright streamers that melted under the full impact of the sun.

"That's something that will have to be rectified in the future," said Scone. "It's an inefficient, air-wasting method. We're not so long on power we can use it to make more air every time a dish enters or leaves a field."

He returned on the r-t, contacted Clavius, told them they were coming in. To the operator, he said, "Pei, how're things going?"

"We're still at battle stations, sir. Though we doubt if there will be any more attacks. Both the Argentinean and South African bases were wrecked. They don't have any retaliatory capabilities, but survivors may be left deep underground. We've received no orders from Eratosthenes to dispatch searchers to look for survivors. The base at Pushkin doesn't answer. It must...."

There was a crackling and a roar. When the noise died down, a voice in Russian said, "This is Eratosthenes. You will refrain from further radio communication until permission is received to resume. Acknowledge."

"Colonel Scone on the United Soviet Americas Force destroyer Broun. Order acknowledged."

He flipped the switch off. To Broward, he said, "Damn Russkies are starting to clamp down already. But they're rattled. Did you notice I was talking to Pei in English, and they didn't say a thing about that? I don't think they'll take much effective action or start any witch-hunts until they recover fully from the shock and have a chance to evaluate.

"Tell me, is Nashdoi one of you Athenians?"

Broward looked at Nashdoi, who was slumped on a seat at the other end of the bridge. She was not within earshot of a low voice.

"No," said Broward. "I don't think she's anything but a lukewarm Marxist. She's a member of the Party, of course. Who on the Moon isn't? But like so many scientists here, she takes a minimum interest in ideology, just enough not to be turned down when she applied for psychological research here.

"She was married, you know. Her husband was called back to Earth only a little while ago. No one knew if it was for the reasons given or if he'd done something to displease the Russkies or arouse their suspicions. You know how it is. You're called back, and maybe you're never heard of again."

"What other way is there?" said Scone. "Although I don't like the Russky dictating the fate of any American."

"Yes?" said Broward. He looked curiously at Scone, thinking of what a mass of contradictions, from his viewpoint, existed inside that massive head. Scone believed thoroughly in the Soviet system except for one thing. He was a Nationalist; he wanted an absolutely independent North American republic, one which would reassert its place as the strongest in the world.

And that made him dangerous to the Russians and the Chinese.

[ultraheydudemestuff]

St. Ignatius High School

1911 W. 30th St. at Carroll Ave.

Cleveland, OH

Saint Ignatius High School is a private Jesuit boys high school in the Ohio City neighborhood of Cleveland, Ohio. Founded in 1886 by a German Jesuit on the invitation of Bishop Richard Gilmour, the school was originally a six-year secondary school based on the German Gymnasium that was to be attended after the completion of six years of grammar school. Saint Ignatius High School remains at its original location at 1911 West 30th Street. The campus includes the original structure, now known as the Main Building, which was completed in 1891 and is now a designated Cleveland Historic Landmark. Separate four-year high school and college programs were formed in 1902, with the college changing its name to John Carroll University in 1923 and moving out of the Cleveland location to neighboring University Heights, Ohio, in 1935. From 1904 to 1917 St. Ignatius operated a summer retreat and science campus, in Vermilion, known as Loyola-on-the-Lake. On January 21, 1974, Saint Ignatius was added to the National Register of Historic Places.

Other buildings are Loyola Hall (originally St. Mary of the Assumption Elementary School), Clavius Science Center, Saint Mary of the Assumption Chapel (named after a church that once was located on the current campus), Gibbons Hall, Kesicki Hall (which now houses the Welsh Academy), The Carfagna Family Magis Athletic Center, Father Sullivan, S.J. Gymnasium, Murphy Field House, Kyle Field, and the O'Donnell Athletic Complex, which houses Wasmer Field and Dale Gabor Track. In addition, the $11.5 million Breen Center for the Performing Arts replaced the Xavier Center in August 2009. It houses all student performing arts programs and hosts many events for other local arts groups. A new $3.3 million cafeteria has replaced the former Student Center, stage, senior lounge, and cooking areas. It was renamed the Rade Dining Hall. Both the St. Mary of the Assumption Chapel and the Murphy Field House projects were funded and overseen by Murlan J. Murphy.

[blueboxphenomenon]

The Gregorian Compact: When Great Britain Sold 11 Days

When Julius Caesar, famous for his knife block impression, took over as ruler of the Roman Empire, he recognised that the Roman calendar needed to be reformed. The seventh century calendar was based on the lunar cycle and frequently fell out of phase with the seasons, resulting in constant corrections being needed. Those responsible for the corrections often abused their power over time, using it to interfere with elections. Thus the Julian calendar was introduced, and as members of the Roman Empire, Britain was subject to this calendar.

With the help of Sosigenes of Alexandria, a new calendar was engineered which, like the calendars of Egypt, followed a solar cycle. The 365-day year was born, and February would get a "leap day" every four years. Unfortunately, Sosigenes' calculations were eleven minutes off, resulting in the accumulation of a ten day error by the 15th century. The Julian calendar was still out of step with the seasons.

In the middle of the 15th century, Pope Gregory XIII commissioned a new calendar, charging astronomer Christopher Clavius with the task of recalculating the solar year. The Gregorian calendar corrected the errors of the Julian calendar, but was not introduced to the British Empire until 1752.

The new Gregorian calendar met with some resistance in the UK. Most of Europe was already working under the Gregorian calendar by the time The Calendar (New Style) Act 1750 was introduced in Britain, and in bringing Britain in line with Europe, the nation would "lose" eleven days. It was decided that Wednesday 2nd September 1752 would be followed by Thursday 14th September.

