#lunar mission results

[13thpythagoras]

chuckles to self

goddamn i can't believe the moon is actually fuckin hollow and filled with ETs living inside

"The Man in the Moon" archetype wasn't even wrong lmao they even told our grandparents about this and had the same chuckle

no, for real it is the most difficult to believe yet widely accepted fact in science, that the moon is just goddamn hollow

this was discovered by Apollo 12

during their visit to the moon, they dropped a 10 kg weight onto the surface of the moon, and it vibrated like a bell, and rang for more than an hour

subsequent experiments have verified that the moon vibrates like a bell when struck

The moon has craters that are kilometers across yet barely go deep into the surface at all. These are enormous impact craters that should have many hundreds of meters-deep craters, but we don't see craters go deep on the moon at all because why? It may actually be a metallic sphere covered in dust.

every physicist would also agree there's far too much angular momentum in the Earth moon gravitational system, so much to indicate that the moon actually came in from interstellar space, and is not indigenous to our solar system

The radiation levels on the moon are far too high and also indicates long-distance interstellar space travel

The scoring on the close side of the moon, some also hypothesize, is again due to the radioactive interstellar rays from being pushed with that leading face through interstellar space

is it really so far fetched to think that the Earth has been terraformed by ETs for a long time?

is it far-fetched to think that they would want a large base near earth but off-world?

is this all really so far fetched now that every single world government has come forward with UFO disclosure?

[age-of-moonknight]

“Dead Reckoning,” Moon Knight: City of the Dead (Vol. 1/2023), #3.

Writer: David Pepose; Penciler: Sean Damien Hill; Inker: Jay Leisten; Colorist: Rachelle Rosenberg; Letterer: Cory Petit

[peachdues]

Bundle of Joy

Part 1/2 of a secret-pregnancy drabble between Sanemi and the Reader, who is the Lunar Hashira (not the same one from TWAHM). Protective/soft Sanemi, but the other Hashira don't know he's the daddy.

CW: suggestive/smut, blood, pregnancy, difficult labor. Sanemi is a dick to everyone but is so soft for Y/N.

You can find Part Two here and the prequel one-shot here

🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸

Pregnant, Kocho had said, you’re pregnant.

She had sat there for a moment, too stunned to say anything right away. Her eyes flitted between the gentle look on the Insect Hashira’s face and the results of the blood work clutched in her hand.

Pregnant.

In retrospect, Y/N knew she shouldn’t have been surprised. Sanemi was a passionate lover, and she loved being the object of his passion, in both the bedroom and in those quiet, stolen moments shared at one another’s estates, away from prying eyes.

And sometimes, there were less-than-quiet moments where a certain someone had begged Sanemi to stay inside and give it to me, baby, please!

Okay, Y/N conceded, maybe those moments occurred more than sometimes (far more), and Sanemi had only been too happy to oblige her.

And so Y/N was pregnant.

“Well, that’s a surprise!” Y/N said with a soft chuckle, absent mindedly placing a hand over her flat stomach.

Kocho watched Y/N for a moment. “Y/N,” Y/N was surprised to hear Kocho refer to her by her first name, even more so when Kocho moved to place a hand over hers. “you are more than free to keep the child that comes from this pregnancy, or…” Kocho furrowed her eyebrows, struggling to phrase the information delicately, “we have things here that would terminate the pregnancy early. It would be painless.” She promised.

Y/N blinked in surprise. The thought hadn’t even crossed her mind, but the thought of not letting the the child in her belly grow… no, she couldn’t do that.

“Thank you, Shinobu, truly,” Y/N squeezed her hand lightly. “But I wish to see this through.”

Kocho nodded, withdrawing her hand to reach for a stack of papers stacked besides her on the small exam table. “Well in that case, I will need to inform the Master right away. You can still perform some missions for now, but nothing too strenuous. The first few months of pregnancy are quite tricky.” Shinobu began scribbling down a message, but paused mid-word.

“Y/N… is the father… involved?”

Ah. That problem.

It wasn’t so much a problem for her and Sanemi as it was for everyone else. When they had finally given in to the simmering desire between them while training more than a year earlier, neither of them had intended for it to continue. But one time had not been nearly enough, and suddenly, Y/N had found herself craving his voice, his touch, and his lips, and he, hers. It had not taken long for them to realize how ridiculously, stupidly in love they were.

But they had both agreed to not tell the other Hashira — or anyone — about their affair. The decision mostly stemmed from practicality; the Master, while he did not oppose relationships amongst the Hashira, did have a practice of not pairing them up together once their relationship was made public. The Master believed, ultimately, it was too risky, as both would seek to protect the other, potentially to the detriment of civilians and other slayers alike.

It was a rational justification, but it did little to stifle the electricity which cackled between the two Pillars. It held little weight against the stony will of Sanemi Shinuzagawa.

Sanemi had been the first one to crack during an intense sparring session. He had caught Y/N off guard after she had dodged an attack, using the wind to pitch himself into her blind spot and sweep her shapely legs from beneath her.

But Y/N had never been one to go down without a fight, so she had wound the Wind Pillar’s haori around her fist mid-fall, and successfully brought him right down with her.

On top of her.

Sanemi had fallen with a grunt, his eyes nearly bulging out of his head as he realized Y/N had still managed to out-maneuver him, even after he had bested her. His full weight upon her, he had stared at her with a bewildered look in his eyes, breathing hard out of his nose as he struggled to collect himself.

His eyes flitted down once to Y/N’s fist, still wrapped in his haori, before they had lifted back up to her mouth, settling on that stupid, shit-eating smirk she had.

There had been no thoughts in Sanemi’s head as he crashed his mouth against hers in a flurry of lips and teeth.

Y/N had been frozen for half a second before she snapped back into herself and hauled him closer, meeting each demanding swipe of his tongue stroke for stroke.

Within minutes both of of the Pillars’ clothing had been reduced to shreds, and Sanemi’s head had found a home between Y/N’s legs. It had taken embarrassingly little effort on his part to bring her over the edge not once, but twice.

And when he finally flipped her on all fours and rammed his proud length into her desperate core, Y/N had come apart again, half-sobbing his surname as pleasure mixed with pain from overstimulation.

“You know my fuckin’ name. Use it.” He had snarled in between the ruthless snapping of his hips against her.

That night, Shinazugawa had made sure Y/N could only say one word:

Sanemi. Sanemi. Sanemi.

And when it was finally over, and the two had collapsed next to each other on the dirt ground of his training ring, spent and satisfied, Sanemi had told the sweaty Lunar Pillar that she was to report to his Mansion for training sessions forthwith.

Nightly training sessions.

Because one taste had ignited an inferno of desire between the two of them that could not be snuffed out. It could only be tamed when Y/N’s fingers buried themselves in his hair as his own tight grip on her hips and thighs left marks on her skin, his hips setting a relentless and savage pace as he rutted into her, wanton and needy. A fire that could only be soothed when Sanemi sent her hurtling over the edge of her pleasure and found himself free-falling after her, spilling himself inside her warmth until she was filled with nothing but him.

It had not been long before the emotional passion followed their more carnal desires. Y/N had known she was in deep when she had confessed to him her deepest fears of not living past the age of her elder brother and falling to demons the same way he had. She knew he felt the same way when, in the middle of the night, having been startled awake from some unseen terrors in his mind, he stopped leaving the futon they shared to sit out on the engawa stare up at the moon, instead seeking the comfort of her embrace, burying his nose into her hair as he willed his heartbeat to slow.

And so, for more than a year, the two Hashira had kept up the charade of being disinterested co-workers in public, concealing their endless passion, adoration, and concern for one another that they held in private. It appeared that none of the other Pillars were any the wiser.

The only difficulty now would be in how to tell him the news.

She would tell him, of course, the moment she returned to his estate in the dead of night, when she knew the other Hashira would be sleeping or out on patrol, far away from the grounds of Sanemi’s manor. Y/N would tell him, and then they would decide how to move forward, together.

Sanemi, who was so strong, so capable, was also so, so protective. He knew that Y/N was more than capable of handling herself on missions, but too much personal tragedy had scarred him and he found himself unable to leave her completely alone. Even if she had been assigned to complete what was technically a solo mission, Sanemi was always within a few miles to rush to her aid, should she need it. And Y/N was the same way with him. A true team, who could and would figure out how to deal with any obstacle.

But until then…

Y/N smiled, attempting to reassure Shinobu. “I’ll take care of it. Thank you, Shinobu, truly.”

Shinobu pursed her lips, debating whether to push her friend further on the matter. It wasn’t her place to pry, true, but she couldn’t help but worry.

While Shinobu knew Y/N could handle herself— very well — she also knew how it was to be a woman in society. Men were relentless in their pursuit of forcing women to do things against their will; their destructive creativity knew no bounds.

But Shinobu also knew that pushing any woman in such a situation could make her clam up, could make her resist help — or even treatment. So, Shinobu resolved to keep quiet for now, but to keep a close eye on Y/N throughout her pregnancy.

Had she known at the time of the Insect Pillar’s concerns, Y/N would have fallen off of Shinobu’s examination table in a fit of hysterics. The idea that Sanemi, Mr. Made-Madea-Piss-Himself-for-Harassing-a-Young-Slayer, would ever do anything she hadn’t wanted him to do was laughable — as if he didn’t have her begging and pleading for him to do more to her every night.

But Y/N didn’t know, and so she left the Butterfly Mansion without another word. Shinobu sent off her crow to the Master with the Lunar Pillar’s news, pulling Aoi aside to instruct her to monitor the pregnant woman throughout the upcoming months for anything amiss — bruises, unexplained injuries, general skittishness — and to report it immediately to her.

Shinobu may not have known the circumstances of Y/N’s pregnancy, but she did know she would not let harm come to her or her growing child.

———————

Sanemi had wept like a baby when Y/N told him that night.

The man who looked as though he were stone hewn by the wind itself fell to his knees and cried like Y/N had never seen before. He pressed his forehead against the flat expanse of her stomach, raining soft kisses across her abdomen as he held his love close.

“Thank you, Y/N,” he whispered, between the pressing of his lips against her skin while she ran her fingers through his windswept hair, “Thank you for this gift.”

After Sanemi wiped his eyes, he made sure to spend the rest of the night showing Y/N exactly how grateful he was, though with a newfound gentleness. Sanemi typically took her roughly in a way that had Y/N’s eyes rolling back into her head, begging desperately for more. That night, however, he had treated her with such softness and love that it nearly shattered her heart. He had spent the entirety of the night holding her tightly against him, her name falling like a prayer from his lips while he gently rocked into her, whispering how beautiful she was and would look as she grew his child.

The next morning was not as beautiful.

“You’re retiring.” He said sternly as he poured her tea first, then his.

“No, I’m not,” Y/N retorted evenly, “Kocho said I could take low-risk missions until my next appointment with her, and that she would reassess her recommendation then.”

Sanemi stopped pouring his tea, setting the pot down a touch too hard. “Y/N. The first few months of pregnancy are when the mother is the most at risk for losing the child. I will not have you putting yourself in situations where that is a very real possibility.” He reached for her hand, closed in a fist on the table. “I…” he struggled to find his words. “I watched my mother… lose a few pregnancies at the hands of my father,” he spat the last word, but when he looked up at her, his eyes were tender; pleading. “I do not want to see you suffer through the pain that she did.”

Y/N softened at that revelation. She had known about Sanemi’s painful childhood, but the news about his mother’s lost pregnancies was new.

But this was different. She was a Hashira, not a housewife.

“This is… our thing, right now, isn’t it?” Y/N asked lightly, holding her steaming cup of jasmine tea between her hands, relishing in its comforting warmth. Sanemi said nothing but nodded, as he waited for her to continue.

“I’m not ready to share us with the world just yet."

Sanemi’s lips tightened, and his eyes fell to the floor. “Are you…unhappy with this news? He asked quietly. “Do you… feel ashamed… of…” His voice trailed off, but Y/N heard what he was asking all the same.

Ashamed of me?

Y/N’s head snapped up, and within a flash she was on her knees before him, clasping his large hand between her smaller ones. Sanemi kept his eyes resolutely on the floor rather than meet her piercing gaze, and Y/N tightened her grip.

“I need you to look at me when I tell you this,” she tugged lightly on his hand. Slowly, his eyes lifted from the floor and rested on her face, and Y/N’s heart clenched at the softness she saw reflected in his lilac gaze.

“I love you.” Y/N said simply, a small smile tugging on the corner of her pretty mouth. “I love you and I love our child. I thank the stars every day for you.” Sanemi’s breath caught in his chest at her words, and his hand returned her squeeze.

“But as you said, the first few months of pregnancy are difficult. I don’t want this news out before we’re ready to share it, especially in case of,-“ Y/N shut her eyes briefly, trying to shake away the encroaching panic she felt at the idea of losing the child growing in her womb. “In case something happens.” She managed.

“But if I retire now, there will be questions that I’m not ready to answer.” She looked up at him through her eyelashes, feeling slightly guilty about the show she was about to put on. “But I need you to trust Shinobu’s medical opinion on this. To trust me.” Y/N pleaded, bringing his callused hand to her lips, brushing soft kisses over his scarred knuckles. “I need you to trust that I know my limits.”

Sanemi Shinazugawa would never admit it, but he was a sucker for Y/N’s pretty face. A bat of her eyelashes and a nuzzle of her face into his hand brought him to his knees in an instant.

“No dangerous missions. Minor demons only. Cleanup. That’s it.” Sanemi proposed, his voice gruff.

Y/N knew, of course, that Sanemi would still find a way to shadow her whenever she would be sent on a mission close enough to his location, and to be honest, she couldn’t blame him. After all, it was his child she carried. But he was willing to compromise — to try — for her.

So Y/N smiled. “Deal.”

———————————-

Pregnancy had generally been uneventful.

Shinobu had insisted at the start of Y/N’s second trimester that she abstain from future slaying missions (much to her chagrin and Sanemi’s joy), but she encouraged Y/N to continue training under the supervision of the girls at the Butterfly Mansion in order to maintain her abilities.

Of course, once missions were off the table, Y/N knew she had to come clean to the other Hashira.

Almost clean.

She had told them the essentials — she was with child and she was keeping it. Y/N and Sanemi had already agreed not to share that he was the child’s father, again out of concern that once the child had been delivered, the two would never again be permitted to share missions together.

