: They Reached for the Moon by Oberfield William McCauley Harold W Harold William Illustrator - Science fiction; Short stories; Space flight to the moon Fiction

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They Reached For The Moon

The major problem in achieving space flight lay in overcoming gravity. That had been done and men had reached the Moon. But strangely, they never returned!

They took a thousand days to build the great, gleaming monster, and another two hundred to groom it for its trip around the moon. All this they did with an air that made a trip to the moon seem quite natural and sure, even though three other rockets had gone before and not one had returned.

"This one will," they said, as though convincing themselves.

"A military base on the moon!" the leaders had cried. And that had been that. Robot rockets had gone first. They had landed on the moon. They could do that, but they could not establish the desired base. So men had started on a round trip, around the moon, first to prove that men could do it. The only thing they proved was that whatever goes up need not come down.

Now the fourth rocket waited, leaning over against its heavy launching rack, ready to face whatever unknown danger lay out there beyond.

On a certain night, a night long appointed, one overshadowed with heavy clouds that brought a threat of rain, there were lights about the rocket and in the low, concrete buildings that cowered back a ways from the upright metal giant. Around the base of the rocket men scurried like ants, making last minute preparations and seeing that everything was just so and not being satisfied with "good enough".

In one building, a little nearer the rocket than the others, two men lounged, talking of the coming trip and other things that concerned last night's women, and smoking endlessly, the last smokes they would have for four days. These men would soon climb into a long, metal thing and try to do what others had failed to do.

In other buildings were men with great ideas held firmly in their minds, doing things with pencils and paper and adding machines. These checked back over figures and charts, knowing all the time that everything was flawless, but checking just the same. Some were Army men and some were not.

The feeling that seemed to grow over everything was one of waiting and suspense, and one might know without asking, without seeing the many glances at watches and clocks, that it would soon be time.

Strangely, the two men waiting and speaking mostly of wine, women and general good times, knew very little of the import of what they were about to do. In fact, they had no real concept of even the size of the earth, let alone the magnitude of space, the moon and the stars. This, however, was as intended.

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