Superstitious people believed they were literally losing eleven days of their lives through the implementation of the Gregorian calendar. Some people even rioted, demanding the government "give us our eleven days." Most unusual of all were those calling themselves "the Faction," who decided to "purchase" the "missing days" from the British government, an act the prime minister of the time referred to as "an opportunity to relieve the somewhat delusional from the burden of their unfathomably abundant assets." No records exist as to how much exactly this mysterious cult paid for Britain's missing days, however the prime minister's comments suggest it to have been an exuberant amount.

The Gregorian Compact was signed in January of 1752. A member of the Faction cult, a "Godfather-lieutenant," arrived at St James's Palace and performed for the Court of King George II a "shadow dance," which accounts describe as an "oriental" dance wherein the Godfather-lieutenant's shadow was manipulated to resemble a "many-armed Hindu statue dressed as a gentleman." Following this, the terms of the contract were discussed and it was later signed at a pub in what is now Camden.

Just what did this mysterious cult want to do with those eleven days? What exactly were the terms of the contract? We may never know. It could be possible that the activities of this cult and the missing days are related to the frequency of strange occurrences in London. It is, of course, equally possible that the Faction were merely a superstitious cult. One has to wonder, though, how the British government could sell something as ineffable as time.

[elgremiomaestro]

Adivina el libro.

Una antigua civilización alienígena utiliza un gran monolito de cristal para investigar mundos a través de la galaxia y, cuando es posible, impulsar el desarrollo de vida inteligente. Hace tres millones de años, uno de esos monolitos aparece en África e inspira a un grupo de monos antropoides, casi muertos de hambre y al borde de la extinción, a concebir herramientas. Los monos antropoides utilizan las herramientas para matar animales, y terminan así con la escasez de alimentos. También utilizan las herramientas para matar a un leopardo que los acosa. Al día siguiente, el líder de la tribu, Moon-Watcher, mata al líder del grupo rival y toma el control del espacio vital, una fuente de agua. Moon-Watcher se da cuenta de que ahora es dueño del mundo: "Sin embargo, no está muy seguro de qué hacer a continuación. Ya se le ocurrirá algo." En el libro se sugiere que el monolito es el instrumento que induce la inteligencia en los monos antropoides, e induce así en ellos la transición a un nivel superior en el que desarrollarán la habilidad de construir herramientas simples, de manera que la caza y la recolección sean más eficientes.Cráter Clavius.

El libro salta entonces al futuro, al año 1999, cuando tiene lugar el viaje del Doctor Heywood Floyd a la base lunar Clavius, ubicada en el cráter del mismo nombre, en un transbordador espacial que se acopla a una estación espacial en la órbita de la Tierra. A su llegada, Floyd asiste a una reunión donde un científico explica que han encontrado una distorsión magnética en el cráter lunar Tycho, designado Anomalía Magnética Tycho Uno (o TMA-1 por sus siglas en inglés).

Se trata de la primera evidencia de vida inteligente extraterrestre. Floyd y un equipo de científicos deciden ir a ver la TMA-1, en una transbordador lunar. Llegan en el momento justo cuando amanece en el cráter Tycho: la luz del sol alumbra el monolito por primera vez en tres millones de años, y TMA-1 emite una ensordecedora señal de radio a los confines del sistema solar. El rastreo de la señal indica como destino a Jápeto, satélite de Saturno, hacia donde una expedición es enviada a investigar.

El libro continúa la historia 18 meses después, en 2001, a bordo del Discovery One, la nave más moderna construida solamente con este propósito, encontrar algo oculto en el satélite de Saturno. Los doctores David Bowman y Frank Poole son los únicos humanos conscientes en la nave. Viajan con ellos tres científicos en animación suspendida que serán despertados cuando se aproximen a Saturno. El sexto tripulante es HAL 9000, una computadora de inteligencia artificial, que se encarga de mantener la nave en curso y de otras funciones vitales a bordo.

Mientras Poole recibe de su familia en la tierra un mensaje de felicitación por su cumpleaños, Hal le informa de que la unidad AE-35 de la nave fallará. La unidad AE-35 es responsable de mantener la antena parabólica de comunicación apuntada hacia la tierra. Poole toma una cápsula esférica para salir del Discovery One y cambiar la unidad AE-35. Bowman, después de probar la unidad reemplazada, determina que no hay desperfecto. Pool y Bowman sospechan que algo anda mal con Hal. Hal anuncia que la unidad AE-35 reemplazada fallará también. Pool y Bowman llaman a la Tierra y reciben instrucciones de desconectar a Hal debido a que el incidente con la unidad AE-35 muestra definitivamente un mal funcionamiento del computador debido a un conflicto en su programación. Esta transmisión es repentinamente interrumpida. Hal informa de que la segunda AE-35 ha fallado.

