Halcyon's Wake: Faith
Chapter 5

Cabin Fever

The wonderful Colonel Jim Garner granted my wish later that evening, joining Mouse and I in the hangar and toting a very large, plastic, drinking-sleeve filled with the smoothest Kentucky bourbon you’ve ever sucked through a straw. After passing the bag a few times, I got on the intercom and requested that Beth join us. She actually showed up a few minutes later and took a long pull on the bag before I could even offer it to her, and then started laughing hysterically.

For a minute I thought she’d gone off the deep end, but the bourbon loosened my resolve and I started laughing right along with her, Mouse and Jim soon following suit. I still don’t know why we did, but felt a hell of a lot better afterwards, and the bag passed between us freely and frequently over the next few hours as we reflected on everything and anything - except for the present and all that it threatened or promised.

The booze hit the Colonel pretty hard and he passed out midway while telling us about a fishing trip he took with Neil Armstrong and Gordon Cooper. One minute he was laughing hard, the next he was sawing logs; so Mouse and I wrapped him in a blanket and velcro-ed him to the ceiling. I hadn’t seen Jim laugh that hard since we were back on earth - Lord knows the guy needed a serious dose of de-stressor, hell - we all did.

I patted the Colonel on the face and attempted to say “Sweet dreams, sir”, but it came out more like “Schweet dreamssir.” Damn good bourbon. Been awhile, I reckon.

Drinking in zero-g is kind of trippy. Literally. You know that woozy feeling you get when just one too many slips over the gums and the world starts to get that little lean and sway to it? Take that woozy wave, free it from gravity’s bounds and you’re setting smooth sail aboard the S.S. Bourbon to HappyTown. I decided then and there that Mouse needed to build a moonshine still - and soon.

Beth decided we all should do some yoga, and shot down my suggested game of ‘who-can-spit-in-this-bucket-across-the-cargo-bay’; Mouse said he was content just drifting and gabbing. Apparently Mouse won.

“Spin me, Zack - but not too fast or I’ll hurl.” Mouse said, floating my way.

I hooked my foot into a strap on the cargo floor and Mouse twisted into a fetal position, hands wrapped tight around his shins, face tucked close to his knees. We’d done this a lot over the past few months -plenty of time on our hands - and had just about perfected it. I put my left hand on the scruff of his skinny neck, the other grasping his ankles, then corkscrewed him like I was starting the engine on a vintage biplane - but with more finesse, and perhaps a bit more force than he asked for. Okay, a lot more.

Mouse was spinning like a pinwheel in a hurricane and just barely floating into the center of the cargo bay. This one would be a new record. I heard him mumble ‘asshole’ as he slowly began extending his arms and legs - eyes squeezed shut - hell, I thought I was gonna puke just watching him twirl, but his face remained placid and no chunks were redecorating the hangar.

“A mouse in motion tends to stay in motion,” quipped Beth, stretching into an elegant crescent moon pose.

I stretched my arms out and clasped my hands behind my head, afloat on a calm and peaceful river of bourbon bliss.

“Mouse, I’m wondering about something the President said this morning in the briefing - you never told me you’d talked to him about the UFO stuff,” I said, drifting along on my lazy river.

“He started asking me about it last month, after he had me hack into one of the laptops we recovered from the shuttle. I’m guessing it was the archive info with the details on Luna Base. One of the passengers that didn’t make it on board must have been a part of the program…”

“Didn’t make it on board?!” Beth roared. “They were launched into space and murdered on his orders, Mouse! And we had enough stores and space to accommodate every last one of them - you know that better than anyone.”

“I’m so sorry, Beth… I wasn’t thinking… please forgive me - it’s the bourbon, and the spinning…”

“Shut up, Mouse.” I said. “You need to get this out, Beth, and I figure now is as good a time as any - this has been a long time coming. Mouse didn’t have a damn thing to do with what happened, and you know it.”

Anger and tears brimmed in her eyes and I thought she was gonna bolt but I stared her down hard, liquid courage fueling my resolve. “If you want to blame somebody - you blame me. Mark was my best friend, Beth!”

She took a few deep breaths, forcing herself to calm down, then eyed me severely.

“Zack, you don’t get it. This isn’t about blame. The President’s a liar and guilty as hell, and no matter what you think, I don’t blame you or that snoring cocoon up there for what happened. Do I think you could and should have disobeyed that order, YES! But that doesn’t change the ‘why’, Zack. Bielski wanted somebody on that shuttle dead, and it’s all because of Luna Base... that was Mark’s laptop, Zack. He was part of the Luna project.” She put her face in her hands, crying softly.

Mouse had stopped spinning and sat staring open-mouthed at Beth, then looked at me for answers.

I didn’t have any. Just a thousand questions.

“Come on, Beth - that’s crazy - if Mark had been in any way associated with this stuff I would’ve known about it - we were practically glued to each other’s hips over the last decade. I don’t buy it.”

She daubed her eyes with her sleeve and took a deep, shuddering breath.

“He never knew that I knew. Nobody did. And I plan on keeping it that way. At least I did.”

“How did you know?” I asked, still not wanting to fully believe her, Mouse nodding in silent agreement.

She eyed us both carefully, then proceeded to tell us a story that just about ruined a perfectly good drunk. Almost, but not quite.

If anything, it was a damn good way to send off Mouse and Jim - and highly enlightening.

Things were about to get very, very interesting around here.

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