The Moon is a Harsh Mistress Part 1
Revised Apollo 13 Mission Patch
Art by Asaph 💛
"Okay, coming up on shut-down..." Commander James 'Jim' Lovell was watching the DSKY or display and keyboard of the lunar module computer and the timer, monitoring the critical lunar insertion manoeuvre that would put them into orbit around the moon.
Jack Swigert, the Command Module pilot, checked his own instruments. "Copy that, I make shut-down in 22 seconds, chamber pressure 100%, balance is on the money..."
The Apollo 13 spacecraft, currently comprising the Command and Service Module (CSM) Odyssey, and the Lunar Module (LM) Aquarius, was on the 'dark' side of the moon, though the surface ahead was half in sunlight as they swept past the terminator into the lunar dawn. Aquarius was the first Extended Lunar Module or ELM, with larger propellant tanks and other features to allow larger payloads and longer stays on the moon, though in this case it had been adapted to the goal of carrying Luna back to lunar orbit.
With Earth hidden by the body of the satellite they were reliant on the initial trajectory data provided by their capsule communicator, or Capcom, Jack Lousma back in Houston, before their spacecraft had been eclipsed by the moon, and now their own measurements and calculations. Their seats pressed into the backs of the three astronauts as the Service Module Propulsion System, or SPS, continued to fire retrograde, against their direction of travel, slowing the spacecraft into a low lunar orbit.
"5... 4... 3... 2... 1, Shutdown!" Lowell called, echoed by Swigert as the pressure let up, and they returned to free-fall. "Ball valves shut off. Check Gimbal motors."
The trio went through the shutdown procedure for the SPS, taking readsings and checking propellant reserves. A combination of data from the guidance computer and observations allowed them to check their final trajectory.
"Nicely done, Jack." Lowell commented, "Looks like that put us right in the groove."
Fred Haise was taking the opportunity to look through one of the command module viewports at the moon. "Then why does the street sign say, 'Welcome to Mars'?"
That got a chuckle out of the other two. Swigert exclaimed. "Damn, I knew I should have taken a left at Albuquerque!"
Despite the fact that all three had been thoroughly professional, there had been a certain tension between Jack and the other two astronauts initially, as he'd replaced Ken Mattingly, the scheduled Command Module Pilot only two days before lift-off. After months of training together, the loss of their original CMP due to a potential case of measles had hit hard. While as back-up, Swigert had undergone the same training, they didn't have the same rapport with him.
However, three days of living together in a space not much bigger than a walk-in closet had smoothed a lot of the rough edges. It helped that he had proved just as capable, and done his best to fit in the gap left behind.
"Will you look at that!" Jim Lowell exclaimed taking a turn at the port looking down at the lunar surface. "It looked just that way from Eight, and it never gets old..."
"Well, you're going to get a much closer look at it this time," Fred Haise replied. "Plus we finally get to see this secret gift Luna has been building at Fra Mauro, the one she hinted at when we last talked to her."
"What's with that, anyway?" Jack Swigert asked, "Bringing Luna back is the name of the game, but we're landing over 100 miles east of where Luna set up camp in Mare Cognitum. I know I'm late to the party, but asking her to up stakes and move sites when we could just go to her?"
Jim shrugged. "Bureaucracy and politics, as usual. Fra Mauro was chosen as the landing site for Thirteen well before Eleven launched. Remember, the original mission was to compare a highland area to the mare of the previous missions, and collect ejecta from Mare Imbrium. It's what was originally paid for, and when the idea of revisiting the Apollo 12 site was mooted instead, there was a minor palace revolution led by the selenologists.
"Even with our extended tanks and the mission profile changes, we won't be returning with a lot of samples, as most of the excess ascent mass budget is for Luna. However, they still expect us to follow the reduced sample schedule. Maybe if the sites were further apart, things might have been different, but a hundred miles is a couple of hours travel for Luna, so a compromise was reached."
"And as part of it, Luna gets a half hour of our first EVA to demonstrate her latest developments, including this surprise, partly because of that reduced schedule." Fred added.