Hay una tercera unidad AE-35 de repuesto. Pool toma una cápsula EVA para salir de la nave y reemplazar una vez más la unidad AE-35. Mientras extrae la unidad, la cápsula, que había dejado cerca del casco de la nave, se dirige hacia él. Pool no puede esquivarla y muere cuando su traje espacial es rasgado, y queda así expuesto al vacío del espacio. La muerte de Poole impacta a Bowman profundamente. Bowman no está seguro de que Hal, una máquina, haya sido capaz de haber matado a Poole. Decide despertar al resto de la tripulación. Discute con Hal, que se niega a poner en manual el control de las cápsulas de hibernación. Bowman amenaza con desconectar a Hal si no hace lo que le manda, y Hal cede. Pero mientras Bowman inicia el proceso para despertar a sus colegas, oye que Hal abre las puertas de la nave y deja así escapar la atmósfera interior. La presión a bordo disminuye rápidamente, pero Bowman es capaz de encontrar un refugio de emergencia que es un pequeño cuarto donde cabe un hombre y un traje espacial. Bowman desconecta la computadora, y restablece el funcionamiento del Discovery One y el contacto con la Tierra.

El propio Floyd le informa de la causa del mal funcionamiento de Hal: su programación había entrado en conflicto al prohibirle revelar el verdadero propósito de la misión a Bowman y Poole. El conflicto hizo sentir culpable a Hal y se manifestó en pequeños errores; con el tiempo, el conflicto habría podido ser resuelto por el propio Hal, pero se agravó y entró en crisis cuando Hal se enfrentó con la desconexión. Floyd también revela el objetivo de la misión: Bowman viajará a Jápeto para intentar entrar en contacto con los extraterrestres.

Bowman pasa meses solo en la nave mientras se aproxima a Jápeto. Sabe que ya no es posible regresar a la Tierra, los filtros de aire están dañados por la descompresión, y la hibernación tampoco es posible sin Hal para monitorearla. Mientras se aproxima a la Jápeto, nota una pequeña mancha en su superficie. Cuando se acerca más, se da cuenta de que es un monolito como el encontrado en la luna, pero mucho más grande, de alrededor de kilómetro y medio de altura.

No teniendo nada que perder, Bowman decide salir en una cápsula para inspeccionar el monolito de cerca. El monolito es en realidad una “Puerta de las estrellas” que se abre y se cierra para, en un instante, llevarse a Bowman. En la Tierra oyen sus últimas palabras: “Este hueco… no tiene fin... y… ¡oh, Dios mío!…: ¡está lleno de estrellas!”.

Bowman viaja a través de una especie de túnel, en teoría un agujero de gusano. Cuando sale, se encuentra con un gran conmutador interestelar. “Estaba pasando a través de la Gran Estación Central de la Galaxia”. Entra a un segundo túnel. Cuando sale, se dirige a un gran sol rojo que está acompañado de una pequeña enana blanca. Al acercarse, todo se oscurece.

Cuando vuelve a haber luz, se encuentra en lo que parece ser una suite de hotel. La habitación es una cuidadosa reconstrucción a partir de transmisiones de TV recibidas por los extraterrestres, y su objetivo es hacer sentirse cómodo a Bowman, quien se va a dormir. Mientras duerme, su mente y su memoria son drenadas de su cuerpo. David Bowman es ahora un nuevo ser que puede vivir y viajar por el espacio: es un Hijo de las Estrellas. El Hijo de las Estrellas regresa a la Tierra y hace estallar armas nucleares que acaban de ser disparadas. El ente que anteriormente se llamaba David Bowman se da cuenta de que ahora es dueño del mundo. "Sin embargo, no está muy seguro de qué hacer a continuación. Ya se le ocurrirá algo."

[ralfmaximus]

Will the mystery be solved? You bet it will.

There's so much wonderful detail here if you zoom in. Clearly these are VERY early renderings (by Robert McCall?) and while the article implies it was written in 1966 I suspect it's earlier than that.

There's no monolith! Instead it's still a pyramid.

Orion looks like a fat guppy, and without Pan Am livery.

Discovery here looks more like the description in Clarke's book.

There was a scene planned of Clavius base?! And a moon tractor??

[atomic-chronoscaph]

2001: A Space Odyssey - art by Robert McCall (1968)

[vintagerpg]

This is Moon Base Clavius (1981), from Task Force Games. I dunno if you noticed, but I was trying to have a science fiction board game theme this week. That meant this beat out The Creature that Ate Sheboygan because it is a bit more science fictiony, what with the moon base and the laser guns.

It is a pretty straight forward game at a glance. Nothing jumps out at me as being particularly interesting the way Starship Troopers did. Its Americans vs. Russians. On the moon. Pew pew.

I guess this is what you’d call a filler post.

[aiaalalv]

