High Moon (2014) s01e01 Episode Script
Pilot
Astronauts used to be heroes.
Maybe we'll get a medal if we fix this sensor relay.
Buzz Aldrin's spacesuit wasn't issued by the bureau of prisons.
What a bunch of posers.
Those first astronauts, they were on the Moon for two and a half hours.
I'm doing 10 to 20.
I thought you said the first moon landing was fake.
All those medals they got? The only one they deserved? "Best actor.
" We got a bum satellite.
Satellites don't just fall out of the sky.
Um I think this one did.
Huh.
No.
Just stare at it.
That's good.
Here.
Can I see those, please? Yeah.
Nah.
It's toast.
Somebody cut that? Sabotage Probably the russians.
They are history's villains.
You worried about the russians, Leon? I I don't know.
You should be.
They've banked a hundred years of resentment about losing the race to get here, and now they're ready to cash in.
Huh.
Fascinating.
Whoa.
It looks like a root.
What is that? It's a flower.
Do we have earthquakes on the Moon? Not by definition.
Get up.
Get up, Leon! Compliments of Pilgrim Galactic.
You must be Eve St.
John-Smythe.
Thank you.
I am so sorry for your loss.
I can't imagine losing a brother and then being asked to investigate what caused the explosion you lost him to.
"Who.
" "What" caused it is for the forensic scientists.
I'm here to find out who caused it.
I'd want revenge, too.
Justice.
State-sanctioned revenge is still revenge.
So what part of the state is sanctioning you? I guess you could say I work for myself.
Everybody answers to somebody.
Unless they're you, of course.
I answer to the shareholders.
Don't you own the majority share? I answer to my father's legacy.
And his father's.
The St.
John-Smythe family have poured generations into bringing the Moon to the people of Earth, and you still haven't answered my question.
When I catch whoever's responsible, they'll answer to the air force office of special investigations.
I hope you find your justice.
Prepare for landing.
Your gravity suit is too cumbersome to put on yourself, so the sarcophagus does the heavy-lifting.
Doesn't leave much to the imagination.
We sacrificed modesty for efficiency.
And a view.
It's just like moving in Earth gravity.
By contrast, your spacesuit is ultra-light, designed to be taken on and off quickly.
Snappy.
Uh Self-filtering, smart-fibre clothing, so if you have to go, go forth and eliminate.
Just No solids.
And where's your space suit? Form-fitting, oxygen-recycling force-fields.
Beta-testing? Omega-testing.
I am wearing it.
You still get oxygen from your suit.
Don't run out.
Ah.
Yours? When it opens to the Moon's first recreational visitors in three months, we'll finally be delivering on the commitment made by this monument.
The Moon and her helium aren't just an energy drink to quench Earth's thirst for fuel.
She's a medal pinned in the night sky to commemorate mankind's greatest accomplishment and to remind everybody we're capable of more.
Very inspirational.
It's going to stay that way.
That little lander didn't just carry two men to the Moon, it carried the promise of bringing the Moon to everyone on Earth, and I'm not going to let sabotage, revenge, or Justice break that promise.
Bon voyage.
Ian Thurgood.
I'm Yama winehart.
I'm your lunar liaison.
The general's daughter.
A pleasure.
All mine.
I understand you're the one going into the debris ring to collect what's left of our physical evidence.
One of the perks of having muscles built for the Moon.
Yes.
I am "baby prime.
" First, and last, kid born on the Moon.
Oh, you're a big deal, you know.
Living proof that artificial gravity is not fetus-friendly.
So you aren't required to wear the, uh Same sous-vetements as the rest of us? That's right.
I don't have to wear any fancy underwear.
I'm a portrait of grace in Moon "g" s, but breathe like a 600-pound heifer in Earth gravity, which is kind of unfortunate, 'cause I'm a sweater.
Good luck with the general.
The entire Moon is just bigger than Africa, and the five countries scratching Helium-3 out of its green cheese share an area no bigger than the Sahara.
The japanese are our allies, the Indians don't have the tech for this kind of attack, and the brazilian-mexican coalition would've needed outside help.
That leaves the russians.
The russians? We're not even on their radar.
They've got no motive.
That we know of.
But we can assume that whatever country was responsible had inside help.
Suspects.
The U.
S.
economy is up cripple creek without a crutch, which means that instead of trained miners, we get white-collar criminals who chose manual labor here over prison time on Earth.
Smart people who did something not-so-smart and now have to work for free.
These are the "indentured servants" that fit the profile to go fifth column.
Why are they suspects if they're dead? Your brother, Martin Thurgood, was engaging in suspicious activity directly above the epicenter of the blast, and immediately preceding it.
He'd have to be a pretty stupid terrorist to blow himself up.
Well, "stupid" is a terrorist's Lingua Franca.
So until we recoup his body and prove otherwise, he's swimming laps in the suspect pool.
Your coming here is a mistake.
You're compromised.
"Compromised" suggests an intimacy I didn't share with my brother.
Well, then you must be hobbled by regret.
Either one comes at the cost of objectivity.
You wanted me to see that mugshot in the hope that I would crack, because you don't want an outsider running an investigation you think you should be in charge of.
I don't crack.
I find answers How did this happen, and who's to blame.
You say the russians, but you don't really say why, which suggests to me you know something you're not sharing, and that makes you, not me, general, the one who's compromised.
Now, let's place our competency concerns aside and focus on answers.
Let's start with the one that explains why the russians? Tranquility station sits on the Moon's largest stores of helium.
The russians are atop the smallest, but have the most high-tech drilling operations.
They're running out of gas? So they put their straw in our milkshake.
And you're letting them? Oh, no, no.
We have them red-handed, and you'd better believe we're gonna bend 'em over a barrel.
But their straw has to be discovered "Organically," to protect certain assets.
You've got a spy.
Velocity Rotation Altitude.
Place this in locus 276.
More moon buggy.
Marker 7-1-2, code for priority.
It looks like ordnance.
Repeat, marker 7-1-2 is a piece of a bomb.
Ew! Ew! Dead body.
Air! Debris ring blocking your view? It's not the Earth I'm looking for.
Hiya, Moose.
Never thought I'd be so happy to hear your "moose" call.
Ow! Geez What's with the The explosion, it, uh, wasn't an accident.
Well, what's that got to do with me? I don't know yet.
"Yet?" No.
Don't read into that.
How did you make it up there? My com-link was busted, so I bounced from one dead guy to the next, using their oxygen to stay alive.
And now here you are.
And now here you are.
This is a second chance.
I-I'm gonna be I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna be There was a flower.
Beg your pardon? Growing right out of the moon dirt.
Okay.
Fine.
Uh Look.
I love you, and I'm glad you're alive.
Here we go.
You're the sole survivor of a massive explosion, there's moon-buggy footage of you tampering with an unknown object at ground zero, and I'm looking for an inside man.
Okay, so this your idea of a second chance? Accusing me of being a terrorist? Your excuse you're not is that you saw a flower.
And we're back! It's only been, what, like, two years? And in two minutes, you're trying to get inside my head.
Because I need to know if you're working for the russians, and you won't just tell me if I ask you.
Uh yes, I will.