To the other Pillars’ credit, no one pushed her for paternity details. Y/N suspected that Shinobu had shared her hypothesis with them, that the father at best was uninvolved, at worst, might attempt to do harm to her if he knew.

Sanemi said nothing in his own defense, and even talked Y/N down from screaming at the lot of them on his behalf. He informed her that as a result of Shinobu, the other Hashira had formed a little pact to protect both Y/N and her (their) unborn child at all costs.

Sanemi found great relief in this, given that he was still being sent on missions. The promise among the other Pillars meant someone was watching over Y/N at all times, should she ever need assistance. And, because he had also agreed to partake in this pact, Sanemi was guaranteed alone time with Y/N at her estate, without the added pressure of sneaking around the other Pillars. Thus, he had been content to sit back and keep the knowledge that she carried his child close to his chest.

And Sanemi had been so attentive to Y/N throughout the months of her pregnancy. He constantly worried about her comfort and sought to make pregnancy as easy as possible. He awoke at all hours of the night to fix something that would satisfy her insane cravings. He would arrive home from missions and kiss her so sweetly, Y/N thought her heart would burst, before pressing his ear against the growing swell of her belly to listen to his child’s small heartbeat and lavish Y/N with kisses and soft praises. In the later months of her pregnancy, he would be sure to rotate Y/N’s sleeping form throughout the night to ensure she wouldn’t wake up in pain or discomfort.

And throughout it all, he maintained his passionate physical love for her, though more gently so as not to risk hurting Y/N or their child. But he worshipped her body with such fervor that it often reduced Y/N to tears.

When Sanemi was away, the other Hashira took turns keeping Y/N company, and each Pillar took on a special role for her. Uzui and his wives showered her with new clothes, fitted to accommodate her growing belly, and the wives lauded her with compliments. Mitsuri had become her meal-time buddy, the two of them nearly eating their way through the entire pantry stock of both their mansions in a single evening.

And so, pregnancy itself, had been easy.

Labor, when it arrived, was an entirely different matter.

Labor hurt.

Y/N had known something was wrong the moment her water had burst, having barely registered the wetness that slipped down her legs due to the agony that followed, leaving Y/N feeling as though she was being ripped open from the inside.

Y/N’s ears rang with a scream she had not realized was her own until she felt her throat burn. Her knees buckled, and she would have hit the ground had Uzui and Rengoku not materialized out of thin air, having noticed her from across the courtyard outside of her estate. The pair stood on either side, working to catch her before her knees could bite into the rocks below.

“We need to get her to Kocho, right away,” Uzui said to Rengoku. “I can run ahead and let the Butterfly Mansion know we’re coming. Can you get her there?” The Sound Hashira asked Rengoku, who nodded.

“Come, Y/L/N, I’ll take care of you,” Rengoku said warmly, lifting her up into his arms before taking off at a break-neck speed. Y/N clutched the front of his robes, hissing as another wave of excruciating pain washed through her.

“Sorry- ah— Rengoku, I might tear your uniform.” Y/N said through gritted teeth, sweat beginning to bead on her forehead.

Regoku’s deep laugh rumbled from his chest. “No worries, Y/L/N! I have plenty of uniforms. He glanced down at his friend, a comforting smile tugging on his lips, “You do what you need to do to help manage the pain.” He added kindly.

Y/N held onto the Flame Pillar’s robes for dear life, as she tried to keep herself from crying out, head falling against her friend’s chest. Above them, a raven circled once, twice, before heading east, its wings beating frantically.

The Butterfly Mansion had just come into sight when the unmistakable scent of iron hit Y/N’s nose. She tried to sit up in Rengoku’s arms to look over the large swell of her stomach, panic beginning to spread through her chest. Before she could confirm the source of the smell, Y/N collapsed back into Rengoku’s arms.

“Is-is that-?” Y/N trembled, her voice unusually high.

Rengoku’s nostrils flared slightly as he too, took notice of the scent. He only had to tilt his head slightly to the side to see below Y/N’s pregnant belly, his expression grim.

“Kyojuro,” Y/N whimpered, her grip on the front of his uniform slackening.

Rengoku turned his gaze back to Y/N’s, his expression soft and comforting as a kind smile chased away whatever shadow had been there.

“You are doing so well, Y/L/N! Truly! You will deliver this child in no time.” He said warmly, the hand holding her against him squeezing reassuringly.

Y/N may have been in blinding pain, but she did not fail to notice how the Flame Pillar clutched her tighter to him, his pace quickening as he sped towards the Butterfly Mansion.

Rengoku had all but leapt the last length of their journey, swiftly landing at the entrance to Kocho’s residence. The Insect Pillar was already waiting outside for them, alongside Uzui and a small team of Butterfly Mansion girls who were prepared to open doors and clear hallways for them.

“Come with me,” Shinobu ordered the moment Rengoku’s feet touched the ground, her eyes scanning over Y/N’s ashen face. Shinobu’s gaze snagged at the bloodstain spreading across the lower middle of the light cotton kimono Y/N wore.

Wordlessly, the small group of Hashira swept through the halls of the Butterfly House, escorted by Shinobu’s staff. The Insect Pillar drew up short outside of a small room in the back of the main hallway, urgently motioning Rengoku through the doorway.

“Uzui, grab Y/N’s legs. Rengoku, move your arms to support under her ribs,” Shinobu ordered the two men as she dunked her hands in a bucket of cold, soapy water, quickly scrubbing at her skin. “You both need to work together to lower her onto the birthing bed.” Shinobu pointedly looked to the small, white futon that lay in the middle of the wooden floor, its blankets already pulled back in anticipation of the pregnant woman now panting in Rengoku’s arms.

The pain in her lower belly was unbearable, and Y/N could not stop herself from crying out as she felt the two male Pillars gently readjust her so they could lower her as Shinobu ordered. Hot tears clung to her eyelashes as she gasped out, breathing becoming difficult through the haze of the pain.

Shinobu, having finished cleaning her hands, moved to kneel at Y/N’s feet. The Insect Pillar adjusted the futon’s cotton blanket to cover Y/N from the waist-down before gently spreading her legs and propping them up on either side of her.

“Y/N,” Shinobu said firmly, rolling up the bottom of the futon blanket to Y/N’s knees so she could examine her friend. “Y/N, you need to get your breathing under control. Your distress is affecting your body’s ability to heal, and it will harm the child.”

Y/N whimpered, a tear rolling down her cheek. Eyes closing, Y/N took a shuddering breath, willing her heart to slow its wild thumping in her chest and her body to relax. She managed for all of two breaths before another wave of pain rocked through her, causing her to cry out.

“Dammit,” Shinobu swore, as a fresh wave of blood spilled from between Y/N’s legs, staining her trembling thighs crimson. Both Uzui and Rengoku stood back behind Y/N’s head, their eyes wide as the smell of blood hit them.

Shinobu wracked her brain, trying to think of something, anything, that would help her friend calm down enough to get her breathing under control, to get her body to stop fighting her labor.

“Y/N, does the father know? Does he know the child is coming?” Shinobu blurted, as she tried to wipe away the blood that was rapidly pooling beneath Y/N’s center.

It had taken a moment for Shinobu’s words to fully register in Y/N’s mind. Her heart stuttered as she remembered that Sanemi was on a mission, at least half a day’s journey from the Butterfly Mansion.

Y/N’s eyes filled with fresh tears not from the endless pain, but from the realization that Sanemi might not make it here in time, might not make it before she…

“He’s t-too far.” Y/N half-sobbed, back bowing off the futon as her body seized with the strain of labor, her eyes squeezing shut as she tried to breathe through the contraction.

Uzui stepped forward from his spot against the back wall. “Nothing is too far for me, Y/N” he said gently, “tell me where he is, and I can get him here in a flash.”

Shinobu nodded, patting Y/N’s knee comfortingly. “Where is he, Y/N? Does he live in a village nearby?”

Y/N shook her head furiously, her mouth opening to respond, but only a choked sob came out.

Shinobu pressed. “Y/N, you must tell Uzui his name, or else he won’t be able to bring him back.” Shinobu motioned for one of the Butterfly Mansion’s young girls to bring over a damp towel to dab at Y/N’s burning forehead. 

“Who is the child’s father, Y/N?” Shinobu repeated.

“It’s — fuck,” she hissed, her stomach feeling as if it were about to split open. “S-SANEMI.” She called out, body curling off the futon before collapsing against it once more, feeling exhaustion settling in over her bones, threatening to take over her consciousness.

The room was silent — dead silent — for a moment. Shinobu looked up to the two Male Pillars, her jaw slackened and her eyes wide, her shock mirroring that of both her comrades.

It had taken each Pillar another moment to re-correct themselves. Shinobu locked eyes with Aoi, a similar stunned look on her face, and silently ordered her to take up her position at Y/N’s feet. Once Aoi had knelt, Shinobu rose, and the other two Hashira swiftly exited the room, the former pulling the door to the birthing room behind her shut.

“No fucking way Shinazugawa is the father,” Uzui had hissed the moment the birthing room door had latched, his magenta eyes wild. “I can’t believe someone like Y/N would willingly have a child with that snarky little bitch.”

“You are not suggesting that Shinazugawa may have forced himself on Y/N, are you Tengen?” Rengoku asked quietly.

Uzui shook his head, scoffing slightly. “No. But I do think it's weird that she kept it a secret until the last possible second,” Uzui ran a hand through his hair, anxiously. “And he never said a damn word about it either. Maybe something happened that shouldn’t have. Maybe he feels ashamed.”

Rengoku eyed Shinobu, whose mouth had been pulled into a deep frown, her eyes fixed on the wall behind the Sound Pillar in deep thought. “Kocho? What should we do?” 

Shinobu also did not believe Shinazugawa would ever force himself upon a woman, but she could not deny the unease she felt at the revelation that Y/N had concealed the identity of the child’s father. “Go get Shinazugawa, Rengoku.” She said softly, “Uzui, you stay here. Shinazugawa is fast enough on his own. I want you here to guard the door.”

Rengoku looked quizzically at his tiny friend, but she said nothing more and so he hid the pair farewell and took off into the night.

“Guard?” Uzui asked, puzzled.

Shinobu pinched the bridge of her nose, eyes closing as a dull ache bloomed through her skull. “Unless and until Y/N asks for him, I want him kept out. I don’t imagine he would be a very calming presence.” Shinobu grimaced. “Frankly, I don’t have the patience to handle him right now. I need to keep her calm.”

Uzui nodded, moving only to send a crow for the Water Hashira to come assist. He leaned casually against the frame of the door once Shinobu had closed it back behind her, shaking his head lightly. Really, Y/N? He chastised, internally, Shinazugawa?

🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸

Keep an eye out for Part 2 if you want to see Sanemi be both feral and the softest boy.

[book--brackets]

Summaries under the cut

Anne of Green Gables by L. M. Montgomery

Anne Shirley, an eleven-year-old orphan, has arrived in this verdant corner of Prince Edward Island only to discover that the Cuthberts—elderly Matthew and his stern sister, Marilla—want to adopt a boy, not a feisty redheaded girl. But before they can send her back, Anne—who simply must have more scope for her imagination and a real home—wins them over completely.

The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer

Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless Lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth’s fate hinges on one girl. . . . Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg.

She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai’s, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world’s future.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl

Charlie Bucket's wonderful adventure begins when he finds one of Mr. Willy Wonka's precious Golden Tickets and wins a whole day inside the mysterious chocolate factory. Little does he know the surprises that are in store for him!

Uglies by Scott Westerfeld

Tally is about to turn sixteen, and she can't wait. In just a few weeks she'll have the operation that will turn her from a repellent ugly into a stunning pretty. And as a pretty, she'll be catapulted into a high-tech paradise where her only job is to have fun.

But Tally's new friend Shay isn't sure she wants to become a pretty. When Shay runs away, Tally learns about a whole new side of the pretty world—and it isn't very pretty. The authorities offer Tally a choice: find her friend and turn her in, or never turn pretty at all. Tally's choice will change her world forever....

Number the Stars by Lois Lowry

Ten-year-old Annemarie Johansen and her best friend Ellen Rosen often think of life before the war. It's now 1943 and their life in Copenhagen is filled with school, food shortages, and the Nazi soldiers marching through town. When the Jews of Denmark are "relocated," Ellen moves in with the Johansens and pretends to be one of the family. Soon Annemarie is asked to go on a dangerous mission to save Ellen's life.

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

Nobody Owens, known to his friends as Bod, is a perfectly normal boy. Well, he would be perfectly normal if he didn't live in a graveyard, being raised and educated by ghosts, with a solitary guardian who belongs to neither the world of the living nor the world of the dead.

There are dangers and adventures for Bod in the graveyard: the strange and terrible menace of the Sleer; a gravestone entrance to a desert that leads to the city of ghouls; friendship with a witch, and so much more.

But it is in the land of the living that real danger lurks, for it is there that the man Jack lives and he has already killed Bod's family.

Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson

Jess Aarons has been practicing all summer so he can be the fastest runner in the fifth grade. And he almost is, until the new girl in school, Leslie Burke, outpaces him. The two become fast friends and spend most days in the woods behind Leslie's house, where they invent an enchanted land called Terabithia. One morning, Leslie goes to Terabithia without Jess and a tragedy occurs. It will take the love of his family and the strength that Leslie has given him for Jess to be able to deal with his grief.

The BFG by Roald Dahl

Captured by a giant! The BFG is no ordinary bone-crunching giant. He is far too nice and jumbly. It's lucky for Sophie that he is. Had she been carried off in the middle of the night by the Bloodbottler, the Fleshlumpeater, the Bonecruncher, or any of the other giants-rather than the BFG-she would have soon become breakfast.

When Sophie hears that they are flush-bunking off in England to swollomp a few nice little chiddlers, she decides she must stop them once and for all. And the BFG is going to help her!

Graceling by Kristen Cashore

Katsa has been able to kill a man with her bare hands since she was eight—she’s a Graceling, one of the rare people in her land born with an extreme skill. As niece of the king, she should be able to live a life of privilege, but Graced as she is with killing, she is forced to work as the king’s thug.

She never expects to fall in love with beautiful Prince Po.

She never expects to learn the truth behind her Grace—or the terrible secret that lies hidden far away . . . a secret that could destroy all seven kingdoms with words alone.