"Well, at least you guys get to go down there. I'll be stuck up here, for the duration, keeping the lights on." Jack was monitoring his station as they talked, and following his checklist. "Rolling for attitude control. What's our time to AOS?"
"I'll check the schedule. Hey Freddo, where's the pad for the orbit 1 changes?" Jim asked, dropping back into his seat.
Fred passed the pad to him, which contained a form for orbital calculations. "Transition comes out to 84:05 for the latest update, based on our revised burn time."
Jim checked the figures, punching verbs into the DSKY to get the matching data. "Okay gang, so it's 84:32 for Earthrise and reaquiring communication from Houston. Make sure we have the cameras ready, it's a sight not to be missed, especially the first time."
Fred exclaimed, "Heck of a thing, that's later than Twelve managed, wasn't it? You'd think with how smooth things have gone so far we'd be ahead of them."
"Not a race Freddo, besides, we're hauling more mass with a modified ELM." Jim Lowell replied. "We took it up slow and smooth. Less wear and tear on the components. We even avoided most of the pogoing on the second stage we got on eight, maybe the extra mass or slower impulse created a damping effect."
Jack tapped the arm of his seat, even as he brought the combined spacecraft into the correct orientation. "Odyssey's solid. She can take it. Okay, we have lunar surface attitude."
They carried on the complex process of putting the spacecraft into it's lunar orbit mode, and the housekeeping tasks of maintaining the craft and themselves.
Several orbits later, they made their initial pass close enough to the landing site to examine it at 'close' range, from only a few hundred miles away. They were still in their initial, higher lunar orbit, preparing for the CSM to ferry the LM down to the lower orbit where it would separate and initiate Powered Descent to the lunar surface. It was just coming out of the darkness of the lunar dawn, another reason it had been difficult to see on their inital passes.
They were also hoping to make contact with Luna on the VHF band the command module would normally use for co-ordinating with the Lunar module during docking. As such it was low power, both in transmitting and recieving, but Luna's thaumically powered tranciever station would be considerably stronger as it could be laid out on a larger scale.
Jack Swigert was using the optical unit, a binocular telescope with a hood that was built into the command module and looked a lot like the science instrument Mr Spock frequently used. He was checking the landing site land marks against their maps, refining the trajectory of their orbit against the calculations.
"Okay, coming up on Fra Mauro... I can see the D crater and the edge... Old Nameless should be... what the hell?"
Jim was immediately by his side. "Do we have a problem?"
The question was echoed by the Capcom, currently Joseph Kerwin.
"I'm not sure what we have! Old Nameless has changed shape, and there seems to be a dark feaure next to it, I think it's rectangular..." Jack moved back to let the Mission Commander take a look.
The high magnification mode of the optical unit had a field of view of 1.8 degrees, which even at this close range translated to an area 5 miles in diameter. The features were smaller, but there was a definite impression of straight lines in the crater, and a small rectangle of blackness to the immediate south of it, and he was sure they weren't just artefacts of the long shadows cast by the lunar dawn.
"Houston, Thirteen, we are seeing changes to Old Nameless crater, south of the landing site. There are structures inside the crater, and a small black rectange just south of it. That could be a shadow cast from a low wall, or it might be an active thaumic solar array. If it's the second, it has to be a hundred yards wide at least."
"Apollo 13, this is Houston. We read you, is the landing site clear?"
Even in the short while they'd been talking, the ground had moved underneath them, and it took a few seconds to refocus on the area.
"Houston, this is Thirteen, we're not seeing any changes in the area north of the crater, Cone crater looks unchanged, but at this height we can't see much detail... with the sun so low, the light isn't helping. Even so I'm betting Luna has been busy. This has got to be something to do with the gift she talked about."
Fred Haise had been working with the VHF system, activating it far earlier than normal, as in other cicumstances it wouldn't be used until they co-ordinated separation and PDI for the lunar module. "Maybe we can ask her directly."