No, I'm not.
Has it occurred to you that being raised by a brother who's a mind-reading swami ruined my ability to tell a convincing lie? Or it made you better.
You're really committing to this moonflower story.
The whole moon could be a plant.
It could've spent the last billion years squeezing its little plant parts as hard as it can to sprout that one single flower.
And this might be the only point for another billion years to prove it, but you won't unclench long enough to even consider it.
Validating your hallucinations would only make me seem collusive or desperate, and I'm already gonna look bad just talking to you.
To who? Contact with your brother was an absolute breach of protocol.
We've already had this discussion, general.
Your brother showing up alive is a game-changer.
My mandate is two-pronged.
Prong one Find the party responsible for the helium-mine explosion, and parties are no fun when only one person shows up, so I've still got work to do, even if Marty is involved.
And prong two Make sure nothing like this happens again.
The fine print there is that I'm going to be here until I've installed a security apparatus that makes your base impregnable.
I am a fixture, general.
Your boss in special investigations disagrees.
You're done.
Connect to 123181.
Authorization Ian Thurgood.
Please stand by while we connect your call.
Thurgood.
I'm sorry to bother you, Mr.
secretary, but general winehart here seems to be playing politics and is trying to get me shipped home.
There won't even be a way to get home if our helium supply falls even one hitch short in its get-a-long.
General! Sir.
The whole damn western hemisphere is running on batteries as it is.
We're already rationing electricity because of this attack.
If there is one more, we are stewed.
I understand, sir.
Then why are you adding more "polyticks" to my already crumbling woodpile? Now, this whole damn mess is 100% under Thurgood's jurisdiction, so you give him everything he needs.
Am I making clear? As a bell, sir.
Thank you, sir.
Now, somebody shut this thing off! Have all your files on Marty and reports from your russian spy sent to me immediately.
You're running out of oxygen.
I always carry a spare.
Any scuttlebutt on an indentured servant named Martin Thurgood? Might be our trigger man.
Never heard of him.
Everybody's pretty hush-hush in the motherland.
They got something new to hide? Just the tunnel we've been digging to steal american helium.
New plan is to bury it before you find it.
Even with all your sabotage and subterfuge, that russian funnel's still nipping at my moonshine.
They haven't turned it on yet.
Then who the hell else is stealing our helium? Our output is down 13% from last month.
The russians are losing yields, too.
What do you know about this Thurgood guy? Small-potatoes felon.
Presumed dead in the blast, but then showed up alive, babbling about a flower, the same day his well-connected brother coincidentally arrived.
Whole thing stinks like fish.
I'll put a word-worm in the communications database and see if he turns up.
Any chance you haven't heard anything because they found out you're a spy? They've had plenty of opportunities to kill me, and haven't yet.
Never too late to start.
Stay lucky.
You rum-running me out in the middle of the night is a little shady.
I don't even know you.
Why didn't my brother join us? This isn't exactly an official, on-the-books sort of thing.
He's trying to help you prove your story without compromising himself.
That sounds like my brother, all right.
Ground-penetrating radar? There's a cavern beneath here.
Well, there were no mining tunnels this far out, right? Could it be part of the sinkhole? No.
It's definitely its own cave.
The fireball came out of that vent there.
Maybe where there's a flower, there's a garden.
Maybe.
You go first.
Hey, sergeant? Sergeant! I'm gonna unhook and go deeper.
I'm right behind you! Sergeant, you gotta see this.
There's roots Or something.
Whoa! Help! Sergeant! Sergeant! Get in here! Leak detected.
Oxygen level at 75%.
Oxygen level at 50%.
Leak contained.
Sergeant, where are you? Up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up! Just say it.
Stop chewing on it in your head and say it out loud.
Do you have any idea how this looks? Like I was attacked by an assassin? Presumably because I saw something I shouldn't have.
Like a flower.
You stole a moon buggy, snuck into a crime scene and survived another massive explosion.
It looks like you're working for the russians.
Oh, well, that's weird, 'cause the guy who attacked me was an Indian.
I suppose you think I stabbed myself, too? You did! Yes.
To plug the leak in my suit after I was stabbed the first time.
That sounds insane! Everything you're saying is coming off like some dumb criminal trying to come off like a hippy-dippy pacifist.
"I wasn't planting a bomb.
I saw a flower.
" "I stabbed myself because an Indian made me.
" Alright.
Okay.
Fine.
Let's pretend I'm completely gullible and irrational.
You've got 60 seconds to explain to me how a flower could possibly grow in a vacuum.
How would I know that? Ian, how would anybody know that? Even if lunar botany was a thing, it wouldn't be my thing.
I just saw it.
No thing is your thing.
That's your problem, Moose.
Okay, just because I don't need to dethrone you as the great potentate of the psyche doesn't mean I'm not driven.
Where are you? The moon I love.
Being on it and doing my small part to tame it is all the purpose I need.
Your calling is being indentured labor to pay off a felony conviction? Dreams really do come true.
30 seconds.
This is why I left.
First of all, you didn't leave! You were arrested.
Yeah, I got arrested so I could leave! And second of all, I'm doing everything I can to help you, but it's hard to help someone who's going out of their way to appear guilty! Okay, well, you got a funny way of showing it, because it was the guard you sent to help that ditched me! I didn't send a guard.
What do you mean, you didn't send a guard? What version of me have you seen in the last 25 years that would send some lackey that I don't know and that you don't know, to lead you into an area that everyone thinks you blew up? Well, somebody sent him! I was at my post all night, sir.
Security footage proves it.
You're dismissed, sergeant.
Sir.
Uh, quick question before you go, sergeant.
Can you hold your breath for two hours? Security footage shows you at your post, but oxygen logs say you weren't breathing.
You a hologram right now? No.
Seems real.
Who're you working for, horton? Why are they after Marty? Something he said in his debriefing.
I don't know what.
Who? Whose dole are you on? Russians? Indians? Sergeant? Sergeant, he asked you a question.
I haven't seen a brain-bomb since the war.
Nowadays, they can be rigged to explode based on specific neurological signatures.
Like when a mole is about to give up the goat? What was that? About Indians? Marty said an Indian stabbed him while he was busy "not" causing the last explosion.
Your pain-in-my-ass dipstick little brother is either working for the same people who did this, or he's a hapless patsy.
You got a damn lot of work to do convincing me it's door number two, or it's gonna take more than the secretary of the air force to keep you on my moon.
Fair.
Let's start with this.
Brain-bomb knew about Marty's debriefing.
Who have you talked to about it? Russian, Indian, or otherwise.
My russian spy may be compromised.
Hello, Stanislav.
Are the shackles really necessary? If you arranged to have Martin Thurgood killed.
I steal mining technology and drill bits.
I don't kill people.
Nobody else knew about his debriefing.
Have you mentioned his name to somebody? Nobody.
Well, let's assume you're just a really bad spy and not a murderer.
Why would the russians attack the americans? They spent a lot of rubles to build a tunnel to Filch U.
S.
helium, which they now have to tear down.
They would've gained nothing from an attack.
Well, there's plenty worth killing for on the moon.
Food.
Water.
Air.
Revenge.
Love.
So The russians want more air.