e-Happy Hour on AIAA LALV Virtual Moon Base Alpha, Clavius Crater, the Moon

e-Happy Hour on AIAA LA-LV Virtual Moon Base Alpha, Clavius Crater, the Moon RSVP and Information: https://conta.cc/3vVngCk (For posting only, not for ticket sale on this webpage. Please check RSVP and information link/button for RSVP/registration/tickets. Thank you very much !) e-Happy Hour on AIAA LA-LV Virtual Moon Base Alpha, Clavius Crater, the Moon Tuesday, July 20, 2021, 6:30 PM PDT July is the Month for America and Space! Please Join us in this e-Happy Hour on the historic date of July 20th (Apollo 11 Moon Landing and Vikings Mars Landing) and in the auspicious month of July for American Independence! Share your thoughts about those 2 great events, Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover & Ingenuity Mars Helicopter, where to build the Moon / Mars Bases, Mr. Jeff Bezos's going into Space on July 20th with Blue Origin's rocket / vehicle, recent May 22nd flight into Space by Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo and July 11 flight into Space with Sir Richard Branson, SpaceX's Starship development and Planetary Defense efforts (launching DART for NASA), NASA SOFIA's (NASA’s Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy) discovery for water on Clavius Crater, the place where the Moon Base in the legendary Sci-Fi movie "2001 Space Odyssey" is designated, the space transporters (like the Eagle in "Space 1999") with moon bases, and the ongoing NASA Artemis Missions, along with the growing Lunar / Space Economy, Space Tourism, Sci-Fi, and/or life etc. And mostly, relax and enjoy a mid-summer evening with like-minded folks and the AIAA / LA-LV / aerospace communities! Look forward to your participation and having a fun evening with us! -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- AIAA LA-LV Virtual Moon Base Alpha @ Clavius Crater, the Moon Please RSVP / register. And join us online on July 20, 2021. The web link, password, and simple instructions will be emailed to the registrants after Saturday, July 17, 2021, a few days before the event. Please check the email Spam or Junk folder at that time if you don't see it in your email Inbox. Ticket prices: AIAA Professional member: $2, Non-AIAA member Professionals: $3 AIAA University Student member $1, non-member student: $1.5 High School (HS) students: $0 (free) (AIAA HS member and non-AIAA HS Students. other K-12 Students) AIAA Educator members: $1.5, non-AIAA member Educator: $2.5 You will be able to meet, chat, networking, and socialize with a computer web browser, camera, microphone / speaker, and a high-speed internet, similar to join a Zoom meeting with a link/URL and password to be provided a few days before the event. A keyboard (a real keyboard of a virtual keyboard) is needed to move around in the virtual meeting facility, to have the mixed-reality simulated in-person presence and experiences. If your computer is ok for a Zoom video / audio meeting (or similar), it will be ok for this as well. Please join us and give it a try. And help us to try out for a different new way of networking, socializing, and meeting. It will be fun. Thank you very much ! Look forward to meeting you there in this e-Happy Hour! Enjoy! ------------------------------------------------------------ Connect with us AIAA Los Angeles-Las Vegas Section | aiaa-lalv.org | events.aiaalalv@gmail.com Read the full article

[frankpooleunofficial]

It was a fairly uncreative ceramic ashtray, round and printed with a photo of the Elysium Mons. It seemed more like something you’d find in a tourist trap in the middle of nowhere Nevada, not as a keepsake from another planet.

Frank smiled and inspected the rest of the collection.

“Well, you’re right; Clavius is much better.”

There were a few things from the moon base, and Frank was particularly drawn to a little paper booklet covered in illustrations of different lunar landmarks. It had been annotated, too, and he saw contributions from a plethora of notable, now-retired astronauts.

“Ooh,” he pointed it out and gawked a bit. Were those signatures authentic?

The longer he looked, the more details he could make out. Everything was sorted, first by astronomical body, then by region or country, then by name alphabetically, then by time visited. It was very neat, and there was a label for each one; some even had timestamps!

“You’ve got sections and subsections and subsections for the subsections!” Frank exclaimed, “Oh my god!”

“Whoa… what’s all this?”

- @frankpooleunofficial

—

He collects stuff you say? What kind of stuff?

Frank is poking around and finds a collection. I’m sure we can write something about it!!

“It’s uh,” he claps his hand to the back of his neck and averts his gaze. No one ever thinks they have that much until they see it laid out in-front of them.

“I like to get a little something whenever I go some place new.”

A large chunk of the collection was ceramic ash trays, beautifully painted and only slightly kitchy. Some more than others. A few had matchbooks with them, others sat alone, most unused.

“I’ve got a few postcards too but I don’t know where I’ve put those. Though really my main trouble is Mars never caught up to clavius— I mean look at this.”

Dave reached over the other to grab on of them waving it in his hands with a great deal of confidence. As if he’d never dropped one before.

“I-I didn’t th-think I had such a strong opinion on the state of collectibles,” he chuckled.

[hellsitesonlybookclub]

Tongues of the Moon, Philip Jose Farmer

Broward sat down by Ingrid Nashdoi. She was a short dark and petite woman of about thirty-three. Not very good-looking but, usually, witty and vivacious. Now, she stared at the floor, her face frozen.

"I'm sorry about Jim," he said. "But we don't have time to grieve now. Later, perhaps."

She did not look at him but replied in a low halting voice. "He may have been dead before the war started. I never even got to say goodbye to him. You know what that means. What it probably did mean."

"I don't think they got anything out of him. Otherwise, you and I would have been arrested, too."

He jerked his head towards Scone and said, "He doesn't know you're one of us. I want him to think you're a candidate for the Nationalists. After this struggle with the Russ is over, we may need someone who can report on him. Think you can do it?"

She nodded her head, and Broward returned to Scone. "She hates the Russians," he said. "You know they took her husband away. She doesn't know why. But she hates Ivan's guts."

"Good. Ah, here we go."

After the destroyer had berthed at Clavius, and the three entered the base, events went swiftly if not smoothly. Scone talked to the entire personnel over the IP, told them what had happened. Then he went to his office and issued orders to have the arsenal cleaned out of all portable weapons. These were transferred to the four destroyers the Russians had assigned to Clavius as a token force.

Broward then called in his four Athenians and Scone, his five Nationalists. The situation was explained to them, and they were informed of what was expected of them. Even Broward was startled, but didn't protest.

After the weapons had been placed in the destroyers, Scone ordered the military into his office one at a time. And, one at a time, they were disarmed and escorted by another door to the arsenal and locked in. Three of the soldiers asked to join Scone, and he accepted two. Several protested furiously and denounced Scone as a traitor.