Cross-linking the VHF into the voice loop, he gave the nod to Lovell.
"Fra Mauro, this is Apollo Thirteen..." Jim paused, it was possible the omni-directional VHF antenna was still too weak to work at such a distance. "Luna, are you receiving?"
"Indeed, my friends! Fra Mauro Actual, responding!" Luna's voice was exuberant, not the full Shakesperian of her translated voice, but regular, of formal English.
It wasn't the first time they'd talked, or even the tenth, they had been having regular conversations with her since Febuary, first at the LRL, and lately at the new complex that had sprung up acrross the road from it at JSC. Jim knew that the Apollo 11 and 12 lunar crews had visited occasionally as well. It had been generally agreed that maintaining her previous connections and ensuring she was familiar with her rescuers and vice versa would be helpful. Of course, with Ken Maddingly being replaced at the last minute, James Swigert hadn't been introduced.
"This is Commander Lovell. It's good to hear from you."
"Sir James, you also. I was sorry to hear that Sir Ken was laid low with illness, I hope for his speedy recovery. Sir Fred is there, and Sir Ken's second?"
Fred Haise answered, "We're here Luna, I can't wait to get down there and see you, and what you've been doing. About that, is the big black square a part of it?"
There was an adorable little whinny of annoyance over the comms. "You are most eagle eyed to have spotted it, I had hoped it would be a surprise entire. It is in truth a part of it, but only a small part. I will say no more for now, even as I speak, your craft had passed it's closest point, and I wish to greet your new companion before we pass beyond calling range."
Prompted by the others, Jack spoke. "Jack Swigert, ma'am. At your service."
"Sir Jack, I am honoured by your service. If I remember rightly, you will helm the command module as your companions descend to the surface. A lonely job, but a needful one."
Jack grinned. "I'll be here when you need me."
"Then may the stars and harmony keep you on your course, and may we meet soon." Luna replied, her voice already getting fainter as the distance increased and the signal to noise ratio decreased, fading beyond the range of the VHF system to decipher.
Jim spoke for the S band connection back to Earth. "Houston, Apollo 13. We have made sucessful first contact with Luna, though we didn't find out much about what she'd been building down there."
"I was monitoring Thirteen. Luna seems to be in fine form today." Kerwin replied. "I'll need you to check the PDI schedule against our latest returns..."
The process of ensuring the tandem spacecraft was ready for the next mission phase continued.
&&&
"Ready the hatch Freddo." Jim Lovell said as he moved to the opposite side of the LM command section, from Fred Haise. The hatch was hinged towards Fred's position, and the swing arc required them both to stand aside. "Cabin pressure is down to 2.6 psi, check suit pressure."
"I have 4.1." Haise replied, He flexed his right arm, reaching up to the right side of his PLSS backpack. "Gotta say this isn't bad at all."
"3.9." Jim reached out and closed the dump valve above the LM hatch, as the gauge reached 2.5 psi, stopping the depressurisation, then reached up to touch the feedwater valve handle on his own Portable Life Support System, testing his range of motion. This would feed water from the PLSS through the Liquid Cooling Garment against his skin, carrying away heat from the LCG to a sublimator on the PLSS, where the water would evaporate, taking the heat with it. "Let's hope this new procedure works out as well as it did in simulation."
Aquarius had a feature not found on any previous LM, a permanent thaumic atmospheric containment field across the surface of the front hatch. It meant the hatch could be opened without any depressurisation of the cabin down from the 5 psi of pure oxygen it normally operated at. Unfortunately, at 5 psi, the AL7 space suits used by the two astronauts would starfish when exposed to vacuum, the pressure differential being to great for their muscles to overcome.
For the suits to reach their nominal internal operating pressure of 3.85 psi meant that some depressurisation of the cabin was still needed, as the suits simply exhausted the excess gas. Testing had suggested maintaining the cabin pressure at 2.5 psi during EVA operations was a good compromise, allowing the astronauts to adjust more gently to the pressure change, and giving greater freedom of movement during EVA preparation. It would also ensure the LM was a safe haven in the event of an emergency, without the full force of an emergency pressurisation and the stress it would put on the hull, and extend the oxygen reserves used to refill it after each EVA.