The russians want to control the moon, but they can't, because Eve St.
John-Smythe supplies everybody's oxygen.
If the russians were gonna attack anybody, they would attack her.
Evidence tag 0712.
Know what this is? Wasn't used for drilling.
I'll tell you what it was used for.
These are the bombs that caused the explosion.
This is Indian tech.
Indian? Yes, sir.
That greenish-white sheen is a magnesium-phosphorus coating.
The Indians coat their explosives with it so they can blast through titanium.
You know an awful lot about Indian technology that nobody else even thought existed.
I thought you thought I was working for the russians.
Now I'm an Indian spy? Mm.
At this rate, I'll be back to being american any minute now.
My most trusted man and your most trusted man both just cried "Indian.
" The difference between me and my brother and you and your spy is that he's lying to you.
I trust a highly-decorated war hero on my payroll over some helium-hacking felon any day, which is moot at this point, since they're saying the same thing.
Yes.
About the Indians.
But he's lying about working for you.
You have an Indian problem and a turncoat problem.
My best agent did not blow us up for anybody.
I've known him for 15 years.
We were in the war together.
Which is why you're trying so hard to believe him.
General, my job is to separate the chaff of deceit from the wheat of truth, and that man is a bushel of unshucked grain.
He didn't give you one reason to doubt him.
Did you know he's taken a lover? It's a committed relationship and said lover isn't living in America.
How in hades could you know that from talking about that Indian buckshot that crippled my mines? He has a tell, and I saw it when I mentioned love as a motive.
Even if he does have a little bacon on the side, that doesn't make him "Eggs-Benedict Arnold.
" He values that rasher more than you, and I can prove it, but you've got to let me do my job.
Son of a You know he could do that? Nobody can do that.
Emergency override.
Authorization winehart.
Show me your hands.
Show me your hands! Don't shoot.
Holy sh Could give us a sec, corporal? Nice ride.
Yeah, my ninja skills don't translate to the infirmary's artificial gravity.
Whoa You mean you're baby prime? Yes, I'm her.
Hey.
Listen.
I read your file.
You said you saw a flower.
You saw it, too? I had it in my hand.
Yeah, until you floated along and knocked it out.
Then you know I'm not crazy.
For a convicted felon, I want cold, hard evidence in my hand.
Again.
How do I know you're not gonna take my cold, hard evidence and leave me hanging by my felonious toes? Listen, you and I, we saw life in the lifeless, and that is a gift that we have a duty to protect.
So we're bonded, whether we like it or not.
That's a little churchy.
There was some kind of glowing gunk on my smart-fiber, pee-filtering spacesuit.
It's like a pollen or sap or something.
Okay, where's the suit now? Well, they gotta process evidence somewhere.
Wait, no! Help! Somebody! Hello! What the hell just happened to that guy? If he goes out with a pop, you can bet he'll come back with a bang.
That's Messed up.
It's just D.
N.
A.
Yeah, doesn't make it any better.
Who are you? I'm the one everybody thinks is trying to kill you, which is why keeping you alive is my number-one priority.
Why are the Indians trying to assassinate you? No idea.
You're not a very good liar.
I saw a flower growing on the surface of the moon.
Did she see it, too? No.
She just came here to thank me for saving her in the debris ring.
Wrong place, wrong time.
Bad liar.
But he's got the right idea.
You should probably keep your lips zipped if you don't want to end up in the same boat as him.
Wait.
Take me with you.
I'm going to India.
The Indians want to kill you.
Which means they know about the flower, which means they know what this is all about.
Indians Are you nuts? You don't even know who this guy works for.
I've been blown off the surface of the moon, stabbed, blown up again, almost strangled, and had my ears popped by a disappearing assassin that can breathe in a vacuum.
I like my odds with a guy whose good reputation depends on keeping me alive.
I can be helpful.
I have to find that flower.
You said it.
We have a duty.
And how do you plan on getting out of here? Trash chutes? Look, if you hack the doors they'll be on you like stink.
Ironically, stink will also be on you like stink.
It's my access card to everywhere on tranquility station.
For the Moon.
Not just for the Moon.
Your main suspect and my main suspect are heading right into the belly of the beast.
Together.
Oh.
They are not working together.
I mean, they are now, but they weren't earlier.
I mean "earlier" earlier, not like, "3 hours ago" earlier.
Though they weren't then either, right, 'cause clearly, they How are you standing in artificial gravity? - Doctor, sit.
- No, no, no.
I'm fine.
You know what? I accidentally took two caffeine pills and forgot that I had, like, a pot of coffee this morning.
Yama, did you happen to see when the security cameras were disabled? Maybe the Indian Assassin did it before he attacked? Or whoever that other guy was He seemed wily.
Wily enough to get out through the trash chutes without setting off any alarms.
That is pretty wily.
Why were you in the infirmary, anyway? Trees don't grow on the Moon, Thurgood, so whatever you're barking up is wrong.
No more coffee.
Java jitters don't give people superhuman strength.
There's only two eggs in our basket My spy and your brother, and right now, they're heading straight into an Indian omelette.
Trash chutes were opened with a universal access code.
Your spy have one of those? Remember that speech you gave me about being "compromised"? So I trust my daughter and you trust your brother.
Now we just have to trust each other.
So what's our plan for getting in? You're the guy smart enough to disable the ion wrist restraints, you tell me.
Are y Are you kidding me? You really don't have a plan? How did you get out of those cuffs? Silicone absorbs the electricity generated from the ions Ah.
No electricity, no lock.
Clever.
Maybe we can just use the trash chutes again? The Indians burn their trash.
We're walking right through their front door.
I'm just sayin' When you got a loaf of dark rye, people tend to notice the slice of white bread in the middle.
Why don't ya take the wheel, "wonder bread"? Oh! Holy crap! Relax.
I collected his D.
N.
A.
after he attacked you.
Put these back on.
You're bait.
Try to act beat down.
What, you mean like this? Oh Yeah.
That's better.
This is Eve St.
John-Smythe for Indra Ravimurtha.
Please respond while this is still a diplomatic call.
This is Eve St.
John-Smythe for Indra Ravimurtha.
Please respond while this is still a diplomatic call.
Well, you hit me for nothing.
Where is everybody? Is that statue breathing? That thing's breathing on me.
What are you looking for? Oh.
Okay.
Let me just go look for Something.
Oh, look.
I found absolutely nothing over here.
After you.
Oh, no.
I don't do first anymore.
Nice.
This looks exactly like the interior of that shaft of death I climbed into by the sinkhole.
Could be connected.
Indians might be siphoning U.
S.
helium.
Is that even possible? It's been known to happen.
Check this out! Flowers.
Indians may have learned how to grow crops in moon mud.
Or maybe they're trying to create oxygen.
This is some heavy science.
Game-changing, moon-shattering, big money, I'd-kill-me-too science.
It's gonna take a little bit more than some crumbling dirt to shake the pillars of creation.
Like, maybe an actual Indian to tell us what's really going on here.
Yeah Where is everybody? Russians.
Trofim? 6 of us, 6,000 Indians.
What would custer say? Time to take a stand.
Blink that trigger-happy glint from your eyes.