Then, Scone had the civilians assembled in the large auditorium. (Technically, all personnel were in the military, but the scientists were only used in that capacity during emergencies.) Here, he told them what he had done, what he planned to do—except for one thing—and asked them if they wished to enlist. Again, he got a violent demonstration from some and sullen silence from others. These were locked up in the arsenal.

The others were sworn in, except for one man, Whiteside. Broward pointed him out as an agent and informer for both the Russians and Chinese. Scone admitted that he had not known about the triple-dealer, but he took Broward's word and had Whiteside locked up, too.

Then, the radios of the two scout ships were smashed, and the prisoners marched out and jammed into them. Scone told them they were free to fly to the Russian base. Within a few minutes, the scouts hurtled away from Clavius towards the north.

"But, Colonel," said Broward, "they can't give the identifying code to the Russians. They'll be shot down."

"They are traitors; they prefer the Russky to us. Better for us if they are shot down. They'll not fight for Ivan."

Broward did not have much appetite when he sat down to eat and to listen to Scone's detailing of his plan.

"The Zemlya," he said, "has everything we need to sustain us here. And to clothe the Earth with vegetation and replace her animal life in the distant future when the radiation is low enough for us to return. Her deepfreeze tanks contain seeds and plants of thousands of different species of vegetation. They also hold, in suspended animation, the bodies of cattle, sheep, horses, rabbits, dogs, cats, fowl, birds, useful insects and worms. The original intention was to reanimate these and use them on any Terrestrial-type planet the Zemlya might find.

"Now, our bases here are self-sustaining. But, when the time comes to return to Earth, we must have vegetation and animals. Otherwise, what's the use?

"So, whoever holds the Zemlya holds the key to the future. We must be the ones who hold that key. With it, we can bargain; the Russians and the Chinese will have to agree to independence if they want to share in the seeds and livestock."

"What if the Zemlya's commander chooses destruction of his vessel rather than surrender?" said Broward. "Then, all of humanity will be robbed. We'll have no future."

"I have a plan to get us aboard the Zemlya without violence."

An hour later, the four USAF destroyers accelerated outwards towards Earth. Their radar had picked up the Zemlya; it also had detected five other Unidentified Space Objects. These were the size of their own craft.

Abruptly, the Zemlya radioed that it was being attacked. Then, silence. No answer to the requests from Eratosthenes for more information.

Scone had no doubt about the attackers' identity. "The Axis leaders wouldn't have stayed on Earth to die," he said. "They'll be on their way to their big base on Mars. Or, more likely, they have the same idea as us. Capture the Zemlya."

"And if they do?" said Broward.

"We take it from them."

The four vessels continued to accelerate in the great curve which would take them out away from the Zemlya and then would bring them around towards the Moon again. Their path was computed to swing them around so they would come up behind the interstellar ship and overtake it. Though the titanic globe was capable of eventually achieving far greater speeds than the destroyers, it was proceeding at a comparatively slow velocity. This speed was determined by the orbit around the Moon into which the Zemlya intended to slip.

In ten hours, the USAF complement had curved around and were about 10,000 kilometers from the Zemlya. Their speed was approximately 20,000 kilometers an hour at this point, but they were decelerating. The Moon was bulking larger; ahead of them, visible by the eye, were two steady gleams. The Zemlya and the only Axis vessel which had not been blown to bits or sliced to fragments. According to the Zemlya, which was again in contact with the Russian base, the Axis ship had been cut in two by a tongue from Zemlya.

But the interstellar ship was now defenseless. It had launched every missile and anti-missile in its arsenal. And the fuel for the tongue-generators was exhausted.

"Furthermore," said Shaposhnikov, commander of the Zemlya, "new USO has been picked up on the radar. Four coming in from Earth. If these are also Axis, then the Zemlya has only two choices. Surrender. Or destroy itself."

"There is nothing we can do," replied Eratosthenes. "But we do not think those USO are Axis. We detected four destroyer-sized objects leaving the vicinity of the USAF base, and we asked them for identification. They did not answer, but we have reason to believe they are North American."

"Perhaps they are coming to our rescue," suggested Shaposhnikov.

"They left before anyone knew you were being attacked. Besides, they had no orders from us."

"What do I do?" said Shaposhnikov.

Scone, who had tapped into the tight laser beam, broke it up by sending random pulses into it. The Zemlya discontinued its beam, and Scone then sent them a message through a pulsed tongue which the Russian base could tap into only through a wild chance.

After transmitting the proper code identification, Scone said, "Don't renew contact with Eratosthenes. It is held by the Axis. They're trying to lure you close enough to grab you. We escaped the destruction of our base. Let me aboard where we can confer about our next step. Perhaps, we may have to go to Alpha Centaurus with you."

For several minutes, the Zemlya did not answer. Shaposhnikov must have been unnerved. Undoubtedly, he was in a quandary. In any case, he could not prevent the strangers from approaching. If they were Axis, they had him at their mercy.

Such must have been his reasoning. He replied, "Come ahead."

By then, the USAF dishes had matched their speeds to that of the Zemlya's. From a distance of only a kilometer, the sphere looked like a small Earth. It even had the continents painted on the surface, though the effect was spoiled by the big Russian letters painted on the Pacific Ocean.

Scone gave a lateral thrust to his vessel, and it nudged gently into the enormous landing-port of the sphere. Within five minutes, his crew of ten were in the control room.