A Light in the Attic by Shel Silverstein

Here in the attic of Shel Silverstein you will find Backward Bill, Sour Face Ann, the Meehoo with an Exactlywatt, and the Polar Bear in the Frigidaire. You will talk with Broiled Face, and find out what happens when Somebody steals your knees, you get caught by the Quick-Digesting Gink, a Mountain snores, and They Put a Brassiere on the Camel.

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Writing Notes: The Moon (pt. 2)

Earth’s Moon is thought to have formed in a tremendous collision. A massive object ― named Theia after the mythological Greek Titan who was the mother of Selene, goddess of the Moon ― smashed into Earth, flinging material into space that became the Moon.

The brightest and largest object in our night sky, the Moon makes Earth a more livable planet by moderating our home planet's wobble on its axis, leading to a relatively stable climate. It also causes tides, creating a rhythm that has guided humans for thousands of years.

The Moon was likely formed after a Mars-sized body collided with Earth several billion years ago.

Earth's only natural satellite is simply called "the Moon" because people didn't know other moons existed until Galileo Galilei discovered four moons orbiting Jupiter in 1610. In Latin, the Moon was called Luna, which is the main adjective for all things Moon-related: lunar.

The many missions that have explored the Moon have found no evidence to suggest it has its own living things. However, the Moon could be the site of future colonization by humans. The discovery that the Moon harbors water ice, and that the highest concentrations occur within darkened craters at the poles, makes the Moon a little more hospitable for future human colonists.

With a radius of about 1,080 miles (1,740 kilometers), the Moon is less than a third of the width of Earth. If Earth were the size of a nickel, the Moon would be about as big as a coffee bean.

The Moon is an average of 238,855 miles (384,400 kilometers) away. That means 30 Earth-sized planets could fit in between Earth and the Moon.

The Moon is slowly moving away from Earth, getting about an inch farther away each year.

The Moon is rotating at the same rate that it revolves around Earth (called synchronous rotation), so the same hemisphere faces Earth all the time. Some people call the far side – the hemisphere we never see from Earth – the "dark side" but that's misleading. As the Moon orbits Earth, different parts are in sunlight or darkness at different times. The changing illumination is why, from our perspective, the Moon goes through phases. During a "full moon," the hemisphere of the Moon we can see from Earth is fully illuminated by the Sun. And a "new moon" occurs when the far side of the Moon has full sunlight, and the side facing us is having its night.

The moon's near and far side.

The Moon makes a complete orbit around Earth in 27 Earth days and rotates or spins at that same rate, or in that same amount of time. Because Earth is moving as well – rotating on its axis as it orbits the Sun – from our perspective, the Moon appears to orbit us every 29 days.

The leading theory of the Moon's origin is that a Mars-sized body collided with Earth about 4.5 billion years ago. The resulting debris from both Earth and the impactor accumulated to form our natural satellite 239,000 miles (384,000 kilometers) away. The newly formed Moon was in a molten state, but within about 100 million years, most of the global "magma ocean" had crystallized, with less-dense rocks floating upward and eventually forming the lunar crust.

Earth's Moon has a core, mantle, and crust:

The Moon’s core is proportionally smaller than other terrestrial bodies' cores. The solid, iron-rich inner core is 149 miles (240 kilometers) in radius. It is surrounded by a liquid iron shell 56 miles (90 kilometers) thick. A partially molten layer with a thickness of 93 miles (150 kilometers) surrounds the iron core.

The mantle extends from the top of the partially molten layer to the bottom of the Moon's crust. It is most likely made of minerals like olivine and pyroxene, which are made up of magnesium, iron, silicon, and oxygen atoms.

The crust has a thickness of about 43 miles (70 kilometers) on the Moon’s near-side hemisphere and 93 miles (150 kilometers) on the far-side. It is made of oxygen, silicon, magnesium, iron, calcium, and aluminum, with small amounts of titanium, uranium, thorium, potassium, and hydrogen.

Long ago the Moon had active volcanoes, but today they are all dormant and have not erupted for millions of years.

With too sparse an atmosphere to impede impacts, a steady rain of asteroids, meteoroids, and comets strikes the surface of the Moon, leaving numerous craters behind. Tycho Crater is more than 52 miles (85 kilometers) wide.

Over billions of years, these impacts have ground up the surface of the Moon into fragments ranging from huge boulders to powder. Nearly the entire Moon is covered by a rubble pile of charcoal-gray, powdery dust, and rocky debris called the lunar regolith. Beneath is a region of fractured bedrock referred to as the megaregolith.

The light areas of the Moon are known as the highlands. The dark features, called maria (Latin for seas), are impact basins that were filled with lava between 4.2 and 1.2 billion years ago. These light and dark areas represent rocks of different compositions and ages, which provide evidence for how the early crust may have crystallized from a lunar magma ocean. The craters themselves, which have been preserved for billions of years, provide an impact history for the Moon and other bodies in the inner solar system.

If you looked in the right places on the Moon, you would find pieces of equipment, American flags, and even a camera left behind by astronauts. While you were there, you'd notice that the gravity on the surface of the Moon is one-sixth of Earth's, which is why in footage of moonwalks, astronauts appear to almost bounce across the surface.

The temperature on the Moon reaches about 260 degrees Fahrenheit (127 degrees Celsius) when in full Sun, but in darkness, the temperatures plummet to about -280 degrees Fahrenheit (-173 degrees Celsius).

During the initial exploration of the Moon, and the analysis of all the returned samples from the Apollo and the Luna missions, we thought that the surface of the Moon was dry.

The first definitive discovery of water was made in 2008 by the Indian mission Chandrayaan-1, which detected hydroxyl molecules spread across the lunar surface and concentrated at the poles. Missions such as Lunar Prospector, LCROSS, and Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, have not only shown that the surface of the Moon has global hydration but there are actually high concentrations of ice water in the permanently shadowed regions of the lunar poles.

Scientists also found the lunar surface releases its water when the Moon is bombarded by micrometeoroids. The surface is protected by a layer, a few centimeters of dry soil that can only be breached by large micrometeoroids. When micrometeoroids impact the surface of the Moon, most of the material in the crater is vaporized. The shock wave carries enough energy to release the water that’s coating the grains of the soil. Most of that water is released into space.

In October 2020, NASA’s Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) confirmed, for the first time, water on the sunlit surface of the Moon. This discovery indicates that water may be distributed across the lunar surface, and not limited to cold, shadowed places. SOFIA detected water molecules (H2O) in Clavius Crater, one of the largest craters visible from Earth, located in the Moon’s southern hemisphere.

The Moon has a very thin and weak atmosphere, called an exosphere. It does not provide any protection from the Sun's radiation or impacts from meteoroids.

The early Moon may have developed an internal dynamo, the mechanism for generating global magnetic fields for terrestrial planets, but today, the Moon has a very weak magnetic field. The magnetic field here on Earth is many thousands of times stronger than the Moon's magnetic field.

Earth’s Moon was born out of destruction.

Several theories about our Moon’s formation vie for dominance, but almost all share that point in common: near the time of the solar system’s formation, about 4.5 billion years ago, something ― perhaps a single object the size of Mars, perhaps a series of objects ― crashed into the young Earth and flung enough molten and vaporized debris into space to create the Moon.

Five Things We Learned from Apollo Moon Rocks

The chemical composition of Moon and Earth rocks are very similar.

The Moon was once covered in an ocean of magma.

Meteorites have shattered and melted rocks on the Moon’s surface through impacts.

Lava flowed up through cracks in the Moon’s crust and filled its impact basins.

Lunar “soil” is made of pulverized rock created by meteorite impacts.

If these writing notes helped with your poem/story, please tag me. Or leave a link in the replies. I'd love to read them!

Writing Notes: The Moon (pt. 1) ⚜ Writing Notes & References

[foone]

Apollo 19 on approach to the unknown Soviet module

You could cut the tension with a knife. Mission Control is furiously chewing gum, like only a man whose recently been told he's not allowed to smoke in here can. The screen is showing mostly static, but there's enough visibility to see that it's definitely a Soviet module that the Apollo 19 mission is approaching.

Albertson, a young guy of about 22, comes in with a couple binders. "I've got those mission briefs, sir." "Great, great. Chaffee is almost close enough to read the insignia, and then we can figure this crap out." Another phone rings. He ignores it. This mission is screwed up enough without some white house bureaucrat breathing down his neck.

Chaffee's radio signal lights up. "I'm close enough to read the markings. It looks like it's C-O-Ю-З... 2. Over." and a burst of static.

Albertson drops a binder on the floor, the sound making everyone jump, like the Space module a hundred miles over their head might jump out and bite them. Control spots the right binder among the ones still perched on the desk, and grabs it himself.

"Here it is. Soyuz 2, launched back in '68, unmanned. It was supposed to be docked with Soyuz 3, but they gave up and the mission was a failure. Says here that it deorbited 28th of October, 1968. Huh..."

He looks up at the big clock on the wall. It's 9:18 AM, 3rd of July... 1972.

He motions to Stevenson. "Give him the go-ahead. He should know how to open the hatch, we covered this in training." He zones out as Stevenson relays the information. What in the Sam Hill is a Soviet rocket doing in lunar orbit, nearly four years after the blasted thing is supposed to have landed? Did the commies cover up what they were really doing with this rocket? Is his information wrong? Is the damn CIA lying to them again?" and he reaches into his shirt for a pack of smokes that isn't there, for about the 14th time today. He's shaken back to reality by the image showing up on the screen: There's a Krechet-94 spacesuit in the module. There's only one reason a spacesuit would be in an "unmanned" module... this mission wasn't as unmanned as everyone says.

On the screen, Chaffee is reaching into the cramped pod. The suit's sun visor is down, thankfully, he's happen for one less scare today. Chaffee is looking at the suit's indicators, but they're all blank. If someone was alive in there... they aren't anymore. He fumbles with the bottom of the helmet's gold-colored visor, and Control vaguely hears Stevenson relaying to Chaffee that there should be two plastic clips by the bottom which can be used to raise the sun visor. Chaffee gets it, and slowly raises the visor. The death's head, the smiling skull... it's always an almost comical image, even when you rationally know that a skeleton is the result of a living and breathing person who has died and decayed. Control saw plenty of dead bodies back in the war, but usually they weren't this far gone.

Chaffee cuts in on the mic, saying the obvious. Yep, Houston, if you can't see this... it's a skeleton. He says he'll check the uniform for a name. Behind Control, Albertson finally stands back up and ends up dropping the binder all over again, and this time even more people jump. "My god!" he nearly shouts. Control needs a cigarette more than ever.

Albertson peers past Control at the screen. "The Soviets... were sending skeletons into space?"

Control tells Stevenson to take over, he needs to make a call. It's a lie, there's no call, he's just not going to make it through today without a smoke break. And as for Albertson... "Albertson, get the hell out of here. You're too damn stupid to be working at NASA. No, they didn't launch skeletons, you complete... GAH."

The mission carries on. Control gets his cigarette. Albertson goes off to be a fool somewhere else.

[talonabraxas]

Celestial Dragon (Tianlong)

Legends of the Dragon

The myriad legends of the Chinese Dragon permeate ancient Chinese civilization and shaped their culture even today. Its benevolence signifies greatness, goodness and blessings. Instead of being feared and hated the Chinese dragons are highly respected creatures of good fortune that bring ultimate abundance, prosperity and good fortune. Chinese mythology says dragons control the rain, rivers, lakes, and seas. Many Chinese cities have pagodas where people used to burn incense to ask the dragons to favor their crops or change the weather. Dragons are referred to as the divine mythical creature.

As an animal possessed of magical abilities the Chinese dragon is able to shrink to the size of a silk worm; and then swell up to fill the entire space between heaven and earth. It can make itself visible or invisible, as it so chooses. It can take on human form or that of another animal to carry out some secret mission.

Everything connected with Eastern Dragons is blessed. The Year of the Dragon that takes place ever twelve years is lucky. Present-day Oriental astrologers claim that children born during Dragon Years enjoy health, wealth, and long life. (1964 and 1976 were Dragon Years.

Dragons are so wise that they have been royal advisors. A thirteenth-century Cambodian king spent his nights in a golden tower, where he consulted with the real ruler of the land a nine-headed dragon. Eastern Dragons are vain, even though they are wise. They are insulted when a ruler doesn’t follow their advice, or when people don’t honor their importance. Then, by thrashing about, dragons either stop making rain and cause water shortages, or they breathe black clouds that bring storms and floods.

Types of Dragons

There is more than one type of dragon depicted in Chinese art. In early times there were four main kinds of dragon with many other sub-divisions:

The heavenly or celestial dragon (tian-long) was the celestial guardian who protected the heavens, supporting the mansions of the gods and shielded them from decay. The Tian-long could fly and are depicted with or without wings they are always drawn with five toes while all other dragons are shown with four or three toes.

Spiritual Dragon

The spiritual dragons (shen-long) were the weather makers. These giants floated across the sky and due to their blue color that changed constantly were difficult to see clearly. Shen-long governed the wind, clouds and rain on which all agrarian life depended. Chinese people took great care to avoid offending them for if they grew angry or felt neglected, the result was bad weather, drought of flood.

Earth Dragon

Dragons that ruled the rivers, springs and lakes were called Earth dragons (di-long). They hide in the depths of deep watercourses in grand palaces. Many Chinese fairy tales spin yarns of men and women taken into these submarine castles to be granted special favors or gifts. Some of the di-long even mated with women to produce half-human dragon children.

Treasure Dragon

Believed to live in caves deep in the earth the (fu-can-long) or treasure dragon had charge of all the precious jewels and metals buried in the earth. Each of these dragons had a magical pearl that was reputed to multiply if it was touched. This pearl was as symbol of the most valuable treasure, wisdom.

Over the ages many other forms and hybrid animals related to the Chinese dragon have emerged as part of dragon lore. There are said to be nine distinct offshoots of the dragon that are carved as mystical symbols on doors, gates, swords, and other implements as means of protection and as harbingers of good fortune.

The Dragon Pearl

The luminous ball or pearl often depicted under the dragon’s chin or seen to be spinning in the air, pursued by one or two dragons is thought to be a symbolic representation of the ‘sacred pearl’ of wisdom or yang energy. Pearl symbolism, like lunar symbolism arises from Daoist roots and the connections, are extremely The dragon's pearlcomplex. This pearl can be said to stand most often for ‘truth’ and ‘life’ – perhaps even everlasting life which is made available to those who perceive the truth and attain enlightenment.