The Indian base has been abandoned.
The Indians don't appear to be anywhere on the Moon.
None of them? Could another base be hiding them? No one has requisitioned the extra oxygen it would take.
There are no bodies.
No signs of trauma.
Thousands of people don't disappear into thin air There is no air.
You didn't come here to tell us that.
I beg your pardon, but I most certainly did.
Then the question is why you came here, seeing as we would've found all this out ourselves.
There's a team of russians already inside the Indian base.
Since when did you start guard-dogging the russians? Since I found out you were racing to the Indian base, guns cocked.
The Moon can only handle one international incident at a time.
So you're lying.
I'm stalling.
My experience on the Moon has been that there's one-sixth the Earth's gravity and roughly the same quotient of truth, and stalling is just one more way to avoid it.
In fact, the only person I've spoken to who's been honest to the point of absurdity is my brother, and if you're satisfied the russians have had time to abscond, I'd like to go find him.
What is the deal with you two? What's going on? Okay, well, why is he yelling? Whoa-whoa-whoa.
Whoa.
Whoa Whoa.
W-w-w-wait, wait! Lunar Japan welcomes you.
I thought everything japanese up here was fully-automated.
It is.
Mikiko's supposed to be in hibernation.
I wake up when something breaks.
I am like "the maytag man.
" Oh, uh, w-what's broken now? Just the rules.
I didn't come to the Moon to sleep.
I have unlimited tools to build lots of toys.
Besides the t-Rex, I'm also building working replicas of stegosaur and triceratops, so people on Earth with telescopes can look back in time to when dinosaurs ruled the Moon.
I found that glowing pollen from your spacesuit But it's gone ish.
I absorbed it.
Accidentally.
It made her go bananas.
But You seem pretty cool with the fact that your liver might be choking on lunar hemlock right now.
We scanned her bodily humors.
She is full of nothing but the blood and guts of Yama winehart.
Yeah, I mean, I feel fine.
I respect your need for a vision quest or whatever, but look at the Indians.
Oh wait.
No, you can't, actually, because they're all gone, very possibly because of that same sap that you absorbed.
I'm just saying Maybe it's time to get your dad to dig for flowers so that you don't end up like them.
Look, finding this flower is a discovery for science.
Not business.
Not the military.
It's a discovery for us to make.
We don't need help to dig for flowers.
T-Rex digs.
Filipov! I want these consoles fired up and cooking me a hearty dish of "what the hell happened here?" Now.
Somebody else had the same idea.
Russians.
I'm going to search the ambassador's office.
Corporal, private.
Escort miss St.
John-Smythe.
No.
I'll go with her.
Keep a weather-eye out for wayward Indians.
What are you hiding? You'll have to be more specific.
What did you find back there? Oxygen logs.
But I haven't seen real paper since I was a girl.
Only two kinds of people use paper Romantics, and spies afraid of being hacked.
There's certainly nothing romantic about oxygen logs.
According to this, they haven't used oxygen in three months.
Must be a hoax.
Tastes like oxygen.
Maybe they figured out a way to make it synthetically.
Maybe they did And maybe it poisoned them.
Maybe we're being poisoned right now.
Maybe you are.
Eyes Ambassador Ravimurtha? Eyes Sir What happened here? Darkness.
Where are the others? They are here.
Eyes in the darkness.
I see them And they see you.
Okay.
Where did his eyes go? Where did he go? Filipov? Filipov? What is that? A giant human cephalopod.
What in the high hell were these people doing here? Where is my brother? A dinosaur stepped on him.
It's been a very strange day.
Somebody get Japan on the horn! Handcuff them and get 'em out of Sir, he doesn't have hands.
They're over here.
Put your weapons down.
Stick a cork in every blowhole this base has and stop them before they get out.
Yes, sir.
Please stand by as we connect your call.
Thurgood.
This is the emergency line.
Sir, you need to implement section 361 immediately.
Tell me exactly how one isolated explosion can mushroom into a quarantine of the Moon? Please.
An entire colony of people is missing.
There are reports of Impossible biological entities.
I personally witnessed a man disappear into thin air beneath the gaze of 10,000 de-socketed human eyeballs, and everyone here is breathing oxygen of an unknown origin.
Now, Mr.
secretary, whatever is causing all this is some kind of something that should be contained.
The Earth cannot survive without the Moon, so you damn well better deliver me some answers soon and keep this quarantine quiet! Yes, sir.
We keep thinking the flower's new.
Maybe it's super-old, but it's just always fed off helium trapped deep down in the Moon.
Yes.
We mined its food, so it grows out further and further, until it poops through the surface.
"Popped.
" Pooped? Popped.
We are on the verge of explaining how a flower can grow in a vacuum.
If my brother were here, I would politely tell him to "suck it.
" Yuck.
Ahem.
Brothers make terrible fathers.
Mm.
Pretty sure you were a delight.
By the way, your relationship sounds super-healthy.
I said "politely.
" And this coming from the girl who calls her dad "the general.
" Okay, um, the difference is, I love the general.
Well, I love Ian.
But he has got so much riding on being right, and he's so freaked out he's gonna be wrong, he has to mentally eviscerate everybody around him so that his brain doesn't eat itself.
I just wish my brain was big enough for the both of us.
Sounds like regret.
There! Check it out! Back up, back up, back up, back up, back up! Open emergency frequencies.
Hailing general Gale Lynn winehart.
Did you die? You wish.
How far did we fall? I can't see the hole above us.
I'm stuck.
Shimmy! I am shimmying! Okay, well, shimmy harder.
I'm giving you a hard shimmy.
Shut up and save your oxygen.
They won't find us under all this rock.
I've got a signal topside.
Hey Hey.
I know what you're thinking, but if you go into one of those caves, you'll be lost forever.
Don't even think about it.
Mikiko'll send help.
Yeah, but listen.
It's my fault that you're even in this mess.
It's your fault I'm even alive.
You've saved me three times now.
It's starting to get embarrassing.
Three minutes to oxygen depletion.
Three minutes? Yeah, I snuck out of the american base, like, four hours ago now.
Initiating plasma link.
Oxygen transfer in progress.
What are you doing? You're gonna need all your oxygen.
I'm just trying to give you a fighting chance.
I have to find a clean signal to the surface.
Don't worry, okay? Mikiko will have extra o-2.
- Yama, don't - Don't die! Whoa What exactly were your brother and your daughter hoping to dig up? I think a little grim silence might do us all some good.
Evading is an even greater enemy of the truth than stalling, agent Thurgood.
It's our allegiance to secrets and lies that landed us in this hassle.
Your holding everyone's oxygen for ransom is what caused this "hassle.
" Without my oxygen, you'd be mining helium with a hammer and sickle for your comrades in baza kedr.
I single-handedly prevented a russian monopoly on the Moon, then I sacrificed sound business practice by letting everybody get a free slice of the moon-pie.
That idealism failed.
Now You get to work for me, transparently, to deliver the future our forebearers promised Or I bowl you over.
Oxygen depleted.
Oxygen levels replenished.
Ian We were looking for the flower.
I know.
I believe you.
Where is Yama? She's not with you? She was looking for a way out.