Jim pulled the lever that opened the feedwater valve. Fred opened up the hatch, and Jim dropped down, levering himself carefully through the now open hatchway. He could feel the way the suit legs stiffened as they passed beyond into vacuum, but passing through the hatch in at least partial pressure made things easier. It was still an effort to get the larger visored helmet which fitted over the inner transparent pressure helmet past the ascent stage engine cover without banging into it, but with some assistance from Fred, he managed it.
He manoeuvred himself out onto the 'porch', the platform in front of the ladder, turned to sit with his back to the hatch. Haise had moved around to look out through the open hatch and help with a visual inspection. Lovell checked the instruments on his Remote Control Unit, the front mounted device that controlled his PLSS.
"Okay, Houston, CDR, I have water flag, pressure 3.75, battery, O2 at 98%. Min cooling and other readings okay."
"Copy, Jim, that matches our telemetry." Ken Mattingly was currently Capcom, and lacking the measles. It had been decided that as he'd trained alongside them, he would be their communications link for this most vital part of the mission.
"Jettison bag coming out." Fred Haise passed a large white bag out through the hatch, which Jim turned to collect and throw over the porch railing opposite the camera. It contained the cabin refuse produced from the LM.
Once the final checks were done, Fred reached through, fully extending Jim's PLSS antenna. By waiting until he was fully outside, it removed the risk of it being snapped off during the tight squeeze through the hatch. Jim simply sat and looked out for a moment, appreciating the view.
The landing pad Luna had built, modelled on the one for Apollo 12, was invisible from this angle, hidden underneath the lander. It was almost directly north of the feature they'd called Triplet crater, a set of three craters running north to south, and just to the west of a trio of overlapping craterlets they'd named Wierd crater. The early morning shadow of the lunar module stretched out ahead of him, throwing every variation in the terrain into sharp relief.
There were no other immediate signs of Luna's presence apart from the oddly regular shapes around Old Nameless further to the south and the eager pony herself, bouncing between her left and right hooves near to the foot of the ladder.
However, she kept silent, as Fred Haise levered himself out of the hatch, and Jim moved to accomodate him. climbing over the edge onto the top of the ladder. The lunar module pilot went through his own checks to see that his suit was fully functional, and Jim helped with the inspection. Fred pulled through the Equipment Transfer Bag and Lunar Equipment Conveyor, the fancy names for the bag and line used to lower equipment down from the cabin.
Lovell triggered the the Modular Equipment Stowage Assembly, the fold-out storage tray which carried the colour video camera currently set to view the foot of the ladder and the pad underneath, and the eager alicorn filly in the background. It also held some larger equipment they'd need right away, such as the flag and deployable S band antenna. "Houston, MESA deployed. Are you recieving a good signal?"
The three second delay of the response still caught him off guard. "Copy MESA deploy, Jim. Picture is coming through."
Jim Lovell started downwards. "I'm heading down the ladder. If I wait much longer, our friend may not need the ascent stage to reach orbit!"
There was a chuckle from Ken. "We see that Jim, and we're seeing you come into view... looking good, you're on the bottom rung."
Dropping down onto the LM footpad, he steadied himself and stepped out onto the fused regolith of the landing pad. "Okay, I'm stepping off the LM pad, Luna's landing pad is solid, it's a fine job, but feels slippery underfoot. I'm guessing the low gravity. About to cross onto the lunar surface..."
He crossed the de-dusting band, and stepped out onto the regolith, feeling it crunch under his boots, and the oversoles that protected them from direct contact with the regolith. "I'm on the moon's surface. Following in the footsteps of brave explorers, and adding my own. I've dreamed of this my whole life."
Luna had stopped bouncing and watched more calmly, if no less eagerly. She finally spoke over his VHF loop. "I am pleased to witness your dream come to be, Sir James."