The dragon’s pearl can also be thought of as a symbol for universal Qi the progenitor of all energy and creation. The dragons seem to be depicted in attitudes of pursuit. He is seen to be reaching out eagerly to clutch at the elusive object, mouth open in anticipation and eyes bulging with anticipation of achieving the prize afforded by clutching the pearl.

In connection with the dragon the pearl has been called the image of thunder, of the moon, of the sun, of the egg emblem of the dual influences of nature, and the ‘pearl of potentiality’. The pearl is most often depicted as a spiral or a globe. In some paintings it is sometimes red, dragons eggsometimes gold, sometimes the bluish white of a true pearl. The pearl is often accompanied by little jagged flashes that seem to spark out from it, like flames; and it almost always has an appendage in the form of a small undulating sprout, not unlike the first young shoot from a bean.

In Daoist concepts the moon, pearls, dragons and serpents are inextricably linked. Like the snake that is reborn when it sheds its skin, the moon is reborn each month, and both are symbols of immortality. Like the dragon, the moon is always associated with water; its undeniable power over the tides is believed to extend to all liquids on earth. The dragons that lived in the sea were said to be inordinately fond of pearls and collected them and watched over them in great submarine palaces. -The Dragons of China

[liopleurodean]

The Martian starts in 2035, so it's highly likely that there will be at least one more (especially given the mission end-goals for Artemis). However, said mission would likely be some sort of prep work for an Ares-adjacent mission, so it could possibly be left out of the list under the assumption that it was part of/set up for Ares I. In any case, this is a really cool idea!

I'm rereading The Martian, and in Chapter 15 the narrator lists some (though it's implied not all) previous NASA Mars missions, including "Mariner, Viking, Spirit, Opportunity, and Curiosity". The book was originally published in 2011, a year before Curiosity landed on Mars (though obviously the plan was well known), and including it in the list was a cool and subtle way of reinforcing that the story takes place in the near future.

But obviously Curiosity is now old news, and in 2021 Perseverance became the latest NASA rover to land on Mars. It landed on the opposite side of the planet from where the Martian takes place, so it's presence wouldn't be relevant to Mark's survival, but it's absence from the list in chapter 15 is notable if you are even vaguely aware of current NASA research.

I think it'd be really cool if in future reprintings of the book (I assume it's still in print?) they left everything else the same (because adjusting for every new scientific discovery would be a nightmare), but added Perseverance to that list. idk about anyone else, but that would do wonders for my immersion in the story and make it feel less like a past vision of the future, and more like a still real vision of the future

[rambleonwaywardson]

Clegan Astronaut AU - Part 14

Masterpost Read on AO3

AU Summary: the boys as modern day NASA astronauts. Taking place in 2025, Bucky is about to head to the moon as mission commander of Artemis III while Buck is CAPCOM at NASA. Established relationship (obnoxiously in love).

Author's Note: I've been absolutely blown away by some of your comments, especially on chapter 13. Not lying when I say they make my day. We are slightly shorter this week, just over 10k. There's a few new technical terms in the Mission Control transcript dialogue that I'll include at the end of the chapter.

---

We’re all made of stardust, Gale likes to say.

The human body is nothing but a fascinating and precisely messy, messily precise combination of the very elements that build up everything around us. Everything that has ever lived, everything that has ever been, came from the stars.

It’s hard not to be romantic about space. It’s the very star stuff, after all, that poets and philosophers and physicists alike have wondered and wandered about for as long as human thought has been able to comprehend the idea of an unknown. Our ancient ancestors stared up at the sky and, even without a concept of what it was or where it led to, they looked at the stars, and the stars looked back.

The stars from which we came, and the stars to which we will one day return, when the little miracle of a world on which our kind was born is swallowed by the sun that gave us life. Some may say that the vastness of an infinite universe renders a life lived, no matter how large, insignificant. Nothing but a speck in the cosmos, a blip on the timeline of something grander than we can ever comprehend. 

But why can’t it be the other way around?

For life to come forth from the building blocks of a largely uninhabitable infinity feels like impossible odds, because the odds should be mathematically impossible. One in infinity. And yet, billions of years of chance and circumstance, and it resulted in you.

Who’s to say that a life lived, no matter how small, isn’t, by virtue of its very existence, the most significant thing imaginable? Perhaps it’s made even more so by the reality of a forever that we can’t comprehend. Because, of all the infinite possibilities in the universe, you are here. You are breathing. You exist. You are alive.

Our universe is a masterpiece with no artist to claim it, the most complex melody to ever be played. A human life, a human breath, may be but a moment on a vast canvas of reality that we can never touch. 

But what a moment.  

How special is it that such a thing is even possible. To one person, a life is everything. To the universe, many think it’s nothing. But in a sky of a million stars, every little thing is a puzzle piece, one stroke of a brush that fills in the gaps in this work of art. Where life seems impossible, every improbable life that beats those odds is nothing short of a miracle.

So. How lucky are we that this beautiful, complicated universe aligned so perfectly, that the laws of physics have permitted us to exist as we do, together, in this minute span of space and time?

We’re all made of stardust.

That thought has always made Bucky smile. 

One day he’ll return to the stars that created him from nothing, but until then, he exists in a universe that gave him everything. A reality that, among improbable odds, gave him Gale. 

—

November 22 Lunar South Pole, Starship

When Curt opens his eyes, he doesn’t recall closing them. He must have fallen asleep at some point in the night that, on this side of the moon’s south pole, is never actually night. Just a stone’s throw away, and he would be in total darkness all the time. But not here. Not where his ship sits, lonely in an ocean of glass and dust. Oxygen, silicon, magnesium, iron. The same oxygen that fills his lungs. The same iron that courses through his blood.

He’s spent too long listening to Gale Cleven wax poetic about the universe.

When he blinks his eyes open, he can’t explain the vague feeling of dread pulling the walls of his chest inwards like a perpetually collapsing tower of cards. Perhaps that’s just the state in which he’s been living the past few days. Never sure what comes next, up here on this nowhere neverland. Unstable, ready to topple at the slightest breeze.

Maybe it’s a good thing, then, that there is no wind on the moon.

Music is playing. He must have forgotten to turn it off. Mournful notes surround him on all sides, washing over him in a surreal tide of sound.

One More Light, by Linkin Park. Who cares if one more light goes out in the sky of a million stars?

The dread in Curt’s gut quivers, spreading through him like a disease. He glances over at Bucky’s still form across the cabin, but he can’t see the rise and fall of his chest in the dimness of the lander’s simulated night. He swallows, feeling the painful lump of anxiety stuck in his dry throat. The song, no doubt, doesn’t help.

It plays on, though, as he rolls sloppily out of his hammock and wanders over to Bucky’s cot. Slowly, slowly, almost like he doesn’t want to know. As if his actions right this very second, this fraction of a second, could change an outcome that he’s fought tooth and nail to have any say in. He hears his own heartbeat, pumping blood that carries within it the same iron that courses through the veins of their solar system. He feels it pounding in his chest as he wades through this small ocean of a no man’s land. Schrodinger’s cat – alive or dead? 

He looks. Slowly, slowly. And he swears he feels the moment his soul is crushed beneath a weight that it wasn’t designed to bear.

For a moment, he is consumed by all of his worst fears. A heart stopped. Chest still. Face pale. Fingers cold. Unmoving. Like a light gone out, the blink of a supernova that can’t be observed with the naked eye, nothing but the sudden absence of light to tell the universe that it’s moved on from this life.

Not even a flicker.

Bucky. 

Just gone in the night. 

Who cares when someone’s time runs out if a moment is all we are?

Curt wakes with a gasp, a ball of anxiety dislodging from his throat in a scream that he has to forcefully shove back down into his chest so it doesn’t ring out at a deafening pitch. His eyes snap open, his hands gripping the fabric of his hammock so tight his fingers hurt. 

Alone. He’s alone. 

The only living being on the surface of this whole desert-island world. 

He can’t breathe. 

He glances over at Bucky’s still form, squinting through the darkness of the cabin. He can’t see well enough. His fingers frantically search for the PTT button on his coms.

Curt: “Benny? Benny??”

Benny: “You okay, Curt?”

Curt: “Is he alive?” He can’t push the words out fast enough, desperate enough. Not a single person on shift misses the way his voice breaks on the third word.

Silence.

Curt can feel the panic rising up through his body, tears threatening to spill over. His heart is beating too fast in a chest that feels hollow and hopeless, and his head spins. He waits for Benny to tell him no, don’t you remember… Waits for the confirmation that he’s lost perhaps the most important person in his life. Nervously, though, he looks at the time displayed on the console across from him. It’s the same day as it was before, when he last remembers being awake.

The same day. 

A dream. 

But. It’s 5:30am GMT. He’s been asleep for at least four hours, the longest he’s dared to close his eyes in the past few days. Bucky’s progress gave him a sense of complacency, and now he worries it’ll cost him everything.

A lot can happen in four hours. But it doesn’t take a lot for a light to go out.

He swallows thickly. His whole face burns, his eyes stinging with the fear that is threatening to eat him alive if his CAPCOM doesn’t say something.

Curt: “Benny?”

Benny: “He’s fine, Curt. Did something happen? His vitals look as stable as can be expected.”

Curt shakes his head, as if he isn’t alone in the dark. He flexes his fingers against the side of the hammock, gripping and releasing, gripping and releasing. His eyes squeeze shut against unshed tears.

Curt: “No. Bad dream.” He tries to make his lungs work properly. Tries to force his body to stop shaking. He’s okay. He’s okay. “Forgot to turn the music off.”

Who cares if one more light goes out?Well I do.

Okay. Well. That’s certainly enough of that.

Curt throws himself out of the hammock with abandon, stumbling as his socked feet slide on the floor. He grabs his tablet, pauses the music, and he stares down at the screen long after it fades to black again, unblinking as the quiet descends around him. 

Benny: “I told you we were concerned about the sad boy hours playlist.”

Curt: “Oh shut it, Benny.”

He hears Benny snicker.

Benny: “You okay, Curt?”

His heart is still pounding. The dread is still making a home deep in his chest. All he feels is a gripping fear that isn’t quite like anything he’s ever felt before. But he nods.

Curt: “Yeah. Thanks, Benny.”

He turns on the lights. And he wanders, slowly, slowly, over to Bucky’s cot. Relief washes over him when he sees the way Bucky’s hand twitches. The way it moves slowly, slowly, up from Bucky’s side to his chest. Blue eyes blink up at Curt, brow scrunched. The hint of a smile plays at the corner of Bucky’s mouth.

“Scream?” he says quietly, fighting to scrape the words out of a dry throat through lips that fumble across the messy syllable.

Curt huffs and rubs a hand over his face. He nods. “Yeah. I did.”

The expression on Bucky’s face changes, the quirk of his lips dropping as he squints up at Curt in concern, but it returns a second later. “The fuck?”

That makes Curt laugh, and he feels some of the nerves recede. A tide going out as the world continues to turn. “You’re just full of sass, aren’t you.”

Bucky makes a vague, minute motion with his shoulders that might be a shrug. Curt watches as Bucky’s left hand drifts in stiff, labored movements up to his chest to meet his right. His fingers brush over his wedding band, and Curt can visibly see some of the tension leave Bucky’s body.

“You remember him talkin’ to ya last night?” Curt asks. He reaches a hand out to rest on Bucky’s good leg and shakes it gently. 

Bucky’s eyes flick back up to him even as his thumb continues to rub over the ring. “Buck,” he breathes out. His eyes, already glassy, take on a wet look and drift away from Curt’s. The corners of his mouth drop into a frown. “Don’t… cry.”

Curt doesn’t know who he’s saying it to, exactly. Himself or Gale. Belated words that he couldn’t force out hours ago. But the words, the look on Bucky’s face, make Curt feel like crying anyways.

And then Bucky’s out again. 

—

Houston, TX

Marge is exhausted. She won’t complain, but she’s barely getting any more sleep than Gale is. She loves her job as Artemis PAO, she really does. But it was running her ragged even before catastrophe struck home. She’s dedicating all of her work hours and then some to keeping this mess controlled in the media. She’s been constantly communicating with the public about the mission status, monitoring media coverage, negotiating with media outlets about what to release when, and trying her best to keep the whole damn world off Gale’s back. She fights like a mother cat, baring her teeth and showing her claws as she pulls out every trick in the book to keep the ugliness of the press from descending on her best friend. Her brother. 

She spends her entire ten hour work day between Mission Control and her office, trying to put out fires and keep up with the shit storm swirling around her, and she is never, ever done. She’s working before she gets to the office and she’s working after she leaves. She’s working in the middle of the night while she lies awake in Gale’s guest bedroom. 

And when she’s not doing any of that, she’s keeping a sharp eye on Gale. 

Gale, her best friend since they were just little kids in grade school, playing make believe in her bedroom or throwing sticks for the dog. Wandering through the countryside under a setting sun, Gale telling her all about the stars above, the stars he has always loved so much. Camping in her backyard, making pillow forts to watch movies and share secrets in, making up stupid handshakes that they could never quite remember. 

Gale, who, at only eight years old, came to her house with tears staining his cheeks but trying so, so hard to hide how much he’d been crying after his dad hit him for the first time. Gale, who bit his lip until it bled because he was scared to go home but just as scared to tell Marge why. Gale, who learned too early that life can suck, but tried so hard to break free anyways.

Gale, who she grew up with, who she has watched become the incredible man he is. Who she loves so deeply. Her platonic soulmate, she likes to say, making him laugh as he hugs her tight. They’d go to the ends of the Earth for each other. Hell, they showed up on NASA’s doorstep together, prepared to do just that in their own ways. 

She has seen him succeed. She has seen him on top of the world in every sense of the word. And she has seen him hurt. She has seen him cry. She has seen him seething with rage. But she has very rarely seen him scared. Not since he was that wide-eyed little boy watching bruises bloom on his arms and chest for the very first time.

Gale Cleven and scared are not words that feel right together, but they are words that, from time to time, do coexist. Marge is one of only two people in the whole world who ever sees what that intersection looks like. Her. And John.