Scone did not waste any time. He drew his gun; his men followed suit; he told Shaposhnikov what he meant to do. The Russian, a tall thin man of about fifty, seemed numbed. Perhaps, too many catastrophes had happened in too short a time. The death of Earth, the attack by the Axis ships, and, now, totally unexpected, this. The world was coming to an end in too many shapes and too swiftly.

Scone cleared the control room of all Zemlya personnel except the commander. The others were locked up with the forty-odd men and women who were surprised at their posts by the Americans.

Scone ordered Shaposhnikov to set up orders to the navigational computer for a new path. This one would send the Zemlya at the maximum acceleration endurable by the personnel towards a point in the south polar region near Clavius. When the Zemlya reached the proper distance, it would begin a deceleration equally taxing which would bring it to a halt approximately half a kilometer above the surface at the indicated point.

Shaposhnikov, speaking disjointedly like a man coming up out of a nightmare, protested that the Zemlya was not built to stand such a strain. Moreover, if Scone succeeded in his plan to hide the great globe at the bottom of a chasm under an overhang.... Well, he could only predict that the lower half of the Zemlya would be crushed under the weight—even with the Moon's weak gravity.

"That won't harm the animal tanks," said Scone. "They're in the upper levels. Do as I say. If you don't, I'll shoot you and set up the computer myself."

"You are mad," said Shaposhnikov. "But I will do my best to get us down safely. If this were ordinary war, if we weren't man's—Earth's—last hope, I would tell you to go ahead, shoot. But...."

Ingrid Nashdoi, standing beside Broward, whispered in a trembling voice, "The Russian is right. He is mad. It's too great a gamble. If we lose, then everybody loses."

"Exactly what Scone is betting on," murmured Broward. "He knows the Russians and Chinese know it, too. Like you, I'm scared. If I could have foreseen what he was going to do, I think I'd have put a bullet in him back at Eratosthenes. But it's too late to back out now. We go along with him no matter what."

The voyage from the Moon and the capture of the Zemlya had taken twelve hours. Now, with the Zemlya's mighty drive applied—and the four destroyers riding in the landing-port—the voyage back took three hours. During this time, the Russian base sent messages. Scone refused to answer. He intended to tell all the Moon his plans but not until the Zemlya was close to the end of its path. When the globe was a thousand kilometers from the surface, and decelerating with the force of 3g's, he and his men returned to the destroyers. All except three, who remained with Shaposhnikov.

The destroyers streaked ahead of the Zemlya towards an entrance to a narrow canyon. This led downwards to a chasm where Scone intended to place the Zemlya beneath a giant overhang.

But, as the four sped towards the opening two crags, their radar picked up four objects coming over close to the mountains to the north. A battlebird and three destroyers. Scone knew that the Russians had another big craft and three more destroyers available. But they probably did not want to send them out, too, and leave the base comparatively defenseless.

He at once radioed the commander of the Lermontov and told him what was going on.

"We declare independence, a return to Nationalism," he concluded. "And we call on the other bases to do the same."

The commander roared, "Unless you surrender at once, we turn on the bonephones! And you will writhe in pain until you die, you American swine!"

"Do that little thing," said Scone, and he laughed.

He switched on the communication beams linking the four ships and said, "Hang on for a minute or two, men. Then, it'll be all over. For us and for them."

Two minutes later, the pain began. A stroke of heat like lightning that seemed to sear the brains in their skulls. They screamed, all except Scone, who grew pale and clutched the edge of the control panel. But the dishes were, for the next two minutes, on automatic, unaffected by their pilots' condition.

And then, just as suddenly as it had started, the pain died. They were left shaking and sick, but they knew they would not feel that unbearable agony again.

"Flutter your craft as if it's going out of control," said Scone. "Make it seem we're crashing into the entrance to the canyon."

Scone himself put the lead destroyer through the simulation of a craft with a pain-crazed pilot at the controls. The others followed his maneuvers, and they slipped into the canyon.

From over the top of the cliff to their left rose a glare that would have been intolerable if the plastic over the portholes had not automatically polarized to dim the brightness.

Broward, looking through a screen which showed the view to the rear, cried out. Not because of the light from the atomic bomb which had exploded on the other side of the cliff. He yelled because the top of the Zemlya had also lit up. And he knew in that second what had happened. The light did not come from the warhead, for an extremely high mountain was between the huge globe and the blast. If the upper region of the Zemlya glowed, it was because a tongue from a Russian ship had brushed against it.

It must have been an accident, for the Russians surely had no wish to wreck the Zemlya. If they defeated the USAF, they could recapture the globe with no trouble.

"My God, she's falling!" yelled Broward. "Out of control!"

Scone looked once and quickly. He turned away and said, "All craft land immediately. All personnel transfer to my ship."

The maneuver took three minutes, for the men in the other dishes had to connect air tanks to their suits and then run from their ships to Scone's. Moreover, one man in each destroyer was later than his fellows since he had to set up the controls on his craft.

Scone did not explain what he meant to do until all personnel had made the transfer. In the meantime, they were at the mercy of the Russians if the enemy had chosen to attack over the top of the cliff. But Scone was gambling that the Russians would be too horrified at what was happening to the Zemlya. His own men would have been frozen if he had not compelled them to act. The Earth dying twice within twenty-four hours was almost more than they could endure.

Only the American commander, the man of stone, seemed not to feel.

Scone took his ship up against the face of the cliff until she was just below the top. Here the cliff was thin because of the slope on the other side. And here, hidden from view of the Russians, he drove a tongue two decimeters wide through the rock.