"Thanks Luna." He wasn't yet comfortable bending down, but he went over to the alicorn, who was wearing her regular PLSS cover saddlebags and gold foil 'coolie' hat, but had added a cloak or horse blanket of the same Kapton gold foil underneath the saddlebags with wing slits, allowing her wings free movement. He winced slightly as he moved out of the LM's shadow, partly side-on to the rising sun, and turned to face directly away from it. He didn't pull down his gold visor as he didn't want to hide his face from Luna. "Man, that's bright."
As he reached Luna, the ground rose up before her, the regolith forming into a solid pillar she could stand on. She jumped up and landed on the flat top, at the height of his waist. While her muzzle was level with his chin, it made it possible to see eye to eye with her without looking or kneeling down.
"It is good to finally meet you face to face, after a fashion." she said, smiling and spreading her wings slightly.
Seeing her up close like this was very different from seeing her on the screen back at the LRL, something that had happened several times before a month ago, when she finally had to move across to the Fra Mauro site full time. The movement of her wings, her bright intelligent eyes, her eager, easy expression, for the first time he saw her as a real person, rather than an image or a mission goal.
"It's good to see you for real too, Luna." He suddenly realised what her posture meant, and leaned forward to give her a hug. He knew intellectually that she was an alien, once co-ruler of a kingdom, and a polymath with literal centuries of experience and knowledge, but right then, all he could see was his younger daughter.
Thinking of which, he joked, "My daughter Susan will be annoyed that I got to hug you, and she didn't!"
Luna released the hug, and said, "You mentioned her in our talks, yes? Very well then, when I am on Earth, I shall visit her for a hug of her own. It is fortunate I have an unlimited supply."
"First we have a schedule to keep, quite apart from what you want to show us." Jim stated, turning back to the Lunar Module to see Fred Haise lowering the ETB from the porch with the LEC. A Hasselblad camera sat around his neck.
"Indeed, then let us not tarry!" Luna jumped from her pillar and glided towards the lunar module, wings outstretched.
"Wait, you're flying?" Jim exclaimed, following her. "I thought you weren't able to do that on the moon, even though you use your powers and not airflow for lift."
Luna's delighted laugh as she landed showed she had hoped for a reaction like that. "In truth, I am not flying, Sir Edwin, Buzz that is, described it as 'falling with style'. He and Sir Neil have talked with me by radio, and he was interested in exactly how the geas that binds me to this orb is triggered to block my magic. While intent was a possibility, such things are complex, and for all their power, and being driven by such forces, the Elements of Harmony are direct, one might say, elemental, in their actions.
"He is greatly learned in matters of celestial navigation, beyond what was needed as a pilot; some experiments he suggested allowed us to discover a simpler answer. The geas prevents me from using my magic to move further away from the centre of the moon. My theory is that the power of the elements was divided, diminished in the dimensional split, so where it's full power would have been sufficient to bind me to the very substance of the moon, the reduced power forced it to find a simpler, low energy solution that fitted the parameters of the geas.
"It is why when I raised the pillar by magic, I had then to jump up by the strength of my own legs. Had I sat atop it, the pillar would not have risen. Fortunately it ignores non-magical effects, whether it be my own strength or your fine ship Aquarius, or this would be a somewhat wasted journey."
"Thankfully it isn't." Jim said, checking his cuff checklist, and moved to the foot of the ladder and started removing the contents of the ETB. "Houston, Apollo 13. We have made contact with Luna, and are proceeding with scheduled tasks."
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The most ominous word of them all: yet.
This mission patch was worth the wait alone, great chapter ♡
I hope Luna can save the crew if anything goes wrong.
So far so good, they've made a safe landing. Now they'll just have to get back.
A mission that historically failed before it began, has touched down successfully! However....goodness knows what new challenges lie in wait as the mission to bring Luna to earth begins in earnest!
11828338
something probably will go wrong. It IS Apollo 13 after all.
Looks like she may have made a 2001 Obelisk in her spare time. I wonder what effect she intends for it to have?