Oxygen depleted.
Oxygenated environment detected.
Maybe we'll get a medal if we fix this sensor relay.
Buzz Aldrin's spacesuit wasn't issued by the bureau of prisons.
What a bunch of posers.
Those first astronauts, they were on the Moon for two and a half hours.
I'm doing 10 to 20.
I thought you said the first moon landing was fake.
All those medals they got? The only one they deserved? "Best actor.
" We got a bum satellite.
Satellites don't just fall out of the sky.
Um I think this one did.
Huh.
No.
Just stare at it.
That's good.
Here.
Can I see those, please? Yeah.
Nah.
It's toast.
Somebody cut that? Sabotage Probably the russians.
They are history's villains.
You worried about the russians, Leon? I I don't know.
You should be.
They've banked a hundred years of resentment about losing the race to get here, and now they're ready to cash in.
Huh.
Fascinating.
Whoa.
It looks like a root.
What is that? It's a flower.
Do we have earthquakes on the Moon? Not by definition.
Get up.
Get up, Leon! Compliments of Pilgrim Galactic.
You must be Eve St.
John-Smythe.
Thank you.
I am so sorry for your loss.
I can't imagine losing a brother and then being asked to investigate what caused the explosion you lost him to.
"Who.
" "What" caused it is for the forensic scientists.
I'm here to find out who caused it.
I'd want revenge, too.
Justice.
State-sanctioned revenge is still revenge.
So what part of the state is sanctioning you? I guess you could say I work for myself.
Everybody answers to somebody.
Unless they're you, of course.
I answer to the shareholders.
Don't you own the majority share? I answer to my father's legacy.
And his father's.
The St.
John-Smythe family have poured generations into bringing the Moon to the people of Earth, and you still haven't answered my question.
When I catch whoever's responsible, they'll answer to the air force office of special investigations.
I hope you find your justice.
Prepare for landing.
Your gravity suit is too cumbersome to put on yourself, so the sarcophagus does the heavy-lifting.
Doesn't leave much to the imagination.
We sacrificed modesty for efficiency.
And a view.
It's just like moving in Earth gravity.
By contrast, your spacesuit is ultra-light, designed to be taken on and off quickly.
Snappy.
Uh Self-filtering, smart-fibre clothing, so if you have to go, go forth and eliminate.
Just No solids.
And where's your space suit? Form-fitting, oxygen-recycling force-fields.
Beta-testing? Omega-testing.
I am wearing it.
You still get oxygen from your suit.
Don't run out.
Ah.
Yours? When it opens to the Moon's first recreational visitors in three months, we'll finally be delivering on the commitment made by this monument.
The Moon and her helium aren't just an energy drink to quench Earth's thirst for fuel.
She's a medal pinned in the night sky to commemorate mankind's greatest accomplishment and to remind everybody we're capable of more.
Very inspirational.
It's going to stay that way.
That little lander didn't just carry two men to the Moon, it carried the promise of bringing the Moon to everyone on Earth, and I'm not going to let sabotage, revenge, or Justice break that promise.
Bon voyage.
Ian Thurgood.
I'm Yama winehart.
I'm your lunar liaison.
The general's daughter.
A pleasure.
All mine.
I understand you're the one going into the debris ring to collect what's left of our physical evidence.
One of the perks of having muscles built for the Moon.
Yes.
I am "baby prime.
" First, and last, kid born on the Moon.
Oh, you're a big deal, you know.
Living proof that artificial gravity is not fetus-friendly.
So you aren't required to wear the, uh Same sous-vetements as the rest of us? That's right.
I don't have to wear any fancy underwear.
I'm a portrait of grace in Moon "g" s, but breathe like a 600-pound heifer in Earth gravity, which is kind of unfortunate, 'cause I'm a sweater.
Good luck with the general.
The entire Moon is just bigger than Africa, and the five countries scratching Helium-3 out of its green cheese share an area no bigger than the Sahara.
The japanese are our allies, the Indians don't have the tech for this kind of attack, and the brazilian-mexican coalition would've needed outside help.
That leaves the russians.
The russians? We're not even on their radar.
They've got no motive.
That we know of.
But we can assume that whatever country was responsible had inside help.
Suspects.
The U.
S.
economy is up cripple creek without a crutch, which means that instead of trained miners, we get white-collar criminals who chose manual labor here over prison time on Earth.
Smart people who did something not-so-smart and now have to work for free.
These are the "indentured servants" that fit the profile to go fifth column.
Why are they suspects if they're dead? Your brother, Martin Thurgood, was engaging in suspicious activity directly above the epicenter of the blast, and immediately preceding it.
He'd have to be a pretty stupid terrorist to blow himself up.
Well, "stupid" is a terrorist's Lingua Franca.
So until we recoup his body and prove otherwise, he's swimming laps in the suspect pool.
Your coming here is a mistake.
You're compromised.
"Compromised" suggests an intimacy I didn't share with my brother.
Well, then you must be hobbled by regret.
Either one comes at the cost of objectivity.
You wanted me to see that mugshot in the hope that I would crack, because you don't want an outsider running an investigation you think you should be in charge of.
I don't crack.
I find answers How did this happen, and who's to blame.
You say the russians, but you don't really say why, which suggests to me you know something you're not sharing, and that makes you, not me, general, the one who's compromised.
Now, let's place our competency concerns aside and focus on answers.
Let's start with the one that explains why the russians? Tranquility station sits on the Moon's largest stores of helium.
The russians are atop the smallest, but have the most high-tech drilling operations.
They're running out of gas? So they put their straw in our milkshake.
And you're letting them? Oh, no, no.
We have them red-handed, and you'd better believe we're gonna bend 'em over a barrel.
But their straw has to be discovered "Organically," to protect certain assets.
You've got a spy.
Velocity Rotation Altitude.
Place this in locus 276.
More moon buggy.
Marker 7-1-2, code for priority.
It looks like ordnance.
Repeat, marker 7-1-2 is a piece of a bomb.
Ew! Ew! Dead body.
Air! Debris ring blocking your view? It's not the Earth I'm looking for.
Hiya, Moose.
Never thought I'd be so happy to hear your "moose" call.
Ow! Geez What's with the The explosion, it, uh, wasn't an accident.
Well, what's that got to do with me? I don't know yet.
"Yet?" No.
Don't read into that.
How did you make it up there? My com-link was busted, so I bounced from one dead guy to the next, using their oxygen to stay alive.
And now here you are.
And now here you are.
This is a second chance.
I-I'm gonna be I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna be There was a flower.
Beg your pardon? Growing right out of the moon dirt.
Okay.
Fine.
Uh Look.
I love you, and I'm glad you're alive.
Here we go.
You're the sole survivor of a massive explosion, there's moon-buggy footage of you tampering with an unknown object at ground zero, and I'm looking for an inside man.
Okay, so this your idea of a second chance? Accusing me of being a terrorist? Your excuse you're not is that you saw a flower.
And we're back! It's only been, what, like, two years? And in two minutes, you're trying to get inside my head.
Because I need to know if you're working for the russians, and you won't just tell me if I ask you.
Uh yes, I will.
No, I'm not.