And, at the moment three Russian destroyers hurtled over the edge, tongues of compressed light lashing out on every side in the classic flailing movement, Scone's beam broke through the cliff.

The three empty USAF ships, on automatic, shot upwards at a speed that would have squeezed their human occupants into jelly—if they had had occupants. Their tongues shot out and flailed, caught the Russian tongues, twisted, shot out and flailed, caught the Russian tongues, twisted as the generators within the USAF vessels strove to outbend the Russian tongues.

Then, the American vessels rammed into the Russians, drove them upwards, flipped them over. And all six craft fell along the cliff's face, Russian and American intermingled, crashing into each other, bouncing off the sheer face, exploding, their fragments colliding, and smashed into the bottom of the canyon.

Scone did not see this, for he had completed the tongue through the tunnel, turned it off for a few seconds, and sent a video beam through. He was just in time to see the big battlebird start to float off the ground where it had been waiting. Perhaps, it had not accompanied the destroyers because of Russian contempt for American ability. Or, perhaps, because the commander was under orders not to risk the big ship unless necessary. Even now, the Lermontov rose slowly as if it might take two paths: over the cliff or towards the Zemlya. But, as it rose, Scone applied full power.

Some one, or some detecting equipment, on the Lermontov must have caught view of the tongue as it slid through space to intercept the battlebird. A tongue shot out towards the American beam. But Scone, in full and superb control, bent the axis of his beam, and the Russian missed. Then Scone's was in contact with the hull, and a hole appeared in the irradiated plastic.

Majestically, the Lermontov continued rising—and so cut itself almost in half. And, majestically, it fell.

Not before the Russian commander touched off all the missiles aboard his ship in a last frenzied defense, and the missiles flew out in all directions. Two hit the slope, blew off the face of the mountain on the Lermontov's side, and a jet of atomic energy flamed out through the tunnel created by Scone.

But he had dropped his craft like an elevator, was halfway down the cliff before the blasts made his side of the mountain tremble.

Half an hour later, the base of Eratosthenes sued for peace. For the sake of human continuity, said Panchurin, all fighting must cease forever on the moon.

The Chinese, who had been silent up to then despite their comrades' pleas for help, also agreed to accept the policy of Nationalism.

Now, Broward expected Scone to break down, to give way to the strain. He would only have been human if he had done so.

He did not. Not, at least, in anyone's presence.

Broward awoke early during a sleep-period. Unable to forget the dream he had just had, he went to find Ingrid Nashdoi. She was not in her lab; her assistant told him that she had gone to the dome with Scone.

Jealous, Broward hurried there and found the two standing there and looking up at the half-Earth. Ingrid was holding a puppy in her arms. This was one of the few animals that had been taken unharmed from the shattered tanks of the fallen Zemlya.

Broward, looking at them, thought of the problems that faced the Moon people. There was that of government, though this seemed for the moment to be settled. But he knew that there would be more conflict between the bases and that his own promotion of the Athenian ideology would cause grave trouble.

There was also the problem of women. One woman to every three men. How would this be solved? Was there any answer other than heartaches, frustration, hate, even murder?

"I had a dream," said Broward to them. "I dreamed that we on the Moon were building a great tower which would reach up to the Earth and that was our only way to get back to Earth. But everybody spoke a different tongue, and we couldn't understand each other. Therefore, we kept putting the bricks in the wrong places or getting into furious but unintelligible argument about construction."

He stopped, saw they expected more, and said, "I'm sorry. That's all there was. But the moral is obvious."

"Yes," said Ingrid, stroking the head of the wriggling puppy. She looked up at Earth, close to the horizon. "The physicists say it'll be two hundred years before we can go back. Do you realize that, barring accident or war, all three of us might live to see that day? That we might return with our great-great-great-great-great-great grandchildren? And we can tell them of the Earth that was, so they will know how to build the Earth that must be."

"Two hundred years?" said Broward. "We won't be the same persons then."

But he doubted that even the centuries could change Scone. The man was made of rock. He would not bend or flow. And then Broward felt sorry for him. Scone would be a fossil, a true stone man, a petrified hero. Stone had its time and its uses. But leather also had its time.

"We'll never get back unless we do today's work every day," said Scone. "I'll worry about Earth when it's time to worry. Let's go; we've work to do."

THE END

[itsfullofstars]

2001 - Clavius Base by x-ray delta one https://flic.kr/p/7r28YW

[combat-model]

there should be more movies that have the flavor of the Hilton space station and Clavius base sequences in 2001

[introvertguide]

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968); AFI #15

The next film for review on the AFI top 100 under review is probably the strangest film on the list, Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). The film is very strange in many ways, but this doesn't mean that it is not a good film. The movie won an Oscar for Best Special Effects while picking up nominations for Best Director and Best Screenplay. The movie also won 3 BAFTAs for Best Art Direction, Best Soundtrack, and Best British Cinematography. The movie was written by Stanley Kubrick in collaboration with highly acclaimed science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke. It is what is generally considered a visual masterpiece. I want to briefly go over the story line, but I know I could just copy out the script and it wouldn't really give away the plot. This is not that kind of movie. But, just to cover all my bases...

SPOILER ALERT!!! I DON'T KNOW HOW MUCH I CAN ACTUALLY SPOIL, BUT THIS IS WHERE THE ALERT GOES AND I WANT TO BE CONSISTENT WITH MY REVIEWS!!!