Gale is scared, now. He’s angry. He’s grieving. He’s lost and confused and hurting and hesitantly hopeful but trying not to crumble, trying not to get caught beneath a landslide. He’s scared. Because John almost died. Could still, perhaps. He could come home, or he could not. He could come home, but if he does, he could be totally different. He could be fine. Or he could not. And no one knows. No one will know until he’s safe and sound with his feet on dry land, wrapped in Gale’s arms with a beating heart. It could happen. Or it could not. And now Marge has to hold the pieces of his husband together.

She’s trying her best, she really is. She’s terrified to take her eyes off of Gale, though. Everyone sees him as this stoic pillar of strength that can always be relied upon, because he is. She knows that he isn’t prone to dramatics or drastic measures. He’s level-headed, ready for anything, indomitable. He’s unbreakable, when it comes to everything except for John.

John, who has spent nearly two decades chipping away at Gale��s walls of stone. John, who calms the internal storm that Gale won’t let the world see. John, who takes care of Gale when no one else notices that he needs to be taken care of. 

Buck and Bucky. One cannot exist without the other.

One half in limbo, and so the other won’t sleep. Gale barely even eats. It doesn’t seem to occur to him. Marge is worried that if he keeps going like this, he’ll simply keel over or get into an accident or simply vanish from this plane of existence. And if the absolute worst happens, yeah, she’s worried about that unbreakable will in him breaking.

Gale, who she has known as long as she’s known herself. Gale, who has always been there for her through the highs and the lows and the zigzags of this crazy life. Gale, who has always been the strongest person she knows. She doesn’t think she needs to worry, but she isn’t taking the chance.

Gale, who has always been just fine on his own. Gale, who never falters under pressure. Gale, who has never been afraid of anything.

Other than losing John.

Gale, who fell asleep in her bed last night because he was afraid to be alone. She held him close, and she let him sleep right there beside her like they were kids again, hiding from the monsters that he refused to talk about. She’ll call it a win that he slept for four whole hours before he woke around 3am and wandered out of the guest room. She found him sitting on the floor, his back against the door to his master bedroom, the dogs laying beside him. He was looking through the wedding photos, biting too hard on his lip. He’d finally made it to their first look, but he couldn’t bring himself to go further. He just sat there, staring at the emotional and ecstatic look on John’s face as he took in the sight of his fiancé dressed in white, lit up by the sun streaming through the windows. Gale smiled, and he frowned, grimaced at the blood on his lip, ran a hand through his messy hair. And then he smiled again.

“He’s gonna be okay,” he said, not even looking up. His voice was weak but carried a sense of certainty that Marge hadn’t heard since before the accident. “He has to be.”

It breaks her heart, seeing him like this. She wants so badly to make the world right, to bring John home safe, to personally guarantee that Gale doesn’t have to worry about a thing. 

But she can’t.

So she’ll stay with him. She’ll keep an eye on him. She’ll make sure he eats and she’ll hold him up when he falls and she’ll get him through this if it kills her. No matter what happens.

But goddamn is she tired. And scared. 

She’ll protect Gale with everything she has from the cruelty of this world, and she will stand by him in the aftermath. He’s her best friend. Her family.

But John is, too. John is her friend, too. He’s her family, too. Has been since the moment Gale introduced them so many years ago.

So here she is. She’s alone in her office bright and early the morning of November 22nd. Today, Starship leaves the lunar surface, whether John is ready or not. She and Gale arrived at JSC earlier than usual so she could get some extra work done. Normally, she’d stay in Mission Control for the entirety of Red Shift, but she has to moderate a press conference this afternoon. Time that she simply does not have to spare.

When they arrived, Gale went off in search of better coffee than Mission Control has to offer. He’s with Sandra, so they can discuss Artemis 4, though it’ll likely devolve into office gossip anyways. It was difficult for Marge to let him go off without her, somewhere where she can’t watch him, remind him to breathe, hold the broken pieces of him in place. But she thinks some time with one of his colleagues, talking about something that isn’t Artemis 3, will be good for him.

As for her, she’s supposed to be getting work done. Sending emails. Drafting press releases. Checking schedules. But she isn’t doing any of those things. All she’s managed to do since she got here is stare silently at the wall.

She takes a deep, shuddering breath and rubs a hand over her eyes. Fingers poised over her keyboard, she stares at her computer screen, willing herself to get to work on this statement about Major John Egan’s condition and the plans for getting him home. But every time she tries to type his name, she freezes.

Her eyes wander to a photograph on her desk. It’s her, Benny, Gale, John, and Curt standing in front of the SLS in KSC’s Vehicle Assembly Building. They’re all grinning from ear to ear, all of them, even her, in NASA flight suits. She reaches a hand out to touch it, her finger landing gently on John’s face, and all of a sudden there’s tears streaming down her cheeks.

She takes one gasping breath, a little sob that tries its hardest to release every awful thing she’s feeling but can’t even come close. She hides her face in her hands, bites her lip like she’s always telling Gale not to do, and she breathes. Slowly. In. Out.

She’s startled out of it by a knock on her door, and she rushes to brush her hair back out of her face. She wipes below her waterline, taking care not to smear her makeup, and she sits up tall, shoulders back. She plasters a smile to her face even though it will never reach her eyes.

“Come in,” she calls, forcing a steadiness into her voice and hoping it doesn’t betray her.

The door opens, and Benny walks in. Surprised, Marge checks the time. Not quite 8:00.

“Gale’s on console already?” she asks. They’d gotten to JSC around 6:30, but she didn’t expect Benny to leave Mission Control until at least 8am sharp.

He nods. “He wanted me to check on you. He’s concerned.”

Marge laughs wetly, letting her guard down just the littlest bit. It’s just Benny. “He’s concerned about me?”

Benny nods again and sits in the chair on the other side of her desk. He slides a cup of coffee across to her. “Says you’re wearing yourself out looking after him all the time.”

Marge frowns as she grabs the hot cup and inhales the scent of the caffeine she so desperately needs. “I don’t have a choice, Benny. He’s… not okay.”

“I know,” Benny agrees. “But you’re allowed to hurt, too. You love John nearly as much as he does.”

“I don’t think that’s even possible.”

Benny laughs halfheartedly. Marge loves her friends fiercely. But Gale loves John with a power that outshines every star in this universe. “Maybe not,” he says. “But this is hard for all of us. It’s allowed to be hard for you.”

She sips her coffee to keep her voice from trembling. “I know. But he needs me to be the strong one right now. I can’t afford to break.”

Benny nods in understanding and offers a sad smile, because he knows. He feels it, too. This pressing need to keep it together because there is simply no other choice. He can go home and throw things at the walls on his own time if he needs, but Marge can hardly even do that, since she’s basically on 24/7 Gale watch. 

“How’s John doing today?” she asks. They’re getting dangerously close to their Starship launch window.

Benny runs a hand through his hair and sighs deeply. “He’s… improving. We’re seeing more and more signs of him. Just not as quickly as we’d like.” He smiles weakly and tells her about the last six or so hours. Bucky has woken up a few times, totaling about three hours of being conscious. His speech capabilities are returning. Mostly single words like “fuck,” “Gale,” “Curt,” and “shit.” He seems aware of his surroundings. He can answer yes/no questions, and most of the time he seems to remember what happened on the surface. 

He can swallow, and has asked for water twice but is not eating on his own. Curt has had to help him with sitting up and holding his water packet. Sometimes he wakes up confused, startled, anxious, doesn’t seem to know where he is or why. Even awake, he drifts in and out of awareness. He keeps trying to pick at his IV or reach down to his leg, and he seems to be in considerable pain. He has not had another seizure, but his heart rate spikes every once in a while, or his breathing will become erratic, too slow or too fast. 

Perhaps the most promising development is that, as long as Curt helps him get his comcap on, he’s able to speak to Mission Control well enough to convey basic needs. Sort of. Almost. This means, ideally, once Curt manages to get him all set for launch, he’ll be able to communicate with Curt and Gale if he needs anything. Curt, for all intents and purposes, is in charge of all flight and docking duties on Starship. Thankfully, he spent time training on all facets of these procedures, so he isn’t going in blind.

“How’d Gale seem?” Marge asks.

Benny shrugs. “He seemed okay. But, I mean, he usually seems okay on shift, you know?” When Marge frowns, he rushes to reassure her. “I think he’s gonna be alright, Marge. As long as John keeps improving, he’ll be alright.”

“What happens if he doesn’t? Keep improving?”

Benny sighs again and reaches across the desk to take her hand. He glances at the photo on her desk, the one of them all together. He doesn’t know, is the truth. But he’s a pilot. An astronaut. He always has a sense of the worst that can happen, but he can’t afford to actively anticipate that outcome. All he can do is move forward and take it as it comes. He offers Marge a weak smile. “We’re just gonna take this one minute at a time, okay?”

They don’t count in days anymore. Minutes and seconds. It’s all they can ever count on. 

—

Bucky doesn’t like a single thing about this. No. Nope. Not at all.

He scowls at Curt in hopes that that will convey the general desire to burn this entire place to the ground and take the two of them with it.

“I know, dude,” Curt groans. “We don’t got a fuckin’ choice so work with me here.”

Bucky takes a deep breath, as controlled as he can manage, and glances out the window of Starship, which he can finally see out of again now that he’s sitting up. Even once he managed to open his eyes, he spent a long time just staring at the ugly ceiling of their little crew cabin, imagining stars above. Curt has helped him to sit up straight today, though, with his legs hanging over the side of the cot. Before Curt started helping him to dress in his first suit layer, he was finally able to see the damage done to his body – his leg hanging useless and throbbing, held together by a splint, and the faint remnants of a decompression rash mottling his skin. Curt removed the bandage from around his head, but Bucky keeps trying to reach his hand up to rub at the wound there.

Curt keeps swatting it away, saying “I didn’t stitch you up for you to break that open. So quit it or I’ll wrap you up again.”

Sitting up like this makes Bucky feel dizzy, the room tilting and blurring around him all funny, and he feels his heart rate spiking again. He tries to focus on the stars he can see through the window. Flickering lights in a dark, forever sky. He wonders if he can count them, but his brain keeps stalling after he reaches six or seven and his vision goes fuzzy.

Pain pulses in his leg with every heartbeat, and nausea keeps rising and fading, rising and fading. He closes his eyes and tries to breathe deeply, but the air chokes his lungs as his chest shakes with the effort. 

“Hey, take it easy,” Curt says. Bucky feels Curt’s warm hand on his knee as his copilot kneels in front of him. He’s securing the booties of Bucky’s cooling garment, which has to be worn beneath the OCS suit to avoid overheating. How, exactly, to get Bucky into the layers of his suit required a lot of back and forth and arguing between Curt and “the idiots in Mission Control,” while all Bucky could do was sit and wait while they determined how best to dress him up like some sort of doll.

The results were excruciating, involving removing the splint to get the cooling garment over his broken leg, and it was a harrowing taste of what’s to come between now and touching down on Earth. Benny said Smokey wanted Curt to redo the splint anyways, since the swelling in his leg has likely gone down, making it too loose. Either way, Bucky kind of wants to be unconscious again so he doesn’t have to feel so much pain. Part of him thinks if it’s between this and never waking up again, he’d choose the latter. He can’t bear the thought of abandoning Gale like that, but he desperately needs all of this to stop.

Nausea rises up as Curt jostles his leg trying to get the splint back on over the cooling layer, and it doesn’t subside like it did before. Bucky tries to reach out to tap Curt on the shoulder, tries to say something to let him know, but all that comes out is a weak “uh?” And then he’s coughing up bile that misses Curt’s head by mere centimeters. Curt looks at the spot on the floor where it landed, looks up at Bucky with a mix of disgust and pity, and Bucky kind of wants to cry.

He hates this.

He hates it.

He hates the way he can feel it sticking to his mouth and the way it’s making him choke on little coughs that rattle his brain as he tries to keep from swallowing what didn’t make it past his lips. He hates how useless and incompetent he feels, like an overgrown child who can’t take care of himself or so much as communicate what he needs. He hates that he can’t dress himself or eat or drink. He can hardly move, can hardly balance enough to sit upright. He hates that Curt is stuck here taking care of him when that is not what he signed up for. And he is in so much pain.

He feels the wetness in his eyes, but thankfully the tears don’t fall.

Curt takes a deep breath and looks Bucky in the eye. “Just a second,” he says. He finishes fastening the splint, making Bucky grunt in pain again, and then Bucky is alone, focusing too hard on staying upright on the edge of the bed.

When Curt comes back, he has one of the rags they use for cleaning. He squirts some water from his water packet onto it and gently wipes Bucky’s face, then the floor. Then he holds the water towards Bucky. Bucky takes it between his lips and sucks weakly at the straw, feeling instant relief at the way the water coats his throat and washes away the acid taste.

Curt wipes his mouth again, drying up a drop of water below his lower lip. He frowns as he considers Bucky, barely able to handle getting into the first layer of his suit before launch. “This is probably gonna get a whole lot worse,” he tells him. 

—

Gale feels sick.

If Starship liftoff and rendezvous weren’t scheduled for Red Shift, he absolutely would have been here anyways. But, even after everything, he didn’t anticipate how much being in Mission Control would hurt. How much it would physically hurt to know that his husband is confused and sick and in so much pain. How much it would hurt to sit here and bear witness to the unique torture that is launching Bucky off the moon despite all of it.

The moment Gale takes over the console, the first thing he hears is a weak voice crackling over the coms. “Gale?”

“I’m here,” he says. He wants to reach across space and time, hold Bucky to him and shelter him from everything that’s about to happen. He thinks, for the first time, that perhaps being unconscious was the most merciful thing for the Artemis 3 Commander these past few days. Perhaps he’d been selfish, wanting so badly for his husband to wake up. Because how is this any better?

The next thing he hears is a quiet sob, a voiceless scream that didn’t have the power to truly make a sound, as Curt tried to get Bucky’s bad leg into the OCS suit. Gale has to shut his eyes for a moment and take a breath, push past the bile rising in his throat at the sound of John in anguish. The completely irrational part of his brain wants to shut this whole operation down, make everyone stop what they’re doing, stop subjecting his husband to this abuse. The rest of him knows that that isn’t an option. They have to get this launch right, and they have to get it right now, excruciating pain be damned. So he holds his breath to keep the pieces of his shattered heart from overflowing right onto his console, because if he can’t deal with listening to Bucky’s suffering, then he can’t be here at all.

It’s not fair, but it’s what this job requires. As long as he is in Mission Control, he needs to put on a brave face, play Major Buck Cleven. 