Has it occurred to you that being raised by a brother who's a mind-reading swami ruined my ability to tell a convincing lie? Or it made you better.
You're really committing to this moonflower story.
The whole moon could be a plant.
It could've spent the last billion years squeezing its little plant parts as hard as it can to sprout that one single flower.
And this might be the only point for another billion years to prove it, but you won't unclench long enough to even consider it.
Validating your hallucinations would only make me seem collusive or desperate, and I'm already gonna look bad just talking to you.
To who? Contact with your brother was an absolute breach of protocol.
We've already had this discussion, general.
Your brother showing up alive is a game-changer.
My mandate is two-pronged.
Prong one Find the party responsible for the helium-mine explosion, and parties are no fun when only one person shows up, so I've still got work to do, even if Marty is involved.
And prong two Make sure nothing like this happens again.
The fine print there is that I'm going to be here until I've installed a security apparatus that makes your base impregnable.
I am a fixture, general.
Your boss in special investigations disagrees.
You're done.
Connect to 123181.
Authorization Ian Thurgood.
Please stand by while we connect your call.
Thurgood.
I'm sorry to bother you, Mr.
secretary, but general winehart here seems to be playing politics and is trying to get me shipped home.
There won't even be a way to get home if our helium supply falls even one hitch short in its get-a-long.
General! Sir.
The whole damn western hemisphere is running on batteries as it is.
We're already rationing electricity because of this attack.
If there is one more, we are stewed.
I understand, sir.
Then why are you adding more "polyticks" to my already crumbling woodpile? Now, this whole damn mess is 100% under Thurgood's jurisdiction, so you give him everything he needs.
Am I making clear? As a bell, sir.
Thank you, sir.
Now, somebody shut this thing off! Have all your files on Marty and reports from your russian spy sent to me immediately.
You're running out of oxygen.
I always carry a spare.
Any scuttlebutt on an indentured servant named Martin Thurgood? Might be our trigger man.
Never heard of him.
Everybody's pretty hush-hush in the motherland.
They got something new to hide? Just the tunnel we've been digging to steal american helium.
New plan is to bury it before you find it.
Even with all your sabotage and subterfuge, that russian funnel's still nipping at my moonshine.
They haven't turned it on yet.
Then who the hell else is stealing our helium? Our output is down 13% from last month.
The russians are losing yields, too.
What do you know about this Thurgood guy? Small-potatoes felon.
Presumed dead in the blast, but then showed up alive, babbling about a flower, the same day his well-connected brother coincidentally arrived.
Whole thing stinks like fish.
I'll put a word-worm in the communications database and see if he turns up.
Any chance you haven't heard anything because they found out you're a spy? They've had plenty of opportunities to kill me, and haven't yet.
Never too late to start.
Stay lucky.
You rum-running me out in the middle of the night is a little shady.
I don't even know you.
Why didn't my brother join us? This isn't exactly an official, on-the-books sort of thing.
He's trying to help you prove your story without compromising himself.
That sounds like my brother, all right.
Ground-penetrating radar? There's a cavern beneath here.
Well, there were no mining tunnels this far out, right? Could it be part of the sinkhole? No.
It's definitely its own cave.
The fireball came out of that vent there.
Maybe where there's a flower, there's a garden.
Maybe.
You go first.
Hey, sergeant? Sergeant! I'm gonna unhook and go deeper.
I'm right behind you! Sergeant, you gotta see this.
There's roots Or something.
Whoa! Help! Sergeant! Sergeant! Get in here! Leak detected.
Oxygen level at 75%.
Oxygen level at 50%.
Leak contained.
Sergeant, where are you? Up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up! Just say it.
Stop chewing on it in your head and say it out loud.
Do you have any idea how this looks? Like I was attacked by an assassin? Presumably because I saw something I shouldn't have.
Like a flower.
You stole a moon buggy, snuck into a crime scene and survived another massive explosion.
It looks like you're working for the russians.
Oh, well, that's weird, 'cause the guy who attacked me was an Indian.
I suppose you think I stabbed myself, too? You did! Yes.
To plug the leak in my suit after I was stabbed the first time.
That sounds insane! Everything you're saying is coming off like some dumb criminal trying to come off like a hippy-dippy pacifist.
"I wasn't planting a bomb.
I saw a flower.
" "I stabbed myself because an Indian made me.
" Alright.
Okay.
Fine.
Let's pretend I'm completely gullible and irrational.
You've got 60 seconds to explain to me how a flower could possibly grow in a vacuum.
How would I know that? Ian, how would anybody know that? Even if lunar botany was a thing, it wouldn't be my thing.
I just saw it.
No thing is your thing.
That's your problem, Moose.
Okay, just because I don't need to dethrone you as the great potentate of the psyche doesn't mean I'm not driven.
Where are you? The moon I love.
Being on it and doing my small part to tame it is all the purpose I need.
Your calling is being indentured labor to pay off a felony conviction? Dreams really do come true.
30 seconds.
This is why I left.
First of all, you didn't leave! You were arrested.
Yeah, I got arrested so I could leave! And second of all, I'm doing everything I can to help you, but it's hard to help someone who's going out of their way to appear guilty! Okay, well, you got a funny way of showing it, because it was the guard you sent to help that ditched me! I didn't send a guard.
What do you mean, you didn't send a guard? What version of me have you seen in the last 25 years that would send some lackey that I don't know and that you don't know, to lead you into an area that everyone thinks you blew up? Well, somebody sent him! I was at my post all night, sir.
Security footage proves it.
You're dismissed, sergeant.
Sir.
Uh, quick question before you go, sergeant.
Can you hold your breath for two hours? Security footage shows you at your post, but oxygen logs say you weren't breathing.
You a hologram right now? No.
Seems real.
Who're you working for, horton? Why are they after Marty? Something he said in his debriefing.
I don't know what.
Who? Whose dole are you on? Russians? Indians? Sergeant? Sergeant, he asked you a question.
I haven't seen a brain-bomb since the war.
Nowadays, they can be rigged to explode based on specific neurological signatures.
Like when a mole is about to give up the goat? What was that? About Indians? Marty said an Indian stabbed him while he was busy "not" causing the last explosion.
Your pain-in-my-ass dipstick little brother is either working for the same people who did this, or he's a hapless patsy.
You got a damn lot of work to do convincing me it's door number two, or it's gonna take more than the secretary of the air force to keep you on my moon.
Fair.
Let's start with this.
Brain-bomb knew about Marty's debriefing.
Who have you talked to about it? Russian, Indian, or otherwise.
My russian spy may be compromised.
Hello, Stanislav.
Are the shackles really necessary? If you arranged to have Martin Thurgood killed.
I steal mining technology and drill bits.
I don't kill people.
Nobody else knew about his debriefing.
Have you mentioned his name to somebody? Nobody.
Well, let's assume you're just a really bad spy and not a murderer.
Why would the russians attack the americans? They spent a lot of rubles to build a tunnel to Filch U.
S.
helium, which they now have to tear down.
They would've gained nothing from an attack.
Well, there's plenty worth killing for on the moon.
Food.
Water.
Air.
Revenge.
Love.
So The russians want more air.
The russians want to control the moon, but they can't, because Eve St.