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The film starts with 40 seconds of black, so be prepared and know that the film isn't broken. In a prehistoric desert, a tribe of apes is driven away from its water hole by a rival tribe. The next day, they find an alien monolith has appeared in their midst; it helps them discover how to use a bone as a weapon and, after their first hunt, return to drive their rivals away with the newly discovered tool. There is a great visual in which the apes kill one of the rival apes and then the leader tosses the bone in the air and it sort of transforms into a space ship.

Millions of years later, Dr. Heywood Floyd (William Sylvester), Chairman of the United States National Council of Astronautics, travels to Clavius Base, a US lunar outpost. During a stopover at Space Station 5, he meets Russian scientists who are concerned that Clavius seems to be unresponsive. He refuses to discuss rumors of an epidemic at the base. At Clavius, Heywood addresses a meeting of personnel to whom he stresses the need for secrecy with respect to their newest discovery. His mission is to investigate a recently found artifact, an identical monolith buried four million years earlier near the lunar crater Tycho. He and others ride in a Moon bus to the monolith. As they examine the object, it is struck by sunlight, upon which it emits a high-powered radio signal.

Eighteen months later, the American spacecraft Discovery One is bound for Jupiter, with mission pilots and scientists Dr. David "Dave" Bowman (Keir Dullea) and Dr. Frank Poole (Gary Lockwood) onboard, along with three other scientists in suspended animation. Most of Discovery's operations are controlled by "HAL", a HAL 9000 computer with a human personality. When HAL reports the imminent failure of an antenna control device, Dave retrieves it in an extravehicular activity (EVA) pod but finds nothing wrong. HAL suggests reinstalling the device and letting it fail so the problem can be verified. Mission Control advises the astronauts that results from their twin 9000 computer indicate that HAL is in error about the reporting, but HAL blames it on human error. Concerned about HAL's behavior, Dave and Frank enter an EVA pod so they can talk without HAL overhearing and agree to disconnect HAL if he is proven wrong. HAL follows their conversation by lip reading.

While Frank is on a spacewalk attempting to replace the antenna unit, HAL takes control of his pod, setting him adrift (this is inadvertently hilarious because Dave looks up and a man goes flying by the window like a rag doll). Dave takes another pod to rescue Frank; while he is outside, HAL turns off the life support functions of the three other crewmen in suspended animation, killing them. When Dave returns to the ship with Frank's body, HAL refuses to let him in, stating that the astronauts' plan to deactivate him jeopardises the mission. Dave opens the ship's emergency airlock manually, enters the ship, and proceeds to HAL's processor core, where he begins disconnecting HAL's circuits despite being begged not to. When disconnection is complete, a prerecorded video by Heywood plays, revealing that the mission's objective is to investigate the radio signal sent from the monolith to Jupiter.

At Jupiter, Bowman finds a third, much larger, monolith orbiting the planet. He leaves Discovery in an EVA pod to investigate but is pulled into a vortex of colored light. Bowman is carried across vast distances of space, while viewing bizarre cosmological phenomena and strange landscapes of unusual colors. Eventually he finds himself in a large neoclassical bedroom where he sees, and then becomes, older versions of himself: first standing in the bedroom, middle-aged and still in his spacesuit, then dressed in leisure attire and eating dinner, and finally as an old man lying on a bed. A monolith appears at the foot of the bed, and as Bowman reaches for it, he is transformed into a fetus enclosed in a transparent orb of light, which floats in space beside the Earth.

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The special effects in this film are extremely noteworthy. Use of special camera rotation, cranes, and sets give the illusion of space and time travel. Both the music and the lack of music are well used throughout the film. There is a ten-minute segment in which Dave is trying to get back into the ship and all that we really hear is his breathing. There is very little in the way of acting. All of the spoken conversations are very calm and feel like just chatter. The exception is with the discussion between HAL and Dave, but the calm tone of these life-or-death discussions makes them all the more memorable.

One would think that a prolific science fiction writer like Clarke and a film director of projects like Doctor Strangelove and The Shining would making a strongly acted film with a lot of deep dialogue. That's not what happened. The version of the film I saw was 143 minutes long and only 40 minutes of that had any dialogue. Roger Ebert called it basically a silent film. This lack of speaking is not that noticeable while the film is playing because the visuals are outstanding, and the music is well used. The film is what I call mesmerizing. It is kind of like staring at a crackling fire, nothing is really happening, and it is easy to just stare at this nothing for hours.

The film is cut into an obvious four acts and most people seem to remember the 3rd part with the astronauts and HAL 9000. I have always been impressed with how HAL was portrayed because I felt fear and distrust of a red light. That is all that it is. The film completely personifies a red light with a slight amount of monotone dialogue. I don't know if I have ever gotten some much out of a character when I was given so little. It is kind of horrifying when HAL knows that he is dying and is saying that he is scared and can feel it. I would imagine that a human would be crying and screaming these things, but the calm expressionless voice of HAL makes it all the worse. There isn't a lot of dialogue, but every single word seems to matter and the sparing nature gives it a greater effect.

This is definitely one of my shortest reviews because this is not a movie that can really be explained with words on the page and needs to be experienced. Kubrick truly used all parts of the visual medium to make this film great and just talking about it does not do it justice.

So, does this film belong on the AFI top 100? Yes. It belongs in a space on the top of any best film list. It is a fantastic use of the medium by one of America's greatest directors. It might not be as popular or as well-known as some of the other films on this list (and it is super weird at parts), but it might be the greatest visual achievement in film of the bunch. Would I recommend? Of course. This is a must see to really understand film and what can be done with visual storytelling. I can't recommend it enough.