When he finally opens his eyes again and looks around the room, every flight controller is looking right at him. Painted on their faces is sorrow and pity, for him and for John, two of NASA’s most unassailable forces being shoved through Hell but fighting through it for each other. He looks at each of them, and he holds his head high, even as he swallows thickly to keep the tears stinging the backs of his eyes from welling up right here and now.

“Gale?” Bucky says again, his voice weak and thick and begging for something that Gale can’t give him.

And in that moment, Gale makes a decision. The only way to get John through this is to make room for both of them – Major Buck Cleven and Gale Cleven. He’ll be as strong as he has to; he’ll get these boys through this if it kills him. But in the end, even if the mission needs Buck at the helm, Bucky needs him. His husband. 

So he tries out a watery, encouraging smile even though Bucky can’t see his face, and he softens his voice, like it’s just him and John, no one else. “I’m here,” he says again. “I know it hurts, darling. I’m sorry we’re making you do this. But it’s the only way to get you home.”

—

Curt managed, somehow, to get Bucky all set in his suit, even as Bucky cried out in agony and tried to push him away. Curt doesn’t know if it was easier or harder when Bucky started to get all disoriented, fading in and out of consciousness. He gave up fighting, but it left Curt trying to single handedly shove his body into the most complicated outfit known to man. “I’m sorry,” Curt kept saying, wincing every time Bucky gasped in pain or flinched away.

As much of an ordeal as it was to get Bucky dressed, it was nearly as difficult for Curt to dress himself. On launch day at KSC – a day that feels so terribly long ago now – they had a whole team of suit techs, specially trained to help them get into these OCS suits. They helped the astronauts put on every layer, checked the fit and positioning of every single component, triple checked every seal and zipper to make sure not a thing was out of place and everything was as comfortable as possible. Even up in space or on the moon, the astronauts are trained to help each other so no one ever has to try to get themselves into the suit without another set of hands and eyes. It is not, by any means, a task that they are meant to accomplish on their own. And Curt has quickly learned that the hard way.

He manages, though, and finally returns to the console to finish preparing for launch. Before getting himself suited up, he had to carry Bucky across the cabin bridal-style in order to settle him into one of the seats and strap him in. “Now, don’t you fuckin’ touch anything,” he instructs, pointing a finger at Bucky. “Look at me.”

Bucky tilts his head a little and his eyes slowly roam over to see Curt beside him. Curt can see it all on his face: the joke he wants to make, the stubbornness he doesn’t want to leave behind. I’m your commander, show some respect, he probably wants to say. This is my ship as much as it is yours.

But even John Egan isn’t stubborn or egoistic enough to think he can fly a spaceship when he can barely move or talk, when his brain keeps going all foggy and he can barely stay awake. The look on his face also tells Curt that he’s angry, he’s sad, he’s in pain both physically and emotionally. It says, Am I still the commander of this mission if I’m no more use than a goddamn toddler?

So Curt gives him his best reassuring smile. “You just sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride, Commander.” Bucky rolls his eyes, but the expression on his face eases into something less unsettled.

Luckily, Mission Control had foreseen the difficulties in suiting up, and they scheduled plenty of time into their morning for accomplishing a task that really shouldn’t have been harder than literal rocket science and yet managed to be just that. Before taking on that endeavor, Curt spent much of the morning preparing Starship for takeoff. Another task that was not meant to be accomplished by one person alone.

He never got to do his last EVA to retrieve their plants.

He lets himself look out the window one more time before he has to strap himself in. He can see the LEAF greenhouse far in the distance, and he presses his hand to the thick glass. He’d been really, really hoping for that one last moonwalk. That last chance to bound across the peaceful emptiness of the lunar surface, to take in the views he’s dreamed about since he was a kid. He really wanted to be able to bring home their little crops, the first living things to be born and to grow on the moon. But Bucky just wasn’t in a good enough place to be left alone for so long. No one could be sure if or when another seizure would occur, like a monster lurking in the darkness. And no one was confident that Bucky would be able to communicate his needs in Curt’s absence, or that he wouldn’t get agitated and accidentally hurt himself.

Curt doesn’t feel angry anymore. He might later, when it all catches up to him again. Now he’s just a little sad. A little disappointed. He looks out at the moon, at the Earthrise on the horizon, the stars in the sky, the vast expanse of fine rock and rubble that calls to him. He knows Bucky dreamed of the exact same thing. Neither of them are alone.

When he looks back at his commander, Bucky is watching him. His voice is quiet and scratchy, slow and unsure, but Curt can hear him over the coms. “Plants?” His eyes alone say more than that one word ever could. I’m sorry.

Curt smiles sadly and shrugs. “I’ll tell your husband to get them on Four.”

Then he nods to himself, looks at the console in front of him, and asks Houston for a launch checklist.

—

Shortly before takeoff, Gale is biting at his thumbnail in anticipation as he listens to the other flight controllers give their go/no-go. Typically, Curt and Bucky would have run through their pre-launch checklist together, only referencing Houston if they needed clarification on something. With Bucky unable to do much of anything, Gale had to take Curt through the checklist himself. He scans through the hard-copy packet of instructions in front of him, triple checking that he didn’t miss anything.

He pauses, his finger pressed with too much force to a line of text that smears ink on his skin, when he hears Bucky’s small voice coming over coms again.

Bucky: “Gale?”

Gale: “I’m here, darling.”

He can hear it: Bucky sounds nervous. Gale can’t seem to decide if he should smile or frown. On one hand, Bucky is awake, coherent, thinking, talking. On the other, Gale knows he’s scared. And John Egan and scared are not words that seem like they should fit in the same sentence.

He wonders how much of this makes sense to Bucky right now. He wonders if he knows how much this is all about to hurt, even more than it already does. He wonders if knowing in advance would make it better or worse, or if the fear etched into Bucky’s voice is simply because everything happening around him is already too much.

Gale: “He okay, Curt?”

Curt: “Think so. A little agitated, but I think he just wants to know you’re there.”

Dr. Huston informs him that this situation is extremely stress-inducing for Bucky, who is still not fully aware of what’s going on and is in a lot of pain. It’s natural for him to be seeking comfort. He’s reaching out because he doesn’t feel safe. And no matter what state he’s in, he seems to associate Gale with safe.  

Gale has to fight back tears once again.

Gale: “I’m here, John. I love you.”

In the silence that follows, he can feel the words Bucky can’t actually say in his mind. I love you more, angel. Gale sips his coffee and looks across the room at Marge, who catches his eye and gives him a thumbs up.

Clark starts counting down. Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six.

—

Curt mutters under his breath.  “Five. Four. Three. Two. One. Liftoff.”

The Starship engines shake the entire silver tower, jostling Curt in his seat. They could do as many simulations as they wanted, but nothing compares to the real thing. Even in partial gravity, the ship has a shocking amount of power. He watches moon dust kick up in a billowing cloud around them as they start to rise.

Bucky: “Gale?” 

He sounds agitated again, and Curt can see his gloved hand trying to grab onto something, searching for stability. Curt reaches his hand out and squeezes Bucky’s fingers to let him know it’s okay. He wonders how excruciating this aggressive shaking feels when you’re coping with a traumatic brain injury. He doesn’t want to know.

Gale: “I’m here.”

Curt: “We’re going! 600 feet and climbing.”

The official mission transcript will indicate that something unintelligible was said, but Curt hears when Bucky says “pitch.”

Curt: “Yeah, we have pitchover. Right on time. Hear that, Gale?”

Gale: “I heard. Thank you Major Egan.”

Typically, this is the point in the launch when Curt would say something like what a fuckin’ ride , but he’s too nervous about the potential for Bucky to simply disintegrate into dust beside him, lost to the lunar sky. Stars from which we came, stars to which we will return.

Curt: “Alex, Rosie, we’re on our way to you. Heat us up somethin’ nice to eat would ya?”

Alex: “Want me to set the table, too?”

Curt: “That’d be great, honey… Trajectory good.”

Gale: “Trajectory good. Systems nominal.”

Curt: “Copy.” 

Gale: “Alex, I want in on whatever you’re makin’.”

Alex: “I’ve got chicken ‘n rice. And wheat chex. I’d stick with whatever you have earthside, Major.”

Curt shifts his gaze back and forth between the rising trajectory displayed on the screen in front of him and the rapidly descending darkness out his window. They’re nearing 5,000 feet, velocity approaching 400 feet per second. Rate of ascent right where it should be. 

Curt: “Right on the H-dot. Goin’ up as expected. One minute.”

Gale: “Starship, you’re go at one minute. Lookin’ good.”

Curt: “AGS and PGNS agree.”

Bucky: “Gale?” 

Gale: “I’m here, John. You okay?”

There’s a garbled groan through the coms, and Curt glances over. He recognizes the weird, twisted expression on Bucky’s face immediately, the way the commander shifts uncomfortably in his seat. 

Curt: “No. No no no. Do not be sick right now.”

Another groan. Bucky doesn’t have anything in him to throw up except for bile, but either way, vomit is the absolute last thing you want in your helmet. Once they hit zero G and things start floating… well, Curt is concerned Bucky won’t have the wherewithal to keep himself from choking on it. 

Gale: “He doin’ okay, Curt?”

Curt: “Drink your water. Drink your damn water.”

Curt reaches a hand out to pat Bucky aggressively on the shoulder and then motions to the little straw sticking upwards into his helmet out of the neck ring. While they were suiting up, he even figured out a way to stick it up a little higher so Bucky doesn’t have to duck down so much to get at it. “Water,” he says again.

Bucky’s eyes follow his finger and try to see the straw, not really remembering where it is or what he’s supposed to do. Water. He doesn’t see how he’s supposed to get water out of that, but he ducks his head down and struggles to get it between his lips. He cries softly in frustration as the nausea rolls through him, but he manages, feeling cold water rush into his mouth faster than he was prepared for. He coughs a little as it dribbles down his throat, but he manages to swallow. Curt nods and pats him on the shoulder again.

Curt: “You’re gonna be alright. Just don’t fuckin’ throw up in there.”

—

���Trajectory nominal,” Croz reports. “We’re on target.”

Gale doesn’t even realize he’s standing, probably has been for a while, with one hand on his hip and the other pressed to his lips, until Croz looks up and asks him if he’s alright. Only then does Gale notice that he’s paced a few steps away from his console and is standing on Croz’s other side, behind Bubbles. With an unconvincing nod, he runs a hand through his hair and wanders back over to his own desk. He picks up his fourth cup of coffee of the day and frowns when he realizes it’s empty.

Gale: “Coming up on three. We have you at 15,000 feet per second.”

Curt: “Lookin’ damn good here. 22,000 feet and a sky full of stars out our window.”

Gale: “Targeting good. How’s-”

Bucky: “Gale.”

The twisted, pained way Bucky cries his name is another icy stab to Gale’s heart, and it stops him cold where he’s standing behind his console. He rubs his hand over his face before pressing his wedding ring to his lips and closing his eyes. Breathe. He flexes his right hand, feels the scabs tug at the skin. This morning, Dr. Huston had tried to prepare him, telling him that the pain Bucky would feel during launch would probably be excruciating. That if Bucky could communicate that, it would rip Gale apart and make him feel like the worst person in the world for forcing him through this.

But it’s no one’s fault. It’s what has to happen. Gale just needs to breathe and work through it.

Gale: “I’m here, darlin’. It’s gonna be alright. Close your eyes and breathe for me.”

Rosie, listening in from Orion, jumps in. 

Rosie: “I know it hurts, Bucky. I want you to know it’s alright if you pass out.” 

Bucky moans in response.

Gale asks Dr. Huston about John’s vitals, and the flight surgeon reports that his heart rate is high but that’s to be expected from the stress alone. He’s not concerned yet.

Bucky: “Buck.” Softer now, but the scared and defeated cry is almost harder to bear.

Gale: “I’m right here with you… Four minutes. Go at four minutes.”

Curt: “Pringles can is stayin’ strong. Hear that, John?” 

—

Liftoff from the moon is something Bucky used to dream of. He’d stand at the top of his swing set, like the little peaked canopy above him was the nose of his ship, and he’d pretend he was launching towards the stars. He’d pretend the ground below him was made of moon dust, his own footsteps visible on the surface as he ascended higher and higher and higher until the world was nothing but a speck beneath him. “We’re lookin’ good, Houston,” he’d say, mimicking his heroes of the Apollo and Shuttle eras. “Right on target. Oh man it’s beautiful.”

He keeps trying to look out the window now, at that sky full of stars. That infinity that leads to nowhere and everywhere at the same time. His vision keeps fading in and out, though. Curt’s trying to talk to him but he can’t think straight.

His leg hurts. He doesn’t quite remember why. He tries to say Gale’s name, but he can’t.

His head feels… bad. 

It’s hard to breathe.

A sky full of stars.

He pretends he’s one of them.

—

Gale: “Go at six. Doin’ okay?”

Curt: “Good here. Coming up on ascent termination. Bucky?.... Bucky?”

Silence.

Curt reaches a hand out and puts it on Bucky’s shoulder, then his chest. He shakes him gently. He leans forward as much as he can and sees Bucky’s head flopped to the side, lax against the inside of his helmet.

Curt: “He’s out, Buck.”

Gale: “Probably better for him.”

Curt frowns, even though he agrees. He’d rather Bucky be unconscious than in unbearable pain. But he misses having his commander at his side, sass and all.

He lets his hand drop away from Bucky’s body, and he listens to Gale giving him a countdown to engine shut-off over coms. A job that Bucky should be doing.

Gale: “Three. Two. One.”

Curt: “Ascent terminated.”

—

Bucky pops in and out of consciousness over the next several hours, sometimes perfectly aware and sometimes confused and agitated. Sometimes he speaks, and sometimes he stares in silence out the window, wondering where he’d end up if he just kept drifting forever. Here am I floating ‘round my tin can, far above the moon.

When they hit zero gravity, their indicator floats up in front of their faces. Beary Egan remained on Orion. On Starship they have the little Earth plush that SpaceX often uses on their spacecraft. It bumps Bucky’s helmet, and he smiles the littlest bit. It makes Curt laugh as he watches Bucky slowly reach a hand up to poke the plush toy, watching it drift away. For a moment, there’s no pain, no fear, no worries. Bucky is just John Egan again. Mission commander. That same little boy who is just excited to be in outer space.