John-Smythe supplies everybody's oxygen.
If the russians were gonna attack anybody, they would attack her.
Evidence tag 0712.
Know what this is? Wasn't used for drilling.
I'll tell you what it was used for.
These are the bombs that caused the explosion.
This is Indian tech.
Indian? Yes, sir.
That greenish-white sheen is a magnesium-phosphorus coating.
The Indians coat their explosives with it so they can blast through titanium.
You know an awful lot about Indian technology that nobody else even thought existed.
I thought you thought I was working for the russians.
Now I'm an Indian spy? Mm.
At this rate, I'll be back to being american any minute now.
My most trusted man and your most trusted man both just cried "Indian.
" The difference between me and my brother and you and your spy is that he's lying to you.
I trust a highly-decorated war hero on my payroll over some helium-hacking felon any day, which is moot at this point, since they're saying the same thing.
Yes.
About the Indians.
But he's lying about working for you.
You have an Indian problem and a turncoat problem.
My best agent did not blow us up for anybody.
I've known him for 15 years.
We were in the war together.
Which is why you're trying so hard to believe him.
General, my job is to separate the chaff of deceit from the wheat of truth, and that man is a bushel of unshucked grain.
He didn't give you one reason to doubt him.
Did you know he's taken a lover? It's a committed relationship and said lover isn't living in America.
How in hades could you know that from talking about that Indian buckshot that crippled my mines? He has a tell, and I saw it when I mentioned love as a motive.
Even if he does have a little bacon on the side, that doesn't make him "Eggs-Benedict Arnold.
" He values that rasher more than you, and I can prove it, but you've got to let me do my job.
Son of a You know he could do that? Nobody can do that.
Emergency override.
Authorization winehart.
Show me your hands.
Show me your hands! Don't shoot.
Holy sh Could give us a sec, corporal? Nice ride.
Yeah, my ninja skills don't translate to the infirmary's artificial gravity.
Whoa You mean you're baby prime? Yes, I'm her.
Hey.
Listen.
I read your file.
You said you saw a flower.
You saw it, too? I had it in my hand.
Yeah, until you floated along and knocked it out.
Then you know I'm not crazy.
For a convicted felon, I want cold, hard evidence in my hand.
Again.
How do I know you're not gonna take my cold, hard evidence and leave me hanging by my felonious toes? Listen, you and I, we saw life in the lifeless, and that is a gift that we have a duty to protect.
So we're bonded, whether we like it or not.
That's a little churchy.
There was some kind of glowing gunk on my smart-fiber, pee-filtering spacesuit.
It's like a pollen or sap or something.
Okay, where's the suit now? Well, they gotta process evidence somewhere.
Wait, no! Help! Somebody! Hello! What the hell just happened to that guy? If he goes out with a pop, you can bet he'll come back with a bang.
That's Messed up.
It's just D.
N.
A.
Yeah, doesn't make it any better.
Who are you? I'm the one everybody thinks is trying to kill you, which is why keeping you alive is my number-one priority.
Why are the Indians trying to assassinate you? No idea.
You're not a very good liar.
I saw a flower growing on the surface of the moon.
Did she see it, too? No.
She just came here to thank me for saving her in the debris ring.
Wrong place, wrong time.
Bad liar.
But he's got the right idea.
You should probably keep your lips zipped if you don't want to end up in the same boat as him.
Wait.
Take me with you.
I'm going to India.
The Indians want to kill you.
Which means they know about the flower, which means they know what this is all about.
Indians Are you nuts? You don't even know who this guy works for.
I've been blown off the surface of the moon, stabbed, blown up again, almost strangled, and had my ears popped by a disappearing assassin that can breathe in a vacuum.
I like my odds with a guy whose good reputation depends on keeping me alive.
I can be helpful.
I have to find that flower.
You said it.
We have a duty.
And how do you plan on getting out of here? Trash chutes? Look, if you hack the doors they'll be on you like stink.
Ironically, stink will also be on you like stink.
It's my access card to everywhere on tranquility station.
For the Moon.
Not just for the Moon.
Your main suspect and my main suspect are heading right into the belly of the beast.
Together.
Oh.
They are not working together.
I mean, they are now, but they weren't earlier.
I mean "earlier" earlier, not like, "3 hours ago" earlier.
Though they weren't then either, right, 'cause clearly, they How are you standing in artificial gravity? - Doctor, sit.
- No, no, no.
I'm fine.
You know what? I accidentally took two caffeine pills and forgot that I had, like, a pot of coffee this morning.
Yama, did you happen to see when the security cameras were disabled? Maybe the Indian Assassin did it before he attacked? Or whoever that other guy was He seemed wily.
Wily enough to get out through the trash chutes without setting off any alarms.
That is pretty wily.
Why were you in the infirmary, anyway? Trees don't grow on the Moon, Thurgood, so whatever you're barking up is wrong.
No more coffee.
Java jitters don't give people superhuman strength.
There's only two eggs in our basket My spy and your brother, and right now, they're heading straight into an Indian omelette.
Trash chutes were opened with a universal access code.
Your spy have one of those? Remember that speech you gave me about being "compromised"? So I trust my daughter and you trust your brother.
Now we just have to trust each other.
So what's our plan for getting in? You're the guy smart enough to disable the ion wrist restraints, you tell me.
Are y Are you kidding me? You really don't have a plan? How did you get out of those cuffs? Silicone absorbs the electricity generated from the ions Ah.
No electricity, no lock.
Clever.
Maybe we can just use the trash chutes again? The Indians burn their trash.
We're walking right through their front door.
I'm just sayin' When you got a loaf of dark rye, people tend to notice the slice of white bread in the middle.
Why don't ya take the wheel, "wonder bread"? Oh! Holy crap! Relax.
I collected his D.
N.
A.
after he attacked you.
Put these back on.
You're bait.
Try to act beat down.
What, you mean like this? Oh Yeah.
That's better.
This is Eve St.
John-Smythe for Indra Ravimurtha.
Please respond while this is still a diplomatic call.
This is Eve St.
John-Smythe for Indra Ravimurtha.
Please respond while this is still a diplomatic call.
Well, you hit me for nothing.
Where is everybody? Is that statue breathing? That thing's breathing on me.
What are you looking for? Oh.
Okay.
Let me just go look for Something.
Oh, look.
I found absolutely nothing over here.
After you.
Oh, no.
I don't do first anymore.
Nice.
This looks exactly like the interior of that shaft of death I climbed into by the sinkhole.
Could be connected.
Indians might be siphoning U.
S.
helium.
Is that even possible? It's been known to happen.
Check this out! Flowers.
Indians may have learned how to grow crops in moon mud.
Or maybe they're trying to create oxygen.
This is some heavy science.
Game-changing, moon-shattering, big money, I'd-kill-me-too science.
It's gonna take a little bit more than some crumbling dirt to shake the pillars of creation.
Like, maybe an actual Indian to tell us what's really going on here.
Yeah Where is everybody? Russians.
Trofim? 6 of us, 6,000 Indians.
What would custer say? Time to take a stand.
Blink that trigger-happy glint from your eyes.
The Indian base has been abandoned.