Excellent work, as always.
Ooo, a ticking time bomb in the O2 tanks! And the talk about the geas that prevents her from using magic on the Moon. Will that mean even on Earth she cannot use magic or is there a range to the spell that will fade/snap at some distance? I feel like the specific talk about the geas means she is still capped on casting magic no matter where she goes and will prevent her from just making any (looming) problem vanish with a flick of her horn. This doesn't mean she's completely helpless, considering all the runic work she's developed and shared. The runic air-seal on the LM's hatch will make it far easier for someone/somepony to go outside and check the damage too, rather than all the guessing in the original timeline.
Thinking a bit more on the geas... I hope it doesn't react to Luna's "escape" in the LM and make her mass increase or actively pull against her. That itself could prove fatal for the humans with her.
As always, I am infinitely happy to see this update.
The chapters always feel too short...
I cant remember how old Scott Manly is, if he was watching as a child or teen to be able to suggest his simple solution to the problem to come?
Every chapter of this mission feels like watching a lit fuse slowly burn towards inevitability.
I love this story soo far! Can't wait for part 2 of The Moon is a Harsh Mistress sometime later this week. If I had to guess... sometime from Wednesday to Friday.
A great chapter. i am really hoping nothing goes wrong, or at least nothing major.
Oh, I'm sure he did. Well played.
Waiting for the next shoe to drop.
Well, now I'm on edge.
When will it happen? I know an oopsie must happen at some point...
For what it's worth, I'd be really surprised if the same problem pops up for 13 ITTL - the Luna retrieval mission is a national security priority, so I could see them electing to go over Apollo 13's hardware with a fine toothed comb. Notably, any investigation for potential issues with SM-109 - the incident module for the OTL Apollo 13 failure - would show that one of the module's two oxygen tanks had previously been dropped at least 5 centimeters while installed as a component of an oxygen shelf that had been pulled from Apollo 10 to fix potential issues.
Even if the testing - which notably doesn't include filling the tank with liquid oxygen under normal circumstances - had come up clean, I could see the Nixon administration insisting that NASA not use previously damaged hardware be used for a mission as critical to both scientific discovery and the United States' national security. For that matter, ITTL I would assume that, even if SM-109 were initially selected for Apollo 13, the mission would be aborted and rolled back after the Countdown Demonstration Test showed that Oxygen Tank 2 was having trouble with its normal drain line. While a delay of a month isn't great, better to delay the mission a month but guarantee that Luna gets home safely than risk something going wrong in flight.
This is not yet the NASA of the days of Challenger, where Go Fever and normalization of deviance has eroded safety - and, just as importantly, Nixon and his administration are going to want to be 100% certain that Luna makes it to Earth safely.
Source for the information above is the Wikipedia article for Apollo 13.
I do wonder if Luna will be teleported to Equestria once her 1000-year exile ends
Well at least here Jim got on the moon
11828883
Another point worth noting is that the tank-stirring mechanism that sparked the explosion was experimental and redundant. Scientists at the time weren't sure if, in the absence of Earth's gravity, oxygen in the tank would spread and move to where it could be measured for pressure without assistance from a fan. Turns out that it spreads just fine.
Another fantastic chapter, I just love your attention to detail with the lunar excursion module and the depressurization process. Apollo 13 was one of my favorite movies growing up, and still is.
So good to finally see moon pony again and see her get hugs, I eagerly await the next chapter!
Hugs are mandatory even out in lunar space
TANSTAAFL
Great writing as always!
One of my favorite sci-fi books!
This made me realize that selenium was named after the moon...
Alondro's mind at this moment:
i2.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/334/412/a4e.gif
11829182 They really should have known it would. PV = nRT is independent of gravity.
Wait... did they just see the Monolith?
Also, I absolutely love that redone Apollo mission patch, kudos to your artist!
11830716
"I can't answer that, Dave."
Probably just missed an 'r'
And an 's'
Aah, no suggestions, all you, author :P
Already utilizing magic in their tech, how wonderful!