One time he glances at the trajectory displayed on the console in front of them, and in a moment of lucidity, he says “Good.” Curt gives him a thumbs up.

One time he looks at it and notices they’re angled the littlest bit off course, and he says “Curt,” as he tries to point at the screen.

“I know, bud,” Curt tells him as he works on adjusting their position.

One time he groans as bile rises in his throat and he has to close his eyes again, force himself to swallow the acid-tasting liquid and wash it down with a small sip of water. That happens a few more times on their journey, with varying levels of concern.

Sometimes all he does is pop his eyes open, cry out Gale’s name, and wait for his husband to tell him that he’s still there.

“Leg,” he moans at one point. Curt has to reach across and smack him to get him to stop trying to reach down to mess with his leg. Rosie tells him they’ll pump him full of pain meds as soon as he’s onboard Orion.

Curt doesn’t know if it would be easier or harder to shift Bucky from the lander to Orion when he’s unconscious. But it’s not his choice to make. Soon after Curt and Alex maneuver their ships into docking position and make contact, White Shift enters Mission Control. Gale discusses with Bucky at length – a mostly one-sided conversation – that he’s going off console for the night. That he’s going to go get something to eat, get some rest, see their dogs, and he’ll talk to Bucky again in the morning. No one knows if Bucky understands. 

While Curt conducts his post-docking cabin inspection and prepares for transfer to the crew capsule, Bucky wakes up again.

“Gale?” he says. He doesn’t sound so pained anymore, but his voice carries a distinct fear and need for comfort that kills Curt to hear.

The voice that comes back isn’t his husband’s. It’s Helen, gently reminding Bucky that Gale is off shift now. 

Bucky goes quiet. Curt watches his eyes drift closed, a frown on his face. Rosie and Alex have to help maneuver his unconscious body through the hatch.

—

Even when he was just an awkward teenager in high school, still growing into the good looks that made the girls swoon, Gale knew that he would become a military man. Not only was it in his blood, but it was the only way he could afford to get to college. The only way he could afford to get out of the town that trapped him in his father’s misfortunes. 

He always imagined himself marrying some nice girl with a stable, predictable job. Someone who he could count on coming home to. Someone who he could love and who could love him just as much. Someone who could give him a family. Someone, somewhere, who he didn’t have to worry about staying safe, staying alive. 

For a long time, everyone, including him, thought that was Marge.

But well into his teenage years, during that tumultuous time when everything feels like a big deal and you’re trying so hard to figure out who you are, who you were, and who you want to be, he realized something. He didn’t love Marge like that. He didn’t particularly like girls at all. He found himself more interested in the boys around him. The hot football player with the kind smile who sat next to him in world history and made Gale, just for half a second, try to vaguely understand sports. The lead in the school musical who sometimes asked Gale for help with his homework in calculus. The cute exchange student with the adorable accent in his French class, who would compliment Gale on his pronunciation.

Okay.

So, not a girl, then. Some nice guy, perhaps. Some nice guy with a normal, stable, non-military, non-perilous job who Gale could come home to. Who he didn’t have to constantly worry about being in danger. That’s what Gale wanted.

And then he started college, and an absolute whirlwind named John Egan crashed into his life with all the subtlety of a category 4 hurricane. Gale tried his best not to fall for him, he really did. But it was absolutely hopeless from the very first time Bucky smiled at him, bright as the sun. He held out for a while, refusing John’s advances for months even as he secretly hoped the cute brown-haired boy with the broad shoulders and the irresistible smile and the wild personality wouldn’t give up.

He didn’t.

Because both of them were a little bit in love from that very first day. And Gale had to admit that his plans for someone stable, someone reliable, someone safe, had to be thrown out the window.

Because Bucky Egan was the complete opposite of everything Gale had ever hoped for.

He knew the risks. He keeps reminding himself of that. He knew the risks, but he just couldn’t stop himself from falling anyways. Just two boys – young men – who looked danger in the eye and laughed in its face, saw it as something to conquer for themselves. Two people with stars in their eyes and the sky in their hearts, trying their best to ground each other even when neither of them can seem to keep their feet on solid Earth.

He’s seen John off into danger more times than he can count. It’s gone both ways. They’ve gone months without seeing each other, weeks without knowing where the other was or if they were safe. They’ve waited with bated breath for someone to show up on their doorstep with the worst news imaginable. But it never came.

They’ve always come home to each other, because there is simply no other choice.

So Gale stands outside in his front yard as the sun sets over Nassau Bay. It physically pained him to tell Bucky that he was going off shift, especially when he couldn’t tell if Bucky understood. Or if he’d wake up again in an hour and Gale would be gone and he wouldn’t know why. Wouldn’t know why he’d left, why he’d abandoned him. Gale sat at that console with his head in his hands, wondering if he should stay. He sat there well past the end of his shift. Well past handing Helen the headset. He sat there until Harding gently pulled him up, wrapped him in his arms, and told him, “You need to go home, son. We’ll take care of him.” 

So he left, and now he’s here, still not convinced that it was the right thing to do. He ate half of the sandwich that Marge made for him but couldn’t stomach the rest. He paced his living room, fighting the urge to turn on the news, to watch the press conference that Marge had moderated earlier in the afternoon. He broke open the scabs on his hands once again because he couldn’t stop picking at them, smearing blood across his face when he rubbed tiredly at his eyes. Marge had to wipe it off. He chucked his phone across the room because he couldn’t bear the way that it taunted him, inviting him to scroll social media or stare obsessively at the wedding photos that he still hasn’t been able to look through. It scared the dogs when the phone hit the wall, and it strangled his heart in a way that made him collapse to the floor all over again, angry and frustrated and scared. 

Things are looking up, so why is he still so damn scared?  

But the dogs came back. They crawled up beside him, Pepper with her head in his lap and Meatball nudging gently at his bloody hand. And they sat there together, a family waiting for dad to come home, until Marge took his hand and insisted that he needed fresh air. 

So now they’re here, in his front yard as night falls upon them. Marge stands beside him, holding him up with her presence alone, the dogs sitting at their feet. Across the road, a door opens, and Maggie runs towards them, her red curls bouncing against her back as she skips across the road. A broad smile is on her face, but she grows somber when she sees the sadness on Gale’s.

Carefully, she takes his hand in her own, little fingers gripping his, and all of them look together towards the horizon.

“Is John coming home soon?” the girl asks.

Gale closes his eyes and holds his breath. He feels Maggie squeeze his hand, and he squeezes back. Marge wraps an arm around him, whispers the word breathe as she does.

“Yeah, Mags,” Gale finally says. “He’ll come home soon.” He has to.

As blacks and blues spread like ink over the sky, Marge points to a dim sliver of light above. The little hint of a crescent moon peeks out of the darkness, finally visible for the first time since Benny woke Gale in the night what seems like forever ago. It’s a moon that John is no longer on, just like he’s not on this Earth. Instead, he’s somewhere in between, floating in the beautiful, unpredictable void of the great infinity up above. A flicker among that sky of stars.

He’s somewhere up there, back aboard Orion once again.

Because he’s going to come home.

---

---

Part 15

Terms:

H-dot: time derivative of height (the rate of ascent) AGS: abort guidance system PGNS: primary guidance and navigation system (pronounced 'pings')

[lonestarflight]

Apollo Missions: Apollo 5

A schematic highlighting the major milestones of the Apollo 5 mission to test LM-1.

Diagram of the Saturn IB used for the unmanned LM-1 test flight.

"A nearly perfect performance by the Saturn IB placed the S-IVB-204 stage and its LM-1 payload into an initial 163 by 222 kilometer orbit with an inclination of 31.6° following 10 minutes and 3.3 seconds of powered flight. After 35 seconds in orbit, the nose cone was successfully jettisoned with the four panels of the SLA deployed 9 minutes and 15 seconds later. LM-1 used its RCS to separate from S-IVB-204 at 23:38:58 GMT about halfway through its first revolution and into a 167 by 224 kilometer orbit. After separation, LM-1 changed its attitude to cold soak its propulsion system for the next two orbits.

Diagram showing the configuration of LM-1 inside of its Spacecraft Launch Adapter (SLA).

With its primary duties concluded, S-IVB-204 performed a number of engineering tests including the dumping of residual cryogenic propellants and helium pressurant through the stage’s J-2 engine. This procedure would help lighten the stage for easier control in orbit and prepare future S-IVB stages for use as a 'wet' orbital workshop as proposed for the Apollo Application Program which was planned to follow the initial Apollo lunar landing missions (a program which later evolved into Skylab). After the propellant dump was successfully completed at 01:19:33 GMT on January 23, the stage was in a 155 by 223 kilometer orbit. Although it was not tracked, the orbit of S-IVB-204 was expected to decay ten revolutions after the separation of LM-1 about 15½ hours after launch.

An artist conception of LM-1 separating from its spent S-IVB stage.

Following the three-hour cold soak of LM-1, a pair of burns were planned for the descent propulsion system (DPS) followed by two burns of the ascent propulsion system (ASE). The first 39-second burn of the DPS would start at a throttle setting of 10% then ramp up to full thrust for the last 12 seconds to simulate the initial deorbit burn which would start the descent towards the lunar surface. The second firing of the DPS would last for 739 seconds and use a series of throttle settings representative of an actual descent to the lunar surface. Immediately afterwards, the abort staging would be tested with an initial five-second burn of the APS. A subsequent firing of the APS would continue until the stage’s propellants were depleted after about 445 seconds completing the primary mission about 6½ hours after launch. Because the LM ascent stage was expected to be left in a comparatively long-lived 315 by 815 kilometer orbit after the completion of the last APS burn, extended mission activities were planned until the ascent stage depleted its consumables about seven hours later.

-Animation of LM-1 in orbit

At 02:47:49 GMT on January 23 (just shy of four hours after liftoff), LM-1 was commanded to start the first of two planned burns of the DPS but the engine unexpectedly shutdown after firing for only four seconds leaving the spacecraft in a 170 by 222 kilometer orbit instead of the planned 215 by 330 kilometer orbit. After examining the telemetry, ground controllers quickly located the source of the problem. The LM’s guidance computer had been programmed to abort the maneuver and shutdown the DPS if it did not provide the expected acceleration level after four seconds – a situation which would normally indicate a problem with the DPS. Because the pressure-fed propulsion system was purposely running at lower than nominal pressure for these tests, it would now take six seconds to reach full thrust. It was this oversight which resulted in the premature shutdown of the DPS.

Cutaway diagram of LM-1 used for the first unmanned test flight of the Lunar Module (LM)

As a result of the problem, a preplanned alternate mission was adopted by ground controllers which would meet the minimum mission requirements while keeping LM-1 in touch with tracking stations for key maneuvers.

An artist conception of the firing of the LM descent propulsion system (DPS) during the Apollo 5 mission.

With the guidance system deactivated, the DPS was ignited by ground command for a 33-second burn at 04:58:49 GMT during the fourth revolution. The second burn of the DPS for the alternate mission sequence was commanded at 04:59:54 GMT for an abbreviated 28-second burn.

This was followed by the abort staging test and a 60-second burn of the APS. All systems worked as intended during this alternate mission’s three burns. The 228 meter per second total change in velocity from these three propulsive maneuvers boosted LM-1 into a 172 by 961 kilometer orbit.

-Animation of LM-1 Ascent Stage in orbit.

After these first three firings of the propulsion systems, the primary control system was reactivated for the balance of the mission. Unfortunately the guidance computer, which had been in a passive mode during the abort staging, had not taken into account the change in spacecraft mass and used excessively long burns of the RCS to control attitude as if it had a fully loaded descent stage still attached. This resulted in higher than expected RCS usage and eventual propellant depletion after only about an hour. Fortunately the RCS could be configured to draw from the APS propellant supply to provide attitude control during the mission’s final burn. Because of the timing and other requirements of the burns in the alternate mission plan, this second burn of the APS would be in the retrograde direction which would send the spacecraft into Earth’s atmosphere ending the Apollo 5 mission.

Flight Director Gene Kranz (left) and Dr. Gilruth (right) shown in the Mission Control Center at the conclusion of the Apollo 5 mission

With the ground track of LM-1 beginning to drift beyond the mission’s tracking stations due to the one-orbit delay to implement the alternate mission, the remainder of the mission had to be completed by the next revolution. The second burn of the APS started at 06:32:20 GMT during the fifth revolution. As planned, the sequencer automatically closed the valves supplying the RCS with propellant about 161 seconds later. Without attitude control, the ascent stage began to tumble as the APS continued to fire for another 190 seconds before its propellants were finally depleted. The last telemetry was received from LM-1 at 06:40:18 GMT on January 23 ending the Apollo 5 mission 7 hours, 52 minutes and 10 seconds after launch. The LM-1 ascent stage reentered the Earth’s atmosphere and was destroyed over the Pacific Ocean some 640 kilometers off the coast of Central America. The inactive descent stage of LM-1 fell from orbit on February 12.

"Map showing the ground track of the Apollo 5 mission as flown and the location of tracking stations supporting the mission.

Although the Apollo 5 mission had encountered problems forcing a switch to an alternate mission plan, the overall performance of LM-1 was good enough to satisfy the mission’s main objectives. And with the requirement to certify the LM for crewed test flights satisfied, a potential second unmanned test flight with LM-2 was cancelled allowing one more mission to be cut from the Apollo program’s increasingly tight schedule. With LM-2 being unsuitable for manned flight without significant reworking to meet new requirements in the wake of the Apollo 1 fire, it was set aside as work continued on LM-3 for the first manned LM test flight on Apollo 9."

-information from DrewExMachina: link

[kleopatra45]

Hi khi, what if one has both the atmakaraka and amatykaraka in the same nakshatra? The planets are 2° apart sun and mercury in the same nakshatra.

When both the Atmakaraka and Amatyakaraka are in the same nakshatra, it creates a powerful synergy in Vedic astrology.

The Atmakaraka is the planet that holds the highest degree in your natal chart (within any sign), representing your soul's desires, deepest lessons, and primary karmic path in this lifetime.

The Amatyakaraka is the planet with the second-highest degree, symbolizing your career, professional life, and how you fulfill your soul's mission in the material world.

When both the Atmakaraka and Amatyakaraka are in the same nakshatra (a lunar mansion), their energies are closely intertwined, leading to a more focused and intensified expression of that nakshatra's qualities.