The Indians don't appear to be anywhere on the Moon.
None of them? Could another base be hiding them? No one has requisitioned the extra oxygen it would take.
There are no bodies.
No signs of trauma.
Thousands of people don't disappear into thin air There is no air.
You didn't come here to tell us that.
I beg your pardon, but I most certainly did.
Then the question is why you came here, seeing as we would've found all this out ourselves.
There's a team of russians already inside the Indian base.
Since when did you start guard-dogging the russians? Since I found out you were racing to the Indian base, guns cocked.
The Moon can only handle one international incident at a time.
So you're lying.
I'm stalling.
My experience on the Moon has been that there's one-sixth the Earth's gravity and roughly the same quotient of truth, and stalling is just one more way to avoid it.
In fact, the only person I've spoken to who's been honest to the point of absurdity is my brother, and if you're satisfied the russians have had time to abscond, I'd like to go find him.
What is the deal with you two? What's going on? Okay, well, why is he yelling? Whoa-whoa-whoa.
Whoa.
Whoa Whoa.
W-w-w-wait, wait! Lunar Japan welcomes you.
I thought everything japanese up here was fully-automated.
It is.
Mikiko's supposed to be in hibernation.
I wake up when something breaks.
I am like "the maytag man.
" Oh, uh, w-what's broken now? Just the rules.
I didn't come to the Moon to sleep.
I have unlimited tools to build lots of toys.
Besides the t-Rex, I'm also building working replicas of stegosaur and triceratops, so people on Earth with telescopes can look back in time to when dinosaurs ruled the Moon.
I found that glowing pollen from your spacesuit But it's gone ish.
I absorbed it.
Accidentally.
It made her go bananas.
But You seem pretty cool with the fact that your liver might be choking on lunar hemlock right now.
We scanned her bodily humors.
She is full of nothing but the blood and guts of Yama winehart.
Yeah, I mean, I feel fine.
I respect your need for a vision quest or whatever, but look at the Indians.
Oh wait.
No, you can't, actually, because they're all gone, very possibly because of that same sap that you absorbed.
I'm just saying Maybe it's time to get your dad to dig for flowers so that you don't end up like them.
Look, finding this flower is a discovery for science.
Not business.
Not the military.
It's a discovery for us to make.
We don't need help to dig for flowers.
T-Rex digs.
Filipov! I want these consoles fired up and cooking me a hearty dish of "what the hell happened here?" Now.
Somebody else had the same idea.
Russians.
I'm going to search the ambassador's office.
Corporal, private.
Escort miss St.
John-Smythe.
No.
I'll go with her.
Keep a weather-eye out for wayward Indians.
What are you hiding? You'll have to be more specific.
What did you find back there? Oxygen logs.
But I haven't seen real paper since I was a girl.
Only two kinds of people use paper Romantics, and spies afraid of being hacked.
There's certainly nothing romantic about oxygen logs.
According to this, they haven't used oxygen in three months.
Must be a hoax.
Tastes like oxygen.
Maybe they figured out a way to make it synthetically.
Maybe they did And maybe it poisoned them.
Maybe we're being poisoned right now.
Maybe you are.
Eyes Ambassador Ravimurtha? Eyes Sir What happened here? Darkness.
Where are the others? They are here.
Eyes in the darkness.
I see them And they see you.
Okay.
Where did his eyes go? Where did he go? Filipov? Filipov? What is that? A giant human cephalopod.
What in the high hell were these people doing here? Where is my brother? A dinosaur stepped on him.
It's been a very strange day.
Somebody get Japan on the horn! Handcuff them and get 'em out of Sir, he doesn't have hands.
They're over here.
Put your weapons down.
Stick a cork in every blowhole this base has and stop them before they get out.
Yes, sir.
Please stand by as we connect your call.
Thurgood.
This is the emergency line.
Sir, you need to implement section 361 immediately.
Tell me exactly how one isolated explosion can mushroom into a quarantine of the Moon? Please.
An entire colony of people is missing.
There are reports of Impossible biological entities.
I personally witnessed a man disappear into thin air beneath the gaze of 10,000 de-socketed human eyeballs, and everyone here is breathing oxygen of an unknown origin.
Now, Mr.
secretary, whatever is causing all this is some kind of something that should be contained.
The Earth cannot survive without the Moon, so you damn well better deliver me some answers soon and keep this quarantine quiet! Yes, sir.
We keep thinking the flower's new.
Maybe it's super-old, but it's just always fed off helium trapped deep down in the Moon.
Yes.
We mined its food, so it grows out further and further, until it poops through the surface.
"Popped.
" Pooped? Popped.
We are on the verge of explaining how a flower can grow in a vacuum.
If my brother were here, I would politely tell him to "suck it.
" Yuck.
Ahem.
Brothers make terrible fathers.
Mm.
Pretty sure you were a delight.
By the way, your relationship sounds super-healthy.
I said "politely.
" And this coming from the girl who calls her dad "the general.
" Okay, um, the difference is, I love the general.
Well, I love Ian.
But he has got so much riding on being right, and he's so freaked out he's gonna be wrong, he has to mentally eviscerate everybody around him so that his brain doesn't eat itself.
I just wish my brain was big enough for the both of us.
Sounds like regret.
There! Check it out! Back up, back up, back up, back up, back up! Open emergency frequencies.
Hailing general Gale Lynn winehart.
Did you die? You wish.
How far did we fall? I can't see the hole above us.
I'm stuck.
Shimmy! I am shimmying! Okay, well, shimmy harder.
I'm giving you a hard shimmy.
Shut up and save your oxygen.
They won't find us under all this rock.
I've got a signal topside.
Hey Hey.
I know what you're thinking, but if you go into one of those caves, you'll be lost forever.
Don't even think about it.
Mikiko'll send help.
Yeah, but listen.
It's my fault that you're even in this mess.
It's your fault I'm even alive.
You've saved me three times now.
It's starting to get embarrassing.
Three minutes to oxygen depletion.
Three minutes? Yeah, I snuck out of the american base, like, four hours ago now.
Initiating plasma link.
Oxygen transfer in progress.
What are you doing? You're gonna need all your oxygen.
I'm just trying to give you a fighting chance.
I have to find a clean signal to the surface.
Don't worry, okay? Mikiko will have extra o-2.
- Yama, don't - Don't die! Whoa What exactly were your brother and your daughter hoping to dig up? I think a little grim silence might do us all some good.
Evading is an even greater enemy of the truth than stalling, agent Thurgood.
It's our allegiance to secrets and lies that landed us in this hassle.
Your holding everyone's oxygen for ransom is what caused this "hassle.
" Without my oxygen, you'd be mining helium with a hammer and sickle for your comrades in baza kedr.
I single-handedly prevented a russian monopoly on the Moon, then I sacrificed sound business practice by letting everybody get a free slice of the moon-pie.
That idealism failed.
Now You get to work for me, transparently, to deliver the future our forebearers promised Or I bowl you over.
Oxygen depleted.
Oxygen levels replenished.
Ian We were looking for the flower.
I know.
I believe you.
Where is Yama? She's not with you? She was looking for a way out.
Oxygen depleted.
Oxygenated environment detected.