Having both these karakas in the same nakshatra signifies a strong alignment between your soul's purpose (Atmakaraka) and your professional or worldly pursuits (Amatyakaraka). Your career or duties are likely to directly reflect your soul's deeper desires.

The nakshatra they occupy will color the expression of both the Atmakaraka and Amatyakaraka. Each nakshatra has its own set of myths, deity associations, and characteristics. The influence of the nakshatra can bring specific themes into your life, such as creativity, spirituality, communication, or leadership.

With the Sun and Mercury only 2° apart, this close conjunction often results in a phenomenon known as "Budha-Aditya Yoga" (a combination of the Sun and Mercury), which enhances intelligence, communication skills, and leadership abilities.

A close conjunction, especially with the Sun, might lead to Mercury being "combust," which means its energy might be somewhat overpowered by the Sun’s intense rays. However, this can also mean a more driven and focused mind, especially in the areas governed by the nakshatra.

Example:

If in Ashlesha Nakshatra (Ruled by Mercury):

This combination might give a very sharp mind, strong communication abilities, and a knack for dealing with complex or hidden matters (like research or occult knowledge).

If in Krittika Nakshatra (Ruled by the Sun):

The focus might be on leadership, cutting through obstacles, and being a guiding light for others, with a strong drive to achieve recognition and success in your professional life.

Having both the Atmakaraka and Amatyakaraka in the same nakshatra indicates that your soul's journey and professional path are deeply connected. This alignment suggests that by following your professional pursuits, you're also fulfilling your soul's purpose. The specific nakshatra will give more detailed insights into the nature of this connection and the themes that are most prominent in your life.

©️kleopatra45

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

Study reveals origins of lunar water and its connection to earth's early history

The team analyzed water in nine samples from the Apollo lunar mission, using a high-precision triple oxygen isotope technique. This method, developed by Dr. Morgan Nunn Martinez of the University of California, San Diego, separates water into its various binding phases—loosely bound, tightly bound, and trapped within minerals—via stepwise heating at 50°C, 150°C, and 1,000°C. Their findings provide crucial evidence that lunar water has a dual heritage: one part originating from early Earth-like material and another delivered through cometary impacts.

"This is a major step forward in unraveling where lunar water comes from," Dr. Maxwell Thiemens of the AMGC research group of the VUB explained. "Our data suggest that the Moon inherited water tracing back to Earth's formation, followed by later contributions from comets, delivering the water reservoirs we see today."

Three key results are central to the report. An early Earth signature: The oxygen isotopic composition closely matches enstatite chondrites, a meteorite type believed to be the building blocks of the Earth. There are also clear signs of cometary contribution: A significant portion of lunar water shows isotopic similarities to comets. A reducedimportance of solar wind: the study challenges the prevalent theory that the majority of lunar water was produced in situ via solar interactions with lunar silicates, presenting instead a complex mixing of sources.

This discovery is timely as nations and private enterprises intensify their efforts to establish permanent lunar bases. Understanding the water’s origins and distribution could have significant implications for sustaining human presence on the Moon.

"The data not only enhance our understanding of the Moon’s past but also pave the way for future space exploration and resource utilization. These findings should redefine how we think about water as a resource for long-term lunar habitation." Thiemens concludes.

This research has the potential to shape lunar and planetary science for decades to come, offering a deeper connection between Earth's water-rich environment and the Moon’s arid surface. With Artemis missions on the horizon, this pioneering study provides a crucial foundation for future exploration and resource planning.

[jcmarchi]

Scientists pin down the origins of the moon’s tenuous atmosphere

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/scientists-pin-down-the-origins-of-the-moons-tenuous-atmosphere/

Scientists pin down the origins of the moon’s tenuous atmosphere

While the moon lacks any breathable air, it does host a barely-there atmosphere. Since the 1980s, astronomers have observed a very thin layer of atoms bouncing over the moon’s surface. This delicate atmosphere — technically known as an “exosphere” — is likely a product of some kind of space weathering. But exactly what those processes might be has been difficult to pin down with any certainty.

Now, scientists at MIT and the University of Chicago say they have identified the main process that formed the moon’s atmosphere and continues to sustain it today. In a study appearing today in Science Advances, the team reports that the lunar atmosphere is primarily a product of “impact vaporization.”

In their study, the researchers analyzed samples of lunar soil collected by astronauts during NASA’s Apollo missions. Their analysis suggests that over the moon’s 4.5-billion-year history its surface has been continuously bombarded, first by massive meteorites, then more recently, by smaller, dust-sized “micrometeoroids.” These constant impacts have kicked up the lunar soil, vaporizing certain atoms on contact and lofting the particles into the air. Some atoms are ejected into space, while others remain suspended over the moon, forming a tenuous atmosphere that is constantly replenished as meteorites continue to pelt the surface.

The researchers found that impact vaporization is the main process by which the moon has generated and sustained its extremely thin atmosphere over billions of years.

“We give a definitive answer that meteorite impact vaporization is the dominant process that creates the lunar atmosphere,” says the study’s lead author, Nicole Nie, an assistant professor in MIT’s Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences. “The moon is close to 4.5 billion years old, and through that time the surface has been continuously bombarded by meteorites. We show that eventually, a thin atmosphere reaches a steady state because it’s being continuously replenished by small impacts all over the moon.”

Nie’s co-authors are Nicolas Dauphas, Zhe Zhang, and Timo Hopp at the University of Chicago, and Menelaos Sarantos at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.

Weathering’s roles

In 2013, NASA sent an orbiter around the moon to do some detailed atmospheric reconnaissance. The Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE, pronounced “laddie”) was tasked with remotely gathering information about the moon’s thin atmosphere, surface conditions, and any environmental influences on the lunar dust.

LADEE’s mission was designed to determine the origins of the moon’s atmosphere. Scientists hoped that the probe’s remote measurements of soil and atmospheric composition might correlate with certain space weathering processes that could then explain how the moon’s atmosphere came to be.

Researchers suspect that two space weathering processes play a role in shaping the lunar atmosphere: impact vaporization and “ion sputtering” — a phenomenon involving solar wind, which carries energetic charged particles from the sun through space. When these particles hit the moon’s surface, they can transfer their energy to the atoms in the soil and send those atoms sputtering and flying into the air. 

“Based on LADEE’s data, it seemed both processes are playing a role,” Nie says. “For instance, it showed that during meteorite showers, you see more atoms in the atmosphere, meaning impacts have an effect. But it also showed that when the moon is shielded from the sun, such as during an eclipse, there are also changes in the atmosphere’s atoms, meaning the sun also has an impact. So, the results were not clear or quantitative.”

Answers in the soil

To more precisely pin down the lunar atmosphere’s origins, Nie looked to samples of lunar soil collected by astronauts throughout NASA’s Apollo missions. She and her colleagues at the University of Chicago acquired 10 samples of lunar soil, each measuring about 100 milligrams — a tiny amount that she estimates would fit into a single raindrop.

Nie sought to first isolate two elements from each sample: potassium and rubidium. Both elements are “volatile,” meaning that they are easily vaporized by impacts and ion sputtering. Each element exists in the form of several isotopes. An isotope is a variation of the same element, that consists of the same number of protons but a slightly different number of neutrons. For instance, potassium can exist as one of three isotopes, each one having one more neutron, and there being slightly heavier than the last. Similarly, there are two isotopes of rubidium.

The team reasoned that if the moon’s atmosphere consists of atoms that have been vaporized and suspended in the air, lighter isotopes of those atoms should be more easily lofted, while heavier isotopes would be more likely to settle back in the soil. Furthermore, scientists predict that impact vaporization, and ion sputtering, should result in very different isotopic proportions in the soil. The specific ratio of light to heavy isotopes that remain in the soil, for both potassium and rubidium, should then reveal the main process contributing to the lunar atmosphere’s origins.

With all that in mind, Nie analyzed the Apollo samples by first crushing the soils into a fine powder, then dissolving the powders in acids to purify and isolate solutions containing potassium and rubidium. She then passed these solutions through a mass spectrometer to measure the various isotopes of both potassium and rubidium in each sample.

In the end, the team found that the soils contained mostly heavy isotopes of both potassium and rubidium. The researchers were able to quantify the ratio of heavy to light isotopes of both potassium and rubidium, and by comparing both elements, they found that impact vaporization was most likely the dominant process by which atoms are vaporized and lofted to form the moon’s atmosphere.

“With impact vaporization, most of the atoms would stay in the lunar atmosphere, whereas with ion sputtering, a lot of atoms would be ejected into space,” Nie says. “From our study, we now can quantify the role of both processes, to say that the relative contribution of impact vaporization versus ion sputtering is about 70:30 or larger.” In other words, 70 percent or more of the moon’s atmosphere is a product of meteorite impacts, whereas the remaining 30 percent is a consequence of the solar wind.

“The discovery of such a subtle effect is remarkable, thanks to the innovative idea of combining potassium and rubidium isotope measurements along with careful, quantitative modeling,” says Justin Hu, a postdoc who studies lunar soils at Cambridge University, who was not involved in the study. “This discovery goes beyond understanding the moon’s history, as such processes could occur and might be more significant on other moons and asteroids, which are the focus of many planned return missions.”

“Without these Apollo samples, we would not be able to get precise data and measure quantitatively to understand things in more detail,” Nie says. “It’s important for us to bring samples back from the moon and other planetary bodies, so we can draw clearer pictures of the solar system’s formation and evolution.”

This work was supported, in part, by NASA and the National Science Foundation.

[apod]

2024 January 30

SLIM Lands on the Moon Image Credit & Copyright: JAXA, Takara Tomy, Sony Co., Doshisha U.

Explanation: New landers are on the Moon. Nearly two weeks ago, Japan's Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) released two rovers as it descended, before its main lander touched down itself. The larger of the two rovers can hop like a frog, while the smaller rover is about the size of a baseball and can move after pulling itself apart like a transformer. The main lander, nicknamed Moon Sniper, is seen in the featured image taken by the smaller rover. Inspection of the image shows that Moon Sniper's thrusters are facing up, meaning that the lander is upside down from its descent configuration and on its side from its intended landing configuration. One result is that Moon Sniper's solar panels are not in the expected orientation, so that powering the lander had to be curtailed and adapted. SLIM's lander has already succeeded as a technology demonstration, its main mission, but was not designed to withstand the lunar night -- which starts tomorrow.

∞ Source: apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap240130.html

[retropopcult]

Apollo 9 astronauts Rusty Schweickart, Dave Scott and Jim McDivitt in front of their Saturn V Rocket. Their mission (March 3–13, 1969) was the third human spaceflight in the Apollo program. Unlike the missions before and after them, they did not leave Earth orbit and go to the moon. But it was important because it was the first test of a complete Apollo spacecraft (command and service module, lunar module and the Saturn rocket). During the mission, the crew tested the LEM and successfully performed a rendezvous and docking with the command module. The results of this mission proved the lunar module and landing craft were ready to go to the Moon on Apollo 10.

The excellent Tom Hanks/Ron Howard miniseries From the Earth to the Moon has a great episode that showcases Apollo 9 called "Spider" - the title comes from the nickname the astronauts gave the lunar lander. The show of course features the mission but does a superb job showing the numerous challenges the Grumman engineers had in designing, building and testing the lander.

[mysticstronomy]

WHAT IS INSIDE THE MOON??

Blog#340

Saturday, October 14th, 2023

Welcome back,

Well, the verdict is in. The Moon is not made of green cheese after all.

A thorough investigation published back in May has found that the inner core of the Moon is, in fact, a solid ball with a density similar to that of iron. This, researchers hope, will help settle a long debate about whether the Moon's inner heart is solid or molten, and lead to a more accurate understanding of the Moon's history – and, by extension, that of the Solar System.

"Our results," wrote a team led by astronomer Arthur Briaud of the French National Centre for Scientific Research in France, "question the evolution of the Moon magnetic field thanks to its demonstration of the existence of the inner core and support a global mantle overturn scenario that brings substantial insights on the timeline of the lunar bombardment in the first billion years of the Solar System."

Probing the interior composition of objects in the Solar System is most effectively accomplished through seismic data. The way acoustic waves generated by quakes move through and reflect from material inside a planet or moon can help scientists create a detailed map of the object's interior.

We happen to have lunar seismic data collected by the Apollo mission, but its resolution is too low to accurately determine the inner core's state. We know there is a fluid outer core, but what it encompasses remains under debate. Models of a solid inner core and an entirely fluid core work equally well with the Apollo data.

To figure it out once and for all, Briaud and his colleagues collected data from space missions and lunar laser ranging experiments to compile a profile of various lunar characteristics. These include the degree of its deformation by its gravitational interaction with Earth, the variation in its distance from Earth, and its density.

Next, they conducted modeling with various core types to find which matched most closely with the observational data.

They made several interesting findings. Firstly, the models that most closely resembled what we know about the Moon describe active overturn deep inside the lunar mantle. This means that denser material inside the Moon falls towards the center, and less dense material rises upwards. This activity has long been proposed as a way of explaining the presence of certain elements in volcanic regions of the Moon. The team's research adds another point in the "for" tally of evidence.

And they found that the lunar core is very similar to that of Earth – with an outer fluid layer and a solid inner core. According to their modeling, the outer core has a radius of about 362 kilometers (225 miles), and the inner core has a radius of about 258 kilometers (160 miles). That's about 15 percent of the entire radius of the Moon.

The inner core, the team found, also has a density of about 7,822 kilograms per cubic meter. That's very close to the density of iron.

Curiously, in 2011 a team led by NASA Marshall planetary scientist Renee Weber found a similar result using what were then state-of-the-art seismological techniques on Apollo data to study the lunar core. They found evidence of a solid inner core with a radius of about 240 kilometers, and a density about 8,000 kilograms per cubic meter.

Their results, Briaud and his team say, is confirmation of those earlier findings, and constitute a pretty strong case for an Earth-like lunar core.

And this has some interesting implications for the Moon's evolution.

We know not long after it formed, the Moon had a powerful magnetic field, which started to decline about 3.2 billion years ago. Such a magnetic field is generated by motion and convection in the core, so what the lunar core is made of is deeply relevant to how and why the magnetic field disappeared.

Given humanity's hope to return to the Moon in relatively short order, perhaps we won't have long to wait for seismic verification of these findings.

Originally published on www.sciencealert.com

COMING UP!!

(Wednesday, October 18th, 2023)

"IS THE MOON RUSTING??"